brainstorm is laying out the briefcases, concentric rings, covering the floor. the hour is at hand. the clock is winding up. whirl is there. these are all synonymous things.
"so you're basically building a giant clock," says whirl, one bird-foot swinging.
brainstorm places the eleventh briefcase into position. "it's a time machine. something no one else in history has been able to accomplish."
"sure looks to me like a giant clock."
the twelfth. "it's a marvel of engineering and delicate quantum mechanics that it took me thousands of years to complete—"
"oh, talk, talk, talk," says whirl, ticking around the circle like a second hand, "you always did love to hear yourself talk. you think you're so smart. you think you're a genius, but really all you're doing is building a clock and blowing a hole in something—"
"—in the fabric of spacetime—"
"—yeah, in something. two hobbies i know a lot about. you're just like the rest of us."
that's one ring finished. brainstorm is in an ever-smaller bare circle around the floor, surrounded by briefcases. the clock grows.
"i know a little something about clocks," says whirl, from the ceiling, "and about trying to turn them back. everyone tries to turn them back. you can't do it. clocks can only go forward."
"i'm an unprecedented genius," says brainstorm. "if anyone could do it—"
"so was i," snaps whirl, "you're not special. you think i don't know it can't be done? you think i didn't try? the gears won't go in reverse no matter what you do. sometimes when you're a genius it blows up in your face and you gotta leave the ashes behind and move the fuck on."
the seventeenth briefcase. "that's quitter talk."
"that's stubborn idiot talk."
"you're just jealous because you can't get back what you once had, and i'm about to."
"idiot." a snick-snack of claws right in front of brainstorm's face. "i could have new hands at any time if i wanted. i choose not to because i've moved the fuck on, like a sensible grown-up motherfucker. but you're not getting him back, loverboy! you're deluded! time won't unbuild itself for you!"
"you need to learn a thing or two about love."
"oh, you want to talk about love?" sneers whirl, circling the ceiling. "love is a poison. it won't get you anywhere. you ever seen someone stay up all night for some dying midget? you ever seen someone risk their life on a great sword for someone else? you ever see someone you know lose themself to that greatest of scams we know as love, and you can't do anything to stop them?"
"i have. it's why i'm doing this." the next three briefcases are mach, pivot, and scattergun. "for all of us. for all the lovers. everyone who was torn away from someone else. i'm going to fix all of it."
"there's no fixing shit." whirl is upside down, the reversed card. "conjunxes don't pop out of the grave, workshops don't rebuild themselves, hands don't grow back and clocks don't run backwards. you know nothing."
there is almost no bare floor around brainstorm. he has corralled himself into the clock-circle of briefcases.
"you're a scientist trying to fix a giant watch," says whirl. "you should have asked a watchmaker."
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