When Wave stepped out of the cleaning syth, Ember was gone. She had left her only a brief message, telling her: "Stay safe." Ember might have gone off to work out, and she herself would have benefited from doing that, too.

In retrospect, Wave was upset with how this had gone down, annoyed that she pretended to understand Ember, but still went her own way without consideration. Of course, it was the path that could help her find out more about Aki’s condition, and of course, it was one that was useful to herself. The fact that Aki knew something about her parents' past just couldn’t be ignored.

Was it right for her to risk her friendship with Ember by doing so? What if she never recovered from this? Ember was the one who rescued her from loneliness back then. Before that, it had only been the climbing and the music that had saved her from going completely insane. Her bags were always packed and she was always ready to disappear into the outside world, again. But even there was nowhere to go, but hide, because she could no longer face the people of her past. She was too ashamed of what her parents had become.

Wave lay down on the couch and stared into the distance, remembered how she had lain here with Ember, with a virtual starry sky above them. She gritted her teeth, trying to banish the memory, but it remained.

So she sang the first notes of Aki’s song. Among all his songs she liked, it was this one that had always soothed her, the only one that had no lyrics and could only be hummed. Many musicians lamented their sorrow over separation and pain in flowery words or settled their scores with sharp lyrics but in this song, she could feel the loneliness that Aki must have felt when he composed it without having to express it. Whenever she heard it, she knew she wasn’t alone in her loneliness.

But now, when she hummed it all by herself, it didn’t have the same effect. She hit a crooked note and fell silent. Bitterness arose in her over the failures at work and the failure today, that in the argument with Ember, she had-

"I like this song," Aki interrupted her thoughts. "It reminds me of my childhood."

"You remember it?" Hope sparked in Wave and the bad thoughts crawled away into the corners of the room.

"Now that I’ve had that song stuck in my head for half the day, that part of my life is popping back up clearly in front of me. Maybe it helps that I don’t remember much else. As if my memory was a canvas, white and pure, with just a single blob of color on it. It stands out, not yet blending with the color around it."

"Wow, that’s kinda poetic. What color is that blob?"

"Hmm ... it’s blue. Blue like the dark sea when the sun has already set on the horizon. A lonely blue because you don’t see anyone else sailing out into that night with you."

Wave was surprised. Blue and the sea, both had a very different meaning to her, reminding her of the time when she was not alone when everything was good.

"You’re popular, weren’t you in your childhood?" she asked.

"What do people love about me?"

Did he mean that or did he really not remember anymore? "It’s your voice," Wave said. "It’s unmistakable."

"Yeah, my voice." He laughed dryly. "When you hear someone’s voice, you always have an exact image in your head that has to match that voice."

He was right. When Wave heard his voice, she saw a big, strong man. One who radiated tranquility, was afraid of nothing, and by whose side she would climb mountains and cross seas without a second thought. But she didn’t want to say that, she couldn’t admit that, could she?

"It’s a voice that forces people to turn around because they just have to see who it belongs to and then get disappointed when all they see is me."

Instinctively, she wanted to tell him that it couldn’t be as bad as he thought but how could she? She had never seen him herself.

"You know, Wave, I grew up in the Citadel at a time when you couldn’t hide behind virtual images but just like today, there was so much emphasis on physical perfection. People saw me as I was and couldn’t reconcile that with what they had imagined. I was just a kid and I didn’t understand why at the time. My parents loved me after all, so why did the other kids give me a wide berth?"

He really was like her, Wave just realized now, like her when she had moved to Citadel City. "That sounds so familiar," she replied. "From that time the song was written?"

"Yes, it was the first song I thought of on my own. I didn’t have the words then to express what I was feeling, but the music was there as if it came directly from my heart. Whenever I hummed that song, I forgot the sadness, sent it away with the song, and was free. Free until the loneliness came back again."

Wave let that sink in, waiting to see how the goosebumps first crawled over her body and then subsided. Should she ... then she simply spoke.

