death and the buddy
Eckbo, a blazing figure in his white linen suit, looks up at the helicopter. The lenses of his sunglasses are bright blue, almost the color of the sky. He’s holding his Buddy in one hand, stylus in the other.
Eckbo applies the stylus to the tiny input screen of his Buddy. His movements are measured, leisurely.
The helicopter descends almost to his eye level. He looks dispassionately into the freckled muzzle of the Fourier gun, and finishes his script. He signals to Chance: two, then three fingers.
Chance slides open his handheld and punches a few buttons. At the same time, somewhere deep within the IO, Annecue hits “enter.”
I clear my throat, and speak into the radio.
“You may have noticed,” I say, “that you don’t actually have control over your helicopter anymore. We’ve also disabled your Fourier gun, but—“ there is a series of harsh, attenuated clicks, loud enough to hear over the sub-bass propeller hum—“but sure, go ahead and try it out for yourselves.”
Eckbo, eye to eye with the denizens of the helicopter, gives them the finger.
“We’re going to, ah, suggest that you land your craft on the shuffleboard deck now,” I say. “Please consider yourselves prisoners of war, as per the Mothra Convention agreements.”
“Moera Convention, you jackass,” Eckbo shouts from his position on top of the climbing wall.
