38 - TYSE

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

T he out-city politician Stayn asked me to follow leaves just after lunch, so I get off early. I'm just about to shove my city-issued patrol phone through the little gap under the glass in logistics when a text buzzes in. I hold up a finger for the clerk. "One sec." Then I take the phone back and check the message.

It's from Stayn. See you tonight .

Tonight?

I shove the phone back through check-in, sign my name, and then go find Stayn to see what the hell he's talking about.

Logistics is in the basement because of security, and Stayn is a top-floor kind of guy these days, so I have to ride the elevator all the way up to the seventy-fourth floor of the skyscraper to see him. But I haven't ever been to his office, so stepping out facing those western floor-to-ceiling windows is kinda worth the trouble.

Fucking hell. So this is why guys do it. The view.

I turn away, make my way to reception, then wait as I'm announced, then directed through a buzzing door and told to turn left.

I find Stayn behind not one, but two sets of double doors, at the end of the hall. His office is… well, let's just say my room could fit in here ten times, easily.

Stayn gets up from his desk when I'm let in. "Well. I wasn't expecting to see you up here. Ever."

I grin, get a little lost in his eastern view on the opposite side of the office, then turn back to him, my gawking under control. "I got your message as I was turning in my phone. I thought the job was done."

"It is."

"So… why are you expecting to see me tonight?"

He laughs, claps me on the back, and points to his bar. "Do you want a drink?"

"No. Just an explanation."

"You got big plans tonight, or what? Because you said raincheck on dinner last week, remember?"

"Oh, shit. I forgot. Did we say that was tonight?"

"We didn't. But you're already in town. And now that you're here, you might as well come home with me. I'll leave early. We can go now. Janice and the girls are dying to see you again. It's been months since you've come by."

"Ah, I can't, Stayn."

His face furrows up into confusion, but then he turns to make me a drink I don't want. "Why the hell not?"

"I've got… well, I got a girl. Waitin' at home."

"What?" He actually spills some of the drink when he turns around to face me again. "You… you're… in some kind of… relationship?"

"Are you surprised?"

He bursts out laughing. "Oh, my god. You're in a relationship. When did this happen? Who is this woman? Better question"—he points at me with the drink—"why is she dating you?"

I don't have a backstory prepared for Clara, so I have to make up something general on the spot. "She's one of those vagabond girls. A traveler. Just came in from…" I falter here. "I don't know. One of the median cities."

"And you found her… how?" He's not suspicious. It's genuine curiosity. Because he's never seen me with a woman. Well, not one I'd take home.

"We bumped into each other last weekend."

"Last weekend? Things are moving fast if she's living at your place."

"It's a temporary thing. She's outta here in a couple days. That's why I can't come tonight. Maybe next week, when she's gone."

Stayn claps me on the back again. And he might be wearing the widest smile I've ever seen. "Well, you just bring her along."

"Oh—"

"No." He shakes his head. "No. Janice will not forgive me if I don't make you come. You're coming. Seven. You've got plenty of time, so… don't forget to take a shower. And here. Your drink."

I want to protest, but… it might be fun to take Clara over there. Stayn, regardless of his sell-out political job, is a friend. And his family is big, and good, and his home is one of the few places where I feel comfortable outside the tower. So I give in, take the drink, down it, and leave.

All the way down to the ground floor I picture this night. Clara and me sitting in Stayn's dining room. The walk there, the walk home. The sudden realization that this is a date. And not only that, it's a good date. A good second introduction for us. One that paints me in a slightly better picture, if only because of the company I keep.

By the time I get up all the steps and I'm pulling my door open, it's nearly four. But I'm still a couple hours early, so I walk in on a party.

A tea party, to be exact.

Clara, who is sitting on a velvet cushion that was not here this morning, jumps up from the little coffee table, turning to me with a smile. "You're home! We weren't expecting you."

This is when I notice that Anneeta is also sitting on a velvet cushion at the little coffee table. "What is going on here?"

