Welga blinked and kept her expression bland. “That region hates WAIs.”

Ammanuel’s gaze turned inward. Welga left them to puzzle it out. The caliph would be happy to sell someone a hacked plague, especially if he already had the cure designed and plausible deniability in spreading it. She’d heard rumors of pill funders making similarly shady transactions. They earned coin off treatment designs, which put them in a unique, morally compromised situation if someone showed them an engineered virus under the table.

Innocent or not, it’s my job to protect them.

Jane Santiago sat across from Welga in the armored truck. Their six-person shield team and half a dozen riot-control bots filled out the remaining space. Someone at the agency had a theory that the Machinehood wouldn’t attack their own kind, based on watching the pattern of their behavior in other locales. That fit better with the sentient AI angle than the al-Muwahhidun, but it provided them a good cover story.

Their team leader, Oliver Mendoza, had passed out their pill packets thirty minutes before arrival. Their client stuck a flow-flush patch onto her neck, then took her pills with the rest of them. Santiago insisted again on coordinating their outfits with her own, all synthetic leather with elegant, clean lines, and pale, neutral colors. No bright hair or flashy jewels. Cameras swarmed around them in the confines of the vehicle. They had to strike a balance between publicity and trying too hard.

Ammanuel grumbled about how boring they looked, but Welga had lost her desire for frivolity. Her insides coiled as tight as the latent speed in her muscles. Come and get us, blankers. Stop hiding and scaring people with your shadows. I’m running out of time to deal with your sorry asses.

The truck pulled into a driveway and stopped. A sprawling two-story structure stretched to either side. Steam rose from vents in its roof. Massive pipes emerged and ran to other buildings and silos. Hives towered in the hazy distance.

Muggy air clung to Welga the instant she emerged. Damn leathers weren’t meant for this kind of weather. Then again, she wasn’t truly there as a shield. She didn’t have to give a shit about sweat and lank hair.

A welcome party crowded the air above them. Exfactors and reporters stood on the rooftop of a warehouse across the street. A group of machine rights activists clustered on the pavement below, waving signs in favor of the Machinehood or legal protection for bots and WAIs. No protesters had registered to confront Santiago, though, and the only civilians in the area worked at the facility. Bots formed a cordon to keep the onlookers contained.