“You have seen how easy it is for us to find you and your friends, to capture you. Once we were ready to find you, it took us four minutes. If it’s not you, Luka, it will be Igby Koh, or Pander Banks, or Kina Campbell. It makes no difference to us.”

It took them four minutes to find us, I think, but they’ve been searching for the Missing for years and never found them.

“Who’s the third?” I ask.

“You will find out soon enough.”

“No, I want to know now. Who is the third?”

“Agree to do as we ask, and we will show you the third.”

“I have one more condition,” I say.

Galen stands up. “You’re not in a position to bargain, Luka.”

“Let the boy speak,” the thing controlling Maddox says.

“I’ll do it if you let them all live,” I say.

“What do you mean?” Galen asks.

“All my friends: Pander, Igby, Wren, Dr. Ortega, Malachai, Samira, Molly, and Kina.”

Saying this list of names hurts me; not including the likes of Blue, Pod, Shion, Akimi because they have not made it this far hurts me.

“The offer is as stated,” Maddox replies. “They may live for six more months unharmed and unhunted. They may not be a part of the new world.”

“Not the new world,” I say, “but let them live in the Arc, let them die in the Arc. Remove the healing tech from them and let them grow old together. What difference will it make?” When they’re in the Arc, I think, maybe they can figure out how to fight on—maybe they can take Happy down from the inside.

There is a long pause as Happy considers this using Maddox’s brain. Finally, he looks at me once again. “I am not capable of understanding why you fight so fiercely against this. It is not fear of your own death, you have proven that, so why? You’re fighting Eden! You’re fighting heaven! You’re fighting paradise for your species.”