“Nothing—it’s nothing. Everyone, gather round!” He motions to bring us all in, and Calvin and Vance circle up with me. “Here’s where we get to announce your hard work and the title.”

Calvin thrusts up his fist. “Heck yeah! Beating that leaker to the punch!”

Amon’s phone begins to ring, but he quickly silences it.

“That too. Are you ready, team?” He sticks his hand out into the middle, and everyone puts their hands on top of his. “Jess, I know you’re off in your own world, but are you with us?”

I blink out of my thoughts and put my hand with theirs.

“Look to the stars!” he starts. “Aim!”

“Ignite!” we cry, and break the circle.

Bunch of nerds, I realize. The lot of them.

Except for Vance. Vance can go take a hike off the nose of a Nova-class star cruiser.

The lights in the audience crash to black, and the Starfield theme comes on, so loud it vibrates my chest. Excitement races across my skin like electricity. Jess should be here experiencing this. She should be the one about to walk out onstage.

She’ll be here, I remind myself, and I eye Vance for the umpteenth time. Bran should be taking over his Twitter account by now, getting his phone number.

Amon climbs the stairs to the stage first, and the rest of us follow into the blinding light.

The roar of the crowd is…monstrous.

Three thousand screaming fans, and even more watching the live-stream on the internet. With so much Starfield fandom gathered in one place, there’s no way not to feel alive. Like every one of us is linked in some cosmic tapestry, all of our lives affected, in some small way, by Starfield. I close my eyes and listen to the crowd singing along to the theme song like it’s their own heartbeat, and there’s nothing quite like it.

There will be nothing quite like this ever again.

Amon introduces us. I try to squint beyond the glaring lights pointed at me, but I can’t see if Jess is in the audience. I can’t see Ethan, either. Wherever Bran is, he should be calling Vance’s phone right about now. I glance down the table to the phone’s screen but it’s dark.

Please let this work, I pray to the impossible universe.

“So! Before we get into the questions, and as we wait for our Carmindor,” Amon says into his mic, setting his phone on the table. The screen blinks on—someone is calling him.

And not Vance.

About a thousand expletives race through my head.

No way.

NO FRAKKIN’ WAY.