“Go work. Talk to the bosses, let them know. It’s their call. They should communicate to other teams, verify the rules are in place. If this is a thing then it’s a thing that’s going to hit other people. Go. We’ll go to your apartment, get Sveta’s things, and be gone before you’re back. I’ll do what I can to look into this thing when I’m free, but I’ll prioritize Sveta for right now. Yes?”

I looked at Sveta.

She nodded.

I looked at Weld.

He hesitated, then nodded.

“You focus on the threat at hand,” I told Weld. “Think about who to tell, and be aware that if they are onto us, things are going to get messy. This is where we see how strong our teams and their human resources are.”

“Yeah,” he said.

“Time matters. Don’t trust digital communication. They’re playing a subtle game.”

“Yeah,” he said. “But I’m not entirely sure you haven’t lost it.”

“That’s the subtlety of it,” I said. “And speaking of subtlety, I’m kind of trying to politely nudge you here to, uh, make your exit. Let us deal.”

“Got it,” he said. “Thanks.”

He headed to the door, floorboards creaking beneath him.

“Sorry,” Sveta said, to his back.

“Me too.”

The fire escape creaked precariously as he stepped onto it.

“You have a guest,” he said.

Then he was gone.

“Why did I say sorry?” Sveta asked. “So stupid. I didn’t want to say sorry. I went that entire conversation and two arguments without saying sorry, because I didn’t want to apologize. I didn’t do anything I wanted to apologize for.”

“It’s okay. Brain misfires happen.”

“It was my one goal. The one thing I knew I could hang on to and I just threw it away. And then he says ‘me too’? What the hell does he think I should apologize for?”

Her tendrils ruffled beneath her dress. Some spilled out to grasp at sections of the floor. I avoided moving, ready to use my forcefield if I had to, but I didn’t want to step away from her side.

“I think I need a control session with Rain,” she said.

“I think a session with Rain right now would be a terrible idea. Not when you’re off balance. I’d veto.”

“You can’t veto,” she told me, and her eye contact was damn close to being a glare.

“Can and will. As a friend.”

She was still ready, riling for a fight, upset and with no place to vent it. It was reaching the tendrils, but those tendrils weren’t reaching anything or anyone.

The anger faltered, and I saw the hurt creep across her face, the black moisture in her eyes, that she blinked into tears that ran down her cheeks as soon as they appeared.