Evan chews the inside of his cheek. “You can do that in your sleep,” he points out. “If you want out badly enough, you can fake incompetence. They’ll let you go.”

“Yes, but then I won’t learn anything. Anything new.”

“So.” Alex shrugs. He’s half-enjoying watching Evan climb the walls. Admittedly the training course is a bit of a joke; he or Evan could teach it themselves, in their sleep, except for the exotic and recondite bits relating to the actual praxis of summoning—the core elements of magic. They’re ready to leap on that topic and get their fangs into it, given the opportunity. But clearly nobody in this organization is prepared for such enthusiastic and talented inductees; or perhaps they have other reasons for taking things slowly. A bureaucracy is all about standardization, so that necessary tasks can be accomplished regardless of the abilities of the human resources assigned to it. And the Laundry is impressing Alex as being a remarkably mundane and plodding organization, given the nature of the adversaries it is required to deal with.

“Why don’t you relax? You’ve got an all-expenses-paid month-long vacation from the Scrum, even if you decide to blow off the training. And nobody’s going to say boo to us when we go back to work.” The novelty of having a guilt-free working holiday from work has gone right to Alex’s head: even having a vicar for a mentor strikes him as funny, now he’s over his reflexive fear of holy water.

“I’m hungry, too, dick-weed.” Evan gathers up his dice and sweeps them into his briefcase. Beside them it contains a couple of energy bars, his iPad, and a water bottle. (The iPad caused some trouble with building security until Mr. Howard intervened and explained the ground rules, and now it sports a hideous asset tag that proclaims UNSEC PRIVATE NOCLASS inside a disturbingly eye-warping silver star. The mere thought of trying to put secret information on it makes Alex feel ill.) “I am so out of here,” Evan adds.

“But it’s only six thirty! And it’s Tuesday!”

“Not a banker.” Evan grabs a jacket from the back of the office door. “I need some R&R time. Call me if you get bored.”

• • •

EVAN SLIPS OUT OF THE SIDE DOOR OF THE BUILDING, OUT PAST the battered row of dumpsters and into the twilight of an alleyway. The van with blacked-out windows is waiting to whisk him to his apartment in Docklands. He leans back in the padded, comfortably dark capsule and closes his eyes, opening them only when the driver offers him a form to sign. Then he gets out and goes in through the front door to get changed for a night out on the town. He doesn’t notice the car parked with its lights turned off across the street from the building.