January, 1099

"Lita! Wake up."

The voice cuts through the comforting void of my sleep, along with an insistent rocking of my shoulder.

The second my consciousness flickers, a sun-drenched field washes over me, overflowing with honey.

"…just one more minute," I groan, pulling the blanket over my head to shield myself from the light of the dorm room.

"You're late to work."

The word late goes straight through the honey.

I sit up so fast my spine pops.

My misty blue, spade-tipped tail whips out from under the covers. It catches the squishy beckbeast plushie at the foot of my bed and sends the grey thing flying across the room, where it bounces off the wall.

I blink the sleep away. I'm still clutching my oversized shark plushie to my chest, while my orange Vulpo plushie, the grey one, and the brown floppy-eared Cautus stand silent guard around my pillows. Tucked between them sits the little squishy cake mom tells me she gave me for my first birthday.

Mom stands beside my bed, hands on her hips. Her white feathers twitch with exasperation and something much warmer underneath it.

"You still need to shower and get dressed." Mom does not leave room for argument. "Today's your first day actually back at work. Now, young lady!"

She points at my room's built-in restroom.

I deflate, letting my forehead drop against the snout of my shark.

"Yes… mom…" I mumble. The word still feels like a gift on my tongue.

I force my legs over the edge of the mattress, bare feet hitting the cold floor panels, and shuffle toward the restroom. Every step is an effort. The ache runs from my shoulders all the way down to my calves, and my limbs feel like they've been replaced with lead.

I step into the small bathroom and toss my light grey, fleece-lined hoodie with the sleeping black kitten graphic into the laundry basket.

I turn the shower dial and wait for the water to settle lukewarm, then step under the spray and let it run over my woodsmoke grey hair and down my aching back.

I lean my forehead against the cool, damp tiles.

Ms. Dobermann's regimen is trying to kill me.

Even here in the shower I can remember the taste of her — cracked black pepper, stiff canvas, unsweetened espresso. She made it clear during yesterday's combat evaluation that if I want to deploy on the frontlines, I need to survive without leaning on my Arts Creations. That means physical conditioning. Grueling physical conditioning.

I groan, wishing I could melt down the drain.

I step out of the stall. The lukewarm water has done nothing for my calves. I dry off and pull on my new uniform — the soft light grey tee, the black tactical skort, my dark knee-high socks.

"I'm done, mom!" I call out.

The door slides open almost immediately.

Mom steps into the room. "Sit." She grabs a towel and the hair dryer off the rack. "I'm drying your hair and styling it."

"Okay…" I shuffle over to the small stool in front of the mirror.

I drop onto the seat with a sigh, my tail curling around the stool's leg. Mom steps behind me. She is gentle as she towel-dries my hair, working the damp strands carefully around my horns.

The dryer kicks on, warm and humming, and I close my eyes, ready to melt into her.

"What time did you sleep last night?" mom asks.

"Not too late…" I offer.

The hair dryer clicks off. The silence is worse.

"What time?" mom repeats.

I bite my lip, staring down into my lap.

"…3."

"3?" mom's voice pitches up, and the field spikes with something tart underneath.

"It was New Year's Eve!" I yelp, spinning around on the stool to mount my defense, tail lashing behind me. "I was with Lisa and Podenco and Eleanor! We were having a game night!"

I try to justify the chaos of the previous night. My channels are still buzzing with the residue of it — Lisa's crystallized sugar, the bright splash of Podenco's sun-ripened yuzu, the academic static of Eleanor's freshly printed parchment and sweet mint. We stayed up eating sweets and playing a classic Columbian board game called Techpoly, where you race to control the technologies and industrial patents and take over your opponents. Podenco destroyed us while we waited for the clocks to roll over into the new year.

Mom stares down at me.

She lets out a long, exhausted sigh and pinches the bridge of her nose.

She turns the hair dryer back on and turns me so I'm facing the mirror again. She gathers my dried hair, pulls the asymmetrical fringe to the right, and secures the rest into a neat ponytail at the nape of my neck.

"Be sure to apologize to Lena later, okay?" mom says softly over the hum of the dryer.

I wince at my reflection. Lena manages the Convalescent Garden, and rolling in late on my first official day back is not a professional start. I can already imagine her warm lavender and steeped chamomile with a disappointed sigh mixed into it.

"I will…"

We move back to my bed. I sit on the edge of the mattress, legs dangling.

Mom kneels on the floor panels in front of me. With practiced efficiency she slips my feet into the black boots, pulls the zippers up, secures the fasteners on my left boot. Then she rises slightly and moves to the translucent utility belt at my waist, snapping my modular medical pouches into place with a series of satisfying clicks.

Then she lifts my oversized dark grey jacket off the end of the bed and holds it open behind me. I push my arms back through the sleeves, and the cuffs drop past my knuckles.

I reach over to my bedside tray and grab my Arts Unit. The long black shaft sits balanced in my grip, the misty blue liquid suspended weightlessly inside its intersecting matte black halos. I press the staff against the inert Originium circuits on my belt. It locks with a sharp magnetic snap.

"Is your Arts Unit secure?" mom asks as she steps back to inspect my uniform.

I wriggle side to side. The staff stays anchored at the small of my back, neither shifting nor unbalancing me, and my tail swishes freely through the modified slit of my skort.

"It is, mom," I say, offering a small smile.

Mom's eyes travel up the jacket and stop at my throat.

"And your monitor?"

Before I can answer, she steps in close again and tips my chin up with two fingers. Her thumb finds the clasp of the black monitor collar and presses until the lock gives a small, answering click. Then she slides one finger between the band and my skin to check the fit, and turns it a fraction so the readout sits straight at the front.

The honey around her goes quiet and careful. Under it runs a thin thread of cold iron.

I don't know what she's remembering. I only know what it tastes like.

"It's secure, mom," I murmur, careful not to move my chin.

"I know." Her finger stays where it is until the readout glows a steady blue. "I just like to see it for myself."

She lets go of my chin and smooths down the fringe of my hair.

"Good. Now go grab something to eat in the cafeteria before you head to the garden," she says. "You need your energy for your first day."

"Okay, mom. See you at dinner," I say, sliding off the bed. My calves scream the second my boots hit the floor.

"See you, Lita."

I step out of the dorm into the corridors of the landship and force my legs into a stiff-legged fast-walk. I want to run, but Raidian's warning about sprinting down the hallways keeps me honest.

As I turn the corner toward the central junction, floral nectar and the clearing bite of medicinal eucalyptus washes over me.

"Morning, Lita. Heading for breakfast?"

I slow down. Hibiscus is walking toward me in her immaculate dark purple and black uniform, smiling with her usual no-nonsense warmth. Her monitor rides high on her left wrist, a slim band above the glove, readout turned inward where only she can see it.

"Morning, Hibiscus," I reply, giving a quick, polite nod. "Yes, I am."

"I heard they have special sandwiches today," Hibiscus says, with clinical approval. "Very filling, and not unhealthy for your digestive system. You should grab one."

"Okay, thanks for letting me know," I say. "I'll be on my way, I'm running a bit late!"

"Good luck at work, Lita. Laters," she calls out, the eucalyptus lingering behind me as I resume my speed-walk.

I finally reach the cafeteria. It's slightly past the morning rush, so the room is quiet — the low hum of the landship's engines and the clink of mugs from a few scattered Operators on late coffees.

I bypass the hot food lines and head for the pre-made sandwich section, scanning the neat rows of wrapped meals under the cool glass.

I spot the special Hibiscus mentioned. It doesn't look like the greasy breakfasts of the combat squads, and it doesn't look like the dry ration bars of the Military Commission either.

It's a neatly assembled sandwich between two thick slices of rustic wholegrain bread. The crusts are dark and hearty, the bread speckled with crushed sunflower seeds, oats, and cracked flax that give off a faint nutty smell. Stuffed between them is a thick, vibrantly yellow filling of finely mashed hard-boiled egg folded into creamy mayonnaise, dusted with cracked black pepper and a hint of green herbs. The filling looks smooth and savory and deeply comforting.

I pick one of the wrapped egg and wholegrain sandwiches out of the chilled display and step over to the checkout terminal, tapping my Rhodes Island ID against the scanner and waiting for the beep.

"Hey! Don't think we met before! Gummy thinks you should get double serving! You are too skinny!"

The voice arrives half a second ahead of the taste. Bubbly, fabricated sunshine, overwhelmingly bright — and underneath it something much heavier, with the cheer sitting on top of it like a lid.

I turn around. Standing nearby is a blonde Ursus girl, her eyes wide and unbothered.

But as she looks at my face, the sunshine shifts with a spark of recognition.

"Oh! Lethe! Haven't seen you for a while!" she gasps, her smile widening.

"Sorry…" I whisper, shrinking down just a fraction. "Have we met?"

Her sunshine doesn't dim. She squares her shoulders and beams at me.

"Gummy is Gummy!"

Gummy.

"Ah… sorry, I lost my memories recently," I explain, quiet but steady. I offer her a small, polite bow, keeping my spine straight. "Nice to meet you, Gummy."

Gummy tilts her head, looking over my Rhodes Island uniform.

"You look so serious and professional now." Gummy leans in. "Did you get a promotion?"

I pull the wrapped sandwich closer and give her a shy smile.

"Sort of like that."

"That sounds fun!" Gummy cheers. "Anyways, Gummy won't keep you longer. But here."

She reaches over to a display tray and grabs a sweet, glazed fruit loaf, holding it out with a huge grin.

"On the house!"

"Okay. Thank you, Gummy," I say, carefully taking the sweet loaf and adding it to the paper bag alongside my egg sandwich.

"See you later, Lethe!"

"Bye."

I head out of the cafeteria, clutching the paper bag to my chest, and force my aching calves into a brisk pace through the arteries toward the Convalescent Garden.

The doors hiss open, and the sterile industrial smell of the landship is swallowed by damp earth and blooming flora.

I step across the threshold. Gathered around one of the tables near the flowerbeds are three familiar figures.

I taste Lena's warm lavender and steeped chamomile, mingling with Beanstalk's roasted seeds and dry, sun-baked hay. Cutting through both is a bright splash of sun-ripened yuzu.

Podenco is in the middle of talking to them, gesturing. But the second my boots click against the pathway her ears perk up, and she stops mid-sentence and turns around.

Her tail gives a slow swish.

"Oh, look who finally remembered she has a job now," Podenco calls out, dripping with teasing reprimand.

I freeze in the middle of the pathway and look down at myself. Here I am, late for my first official day back at work, in my new tactical uniform, clutching a paper bag stuffed with an egg sandwich and a sweet fruit loaf.

I plant my feet together, press my hands flat against my stomach and I bow.

I bend at the waist, folding my spine into an apology.

"Sorry!" I yelp, my voice echoing frantically across the quiet greenhouse.

But even as I stare at my boots, something registers.

Hold on. Podenco.

She was the one destroying us at Techpoly until three in the morning! How is she already here, wide awake, put-together, and scolding me for being late?!

A warm hand comes to rest on top of my head.

Lavender and chamomile melts over me, taking the heat out of my cheeks.

"That's alright, Lita. No need to be so formal here." Lena is so calm my shoulders drop.

I let out a muffled sigh of relief and start to unbend.

"Just make sure you are not late tomorrow," Lena continues, her tone remaining flawlessly gentle. "Or I have to talk to Closure about your… soft plushie funds."

My spine snaps straight.

My plushie funds?!

My mind flashes to the squishy grey beckbeast at the foot of my bed, and the oversized shark I sleep with every night. Then the towering stack of soft, colorful plushies still sitting under the track lights in Closure's general store. If Lena talks to Closure, my account will be obliterated before I ever see a transfer.

"I won't be!" I yelp. I shake my head, clutching my paper breakfast bag like a shield. "I promise, Lena! I will be early! Please don't let Closure take my plushies!"

A bright laugh rings out across the table.

Podenco covers her mouth, tail wagging. Beside her, Beanstalk chuckles quietly, the hay and roasted seeds of her rippling with something teasing.

Lena just smiles, her eyes crinkling at the corners. She gives my head one last pat before pulling her hand back.

"I am glad to hear that, Lita. Now, go on and eat your breakfast. We can go over your tasks once you are fueled up."

The creamy egg salad sandwich and the glazed fruit loaf are a blessing, and they silence the hollow protests of my stomach.

I tidy up, wiping the crumbs from my lips. I crumple the empty paper bag and toss it into a nearby bin before walking back over to the wooden table where my manager is standing.

"So…" I look around the lush, sunlit greenhouse. "What do I do in the garden… when there are no patients? Podenco said I was her logistics assistant, but that was out in the barrens. In here… am I a botanist?"

Podenco and Lena pause.

The yuzu and the chamomile both stall in the air at the same moment. They share a quick, unreadable glance.

"About that, Lita," Lena says, turning her attention fully back to me with gentle, careful patience. "You're our logistics support. You count the inventories, make sure deliveries to the Medical Department are on time and with all required supplies. And most importantly, proper paperwork for Kal'tsit."

Logistics. Even in here.

I am not planting delicate flowers. I am not studying rare ferns.

But it's the last sentence that freezes the blood in my veins.

Proper paperwork for Kal'tsit.

I picture Dr. Kal'tsit in her sterile office, green eyes scanning a requisition form I filled out, judging every misspelled word and misplaced decimal with surgical precision.

I stare at Lena, fingers curling into the hem of my jacket. My mouth opens, and only a squeak comes out.

"I… I must be able to plant something, right?"

I look between the three of them, trying to salvage whatever elegant botanical image I'd just built of my past self. "I worked here for over two years! You all said I was always in the Convalescent Garden! Surely I grew something!"

Podenco looks me up and down.

"Well, where do I start?" Podenco taps her chin, as if sorting through an archive of my past disasters. "The time your tail sliced through an entire row of expensive new sprouts because you got too excited? Or the time you tripped over your own tail, faceplanted into the fertilizer, and broke three custom ceramic pots in one go?"

My tail freezes mid-air.

I turn my head to look at Lena, hoping for a denial. I wait for her to correct Podenco and tell me I was actually a delicate, graceful healer who coaxed rare flowers to life.

Instead, Lena just offers a small, apologetic smile. Even Beanstalk covers her mouth to muffle a quiet chuckle.

I wasn't a graceful botanist. I was a clumsy, walking hazard to plant life.

"Oh…" I whisper into the quiet greenhouse, my tail dropping dead against my calves.

I stand near the edge of the cabinets, gripping my PRTS slate like a lifeline. I'm supposed to be doing logistics.

"Lita, how many Alpine Frost-bell seedlings do we currently have in stock?"

Lena's voice floats over from the potting station. It's perfectly calm, but the second the question registers my spine snaps straight.

"Eh? Uhm… I think…"

I tap at the screen. The spreadsheet interface is a maze of tiny grids, sub-menus, and requisition codes, and the numbers blur together into soup as I scan the glowing rows.

