They appear in midair, visible out of a few thirtieth-floor apartments.
One starts to fall. The other catches her by the arm, flings out - wing-shapes of light - and slows her, spiraling down until they're at street level.
They appear in midair, visible out of a few thirtieth-floor apartments.
One starts to fall. The other catches her by the arm, flings out - wing-shapes of light - and slows her, spiraling down until they're at street level.
Maurabel looks up at what's going on occasionally but is mostly doing the notes thing. Penumbra is more watchful.
The police officers wear bulky vests and carry sticks and guns, neither of which they have out; people are agreeable about being shooed. Some people talk to Aveline; she smiles at them and says something confidently.
One of them ducks the police line and hurries over towards Maurabel and perfectly repeats the greeting she gave earlier.
A few of the police seem to contemplate going after him and then decide not to do that.
"Nice to meet you. That's Penumbra, that's Maurabel, that's -"
"Aveline Santami."
"That's Aveline Santami?"
"Uh, I showed up and said, 'Hi. Maurabel', and she said 'Aveline' and some other stuff and when you got here you said 'hi' -"
"You said hi, I said hi. She said you Aveline, she said me Aveline Santami. You said what does Santami mean."
"She told me her name was Aveline. What does antami mean, it's in both your - names, if those are your names and not titles - Santami, Kisantami -"
"Title name for - in writing. Writing -" he gestures to suggest a large category -"antami -" subcategory.
"Well, I'm not. Probably. Depending on what Anitami means. Maybe you wanted to say 'all of us' - that would be you all but not me and Penumbra -"
"It'd be 'all of us are' and 'you are not' and I'm not sure what you were trying to say with the last part."