Clara points to the table. "This, my good sir, is a proper tea party. You see, I"—she places a hand across her chest—"have hosted at least a hundred of these fuckers over the last decade. And I wanted to make sure that our little friend here has a better perspective of what an actual tea party looks like."

"We got finger sandwiches, Tyse! Do you want one?"

The whole table is set for high tea. Like… I actually feel like I'm back in the Delta god's tower, being served tea as I wait for punishment because that's the kind of asshole god he was. He'd soften ya all up with cucumber sandwiches and get ya all loose with hot tea as the scent of lavender lingers from the fresh flower arrangements. So then, when he appeared for your little ‘talk,' you think he's a good guy. But he's not. He's always been an asshole. And you only make this mistake once. The next time you're there, you don't even look at the tea.

But this Clara's tea party and it's… delightful. Just like her.

Nothing in the tea set matches. Not the plates, not the pot, not the cups. All the little spoons are every different kind of metal and almost everything is chipped. But the table is dressed up with a yellow cloth that matches the rug, which matches the curtains, which matches the throw pillows.

And she's wearing… "Oh, my god, what are you wearing?"

"Do you like it?" She spins for me. "This is the dress Rodge gave me." She pauses to think here. "Or maybe it was Prisha? I'm not sure, but I love it. And it's perfect for tea. Don't you think it's perfect?"

Not only is it perfect for tea, it's perfect for dinner. I was a little worried about Clara showing up in jeans and boots. But this dress works. It's a light green color and… well… not slutty. "It's perfect. In many ways. Because I've got us a dinner invitation tonight."

I'm expecting her to balk at this dinner. Most girls I've dated in the past—if you could call it dating—would not be the least bit interested in having dinner with the patrol chief of Tau City.

But up-city Clara Birch was made for dinner parties. And she's all smiles when this invitation comes out. "Really!" She presses her hands together and sighs. "Oh, I can't wait. I was starting to feel a little—" But she stops mid-sentence and suddenly remembers we're not the only ones in the room. She looks over her shoulder at Anneeta.

Anneeta looks crushed . Even I can see this and I'm no expert interpreting the moods of little girls.

Clara steps in to mitigate. "It is OK with you, Anneeta? If we go to dinner in the city tonight? I'll bring you something back. Something very sweet or something very pretty. Your choice."

Anneeta goes into a full-on pout mode now, crossing her arms and everything. "What about these sweets?" She points to the little cookies stacked perfectly on a tarnished three-tiered silver tray. "And the sandwiches."

"We can have another party tomorrow," I say. "We'll have it out on the ruin steps and everything."

Anneeta makes a face at me. "They'll be soggy by tomorrow, Tyse."

Clara intervenes. "We'll get new sandwiches and sweets, of course. And I'll pack these up so you can take them with you and they won't go to waste."

"How's that sound?" I ask. "Fair trade?"

Anneeta huffs. "I guess ." But she is not happy about it.

Clara takes over, packing up the food and putting it back into a very fancy box that came from the city via runner, while Anneeta starts dumping tea out into the sink. It's real tea, too. I can smell it. I bet Clara got it hot with her spark. And I kinda wish I was here to see that.

Finally, after several minutes of bustling about, everything is packed up and Anneeta is sent on her way with promises of tomorrow.

Clara shuts the door, then turns to face me as she presses her back against it. "Hi."

"Hi, yourself."

"Did you have a good day at work?"

I shrug. "It was… whatever. Good news, though. The job is over. So I won't be gettin' up early to go into the city tomorrow."

"You can sleep in then?" She walks over to me, then takes a seat on the bed.

"Sleep? Sure." I smile at her.

She points at me. "I missed you today."

My eyebrows shoot up. "You did?"

"I did. I feel like you're a tea-party kind of man."

I just laugh. Then I get up and start taking off my battle belt. "I'm gonna jump in the shower. Could you…"

"Stand nearby and heat the water for you?" She's got a wild grin on her face. And if we had gotten past this preliminary point already, I'd just attack her right now. Throw her down on that bed and make her squeal.

