Dess shrugged and returned her gaze to the ground, scanning the pile of metal bits that Rex had picked for her. According to him, all of them were untouched by inhuman hands. If he was right about tonight, there was the possibility of a serious rumble, and she was going to need clean steel to work with.

Of course, Rex could be wrong. It didn’t feel like a bad night to Dess. Friday, September 5, the fifth day of the ninth month. The combination of nine and five wasn’t particularly nasty: the numbers made four, fourteen, or forty-five (when subtracted, added, or multiplied), which was kind of a cute pattern if you liked fours, which Dess did, but hardly dangerous. On top of that, “S-e-p-t-e-m-b-e-r f-i-v-e” spelled out had thirteen letters, which was as safe as any number could be. What was to complain about?

But Rex was worried.

Dess looked up. The dark moon looked normal, rising at its usual stately pace and resplendent with its usual gorgeous, pale blue light. So far, Dess hadn’t heard the sounds of anything big roaming. Nor had she seen too many slithers. Not a single one, in fact, not even out of the corner of her eye.

That was weird, actually. She looked around the junkyard. There were rusted-out cars, a corrugated iron shack flattened by some ancient tornado, and a jumbled tire pile—plenty of places to slither under and peer out from, but not a flicker of movement anywhere. And even when they couldn’t be seen, the chirps and calls of slithers were usually audible. But none of the little guys were watching tonight.

“Almost too quiet,” she said to herself in a bad-guy accent.

Across the junkyard Melissa moaned, and despite the constant warmth of the blue time a shiver passed through Dess.

It was time to get started.

She squatted and began to sort through the pieces of metal, looking for bright steel uncorrupted by rust. Stainless was best, unpainted and shiny. The twisted, uneven shapes of the metal also played a part in her selection process. The long trip from factory to junkyard had weathered some pieces to certain proportions, small rods with elegant ratios of length and width, scarred old bolts with harmonious spacings between their dents. Dess arranged her finds happily. Steel came alive here in the blue time. She saw iridescent veins of moonlight streak across the metal and then fade, as if the steel were reflecting a fireworks show in the pale sky above.

As she chose from the bits of metal, Dess brought each to her mouth and blew a name into it.

“Deliciousness.”

Some of the big pieces were beautiful, but she needed to be able to carry all of them easily, possibly while running for her life. She selected a small but perfect washer, rejecting a heavy length of pipe.

“Overzealously,” she whispered to it.