Looming behind me are two brittle archways. Both with worn paths. Two tunnels, like Zora’d said. One glows with blue light in the orbs on the wall and the other is completely dark.

“Uhm… let’s try this way,” I say, stepping toward the blue-lit corridor.

Bri holds out her device as we stalk through the darkness. The farther we go, the more the lights dim. Julius’s breath is heavy next to me. I make out his profile in the darkness, slivers of blue light sloping around his full lips, his heavyset brow. What would he say if I told him about Jhamal?

“What is it?” Julius asks. “You staring. My fade on the side fucked up or something?” He slicks a hand over the side of his hair.

“You so dumb, shut up.” I pull him along. “I was just zoned out.”

“What’s on your mind?”

“No one.”

“I said what….” He purses his lips and my cheeks burn.

“It’s no one. I mean, nothing. Can we just focus, please? We’re trying to find—”

“A dirt wall.” Julius peers around. “No shortage of dirt walls down here.”

“A very specific dirt wall, thank you very much. We need to concentrate.”

“You ever hear that saying about a needle in a haystack?” Julius asks Bri.

“I haven’t, but that’s—” She snorts laughing. “That’s exactly it.”

“Y’all got jokes. This was the best plan I could come up with. Y’all have any better ideas, I’m all ears.”

“I’m fucking with you, fam.” Jue nudges my shoulder. “But you good foreal?”

“I am.” I meet his eyes and they burn into me in that way only Julius’s stare can.

“You lying, but I’ma let you have that.”

Thank you.

“Okay, so we might have found our needle,” Bri says, swirling her gadget at a part of the wall that’s chiseled and cracked. She rumbles through her bag and pulls out a disc. “Wait for it.” Her tongue pokes her cheek. The disc suctions to the wall and she taps a blinking light on top. The motor on the device hums, specks of dirt flying in every direction.

BEEP!

“This wall is eighty-three point six percent less dense than the walls around us. There’s a room behind here.”

I’d hoped to find the door. But I can break through this wall if I need to. “We have to be sure if I’m busting through it Kool-Aid man–style.”

“What is koo lay?”

“Bri,” Julius starts. “So, you’ve never had a Kool-Cup either? Yo, we have so much to catch you up on.”