Mirella, on the other hand, was fighting for people she didn’t even know. For other people still trapped in markets, for girls she’d never met. Why did Mirella care what happened to other girls? Mirella had escaped—she should have lain low and survived. By sticking her neck out for all these other faceless, voiceless girls, she only put herself in danger. It boggled Nita’s mind.

Nita might need to fight the black market, might need to take on INHUP or the police or even the world, but the only person she fought for was herself. And occasionally Kovit.

Certainly not people she didn’t even know. What a waste of effort.

This was why she’d never liked Mirella. How was she supposed to understand someone like that?

“We should see if we can warn this girl,” Kovit said, skimming through more emails. “She could use a heads-up.”

Nita stared at Kovit as if he’d grown a second head. “You want to help her?”

“Yeah.” He seemed confused by her reaction. “Why not? It costs us nothing.”

“I . . .” Nita shook her head. “No, you’re absolutely right, we should try and send this to her. I just . . .”

“Nita, you’re acting weird, what is it?”

“Kovit, you tortured her.” Nita’s voice broke a little. “You made her scream until she could barely talk. She hates you, and with good reason.”

“I . . . What?” He leaned back. “I did?”

“How can you not remember? She had grayish skin? She and I were in the cages together.”

His eyes widened, and something dark and incomprehensible crossed his face. “Oh, her.”

For a moment, he looked haunted, as though he could actually see Mirella as a person and realize the atrocities he’d committed on someone he’d expressed admiration for not a minute earlier. And then it was gone, something hard coming into his eyes. Nita could almost see as he built a wall, forcing himself to dissociate from Mirella, forcing himself to forget she was a person.

“I don’t see how that’s relevant.” He shrugged. “Are you done yet? I’m hungry.”

Nita opened her mouth, part of her not wanting to let him change the subject like this, wanting to bring Mirella up again. But she didn’t. She’d known who he was when she teamed up with him, and she’d known what he’d done to Mirella. Nothing had changed.

So she went back to the computer, screen-shot all the evidence, and then went online to find out how she could get in touch with Mirella. Her activist cause had a website with a contact form, and Nita pasted all the information and sent it, hoping Mirella would look. There was an email required at the bottom, and Nita hesitated before creating a new account just for this. She picked a username that couldn’t be traced back to her and then sent the information off.