Kevin was sitting on top of the entertainment center along the back wall. He'd pushed the TV off to one side to give himself more room and covered the space around him with papers. He'd watched this entire spectacle and, judging by the cool look on his face, was unimpressed by Neil's reaction.

It'd been years since Neil stood in the same room as Kevin, years since they'd watched Neil's father cut a screaming man into a hundred bloody pieces. Neil knew Kevin's face as well as he knew his own, the consequence of watching Kevin grow up in the public eye from a thousand or more miles away. Everything about him was different. Everything was the same, from his dark hair and green eyes to the black number two tattooed onto his left cheekbone. Neil saw that number and wanted to retch.

Kevin had that number back then, too, but he'd been too young to have it done permanently. Instead he and his adopted brother Riko Moriyama wrote the numbers one and two on their faces with markers, tracing them over and over anytime they started to fade. Neil didn't understand it then, but Kevin and Riko were aiming for the stars. They were going to be famous, they promised him.

They were right. They had professional teams and played for the Ravens. Last year they were inducted to the national team, the US Court. They were champions, and Neil was a jumble of lies and dead-ends.

Neil knew Kevin couldn't recognize him. It'd been too long; they'd both grown up a world apart. Neil had further disguised his looks with dark hair dye and brown contacts. But why else would Kevin Day be here looking for him? No Class I school would stoop so low, not even the Foxes. Neil's records said he'd only been playing Exy for a year. He'd been very careful this year to act like a know-nothing, even loading up on and lugging around How-To books last fall. It was easy to pretend at first, since he hadn't picked up a racquet in eight years. The fact he was playing a different position now than he'd played at little league helped, since he had to relearn the game from a new perspective. He'd had an enviable and unavoidable learning curve, but he'd still fought hard to not shine.

Had he slipped? Had it been too obvious that he had past experience he wasn't talking about? How had he caught Kevin's eye despite his best attempts to stay hidden? If it was that easy for Kevin, what sort of beacon was he sending to his father's people?

"What are you doing here?" he asked through numb lips.

"Why were you leaving?" Kevin asked.

"I asked you first."

"Coach already answered that question," Kevin said, a tad impatiently. "We are waiting for you to sign the contract. Stop wasting our time."

"No," Neil said. "There are a thousand strikers who'd jump at the chance to play with you. Why don't you bother them?"