Amy. Fuck.

I walked over to a new seat, not next to or especially near anybody. I got my phone out, laying it on the table. I leaned over the table without sitting, thinking about framing.

First steps first. I looked Eric’s way.

“I want to have a discussion,” he told me, before I could open my mouth.

“Disciplinary?” I asked.

“Yes. More or less.”

“I’ll listen to what I have to, do what you require. But can I please call my therapist first? If you haven’t arranged one?”

“We haven’t. And no you can’t.”

“Is this because you have a missile flying toward Amelia Dallon-Lavere? I wouldn’t agree with taking that approach before giving her a chance, but—”

“No missile,” he said. “For now, sit in this chair next to me. We’ll review things.”

“Just tell me the Wardens are doing something to follow up on the action earlier. My teammate almost died putting herself on the line, working with Tattletale to get across to someone very powerful and very ill. I have a trace of hope here. I need to know it’s justified.”

“I don’t have to tell you anything,” Eric said. “You’ve been uncooperative every step of the way. Why should I extend you any favors?”

I stared him down, taking mental note of the situation. Armstrong wasn’t present. Citrine wasn’t on my side. The only other people I could name were Megan and Ysmine, Goddess’s cluster, and Pearce, who I only knew as the person who tended to stick near the computers. She was there now, and she and her underlings were agitated. The only scene that matched that agitation was the ongoing fight against the Machine Army. Soldiers running this way and that, to move rubble and adjust the forward defense. Here and there, they used explosives to deal with larger robots. The flash on the screen drew Eric’s eye, as he broke eye contact first, and I looked too.

There was a machine that was as tall as a house, with spindle legs, and a kind of open coffin for a head. A person was in the coffin, machinery threaded into their eyes and mouth. They groped blindly at the air as the machine spider-walked its way forward. When the giant smashed the machine, it bled from the resulting cracks, lurched back to a standing position, and then began firing lasers from turrets at the side.

While Eric wasn’t looking, I slid my phone across the table. I took the seat next to him.

The machine was hit with a rocket. The person at the head was given a merciful end, but the general shape of him and the giblets were held more or less in place by the machinery that threaded into the mouth, out the other end, all along bones and around organs.

Eric looked away. He seemed surprised when he saw me sitting next to him.

I turned my palms upward, keeping my expression unimpressed.