Is it under 'Medicinal Herbs' or 'Cold-Climate Flora'? Why are there so many tabs?!

"Twenty?" I guess, my voice wobbling. I squint at a random cell. "Or… thirty? Uhm…"

I brace for the reprimand. I am failing my first logistical task.

Instead, Lena steps away from the prep station, walks over, and gives me a small smile.

"That's alright, take your time, Lita. Getting it right is far more important than anything else, okay?"

"But…" My fingers tighten around the metal casing. My chest goes tight.

The thought of making a mistake puts an icy spike straight into my heart.

"The Medical Department… if I am slow… what if a Field team comes back?" I stammer, my breathing hitching as I look up at Lena. "Will someone… will I be the reason someone doesn't get their medicine in time? Will they…"

Will there be more blood on my hands…

A hand rests against my shoulder. Lena's chamomile deepens around me and pushes the icy spikes back.

"No, Lita," Lena reassures me. "These requisition forms are strictly to restore our long-term pharmaceutical stocks. They're preventative, not reactive."

She leans in slightly, making sure she catches my eye.

"When emergency triage happens, the medical teams already have everything they need right there in the wards. And if they ever do need emergency supplies from the garden, you won't be alone. Someone will always be here to help you pull them. I will be here. Podenco will be here. Don't worry, okay?"

I let out a long, shaky breath, and the tension bleeds out of my sore shoulders.

"Okay," I whisper, offering a small nod.

I look back down at my slate and take a slow breath of the humid, floral air, letting the greenhouse settle into my bones.

"Let me… let me try counting them again, Lena."

I stare at the glowing spreadsheet. The tiny color-coded grids of the inventory system seem to be mocking me. No matter how long I stare…

I groan and let my forehead drop against the slate with a soft thunk.

"How did the me before… before July last year do this?"

A few paces away, Beanstalk pauses her work.

"Well," she ponders aloud.

She's crouched near one of the reinforced enclosures, checking the carapace of one of her metal crab critters. She finishes with a pat to the creature's shell, then turns to face me, her sharp Reproba ears twitching.

"You didn't, not exactly."

I slowly lift my head, blinking at her in confusion.

"What do you mean?"

Beanstalk chuckles, dusting off her hands. "You kind of mislabeled crates once or twice every week. My crab feeds got sent as nutrients, Podenco's seeds got mixed with purified waters. Stuff like that."

I picture some poor, exhausted Operator in the Medical Department ripping open a priority crate expecting botanical nutrients, only to find a sack of premium metal crab feed.

"I did what?! How was I not fired?! How did Dr. Kal'tsit not throw me off the landship?!"

Beanstalk just laughs again.

"You'd realize your mistake, panic exactly like you're doing right now, and then the ladies would manually swap the crates before anyone could file a formal complaint," Beanstalk says, walking over and tapping the edge of my slate with a finger. "It kept the rest of us on our toes. And, well, your palliative care technique was second only to boss here herself. Your logistics mishaps are just the bonus. All part of the charm, eh?"

I stare at my slate.

I breathe in the garden until my heart slows down. Knowing the 'old me' was just as hopelessly lost in these spreadsheets is a strange sort of comfort.

I go back to wrestling with the color-coded grid. I'm trying to work out whether a crate of specialized fertilizer got logged under dietary supplements when the doors hiss open.

The sterile air of the corridors intrudes on the humid floral sanctuary before the doors slide shut again. Boots click steadily against the stone pathway.

Two Operators walk in. They don't seem to be looking for medical assistance or dropping off requisition forms; they are simply wandering the winding paths, taking a quiet moment among the lush foliage.

I peek through the gaps in a broad-leafed fern. One of them is a tall Forte woman with sturdy horns. Beside her walks a Phidia, her scaled tail catching the light of the greenhouse. They both wear monitors, and neither wears it the same way — the Forte's is strapped above her boot, and the Phidia's sits at her throat on a thin black band.

The second they cross the threshold, my Arts catches them.

The Forte is worn leather and polished iron, dependable and heavy. But underneath it, bleeding into the edges, is something else — freezing black ash, clotted copper, the rotting chill of a wound that refuses to close.

Beside her, the Phidia is smoother. Cool creek water, dry reeds, a bite of spearmint that anchors her taller companion.

"How are you holding up, Mercury?" The Phidia asks, her voice barely a murmur.

Mercury slows, stopping right in front of the ferns I'm hiding behind. She reaches out, fingers brushing the green fronds.

"I still dream of it sometimes…" The ash spikes in the air. "Lacunae… it is hard to forget."

Lacunae lets out a long sigh. "Well, if it makes you feel better, apparently Chernobog is mostly repaired and back in service. We saved the city."

Mercury shakes her head. Her hand drops from the fern.

"A third of the population was lost…" Her focus drops to the dirt path. The leather of her presence is worn through, frayed by guilt. "…and what happened in the Lungmen slums…"

"It has been two years, Mercury…" Lacunae says, stepping closer to her friend. "Do you want Lethe to help? They say she is back working now."

Mercury looks out toward the center of the garden, staring at the blooming flowers. She lets out a breath.

"No," Mercury replies, steadier now. "I think… I already burdened her enough back then. It is not as bad anymore."

I don't remember Mercury's face. I don't remember the exact pain I siphoned from her when she returned from those shattered cities.

But as the two Operators resume their walk down the winding path, I close my eyes. I reach out through my Arts and project a faint, gentle wave toward her. It is a tiny, invisible blanket of comfort — a wordless whisper of safety, meant to warm the ash in her chest.

I watch through the fern leaves as Mercury pauses, her posture relaxing a fraction, a confused sigh escaping her before she disappears around the bend with Lacunae.

The two of them settle onto one of the secluded wooden benches beneath the drooping canopy of a weeping willow fern.

I stay hidden behind my broad-leafed fern, holding my slate loosely.

A few minutes later, Lena approaches their bench. She sets a small wooden tray holding a steaming porcelain teapot and two cups on the table beside them.

They just sit there for a while.

For almost an hour the Convalescent Garden stays quiet, broken only by the hum of the climate control systems and the trickle of water. Slowly, agonizingly slowly, the freezing black ash buried in Mercury begins to thaw. The leather steadies under it, anchored by Lacunae's cool creek water.

When they finally rise from the bench to leave, Mercury looks exhausted, but her shoulders are no longer drawn up to her ears. They slip out through the sliding glass doors, back into the arteries of our shared home.

I let out a sigh and let my invisible blanket dissipate.

Then a wave of crystallized sugar detonates in the air — a tsunami of sweetness that chases the last shadows out of the greenhouse. I don't need to turn around. The density of the sugar gives her away seconds before she strikes.

I brace my sore calves against the floor panels.

"Lita!"

A pair of arms wraps around my chest from behind, and a cheek presses against mine.

"Morning, Lisa," I reply.

"It's 11:30 now," she chirps. "Want to go to lunch together?"

"Okay," I agree, glad of an excuse to escape the logistics paperwork.

I pry myself out of her hug and turn around, looking across the garden. "Podenco, are you coming?"

Podenco is standing near a row of transparent micro-climate pods, adjusting the humidity dials on the glass terrariums so the sprouts inside get exactly the right amount of moisture.

At the sound of her name, she looks up.

"Ah," Podenco says, offering an apologetic smile as her tail wags. "I have promised Aroma to go to the café and shopping together for the two-hour break. You two can go first." She tilts her head. "Are you going to the Archives later, Lita?"

I nod, putting my slate into my clipped-on bag. "Yes, my schedule is half and half as far as I know." Morning in the garden, afternoon in the Archives.

"Okay, see you tomorrow then," Podenco calls, turning back to the climate dials.

"See you, Podenco," I reply, raising my voice just enough to carry over the rustling leaves. "See you, Beanstalk! See you, Lena!"

"See ya," Beanstalk calls back from her reinforced metal crab enclosures.

Lena steps out from behind a row of blooming medicinal lilies.

"Enjoy your lunch," she adds, her voice a soothing melody.

I give them a final, polite wave before following Lisa's sugar out of the warm humidity of the garden and into the cool corridors of Rhodes Island.

The hum of the landship's engines keeps a steady rhythm under our footsteps as Lisa and I walk down the hallways.

As we approach one of the staff break rooms, the automatic doors are locked open, and a shift in the air makes me pause.

Spilling out into the hallway is a sun-drenched field overflowing with warm honey and care. But it is brushing up against something different.

The second presence is dense and guarded. It tastes like the sterile bite of rubbing alcohol and freshly printed research paper, muted by cold, day-old black coffee. Yet beneath the clinical rigidity, the whole flavor is wrapped in the protective warmth of molted down feathers.

Lisa and I slow, coming to a halt just outside the doorframe.

Mom stands by the counter, holding two ceramic mugs. Across from her is another Liberi I don't recognize — a shorter woman with a deeply ingrained exhaustion resting behind round, wire-rimmed glasses. Her short brown hair is styled neatly, though two brown feathery tufts stick up from her crown. She wears an oversized white cape-like coat with black accents, dark grey buttons, and a green inner lining. A lanyard holding an infinity-symbol ID card hangs around her neck, and strapped to her right thigh are three glass vials glowing fluorescent green.

The tension in the room is thick enough to cut with a scalpel.

"Olivia, you are heading back to Trimounts?" mom asks, her voice low with concern. She hands one of the mugs over. "What about Ifrit?"

Olivia takes it with a tired nod, her gloved fingers wrapping around the ceramic as if anchoring herself to its heat.

"I heard a lot of rumors from the Columbian liaisons… There has been too much activity in Trimounts. It might be the Horizon Arc Project," Olivia replies. Her voice is calm, but the cold coffee spikes underneath it. "I am concerned. I just want to have a look."

She takes a slow sip, staring down at the floor panels before she looks back up at mom.

"Saria is already there… investigating Rhine Lab facilities," Olivia continues, a guarded edge creeping into her tone. "I still don't trust her."

"Olivia…"

"Don't worry. I won't be gone for long. Just a few days. But if you don't mind… can you look after Ifrit? Just in case Doctor and Dr. Kal'tsit are too busy."

Mom offers a dependable smile.

"I don't mind at all, happy to help as always."

Olivia's shoulders drop a fraction. "Thank you, Erika. Sorry, I know you are already busy with Lethe."

"Don't worry, Olivia," mom says, waving a hand. Her expression shifts into something more serious, her brow furrowing. "They are really… trying to build it, are they not?"

Olivia adjusts her glasses.

"After Theresis threatened the Special District with the Shard…" Olivia says, her voice trailing off. "It is conceivable. To a degree."

At the mention of Theresis, a chill shoots down my spine. The name of the Regent drags up nightmares of my time in Londinium. I grip my jacket's sleeves.

Beside me, Lisa's hand slips into mine. A fresh wave of sugar washes over my panicked mind and grounds me. I look down at her, and she gives a small squeeze, her ears flicking toward the hallway ahead as a silent suggestion.

I nod, and we step away from the doorframe, leaving the coffee-stained exhaustion and the honey behind us.

"Who was that, Lisa?" I ask, keeping my voice low so it doesn't carry back down the hall to the open doorway. "Mom… Erika, seems to know her well?"

Lisa walks beside me. She pulls out her communicator and types something out.

"That's Dr. Olivia Silence… or Silence, as she is known here," she explains. "She is a Rhine Lab defector too."

I nod slowly, the pieces clicking together. Rhine Lab. Mom was Rhine Lab too. And that protective down under all the cold coffee — I can see how the two of them found each other.

"I see…" I murmur, tugging at the inner lining of my oversized sleeves. "So that's how they know each other… Who is Ifrit?"

At the name, Lisa's sugar falters. It doesn't turn bitter, it just dims, as if a cloud has passed over her.

She looks down at the floor panels, her ears drooping a fraction.

"A Sarkaz," Lisa begins softly. "She is quite tall… well, considering she is about as old as us…"

She hesitates, her fingers curling into the fabric of her skirt.

"She struggles with her flame Arts and Oripathy quite a lot…" Lisa trails off, and an uncharacteristic silence settles between us.

I watch her carefully, sensing the ripples of unease in her.

"Lisa?" I prompt, offering her the same quiet reassurance she always extends to me.

She blinks, her ears twitching as she pulls herself out of her thoughts.

"Ah. Well. I met her in Siesta."

"She just…" Lisa struggles to find the right words, her tails wrapping tighter around her own legs. "There's just something that feels very off…"

I let out a slow breath.

"Let's…" I offer a tentative smile, bumping my shoulder against hers to ground her. "Let's just focus on our lunch…"

Lisa looks up at me, her eyes softening.

"Yes, let's."

We finally reach the cafeteria.

It is filled to the brim. Chattering Operators, clinking cutlery, and the low hum of the food stations bounce off the bright industrial grid ceiling. I look across the mess hall, taking in the neat rows of square light tables with their rigid blue chairs on the polished yellow floors.

Lisa and I weave through the crowd toward the line of Operators waiting at the hot food stations.

Then the heavy automatic doors hiss open directly behind us.

Before I can turn my head, a wave of emotion crashes into me. Carbonated apple cider and bright sunshine, vibrating with an untamed, infectious energy.

"Oh! Texas! Texas! Look, it is that little Sarkaz!" a bright, melodic voice bounds in, echoing over the dull roar of the cafeteria. "Hey!"

I spin around, and a Sankta appears right in my face.

She leans in close, her bright red hair framing a carefree grin. A halo hovers above her head, matching the twitching flutter of her geometric wings of light. She wears a black tactical jacket over a white shirt, strapped with modular pouches, radiating unfiltered enthusiasm.

"A Sankta?!"

My tail tucks behind my calves, and I shrink back, hands raised.

"Don't… don't hurt me!"

"Exia. You are scaring the kid."

A cool, even voice cuts straight through the sunshine, and a second presence washes over the area in stabilizing contrast. Crisp, chilled air and bitter dark chocolate, masking the coiled, lethal readiness of a seasoned combatant.

A Lupo steps up quietly beside her, dressed in an oversized white and black jacket, her dark hair falling around her pointed ears. She looks unbothered by the crowded cafeteria, her expression a mask of stoic calm as her gaze settles on me.

Beside my cowering form, Lisa steps forward and offers a deeply polite bow. "Good afternoon, Miss Texas, Miss Exusiai."

Wait… Texas… Exusiai…

The names click into place. My mind flashes to the terrifying story my mom told me just last month.

"You… you are…" I stammer, my eyes going wide as I point a trembling finger at the two. "Mom… Erika… told me you accidentally shipped me to Siracusa in a crate…"

Exusiai just winks, planting her hands proudly on her hips. "Well, the actual destination was Lungmen! But we kinda got sidetracked by a Catastrophe and a fun little shootout!" she corrects me cheerfully. "Regardless, it was a five-star delivery, you were in one piece and fed when the way too serious Sarkaz came to pick you up!"

She leans closer, her orange eyes sparkling with mischief.

"Now, Lethe, how about that apple pie date in Lungmen? Ready to go? We are leaving this afternoon."

