They met eyes. And, shockingly—despite the agony—Waxillium found himself nodding. Truthfully nodding. He did feel it. That was why what had happened to Miles terrified him.

“Well, someone has to do something about it,” Miles said.

Harmony, Waxillium thought. If Miles had been born back then, in the days before, he’d have been a hero. “I’ll start helping them, Miles,” Waxillium said. “I promise it to you.”

Miles shook his head. “You won’t live that long, Wax. Sorry.” He kicked again. And again. And again.

Waxillium curled around himself, hands over his face. He couldn’t fight. He just had to last. But the pain was mounting. It was terrible.

“Stop it!” Marasi’s voice. “Stop it, you monster!”

The kicks stopped falling. Waxillium felt her beside him, kneeling, hand on his shoulder.

Fool woman. Stay back. Unnoticed. That was the plan.

Miles cracked his knuckles audibly. “I suppose I should deliver you to Suit, girl. You’re on his list, and you can replace the one Waxillium set free. I’ll probably have to track her down.”

“Why is it,” Marasi said angrily, “that small-minded men must destroy that which they know is better, and greater, than they?”

“Better than me?” Miles said. “This? He isn’t great, child.”

“The greatest of men can be taken down by the simplest of things. A lowly bullet can end the life of the most powerful, most capable, most secure of men.”

“Not me,” Miles said. “Bullets are nothing to me.”

“No,” she replied. “You’ll be brought down by something even more lowly.”

“Which is?” he asked, amused, voice growing closer.

“Me,” Marasi replied.

Miles laughed. “I’d like to see…” He trailed off.

Waxillium cracked his eyes, looking down the length of the tunnel toward the broken ceiling where the building had stood. Light flooded that pit from above, growing brighter at a remarkable rate.

“Who have you brought?” Miles asked, sounding unimpressed. “They won’t arrive quickly enough.” He paused. Waxillium rolled his head to the side and saw the sudden horror in Miles’s face. He had seen it, finally: a shimmering border nearby, a slight difference in the air. Like the distortion caused by heat rising from a hot street.

A speed bubble.

Miles spun on Marasi. Then he ran for the bubble’s border, away from the light. Trying to escape.

The light at the other end of the tunnel became bright, and a group of blurs moved down it, so quickly it was impossible to distinguish what was causing them.

Marasi dropped her bubble. The sunlight of full day streamed in from the distant pit, and filling the tunnel—right outside where the bubble had been—was a force of over a hundred constables in uniform. Wayne stood at their head, grinning, wearing a constable’s uniform and hat, a false mustache on his face.

“Get ’im, boys!” he said, pointing.

They moved in with clubs, not bothering with guns. Miles screamed in denial, trying to dodge past the first few, then punching at the group that laid hands on him. He wasn’t fast enough, and there were far too many of them. In minutes, they had him held down against the ground and were wrapping ropes around his arms.