But… we're not there yet. So I just shrug. "If you don't mind."

She gets up, walks over to the shower, turns the water on, and then turns her back to me. "Hurry up then, get in."

I strip and do as I'm told. But the whole time I'm washing up, I'm staring at her cyan-blue hand, a little bit mesmerized by the swirls of patterns on her skin. They're pulsating tonight. Like they've got energy to burn.

"So tell me about these people we're having dinner with?"

"Stayn is a friend."

"This is the one who sent you to find me down in the lower levels?"

"Yes. He's the patrol chief. He's got a nice family, though. A wife and three daughters."

"You know them well?"

"Yes. I've spent the holidays with them every year since I arrived in Tau City. And odd dinners in between. Like this one. This is actually my payment for going to find you. He promised me a dinner."

"And that's the one you forgot about because I was in the health center?"

"Yes." I'm done now, so I turn the water off. By the time I open the curtain and pull a towel off the shelf, she's already walking away.

I don't go out wet. Instead, I dress. I don't wear fancy clothes. I don't even own fancy clothes. But I've a lot to choose from because apparently someone did laundry while I was at work. I already know that Rodge is billing me for all these expenses, but I ask anyway. Just to see if she's figured it out. "You did laundry?"

"Oh, yeah. You don't mind, right? Prisha came down and asked for it. She said she was gonna put it in with another load."

I'm not sure what to make of this answer. So I pull a shirt on and go back out to the main room. "How are we paying for it?"

"Oh, she said it was a gift from Rodge."

I grab my boots and sit down on the chair. "Why the hell is he giving us free laundry services?"

Clara doesn't seem to understand how dear this service is. Because she just shrugs and changes the subject. "Should I change? Or is this dress good?"

"It's good." I smile at her. "But I told him you're a vagabond girl. So maybe add some layers. Like Anneeta dresses. To make it all eccentric and shit."

"A vagabond girl?" She tilts her head at me.

"Yeah." But this one word comes out with a really big, stupid grin. Because she's so damn delightful. "It's a term we use to describe… free-spirts of the female persuasion. Girls who like to travel and have experiences instead of settling down with a man."

Clara turns to her little chest of drawers and takes out some very long, beige-colored socks. She sits on the bed and starts rolling them up her legs, all the way over her knees. "Hmm. Travel wasn't a thing where I come from. How will I make conversation? What should I talk about?"

"Just make it up."

"But how? I haven't been anywhere."

"Neither have they. They're all born in Tau City. Tau City is a place you go, it's not a place you leave. Everyone wants to live here. They don't travel much. But if you're worried about it, talk about the traditional cities. The closed ones with strict gods. Like Zeta and Rho. When we get into the Canal District, I'll get a phone and you can look at some pics to get an idea. Just… whatever you do, do not light up with spark."

"They've never been to those cities?"

"No. You need permits."

"So how the hell did I get there?"

"You were born there, of course."

"OK." She shrugs and reaches for her boots. "All right. If you're not worried about it, I'm not worried about it."

Right on the edge of the Ruin District is a whole slew of shops that cater to the tower people. There are lots of quick food places, coffeeshops, and laundromats—that run off real power, not spark, so they are super cheap. And every single one of these places sells phones.

So as soon as we leave the Ruin District, I stop at the first shop and get one for each of us. Then I program our numbers, call her phone, and give my number a name.

"Look." I hold Clara's phone out to her. "This is the keypad, this is the menu, and this is where you can search for things." I do a search for traditional god cities and pull up some images. Then hand her the phone. "There. Now you can get an idea of what they look like."

Clara blinks at me, stunned. "You can ask it anything? Anything at all? And it will just give you answers?"

"Yes. Pretty much, anyway. You always need to take into consideration that each city has its own info rules."

"What does that mean?"

"They scrub the databases of things they don't want you to know. But I don't think the traditional cities will be a problem."