I stare blankly at her.

"Eh?"

"Yes, it is then!" Exusiai cheers, bouncing on her heels. "I'll pick you up once we get our manifest from Doctor and Amiya! Enjoy your lunch!"

Beside her, Texas lets out a long, exhausted sigh.

"See you later then, kid," Texas adds, turning on her heel.

The two of them weave back into the dense crowd of the cafeteria, leaving to get their own hot food.

I just stand there, frozen, my tail tucked so tightly against my calves it feels glued in place, while what Exusiai just said works its way through my head.

I turn to look at the departing couriers' backs, then back at Lisa.

"I… I need to message someone… anyone…" I whisper, my voice trembling as my hands pat at the bag pinned to my tactical belt for my communicator.

Lisa steps closer and puts a reassuring hand on my arm.

"I will let Miss Erika, Ms. Skyfire, Miss Eyja, Miss Lena, and Podenco know that you are getting kidnapped by Penguin Logistics," Lisa says, earnest and serious. Her tails swish behind her in a comforting rhythm. "Don't worry, Lita. If you end up in Lungmen, Ms. Blaze will be there in no time!"

The thought of the elite Feline Operator crashing through a Lungmen warehouse roof to rescue me from a shipping crate settles my racing heart more than it probably should.

I pay for my meal and carry my tray over to one of the vacant square tables.

The bowl on my tray draws my full attention, sending warm steam up into the cool air of the cafeteria. It is a deep ceramic bowl filled to the brim with thick, hand-cut Higashinese noodles swimming in a clear, rich broth. Floating in the center, cradled by the pale noodles, is a delicate egg, its translucent white casing barely holding together a warm runny yolk. Arranged neatly along the edge of the bowl is a crisp assortment of fried comforts: a large seafood crusted in golden crumbs with its fan-tail pointing upward, a thin ribbon of sweet potato battered to a pale golden crunch, and a feathery leaf of veggie that glints under the industrial ceiling lights.

Lisa settles into the chair across from me, setting her own lunch down with a soft click. She holds a warm pasta bowl between her hands, the savory aroma of slow-simmered tomato sauce and melted cheese wafting up from the steaming ribbons of noodles.

She takes a bite of her pasta before looking across the table at me.

"You know, Lita," Lisa begins, musing over the hum of the cafeteria, "it is really interesting how you like Higashinese food so much."

I pause, my chopstick tips hovering just above the silky surface of the egg. "Is it?" I ask, tilting my head.

"Well." Lisa sets her fork down against the rim of her bowl. "You only ever speak Victorian. Though your accent is closer to Columbian. But you always gravitate to Higashinese cuisine."

I look down at the noodles and crispy comfort foods, then up at her again. "Even before my amnesia?"

"Yep. Never changed," Lisa answers, offering a small, fond nod. "You always get so excited whenever the cafeteria had Higashinese specials, or when Mr. Matterhorn cooked regional dishes."

I press the tip of my chopstick into the center of the soft egg, watching the golden yolk break and swirl into the broth.

"I wonder why?"

Lisa taps her chin, her ears twitching as she considers it. "Maybe it has something to do with Miss Erika being from Columbia?"

"I don't know…" I say, taking a mouthful of the thick, chewy noodle. The savory soup and soft egg coat my tongue with a grounding warmth that makes the ache in my muscles feel a little lighter. I chew slowly, staring at the golden crunch of the sweet potato. "Mom loves high-energy, practical meals… but this just feels… natural."

Lisa gives me a gentle smile, her sugar wrapping around us like a cozy blanket. "Well, whatever the reason is, I'm just glad you enjoy it. It suits you, Lita."

We finish our meals in a comfortable quiet, the noise of the cafeteria washing over us like a distant hum. I savor the last spoonful of the rich broth and the final piece of crumb-crusted seafood. Across from me, Lisa gathers her empty pasta bowl, the aroma of her tomato sauce fading.

We stand up together and weave through the crowds of chatting Operators to place our trays onto the automated return station.

"See you tomorrow, Lisa. If… if I am still on the landship, that is."

Lisa turns to me.

"I am sure everything will be fine, Lita. You are with Ms. Skyfire and Miss Eyja this afternoon, no?"

I let out a slow breath. "Yeah, Eleanor will be there too."

Lisa's smile brightens, her ears perking up playfully. "Then you are more than safe! See you tomorrow, Lita. Or… if you have homework to do, we can do it together later tonight."

"Okay. See you then, Lisa," I reply, returning her smile with a small one of my own.

After a quick wave we part ways. I step out of the loud cafeteria and back into the cooler arteries of the landship, past clusters of passing Operators, my boots clicking against the floor panels. Despite Lisa's sugary comfort, I check the tactical bag clipped to my translucent utility belt, where my communicator rests. I can only pray that Lisa's emergency messages to mom, Skyfire, Adele, and Lena were received loud and clear. The last thing I want is to wake up trapped inside a wooden shipping crate bound for a mobile city again.

As I navigate a quieter section of the middle deck, I taste her.

The cider and sunshine crashes into my senses all over again, untamed and infectious.

My tail goes rigid. I peek around the sharp turn of the corridor.

Standing just a few paces away is Exusiai, leaning against the bulkhead, her geometric wings of light fluttering in restless twitches. She is deep in conversation with a sturdy Forte woman.

Exusiai crosses her arms over her jacket and sighs.

"I am telling you, Croissant!" Her bright voice echoes off the metallic walls, exasperated. "The people here are way too stiff! They are always saying something about taking their Sarkaz Operator into Lungmen is an 'unacceptable security risk'!"

She throws her hands up in the air, the sunshine of her presence sparking with indignation. "Like, come on! It's just a little field trip! What's the worst that could happen?"

The woman opposite her radiates something else entirely. She tastes like a heavy vault door forged from solid iron, wrapped in the warm aroma of buttery, flaky pastries and the faint, cheerful hum of clinking coins.

Croissant shakes her head, her sturdy presence shifting with a mix of exasperation and amusement.

"Look, Exia," Croissant replies. "I'm just sayin', sneakin' a highly restricted Sarkaz Operator off the landship without proper clearance is a one-way ticket to havin' that Feline drop out of the sky and turn our transport into scrap metal. We run a logistics company, not a…"

Mid-sentence, Exusiai looks away from Croissant, straight at the edge of the bulkhead.

I realize, with an icy spike of horror, that the tip of my misty blue, spade-tipped tail is sticking out in plain sight, swaying just enough to betray my hiding spot.

"There you are!" Exusiai sings as she darts forward. "Ready to go?"

"Wait, no!" I yelp, scrambling backward. My boots slip against the polished floor. I throw a hand up in a defensive gesture. "I didn't agree to any trips! I have to go to the Archives this afternoon! I have logistics paperwork!"

"Don't be shy, come on!" Exusiai beams, unfazed by my protests.

She grabs my hand with a surprisingly strong grip. Her carbonation floods up my arm and overwhelms everything else. With a bright laugh she spins on her heel and breaks into a brisk walk, dragging me along behind her.

I stumble to keep up, my skort swishing around my knees as I shoot a pleading look at Croissant as we pass her.

Croissant just watches us go. She lets out a long sigh that tastes of resigned iron and warm pastry, then reaches into her jacket and pulls out a communicator.

"Texas?" Croissant says into the device. "Are you ready with transport? Yeah, Exia got the kid. We might need to drive really fast."

I shoot pleading looks at the scattered Operators we pass in the main arteries of the landship. A few of them pause, looking between my panicked expression and the woman dragging me along. But the second they register Exusiai, they look away, like they all decided at once that stopping her is somebody else's problem.

We weave through the corridors toward a heavily reinforced, sealed bulkhead at the end of a deserted maintenance hallway. It is a dead end.

"Texas better be below already," Exusiai chirps, her pace not slowing in the slightest.

Then, without breaking stride, she pulls out her patron firearm with her free hand. She doesn't bother to aim. She points the barrel at the thick steel of the dead end and unleashes a barrage of glowing projectiles.

The volume of fire is terrifying. Sparks and molten slag spray across the corridor.

"Wait! What!" I scream, my hands flying up to cover my ears as the roar of gunfire bounces off the walls. "This is our landship!"

Exusiai just winks at me.

"Amiya can bill the boss!"

With a final, agonizing groan of compromised steel, the section of hull gives up. The plating detaches and falls outward into the open air, sheared away by the sheer amount of ballistic damage. The climate-controlled air of the corridor is replaced by sweeping wind and the dusty, open expanse of the barrens.

My heart stops. I look past the smoking edges of the newly created exit. There is no ramp. There is no docking platform. We are four entire decks up, the rocky terrain of the barrens far, far below us.

Then Exusiai simply starts walking again, stepping toward the gaping hole.

"What! No!" I shriek in panic.

I dig my boots into the floor, throwing my whole weight backward to stop our momentum. But her grip on my hand is a steel vise. I struggle, and I am dragged over the threshold anyway.

"Noooo!"

The floor vanishes beneath my feet.

The wind roars in my ears, whipping my hair and the oversized jacket around my torso. My stomach lurches into my throat as gravity takes hold and pulls us down.

"Lita!" mom's desperate voice calls out.

As the air rushes past my face, I force my eyes open and look back up at the shrinking hole in the landship's hull.

Two figures appear at the edge. I recognize Croissant's sturdy silhouette. But right beside her, leaning out over the drop, is mom.

Mom is gesturing frantically over the edge, her feathers puffed out in panic as she reaches toward the empty air where I had just been standing.

"Don't move so much, Lethe!" Exusiai shouts over the roar of the wind, her grip shifting on my arm.

With a disorienting jerk she pulls me against her side and yanks us both upright in mid-air. The stomach-churning plunge shifts into a jarring deceleration. My stomach flips as our descent halts with a mechanical groan, and we begin to wobble, bouncing up and down in the air.

I squeeze my eyes shut, my tail wrapping around my leg. But as the falling slows to an unsteady hover, I look down past my black boots.

We are not on the ground. We are standing squarely on top of a heavily modified industrial delivery drone. The rotors scream in protest under our combined weight, the chassis tilting and wobbling in the sweeping winds of the wasteland.

"It won't hold long!" Exusiai yells cheerfully over the screeching rotors. She flashes me an unbothered grin. "Ready to jump?"

I stare past the edge of the straining drone at the rocky terrain still dozens of meters below us.

"Never!"

"That's a yes then!"

Before I can process the lunacy of it, Exusiai lunges forward. The drone gives way beneath us, dropping like a stone, but she is already airborne. She lands on another hovering drone a few meters away, the metal groaning under her boots before she kicks off again.

Then another. Then another.

We are ping-ponging through the open air, using a mid-air staircase of unsuspecting delivery drones, and I am dragged along for the ride.

Finally, with one last leap, Exusiai hurls me forward.

I fly through the open side door of a waiting vehicle and crash onto a surprisingly soft, leather-lined cushion. The breath is knocked out of my lungs, and the Arts Unit at my back cracks against the door frame.

The second I land, I taste her. Crisp, chilled air and bitter dark chocolate, layered over that coiled, lethal readiness.

I pry my eyes open, groaning as I untangle my limbs from the back seat of an idling transport rover.

Sitting in the driver's seat, unfazed, is Texas. She glances at me through the rearview mirror, her pointed ears twitching.

"Hey kid."

A second later Exusiai dives through the passenger side door. She drops into the front seat, laughing as she holsters her firearm.

Then, right before Texas can hit the accelerator, a heavy thud rocks the suspension of the transport, shaking the metal frame so hard my teeth click together.

"Don't you ever leave me behind again, Exia!" Croissant shouts from the rear cargo bed.

Texas shifts the transport into gear, and the engine comes up into an aggressive rumble.

The rover tears across the rugged terrain as Texas slams her foot on the accelerator. I look out the rear window, watching the towering hull of the Rhodes Island landship shrink into the dusty haze of the barrens.

My sore calves, still aching from Ms. Dobermann's conditioning, throb as I shift on the leather cushion of the backseat. I reach around to my lower back and detach my Arts Unit from the magnetic suspension circuits on my utility belt. The long black shaft, its misty blue liquid suspended at the crest, releases with a sharp snap. I lay it carefully on the seat beside me so I can finally lean back.

Almost instantly, the communicator tucked inside my bag begins to vibrate against my hip.

I pull it out, wincing at the cascade of emergency notifications lighting up the screen. I tap open the communication hub.

[Caladria]: Lita! Are you safe! Talk to me, dear!

I scroll down.

[Suzuran]: I heard what happened, Lita. Are you okay?

There are countless more messages flooding in from Podenco, Lena, and a capslock-heavy threat from Skyfire aimed at Penguin Logistics.

"I am so tired of getting kidnapped…" I groan, letting my head fall back against the leather headrest in defeat. My tail droops beside me.

In the front passenger seat, Exusiai spins around to face me, unfazed.

"Oh, don't worry! You will love Lungmen!" Exusiai beams.

Beside her, Texas watches the cracked earth of the barrens. She reaches up with one hand and adjusts the chocolate stick resting between her lips.

"Exia," Texas asks, her voice even and stoic. "Have you actually thought about how to get the kid into Lungmen?"

"Nope!" Exusiai chirps, unabashedly cheerful.

A heavy thud rattles the rear partition of the rover as Croissant kicks the metal from the cargo bed.

"Are you serious, Exia?!" Croissant yells through the vibrating metal. "We can't just casually drive a pureblood Sarkaz straight through a Lungmen Guard Department border check! It's impossible! They check every single manifest, and the second they see her horns, we're all gettin' thrown in a holding cell!"

"I am sure it will be fine!" Exusiai chirps, waving her hand dismissively.

"We can just cover her in one of those long dress things they wear in Higashi! You know the ones with the really big hoods?" Exusiai snaps her fingers, her eyes lighting up. "Hey, Lethe! If anyone asks, just look down and say something like… 'wa ka ra na i'! I think that's Higashinese!"

A heavy sigh rattles through the rear partition.

"Do you even know what that means?" Croissant asks.

"I am sure it means something!" Exusiai beams confidently.

"Wait. That's not the point," Croissant groans from the cargo bed. "The kid's horns are longer than her actual face! Do you seriously think a piece of fabric is gonna hide that?"

I reach up, my fingers grazing my horns. Croissant isn't wrong; they curve prominently upward and are impossible to flatten.

Exusiai taps her chin, her wings of pure light giving a thoughtful flutter. "Then we just pretend she is a Caprinae?"

"Their horns curl," Texas adds from the driver's seat.

Texas shifts her grip on the steering wheel. "And their ears are caprine."

Exusiai doesn't miss a beat. "Elafia? We can pretend she has really special Elafian horns!"

Texas reaches up, adjusting the chocolate stick in her mouth before glancing at the rearview mirror. Her eyes meet mine for a second.

"Their ears are standard, like your own, Exia," Texas replies, cool and rational, dismantling Exusiai's entire master plan. "Not pointed like hers. Besides, the kid has a tail longer than a meter."

