“We’re standing by” came Robb’s distinctly Erosian accent.

There was the soft murmur of voices in the background. Robb and Jax were gambling nearby in one of the slum’s bars.

“Jax, don’t let him bet too much,” the captain added.

Jax gave a playful gasp through the comm-link. “Robb? Never. He’s a saint with money.”

“Yeah, with spending it,” Lenda, the Dossier’s gunnery lead, groused.

Laughter filled Ana’s earpiece, and it set her nerves steady. “I’ll let you know if anything goes sideways.”

The captain added, “And be careful. If it weren’t for Starbright expressly wanting to see you alone, I’d be down there myself.”

“With over a million coppers on your head?” Ana pointed out wryly. “I don’t think so—no offense, Captain.”

“We all have baggage,” Talle, who must’ve been in the cockpit with Siege and Lenda, chimed in through the comm-link.

“I’ll be careful—on iron and stars,” she promised them, and tapped the small star-shaped comm-link on her lapel to disconnect.

The coordinates pointed to somewhere on the edge of Neon City and near the shore of Lake Leer. The buildings were rusted, and the only light came from tired neon signs and the cold glow of fluorescent bulbs. Ana came to a stop at the end of the street, surrounded by single-level buildings that looked old and feeble and weatherworn.

The appointed address was an abandoned shop across the street. The dying neon sign above flickered, spitting colors across the vacant street in short, sporadic bursts.

Her heart sank a little.

It must have been a coat shop once, but there was only one left on display. It hung tattered on a mannequin, a ghost of its former self, the red wool faded to a dull grayish pink, its lacy cuffs yellowing, brassy buttons clouded over with age. But, in better condition, it would have been the exact kind of coat she once dreamed about—red as blood, its shoulders chromed in gold, buttons polished, and cut sleek.

Behind it, standing so very still, was a shape in the window. The neon light flickered against them. Tall and humanoid.

It had to be Starbright.

She tapped her lapel, E0S hovering at her shoulder. “Robb, Jax? I found them.”

After a moment, her captain said, “Careful, darling.”

Of course she would be—she had to be.

But after two months cooped up in the infirmary, a month of rehabilitation, and three more of hiding and running and hiding some more, she was no closer to finding out what the HIVE wanted or how to find the AI that commanded it—commanded Di, and Mellifare, and the countless Messiers—and defeat it. She’d grown tired of running.

She couldn’t anymore. There was a restlessness inside her that grew every day she sat still.

Tapping her comm-link off again, she told E0S, “Stay out here and keep a lookout,” and jiggled the handle of the shop door. To her surprise, it eased open. This was either the right place, or a trap.

She hoped it wasn’t the latter.