“Emily?” he asked. “Oh . . . hey? Did you get rid of that crazy one? With the fireworks?”

“No, she’s still looking for you,” Emily whispered. “Don’t talk so loudly.”

Jacob nodded and shifted so that he was standing properly. Emily raised her phone and looked past him. There was only a dead end beyond, a sort of chamber stuck to the side of the main factory floor. “You know, I thought I was screwed there for a bit.”

“You might have been,” Emily said. “We’re going to distract Glamazon. You need to get down. Do you have any luck left?”

“Fresh out. I was running on fumes already, and I spent what I had left getting this far.” He stood and leaned forward to see past Emily, but she pushed him back. He was in jeans and a dark gray hoodie, enough to serve as sorta-camouflage in the factory, and it was probably one of the things that had stopped Glamazon from spotting him so soon, but it wouldn’t do for him to just step out.

“Fine,” Emily said. “I’ll move over that way”—she gestured off to her left, toward another room—“and then call for Glamazon to come over. You run for it. If Athena follows you, you do as she says, all right?”

“And then what?” he asked. “Where am I supposed to go now?”

“I don’t know,” Emily said. “Hide somewhere and call me later.”

“This isn’t even my phone,” he said.

Emily blinked. “You stole it?”

“It was just lying there . . . on the passenger seat of some guy’s car. He has a cute girlfriend—her pic’s on the background.”

“I-I don’t care. Just . . . get back there and wait.” She stomped off, making sure to flash her light around as if searching in case Glamazon looked her way.

Somehow, it was so much easier to work with her little sisters than with someone like Alea Iacta. She couldn’t decide if it was because they listened to her or if he was just an idiot.

She found another chamber, like the one Alea Iacta had been hiding in. There were boxes and enough corners that a dozen people could have been hiding there. Emily bounced on the spot a few times and unlimbered herself before taking a deep breath.

“Glamazon!” she called back.

“What?” came the echoing reply.

“Over here!”

The Hero ran over, sparks forming and sputtering in the air around her. Emily pointed into the chamber. “I think he’s in here.”

“What? You see any footsteps?”

Emily blinked and looked down. Her feet traced a path back to where she’d been, the dusty floor leaving little to the imagination. “No?” she said. There weren’t any leading into the chamber.

“Hmm, he’s a sneaky bastard. I think he’s been jumping onto things to hide the traces, and it’s not dusty everywhere, you know?”

“Uh, yeah,” Emily said.