She trailed off.

“But what?” Sveta asked.

“Victoria, do you remember one time, you were complaining you never get the benefit of a doubt, Victoria? From your parents? From people when you were trying to warn them about Amy? With the diary thing and Teacher’s propaganda?”

“I’ve said something like that. But not to you, I don’t think.”

“I picked it up somewhere. My point is… I’d really like that benefit of a doubt right now. I know a lot of what I do is my fault, but… a lot of what I deal with is also because when I tell people stuff, they assume I’m… I dunno. That I’ve been coached. That I had intentions. Or they think about themselves first.”

“I know,” I said. “It’s always been a juggling act, trying to give you the ability to make decisions and… keep you safe.”

“I’m safe, sitting at my computer. I need to be sitting at my computer, because the portal tech is still a thing people might need one day and I need it to not blow up, and stuff I can’t tell you, and I’m not going to freak out. I promise. If I was going to, it would be because Juliette froze Roman so Chicken Little, Candy, and Darlene could touch him and get the effect. Well, technically, it was Chicken Little doing it, then Darlene did it because he did, and Candy joined in after…”

“Fuck,” I said. “Does Tattletale know?”

“Nope!” Kenzie said, brightly. “She’s going to shit herself, she’ll be so mad. But I’m calm, see? I’m okay. Because it’s Breakthrough’s plan and I trust it’s the best option. So I’m going to do my thing, then I’m going to see how things go, with as clear a view of it all as anyone could possibly get.”

“Do you want anyone around?” I asked. “I could get you over there.”

“Nope. Imp called Charlotte and Forrest. They’re going to come here to help look after the gang while they sleep. They can keep me company. Really, you don’t need to worry about me.”

She’d tapped her screen. I walked over to look.

Imp, Grue, Parian, and Foil were all in the room. Imp had an arm around Juliette’s throat, while sitting on a table behind the girl, as a kind of improvised headlock. Grue had a hand on Roman’s shoulder. Off to the side, talking, were Parian and Foil.

They were together, in these tense moments, where skin hummed with the promise of what was to come, and where monitors glowed red, showing the creeping cracks, the landscape turning to crystal at the edges of the cracks.

“I’m going to wrap up here, shut everything down, maybe, so it’s safe no matter what happens. Then I’ll just watch.”

“Kenzie…”

“I’ll give you guys calls on your cellphone. Between the time the people on the second rung and the people on the first rung start passing out. Promise.”