She was facing the city when he did it. Financial district, the Pyramid with its brace on from the Little Grande, the hills behind that. "Fuck a duck ," she said, these towers blooming there, buildings bigger than anything, a stone regular grid of them, marching in from the hills. Each one maybe four blocks at the base, rising straight and featureless to spreading screens like the colander she used to steam vegetables. Then Chinese writing filled the sky. "Sammy ..."