Rig met me down at street level as promised, and we walked through the cavern—passing the mural of a thousand birds in flight, each one divided in half by a line, the two halves slightly offset from each other. The birds soared from a red-orange sun, which you couldn’t even see up above.

Our cadet’s pins got us past the guards and into the tunnels. As we walked one of the easier paths, Rig filled me in on what he’d been doing the last few weeks. His parents were happy he’d washed out; everyone knew how dangerous being a pilot was.

“They’re proud, of course,” Rig said, grunting as he climbed some rubble with me. “Everyone treats me really strangely once they see the pin. Like, they listen to what I say, and tell me my ideas are good—even if they aren’t. And people make way for me, like I’m someone important.”

“You are.”

“No, I’m the exact same amount of important I was before.” He shook his head. “But I’ve got a dozen different job offers waiting for me, and I’ve got two months to decide.”

“Two months?” I repeated. “Without a job or school? Just free time?”

“Yeah. Mrs. Vmeer keeps trying to push me toward politics.”

“Politics,” I said, almost stopping in the tunnel. “You.”

“Tell me about it.” He sighed and sat down on a nearby rock. “But what if she’s right? Shouldn’t I listen to her? Everyone else thinks politics is the best thing you can do with your life. Maybe I should do what they say.”

“What do you want, though?”

“Now you care about that?” he asked.

I winced, and Rig looked away, blushing deeply. “I’m sorry, Spin. That wasn’t fair—I haven’t been fair. To you, I mean. I chose to study for the pilot’s test; you didn’t make me. And yes, your dreams kind of consumed my own—but that’s mostly because I didn’t have any dreams. Not really.”

He slumped on his rock, back to the wall, looking up at the tunnel ceiling. “I keep thinking, what if it happens again? What if I let myself get excited about a job, then discover I’m completely unsuited to it? I’ve failed at flying, right? So maybe I’ll just keep failing?”

“Rig,” I said, taking him by the arm. “The problem isn’t that you’re going to be unsuited to what you pick. The problem is what it’s always been. That you’re simply too scudding great at too many different things.”

He looked up at me. “Do you really believe that, Spin?”

“Sure do. I mean yeah, you decided flying wasn’t for you—but I think if you have a flaw, it’s not that you fail too often. It’s that you refuse to admit what everyone sees. The fact that you’re incredible.”

He smiled. And seeing Rig smile felt good. It reminded me of our days as kids, when an outcast and a kid who was bullied had made friends against the odds.

“You’re going to drag me into something again, aren’t you?” he asked. “Something ridiculous?”