She saluted with two fingers and walked away, her chains retracting into golden nothing as she went.
I sat on the curb and let the morning settle around me. The sun climbed higher. Birds returned to the trees along the boulevard, confused by the silence and the absence of their usual audience. A stray cat, the one Soomin had relocated from the community center storage room, watched me from behind a mailbox with the disinterested superiority that only cats could manage.
Maki hissed at it.
The cat hissed back.
Maki's fur stood on end. Her tails lashed. I grabbed her by the scruff before she could launch herself off my shoulder and start a territorial war with a domestic shorthair in the middle of an active crime scene.
"We are leaving."
"That cat disrespected Maki."
"That cat weighs six pounds."
"Size is irrelevant. Respect is everything."