My tail curls around my calves in the backseat, as if trying to hide itself from the conversation.

I look between the three couriers. They kidnapped me without a single thought about how to get me past the border.

I let my forehead drop onto my hands with a muffled groan. I am going to end up in a Lungmen holding cell.

A clatter echoes from the back of the rover as Croissant gives up on injecting logic into the disguise plans. Her iron vault door wrapped in warm, buttery pastries steadies, the exasperation draining out of it.

"Well. I am just gonna count our cargo," Croissant sighs.

I look out the window. The cracked earth and sweeping winds of the wasteland offer zero identifiable landmarks. I pull my knees up, my fingers gripping the hem of my oversized dark grey jacket.

"Actually… where are we even?" I ask. "How far is the drive to Lungmen?"

Exusiai leans back into the passenger seat.

"We are between Kazdel and Yan!" Exusiai announces cheerfully. "Basically right next to Lungmen!"

Then she claps her hands together, and the whole fizzing mass of her sparks.

"Well. Texas, I will drive when we near Lungmen!" she declares.

Texas keeps her hands steady on the wheel, navigating the rover over the rocky terrain. Her crisp, chilled air and bitter dark chocolate doesn't waver, a mask over the coiled, lethal readiness beneath it.

"Sure," Texas replies, deadpan. "Just don't actually run over a guard."

From the rear cargo bed, the sound of crates sliding against metal comes to a halt.

"Okay! No cargo lost!" Croissant declares over the rumble of the engine. Then a boot thuds against the metal partition one last time for good measure. "And don't you dare lose any later, Exia!"

Exusiai flashes a bright, unapologetic peace sign toward the rear partition.

The next hour of the drive is uneventful. I honestly don't know how we haven't crashed, exploded, or been intercepted by a furious Feline or Liberi yet.

Instead, the rover tears across the rocky expanse of the barrens. In the front passenger seat, Exusiai cycles endlessly through the radio, twisting the dial through patches of static to blast synthesized Lungmenite pop and upbeat Columbian rock. Through the reinforced window of the rear partition, I can see Croissant lounging in the open cargo bed, unfazed by the wind and the driving.

Then another hour. Then another. The barrens don't change — the same cracked earth, the same grey scrub, the same hot wind coming in through Exusiai's window — and the only thing that changes is the light. It goes from flat white to something lower and thicker, and the rover's shadow reaches a little further out across the dirt every time I check for it.

I stare out the window, watching the wasteland blur past.

A jagged shadow falls over the rover. I lean toward the glass. Jutting out of the barren ground is a cluster of Originium shards, easily the size of a small house, its black crystalline surface shimmering with a faint, sickly gold.

As we pass the crystals, the roar of the engine drops into a low, steady growl.

Texas shifts gears, her foot easing off the accelerator. The transport slows, the suspension bouncing as we go from a breakneck sprint to a cautious crawl.

I untangle my legs and peek through the gap between Exusiai and Texas's seats.

A few kilometers ahead, cutting through the dusty haze of the horizon, is a long, disjointed line of slow-moving vehicles. Even from here I can see the wear on them. Rusted armor plating, makeshift canvas roofs flapping in the wind, engines sputtering plumes of dark exhaust. The vehicles are surrounded by a sprawling mass of figures trudging through the arid dirt on foot.

"What's happening?" I reach out with my Arts, but the distance is too great. I cannot taste anything.

"Refugees," Texas replies. Her voice is even, but the chilled air shifts a fraction, the coiled readiness under it sharpening as she surveys the horizon. "Most likely."

Before I can process the sight, a knock rattles the partition directly behind my head.

"Eh?!"

"Hey, kid, open the back window, I am coming in," Croissant's muffled voice calls out over the wind.

"Ah, okay. Uhm…"

I scan the armrests and the door panels, the unmarked toggle switches, the modified dials. I have no idea how Penguin Logistics wires their vehicles.

"There's a button," Texas says. "Under the window frame."

I reach up and find a cold switch. "Ah, got it."

I press it, and with a hiss the rear partition window slides open.

Croissant vaults inside. I scramble to pull my tail out of the way, grabbing my Arts Unit before she sits on the crest.

Croissant dusts off her hands as she settles into the seat.

I look past the windshield again as the transport inches closer to the exhausted procession.

"There are so many refugees," I whisper, my grip tightening on my Arts Unit. "What happened here? Are we near Lungmen?"

"Yeah, kid," Croissant sighs, leaning against the door panel.

She looks out the window. "We're gettin' close to the border. Given the sheer size of that crowd, there must've been a Catastrophe recently… could've hit a settlement."

She crosses her arms, her eyes tracking a rusted, sputtering vehicle.

"Folks always flock to Lungmen when things go sideways," Croissant continues. "It's a big, shiny, heavily defended city. People come lookin' for stability. For jobs. Hopin' the Guard Department takes pity and lets 'em through the gates."

"Shouldn't we help them?" I ask.

Texas does not look over.

"Not our problem," Texas replies. "We are couriers, kid. Not charity."

Her words sting. Tears threaten to break through.

"Aw, don't look so gloomy, Lethe!" Exusiai chimes in, spinning around in her seat to flash me a grin. "Just focus on the apple pie! Once we get into the city, we are getting the biggest, warmest slice of pie in the district. It's gonna be totally stress-free!"

My grip tightens on my Arts Unit.

"But…" I look back out at the line of people. "If the officials reject them… they are just going to die out here in the barrens."

Croissant shifts on the leather cushion. She reaches over and pats my shoulder.

"Listen, kid. Even if we wanted to play the heroes… what do we actually help 'em with?"

She gestures around the cramped interior of the rover.

"We ain't a Rhodes Island relief squad," Croissant reminds me. "We don't got medical triage tents, or Oripathy suppressors, or pallets of clean water and rations. We got a cargo bed full of sealed delivery crates, and an Exia who only packs sweets for herself. We stop out there in the middle of a desperate crowd with a functioning vehicle? We don't save 'em. We just become a target."

I look back out at the procession, then back at the cramped interior of our rover, and down at my boots. She is right. I hate that she is right.

I let out a slow breath and reach into the tactical bag clipped to my utility belt, pulling out my communicator. The screen casts a faint glow in the backseat as I open my messages.

[Lethe]: Mom, there are a lot of refugees near the Lungmen border. I think a Catastrophe hit a settlement.

[Caladria]: I will talk to Dr. Kal'tsit and Amiya. Stay safe, Lita.

[Lethe]: I will, mom. The Penguins… are not bad people. I can taste them.

Even as we drive past all those tired faces, I reach out with my Arts. Exusiai's apple cider. Texas's chilled air. Croissant's iron and pastry. There is no malice in any of them. Just something tough and careful underneath, the flavor of couriers who have done this job long enough to know when not to stop.

[Caladria]: They are not. But Lungmen is still dangerous, Lita. Most Elite Ops are not on the landship, they are checking who we can dispatch to get you back.

[Lethe]: Thanks, mom.

I slip the communicator back into my pouch and look toward the front partition.

"How likely…" I whisper, my voice barely carrying over the rumble of the engine, "is Lungmen going to accept them?"

Silence falls over the rover.

Exusiai reaches forward and twists the radio dial, turning the pop music down to a muted hum. Croissant leans her head back against the backrest and looks away, her presence shifting into quiet resignation.

None of them answer.

In the driver's seat, Texas keeps her eyes locked ahead. She shifts gears, the chilled air and the coiled readiness under it unwavering.

"You will see, kid," Texas says, cool and flat.

She presses her foot down on the accelerator, and the rover surges forward. We keep a wide berth around the caravan the entire time. I watch them through the glass for kilometers, a long parade of rusted vehicles, flapping canvas, and exhausted figures trudging through the arid dirt, swallowed by the swirling dust of the Yanese borders.

Then the barren wasteland begins to fall away.

Cutting through the dusty horizon, a colossal silhouette rises against the sky. The scale of it makes my breath hitch. It is Lungmen, the mobile city in Yan that everyone says is swimming in money.

As we draw closer, the treaded plates become visible, grinding against the earth. Fortified walls form a rigid perimeter, dotted with guarded checkpoints and sprawling bridge systems that connect the outer sectors to the city's heart. Beyond the walls, reaching high into the sky, is a glittering blur of glass monoliths — so clean and polished they look like someone picked them up somewhere else and dropped them in the middle of nowhere.

The rumble of the rover drops into an unsteady hum as Texas eases her foot off the accelerator. As we near the nomadic plates of the mobile city, the sweeping dust of the barrens gives way to Lungmen's border control.

We slow to a crawl a safe distance behind a long, disorganized convoy of rusted vehicles. Ahead of us is a fortified checkpoint.

I press my hands against the glass of the rover's window. Standing behind rows of thick concrete barricades is a wall of officers.

They are clad head-to-toe in matte black tactical gear with rigid plating over their chests and sharp blue accents lining their straps. Their faces are hidden behind angular helmets and opaque visors that reflect the low orange glare of the setting sun. Every officer on the frontline holds a black riot shield emblazoned with the word 近衛 — I think that is how it is written — and GUARD in Victorian. Their free hands rest with practiced discipline on the hilts of long, straight tactical blades at their hips.

"Look up, kid," Texas says from the driver's seat.

I crane my neck upward. Positioned along the high catwalks and the steel overhangs of the checkpoint are snipers. They are still, their crossbows drawn, methodically scanning the hazy horizon.

Below them, even more refugees than the caravan we passed are already clustered against the designated inspection zones.

A group of about a dozen desperate figures breaks away from the inspection line. They sprint toward a small gap in the barricades, their hands raised in a frantic bid to force their way into the city.

It is over before it begins.

The wall of black polymer and shields steps forward with mechanical precision. The guards don't even draw their blades. They drive their shields forward, slamming into the rioters with bone-rattling force. The group is thrown to the ground, pinned under the knees and boots of the officers, immobilized in seconds.

Up on the catwalks, the snipers pivot. Dozens of crossbows level at the rest of the refugees, and nobody else so much as twitches toward the gap.

A metallic voice blares out through a megaphone from the checkpoint, echoing over the winds. The syllables are sharp, staccato, aggressive.

"Zik hak teoi hau, fau zak wui sai jung zi ming mou lik!"

I flinch. The words are foreign to me, a dialect I don't recognize.

"What… what are they saying?"

In the front seat, Exusiai stops fiddling with her patron firearm.

"They are speaking Lungmenite," Exusiai explains, turning her head slightly. "They are telling the crowd: 'Step back! Or we will use lethal force!'"

"They're warnin' the rest of the caravan not to try anything stupid," Croissant mutters. "Like I told ya earlier, kid. This ain't a soup kitchen. They don't have entry permits, they don't have clearance, and L.G.D. doesn't negotiate with border hoppers. You rush the gates, you get put down."

I look back out the window. The subdued refugees are being dragged away, their cries drowned out by the winds. In the driver's seat, Texas adjusts the chocolate stick in her mouth.

"Welcome to Lungmen, Lethe."

Texas brings the rover to a halt in the middle of the dusty road, still a safe distance from the checkpoint.

She shifts into park and unbuckles her seatbelt.

"Exia, all yours."

The two couriers switch places in the cramped cabin. Texas slides over the center console into the passenger seat, while Exusiai vaults into the driver's seat.

The second Exusiai's hands grip the steering wheel, her geometric wings give an energetic flutter against the seat.

"Now, it's time for some real fun," Exusiai declares.

In the back, Croissant's horns catch the dim interior light.

"Be careful," Croissant warns.

I look through the window at the wall of officers. The riot shields, the drawn blades, the snipers on the steel overhangs above.

"Shouldn't we head towards a different checkpoint?" I ask. "One with less… snipers?"

Exusiai spins around in the driver's seat, her eyes sparkling with mischief.

"Well. Texas, Croissant," Exusiai begins, her voice dropping into a conspiratorial whisper. "I just need you two to pretend we captured Lethe in Kazdel and are delivering her to some V.I.P."

Captured?!

"Then, when the L.G.D. is distracted, I go. Deal?" Exusiai finishes, like she just came up with the smartest plan anyone in all of Terra has ever had.

In the passenger seat, Texas says nothing at all.

Beside me, Croissant rolls her eyes.

"Alright, alright, I see that's how it goes," she mutters, pushing herself off the door panel.

Croissant turns toward me and reaches into one of the pouches strapped to her waist. She pulls out a thick industrial zip tie and a wide roll of duct tape.

My eyes go wide in horror.

"Wait! What?" I scramble backward across the cushion.

Before I can reach the opposite door, Croissant's hand catches my wrists. With practiced efficiency, she crosses my hands together.

Ziiiip.

The plastic tie tightens around my wrists. Not enough to bruise, but more than enough to bind my hands together.

"Just act scared, kid," Croissant advises, her tone casual as she rips a strip of silver duct tape from the roll.

Before I can protest, she slaps the tape over my mouth, sealing my lips shut.

"Mhm!"

My tail lashes against the seatbacks. I am actually tied up. They actually tied me up!

Then Exusiai slams her foot onto the accelerator, sending the rover roaring toward the heavily armed Lungmen border.

I thrash against the backseat. The strip of silver duct tape pulls at the edges of my cheeks.

From the passenger seat, Texas glances at me through the rearview mirror.

"Don't wriggle so much, you might hurt yourself, kid," she adds.

Beside her, Exusiai eases off the accelerator, and we crawl the last stretch toward the checkpoint. The howling winds of the barrens bleed into the mechanical grinding of Lungmen's nomadic plates. Outside, the noise of shouting officers and stomping boots grows loud.

A spotlight sweeps across our windshield.

"Halt! Bring the vehicle to a complete stop and cut the engine!" a mechanically amplified voice barks through the megaphone. "Keep your hands perfectly visible!"

Exusiai complies, slamming the brakes and throwing the rover into park. The engine dies with a sputtering sigh.

With a synchronized hum, Texas, Exusiai, and Croissant roll down their windows. The dusty air floods the cabin, carrying iron-tasting discipline and sour suspicion off the approaching Lungmen Guard Department officers.

An officer in matte black tactical gear steps up to the passenger side window. His face is hidden behind an angular visor.

"State your business," the L.G.D. official demands, his voice sharp and uncompromising. "Present your company credentials and entry manifests. No unauthorized cargo passes through Sector 4."

Texas leans toward the window, her posture relaxed, her coiled readiness humming beneath it. She reaches into her jacket and produces a digital credential slate, handing it out to the officer.

"Penguin Logistics. Registered courier transport," Texas states, professional, stripped of her usual casual inflection. "We are carrying commercial cargo. Specifically, authorized technological and medical supply crates bound for the Rhine Lab office in the upper commercial districts."

The officer takes the slate, his visor dipping as he scans the manifest. Then he pulls a flashlight from his utility belt and shines it into the rear cabin.

The beam cuts through the dim interior, washing over Croissant, then landing on me. I freeze.