"OK." She nods her head with resolve. "I will study as we walk so I can be the perfect dinner date." Then she hooks her hand into my elbow—an old-fashioned gesture that actually lends credence to the idea that she's from a traditional god city—and looks intently at the phone as we walk.

She reminds me so much of Anneeta tonight, it's crazy. Because after only two days of hanging out together, Clara has adopted Anneeta's eccentric style. She's wearing her new green dress from Rodge, but she's layered it with a long-sleeve brown Henley that kinda matches her thigh-high brown socks. Not stockings, socks . Made of cotton and ribbed. And she's not wearing sexy high-heeled boots like the city girls, but the combat ones I got her when she was at the health center. Her jacket is something from the lost and found and resembles mine, but olive green instead of black. It's cropped at the waist and covered in flower patches instead of deployment badges. She's even got her hair piled up into something that falls between a plait and a bun. It's very messy, but in all the right ways.

She is a textbook description of a vagabond girl and the whole fuckin' look is sexy.

Maybe too sexy? Is it too sexy? This is when I notice that everyone we pass on the sidewalk is looking at her. Not casually, either. I feel like the women are memorizing her style so they can copy it tomorrow, but the men will definitely be undressing her in their minds tonight.

Stayn's girls are gonna love her.

"OK." Clara looks up at me. "There are two cities to choose from. Zeta and Rho. Which one am I from?"

"I'd go with Zeta. No news gets out of that place. It's zipped up tight."

"Well, how did I get out?"

"It's not a prison. You just left."

"Do many people do that?"

"No. But vagabond girls come from all over. So you got on a train for an adventure. You'll go back one day. Probably. But you're young and enjoying your youth."

"So why did I stop here?"

"You ran out of money and you're using me for my pension."

She laughs, leaning into me a little. "Tyse Saarinen, you make me happy."

For some stupid reason, and even though the night is very cold, a warm feeling floods my body. I smile, looking down at her. "Well, I would like to go on record that you, up-city Clara Birch, are a complete delight."

She leans into me again, hugging my arm a little. But she doesn't say anything else. And though the rest of the walk over to Stayn's house on the banks of the main canal is silent, it's the perfect kind of silence. Filled with moments that are neither too empty nor too full.

"Wow." Clara is looking up at Stayn's canal-front house in complete awe. "I've never seen such a building in my life. This is a house, you say?"

"Yes."

"One family lives here?"

"Yep. And it is over the top, but in Stayn's defense, he is the chief of patrol. It's a very big deal. There are literally fifty thousand men under him. He's like the general of his own private army."

"He's in charge of the Canal District?"

"No, the whole city."

"Hmm. It sounds dangerous to give someone so much power. In my city there was a head of each district and they were like… you know, powerful, and rich, and stuff. Like Finn—he could command a lot of people, but not the heads of other districts. And he had no say whatsoever in the Maiden District."

"Well. Power, when not checked on a regular basis, flows up. Not down."

"I'm not sure I know what that means."

"It means… it consolidates, ya know? Away from the people in general and towards heads of departments, like Stayn."

"Is he a good guy? Or a bad guy?"

I'm slightly ashamed to admit that I have to think about this for a moment. "Well, he's my friend, so I like him. But if he wasn't, and all I saw was the power play and the politics, I would definitely consider him a bad guy."

"That's a good note. I will keep it in mind when I mingle."

"I get the feeling dinner parties are second nature to you."

"Oh, Tyse. I'm in my element here. I am so ready to go in there and compliment strangers while eating canapés, drinking champagne, and enjoying this evening to the fullest." She pauses and looks up at me. "You do have canapés here, right?"

"If you mean gross-looking finger foods made of crackers, paste, and cheese on silver plates, then yes."

She nods and lets out a breath. "I'm going to eat one of everything."

We go to the door and ring the bell. It opens almost immediately, and then Janice, Stayn's wife, is there in her fancy dress, and her perfect hair and makeup, and her lipsticked mouth moving a mile a minute as she greets us warmly and ushers us inside.

