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title: Oh Him? He's Armless
visibility: public
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The last 5% of the publishing work of this chapter has been 95% of the time and effort. I'm so glad to be freaking _done._ I love this chapter, but I am so over the editing process. Genuinely, I need to be less precious about these initial online rolling release works. The only useful editing they could possibly have (beyond basic proofreading) is after the entire book is done.

So visualize with me. It's a weekday morning after the breakfast rush, a lull between the bag-eyed morning frenzy and the time-constrained lunch crowd. Here, in the nice part of town, on a corner bordered by a soap boutique and an Italian-Indian fusion restaurant, sits an independent coffee shop with pristine vinyl-printed window decals and a chalk signboard advertising today's specials. Visitors are embraced immediately in a warm blanket of roasted coffee and pastry smells. The hazy sunlight washes in from the windows, and in one of those beams, a young-looking woman ponders and calculates while waiting to hear her name called...

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"Elizabeth?"

I leaned forward and off the cart of accoutrements, the straws and stir sticks and napkins, and took the coffee cup with my name scribbled in sharpie from the end of the counter. The barista had a kind face, and I made a friendly one back at him. It was the least I could do after handing someone a memory-manifested ten dollar bill which had probably already vanished from the till. When you're dead, it's the _not_ counterfeiting that takes effort.

I was also observing. Nobody looked up at my name - well, except me, obviously. First one here. Good.

So I settled in at a big table near a corner window and waited. I counted in my head: five people. Yeah, this'll be big enough. The AC in this little indie coffee shop was arctic, and had me regretting my sundress for a minute, but I finally had something hot to drink, which helped. It was practically unsweetened. Snob shit. Not my preference, but I could appreciate it. And letting our guest pick the venue was a calculated move: it was an odd job, one that might take some convincing, so if our guy was comfortable, that was one less avoidable barrier on the way to _yes._

They say people-watching is rude. But who's "they?" People? Of course they'd have a biased opinion. Don't let that conflict of interest throw you. People-watching is good for you. Keeping your head on swivel is just good sense. And so, with all present company ruled out, I sipped my little coffee and watched fresh customers pile in.

They say hipsters are people too, and to the discredit of hipsters, it's true. The same cute woman in flannel, square glasses and jeans, will both specify the nation of origin for her beans - a thing I did not know you could do - and pick her nose when she thinks nobody is looking, and poke around on her laptop looking at properties in the city that she probably will never be able to afford. Then again, if you're ordering the Guatemalan organic light roast with hazelnut syrup and a _splash_ of oat milk, maybe you're in the tax bracket where looking at that Zillow page is actually a practical exercise, and not a public moment of unrequited sapphic yearning for real estate.

There _was_ this one man, dressed in a business casual suit, with neatly trimmed grey hair, who I wondered about immediately. There was a grace and precision to his movement, and he was downplaying it. It was like listening to a trained singer _try_ to perform like a bad singer. But, it could just be some startup CEO asshole trying to cultivate the exact right amount of humility in his persona. It's a fake world. Finding a faker in it is like finding a needle in a needlestack.

So I wasn't really sure, until the barista put down a caramel macchiato and called out: "Chase?"

And he went for it. That's our guy. That's our fucking _guy._

As soon as he turned around from the counter and started looking around, I waved. He sat down at my table with a controlled nervousness. "You must be Elizabeth."

"And you must be my shapeshifter." I tipped my cup in admiration. "I never properly met one before, it's an honor."

I thought he was going to crush his freshly acquired coffee cup with his bare hand in front of me. "Do you... _fucking mind..._ exercising a little _discretion_ about _sensitive topics?_"

I raised my hands in a dramatic surrender. "Sir. Chasey. My changeling chappo. You picked the venue. Is this a place where conspirators can talk in peace, or isn't it?"

He made a face that felt like I was getting blasted by the hot air out of a dryer vent, but instead of hot air, it was stank aura. His words were through tight lips: "I get my coffee here every day. People recognize me."

