Again, Trsiel offered to scan Sullivan’s brain for me. I refused.

Since he’d been here only minutes before, he knew exactly where to look for the visions, and zipped me over to that part of her sleeping brain without so much as a glimpse at the putrid wasteland elsewhere.

As we coasted to a stop, I braced myself. Colors and sounds flickered past. A man’s face twisted in anger. Ripples of simmering frustration. A pang of envy. A woman’s taunting laugh. A newspaper clipping. More clippings, like a scrapbook. A grainy photo of a sprawled body. An announcer’s voice with feigned gravitas, words cutting in and out. “Deaths.” “Wounded.” “Notorious.” “Manhunt.” A wave of excitement. Then harsh words raining down like hail. “Stupid.” “Ugly.” “Useless.” “Wasted space.”

The images flipped faster, out of focus, like a movie reel hitting the end. Then nothing. I waited, straining for voices, but nothing came. After about ten minutes of this, Trsiel pulled me out. When I opened my eyes, I saw Sullivan on the cot, sleeping soundly.

“So that’s it?” I said. “She’s gone?”

“It seems so. Her old partners aren’t connected to her all the time.”

“We can’t sit around here, popping in and out of this woman’s brain, hoping she links up with this new partner again.”

“And what would you suggest? Unless you noticed more than I did, there wasn’t anything to go on. Only a few news articles with no solid connection to the partner herself.”

“No? What are they, then? Random images?”

Trsiel shook his head. “The Nix is plucking them out of her memory, showing them to her, hoping to incite a reaction.”

I slumped against the wall. “So we have nothing, then.”

“Be patient. More will come.”

We spent the rest of that night in Sullivan’s cell, with Trsiel logging in to her brain every five minutes, checking for fresh data. At about four, he suggested I go hunt down the little boy, George, see how he was doing. Very considerate…though I suspect he was just tired of watching me pace.

Morning came, and a guard roused the women for breakfast. Sullivan stayed in bed. The other women were released from the cells, but no one even stopped at Sullivan’s door. Maybe she wasn’t a breakfast person.

After every other woman had filed out, Sullivan rose, groggy and sulky, and yanked on her clothing. A few minutes later, a guard brought her a food tray.

“It’s cold,” Sullivan whined, without even taking a bite. “It’s always cold.”

“That so?” the guard said, hands on her broad hips. “Well, Miss Sullen, we could always let you go down and eat with the rest of them again. Would you like that?”

As Sullivan turned away, her hair tumbled off her shoulder, revealing a slice across her neck that had yet to scab over.