The officer's posture snaps rigid. The metallic tang of his suspicion spikes into white-hot threat.

"You have a Sarkaz in the vehicle," the officer barks, his free hand tightening around the hilt of his blade. Several other L.G.D. guards step closer to the rover, their riot shields shifting into a defensive perimeter. "No entry permits are issued for Sarkaz mercenaries. Explain this immediately, or you will be detained."

I let out a muffled whimper behind the duct tape, pressing myself as far back into the seat as I can.

"She is not a mercenary, Officer," Texas replies, her voice maintaining its cool, official cadence. She gestures toward my bound wrists and gagged mouth. "She is a captured asset. A specialized bounty retrieval, also bound for Rhine Lab's internal research division. Our contract strictly dictates her secure delivery to their containment personnel."

Rhine Lab's internal research division?! They are pretending to sell me to the exact people mom and Dr. Silence defected from!

The duct tape muffles my squeaks. I thrash against the seat, my boots kicking uselessly against the back of Exusiai's chair as I try to wrench my zip-tied wrists apart.

"Mmmph!"

"Hold still, you little brat!" Croissant barks, loud enough to carry out the open window.

Croissant lunges across the backseat. Her hands grab my shoulders and slam me back into the leather cushions with a jarring thud. She pins me there. Her iron vault door wrapped in warm, buttery pastries stays steady, and protective.

The L.G.D. officer outside is unamused. The metallic tang of his suspicion goes cold and flat, like a steel ruler that will not bend.

He doesn't step back. Instead, he reaches up and presses a finger to the radio on his vest.

"Command. Request to contact Rhine Lab," the officer barks into his comms, his visor locked on Texas. "Verify an active bounty manifest for a live Sarkaz asset. Priority one."

He drops his hand back to the hilt of his blade. The surrounding guards step in closer.

"Do not move," the officer commands. "We are going to conduct a full physical inspection of your cargo bed and the asset while we await confirmation."

In the passenger seat, Texas doesn't even turn her head.

"Exia." It is barely a murmur over the winds.

In the driver's seat, Exusiai buzzes with bright energy. She grips the steering wheel.

"I know."

Exusiai slams her boot to the floor.

The engine unleashes a roar that rattles my teeth. Before the officer can draw his blade, the suspension lurches backward. The tires screech against the cracked pavement, kicking up a cloud of dust and debris into the guards' visors.

Croissant lets out a whoop, bracing her arms against the roof as the rover launches forward like a cannonball, tearing away from the checkpoint and speeding headfirst into the city of Lungmen.

Thwack. Thwack. Ping!

The whistle of crossbow bolts cuts through the winds, one of them ricocheting off the reinforced rear of the rover.

Behind us, the amplified Lungmenite from the L.G.D. megaphones devolves into a staccato bark of overlapping orders. But their discipline is shattering. A wave of emotion crashes into me — starving ash, cracked earth, and desperate survival.

The refugees are rioting.

I struggle up. Through the rear window I can see the line of L.G.D. riot shields breaking formation as hundreds of bodies surge forward against the barricades in the dimming light.

Croissant pins me down against the cushions. Her presence spikes with adrenaline.

"Exia, drive faster!" Croissant shouts. "The crowd is pinnin' down their response! Step on it before the snipers get a clear line of sight!"

"You don't have to tell me twice!" Exusiai cheers.

Exusiai slams the accelerator to the floor. The suspension groans, and I am thrown back into the leather as the rover rockets away from the checkpoint and plunges into the outer sectors of Lungmen.

I stop struggling against the zip-ties. I look past Texas and Exusiai, out the front windshield.

The sweeping dust of the barrens is replaced by the cold industrial belly of the mobile city.

We are tearing down a sprawling expanse of worn concrete highway. Above us, blocking out the bruised purple and deep grey of the night sky, is a network of elevated bridges and transit lines. They are supported by colossal concrete pillars that jut down into the lower sectors like the legs of a slumbering metal giant. The scale of it makes the rover feel like an insect scurrying across a factory floor.

The streets are dimly lit, illuminated only by the spaced-out glow of yellow industrial floodlights reflecting off the dark pavement. In the hazy distance, construction cranes and steel scaffolding loom like skeletal shadows. Wisps of low-hanging exhaust and venting steam roll across the desolate lanes, swallowing the screech of our tires.

"Take the lower transit arterial," Texas instructs. "We need to lose the border patrol drones before we hit the commercial district."

I squeeze my eyes shut as the rover plunges deeper into the labyrinth of concrete and shadow.

I am still pressed hard against the leather cushions, my chest heaving as the adrenaline from crashing a heavily armed border checkpoint courses through me.

Beside me, Croissant shifts and leans in close.

"Easy, kid. Gonna remove the duct tape," Croissant says, apologetic. "Might sting a bit."

Before I can formulate a muffled protest, her fingers catch the edge of the adhesive. With one merciless yank, she rips it clean off my face.

"Ouchie!" I protest.

Stinging pain flares across my cheeks. My tail thumps indignantly against the backseat as I try to bring my bound hands up to soothe my face.

In the passenger seat, Texas turns around. She holds out a small red box.

"Here, kid."

Croissant produces a small blade from her belt. She slides it under the zip-tie binding my wrists. With a snap, the pressure vanishes.

I pull my arms back to my chest, letting the oversized sleeves of my dark grey jacket fall over my hands to hide them.

I reach out from beneath my sleeve and pinch one of the thin chocolate sticks from Texas's box.

"Thank you."

I take a small bite. The chocolate is rich and slightly bitter against the crunch of the sweet biscuit inside. It tastes almost exactly like Texas.

I chew quietly, turning my head to peer out the rear window. The labyrinth of concrete pillars and low-hanging exhaust stretches behind us. No flashing red and blue lights in the industrial gloom. No sirens.

"They don't seem to be following us," I observe, my shoulders dropping a fraction.

In the driver's seat, Exusiai detonates.

She spins the wheel with one hand, flashing a radiant grin through the rearview mirror.

"See!" Exusiai cheers. "My plan works, as always!"

A synchronized groan fills the cabin. Croissant rubs her temples beside me, her pastry resonance dipping into exhaustion, while Texas turns back to the windshield.

As Exusiai keeps the rover tearing down the dimly lit road, I pull out my communicator, the screen casting a pale glow against the cabin.

I tap open the communication hub, my fingers flying across the keyboard to update my family.

[Lethe]: Mom, we are in Lungmen now, please tell everyone we are safe.

I press send. The loading circle spins for an agonizing second before a red exclamation mark appears next to the text box.

It is unsent. I tap the icon again. Unsent.

My chest tightens, and icy panic crawls back up my throat. I look at the signal indicator in the corner of the screen. It is empty.

"Is there a Catastrophe going on? I cannot reach Rhodes Island."

Beside me, Croissant shifts. "There's always one somewhere." She crosses her arms over her jacket.

In the passenger seat, Texas gazes out at the concrete pillars and the industrial shadows.

"It could just be because we are too deep in Lungmen's nomadic plates," Texas notes. "The interference down here blocks most standard signals."

I look back down at my communicator, then slip it back into its pouch.

"Okay…" I let out a long breath, looking toward the front partition. "Where are we going?"

"Back to one of our safehouses!" Exusiai chirps, weaving the rover around a support beam. "We can pick up Sora and then head towards the Lungmen R.I. branch to finish our delivery first!"

The rover presses deeper into the abyss. We go through the underground superstructure for what feels like an eternity.

The headlights struggle to cut through the fog clinging to the slick pavement. As I stare out the window, the scale of Lungmen's underbelly reveals itself. We navigate a labyrinth of concrete pillars marked with faded orange caution stripes, their bases supporting the weight of the nomadic city above. A canopy of steel catwalks and industrial cables hangs over our heads, casting skeletal shadows across the fading yellow traffic lines painted on the dark floor.

The rumble of the engine echoes hollowly in the cavernous space.

"Exit here, Exia," Texas says, breaking the silence. She points toward a narrow, unlit off-ramp branching away from the main arterial.

"Got it," Exusiai replies. She turns the wheel, her sunshine dimming a fraction in the gloom.

We exit the concrete maze and roll directly into the dark.

The transition is jarring. The enclosed feeling of the superstructure falls away, replaced by a desolate void. Exusiai cuts the rover's high beams and lets the vehicle crawl forward under cover of night.

"What is this place?" I ask, barely above a whisper. I look out into the gloom.

A vast expanse of churned earth and shadow. Thin metal poles topped with flickering yellow lights dot the landscape, arranged in wide circles that stretch as far as I can see. In the hazy distance, the glass monoliths of Lungmen's upper sectors loom through the smog like uncaring giants, detached from the desolation below.

"It is a cemetery," Texas answers. Her crisp, chilled air stays level, but a new weight moves under it. "In what used to be Lungmen's slums."

Croissant shifts in the back seat, her iron vault and warm pastry grounding against the silence outside. "The dead from the Reunion siege are buried here…"

I stare at the rows of flickering lights marking the mass graves. Amiya and mom told me the landship assisted Lungmen during those battles, but seeing the scar left on the earth is different.

"Where did the slums go?…" I ask.

Texas adjusts the chocolate stick between her lips, eyes scanning the dark horizon.

"They are mostly decommissioned."

The word decommissioned hangs in the cabin.

I pull my oversized jacket closer as the rover navigates the silent city of the dead.

We leave the decommissioned slums behind. The rover hums as Exusiai steers us down the empty night street. The lower districts are bathed in gloom, lit only by scattered neon signs that cast blurred reflections across the rain-slicked pavement.

The engine roars and Exusiai takes a sharp turn, guiding us up a sweeping elevated ramp.

The light hits all at once. We merge onto a sleek highway. Holographic signs float above the asphalt, pointing toward the North Export and the upper sectors. Beyond the guardrails, the scale of Lungmen shows itself again: glass monoliths piercing the dark sky, their huge ads blazing away like the dim, empty streets down below don't even exist.

In the passenger seat, Texas reaches forward and connects her communicator to the rover's dashboard.

A dialing tone cuts through the cabin over the hum of tires on wet pavement.

"Hi, hi, Sora speaking!"

The voice that answers is bright and melodic, with a rhythmic cadence that fills the cabin.

"Hey, Sora, it's Texas," she says. "We are heading to the upper districts to pick you up."

"Okie!" Sora chirps through the speakers. "We are in the office. Ah, though Emperor is already sleeping, mumbling something about a bill from Rhodes Island. Do you need me to wake him up?"

An awkward silence falls over the cabin.

A bill from Rhodes Island. My mind goes to the hole Exusiai casually blasted in our landship's hull just to kidnap me.

I guess Amiya or Dr. Kal'tsit already billed them for that.

"That won't be necessary," Texas replies, not missing a beat.

I lean forward, hands resting on the shaft of my Arts Unit, and tilt my head to listen to the cadence lingering over the comms.

"Wait…" I say. "She sounds like… one of the vocalists that sang a few of the songs Exusiai played."

The pitch, the bright energy. It is an exact match.

"Woah! Exusiai listened to my songs?!" Sora gasps, her voice spiking with delight. Then a beat of confusion. "Wait, who are you?"

"Ah. This is Lethe, Sora!" Exusiai answers. "She is joining us on a quest to find the best apple pie in Lungmen!"

Sora lets out a musical giggle that crackles through the dashboard speakers.

"Apple pie? At this hour?"

"Exia's idea," Texas says.

"Of course it is."

I realize I have been leaning toward the dashboard this entire time, my Arts reaching out of pure habit for the shape of the person on the other end of the line.

There is nothing there.

Just a voice. Bright and warm and completely flat to my senses, like being shown a photograph of a meal. I slowly sit back against the cushion, my tail curling tight around my calves. Every single person I have met since I woke up arrived with a flavor attached. Mom is honey. Lisa is sugar. Texas is chilled air and dark chocolate. I didn't know a living person could just be a sound.

"Sora," Texas says. "Twenty minutes."

"Twenty minutes," Sora repeats. There is a rustle of fabric on the other end, and the soft clunk of something being set down on a desk. "I will wait out back by the fire escape, then. The lobby lights are on a timer, and I would rather not explain to Emperor why I am standing around in the dark."

"Dress warm," Croissant calls out from beside me. "It's coming down out here."

"Yes, ma'am!" Sora sings.

There is a pause. The tires hum against the wet asphalt.

"Lethe?"

I freeze, my fingers tightening around the shaft of my Arts Unit.

"…Yes?"

"See you soon."

The line clicks dead, and the cabin fills back up with the low roar of the highway.

"She sounds nice," I murmur, mostly to myself.

"She is," Texas says.

As the rover speeds down the elevated highway, I pull out my communicator again. The signal indicator flares back to green.

Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding.

A cascade of suppressed notifications floods the screen. I stare at the glowing communicator in a mix of gratitude and mild horror. There are check-ins from everyone. Amiya, Lena, Lisa, Podenco, Adele, Eleanor, Skyfire, Susie, and mom… it seems the entire landship knows I was kidnapped by Penguin Logistics.

I sigh and start typing back one by one to let them know I am in one piece.

I tap open my thread with Amiya.

[Lethe]: We are safely in Lungmen.

The "read" receipt appears almost instantly.

[Amiya]: That's a relief, Lita.

My hand hovers over the digital keyboard. I look out the reinforced window at the glittering glass monoliths towering above us, but my mind flashes back to the desolate barrens and the desperate, exhausted mass of refugees we left behind at the border checkpoint.

[Lethe]: Amiya… the refugees.

[Amiya]: Caladria told me about them. Dr. Kal'tsit is working with the Lungmen government to reach a working solution.

I let out a slow breath. If Dr. Kal'tsit is involved, there is at least a chance they will be helped.

[Lethe]: Hopefully everything goes well.

[Amiya]: We can only wait for now.

A brief pause, then another message pops up.

[Amiya]: Oh, by the way, Lita. Rope and Shaw, two of our Operators, are in Lungmen right now. When you reach our branch office, contact them, they have been instructed to coordinate your extraction.

Extraction. The word floods me with relief.

[Lethe]: Okay. Thanks. Cannot wait to be back home.

Another thread lights up underneath it.

[Eyjafjalla]: Lita. I have only just seen all of this.

[Eyjafjalla]: Mint and I put our communicators in the drawer so we would stop reaching for them. We were three hours into geology before Skyfire found us. I am sorry.

[Lethe]: It is okay, Adele. I am safe. There is apple pie coming.

[Eyjafjalla]: That is not the reassurance you think it is.

Beside me, Croissant shifts on the backseat and leans over, catching a glimpse of Amiya's name further up my screen.

"Hey, kid." Croissant's hearty accent cuts over the noise of the highway. "Is that your boss? Little Cautus girl?"

"Yes," I reply, pulling the communicator closer.

"Perfect," Croissant grins, leaning back against the leather. "Why don't you do us a solid and sweet-talk her into payin' us a little extra bonus? You know, a premium fee for a flawlessly safe delivery straight into the heart of Lungmen?"

