The medic looked as though she did mind, quite a bit; but she wasn’t in a position to argue with two patroi, so she smiled accommodatingly. “Very well. But if she shows even the slightest difficulty, this will have to go back on.”

I had never so thoroughly relished the taste of the cold, dank air of the caverns. I inhaled deeply, savoring it.

“How do you feel now?” asked the medic. “Any breathing trouble?”

“No. But my throat hurts.”

The medic had pulled a System panel up and was making notes on it. “That’s understandable,” she said when she was through, waving the panel away. “If you’d like, I can get you some water.”

Her smile was irritatingly unwavering. I could be as nasty to her as I felt like, and that smile would never fade. Of course, that would be very un-gerouin-like of me. So I attempted to smile back at her. “That would be wonderful. Thank you.”

As the woman bustled away, Ceilos snickered. “There. It wasn’t too hard to be civil, was it?”

I didn’t dignify that with an answer.

Ceilos perched on the edge of the hospital bed beside me. “I suppose your annual gift didn’t go as well as I’d hoped for,” he said, the hint of an apology in his voice.

“It’s all right. I wanted to see the sunset, and I got it,” I said. “I appreciate you covering for me with the geroi. They’d never have noticed a thing if it hadn’t been for that boy.” I frowned, remembering his prone form on the ground. “Is that who you and the medic were talking about?”

He tugged his earlobe affirmatively. “Do you know who he is, Nadin?”

“Not at all. I’ve never seen him before.”

Ceilos sighed. “How do you suppose he could have gotten outside?”

“I’d very much like to ask him that myself when he wakes up.” I swallowed uncomfortably. My throat felt dry and raw. That water couldn’t come soon enough. “I didn’t see him at all on the System. If I hadn’t noticed him before I went in…”

“You didn’t see him on the System because he’s not connected to it.”

I struggled up onto my elbows and stared at him. “What? Was he offline, like—” I broke off, not wanting to say it aloud.

Ceilos knew what I meant, though. “No, not like that,” he said. “He didn’t even have an earpiece. And there’s no record of his DNA.”

Silence hung heavy between us. If the System didn’t have a record of this boy, then…