"Why are you asking me?"

You're gripping the mug so hard your fingertips no longer feel the heat, only inadequately-padded bone-on-bone-china pressure. You envision it cracking with the smallest, imperceptible, indelible sound, tea liberating itself all over your corner of someone else's dining room table.

You're standing - your ground, this time. Lock tenses, knowing she's crossed a line, fighting untimely self-beratings that she let herself forget those lines in the first place. Your voice hardens and Lock's eyes flash with fear and your voice is slamming, breaking-

"You're the one with the- the secret club. The codenames. The motorbike and the - the whole outfit and that talking fucking cat. Me, until half an hour ago, I was the last person alive who knew what thumbs were. I was doing an awesome job, just great, fantastic, thanks for doing me the favour of existence and establishing just how - how - sweet fuck all I know about what's going on, because. You know. I was a bit caught up. In things."

You take a deep breath, look over for any provocation to continue - to aim and accuse and retaliate. You're the victim here. Kick back knock over some furniture physically intimidate a complete stranger, it's been a long day, treat yourself-

-you can't do it. You take a shakier breath, and Lock sighs. Half a second ago, you would've bristled, but she's-

"sorry. I assumed-" she drums her fingers, composes herself. "I d- never asked for your name. Her voice is halting, measured. "You assumed, based on what you knew, that there was nobody else out there. I assumed, when Grimes- when I-"

"Wait. You saw me. Through the cat?"

"Definitely not how you're thinking, but-" she winces. "Can we start again?"

---

Cup of tea. Round Two.

Your original cup was fine, you insisted, but Lock - sorry, LoC, Lotus, you suppose feels better to say - looked awkward waiting for the jug to boil, so you were both grateful when you accepted sugar in your tea. It's definitely more to your taste, inasmuch as your tastebuds are intact after the first scalding sips.

Lotus (an online alias, apologetically maintained even after you insisted that Maverick wasn't (though "apologetic" is pretty par for the is-that-seriously-your-real-name course)) worked in web design, and doesn't feel comfortable sharing too much more information. She studied here last year, making friends with one "Tallahassee". You ask her to write it down.

"...oooh, like the capital of Florida. So, when you say computers... do you mean hackers?"

"No. Well, I can't speak for every user-"

"Is this the Matrix?"

"Nnnnnnnno."

"Ok." You take a proper gulp of tea. It's actually kind of nice at this temperature. "Just to establish, that I'm not losing my fucking mind, everyone was humans, yeah? And then everything started - well, I mean, I guess there really isn't a better word for it than glitching, so I guess everyone did that for a bit, and now everyone's! Fucking! Birds! Except you, me, and your ~curlewminati~."

The portmanteau goes unappreciated. Probably for the best. "Your timeframe sounds about the same as mine, then." She frowns. "I do wonder, though-"

And then the front door slams. And Lotus mutters, "oh, shit. Take your shoes off."

You'd ask why, but she's already cussing at the impractical amount of lacing on her combat boots. A pre-emptively-done-with-your-face yawp of a voice precedes: "Ooooooooh my god, Su, I better've unholed myself out of the lab for-"

Tallahassee, you presume, takes in her kitchen. One of Lotus' boots, freshly removed and exiting the premises as the host enters, thunks down the concrete steps out the back door. Yours wasn't nearly as well-aimed, and bounces off her fridge instead.

The graceful host says absolutely nothing, heads back for the hallway, and slams what you hope is the door to her room or something. Lotus mutters something again, probably a cuss, though it's hard to tell whether it's directed at the iron grip her boot's got on the ball of her foot or the ray of sunshine who just got home. She hands you her boot.

"I'll talk to them. Line these all up by the back door, and boil the jug."

You’ll clean up, sure. Only as far as it’ll give you answers, though.

You're supervised by Grimes' aesthetically dissatisfying back as you rearrange shoes. Perched on the stoop all the while against a yardful of cats, like someone was trying to set a scene. Her markings are obnoxiously bland, a coat like you'd never see on a cat for want of anybody bothering to document it. Something that screams "generic" to the point you wonder why it isn't. Shitty grimy quantum-state snowflake.

You crouch down alongside. She studiously ignores you, fixing you at ill-mannered length with the laziest deathglare. Her hackles rise - floating, as if on an imperceptible wind - as you reach to give her a scratch on the head.

You find a sweet spot. She relents, settles in after a moment, watches you through narrowed eyes. You pat the cat down, trying and failing to find hidden speakers, weird microchips, even a bogstandard collar.

She squirms, bites you as you're gently squeezing at her shoulder. Ow.

Grimes looks at you as if to say "I think you should leave." Like you were the one who overstepped rules of civil engagement and got mouthy just now. Fine.

Fine! You were done here anyhow. Be that way.

You trudge back into the kitchen, notice a scuff of rubber-sole black where your hiking boots hit the fridge door. A dislodged post-it tries and fails to stick to your sock as you walk over to the jug.

You stick it back on the fridge under a month-out-of-date chore schedule, trying to cover up the scuff mark. It falls off again as you click the jug back into action. A shelf, a couple inches off comfortable eye level, is stacked with boxes of tea. Lotus, it seems, opted for an artsy box of masala chai. It smells good enough to eat.

Which is well and good, but you student-housing surrounds (standards little-raised from your own university days) remind you this isn’t where you want to be. You want to savour this smell in your own apartment, with Hal. Less visceral and more pragmatic, you want to know whether that’s ever going to be an option again.

One row of clean cups with teabags later, you look around and settle for asking Grimes: “How do you - how does-”

The cat looks at you like how dare you speak to her.

