WHEN WYATT JOINED them, they headed to the Mezzanine. It wasn’t listed as an official floor in the Spire, but the instructions in their neural processors told them to press and hold floors 1, 4, and 9 to get down there. Yuri had received a special exemption to unlock the Mezzanine in his processor, so he spent the whole ride pressing them for information about what else he wasn’t seeing. Tom and Vik had fun making things up.

“You are not being honest,” Yuri said.

“We totally are,” Tom replied.

“I do not believe there is a coed naked romping court. You are inventing this.”

“Frankly, I’m offended by your accusation,” Vik said indignantly. “Because of this, we’re not bringing you to the CNRC next time we go, are we, Tom?”

Tom shook his head. “No way. If you don’t believe us, you don’t romp in our court. You can romp in someone else’s court.”

Yuri scowled at them.

“Don’t worry, they’re making it all up,” Wyatt assured Yuri, as though anyone doubted it.

They emerged into a marble-floored corridor with a bubbling fountain in the center and crisp signs indicating various sectors of the Mezzanine. One was an administrative wing, another led straight to the hybrid fission-fusion nuclear reactor, another led to something called the Vault that was so restricted, looking in that direction plastered warnings in their vision centers: Intruders shot on sight, which made them all walk a bit faster past it. The fourth sector led to the Pentagon, and the fifth to a room empty but for two rows of fake trees and at the far wall a massive set of glass double doors that gazed into pure darkness. Tom’s neural processor told him this was the entrance to the Interstice and that he should walk inside.

“What is an ‘Interstice’?” Vik said.

“Obviously some mode of transportation,” Wyatt said.

“That’s helpful, Evil Wench.”

They ventured through the fake trees, and something triggered. Green lines slashed from the plastic trunks, honing in on their eyes. One by one, their retinas were scanned, and after the green lights bit into Tom’s eyes, he saw words before his vision center: Identity verified. Trainee Raines, Thomas. Proceed to the doors.

They’d all received the same notice, so they found themselves standing there, shoulder to shoulder before the glass doors that led to the black chamber beyond.

And then a mechanized voice boomed in the air: “Decompression sequence initiated.”

Vik whirled around, genuinely alarmed. “Decompression in here?”

“Out there,” Wyatt said, poking her finger to indicate the room beyond the glass before them. “It can’t be in here because our lungs would’ve already ruptured.”

“I would have noticed that,” Tom said.

Yuri nodded. “And then our blood would boil.”

“I’d notice that, too,” Tom said.