I turn my head to stare at her in disbelief.

Flawlessly safe delivery?!

My mind replays the past few hours: Exusiai blasting a hole in our landship's hull, getting dragged across a mid-air staircase of delivery drones, Croissant zip-tying my wrists and sealing my mouth shut with silver duct tape, and Exusiai driving into an armed L.G.D. checkpoint before speeding off under a hail of crossbow bolts.

"You… you duct-taped my mouth!" I whisper-yell, my tail lashing against the backseat.

"Hey, you are in one piece, ain't ya?" Croissant shoots back, unashamed, crossing her arms. "And we didn't drop you. That's premium courier service!"

I hold the device close to my chest.

"Only… only if I actually get the apple pies… I will consider it…"

"That's the spirit!" Exusiai cheers from the driver's seat. Her cider bubbles over, filling the cabin.

"Oh! And we definitely need to try the Lungmen buns too," she continues. "The ones with butter. They are simply amazing. Especially the ones made in the lower districts."

Buns?!

"Are they sweet too?" I ask.

"Oh, definitely, sweet and slightly savory!" Exusiai confirms. Beside me, Croissant chuckles.

Before Exusiai can list off an entire menu of Lungmen street food, chilled air cuts through the sugar.

"Exit here, Exia." Texas points toward a lit exit, deadpan. "Sora is waiting outside already."

"Got it!" Exusiai chirps.

Without touching the brakes, Exusiai jerks the wheel. The rover veers off the highway, leaving the upper lanes behind as we dive into the neon-drenched streets of Lungmen's commercial districts.

The rover halts at the curb of a narrow back alleyway tucked between two commercial buildings. Holographic billboards from the avenue cast ribbons of magenta and cyan across the damp pavement, lighting a figure waiting beneath the fire escape.

Exusiai puts it in park, and she and Texas trade places over the center console without a word about it — one practiced movement, like a shift change.

Standing in the glow is a petite blonde Cautus girl, her long pale ears accented with red ribbons, her red-and-black stage ensemble fluttering in the draft of the alleyway.

The second the car door unlocks, she rolls in through the window like a breeze: sparkling peach soda and candied strawberries, glazed with barley sugar and vibrating with the hum of stage spotlights and polished microphones.

"Yahoo!"

Before Texas can cut the engine, the door on my side swings open and Sora bounds into the cabin.

The door slams shut and the backseat shrinks to zero space. Sora settles beside me, pressing against my left, while Croissant's broad frame hems me in from the right. I am squished in the middle, curling my tail tightly over my lap so nobody sits on it.

"Hey, Sora," Texas greets from the front.

"Hi…" I offer, shrinking into my jacket.

Sora turns to look at me.

"Oh! She is Lethe? She is so cute!" Sora gasps, her ears giving an energetic flick. She leans in, scanning my pleated tactical skort, utility belt, and low ponytail. "Look at the outfit! Though, how did you guys smuggle a Sarkaz into Lungmen?"

"Long story…" Texas adds from the driver's seat. "But well, Sora, if you don't mind, you should stay with her as we finish our deliveries. Lungmen uptown is too dangerous for her to walk around."

"Not a problem!" Sora chirps, flashing an idol-perfect smile as her peach-soda warmth wraps around the backseat.

The rover slows to an idle along the edge of a deserted promenade bordering the river that cuts between the industrial zones and Lungmen's core.

Sora hops out first, boots clicking against the damp pavement, and I slide across the cushions after her. The river breeze catches the hem of my jacket. Reaching behind my back, I press my Arts Unit against the suspension circuits on my utility belt and let it lock into place with a magnetic snap.

Texas leans across the console, her chilled air and dark chocolate steadying the cold night.

"We will be back in about half an hour."

"Okay," we reply.

"Stay safe, you two," she adds.

Beside her, Exusiai pops up, her halo casting warm light across the front seats. "We will be back with some pies to start the evening!"

With a low rumble, the rover pulls away, its taillights bleeding into the shadows of the empty warehouse district.

Sora and I walk up to the rusted railing overlooking the dark, churning water. For a long moment, we are quiet. Across the river, downtown Lungmen rises like a mountain of light. Sprawling holographic advertisements for Monster Siren Records and Marthe, to name a few. The neon ribbons of cyan and amber, and glass monoliths piercing the low-hanging clouds in a display of dizzying wealth and life. Beside me, peach soda and candied strawberries ripple through the crisp air, warm and comfortable.

I glance sideways at her cape and ribbons, tugging at my sleeves.

"Uhm… Sora… you are an idol… no?" I ask softly.

She turns to face me, her long ears giving a cheerful twitch as she beams.

"Yep! I am an idol of Monster Siren Records," she answers proudly.

I tilt my head. "Why are you with the couriers?"

Sora lets out a musical giggle.

"It is a bit complicated," Sora admits, winking as the neon skyline reflects in her eyes. "But don't worry, I am a fully certified courier as well."

"Okay… I trust you," I say, offering her a small smile. I pull the collar of my oversized dark grey jacket tighter against the chill coming off the river.

We step away from the railing and settle down side-by-side on a weathered concrete bench facing the water.

As we sit, Sora swings her boots, and a melodic tune begins to drift from her lips. A quiet, rhythmic hum, different from the synthesized pop Exusiai was blasting in the rover. The second the melody touches the air, the peach soda and candied strawberries smooth out into a flowing ribbon of barley sugar that wraps around my anxiety and melts away the last of the adrenaline from crashing through a border checkpoint.

Sheltered by it, I look across the water at Lungmen.

The skyscrapers loom over the canal. Despite the neon ribbons of cyan and amber on their higher floors, the scale of the buildings casts long, deep shadows that stretch across the dark, churning surface below.

A cargo boat sails by in the distance, its engine humming a low, steady vibration through the damp air. The hull cuts through the dark water, fracturing the neon reflections into a thousand pieces before disappearing into the industrial gloom.

My tail curls beside me on the bench.

"This is so different from Rhodes Island," I say, quiet against the noise of the distant metropolis.

I watch the lights ripple across the water's wake, a display of life and untamed energy.

"It is quite beautiful."

"Is this your first time in a nomadic city?" Sora asks, pulling my attention away from the water.

The reflection of Lungmen's skyline suddenly feels very cold. A knot forms in my chest. I don't remember the other cities my family told me about. Not Trimounts, nor Siesta.

"The only other city I remember being in…" I whisper. "Londinium."

Just speaking the name of the Victorian capital drags up the phantom weight of iron, the shadow of the Military Commission, and the memories of killing people for the Royal Court while the Confessarii had my head stuffed full of their lies. I stare at my palms, the ghost of the violence I committed there threatening to bleed back into reality.

Sora doesn't ask for details. She just scoots a little closer on the concrete bench, and the barley sugar deepens into a wave that pushes back the shadows creeping into my mind.

"It is okay, Lethe." Her shoulder bumps lightly against mine.

She lets the quiet hum of the river wash over us for a moment.

"What kind of music do you like?" Sora asks, tilting her head with a bright, encouraging smile.

I blink, the shift in topic catching me off guard. I think about the mechanical hum of the landship's engines, the rustle of ferns in the Convalescent Garden, and the clash of weapons in Ms. Dobermann's training halls.

"I… I actually don't know," I admit, my tail giving an uncertain flick against the bench. "I don't listen to music back on the landship."

Sora gasps.

"Oh! That cannot be," she declares, throwing an arm out with dramatic flair. "There has to be something you would like. Pop? Classical? There are so many."

She taps her chin playfully, then claps her hands together.

"Oh, I know! You should come to my concert once!"

I stare at her.

"I would be able to?" I ask, as I pull my sleeves over my hands.

Sora simply winks.

"We could always figure something out," she chirps with confidence.

"I… I will… I would like to," I say, my fingers uncurling from the hem of my jacket.

Sora's smile radiates against the dim, industrial gloom of the river canal.

"That's settled then, Lethe!"

We sit in a comfortable silence for a few minutes more.

Then the screech of tires dragging against wet asphalt echoes down the empty promenade. A pair of headlights cuts through the fog, throwing long, erratic shadows across the weathered concrete as a vehicle pulls up to the curb directly behind our bench.

Sora turns her head, her red ribbons fluttering. "Texas?"

I reach out with my Arts.

The air. It is wrong.

There is no chilled air and dark chocolate. No carbonated apple cider, no iron vault. Instead a foul wave crashes into my senses: rancid grease, cheap burning tobacco, and the rusted edge of predatory greed.

"No," I gasp, shrinking back and grabbing my Arts Unit from behind my back. "It's not them!"

Doors slam shut. The uncoordinated thud of boots against the damp pavement surrounds us.

Figures detach from the shadows, stepping into the glare of the headlights. I hear the metallic click of high-tension strings being drawn back. Up on the rusted fire escapes and the overhangs of the nearby warehouses, three silhouettes level modified crossbows at us.

From the front, stepping out of the headlights, a group of Zalak approach. Their long, thin tails flick against the wet pavement, and their hands grip serrated swords that glint in the neon.

Sora's ribbon of barley sugar cools and shatters, spiking into a vibrating hum of protective anxiety.

"Gangs…" Sora's eyes narrow.

She steps in front of me, spreading her arms, her red-and-black stage cape flaring out to shield me from their line of sight.

"What do you want?" Sora demands, her voice stripped of its melodic cheer. It rings out with an uncompromising authority. "She is under the protection of Penguin Logistics."

The lead Zalak stops a few paces away. He rests the flat of his sword against his shoulder and lets out a chuckle that sends a spike of horror down my spine.

"Do yourself a favor, little pop star, and just be quiet. You'll make this a whole lot easier for everyone," he sneers, his eyes darting past Sora to lock onto my horns. "Word travels fast down in the mud. The L.G.D. has quite the bounty on the little devil behind you, and we're just here to collect."

"Not going to happen," Sora declares.

Her voice carries over the dark river promenade, clear and resonant as a bell.

"What do we do?" I ask. The grease and tobacco are thick enough to choke on.

"Don't use Arts, Lethe. L.G.D. will track us," Sora whispers under her breath.

The mobsters don't rush. They keep their eyes trained on us, blades held low, while the gleam of crossbow strings from the fire escapes above stays fixed on my chest. Step by step, Sora herds me backward, her boots retreating until the cold metal railing of the canal presses hard against my back.

Sora doesn't turn her head, her gaze locked on the advancing gangsters.

"Lethe, do you know how to swim?"

"No…"

"We don't have much choice… hold your breath."

"What?"

Before the word leaves my mouth, Sora spins, grabs the fabric of my grey jacket, and vaults backward over the railing, dragging me with her into the open air.

The world drops away.

A biting chill swallows me whole. The impact knocks the remaining air out of my lungs, plunging us into freezing blackness. The murky canal water rushes into my ears and burns my nose as I thrash beneath the surface. My boots and waterlogged jacket drag me toward the muddy bed, while my tail whips uselessly against the current. I can't breathe. I can't see.

Then, through the void, a firm grip locks under my arms.

Sora kicks with surprising strength, hauling me toward the shadowed underside of the wooden pier.

We breach the surface under the damp beams, gasping for air.

"I have you," Sora pants softly against my ear, her arms wrapped around my chest to keep my head above the churning water.

Thwip! Thwip! Splash!

Above us, crossbow bolts slice into the water meters away, followed by a furious, echoing roar from the promenade.

"Diu! Puk gaai!" A gangster screams, his boots stomping frantically against the planks overhead. "Sei baak ci! Where did they go?! Shoot the water! Shoot!"

Bolts strike the river in rapid succession, skimming past the wooden pylons into the dark current. Shivering, I bury my face against Sora's shoulder, clinging to her as the shadows of Lungmen swallow us whole.

We cling to the underside of the pier for several minutes, the water leeching what little warmth remains in my body. The river soaks through my skort and jacket, dragging at my limbs like concrete.

"Sora… I cannot… hold…" My teeth are chattering so hard they click together.

Sora is struggling just as much. Her cape is waterlogged, her long ears drooping, soaked and plastered against her wet blonde hair. Breathing hard, she kicks against the current, dragging me along until she gets one trembling arm around a slime-slicked wooden pylon.

"Are they still there?" Sora pants, her voice barely a murmur over the lapping water. "Are you able to tell?"

I squeeze my eyes shut and force my senses up through the planks. The grease and tobacco have drifted far down the promenade.

"I… I don't taste them," I manage between ragged breaths.

Sora looks up toward a rusted, algae-covered maintenance ladder bolted to the concrete embankment above our heads.

"I need to climb up, Lethe," she says, her fingers digging into the wet wood of the pylon. "Can you stay afloat for just a minute?"

"I… I… I will try," I whisper, dread pooling in my chest.

The moment Sora releases her grip to reach for the ladder, the dark water rushes over my collarbones.

I paddle my arms, kicking my leaden boots and whipping my tail beneath the surface to keep my chin above the freezing swell.

Beside me, Sora lunges upward, her boots scrambling against the slick stone wall as her gloved hands catch the bottom rung. She strains to haul her own weight out of the river, but the slimy metal offers no purchase. Her grip gives out.

With a choked gasp, she slips and crashes back into the black water.

"Sora!" I cry out, accidentally inhaling a spray of foul, freezing river water. I cough, kicking blindly in the dark. "Sora?!"

For a terrifying heartbeat, only dark bubbles rise to the surface. Then her head breaches the foam right beside me, coughing and sputtering as she shakes wet strands from her face. The candied strawberries and barley sugar flicker with breathless exhaustion, but stay anchored to me.

"I am okay… I am okay…" she reaches out through the water to grab the sleeve of my jacket, pulling us both back against the wooden pylon.

I don't even have time for relief.

The cold of the canal wins, seeping into my aching bones. My boots are anchors pulling me down, and my arms simply stop.

I feel my eyelids closing.

"Lethe! Lethe! Stay with me," Sora begs, her voice cracking over the sound of the churning water. The ribbon of barley sugar and candied strawberries trembles and fractures under panic.

"I…"

My head slips back. The murky water rushes over my face, swallowing the distant neon glow of the city.

Time loses all meaning in the void.

Then a rhythm forces its way into the blackness. Pressure on me. Measured compressions driving down against my chest.

With every press, crisp chilled air and bitter dark chocolate pierce my fading consciousness. The coiled, lethal readiness beneath it hums with urgency.

"Stay with us, kid."

I cough. A spasm racks my chest.

I cough again, my body curling inward as my lungs burn, pulling in the damp, smog-heavy air of the Lungmen undercity.

"Mom…" I whimper blindly, reaching out for the sun-drenched field of warm honey that always makes the pain go away.

My eyes snap open.

Blurry silhouettes sharpen in the dim, neon-lit gloom. Sora hovers above me, still soaked. Beside her, looking down with wide eyes, is Exusiai. Her halo casts a flickering radiance across the dark alleyway they must have carried me into, but her bright sunshine and carbonated apple cider is muted by a rare concern.

