“And that’s it right there,” Tom said. “He’s the only person who knew. He’s the only one who could’ve told Vengerov about my refusal. He is the only possible person, Wyatt.”

“But, no. No, Tom. That can’t be right. There are other possibilities. Someone could’ve overheard.”

“We were alone,” Tom said.

“Someone could have bugged the weight room.”

“Who would bug the weight room?” Vik wondered.

“Joseph Vengerov could have bugged the weight room to spy on Tom.”

“Then he’d be an idiot. Does Tom look like he spends a lot of time in the weight room?”

“Hey!” Tom objected. Yeah, he wasn’t going to win any power-lifting contests, but he’d filled out a lot since coming to the Spire.

“What about the surveillance cameras?” Wyatt tried.

“I checked,” Vik said. “No one was actively monitoring that feed and no one’s accessed it. Evil Wench, this was the Android’s doing.”

“But it’s Yuri,” Wyatt protested.

“I know,” Tom burst out. “I don’t like this either. It’s not like I want it to be true.” He scraped his hands through his hair. “I’ve had this feeling, okay? And I couldn’t figure out what it was until I realized. . . . I’ll tell you something, too. Yuri knows Vengerov. Yuri’s dad works for Vengerov. Yuri was considered a security threat, and we never thought to wonder if there was a reason. Maybe we screwed up, Wyatt. What if Vengerov used him somehow to breach the system? Maybe we messed up when we unscrambled him.”

“Which is exactly what I’ve been saying since you two did it, I’d like to point out,” Vik said.

Wyatt shook her head over and over again. “You’re wrong!”

“We should at least put the question to him,” Vik said. “You can write some sort of program to make him feel like being truthful, Evil Wench. Maybe there’s something going on we don’t know about.” Then he seemed to get a great idea, and a crazy-eyed grin came over his face. “Hey, maybe the Android’s been reprogrammed and doesn’t know what he’s doing. Or maybe he’s being blackmailed.”

Tom felt a surge of hope. “Yeah. Yeah, like, Vengerov could be threatening to off his family or something.”

“Have you heard him talk about his mother? I haven’t,” Vik said optimistically. “Perhaps because she’s tied up in a basement somewhere, and Vengerov is planning to shoot her if Yuri doesn’t inform on Tom.”

Tom was very heartened by that possibility. Wyatt still didn’t believe it. “If someone was threatening his family, he would spend all his time figuring out a way to rescue them. Then he’d do it. And he’d succeed.”

Tom and Vik exchanged an unhappy look. That was something Yuri would probably do.

“I’m positive Yuri wouldn’t do this,” Wyatt insisted again.