Burn
around so that the wobbly wheel was in the back, then spoke, trying to make it sound like a casual afterthought.
    “Maybe you two could give me and Mirian an idea of what to expect down here.”
    The blond laughed a laugh much older than his years. He strutted towards the office, and called over his shoulder, “Expect anything. And no working on the Sabbath!”
    Isaac pushed the cart to the rear of the hangar, where Mirian and the Innocents waited for the fresh spring ice water and the hot, fragrant mini-loaves of bread.
    “What did he say? Are we locked in here?”
    Isaac unpacked the ceremonial bowl and towels from the cabinet in the cart, poured them each a glass of ice water while there was still ice. They both downed a glass before filling one for each of the Innocents. The Innocents had no souls and the ritual meant nothing to them spiritually, but they liked being included, and this was the kind of thing that made them a team.
    “Well?”
    Isaac didn’t answer. He filled the foot-washing bowl from one of the stainless-steel pitchers, then knelt at her feet and began the Sabbath ritual.
    “I really hate being locked in,” Isaac whispered, more to himself than to Mirian. “I got locked in the pantry as a kid. My parents said they couldn’t afford a babysitter. Sit down.”
    Mirian said nothing and sat on the cot. Isaac removed her tennis shoes and sweaty socks, placed a clean towel under her feet and began washing them slowly, carefully, as he would want her to wash his own. She would just take a quick swipe with the cloth over his shoes, this he knew, but he thought that with enough example she might become more patient and see the virtue in this small but intimate gesture.
    That’s the nice thing about ritual about instinct, he thought. It gives you time to think
    Apparently they would have the whole weekend to think. And sweat. And remember what was in those cases from ViraVax.
    A disagreeable smell soured Isaac’s nostrils, and he swallowed a biting remark about Mirian’s personal hygiene. The disagreeable smell turned putrid, a combination of burning hair and overdead meat.
    “Whew!” Mirian said. “What . . . ?”
    “Green!” Willy shouted from the office. “Green! Help me!”
    Isaac and Mirian looked at each other for a blink, then Mirian snatched up the palm-cam while Isaac ran for the front of the hangar. What greeted him there stopped him cold, and he waved Mirian back. She stood fast in her bare feet and started filming anyway.
    The blond’s uniform lay crumpled across the communications console, and it leaked a foul organic goo from a mess of rubbery bones. Willy lay on his back under the desk, his brown eyes wide, unblinking, staring at Mirian.
    “She’s so pretty,” he whispered.
    Willy winked at Mirian and the eyelid stayed closed. His chest heaved one last shuddering sigh, and then his whole body sighed. His face and scalp slumped from his skull and his brown eyes liquefied in their darkening beds.
    “God save us,” Isaac whispered.
    He covered his mouth and nose with his shirttail and couldn’t take his focus off Willy’s Sidekick, barely visible under the stinking viscosity that used to be the man who knew the access code. Isaac couldn’t bring himself to cross the threshold of the office, much less reach for that Sidekick.
    A pale blue flame licked across the blond guard’s remains.
    Isaac would have thought it a trick of holographic animation if it weren’t for the stench. He held his breath, reached a trembling hand to the half-empty water pitcher on the desk and tossed the ice water at the flames. There wasn’t enough water to contain it all, and in a moment little tongues of flame flickered over Willy, too.
    “Maggie!” Mirian screamed behind him. “Maggie! Oh, God, Isaac!”
    Isaac didn’t have to turn to know what was happening. He just stared, stupefied, as the spreading mess engulfed the office floor and burned up the Sidekick that controlled their hangar door,

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