Legerdemian had to notice how relaxed the Californians were in their manner of speech. They seemed to think before speaking. Whereas on the East coast, the people seemed to think as they spoke, often illustrating this ungainly process by gesturing with their hands.

Negotiating the afternoon traffic in July on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, his internal audio subsystem thoroughly fried, the cyborg judged this a gloomy reckoning.

He watched in his center rearview mirror as a young blonde woman driving a blue convertible and wearing sunglasses jammed her brakes to avoid smashing into rapidly decelerating vehicles in the suddenly ebbing right lane. Seeing an opening, she yanked left to cut in front of the cyborg's vehicle by a margin of inches.

Legerdemain in one motion unholstered the weapon beneath his left armpit, then hammered the weapon and his right fist holding it through the windshield in front of him, bashing the tinted glass until the afternoon's hot white light and air poured in widely enough for him to queue up a clean shot at her.