There is a whirlwind here filled with teenage girls in frilly dresses, and politicians with their arm-candy wives, and even a couple of dogs that are way too big to be house pets, but since when did rules ever stop rich people from doing impractical things?

Coats are taken, I feel very underdressed next to the power players in coats and ties, and Clara morphs into a Spark Maiden—minus the spark—right before my very eyes. Her smile is big, her voice is soothing, her eyes are bright, and she even leans in and lightly touches people on the arm when she speaks to them. Like everyone in this room is an old friend.

She is at home, to say the least. Like she has attended thousands of dinner parties in alternate dimensions and this one, at the Tau City patrol chief's home, is no particular big deal.

We are separated, as is the way of things. It's just… I've never come to dinner here with a date before, so I never noticed how weird it is that men are ushered into Stayn's office, while the women gather in the living room.

Cigars are passed out. I sit on a tufted leather couch and then exhale smoke as I accept a glass of brandy on the rocks from Stayn. He takes the chair to my right and immediately, the conversation turns to Clara.

"So. Where the hell did you kidnap this one from?"

"Is that an insult? Are you insinuating that she is too good for me?"

Stayn laughs. "Brother, she is…" He decides to stop here so he can choose his words carefully. " Delightful ."

I raise my glass in his direction and we do a mock ‘cheers.' "She is, isn't she."

"Keep this one. You're gonna keep her, right?"

I just smile over my glass as I take a drink.

"OK, OK," a rotund, older man says as he approaches us. "Enough about your man's woman, Stayn. I only came to one of your stuffy parties to discuss the Looking Glass. What news, friend?"

"What's that?" I ask Stayn.

Stayn ignores me. "Not tonight, Richard. This is not a business meeting. I told you that. It's a dinner party. Janice will kill me if we start talking about work at the table."

"All the better to do it now," the portly man says.

"What's a Looking Glass?" I ask again.

For a moment I'm sure that Stayn is gonna blow me off. But he gives me a side-eye instead. Like he's reconsidering. "Well, if I tell you, you have to keep it secret."

The big guy takes a chair to Stayn's right and sits. "I thought you said the man was an augment?"

I shrug. "I am. But I have no idea what we're talking about."

"As an augment, you've seen this stuff. Hasn't he, Stayn? He's the reason I'm here. You told me he has information about this kind of thing."

I look at Stayn again, this time with suspicion. "What the hell is all this about? You invited me under false pretenses?"

"No. Well…" Stayn smiles. "Not originally. It was payment, remember? For the disturbance in the tower."

"Right. And now it's what?" I'm getting a really bad feeling about this. Because while I do not know what a Looking Glass is, after what happened with Clara, I can take a good guess.

"Yes, let's talk about that disturbance, young man."

I direct my gaze to the older guy, then look around and realize every man in this room is watching us. Waiting for whatever comes next. Like I've got answers and they're gonna get them out of me. I look back at Stayn. "What's going on?"

"That disturbance," Stayn says. "It was…"

"A vagrant. I told you that. There was a party down there and someone got left behind."

"Right. Well, here's the thing, Tyse." Stayn actually sits on the edge of his seat, leaning towards me, like this is some kind of secret, when obviously it's not. "After analyzing the vibrational fingerprint of said disturbance?—"

"Just spit it out, Chief!" the old man interrupts. "It matched the signature of a Spark Maiden from Dimension 702. And we weren't expecting another delivery for three more months. So we need you to be real specific about what you found down there in the tower, son."

I can't even speak. I can't even come to terms with the fact that this fucker just used the words ‘Spark Maiden,' let alone the fact that they have… ordered one? In the past? And have one… what? On hold? For the future?

Also, in the back of my mind, I'm processing the reality that I just brought said Spark Maiden to dinner with them.

And this is when it occurs to me that we might not actually make it out of here.

One thing. One slip-up. One little spark.

That's all it takes.

And it's over.

Me and Clara. The overlay, my augments, and Anneeta.

It's all over.

