“Zee replies grimly, 'I understand that problem...Buns is a force of nature.' 'She is,' I say with a reluctant smile, 'you're kind of screwed, dude. She's definitely got her own ideas.'Zee grins too. 'Do not laugh too hard, playa, yours is a Throne..karma...' he says, noddin' his head before grimacin' and addin', 'ouch'. My smile broadens involuntarily. 'Zee, when did you become funny?' I ask.'It is difficult to be funny in Human,' he says, before lookin' at his watch and than graspin' the cover of the portal computer. 'Learn my language and you will think I am hysterical.”

“[Grandfather] would manufacture funnies with Grandmother before she died about how he was in love with other women who were not her. She knew it was only funnies because she would laugh in volumes. 'Anna,' he would say, 'I am going to marry that one with the pink hat.' And she would say, 'To whom are you going to marry her?' And he would say, 'To me.' I would laugh very much in the back seat, and she would say to him, 'But you are no priest.' And he would say, 'I am today.' And she would say, 'Today you believe in God?' And he would say, 'Today I believe in love.”

“Hey, Zee,” I said. “I take it that you can fix it, but it’ll be miserable, and you’d rather haul it to the dump and start from scratch.”“Piece of junk,” groused Zee. “What’s not rusted to pieces is bent. If you took all the good parts and put them in a pile, you could carry them out in your pocket.” There was a little pause. “Even if you only had a small pocket.”I patted the car. “Don’t you listen to him,” I whispered to it. “You’ll be out of here and back on the road in no time.”Zee propelled himself all the way under the car so his head stuck out by my feet. “Don’t you promise something you can’t deliver,” he snarled.I raised my eyebrows, and said in dulcet tones, “Are you telling me you can’t fix it? I’m sorry. I distinctly remember you saying that there is nothing you can’t fix. I must have been mistaken, and it was someone else wearing your mouth.”He gave a growl that would have done Sam credit, and pushed himself back under again, muttering,“Deine Mutter war ein Cola-Automat!”“Her mama might have been a pop machine,” I said, responding to one of the remarks I understood even at full Zee-speed. “Your mama . . .” sounds the same in a number of languages.“But she was a beauty in her day.” I grinned at Gabriel. “We women have to stick together.”

“You're going to, Clay? She whispered before he could leave. You're really going to read to me? Sure. The smile that lit Jackie's face was the first Clayton had seen from her in more than a year. It did funny things in the region of his chest. He moved toward the door but ran into the doorpost because he was staring behind him watching her. Eddie who was headed that way laughed when she witnessed it. Are you in a hurry Eddie asked noticing that he looked a little dazed. She smiled He said his voice bemused. I saw her smile. Eddie's gaze became very tender. If Jackie could see him now she'd know in an instant how much he still loved her.”

“Russell?”“Yeah! You got my back now?” Russell asks in a sour tone, looking over the railing from the tower above. “’Cuz one of them freaky demon things almost ate me after y’all left!”“A Riser nearly ate you?” Reed asks with humor in his tone“Yeah, whatever—it’s not funny!” he calls down, sounding irritated. “Next time, I want Zee for my wingman.”“That is because I am the ultimate assassin,” Zephyr replies from behind Reed.”

“What would you tell her about me?”He did not just ask that.“You did not just ask that.” She chuckled.“I’m serious,” he smiled.“Very well, if you must know, I would say that you are arrogant and foolish, too handsome for your own good and far too cognizant of your own intellect. Unbending, unsympathetic, dogmatic, pig-headed—”“Handsome?” he interrupted, unable to keep the smile from his face. “And intelligent?”“Don’t forget arrogant.”