“Why couldn’t he come with us?” I asked.

“Because if he fell on the damn Dragon-plane, which he would, we’d all be goners,” Gibbet said.

An L-shaped bit of metal appeared below his neck, tried to lift him, and bent. More appeared, straining to force him to a standing position. Hookline provided his hook, which bent in mid-air, caught Torso around the neck, and lifted.

Torso finally let go of his groin with one hand, grabbed the metal ‘L’, and found something approximating balance. In the gloom, his mannequin head with the mismatched cartoon eyes looked especially horrifying, especially where the paint had smeared or scuffed, making it look like he was crying.

I watched as they goaded him forward, Gibbet giving him a shove on one shoulder that would have been helpful if he weren’t so prone to falling over.

He passed me, and I could see that someone had written ‘MORON’ on the back of his head in what looked to be permanent marker. I saw him stumble.

“Don’t fall on my gun!” I called out to them. Torso had to turn roughly two hundred and seventy degrees to look back in my direction, which increased the chance he’d fall on my gun, as he swayed badly.

At the very least, he didn’t fall on my gun. I bent down to retrieve it, looked back, and saw Win staring at it.

I sighed, picked it up, and followed the others.

Deathchester was all together, minus Mockument, who hadn’t showed.

“Sorry again,” Win told Torso, as he caught up with Clockblocker.

The people who’d attacked were wearing refugee clothing. One wore a mask, and was partially burned as he lay on the floor.

“Listen to worlds,” a voice on a distant speaker whispered to us.

“We need to move fast,” I said. “Formation before was working. Try to keep us informed, Win.”

“I know this area,” Sveta said. “The main concourse is this way.”

The speakers continued to play. Even sounds that weren’t from the speakers were becoming more and more like whispers and vocal sounds from all sides. As though every unoccupied office we passed through was filled with a half-formed memory.

“Sorry.”

“Wash.”

“Umm.”

Like my dad’s voice, trying to get into the habit of talking to me again after going a while without visits. Sorry, he said.

The nurses at the hospital. Before a chore I had dearly wished was unnecessary and, self-contradicting myself, constant at the same time.

Something Sveta had said, during one of her visits, after a lingering moment of eye contact, when even she had taken in the full reality of what I’d been and found herself momentarily lost for words.

“Fuck you, Simurgh.”

The statement was marked by others looking at me.

Oh, I’d said that out loud.

“Do we need to worry?” Clockblocker asked.