I look around to get my bearings. There are enormous, smooth columns holding up the ceiling of the winding tunnel, and I weave in and out of them, keeping an ear out for more guards. My mind is racing, sorting through what I’ve seen, trying to piece it together. First on the list, why did that soldier have a Mogadorian cannon? Did he get it from a captured Mog? Or are the Mogs supplying the government with their weapons? The tunnel forks and I slow, trying to decide which way to go. I see nothing to help me choose, so I think of the last time I encountered a fork in a road. It was in the Himalayas, the one that surprised Commander Sharma. I go left.

The first door I spot on the left is all glass. Through it I can see scientists in white coats and masks moving around what look like large gardens brimming with tall green plants. Hundreds of powerful bright lights hang low over them from the ceiling.

A red-haired woman in a dark suit enters through another door and walks over to one of the guys in a white coat at the front of the room. Her right arm is in a sling and she has bandages on her cheek. She watches the scientist pour a vial of liquid over a section of the closest garden. I am stunned to see the plants instantly grow several feet taller and their tips split open. White vines spread in every direction, creating a thick canopy over their heads. The scientist writes something on his clipboard, and then looks up to talk to the woman. I don’t have time to duck out of the way and we make eye contact through the glass door. I slowly raise the Mog cannon at him and shake my head. I have to hope he considers himself a noncombatant and wants to stay out of the action. No such luck. I watch him slip his hand into his pocket. Damn. He’s triggering something. There’s a noise over my head and a thick sheet of metal nearly hits me as it falls in front of the glass door, protecting it. Alarms sound and I know the whole area is going into lockdown. I can’t get captured. I brace myself for the pain about to take over my body and make myself invisible.

Just in time. Soldiers pour into the tunnel and I inch along the wall to avoid them. The pain and the wave of sickness doesn’t come. Whatever drug they gave me must have worn off. The relief I feel is profound, though I don’t have time to enjoy it. A door clicks open on my right. Without thinking, I jump through it and find myself in a narrow white hallway lined with more doors. Halfway down the hall a lone soldier is backing out of one of them.