You tug, twist em Skinner said, behind him, bastardsll clinch up on you. Cops used to carry those. Got made unconstitutional. There was a crash that shook the room and made the light flicker. Yamazaki looked over his shoulder and saw Skinner sitting on the floor, his knees drawn half up, leaning forward. Theres a pair of twenty-inch bolt-cutters in here the old man said, indicating a dented, rust-scarred green toolkit with his left foot. Thatll do it, if I can get em out. Yamazaki watched as he began to work his toes through the holes in his ragged gray socks. Not sure I can do shit with em, once I do He stopped. Looked at Yamazaki. Better idea, but you wont like it.
19. Superball
Skinner-san?
Look at that brace there.
Discolored blobs of puddled welding-rod held the thing together, but it looked sturdy enough. He counted the mismatched heads of nine screws. The diagonal brace itself seemed to be made up of thin metal shims, lashed together top and bottom with rusting twists of wire.
I made that Skinner said. Thosere three sections of blade off a factory saw. Never did grind the teeth off. On top there.
Yamazakis fingertips moved over hidden roughness.
Shot, Scooter. Wouldnt cut for shit. Why I used em.
I saw plastic? Poising his wrists.
Wait up. You start sawing on that crazy-goo, it isnt gonna like it. Have to get through it quick or its gonna close up right down to the bone. I said wait
Yamazaki froze. He looked back.
Youre too close to the center. You cut through there, youll have a ring around each wrist and the suckersll still close up. You want to go through as close to one side as possible, get over here and get the cutter on the other one before it does you. Ill try to get this open He bumped the case with his toes. It rattled.
Yamazaki brought his face close to the red restraint. It had a faint, medicinal smell. He took a breath, set his teeth, and sawed furiously with his wrists. The thing began to shrink. Bands of iron, the pain hot and impossible. He remembered Lovelesss hand around his wrist.
Do it Skinner said.
The plastic parted with an absurdly loud pop, like some sound-effect in a childs cartoon. He was free and, for an instant, the red band around his left wrist loosened, absorbing the rest of the mass.
Scooter!
It tightened. He scrambled for the toolkit, amazed to see it open, as Skinner kicked it over with his heel, spilling a hundred pieces of tooled metal.
Blue handles!
The bolt-cutter was long, clumsy, its handles wrapped in greasy blue tape. He saw the red band narrowing, starting to sink below the level of his flesh. Fumbled the cutter one-handed from the tangle, sank its jaws blindly into his wrist and brought all his weight down on the uppermost handle. A stab of pain. The detonation.
Skinner blew air out between his lips, a long low sound of relief. You okay?
Yamazaki looked at his wrists. There was a deep, bluish gouge in the left one. It was starting to bleed, but no more than he would have expected. The other had been scratched by the saw. He glanced around the floor, looking for the remains of the restraint.
Do me Skinner said. But hook it under the plastic, okay? Try not to take a hunk out. And do the second one fast.
Yamazaki tested the action of the cutter, knelt behind Skinner, slid one of the blades beneath the plastic around the old mans right wrist. The skin translucent there, blotched and discolored, the veins swollen and twisted. The plastic parted easily, with that same ridiculous noise, instantly whipping itself around skinners other wrist, writhing like a live thing. He severed it before it could tighten, but this time, with the cartoon pop, it simply vanished.
Yamazaki stared at the space where the restraint had been.
Katey bar the door! Skinner roared.
What?
Lock the fucking hatch!
Yamazaki scrambled across the floor on hands and knees, dropped the hatch into place, and bolted it with a flat device of dull bronze, something that might once have been part of a ship. The girl he said, looking back at Skinner.
She can knock Skinner said. You want that dickhead with the gun back in here?
Yamazaki didnt. He looked up at the ceiling-hatch, the one that opened onto the roof. Open now.
Go up there and look for the mo.
Skinner-san? Pardon?
Big fag buddy. The black one, right?
Not knowing what or whom Skinner was talking about, Yamazaki climbed the ladder. A gust of wind threw rain into his face as he thrust his head up through the opening. He had the sudden intense conviction that he was high atop some ancient ship, some black iron schooner drifting derelict on darkened seas, its plastic sails shredded and its crew mad or dead, with Skinner its demented captain, shouting orders from his cell below.
There is nobody here, Skinner-san!
The rain came down in an explosive sheet, hiding the lights of the city.
Yamazaki withdrew his head, feeling for the hatch, and closed it above him. He fastened the catch, wishing it were made of stronger stuff.
He descended the ladder.
Skinner was on his feet now, swaying toward his bed. Shit he said, somebodys broken my tv. He toppled forward onto the mattress.
Skinner?
Yamazaki knelt beside the bed. Skinners eyes were closed, his breath shallow and rapid. His left hand came up, fingers spread, and scratched fitfully at the tangled thatch of white hair at the open collar of his threadbare flannel shirt.
Yamazaki smelled the sour tang of urine above the acrid edge of whatever explosive had propelled Lovelesss bullet. He looked at Skinners jeans, blue gone gray with wear, wrinkles sculpted permanently, shining faintly with grease, and saw that Skinner had wet himself.
He stood there for several minutes, uncertain of what he should do. Finally he took a seat on the paint-splattered stool beside the little table where he had so recently been a prisoner. He ran his fingertips over the teeth of the saw blades. Looking down, he noticed a neat red sphere. It lay on the floor beside his left foot.
He picked it up. A glossy marble of scarlet plastic, cool and slightly yielding. One of the restraints, either his or Skinners.
He sat there, watching Skinner and listening to the bridge groan in the storm, a strange music emerging from the bundled cables. He wanted to press his ear against them, but some fear he couldnt name held him from it.
Skinner woke once, or seemed to, and struggled to sit up, calling, Yamazaki thought, for the girl.
She isnt here Yamazaki said, his hand on Skinners shoulder. Dont you remember?
Hasnt been Skinner said. Twenty, thirty years. Motherfucker. Time.
Skinner?
Time. Thats the total fucking mother fucker, isnt it?
Yamazaki held the red sphere before the old mans eyes. Look, Skinner. See what it became?
Superball Skinner said.
Skinner-san?
You go and fucking bounce it, Scooter. He closed his eyes. Bounce it high
20. The big empty
Swear to God Nigel said, this shit just moved.
Chevette, with her eyes closed, felt the blunt back of the ceramic knife press into her wrist; there was a sound like an inner-tube letting go when youve patched it too many times, and then that wrist was free.
Shit. Jesus His hands rough and quick, Chevettes eyes opening to a second pop, a red blur whanging back and forth around the stacked scrap. Nigels head following it, like the counterweighted head of a plaster dog that Skinner had found once and sent her down to sell.
Every wall in this narrow space racked with metal, debraised sections of old Reynolds tubing, dusty jam jars stuffed with rusting spokes. Nigels workshop, where he built his carts, did what shadetree fixes he could to any bike came his way. The salmon-plug that dangled from his left ear ticked in counterpoint to his swiveling head, then jingled as he snatched the thing in mid-bounce. A ball of red plastic.