I leaned forward, hand on the desk. “Point is, Amy, she gave us some insights. You knew Swansong. You sort of know Damsel by proxy. You know Swansong was being paid for her insights into the powers and the place they come from. Damsel was there.”

“And now you’re going to tell me that I’m wrong, I don’t get it, you think you know more than me after… what, a day there? Half a day? Hours?”

“Amy. Stop. You asked for my help, I’m giving it. I can’t believe I’m doing it, but here we fucking are, so stop.”

The silence was tense. Had I pushed it with the ‘fucking’? I could see it being too informal, when this was technically a diplomatic meeting.

“Listen to your sister.”

My mom’s voice. I looked over at her.

“…What do you want from me?” Amy finally spoke, more subdued.

“Let’s talk about this one workable bit of common ground. Remember how I was super into studying powers?”

“Of course I do.”

“Still am. I’ve got a bookshelf filled with my collection of power texts, case files, notes…”

Narwhal motioned for me to hurry up.

“…and I studied a lot while I was in the hospital. After…” I trailed off.

“I know, yeah,” Amy said.

“So you know your thing. I know my thing. Explain. Let’s talk about your Chevalier.”

“Okay. Cryptid stole a scan of his DNA during one of the back-and-forths with the Wardens. I used that scan to make something close enough the power could reach back, leaving the floodgates to power open, Chris forced the connection and gave it a body that could handle the power, like a lot of the broken triggers can’t.”

“But why him? Why is he the one you’re sending?”

“Because he exists in multiple states at once, and the Machine Army, I’m told, does the same thing. They compress seeds of their material into dense matter and when they have something big and dense enough, even a boulder, they use them to house interdimensional pockets. The biggest machines and installments have those same pockets. If you nuke the area, that pocket leaks out, and before you know it, you’ve got an infestation again. He can get past that and do enough damage.”

“They have other tech. Other countermeasures. Is your knowledge of the Machine Army limited to what Dot told you? Your goblin?”

“No,” Amy said.

“’Lo.”

“Hello, Dot,” I said, my voice tense. “Are you looking after Amy like I asked you to?”

“Uh huh. Kinda.”

“I was briefed on the Machine Army in some depth,” Amy said. “They wanted to see if I could do something that would clear them away. I had to make pathogens that would stay long enough to capture the leak, or be able to get through it.”

Narwhal wrote something on a note.

“They said no to that,” I read.