I leaned in, spoke under my breath: "So is this the place, or isn't it?"

His eyes darted around the room, finally settling back on my face. "Keep your voice down, and it'll work nicely."

I nodded. "Sotto voce. I can work with that." I took another sip of my fancy coffee. "How much do you know about this job?"

He fidgeted with his cuffs. "Your friend described it as potentially hazardous, but with good compensation. And I would _very_ much like to know the specifics of both of those things."

"Alan?" I jerked up. I'd gotten focused on our secret weapon. Sure enough, our warlock was grabbing some sort of... frozen blended drink?... and trucking over to our table. I hadn't even noticed him come in. Sneaky devil.

"Hey guys. I see you started without me." He looked back and forth between the two of us, and sucked the straw loudly. I was expecting our finicky guest to be annoyed, but if anything, the man was fixated, and needed a second to pick his jaw back up. It hit me a second later. _Oh._ Well no wonder Alan talked him into meeting me with the world's least descriptive sales pitch. It's okay, buddy, I think Alan's cute too.

"Yep, just pleasantries mostly. Apparently you told our new friend here a fat load of nothing about this job. But really, you haven't missed much."

"Sorry, I didn't know what you'd be okay with me saying." Alan pulled out a chair, sat down, and scooted in next to Chase, who was clearly working hard to be normal about the wizard's subtly scarred-up arm brushing against his own. "I figured it was better safe than sorry. You're, I dunno... the de facto strategist on this mission?"

I nodded. "Good way to put it. There's one more person coming today, plus Carmen, but they both know the plan already. So we can dive into this. Time is... well, not money for me I guess, but _opportunity._" I put my drink down, then balled up both my fists, as if I had a jelly bean in one of them. "Which do you want to discuss first: risk?" I motioned with my left fist. "Or reward?" I shook the right. "Dealer's choice."

"Risk," Chase said without hesitation. "I don't know you. I don't trust your idea of a _good plan._"

"I wouldn't trust me either," I replied. "Alright. We're stealing the knife that can kill anything. We need someone to hold it, someone who has the option to not-hold it later, despite the knife trying to biologically integrate with the wielder. That's, theoretically, you." I poked him gently in the chest. He only flinched a little. "You switch to a shape with no arm, the knife drops. That's the easy part. We're going to need to get through a lot of mechanical, magical and alchemical booby traps on the way in and the way out. We might need to kill some people to get out alive. It's a solid plan, not a safe one."

The changeling nodded. "That sounds terrible. Now I expect you'll promise me the world for my participation, is that it?"

I shook my head. "The world's outside my budget. But if you need someone, or something, dead... we're gonna be in a _great_ position to accommodate you after the job." I leaned back, bracing my legs against the underside of the table. "But really, I'm curious what you _do_ want. A night with a warlock, maybe?"

Now, I didn't _need_ to suggest that, but it was very funny to watch both of them yelp "what?!!!" and look at each other in startled embarrassment. "Kidding," I chuckled, lying through my teeth.

"I'm married, actually." Chase adjusted his suit coat, fully flustered. "In fact, I'm mirroring my husband right now. We take turns going to his job, and nobody's the wiser. It would be a bit demanding for one person."

"Kinky," I remarked. "So you must get home at night and have the most surreal twin-for-twin sex imaginable. I'm slightly jealous."

"You don't know the half of it." He leaned in, conspiratorial, boasting. "I try on different looks regularly. We even have.... _mechanically_ straight sex every once in awhile, just to mix things up. I'm getting everything I need at home, thank you very much."

Alan just looked at him with big buggy eyes, and sipped his drink with a facial expression that I think was best described by George W. Bush as _shock and awe._

"Damn. I underestimated you. Now I feel like I'm having to come up with a Christmas present for the man who has everything."

Chase's eyes went distant, and he tapped on the table, lost in thought. "Not everything." For a very long moment, he said nothing, and we said nothing, and the only sound at our table was Alan and his damn straw. Finally, the shapeshifter asked, "Can you heal someone who's fatally ill?"

