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      Some questions for you, Tsukubashi-San:

• Why did the Ondōans appear to you?
• Why did they bring you back?
• Is the wormhole still there?

      I stopped.

      Is the wormhole still there?

      It was a petulant question. And a non-catcher. I mean, who would know otherwise? The Russians? They never said anything.

      The Chinese?

      A kid ran past, patch hanging drunk from his temple, howling at something. I turned to the other side, facing the calmer drones.

      The Chinese…yeah, they’d be out there soon, they’d tell. Unless they decided to pivot to Mars…nestle in with the adventurists, set up their own farms, their own lithium mines, overworked YA-BOTs…

      Or maybe further…Ceres, the Jovian Belt…Planet X…

      Two tables down, the waitress appeared, struggling with two bowls of imitation shark fin soup. Hadn’t really noticed when I came in, but she looked quite pretty in those green and white stripes. Small circle lips, nice eyes, real eyebrows, none of that pencil-liner shit.

      I watched with my Tsukubashi questions in the foreground as she put the bowls down and said something to the two teens opposite. Both were zonked out, pupils Jupiter-size, though one did muster enough awareness to lean forward an inch and peek down her shirt.

      Sneaky little perv. Delusional too. Clown looked like he was still in Form Five. And the waitress…had to be at least two years out of high school. No way she’d be interested, unless she wanted to spend all her free time watching him sit on a plaza couch…glazed-over junk look in his eyes. And not even a plaza, more like one of the smoky places, or a youth group server…or even here in Saizeriya, her own fucking work place.

      Nah, what she needed was someone older, brighter, someone who could at least take her to a barr without getting ID’d. Fuck her without leaking beforehand. Impress her with unni stories. Defend her against pervs looking down her work shirt.

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