“If I’m understanding the way this works, you could tell me to level the entire city, and I’d think it was acceptable,” Capricorn said. There was something in his voice that made me think he was smiling beneath his helmet.

It felt disconnected, weird. The storm still raged outside, there was virtually no light out there, and the lights inside seemed artificially bright. It was like we were in a box, and the world beyond wasn’t real. This was just a story, a contained, ethereal scene.

A nightmare in a box.

“No,” Goddess said, approaching Capricorn’s projection. She studied it—a head and face that perfectly matched our Capricorn’s in position and in every last detail. “You’re not capable. By asking if it was acceptable, I wanted to know if there were questions or concerns.”

“You’ll be in touch,” Capricorn said. “We’ll ask then.”

“Then we’ll go, there’s not much time before the asshole’s mind-slaves are after us,” she told Amy, Dot, and Luis. “I’ll be in touch, Breakthrough. Next time, we meet in person.”

I glanced at the screen just in time to see Amy glancing back. Momentary eye contact I hadn’t wanted. She flipped up the hood of the white coat, with its red cross at the brow. I watched her go, her squirrel-gremlin climbing up to her shoulder, to wave its toothbrush-razor in what might have been a wave or might have been menacing. She put a hand up to catch it, pulling it down to the front of her coat, where she rummaged, presumably getting it settled there.

I didn’t know how to digest it all. I had fear in my chest, anger running through me and a pit of something bleak in my gut. I felt like I could burst into tears and I felt like I was too numb to move, let alone cry.

I suspected that if we’d been there in person, I would have hit her hard enough to kill her. As part of that thought, I well and truly believed that had I hit her hard enough to kill her, I would have felt better.

Cryptid dropped his costume-projection, becoming Chris in the process. He stretched on his way to the door, taking only a short detour to grab his bag and coat, flipping his hood up to brave the rain.

“You’ll be okay?” Sveta asked him.

“I have a form prepared.”

The door slammed behind him.

Capricorn immediately began shucking off armor. Sveta backed away from the consoles, while Swansong and Precipice exchanged looks—Precipice losing his mask to become regular Rain. It was done. That was the meeting.

“That could have gone worse,” Rain said.

“Yeah,” Capricorn said. “Like Victoria said, the effect from her isn’t that bad.”

“Tolerable,” I said, again.

“Are you okay?” Sveta asked me.

I shrugged one shoulder and shook my head.