“Oh, Mother of the Redeemer,” I heard Tamara say, all on an exhale.

That ringing and wailing. I wasn’t imagining it. The lights had gone all funny on the computer—it was flashing red. An alarm—the Dreamer-bots would be here at any minute.

“Right,” I said, my mouth oddly sore, and let Indigo pull me up with the hand that wasn’t holding the flaming sword. He had to help me out through the hole in the wall, too; the edges of the glass were still glowing with heat.

Tamara waited for us just outside, eyes oddly bright, light flashing red and harsh over her face. She’d shut the exterior door against the Children, just like we’d planned. She said, “I can’t believe you got yourself locked in a vacuum chamber.”

It hurt to talk. “You pushed the button,” I said.

“Hurry,” Indigo said, just barely on the edge of my muffled hearing, and dragged me along. So much for us being discreet, and avoiding any attention—we might’ve gotten rid of the Children, but that sound and flashing lights would call every manikin in a hundred miles.

Lantern-Eyes took the lead from Indigo after a minute, guiding us more confidently through the blackness of the labs. My ears and eyes hurt and the ground seemed unstable underfoot; more than once I found Indigo shoving me upright. His collar-light was a steady glow, but I couldn’t seem to keep my flashlight level.

We halted with an abruptness that startled me; Indigo protested something at my side and Tamara said, her voice louder and clearer than his but still fading in and out of my hearing, “We need to stop… To run, we can’t have him stumbling… Give me your medical device.”

At that point, Indigo pushed me to sit down, and the two of them proceeded to have a brief hissed argument over my head which I only half-heard and less than that understood. I imagined it coming to this, the representatives of the Republic and of Maria Nova, coming to blows over what to do with the Kystrene. How perfectly appropriate.

Tamara must have won the argument, because she crouched down beside me with Indigo’s medical device and manhandled my head until she could get to my ears. I could see down the way we had come, partially obscured by Indigo’s watchful silhouette. We were far enough from the commotion that I couldn’t see the room anymore, but the Nameless was so dark that the air was still faintly lightened by the distant lights, a red haze that I could only see out of the corner of my eyes.

Something cool touched my ears and I flinched, but Lieutenant Gupta held me mercilessly still. Then she clapped her hands over my ears and held them there for some time. Indigo was a taut curve against the faint flash of red.

At long last, Tamara took her hands away from my ears. Sound rushed back in, sharp and clear. I blinked. My head still hurt, but I no longer felt as muffled and dizzy.