The stalkers: Orin's fear of the wheelchaired, and the "Survey" man at the door (Fortier)

pivotal · late Oct–Nov YDAU

• When: late Oct–Nov YDAU (the wheelchair sightings over several days in early Nov; the door "survey" 7 Nov YDAU)
• What: Orin begins noticing a "statistically improbable number of wheelchaired figures" lurking around Phoenix — burly, non-old men in wheelchairs, one in a "domino-mask" — and half-jokingly floats to Hal that they are "a kind of very shy sort of fan club of people without legs" who look up to him as "the ultimate leg." They are the A.F.R. (Wheelchair Assassins). One appears at his hotel-room door posing as a "Survey"-taker (Fortier), studying Orin's mismatched arms and glancing pointedly past him into the room; his eyes "were not… the eyes of someone in any way disabled," and he shares the Swiss accent of the hand-model (event 34). The net is closing.