Half a mile from the Complex was a row of hotels that served politicians and other city visitors who had business with the mayor. Nolan stumbled to the nearest one and requested a room for the day. Five minutes after being shown across the threshold, he was lying facedown on the white bed, fully dressed, completely unconscious. He slept unmoving for the next seven hours.

When he woke, before he remembered anything of the previous night, before he even remembered where he was, he was conscious of a numbing sense of doom. Dread had riddled his heart and made it malfunction; his breathing was labored and unsatisfactory. And then memory leapt in him like a blaze through withered grass, and he scrambled to his feet, all his senses seared and jagged. What would he do, what would he do, what would he do?

He would tell Pakt. He had no other choice. The guldman would be able to advise him. The guldman would have the answer.

There was no answer. Pakt would be of no use whatsoever.

He didn’t know what to do.

He showered, wished he could shave, donned his dirty clothes, and almost could not stand their texture against his skin. They felt contaminated by the knowledge he had absorbed last night, sticky with outrage and disease. He didn’t have time to return to his own apartment or even Pakt’s house to retrieve clean clothes if he was going to make it to the Biolab before it closed for the day. So, as soon as he had paid his bill at the front desk, he headed to the nearest men’s clothing store and bought three complete new outfits, retaining only his shoes and Leesa’s medallion. One outfit he wore out of the store, and as he passed a trash receptacle on the street, he tossed away his bundle of old clothes. The gesture—meaningless as it was—made him feel fractionally cleaner.

There was nothing else to do. He would return to the Complex and tell Pakt. First he would stop at the pharmacy and pick up his experimental drugs, and then he would tell Pakt. And together they would solve this insoluble puzzle.

At the pharmacy, his drugs were ready, big bulky pills stored in tough plastic containers. “That one’ll pounce on the lining of the stomach,” the druggist told him. “Tell your subjects to take it with food or maybe an antiacidic medication.”

“That’s what I thought,” Nolan replied, though it had not occurred to him. He hadn’t actually envisioned who might be taking these pills. “The other, though—”

The pharmacist shrugged. “Like a vitamin. If you’re the type who gets a stomachache with drugs, take it with food. If not, don’t worry about it.”

“All right. Thanks.”