Last paused then, watching their faces as though he were licking the emotions like cream, savoring the involuntary expressions, the half smile that marked the rush of fondness for Dabry. Niko tried to keep it clear, but she was too far under the flow.

Which of us will he kill, once he has us all in it? she wondered. Dread of that moment squirmed in her belly, turned her bones to fluid that was emptying out of her, but new arrivals pushed the emotion out of the way.

Talon was there suddenly, the former sunniness now all bitter rage and anger that made the hollow parts of her ache, voids that could never be filled, no matter how piercing the pain became. They all reached out to him in reassurance, but he flung them off roughly, then lurked at the edges of their collective consciousness, a sour red note of emotion.

Then Skidoo’s love, that endless pulse that was her existence, the odd double beat of the double mind that she was, exterior and interior, two things at once, and yet both undeniably her. She was their core in a way that was as natural as breathing.

Oh, Niko thought, and abandoned herself to this state. Oh how I have missed this. Affirmation from all around her.

Lassite slotted in, an impression of dry scales and meticulously balanced word equations, units measured in infinitesimal drops of god stuff.

But so many absences that now it was like lace rather than the wholeness it had once been: Jakka’s quick wit and Whenlove’s solidity. Names like Breda, Laffert, Fortyseven, Klaw, and Wit—and more and more beyond that. Thorn’s death an enormous gaping wound, so fresh, so raw, that all of them recoiled from it, pulled away, tried to avoid bruising themselves by brushing its edges.

Who will he kill now? she thought, and could not hide that despair from the others. There was no hiding things here. That had always been their advantage, their acceptance of one another, the willingness to see themselves at their worst reflected in the others and accept it for what it was. The despair leaped from her, but the others reached out, steadied her, pulled her in as they had so many times before.

We have this moment, Gio repeated firmly. They all agreed, drawing strength from it while they could.

Last frowned at their vacant faces, unable to puzzle out what was happening. He gestured at the technician again, and the tech pressed the button a second time.

He has killed all of them, Niko’s senses screamed in a voice as loud as the universe as the others vanished from her mind.