A human man would panic here . Unless he was highly trained in stress warfare, he would not be able to react appropriately.

But I'm not really human. And the moment the panic begins, it also ends. Because my augments kick in. Stayn sees it. Hell, everyone sees it. Because, of course, there's a blue light in my eyes to indicate that I've been turned on .

All of them gasp, even Stayn. And then the three of us who were sitting are now standing.

"Are… you OK, Tyse?" There's not just suspicion in Stayn's voice now, there's a hint of alarm.

"I thought you said he was decommissioned? What the hell is going on here?" The old man is about to overreact.

So I play it all down with a smile. "That's a good question." But then I look straight at Stayn. "What is going on here?"

He repeats the old man's concern. "You… were decommissioned, right? I mean, that's why they discharged you, right?"

"Of course."

"Then what is happening inside that head of yours, Tyse? Because from this side of things, you look very much like an operating augment. And you know as well as I do that all operating augments have to be registered as non-human active warfare weapons."

I sigh, then set my drink down on a side table. I can feel the augments dial back, but they don't completely turn off. There's an internal overlay now with a few stats, but nothing else. I look at Stayn, then all of the men in the room. They don't look frightened anymore, they just look like they want to lock me up somewhere in a lab and never let me see the light of day again.

The smile is fake, but warm. "Well, I see that a lesson in augmentation is in order here. As you know, we are chosen as kids and the process starts when we're about fourteen. My brain isn't entirely human anymore. The augments can never be removed, as I'm sure you've heard. Nor can they actually be turned off."

The room is suddenly filled with murmuring.

"That's not what your discharge spectra said."

I meet Stayn's gaze. "It was part of my deal. New name, pension, and official ‘off' status. But before you guys all overreact, they don't work. They haven't really worked since I was like nineteen. It took a few years for it to really show, but they don't work, Stayn. They're there, and sometimes they flash a little blue light, but there's nothing happening inside my brain as far as the augments go."

"Why should we trust you?" This comes from some guy I was introduced to, but can't recall his name. "You could just be lying."

"I could. But do you really think Sweep would let me out if I still worked ?"

There's mumbling now. But they can't deny this. There is no way in hell Sweep would discharge me if my augments were functioning.

"You have something on them," Stayn says. "What is it?"

"What makes you think that?"

"Come on, Tyse. Don't bullshit me. A new name, a pension, and official ‘off' status? It's the definition of a fresh start. You know something. Something they want you to keep quiet. But more than that, you know something so big, they can't just kill you to keep it secret. There's some… dead-man's switch, or something. And ya know, what? Good for you. If you found a way to use this information to keep yourself alive, total respect for that. I don't care. But I want to know what you know. What is it?"

They're looking for something. Something I don't have any actual knowledge of. Stayn is right—I did bribe my way back into civilian life—but he's fuckin' batshit crazy if he thinks I'd spill this secret to him . The Sweep would pick me up so fast, my head would spin. And I'd be dead within a day. Probably less.

No one, outside of a god, maybe, will ever get that secret from me.

Still, I gotta say something or Clara and I aren't going home tonight. So I look at the old man now. Because this is the only way the lie works. "I know about the Looking Glass. I know what it is."

The room erupts in excitement.

But I put up a hand to hush them. "I saw it. I saw lots of things in the Outlands. I know where it is."

"Where?" The old man's hands are in the air, like he's about to throttle the answer out of me. But I shoot him a cautionary look that comes with a flash of blue light, and he pulls them back.

"It's in the Omega Outlands, of course. You don't really think they'd let that thing inside some city, do you?"

"That's not what we heard." This comes from another man whose name I don't recall. "We heard that every tower has one. And that the new god needs?—"

"That's enough , Edward!" Stayn's roar echoes up into the high, coffered ceilings of his office, making everyone shut up at once. He stares hard at Edward, then straightens his tie and looks at me, smiling. "OK. Well, this is not proper dinner conversation. Let's pick it up on Monday. How about nine AM?" Stayn looks around the room as they all agree. Finally, his gaze lands on me. "You good with nine AM, Tyse?"

