Badly written, he’d noted from his brief read in the stacks. An absurdly sensational cover in black, white, red. Both the style and the graphics helped explain the out-of-print status. But what the book contained? Just what he needed, filling in portions of the plan the way flats or round shader needles filled in the space between the outlines of a tattoo.

Billy had worried about getting the book out of the library – he couldn’t check it out, of course. And there’d been security cameras near the photocopiers. In the end he’d decided to slice out the chapter he wanted with a razor blade. He’d cut deep and carefully before hiding the book away so no one else could find it. He knew that the book itself probably contained a chip in the spine that would have set off the alarm at the front doors if he’d tried to walk out with the entire thing. Still, he’d flipped through all the pages he’d stolen, one by one, to search for a second chip. There’d been none and he’d walked out of the library without a blare of alarms.

Now he was eager to study the pages in depth, to help with the rest of the plans for the Modification. But as he spread them out before him, he frowned. What was this? The first page was damaged, the corner torn off. But he was sure that he’d extracted all of them intact from the spine without any tearing. Then he glanced at his shirt breast pocket and noted it too was torn. He remembered that Chloe’d ripped his coveralls when she’d fought back. That’s what had happened. She’d torn both the clothing and the page.

But the damage wasn’t too bad though and only a small portion was missing. He now read carefully. Once, twice. The third time he took notes and tucked them into the Commandments.

Helpful. Good. Real helpful.

Setting the pages aside, he answered some texts, received some. Staying in touch with the outside world.

Now it was cleaning time.

No one appreciates germs, bacteria and viruses more than a skin artist. Billy wasn’t the least concerned about infecting his victims – that was, really, the whole point of the Modification – but he was very concerned about infecting himself, with whatever tainted the blood of his clients and, in particular, with the wonderful substances he was using in place of ink.