Before anyone else can take a photo, I quickly disappear from the exhibit, looking for somewhere to sit and eat my free pretzel, but every bit of the wall is taken by tired con-goers. I shoulder my way to the back exit and out the side of the building, into what looks like a hotel courtyard—a barren space with grass and a sad-looking tree. I find an unoccupied bench and sit down in the quiet to snack on my pretzel and check the texts and emails I missed.

Oh, Ethan texted me a few minutes ago.

ETHAN (5:15PM)

—Vance Reigns is playing the new villain, if you haven’t heard.

—All’s fine here. Keeping her in check.

—Do you have any leads yet?

“I wish,” I murmur, putting my phone back into my pocket. I pry open the container of warm plastic cheese.

About twenty feet away on the grass are two dozen or so cosplayers dressed as Princess Amara (all different kinds, even a Black Nebula version, who seems to be leading the horde). I’ve heard about these get-togethers—meet-ups, I think Ethan calls them.

How many of them are like Imogen and want to save Amara?

You don’t understand, I want to scream at these Amara cosplayers. What about me? How come no one is trying to save me? The negative comments on my Insta and Twitter are so loud, I can barely hear anything else in my life. The strangers calling me ugly are so much louder than my own parents telling me I’m beautiful. My mother once said the only thing that can ever truly be ugly about a person is how they act, who they are on the inside—whether they’re good or rotted to the core.

It seems like there are a lot of people who’re rotten.

I wonder if, to some people, I’m one of them.

I twist my lanyard around my fingers, looking across the loading docks to the patch of green on the other side, and the gathering of Princess Amaras. The girl dressed as the Black Nebula Amara shouts the catchphrase “Look to the stars!” and the others shout “Aim. Ignite!” and thrust their hands in the air with the Starfield sign.

I once asked Dare why he thought Starfield needed a sign—like the Vulcan “live long and prosper” salute, or the Sailor Senshi “I will punish you” hand signs, or that weird Naruto run—and he said because everyone needs a universal greeting sometimes.

Starfield’s is “You and I are made of stars.”

It’s a hand sign that says we are the same.

What a novel thought. I wished I believed that.