The worst part wasn't her own medical ignorance, or the endless, rising count of those she couldn't save. It wasn't even the outbursts of violence that people sometimes directed at her when faced with their own death sentence, or with that of a loved one. She was almost grateful for the shouts and the fists, thrown too rarely to constitute any kind of real cost. She'd experienced far worse in her time, and Miri's weapons blister was always there when things got out of hand.

Much, much worse than the violence of those she didn't save was the gratitude of those she nearly could. The smiles on the faces of those for whom she'd bought a little time, too dulled by disease and malnutrition to ever question the economics of trading a quick death for a lingering one. The pathetic delight of some father who'd seen his daughter cured of encephalitis, not knowing or caring that Seppuku or the Witch or some rogue flamethrower would take her next month or next year, not thinking of the rapes and broken bones and chronic starvation that would stalk her in the days between. Hope seemed nowhere more abundant than in the faces of the hopeless; and it was all she could do to meet their eyes, and smile, and accept their thanks. And not tell them who it was that had brought all this down upon the world in the first place.

Her experiment with naked eyes was long since over. If the locals didn't like her affect, they could damn well go somewhere else.

She wanted desperately to talk to Taka. Most of the time she resisted the impulse, remembering: Ouellette's friendship had evaporated the instant she'd learned the truth. Clarke didn't blame her. It couldn't be easy, discovering you'd befriended a monster.

One night, lonely enough to gamble, she tried anyway. She used a channel that Desjardins had assigned for reporting any late-breaking Seppuku incidents; it got her to an automated dispatcher and thence to an actual human being who—despite his obvious disapproval over personal use of dedicated channels—patched her through to someone claiming to speak for a biological countermeasures lab out of Boston. He had never heard of Taka Ouellette. When Clarke asked if there might be other facilities she could check with, the man replied that there must be—but the goddamned Entropy Patrol never told them anything, and he wouldn't know where to point her.

She made do by indulging in false hopes. Lubin would catch his prey. Desjardins would honor the deal they had made. They would track down the threat to Atlantis, and disarm it. And Taka Ouellette, or others like her, would solve the mystery of Seppuku and stop it in its tracks.

Maybe then they could go home.

She didn't even recognize him at first.