Enchanting. “You probably have no idea what happened, do you?” I said.

To the Senator’s credit, he didn’t try to dissemble or lie. Presumably my appearance in his office one sunny afternoon without an implant in my skull was enough proof that I’d figured out who he was. “No,” he admitted, sitting back in his chair and watching me from wary eyes, “after Alicia—”

I stopped messing with the clock. “Alicia?”

“Alicia Quint, your contact.”

So Quint had been a last name. “Right. After she died…”

“She’s dead?” the Senator asked, searching my face like I might give something away.

“They’re all dead. Quint, Leah, Benny. Just me left. And I have the Philosopher Stone. Of course, so does your country, now.”

A calculating gleam entered his eyes, imperfectly hidden by his relaxed lean. “The Republic’s copy of the data has a few gaps. I’d be interested in negotiating a price for your copy of the data, assuming that it is more complete than ours.”

“Not more complete, maybe, but it fills in some gaps where yours doesn’t,” I said. “And I’m very willing to negotiate a price for my copy of the data.”

“Name it.”

I tossed a few gears from the back of the clock onto his desk, ringing like coins. “You’ll share both copies of the data with the Ministers.”

He was silent while he absorbed that blow. I smiled to myself, and pulled a few more gears from the clock. Then the Senator burst out laughing.

“I can’t do that,” he said. “Are you insane? We’re at war.”

“Sure you are and sure I am, but you’re still going to do it,” I told him cheerfully. “Let me describe a scenario for you: you open a détente with Maria Nova. As a gesture of goodwill, you offer them this piece of mutual history, the data from the Philosopher Stone experiments. See, what you didn’t know—what nobody knew, really, except the people who have seen the data themselves—is that humanity created the Ministers. That the Ministers, really, are just humans too. We’re all one big family. We shouldn’t be fighting, and this is the first step to a universe free of war. That’s a good spin for a politician, isn’t it? A hero for peace?”

“Or a traitor to his country,” Ketel replied. “The Republic isn’t gaining anything from this bargain, just vague suggestions that maybe a peace could be possible.”

“Right, there’s one thing I didn’t mention, that nobody but you and I know,” I said, and turned the clock upside-down to shake out the last few remaining gears. “The Ministers also have a copy of the data.”

Across his desk, the Senator went still.

“I’m guessing that the only way we’ll find out anything close to the complete set of data from the Philosopher Stone is by comparing all three sets of data.” I stuck my finger in the clock to jostle loose any remaining pieces. “And if you offer your set of the data on the condition that they share theirs, then both sides gain something they need, as well as establishing the grounds for future diplomacy.”