“Don’t look at it, Leo. Look at me, okay? Look at me. Take a breath.”

Gareth’s voice was steady, but his gray eyes couldn’t hide their panic. He squeezed Leo’s hands even tighter.

The monster squeezed tighter still.

“I’m here on the ground, Maria. As close as I can get. There are sirens all around. People are screaming. Getting out of their cars and running. You can barely see for the smoke. You can barely breathe through the heat. Everywhere I look there is carnage, bridges collapsed, buildings destroyed. Nobody saw it coming. Nobody had any idea. . . .”

Hrrroooonk. Leo’s father laid into his horn, then pounded on the wheel. “Move, dammit!” There were tears in his eyes.

Leo licked salty lips. Managed to summon his voice. “Where’s Mom?”

“I don’t know, Leo. We don’t know. Dad’s trying to reach her.”

“I want her.”

“I know. We’re calling her, okay. We’re trying,” Gareth said.

Leo wrapped his arms around himself. Tried to fold himself into a ball. He wanted to shrink down to nothing. A different voice came through the radio.

“The president of the United States is mobilizing the military in hopes of launching a counteroffensive. Our understanding, however, is that the Aykari have already driven the Djarik warships off.”

Leo craned his neck toward the window, looking at the sky above.

“Hey. What’s that in your hand?” Gareth asked, getting his attention. “Can I see it?”

Leo pried open his tingling fingers. Inside his tight fist there was a shell. A pink and purple scallop, one side ridged and rough, the other pearly smooth. He’d been holding it this whole time. Gareth reached out as if to take it and Leo pulled his hand away.

“It’s for her,” Leo croaked. “She asked for it. I have to give it to her. I have to.”

Gareth frowned, curled Leo’s fingers back around the shell, one hand closed over the other. “Okay. We will. You will.”

“Call Grace,” their father commanded. Leo stared at his dad’s giant hands clutched tight to the wheel. “Come on, pick up, pick up, pick up. . . .”

“Hi. You’ve reached Grace Fender. Leave me a message and I’ll get right back to you.”

“Gracie? It’s me. It’s Cal. I need you to call me back, all right? Just do that for me, okay? I need you to . . .”

Up ahead, the city smoldered. Ash hung heavy in the air. Right outside Leo’s window, an Aykari drill continued to pound its way into the Earth.

Leo clutched the shell against his heart.

He wandered back through the corridor in a daze, trying to process everything he’d just been told. He passed by the hangar with its phalanx of mining bots, hearing Skits still deep in conversation with Nine.

“It’s like they don’t get me, you know? Not really. It’s like they want me to be this perfect little machine. Always ‘yes, sir, right away, sir, your wish is my command, sir, I’d be happy to blow that up for you, sir.’ Just because my brain is made up of circuits and my heart pumps refrigerant, that doesn’t mean I don’t have feelings, right? Tell me I’m right.”