I can hear the rattle and clatter of the train now, hear the metal wheels rushing along the metal tracks. It must be close, it must be so close.

The air is rushing around us and the squeal and rumble of the train is so loud that I can’t hear anything except the approaching death from behind me.

And then the platform is there.

Akimi grabs Wren and drags her up. Pander pulls Kina onto the platform and Igby’s surprisingly strong hands grip my forearms and wrench me away from the train, which screams past less than a second later.

Kina and I lie on the platform, gasping for breath. Wren’s eyes stare up at the ceiling in shock.

“Holy shit,” Kina whispers once the train’s thunderous sound has dissipated.

“I hate tunnels,” I say, and Kina laughs. Pod joins in, followed by Pander, Igby, and Akimi.

“Pander,” Igby says, “you got a spare hat in that bag of yours?”

Pander digs in her bag and produces a new hat. Once again she pulls it low over Wren’s head until it covers the camera.

“Hey,” I say, asking the question that’s been on my mind since Pander told me to cover my Panoptic camera. “Where are your hats?”

“We don’t need them,” Akimi says, smiling.

“Why not?” Kina asks.

“You’ll see,” Pod replies.

We walk up a set of ancient and broken escalators that seem to go on forever. Antique advertisements for long-ago theater shows line the walls, along with faded public service posters informing commuters that pickpockets operate in this area.

We make it to a bank of dust-covered ticket barriers and hop over them. Pander looks back to Wren every few minutes to make sure she is still wearing her hat. Eventually, we come to a set of steps that leads up to a boarded-up exit.

“Okay,” Pander says, putting her bag on the floor. “This is the tricky part, and we have to move quickly because they have an idea of where we are now.” She takes a pad of paper and a pen out of her bag and scribbles a note onto it. She holds it up so Wren, Kina, and I can read it.

Still dazed from the whole experience, I almost ask Who is Dr. Ortega? But I manage to stop myself just in time. Clearly Pander has written this information down so that the microphones embedded in us won’t pick it up.

We climb the concrete steps, and Pod lifts a massive section of fallen wall away from the opening at the top.

One by one we crawl out into the street and move quickly from cover to cover until we are between the old courthouse and the church.

Pander climbs into the open manhole first, followed by Wren and then Kina. Pod goes next and I follow him. Igby is the last down.