I tilt my head slightly against the cold concrete.

Texas kneels beside me, her hands just pulling back from my chest, her stoic expression lit by the distant city lights.

I blink, my vision stabilizing. Both Exusiai and Texas are soaked through.

Texas's oversized white and black jacket clings to her frame, murky water dripping from her dark hair and ears. Beside her, Exusiai's tactical gear is drenched through.

"Lethe!" Sora gasps, throwing her arms around my neck in a fierce, wet hug. The panicked, fractured edges of her flood with tearful relief. "You are okay!"

Exusiai leans down and flashes me a gentle, reassuring smile. "Welcome back, Lethe."

At the entrance of the alleyway, Croissant glances back. She is standing guard in her undershirt, the biting breeze doing nothing to shake that sturdy iron vault of hers. "Glad to have you back, kid," she says with a hearty, relieved grin.

I shift against the cold concrete. My oversized dark grey Rhodes Island jacket and my boots have been stripped away. I am swaddled in Croissant's courier jacket.

"Thank… thank you…" I pull the collar of her jacket tighter around my neck. I cough again, my throat still burning with the rancid taste of the canal.

Texas rises to her feet.

"Let's get back to our safehouse," Texas says, her cool gaze sweeping the dark alleyway one last time. "We can all take a hot bath there."

The concrete is freezing against my back.

I stay there anyway.

My chest still burns with every shallow breath, the muscle beneath my ribs aching from wherever Texas had driven her hands down. The rancid taste of the canal coats the back of my throat, silt and something sour I refuse to think about too closely. Above me, a narrow ribbon of Lungmen sky glows a sick, hazy orange between the fire escapes, choked with smog.

I focus on the cold seeping through Croissant's jacket into my shoulder blades.

It is uncomfortable.

A hand enters my field of vision.

Exusiai crouches over me, her drenched hair plastered against her cheek, her halo throwing a soft white ring of light across the wet asphalt. Her presence has almost fully recovered its violent carbonation, that sparkling apple cider brightness fizzing back into the alley, but there is still a faint muted undertone beneath it.

"Up you get, Lethe."

I look at her open palm.

I lift my arm. It feels like it belongs to someone else, heavy and clumsy, and it takes an embarrassingly long moment before my fingers finally close around hers.

She pulls. I come up off the ground far too easily, and the world tilts, and Sora's hands are immediately at my back, steadying me.

My feet hit the pavement.

My knee-highs are still soaked through, and they slap wetly against the concrete with a sound that makes my skin crawl. The waterlogged fabric clings to my calves, cold and heavy and gritty with river silt, dragging at every step.

I bend down, hooking my thumbs into the ruined elastic, and peel them off one leg at a time. The wet fabric resists, then gives, and I drop the shapeless bundles onto the ground with a small, defeated splat.

The night air hits my bare legs like a slap.

The cold is immediate and absolute, biting straight into my skin, and I hiss through my teeth, curling my toes against the freezing, grimy pavement. Every hair on my legs stands up. My tail wraps itself tightly around my thigh on its own.

But it is dry cold. Not the black, dragging, drowning cold of the canal.

I will take it.

My Arts Unit lies beside me on the concrete — someone must have fished it out — the matte black shaft beaded with water, its crest dulled with river grime. I reach down and close my hand around the grip. The familiar weight settles into my palm, and the alleyway's ambient bleed softens at the edges, muffled behind that comfortable dark barrier.

"Right, hand 'em over."

Croissant strides back from the alley mouth, still in nothing but her undershirt, the biting undercity wind doing nothing to dent that steady iron-vault presence of hers. Draped over one arm is Texas's soaked white and black jacket.

She spreads it out flat on the concrete like a groundsheet and starts collecting everything. My knee-highs. My boots. My heavy grey Rhodes Island jacket, which is now approximately three times its original weight. Sora's waterlogged cape, which she has to wring out with both hands first, sending a stream of filthy canal water splashing across the asphalt.

"Sorry about the jacket, Texas," I mumble.

"It was already wet," Texas replies flatly from somewhere behind me.

Croissant folds the sleeves over the whole pile and knots them, hoisting the entire sodden bundle up onto her shoulder in one practiced motion.

"Alright. Movin'."

She walks it over to the rover and drops it into the open rear bed with a heavy, wet thud.

Texas is already at the driver's door. She pulls it open.

And the smell hits me.

Butter. Baked sugar. Warm pastry crust, and under it all, thick and rich and impossibly out of place, cinnamon. It comes rolling out of the cabin in a wave of trapped, heated air and erases the stench of the canal from my nose.

I stand there barefoot on a freezing Lungmen backstreet, dripping, wrapped in a courier's jacket, and stare at the open door like an idiot.

The pies.

They've been sitting in the warm cabin this entire time.

"Get in, kid," Texas says, jerking her chin toward the interior. Her crisp, chilled resonance sweeps once more across the fire escapes above us, that coiled readiness beneath the dark chocolate still humming, still unrelaxed. "We can't stay here."

Behind me, Exusiai bounds past, wet boots squelching, and hauls the rear door open with far too much enthusiasm for someone who was pulling a body out of a canal a few minutes ago.

"We can enjoy the pies after we clean up!" she announces brightly.

The cabin swallows us one by one.

Sora climbs in first, then me, and Croissant folds herself in last, pulling the door shut with a solid, final clunk that seals out the wind. Instantly, everything gets warmer, closer, and infinitely safer. The leather squeaks under my bare legs, and I have to bite down on a yelp at how cold my own skin is against it.

I pull Croissant's jacket tighter around myself and hug my Arts Unit against my chest, the damp staff leaving a dark line down the front of the borrowed fabric.

In front of me, Texas drops into the driver's seat, water still beading off the ends of her hair. She doesn't say anything. She just reaches out, turns the heater dial all the way over, and puts the rover into gear.

The engine rumbles to life beneath us, and the dark alley slides away behind the rear window.

Warm air begins pouring out of the vents onto my legs. It stings at first, and I curl my toes hard against the floor mat until it fades into something merciful.

Sora leans against my shoulder. Her barley sugar and candied strawberry resonance is exhausted, worn thin, but it hums steadily where it touches me.

Then Exusiai twists around in the passenger seat, folding her arms over the headrest and propping her chin on them. She flashes me a grin.

"Oh! Almost forgot," she says. "We met Rope and Shaw at the R.I. office earlier, when we were dropping off the manifest."

"They said to just hand you back whenever you're ready to leave."

The rover hums over uneven pavement. Neon light slides across the windshield in long, smeared bars of pink and green.

Whenever I am ready.

Not tonight. Not immediately. Not a schedule someone else built for me.

Then Exusiai lifts one hand off the headrest and points at the footwell by Croissant's boots.

The white bakery box sits there on the floor, slightly crumpled at one corner, radiating that impossible smell of cinnamon and caramelized apple. And stacked right beside it is a second box, smaller, tied with a thin paper string. Through the little transparent window in the lid I can see them, round and golden, their crusts cracked into that delicate checkered pattern that makes them look exactly like the rough skin of a pineapple.

Lungmen buns.

"Hopefully not anytime soon, Lethe?" Exusiai asks.

I look at the boxes. Then down at myself.

My legs are bare and streaked with grey silt. My hair is plastered flat against my horns. There's canal water still dripping off the tip of my tail onto the floor mat, and I can taste the river every single time I swallow.

"I…" My voice comes out thin and raw. I clear my throat, and it hurts. "I just want a bath before I think about anything else."

Beside me, Croissant snorts.

Exusiai gasps like I have handed her a battle plan.

"Well! Safehouse, bath, pie." She counts them off on her fingers, her carbonated apple cider brightness detonating through the cabin, fizzing warm into every corner of it. "In that order then!"

The rover climbs out of the backstreets and onto an elevated road. The radio stays off.

I watch Lungmen go past the window.

The rain has thinned to a mist that beads on the glass, and every light in the city smears through it: amber, cyan and magenta, pulled into long wet streaks by our speed. The glass monoliths slide by one after another, so tall I have to press my cheek to the window to see where they end. Most of them don't end. They just disappear into the low orange clouds.

The heater roars at my bare legs. My toes have finally stopped hurting.

Then a face the size of a building turns toward me.

It's a billboard stretched across the whole side of a tower. It's a Monster Siren Records advertisement, glowing so bright it paints the inside of the rover pink. A girl stands in the middle of it with her blonde hair flying, one hand around a microphone and the other reaching out over the street, like she wants to pull the whole city up onto the stage with her. Red-and-black costume. Red ribbons.

Sora.

But not quite.

The ears poking up through her hair are wrong. They aren't long and pale and floppy. They're big and pointed, the same shape as Lisa's. And curling around her legs, flaring out behind her as she spins, is a tail. A long, fluffy one.

I look at the Cautus squished against my left side.

Her long ears are still plastered flat against her wet hair, the red ribbons limp and dripping. Her eyes are closed.

I look back up at the billboard. The Lupo Sora winks at me, twenty floors tall, and slides away behind us.

I look at the Cautus again.

"Sora?"

"Mm?" She cracks one eye open.

"Do you… have a Lupo twin?"

For a second, nothing. Then her peach soda fizzes up, bubbles racing through the tired barley sugar like a shaken bottle.

She lifts one finger and presses it to her lips.

"Secrets~" she sings, and winks. Exactly like the billboard.

I taste her carefully. Peach soda, candied strawberries, the hum of stage lights. No rot anywhere underneath. It isn't a lie.

It's just… a secret.

In the passenger seat, Exusiai's apple cider pops and crackles like she's trying very hard not to laugh. In the rearview mirror, Texas's eyes flick back at us once, then return to the road.

I sink back against the seat, my tail curling into a confused question mark over my lap.

Then I breathe in, and regret it.

The cabin still smells really bad.

With the heater on full, the canal is cooking off all of us. It's in Sora's hair, in Texas's hair, in Exusiai's jacket, in the silt drying grey on my legs, in the water still dripping off the tip of my tail onto the floor mat. Sour and muddy and rotten. Even the cinnamon from the pie box in the footwell has given up fighting it.

I tug the collar of Croissant's jacket up over my nose. It smells like the canal now too. Sorry, Croissant.

At least we're up off the lower plates. My communicator should have signal up here. I should tell mom I'm okay, before anyone else tells her I nearly…

I reach for the bag on my hip.

My fingers find the waistband of my skort. Cold, damp fabric.

Nothing else.

I pat my other hip. My back. My front. No translucent belt. No bag. No pouches. Nothing to lock my Arts Unit onto.

Ice shoots straight up my spine.

"My belt!"

I jolt upright so fast my horn nearly clips Croissant's chin. My tail lashes out and smacks the back of Texas's seat.

"My communicator! My slate!" My voice climbs higher with every word. "And my suppressants! They were all in my pouches!"

This slate is already my third one. Closure made very sure to tell me that when she handed it over.

"Closure is going to kill me if I lost them!"

Beside me, Sora giggles, a tired, bubbly sound that fizzes warm against my shoulder.

"Relax, kid." Croissant doesn't even open her eyes. She jerks a thumb over her shoulder at the rear partition. "Took it off ya back in the alley. It's in the back with the rest of your stuff, bein' air-dried."

Air-dried?

I twist around onto my knees and press my face to the partition window.

In the open cargo bed, the knotted bundle of Texas's jacket is wedged between two sealed crates. My translucent utility belt is looped through the knot, the RHODES ISLAND lettering flashing every time we pass under a streetlight. My bag hangs off it, flapping and slapping against the metal in the wind.

Air-dried is a very generous way to put it.

I sink back down onto the seat.

"Hopefully it survives," I say in a small voice.

Sora tilts her head, one wet ear flopping over her eyes. "The bag is waterproof, no?"

"I think so…"

I picture it. Half of it is clear. Half of it is fabric. I have no idea which half was in charge of keeping the water out.

I hug my Arts Unit tighter against my chest. The misty blue liquid in the crest is still dull with grime, but underneath the dirt it's still swirling, slowly, keeping time with my heartbeat.

At least I didn't lose this one.

Nobody else in the rover shares my panic.

I keep twisting around to check on my belt through the partition window. Every time we hit a bump, the bag jumps and slaps against the metal of the bed, and my tail jumps with it. Every time we take a corner, I'm sure this is the one that throws the whole bundle over the side and into the street.

It never does.

Beside me, Sora keeps resting. Her head has slid down onto my shoulder, one damp ear draped over my collar, and her breathing has gone slow and even.

On my other side, Croissant's iron vault and warm pastry have gone heavy and content, like a bakery after closing. Her arms are crossed. I think she's asleep too.

Texas drives. Her chilled air and dark chocolate don't shift once.

And Exusiai keeps pointing at the sights.

"Oh! That's the best hotpot in the district! Well, the second best. Texas won't let me go to the best one anymore."

"You know why," Texas says.

"And over there, the tower with the gold roof! There's a bank on the top floor, and you have to take three elevators just to get to it!" Her finger swings to the other window. "And that noodle stall! Their wontons are huge, Lethe. Huge!"

I try to look where she points. I really do. But the city slides past too fast: steaming food stalls tucked under the overpasses, rows of tiny shops with their shutters half down, glowing signs in sharp Lungmenite characters I can't read. Every time I turn my head toward whatever she's pointing at, it's already gone, and she's pointing at something else.

Slowly, the neon thins out.

The shops turn into long, blank walls. The streetlights get further and further apart, until the only light comes from a few buzzing sodium lamps on tall poles, turning the wet asphalt a dull, sickly orange. Shipping containers are stacked three and four high along the road. A crane stands frozen against the clouds, its hook hanging over nothing.

Texas turns into a narrow lane between two rows of warehouses and pulls up in front of the last one.

It looks exactly like every other building on the street. Corrugated metal walls. A big roller shutter streaked with rust. A small steel door beside it, and above the door, a faded sign for some company whose name has peeled away.

The engine cuts. The heater dies with it, and the cold starts creeping back into my bare toes almost at once.

"We are here," Texas says.

I stare out the windshield.

"In a warehouse?"

The last time Penguin Logistics and a warehouse came up in the same story, it was mom telling me how I ended up in a crate halfway to Siracusa. My tail curls around my ankle.

"It is a safehouse, kid." Texas unbuckles her seatbelt. "It is supposed to look like a warehouse."

Exusiai is already out of the rover. She skips over to the small steel door, taps something into a keypad hidden behind a rusted panel, and hauls the door open with both hands.

Behind it is pure black.

She leans inside. Her halo is the only light, a soft white ring that barely reaches past her own shoulders. I watch her head turn left, then right, then left again, one hand patting blindly along the wall.

"Hmm." Her voice echoes back from somewhere big and empty. "Where is that light switch?"

"Over on the right," Sora says.

She hasn't lifted her head off my shoulder. Her eyes are still closed.

With a click, the lights come on.

Somewhere deep inside, a row of fluorescent tubes stutters awake one after another, buzzing and flickering, then settles into a flat white glow that spills out through the open door and across the wet asphalt.