“Milk? sugar?”

You shake your head, sparing Grimes the indignity of any kind of response. Back slowly out of the kitchen, into the foyer where your new friends went.

“...’m not pissed.” Thin walls. A bedroom door not quite closed all the way. The words themselves seem to sulk, like they’d rather lie on the floor than ever be forced to stand up for themselves. Not Lotus. “Not m’bout anything that matters.”

“Tal, come on. Tell me what’s wrong.”

A response. Inaudible.

“If it’s bothering you, it matters.” There’s been a faint keening from Tallahasse’s room all the while. You couldn’t place its source until-

“nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnWho is that guy and why is he in my house.”

“He said his name was Maverick-”

“Wow. Edgy.”

“And he’s got less clue what’s going on than we do. Doesn’t know Cat. Probably doesn’t-”

“-He’s a liar.”

“Tal-”

A lurch-creak of bedsprings; she must’ve sat up or stood. Her voice was too fast and low to catch outside scattered emphasis. “No. He’s- [...] -douchebro friends- [...] -fucking with us. [...] -like, what [...]? -only- [...] -still human- [...] -sole flagged- [...] -whatever the hell-”

“Tal. Grimes led him here. And I don’t think it was worth his time to pretend he’s even more lost than we are.”

“Well we’d find out just like that if Mickey or Cat turned up logs when they should. Oh wait! But we won’t!!! Because they fucking bailed on us and the world is probably actually utterly birdfully fucked.”

“You’re scared,” said Lotus, distinctly - almost insultingly - not. “I understand why you’re upset-”

“Oh, really?”


“You always made sure to not share personal information, so, agreeing to meet in-person was an act of trust. Extra people weren’t part of the deal.”

Talahasse doesn’t respond.

“Also, you’ve told me strangers - men especially - make you uncomfortable. I assumed, when he showed up, he was the person I was waiting for.”

There’s a muttered response. If Tal’s anything like you, your best guess would be “you assumed wrong.”

“I’m sorry.”

Tallahasse just groans, and her bedsprings follow suit. A little more clearly, she says: “Ok. Fine. Alright.”

“So.”

“He’s here because, out of like seven billion victims, he’s immune. Or won the worst lottery ever. Or, you know, Mickey and Cat aren’t telling us what’s up because they did this, or they’re in on it, and it turns out they’re fucking cowards. With no sense of like, responsibility.”

So like, if anyone here knows what’s up, and he’s listening in on us, he can get out of my house right now.”

You spin around, expecting to trip over Grimes or spot her sitting dead centre of the kitchen staring you down like some horrid stealthy cat burglar alarm narc, but the little menace is nowhere to be seen.

Behind you, back in the hallway, Tal’s door is yanked open. “I SAID, IF YOU’RE LISTENING IN-”

On the subject of things you're not listening in on:

-and you're walking.

Part of you is hoping to be intercepted by Grimes or Lotus, but if they're pursuing you they're doing it covertly. Weirdly enough, that's fine. Better to be connected to the other last remnants of humanity on their fickle terms than not at all.

You're tired, and have nothing to show for your morning's troubles. The local business owners have taken the best part of their day so far to get their stores open, and are jabbering angrily at a car left in the street. There's a flutter of occupants within struggling with the doors, passerine passengers and an agitated jet-black driver.

Your USB drive is still safely in your pocket. The less-exposed side roads and alleys you took spat you out at the far end of main street, five minutes' walk to the print store and another ten to the university.

Home? That's-

-your condo_minium you shared (share? shared.) with Hal. With the old coot of a building manager (corn crake, eventually actually) who thought the two of you made a wonderful couple even if Hal forgot to lock up the dumpster and fine arts students got caught scrounging around in there. On several occasions, in fact. Compared to the subletters - the domestically dysfunctional clutches of postgrads, the moneyed little starling who'll probably fail his BComm when he learns house parties aren't partial credit for his Marketing module - compared to them, you and Hal are (were) model neighbors.

Mental exercises of imagining yourself back there leave you short of breath; a sharp, high pain. Would the little kingfisher still be there? Would Hal?

What arrangement of answers there hurts the least to host?


Alright, then, what's the alternative? Is home-

-the lifestyle block at Pine Hill, an hours' drive from downtown and the long-range nail in the coffin of your teenage social life? The place inoculated you on the concept of the once-familiar drifting out of alignment with your memories. There's that to thank it for, at least.

You don't want to think about it. You hate yourself enough when you and Hal visit for Christmas; he'll have all four-to-tens in residence hanging off of him in five minutes flat and you. You'll be watching that simmering element within - laden with resentment and resting on your chest - your whole damn stay, and willing it not to boil over.

You can be happy for Burt and Wanda and their gaggle of foster kids, because you're not a fucking monster. They all deserve to be happy, and if that happiness has to eat into the tangible reminders of your childhood, well... you can pretend to be fine with that.

The living room's got a whole wall just about covered by this point in framed photographs. Still not enough to necessitate taking any down of you and your sister (first-days-of-school, the group photos sent out to relatives while they were alive, graduations, marriages), but you could barely stand spending time in there. You felt crowded and selfish and claustrophobic at all these lives lived in a space you've no right to have enshrined for you.

So you'd stroll down to the paddock at the bottom of the property, and stay awhile under the stars and pines looking back toward the city until everything in your chest was properly quashed away again.


So that's not it, either.


The copy shop. It's open. There's a stolid passerine of some persuasion sprawled outside on the pavement, either one of the city's homeless or some unfortunate birdbrain who flew into the storefront window. You pat your coat pocket down just to check the USB drive's there, then go in-