The appearance of the hole in reality wasn’t as noisy, with the work Lookout had done earlier. I wasn’t even sure the people in the lobby heard. There was a snow-dusted landscape on the far side.

“Not funny,” Tattletale said.

With Sveta helping, I chucked Tattletale through, then raised my hand again.

The portal closed.

“A little funny,” I whispered to myself.

Sveta, by contrast, had body language that betrayed her worries. Tendrils reached out of the sleeves of her patchwork coat to help wring her hands. They ran along the backs and fingers of hands where the wrinkles and textures of flesh weren’t quite right, and where fingers didn’t end in proper nails, with stick-on nails pretty clearly stuck on. She glanced back at the other Case Fifty-Threes.

“Same methods as Cauldron, Sveta?” Egg asked. “Dimensional doors, snatching people.”

“Fuck off, Egg. I’m really not in the mood.”

“Calling it like I see it.”

“The catchphrase of assholes everywhere,” I murmured to Sveta, as I put a hand on her shoulder and led her to the corner of the landing that was furthest from the other group. “You okay?”

“Yeah. You’re sure?” she asked. “About Tattletale?”

“Can’t have her looking at our security apparatus,” I said. “The way she’s been talking, she might actually figure something out. That’s bad. But she might also press buttons and let us know she knows, in which case everyone freaks out. This is simpler. Let her cool off.”

“Yeah.”

“Let’s hope this isn’t so much of a routine shift that it screws up the password procedure,” I told her.

The Old Man was looking so out of it I wasn’t even sure if he’d registered everything that was going on.

“You okay?” I asked him.

“I’m looking forward to lying down,” he said. He visibly tried to straighten to his full height, something he hadn’t even been doing when working at the counter in the Lodge. He swayed slightly, was steadied by Sveta, and seemed to realize he was doing it, because he managed to stop. As much as he presented more of an image of strength, he conceded, “I’m worried.”

“What we’re doing right now, we’re doing to protect you. Feeding people parts of yourself is gross and concerning, but it’s not our priority right now.”

“I’ll cooperate,” he said, smiling.

He had a bit of a creepy vibe. It sucked that my feelings about the guy were so mixed. On the one hand, creepy reverse-cannibal. On the other, he was a survivor of a kind we really didn’t have enough of. Every minute, hour, or day he lived, he was blazing new ground, as far as I knew. Raising the bar for all of us.

“Don’t touch the diagrams. Follow behind Sveta,” I said.

“What happens if we don’t listen?” Egg asked.