"Found it!" Exusiai calls.

Sora finally lifts her head off my shoulder.

We all leave the rover.

The concrete bites my bare feet the second they touch it, cold and wet and gritty. I hug my Arts Unit and hop across the puddles on my toes, and duck inside after Exusiai.

Behind me, Croissant hauls the sodden bundle out of the cargo bed and heaves it over her shoulder. The end of my belt dangles out of the knot, swinging with every step. Texas comes last with the two bakery boxes stacked in her hands. She kicks the steel door shut behind her.

I look around.

The ceiling is so high the lights barely reach it, and rusted steel beams cross it from wall to wall. The floor is bare concrete with faded yellow lines painted across it. Crates and containers are stacked along the walls in no particular order. Some are sealed, some are pried open, and a few have a tiny pill-shaped logo stenciled in one corner. Near the middle stand a folding table, a handful of mismatched chairs and a sagging old sofa that looks like it has survived more than one shootout.

It's sparse. It's cold. It echoes.

But it's dry.

Croissant dumps the wet bundle onto a crate with a thick, squelching thud. My eyes follow it. My belt slides off the edge and hangs there, dripping onto the floor.

Texas sets the bakery boxes on the folding table. Exusiai immediately moves them to the exact middle of it. Then she points at a door far off in the back wall.

"The bath is in there."

She spins around to face us, hands on her hips, her cider fizzing with deadly seriousness.

"So. The most important question." She pauses. "Who goes first?"

Silence.

Five people look at each other.

"We could go two at a time," Croissant says, rubbing her bare arms. "Water heater in this place ain't built for five rounds. Last one in's gettin' a cold one."

"Eh?"

Two at a time?

My tail tucks itself behind my calves. I think about the bathroom in my dorm, small and white, with only enough room for one person. The shower this morning. Every shower I can remember, it's just been me.

Then I look at the others. Texas's hair is still dripping. Exusiai's jacket is still soaked through. She and Texas went into that canal after me, and Croissant has been standing around in her undershirt this whole time because her jacket is on me.

"I… okay," I say quietly.

Sora's barley sugar softens around me. She tilts her head, and one damp ear flops over.

"If you are not comfortable, Lethe, you can go first," she says gently. "On your own."

"No… I don't…" I tug the sleeves of Croissant's jacket down over my hands. "I just never did…"

At least, I don't remember ever doing it. For me, that's the same thing.

Sora doesn't make me finish. She just smiles, takes my hand and pulls me across the concrete toward the far door.

"You can borrow my clothes too," she says. "I keep a spare set here. Everyone else's would be a bit too big for you."

I glance back over my shoulder. Croissant's broad shoulders. Texas's height. Exusiai's long legs. I picture myself drowning in one of their shirts, the sleeves swallowing my arms, the hem hanging down past my knees.

She has a point.

"Okie…"

Behind us, Exusiai's voice rings out across the warehouse.

"Nobody touches the pie until everyone's done!"

The bathroom is the one part of the safehouse that doesn't look like a warehouse.

The tiles are white and clean, the grout scrubbed, and the mirror above the sink is polished without a single water spot. Fluffy towels sit folded on a rack. Against the far wall, taking up almost half the room, is a full bathtub, deep and white and big enough to lie down in.

A row of bottles lines its edge. Shampoos, conditioners, and a pink one with a strawberry on the label.

It's surprisingly well kept.

I lean my Arts Unit in the corner by the door, where I can still see it.

We don't take long. The others are waiting, and the water heater is on a clock.

Sora reaches for the hot tap first. I catch her wrist before she can turn it all the way.

"Not too hot… my horns."

"Oh! Sorry!" She dials it back to warm, her ears drooping.

It's still enough. It chases the chill out of my fingers and the canal out of everything else. Sora chatters enough for both of us, about the bakery where Exusiai buys her pies and a song she can't get out of her head, and somewhere in the middle of it I forget to be shy.

When we climb out, the whole room is warm and foggy, and for the first time since the canal I smell like soap instead of rot.

Sora wraps herself in a towel, perches on the edge of the tub and dries her hair with a small hairdryer from the cabinet. She's quick about it, flipping her ears forward to get underneath them and running her fingers through the blonde strands until they're fluffy and straight again. It takes her only a few minutes.

Then she clicks it off and holds it out to me.

"Uhm… thanks."

I take it, pull my towel tighter around myself, and step up to the mirror. I wipe a clear stripe through the fog with my palm.

The girl looking back at me has grey hair plastered flat against her head and horns, dripping down her back.

Okay. I've watched mom do this every morning. I can do it.

First, the towel. Mom always does this part gently, working the damp strands around my horns a little at a time. I scrub at my head. My hair immediately wraps itself around the base of my left horn and knots there.

I untangle it. It takes a while.

Then the dryer. I click it on and it roars at me, much louder than when Sora was using it. I aim it at my head, and my fringe blows straight up into the air. I tilt it the other way, and all my hair whips around into my face and into my mouth.

"Pfft—"

I hold it further back, and now it isn't doing anything. I hold it closer, and the hot air hits the base of my horn.

"Ouchie!"

And my arms. I forgot about my arms. After Ms. Dobermann's conditioning, just holding the dryer above my head makes my shoulders burn, and I have to keep switching hands. My tail lashes and smacks the cabinet door.

Behind me, Sora's peach soda fizzes. She's pressing her lips together very hard.

I look in the mirror.

My hair is half-dry and sticking out in every direction. My fringe is swept to the wrong side, and one damp clump is still stuck to my horn.

Mom does this in two minutes. Every morning. She makes it look like nothing at all.

I didn't know it was hard.

Sora hops off the edge of the tub, still smiling, and tightens her towel.

"I will get you clothes, Lethe. Just wait here."

She slips out, and the door clicks shut behind her.

A few minutes later, peach soda seeps in under the door a moment before the handle turns.

Behind it, I can hear Exusiai and Croissant arguing about who gets the bath next.

Sora slips back inside and shuts the door on them.

She has already changed. The stage outfit is gone, swapped for a big, soft black hoodie with the sleeves pushed up to her elbows and a pair of loose grey shorts.

She looks like a completely different person from the girl on the billboard. Smaller. Sleepier.

"Well." She tugs the front of her hoodie out so I can see the white logo printed across the chest. "This is MSR merch."

Then she hands me a folded bundle: an identical black hoodie with the same white logo, on top of a pair of grey shorts.

I look at the hoodie. Then at hers.

"The shorts are mine," Sora says, glancing down at my tail, which is curled around my ankle, the spade still damp. "Hopefully your tail fits, Lethe. If not, I will go get Texas's."

I try to picture my tail squeezing through a hole meant for a Cautus. Then I try to picture Texas's shorts on me, hanging off my hips.

"Okay…" I say. "I'll try."

Then she holds out her other hand, palm up.

Draped across it is a ribbon, long and white and satiny, the same kind as her red ones, folded neatly in half.

"If you want to tie your hair," she says.

I dress quickly. The cold is already creeping in under the bathroom door.

Sora turns to face the bathtub and starts humming again.

The hoodie goes on first. I work the neck hole carefully over my horns, one side and then the other, the way I do with my kitten hoodie back home, and pull it down.

It's a little big on me, the same way Sora's is a little big on her, and the sleeves fall past my knuckles.

Then the shorts.

I step into them, pull them up, and run straight into the problem. The tail hole is a neat little circle, cut for a round, fluffy Cautus puff.

I reach behind me, fold the edges of the spade in with my fingers, and push. It doesn't want to go. I push harder. The fabric stretches and the elastic creaks, and then the tip squeezes through with a small, undignified pop.

My tail swishes free behind me. The shorts stay up.

"Okay?" Sora asks the bathtub.

"Okay," I say.

The ribbon is still folded on the edge of the sink. I pick it up and turn back to the mirror. The fog has crept back over the stripe I wiped earlier, so I clear it again with my sleeve.

Hibiscus did the first one, in front of the tall mirror in Closure's store, the day I left the medical ward. I asked her for my birth mother's hairstyle, and she gathered it all up in one go and said "There, done!" like it was nothing.

Mom has done it every morning since.

I can do it.

I reach back with both hands and gather my hair at the nape of my neck. Half of it comes with me. The other half slides out between my fingers and falls back over my shoulders. I try again. This time I get most of it, but my fringe comes too, dragged backward off my forehead. I let go and start over.

My shoulders start burning almost straight away. I hold the bunch of hair with one hand and try to wind the ribbon around it with the other. It slips, and I have to catch the end between my teeth.

Behind me, the humming stops for a second. Then, very carefully, it starts again.

Around once. Around twice. A knot. A loop, then another loop. I pull them tight.

"There!"

I lower my arms, shake out my shoulders, and turn my head to look.

The bow sits crooked at my nape. One loop is bigger than the other and flops toward my left shoulder. The two tails hang at different lengths, a few grey strands have escaped at the sides, and the whole ponytail sits higher than where mom ties it.

It's lopsided.

"Well… looks good enough…" I sigh.

Sora finally turns around. She looks at the bow for a long moment. She reaches out and tucks one escaped strand back behind my horn.

"Good enough for tonight," Sora says. "Come, let's not hog the bath."

I pick up my Arts Unit from the corner by the door. The moment my hand closes around the grip, everything around me goes soft at the edges.

I gather up Croissant's jacket from the floor too, folding it over my arm as neatly as I can.

Sora opens the door, and the cold of the warehouse rushes in to meet the steam.

Exusiai is right there, one hand raised like she was about to knock. Her carbonated apple cider bursts over us, all impatience, cinnamon sugar popping on a hot pan. Texas stands a step behind her with a towel over one shoulder and her hair still damp at the ends.

We shuffle out sideways as they step in.

"Save some warm water for me!" Croissant calls from the sofa. She's still in her undershirt with her arms crossed tight over her chest.

"Yeah, yeah, don't worry!" Exusiai waves over her shoulder without looking back.

"We will," Texas says.

The door shuts. A second later the pipes in the wall shudder, and somewhere above us the water heater groans awake.

Croissant does not look convinced.

I pad over and hold out her jacket.

"Thank you, Croissant… Sorry. It smells like the canal now."

She takes it, sniffs once, and winces. Then she drapes it over the crate with everything else.

"Eh. It'll wash, kid."

My belt is still hanging off the edge of that crate, where it slid when Croissant dropped the bundle. It has stopped dripping. The little puddle underneath has dried into a ring of grey silt on the concrete.

I cross the floor on my toes.

I find my bag. It is mostly dry by now. The fabric half is still cool and a little damp under my fingers, and the clear half is fogged over on the outside, streaked with dried river water. I unclip it, then the two medical pouches for good measure. The suppressants inside are sealed and dry.

I carry everything back to the sofa and sit down with Sora.

The sofa sags so much that we both slide toward the middle, and her shoulder bumps into mine. Sora pulls her knees up under her hoodie and tucks her feet in, and after a second I do the same.

I lay my Arts Unit across my lap, hold my breath, and unzip the bag.

I pull out my communicator and my slate and turn them over in my hands.

They're dry.

My tail uncurls a little against the cushion.

I tap the communicator.

For one long second, nothing happens.

Then the screen turns on, white and bright in the dim warehouse, and lights up the front of my borrowed hoodie.

It works.

I look up, and I stare at the apple pie.

The white bakery box sits exactly where Exusiai left it, in the dead center of the folding table, a little crumpled at one corner, with the smaller box of pineapple buns tied up beside it. Now that I smell like soap instead of the canal, I can finally smell the pie again. Butter. Caramelized apple. Cinnamon, slipping out from under the lid and drifting across the table to the sofa.

My stomach makes a noise.

The pie has my name on it. I'm sure of it.

I drag my eyes back down to the communicator. I need something else to think about. Anything else.

The screen is a wall of notifications.

Lisa wants to know if the pie is good. Eleanor wants to know what Lungmen looks like. Podenco has sent a single question mark and nothing else.

I quickly message everyone to let them know I am still safe.

Lisa, Podenco, Lena, Adele, Eleanor, Susie. It's the same thing to each of them, more or less. Still safe. Still in one piece. No, I haven't had the pie yet.

[Lethe]: Ms. Skyfire, I am still safe. Please don't set anything on fire.

I don't tell them about the canal.

Mom's thread is last.

I type. I delete it. I type again.

[Lethe]: Mom, I am still safe. The Penguins showed me the really tall buildings. One of them has a bank on the top floor.
[Lethe]: There is… a lot to see in Lungmen.

It isn't a lie. It just isn't all of it.

The read receipt appears almost at once.

[Caladria]: I'm glad, Lita. Stay close to them, and eat something proper.

I glance at the pie. It's proper. Probably.

Then Amiya.

[Lethe]: Still safe, Amiya. We are at the Penguins' safehouse now.

The read receipt comes up.

I pause, my thumb hovering over the keyboard.

Behind the bathroom door the pipes are rattling, and Exusiai is singing one of Sora's songs, loudly and mostly in the wrong key. Sora winces in her rest. Across the room, Croissant sits on a crate by the table with her arms crossed, glaring at the door.

I type.

[Lethe]: Amiya, the refugees.

The read receipt appears. Three dots show up, disappear, then show up again.

[Amiya]: Lita…

I know that pause. Mom does it. Lena does it. Hibiscus did it every day in the ward. It's the pause before someone tells me something they wish they didn't have to.

[Lethe]: Tell me.

This time the dots take a long time.

[Amiya]: Because of the riot at the checkpoint… there were casualties.
[Amiya]: Lungmen refused to take them in. We have sent a relief team to set up temporary campsites outside the border.

I read it again, and then again.

Casualties…

The smell of the pie is still drifting across the table. Butter. Cinnamon. Now it only turns my stomach.

"The crowd is pinnin' down their response!" Croissant had shouted. "Step on it!"

And we did.

Did… we…

The pipes stop rattling.

My slate’s screen dims, and I tap it awake again. Then again. Hoping the words might be different next time.

They don’t change.

The bathroom door swings open.

Exusiai comes out right behind it in dry clothes, her red hair damp, her halo bright. She makes a beeline for the folding table.

Texas follows with a towel over her head, still drying her hair with slow, even strokes.

"Croissant. Your turn."

"'Bout time." Croissant pushes herself up off the crate and rolls her stiff shoulders, already heading for the door.

My hands have found the slate in my lap, and I squeeze it so hard the edges of the casing bite into my palm.

The shoulder against mine shifts.

"Lethe?" Sora asks.

She lifts her head, and one ear flops against my cheek.

I open my mouth. Nothing comes out.

"I…"

My voice cracks. I try again.

"We…"

"We killed people…”

I look up.

Croissant freezes mid step.

One boot is on the painted yellow line, halfway to the bathroom door.

Beside me, Sora's peach soda goes very still.

She looks straight at me, at my face, at the devices clutched in my hand. Then she turns her head, slowly, and looks past me at Exusiai and Texas.