Takes less than 90 seconds to string up the body. They try not to look at the face, the clean red line bisecting the forehead — it’s only scaffolding, this body. The continuity still runs. They clip carabiners into the wrist and ankle ties and maneuver the body until it’s spread-eagle against the bridge’s red pylon, an ecstatic X to the sea. To the coming.
It’s early. Behind the men, the sun’s just crested the horizon.
They get back in the van and drive into the city. In minutes, sirens, a helicopter rotor overhead, copbikes in the side mirrors. It’s silent inside the vehicle. The four men wear ballistic vests inlaid with mosaics of boron carbide inserts and polyethylene backplates, kevlar gloves, mirrored polycarbonate face-shields. Three are white, one is southeast asian, the oldest is 42. The man in the passenger seat bounces a heavily modified AR-10 in his lap.
The van weaves through the scattered cars, darting in and out of oncoming traffic, copbikes prodding. Shafts of blinding thick gold light bisect the canyons of skyscrapers.
The passenger points ahead at a yellow light turning red. The driver nods. A semi coming from the left groans into the intersection and the driver guns it, swerves right, just misses the colossus.
Clear for a moment.
Two quick turns and a final sprint to the parking garage. The passenger opens his phone and taps in a sequence of numbers. The metal doors ahead of them rise.
Inside, they take the corkscrew down. They spin past floor after floor of empty parking garage, these concrete vistas lit by canopy LEDs and each wonders how much of the world’s underground is lit up like this, how much energy is wasted on illuminating concrete voids, the flagrant opulence of the world killers.
They reach the bottom level. This one is full of vehicles. The driver takes them up and down two rows before they spot an open berth across the way. They park and sit for a moment, staring at the concrete wall lit by the headlights.
“May the expected value justify the cost,” says the passenger.
The men nod and get out.
