Free After the Collapse by Paul di Filippo Page B

the shore where they milled, reluctant to loose sight of their departing masters. Eventually, they would acknowledge the separation and find their way home.
    “Goodbye, Slasher! See you soon!”
    Arp said dourly, “You hope.”
    “Hey now, no defeatist talk,” Pankey admonished.
    Shamrock came up to the leader and said, “Shouldn’t we erect the canopy now? Pretty soon it’ll get hot, and we’ll appreciate the shelter.”
    “Good idea. Wrinkles, Bunter, Catmaul, Faizai—get to it!”
    Poles and a gaily striped awning soon shielded a large portion of the blonde superwood deck from the skies, and a few of the wardens took advantage of the shade to relax. Bunter was drawing a snack from his UPD. No one had gotten much sleep last night. But Storm stayed where he could see and admire the kite, a burnt-orange scoop decorated with the image of a sword-wielding paw and arm.
    Jizogirl came up beside Storm. He nervously tightened his grip on the rail, then forced himself to relax. He looked straight at her, and admired the way the wind ruffled her patchwork fur.
    “Do you like the picture on our kite, Storm? I designed it myself. No one else cared, but I thought we should have an emblem. I derived it from an old human saga. Lots of daring swordplay! So unlike our humdrum daily routines. The sweep of the action appealed to me. The humans were mad, of course, but so vibrant! I watched the show over and over. Once I played the video on a cloudscreen big as the horizon! Old Tropo indulged me, I guess. Shameful waste of computational power, but who cares! It was magnificent!”
    Storm asked thoughtfully, “Are you okay with this mission? To kill a sentient being, even one accidentally born and malfunctioning?”
    Jizogirl grew sober. “You didn’t see the footage of the Hawaiian wardens being slaughtered, Storm. Horrible, just horrible. I don’t think we have any choice….”
    Jizogirl’s sincere repugnance and sorrow was a strong argument in favor of the assassination of Mauna Loa, but Storm still felt a shard of uncertainty. He wished he could somehow speak to the rogue magma mind first.
    Her natural sprightliness reasserting itself, Jizogirl resumed her light chatter. Grateful that the doe seemed content to conduct a monologue, Storm just smiled and nodded at appropriate places. He found her anecdotes charming. She moved from talk of her viewing habits into a detailed autobiography. She was thirty-two years old. Her assigned marches centered around old human Vancouver. Her father had died when a rotten Sequoia limb had fallen and crushed him, but her mother was still alive….
    By the time the Squid was out of sight of land, Storm felt he knew Jizogirl as well as he knew old Sylvanus. But Sylvanus had never caused Storm’s stomach to flutter, or his heart to thump so loudly.
    In return for her story, Storm told his own—haltingly at first, then with a swelling confidence and excitement. Jizogirl listened appreciatively, her ears (distinctly less tufted than Faizai’s) making continual microadjustments of attitude to filter out the thwack of waves, cries of gulls and cryptovolans, playful loud chatter of their fellow wardens. His story finally caught up with realtime, and Storm stopped, faintly chagrined. He had never talked about himself—about anything!—for such a stretch before. What would she think of such boasting?
    Jizogirl smiled broadly, revealing big white shovel-like teeth. “Why, I never could have made such a leap out of my rut when I was your age, Storm! You’re so brave and daring. Imagine, traveling across half the continent on your own!”
    Storm felt his head seemingly inflate, his vision fragment into sparkles. But Jizogirl’s next words deflated his elation.
    “If I had a little brother, I’d want him to be just like you!”
    “Hey, Jizogirl, come look at this funny fish!” The voice belonged to Pankey, but a crumpled Storm could not even feel any twinge of jealousy when Jizogirl begged off