Scizor rolled one wheel forward and chose the wrong chain first.
The cutter's lower jaw opened toward the chain JJ had wrapped through the brake wheel. That chain held the case away from Ty by half an inch. If the jaw took it, the whole thing would swing into his shoulder and drag him with it.
"That is the stabilizing chain, Blue, not the load chain," JJ said. "Tell me the machine knows the difference between those chains."
Blue clung to the brake wheel with both feet planted on a spoke.
"The machine knows whatever dead workers taught it years ago," she said. "Right now it thinks every tight chain is a problem."
Ty pushed harder into the frozen side band.
The cold had gone past cloth. It gripped his shoulder through the coat and made the joint feel borrowed. His cheek pressed near the glass. Beyond it, his old hand rested against the inside, thin bones bent against restraint as if they were trying to remember a door.
