The next few seconds stretched into a year, and in that space, she knew. In the same way she had just known Ampersand had done something to her brain after he had rescued her. In the same way she just knew what was happening on the other side of the wall when he was having a breakdown, she knew.

Obelus.

She kept her eyes on him like prey trying to evade a tiger. The memories of the things he had done began nipping at her—that feeling of his claws going right through her, the thought of Vincent Park vanishing into a cloud of ash. All her memories were associated with Obelus’s old body, that terrifying machine that stood at around eleven feet and was almost the size of a Cadillac, nothing like this frail, elfin little thing.

If Obelus was alive and in Čefo’s body, that meant Ampersand had put him there.

Keeping her eyes on him, she placed the pill bug in the pocket of her coat and backed out of the chamber. Obelus followed her, keeping a distance of about ten feet between them as she backed away. She had left the pulse emitter Ampersand had given her for protection somewhere in the middle of the main chamber. All she needed was to get to that. And then, she’d have to test it. She’d have no other choice.

And then what?

She backed herself out into the main chamber, Obelus still stalking her, his head down in that familiar antagonistic posture like a bull about to charge. Ampersand had stopped seizing. His eyes were open, the light inside them flickering like a flame in the wind, but otherwise, he wasn’t moving.

She stopped when the pulse emitter was at her feet and stayed absolutely still. Obelus stopped when he reached Ampersand, and took his eyes off her, speaking to Ampersand in Pequod-phonemic. When Ampersand didn’t answer, Obelus spoke again, and then again. As slowly as she could, she lowered herself to the ground. Obelus’s eyes were on Ampersand when she got her hand around the pulse emitter.

Then Obelus looked at her as he continued speaking in his language. He looked as though he expected her to respond. He spoke again, what sounded identical to one of the spurts of sound he’d employed to Ampersand a few seconds ago. Cora didn’t move. Her animal brain was screaming, echoes in her body of the last time she had seen him. Vincent Park’s face, and alongside it, a primal, almost violent urge for revenge. She wasn’t thinking at all of Ampersand anymore. All she could think was that this might be her only opportunity to finish what she had started.

Obelus approached her, and then she heard a static in her ears. Then, a rolodex of words. “Kezīhi befīti beneberikibeti gīzē ’ayini wisit’i mayeti ālichalihimi.”