Egg laid her ball down in the grass, and she turned her focus to ushering the ant out through the airhole.

It was fifteen minutes before Weld was pointed her way. Fifteen minutes of sitting in the dark, thinking.

“Keep me company?” he asked, and his question cut through all plans and fortitude she’d erected in her head.

“Gladly,” she said. “Sorry I’m such a dork.”

“No. Don’t apologize,” he said.

With one short exchange of words, and the distraction of talk, she let herself forget what she’d intended to say about Egg and the more bloodthirsty members of the Irregulars, and wholly convince herself that this wasn’t that big a thing. There were too many nice people and too many people who she couldn’t picture being that angry or upset—after all, a fair few belonged to the tooth and nail contingent, and they were pro-Irregular, how could they want revenge or violence?

Weld was enough of a personality and had a good enough heart to sway the handful of real malcontents. Right? He had to be. She was bloodier than all of them put together and he’d changed her.

Her mind was cleared by the end of an exceedingly awkward night of hanging out with Weld and Gentle Giant, pretending nothing had happened, her heart cleared by seeing Weld happier and more lively, in a way she hadn’t seen in weeks. If nothing else, he’d been flattered, and she’d made a change for the good.

The only trace of the conversation with Egg was a lingering feeling of something left unresolved, a deadline missed.

⊙

Sveta’s body arched as a blister appeared, filled with liquid meat, swelling until it was larger than the rest of her. Skin tore and flesh within ripped apart under its own weight. Her arm tensed, gripping the edge of the table.

“One more time.”

“It’s been six times already,” Victoria said, voice tense. “Six times and you’re doing the exact same thing. You’re torturing her.”

“It doesn’t—exactly hurt,” Sveta said, through grit teeth.

She felt the needle slide into place. No sooner was it in place than some pins were pulled from a jar where they sat in some fluid. She was poked, needles penetrating where tendril met the back of her face. One after another, at least ten. Her tendrils strained and flexed where they were clamped down against the table, stretched out.

Again, she felt the flesh appear, grow, and swirl with random, vague nerve connections. It built up into a massive, fluid-filled hunchback. Again, she felt tendrils stretch, strain, and splinter. That splintering feeling, she knew, was the zipper edge forming, that would interlock tendrils.

The blister-hunchback popped. Fluid flooded out, onto the metal table, and because that table had a lip, some sloshed back into her face. She sputtered, coughing.

“One more time.” He stabbed her with another needle.

“You keep saying that,” Victoria said. “Say it again and we’re going to have problems.”