"Who's sick?" Alan blurted out, and I put my hand on his arm to settle him down.

"You don't have to tell us anything you don't want to," I said, with a sharp look at my compatriot. "But the answer is yes. The knife can kill illness. We can do it."

He fidgeted with his fingers, rubbing them against the table, lost in thought. "I mirrored a woman once, elderly. Not my proudest moment, but there were... extenuating circumstances. I had good reason to. You know, when we do this... we can hear the conscious thoughts of the other person. It's an ongoing, living connection." He paused, considering his words. "She wasn't... well off. Upstairs, I mean. Her mind was foggy, full of looping thoughts, confused and afraid. I had to live like that for a week. It was agonizing."

Alan considered this. "Dementia?"

Chase sighed, and he somehow did it poshly, which I didn't think was possible for someone with an American accent. "Alzheimer's, as it turned out after the fact."

"Oh. Shit."

"... It was."

The changeling took another deep swig of his macchiato and continued. "She's gone now, of course. This was years and years ago, and she was near the end at the time. But it stuck to me afterwards, that feeling. Sometimes I get it in my dreams, and I wake up sweating, panicking... I've never forgotten the specificity of it."

We waited. A fork clinked against a plate a few tables over, where some young couple had decided to try - and share - the carrot cake that this shop treated as a secondary specialty. The air gently sizzled with smooth jazz coming from a bluetooth speaker that one of the baristas had likely brought from home. It was a good place to wait, the three of us and the smell of roasted coffee.

"Anyways. Oswald - my husband - is starting to show the same symptoms. I haven't told him, yet, but I... I do _know,_ with absolute certainty, what this is." He stared straight at me. "I _know._"

I thought about my exsanguination, for the half second I could stand to. The memory was ice against my spine. "I believe you."

Alan sized up Chase. "He's young though, right? I mean, if you're mirroring him, if he looks like you..." He stumbled for the words. "You've got some late-stage salt and pepper going on, but you've got a young face and body."

Chase turned on him, cold and sharp. "Most cases occur in old age. _Most._ Understand the limits of that word."

Alan looked down. "Yeah. I guess so. My bad."

I took another gulp and set my cup down. "We can handle it. It'll be okay."

Whatever Chase was looking at, it was a million miles from here. "Whatever it takes, just tell me what to do."

I put my hand on his arm and squeezed. "It's okay. We've never done something big like this before, but we're smart people, the closest to professional you're gonna get."

From the counter: "I have a flat white for Carmen, and a raspberry mocha for a... Meatball?"

"Aw fuck," I said, flopping my head in my hands.

"Who's Meatball?" Alan asked.

Carmen dropped straight into her chair next to me. "Hey schmucks. Sorry we're late. Had to help _someone_ talk politely to his parole officer."

The large, frankly _round_ man that crashed into a chair next to _her_ laughed in a deep, husky voice. "Oh yeah. Good thing too. Carmy and I've been drinking buddies since before she even died. Never met a woman who could put away beer like her. Sorry about Officer Shugahtits, no sense of humor on her."

Chase taught me, in that moment, exactly what a living human man would look like if you were to put one in a gigantic food dehydrator. "You must be... Meatball."

"The one and only!" He took a slurp of his drink. "Fuck that's good. They charge ya both balls here, but it's good."

Chase held out his arm on autopilot. "Pleasure to... oh."

Meatball used his good arm to point to the stump. "Ehh that's okay. Second time's the charm. Shake on the left, there ya go."

Carmen piped up. "Hey Meatball, tell him what you call that hairdo." Smirking little instigator. I love her. I'd fuck her if she wasn't so straight, I swear.

"What, the skullet?" He pointed at his gigantic bald patch. "Party in the back, nothin' in the front, baby."

Alan stared at him in wonder. "You introduce me to the most interesting people, Maroney. Meatball, how much blood would you estimate you have in your circulatory system right now?"

I chugged down the last of my drink and groaned. "I can't take a damn one of you anywhere."

* [05 - Whispers](/writing/em/05)