“Okay,” she grinned. “I will trust your work then.”
“Pfft, woman. You’d better. It’s good. Just don’t overfire it. It might explode.”
“Small worry, hey?” Cyn weighed the gun in her hand and wanted to lick it. Heavy for a pistol, but nasty in its potential violence. The prospect of an explosion didn’t bother her. Which she found odd. Again with the not worrying about shit she should be worried about. “Let’s buy it.”
“Price?” Hands on hips, Vargr looked ready for serious bargaining.
“Pay me back when you find something good. You’ll know when you do.”
“Really?” Vargr cocked his head. “A weapon from the Top?”
Kiko shrugged his massive shoulders, leaned his butt against his table of wares. “Sure. Or better.” His grin was infectious. “I’ll throw in a big knife for your girl too.”
They shook on it and moved on.
“Haggling is a whole new art,” she muttered.
“You don’t bloody say. I’ll bring him a cruise missile and stump him. He’ll never find the change for that. Let’s go see this edge-sitting area.”
“Maybe I can practice with it there.” She strapped on the belt and holster, unsheathing the ‘big knife’ from where it hung at her left hip. Engravings ran down the shiny blade and swirled on the metal butt.
“Just don’t potshot at that glass that hangs from above.”
“Hah.” Replacing a mile-wide chunk of glass would be difficult.
As they drew nearer to the edge, she could appreciate how the glass visor wasn’t perfectly clean—there were bird feathers, and bird guano, and other dirt that could be anything from dead bugs to fallen pieces of paper—yet zero cracks.
It was a grand feat of engineering that would last until this scraper fell. Maybe until no one was alive to see it.
The sitting place was a long terrace of artificial grass that dropped a few feet into a step where it was guarded by a shoulder-height glass fence. Climb over the fence and you’d fall until you hit a level of the scraper that stuck out just a bit further. It was also several stories below. There were park benches here, but she gathered most sat their rears on the lip of the terrace. People could dangle their legs and that appealed to the crazy in her—as did licking guns.
They sat, and she snuggled closer to Vargr. The heat from him warmed her heart, which was really something new. Her eyes stung with totally unneeded tears.
“How many footballs were kicked over this?” she pondered.
“Tons. Fucking tons. Can you imagine the suicides?”
Ugh.She elbowed him. “Shhh!”
Someone slipped down and sat next to Vargr then leaned forward. It was Locke, with his dirty-blond hair flopping over his eyes.
“They used to have a net below to catch people and things. Or so I’m told.”
“Yeah. Sounds about right. Messy to let them fall. How are you Locke? Willow helped us.”
“I know.”
“I have nanites, in case you’re wondering,” she told him.
“I knew that too. Nothing gets to be a secret for long here. Congrats?” He reached in front of Vargr to shake her hand. “And I brought something to celebrate with.”
He leaned back, and she saw a woven cane hamper he’d left behind him on the artificial grass.
“Champagne.” He pulled out a bottle. “Vintage, sometime-long-ago. And food, and some people to help us make this a proper picnic. Happy Beaster Day?”
“A moonlight picnic. Nice.” The people he meant were obviously those walking up in a ragged line. They carried more bottles and bags and were waving and smiling. He’d assembled almost everyone she knew.
Maura was with them, shining the torch they’d found for her and lighting a path but switching it off as she neared the edge. The moon must be providing enough light for her human eyes.
