“Oh, Tila,” I murmur aloud. She is in deep. She’s been doing this for months. And she’d come to my apartment, pretending she was only a hostess at Zenith. I should be hurt. I should be angry. It’s as if I’ve moved through that, to the other side. Now I’m only sad, disappointed, and still deeply afraid.

All day I read the notes, until I have everything memorized. I take breaks to practice in the gym using the virtual reality overlay, dodging imaginary foes, aiming imaginary weapons. I brainload as much as I can on hacking into implants and hiding information within them, with the hope that the government will not discover what I have hidden.

Thursday melts to Friday. Nazarin stumbles in close to dawn, and I wake slightly as he turns off my Chair. It’s only later that day I manage to build up my courage to tell him something in the notes I have to mention before we go to the party.

“I’m going to be Tested tomorrow at Xanadu,” I tell him over coffee.

He’s slept perhaps three hours, and looks drawn and haggard. At my words, he glances up sharply. “What makes you say something like that?”

“I’ve, um, found Tila’s notes at her place.” I give him handwritten, printed-out translations. I’ve left out the information about the government and Sudice, for our later protection, and a few other things where I didn’t understand what they meant and feared they could be dangerous. Everything else is there, and our handwriting is similar enough he doesn’t question it.

Nazarin reads the notes right there. I sip my coffee, watching his bowed head, the way the light through the bay window highlights his cheekbones. When he’s finished, he holds his head in his hands. “Shit. This changes everything.”

We prepare even more intensely. There’s a hint of desperation in the detective—he doesn’t turn off the brainload to let me have uninterrupted REM. There’s no time. Nazarin trains me, and my muscles grow stronger. I can run faster. The SFPD sends still more information to my brain. Out there in the city, my friends are going on with their lives, and so are Tila’s.