“Suspected, speculated,” Greenwich said. “Not definite. Common ground with other subjects experiencing teeth, each attended mandatory acute zygote manifestation syndrome checks on October 12. No men involved. Two trans women, HRT but no GRS, grew teeth externally.”

“How many people we talking here?” Aziz asked.

Greenwich scrolled down his phone. “Dozens.”

Doc eyed the red bathroom. She would have liked to believe someone else had done this. If hormones were the key, that left a wide range of affected chimeras, not just anyone with a vagina, but penis, intersex, limitless.

“Hormone treatment affects it,” Doc echoed. “And menstrual cycles?”

Yaya had been on her period last Saturday, almost a month since her October 12

appointment at the Sibs station. Odds were good she’d been on her period back then, too.

Greenwich looked up from his phone but said nothing.

“Hormonal fluctuation caused by menstrual cycles.” Doc snapped her fingers. “Bring up those comparisons.”

“We don’t. Have that.” Greenwich looked to his phone again.

“Why not? Don’t you ask?” Silence. “We engage in every invasive

question and procedure imaginable, but we don’t ask if each patient is menstruating? Contact all chimeras with October 12 appointments at that station and ask.”

Greenwich’s yellow hazard suit seemed to turn green. “Can’t you do it?”

“I’ll get the process started, but for now, we should assume Betancourt,”

Aziz said, tapping his neck. “Violent history.”

And strong, Doc noted. She’d appreciated that strength on Monday night.

Less so, now.

Aziz retreated from the bathroom and approached the officer. “Street cams get anything?”

The officer scoffed. “It’s the suburbs, buddy. No street cams.” He took another glance at the body. “No need for them, usually.”

Aziz stood straighter, stiffer. “We have need.”

Greenwich raised his phone as if holding up a trophy. “I’m on with tech.”

The tech department could scarcely crack a phone’s security, let alone invent a time machine to travel back and install cameras throughout Bryant’s neighborhood. Which meant Greenwich was talking weapons for the hunt.

Firearms, flames, chemical gas, and mobile units.

And possibly the Predator Engine.

“Kentucky Part 2: Newark,” Greenwich said. “Appropriate tools necessary.” Was that his equivalent of a joke?

Doc didn’t laugh. She bagged the new quill and pressed it into his free hand. “Run this to the analysis lab,” she said. “Cross with the last sample.

Urgent.”

She could swear his gas mask brightened. “I won’t let you down,” he said, and shuffled back to the false foyer. He would have to call a rideshare or another company vehicle. Or if he’d called the Predator Engine, maybe he would hitch a ride with its crew.

A sound of thunder rang through the house minutes later, earth-shattering engines saying yes, Greenwich had done exactly that.

Doc hurried to the living room windows, quaking in their frames. On the street, gray pipework curled with amber light, hardly visible by day, yet terrifying by night. She had only seen this diesel monstrosity once before. She had abstained from riding along on whatever coastal mission it had been off to—