Another woman was Copse. Woodlands huntress aesthetic, with an emphasis on fur and leather. She’d been a right hand woman for a powerful and obscenely wealthy animal parts trafficker and collector of trophies of endangered species once.

Happyland was the unconscious one. Young, by the looks of it, dressed in bright colors.

“We extricated the last of his victims?”

“Yes, we were careful. Called in a few thinkers and a breaker that could go in and out of that pocket,” Anelace said. “Hi Antares.”

“Hi ’Lace,” I said.

Happyland could push people into a pocket dimension where he was effectively god. Each person was allocated a small twelve-by-twelve-by-twelve foot square space, but whatever he desired, short of expanding the space, could appear or happen.

Kenzie was talking to a tinker. Ashley, standing by, raised a finger. Rain and Capricorn were still making their way in, filling each other in on their respective girl troubles, apparently.

“How are you holding up, little V?” I asked.

“Marveling at how well Sveta’s doing. I have a few other things to say, but they’re not for gentlemanly company.”

“Oh?” I asked. “Now I’m curious.”

“Too bad,” she said, grumping. Her heavy black eyeliner was visible through the green visor she wore, which let me see her eyes narrow. “Salacious details when we next hang out.”

“That’s doable,” I said. “But I hate unanswered questions.”

“Boys,” Vista said. “Weld, Golem, Anelace, Signal, cover your ears.”

“I’m going to walk away,” Signal Fire said.

Weld, Golem, and Anelace did oblige. Vista stepped closer, so it was her, me, and Sveta talking.

“The batshit bunny stabbed me, right? I telescope her sword, so it barely punches past my breastplate, she doesn’t realize. But it does punch through. I concentrate the point that’s supposed to explode into a smaller area and pull it away from me—screws up my breastplate. But that part that did stab me… can’t do anything about that.”

“I know this already,” I said.

“Filling in Sveta.”

“Thank you,” Sveta said. “Don’t feel you have to.”

“It’s fine. I’ve had three weeks of hospital visits and bandage changes, I’m grumpy, and grumping it out is cathartic, you’re giving me an excuse. So anyway, I did get stabbed, and with the angle, it scratches my tit. And that scratch blows up. Blew up pretty good, too.”

Sveta winced.

“It’s taken three weeks to mend, I got a good look today, and it’s another scar, and it’s going to be way worse than the scar I have on my other tit, from when Hookwolf pushed me away with a chainsaw hand. Fuck. Oh! I hope I’m not being insensitive—”

“No,” Sveta said, making a face. “No, that sounds ow.”