“No great rebel, maybe. Maybe it’s just that I’ve been studying you so closely that I see it. Maybe it would be there in anyone if you looked closely enough. But there’s this great stubborn restlessness in you, just underneath the surface . . .”

“Honestly, Dobroc, I think you’re talking about yourself more than me.”

“Well,” Dobroc said, “maybe I should just show you.” Ze pulled a fabric display from zir shift and unrolled it. “I’d send it to you, but I’m . . . I was planning on releasing it anonymously. I mean, if you’re okay with that. And it’s better for you if it’s not in your chatlogs. First, okay, first look at this.”

Fift took the display. Their hands didn’t touch.

It was a cacophony of color and motion, stretched, darting, rippling across the stiff fabric. It seemed deeper than it should be, somehow, drawing the gaze in, a tangled skein of dimensions which slowed and skewed the world.

“Okay,” Dobroc said. “That ought to puzzle your agents for a bit.”

“What—seriously?” Fift caught zir breath. {Are you watching me?} ze asked zir agents.

{Context is overdetermined.} zir context advisory agent responded. {Recursive exegesis offers no purchase for self-summation. All stances are provisional. Please allow for reassociation. Underway.}

{This could be the best thing ever, or the worst thing, or somewhere in between.} the social nuance agent said. {Please act accordingly.}

“You’re right, they’re useless again,” Fift said. “Kumru! How did you do that?”

“It’s something that’s been going around,” Dobroc said. “You have to know where to look for these things. Your agents will be fine in a bit, but meanwhile, they won’t listen in. Okay . . . here’s my piece.” Ze cleared zir throat and balled both hands in the folds of zir shift. “I hope that you like . . . that is . . . well, anyway.”

The display shifted:

Four-year-old Fift on the surface of Foo, tubby and bald in a stiff new shift: “But what about Father Miskisk? Father Miskisk is sad—”

A flicker of unease on Squell’s faces, of anger on Smistria’s, before they composed themselves for the feed.

Grobbard’s gentle hand on Fift’s shoulder. “They’ll catch up, Fift. Clear your mind, please, and get ready.”

Fift taking Squell’s hands, maneuvering to keep zir bodies as far away from each other as possible, as they set out through the gardens and gazebos. One body looking down at zir feet; the other, openmouthed, out across the immensity of Fullbelly. Of its own accord, the view narrowed, centering on Fift’s third face: zir tiny jaw set with determination, zir eyes staring ahead, imagining the First Gate of Logic.