“See?” Chicken Little said, with an almost plaintive edge to his voice, as though he was pleading for people to get it at the same time nobody in the vehicle was disagreeing with him.

“Edgy, as Swansong would put it, is something you live up to.”

“Of course she’d say that,” Tattletale muttered.

“Then he should buy you flowers or chocolate and not embarrass you in front of people, so he can live up to it,” Chicken Little said.

“And we’re here,” Snuff said. “Which is a shame, because I was enjoying this.”

“I’m glad someone’s having fun,” I told him.

Out of the car. I showed Tattletale the phone, and looked around for the building number. By the time I turned around, she was pointing at it.

“Get your birds,” Tattletale told Chicken Little. “If and when we use them, they should be used nonlethally.”

“They’re hawks. And an eagle—”

“Don’t use the eagle. That will kill.”

“So will the hawks! They’re awesome killing machines! They have feet like fistfuls of knives!”

“And this is practice and training,” Tattletale said. “Nonlethal. Hang back with Snuff. If I whistle, cross the street, come to me, obey.”

“But—”

“I’m the customer, right?”

“Half the customer,” Chicken Little said. He turned to me, and even though I couldn’t see his face, I could tell he was hopeful.

Like the divorced parent thing again. When one parent said no…

“What she says.”

His shoulders drooped.

Tattletale and I crossed the street, which was busy enough she had to time her crossing to slip between traffic. I ended up flying over.

We reached the front door. I wondered if we were breaching some rule of secret identities. Then I saw that the glass panel by the buzzer had slips of stained, coarse, post-Gold Morning paper where each resident had handwritten their own names. Everything was laid out in neat print except for one, which just said ‘Rats’.

The building didn’t look nice, which made me wonder just how the other residents felt about it.

I hit the buzzer.

Cars whizzed this way and that down the street. One had a bad muffler, and roared. Too many lacked the tires, I was sure, to handle the light coating of ice, snow, and moisture on the road.

Tattletale whistled.

“What?” I asked. When I looked, she was leaning against the railing.

“She’s ducking out the back window. You should really hurry,” Tattletale told me. “You might be able to fly, but she knows the hiding places.”

Chicken Little and Snuff were hurrying across the road.

“And you’re—”

“Waiting,” Tattletale said. She made a face. “She’s faster than me, what am I going to do?”

I took off. Up and around the building, dodging a frozen clothesline someone hadn’t bothered or cared enough to bring in.

I saw Ratcatcher, and she saw me.