I shrug. "I'll be there."

It's the best possible ending, in my opinion. Because they have forgotten all about the Spark Maiden vibrational signature from Dimension 702, or whatever, and have refocused their attention on some Looking Glass thing I've never even heard of.

Everything that happens next is fake .

We smile, we clap each other on the shoulder, we joke, we dine, we drink, we make polite conversation. Clara is a perfect dinner party guest. She listens attentively, she smiles politely, and she uses all the right forks at all the right times.

But I am counting the seconds until it's eleven-thirty because this is the earliest I figure we can escape without looking suspicious.

Janice and Stayn walk us to the door. We're not the first to leave, so our jackets are ready, held out by the butler and a maid so we can slip our arms into them.

Janice and Clara say their goodbyes. There's air kissing going on and lots of smiling.

Stayn leans in to me. "Monday, right? Nine AM in my office? Oh, and your woman is a keeper. You'll bring her back, right? Janice loves her."

"Yes, I'll be there Monday. And of course we'll be back. Can't wait."

We shake hands and then Clara and I escape into the night.

But even though we're out, we're far from safe. There is no way they're not watching us. Even if they've forgotten about the Spark Maiden, I have some kind of critical information they need.

So I play it cool on the way home. "Wanna get some coffee?"

Clara thinks about this, but declines. "Nah. It was such a nice evening. I'm already wound up enough. I just want to go to bed." She looks up at me, smiling. She's got her hand around my arm again, like she's never walked a city in her life without an escort. And hell, maybe she hasn't. Because clearly, she is a dinner-party kind of woman. She's been talking about her night since we left. She loves the girls and if we were gonna be in this city on Monday, I guarantee Janice would be her new best friend.

But we will not be in Tau City on Monday.

We're getting the fuck out of here tomorrow.

I just can't tip off Clara—not until we're inside the tower, at least. Because everyone outside the ruin is tracked and monitored. Especially through the phones in our pockets.

I can't throw them away, not yet. Not until we're in the tower, because the cameras are watching and I'd bet my life that Stayn is up, right now, in some secret room in his massive house, watching us walk home. Looking for any sign that I might run.

"You didn't have a good time?"

I look down at Clara. "What? Sure I did."

"Well, you're super distracted. What did you talk about with the men while I was chatting up the women?"

"Oh…" I blow out a breath. "Nothing much. Boring work. But not my work, so really boring work."

"You have a meeting on Monday, though?"

I want to end this conversation and I'm trying to think up some kind of plausible way that won't arouse suspicion when Clara suddenly stops and gasps out loud.

"What? What's wrong?"

She lets out a breath, then looks around. "We just came back inside."

That's when I realize she's right. We just entered the Ruin District. In other words, we just entered the spark. "Clara? Look at me."

She tilts her head up, but I can see the panic in her eyes. I can almost see the blue, as well. Maybe I'm just imagining it, because I know that she wasn't ready for the extra spark and now she's feeling a little bit full.

It used to affect me that way too, though I never lit up blue from it.

And that's exactly what she's about to do.

Stayn—or someone, at least—is still watching. Probably leaning into the screen to get a better look at what's going on right now. And if I don't do something fast, they're about to get an eyeful.

Clara is panicking. She knows this is bad. There are hundreds of people out here around the tower and if she explodes with light, everything changes.

And not in a good way.

I grab her and then I kiss her. And when my mouth touches her, all her extra blue spark starts spilling into me. It's cold at first. Ice cold. But then, as the kiss continues and she relaxes with the realization that it's going to be OK, it turns warm.

And then it's pouring into me faster, and faster, and faster until I explode…

Except I don't explode.

I float up, and up, and up. And it's not me doing all this floating, but the augments inside me. Because when I look down, there I am. Standing just inside the Ruin District kissing up-city Clara Birch in front of the whole city.

But… it's not my city.

It's hers .