He watches the dactyl for quite a while. It sits there, and so does he. He does not mind its presence. There is something companionable about it. It has a beakish snout with two nostrils. A bumpy crest in the middle of its head. Honest eyes that look at him squarely, without pity, without judgment, with a blank coldness that wants nothing from him, that feels safe. Maybe it, too, prefers to be left alone. Coop’s stomach rumbles. He’s finally worked up an appetite, doing the stairs twice in two days. The dactyl shifts on its haunches and nibbles on the tips of its feathers. It must be hungry, too. There’s nothing to eat. It might be starving. It might need help.
He wrestles off his cardigan. Holding the cuff of one sleeve, he tosses it toward the dactyl like a net. The dactyl fwumps its wings and lands on the floor. Coop tries again to catch it, but it wobbles just out of reach, like a game. On the third try, the sweater flops across its back. By pulling both sleeves he manages to drag the dactyl closer. He bundles it up and carries it, wriggling, to the emergency exit with the glowing red sign. It takes his full weight to force open the metal door. The dactyl tumbles onto the wet sidewalk. The rain has stopped. It stares at the Coop, at the sky, and back again. Perturbed, perhaps, by the sudden eviction.
“Go on,” Coop says. He lets the heavy door fall closed and peers through the glass strip. It takes a few minutes, but the dactyl eventually goes. It bobs across the cracked parking lot, through the tall weeds and out of sight.
Back in his room, the bathroom ceiling isn’t leaking anymore. Coop washes his hands and picks pink feathers out of his sweater, saves them atop his dresser in a fluffy clump. He is exhausted but almost happy. He has done something real today. Something good. He changes his shirt for dinner. When he enters the dining room, all of the Brooklyns are sitting together, laughing. Brooklyn B. does not even look his way, thank God. He sits at his usual table and checks his ElderScreen. All of the bots are loving his video of the dactyl. His post has gone viral. It’s fake viral, but it feels good anyway. He orders extra nuggets. He apologizes in his head to the dactyl, and to all its breaded brethren.