His huge hand landed on her visor with a smack, slick white teeth gnashing as he leered down at her.

This was the moment she had feared, the loss of control, the panic, the same stomach-churning sensation of knowing a bigger, stronger, angrier body was on top of her. Hot tears poured down her cheeks, into her ears, itchy and slimy. Why couldn’t she move? Why couldn’t she see? It was getting hard to breathe, hard to think. Every time she tried to draw air, it choked her.

Not again, not again, not again . . .

She blinked rapidly. Someone was screaming. A blur rushed above her head and she heard Misato, but it was so far away. There was a sound like rushing water, quick, sloshing bursts. Everything was fading. When the tears finally cleared, she was staring up into Glen’s face. Square chin. Icy gray eyes. Perfectly stubbled jaw.

“You don’t speak to me that way. You do not ever speak to me that way, Roz. It is so fucking condescending, okay? I don’t know why you have to be so smug all the time. It brings out the worst in me.”

Not this time. Fight back.

“No!” she heard herself scream. “No, no! Never again. Never again!”

When it was Glen on top of her she had fought back, too, but this was different, all new but somehow also all terribly familiar. She knew that she could fight this, knew that she was more than strong enough. Her left hand slid into her pocket, the only motion she could manage, and her fingers closed around the multi-tool. It was like someone else was guiding her, her own ghost aiming the two-inch knife, finding with luck or experience the base of the skull, the approximate location of most AR implants. Her own ghost plunged the knife in deep, breaking off, hitting something harder than bone.

The hand covering her visor shook, peeling away and leaving a long smear of blood.

Sound, vision, feeling all rushed in too fast and she drew breath as if resurfacing from deep, dark water.

The weight on her chest lifted and she watched Piero roll to the side, the multi-tool still stuck in the base of his skull, the AR chip shorting, sending him into a seizure. She had spent countless hours studying methods of integration with AR, always careful to make sure their tech didn’t interfere with the implant and cause irreparable damage. And she had been good at it. Careful. Precise. But someone had pushed her to the ground, invaded her, and the only thing that numbed the panic was vodka. Then gin. Losing time. Skipping work. Glen was such a nice guy, who would ever believe her? Running. Running. Running until she was there, watching Piero shake and seize.