He should call Bigend now. But no longer had the Neo, he remembered, and that meant he no longer had a number for him. He could look up Blue Ant and try to go through the switchboard, but under current circumstances that didn’t seem a good idea. A reprieve, of sorts. He went into the bathroom instead, and prepared to clean his teeth, the full four-stage operation, noting that he was still without the special mouthwash. He’d just inserted a fresh conical brush tip between his rearmost upper right molars when the room’s phone rang. Unwilling to remove the brush, he left the bathroom with it still in place, and answered the phone.