\u201cLet\u2019s put an end to all this nonchalance,\u201d cries Maria, in a gale of laughter. Of claughter. Of laughriegaling!<\/p>\n
It is a wicked sound is what it is.<\/p>\n
She points the gun right at Linus. She fires. She shoots a ray of pure death. It hits Linus full-on. Circular ripples of fading death pass through the room.<\/p>\n
There is a silence.<\/p>\n
Linus smirks at her. He looks somber. He smombers.<\/i> He does not bother looking harmed.<\/p>\n
Behind him in the pot cupboard there are pristine bright copper kettles. He takes one down. He puts it under his arm.<\/p>\n
The shelves behind him are dead and yet they bleed.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not being nonchalant,\u201d Linus says. He gives her a smile. Everyone has forgotten about his putting on the mittens. He is confident of this. \u201cIt\u2019s just, you can\u2019t hurt me, Maria. You\u2019re just a space princess assassin and I\u2019m . . . well . . . I\u2019m going to be the Devil\u2019s skin.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maria opens and closes her mouth with a prim little click.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou really are<\/i>,\u201d she says. \u201cAren\u2019t you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d says Jane. She glares at Linus.<\/p>\n
Linus gives her a little shrug.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cLet\u2019s put an end to all this nonchalance,\u201d cries Maria, in a gale of laughter. Of claughter. Of laughriegaling! It is a wicked sound is what it is. She points the gun right at Linus. She fires. She shoots a ray of pure death. It hits Linus full-on. Circular ripples of fading death pass through […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3601,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"series":[5],"class_list":["post-3965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stomping-the-world-round-chapter-4","series-stwr"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/Just-Maria.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3965"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3965\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6336,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3965\/revisions\/6336"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3965"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/books.hitherby.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fseries&post=3965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}