"Aki, is it crazy that this song has the same effect on me?"

Aki was silent for a moment as well before answering.

"No. Not at all. My parents told me back then that my voice had that effect on them too. It calmed them down when I sang quiet songs and made them happy when they were happy ones."

"They're lucky to have a son like that." Wave didn’t know if now was the time to talk about her own parents yet, whether she really wanted to. Still, there was something else. "Aki, you know what I noticed?"

"No, I’m just in your ear, not in your head."

"Hey, that was ... kinda funny. I’ll just tell you then. Your voice is much clearer and more fluid now than it was before."

"Yeah, you’re right. Ever since we hummed that song together, right? I guess that song calms me down, no matter what shell I’m in."

Wave pulled a blanket from the corner of the couch - it was strawberry red - and wrapped herself up. "I really haven’t heard that song in a long time, until today on the subway. Are you happier these days?"

"I don’t know. Probably. I found a job at CCR doing what I love, reaching out to others with just my voice, and, for at least one person, I’ve been able to do that after all."

Wave couldn’t help it, the smile just appeared on her face. "Yeah, you did, for sure. Do you have friends and family right now? If ... if you don’t want to keep that a secret."

"Family? I ... don’t know."

What else had the news lady said?

"I heard on the news that CCR won’t reveal your true identity even after you died, to protect your family. So, there must be someone, right?"

Someone, they could tell that not all of Aki had disappeared yet. To exchange final words. Well, if they even wanted to.

Would Wave want that if she were in his place? If her parents had not just disappeared, but died? Would she take the opportunity to talk to them again? To yell at them about how they could have done this to her? Would it give them the chance to talk again, freed from the burden of life?

"Hmm...," Aki mumbled in her ear. "Maybe CCR is referring to my parents. I don’t remember them dying. That’s good, right?"

"Yeah," Wave whispered.

Aki paused. Was he expecting a different answer? "But ... there are some other parents I remember." Wave’s heart leapt. "Yours." Wave closed her eyes and took shallow breaths. As if her heart would then forget she was there and stop beating like crazy. "You want to hear how I first met them? Face to face?"

He had met them?

"When was that? Were they already ..."

"It was before you were born."

Before she was born? When? In the short time when the people of the Citadel had just taken their first hesitant steps out into nature? That was a time full of social unrest. Refugees from the lower floors, pioneers fighting their way through the jungle to establish new lives far away from the Citadel. Gangs roamed around the city and creatures of the jungle snatched up anyone who dared to go out alone. Wave was born only after many settlements were already established and the city grew ring by ring.

"What were they like then?"

"They were heroes. At least they were mine."

Heroes? That sounded so exalted. Unapproachable. Wave couldn’t remember them ever thinking of themselves that way. They did what was necessary simply because it was part of their job. "What do you mean?"

"They saved my life and my parents'. A lot of our neighbors are only alive because they intervened back then."

"It sounds a little bit like my childhood parents. They were always ready to help people in the settlements, but then, that’s what the Wanderers paid them for."

"But we didn’t live in one of the settlements, we lived right in the middle of the city."

"What?" In the city? She hadn’t known her parents had been in the city. Their whole life took place in the outside world, didn’t it? All their friends were there. The city was a place to avoid, they had always taught her that. Was the reason not just the city’s recklessness toward the outside world, but something they had experienced while living there? "Did my parents live in the city, too?"

"Maybe but I don’t really know. I was just a little boy back then, after all. Just old enough to remember, not old enough to run away from it fast enough."

"Run away? From what? What was brave enough to venture all the way into the city?"

"I rather think it wanted to get out of the city."

"It?"

"A monster. it was big and red, roared so loud my ears rang and it breathed fire. A monster that could have come out of a storybook, yet, it probably just came from one of the illegal labs."

Illegal laboratories and monsters were actually content of urban legends or conspiracy theories, but if Aki told her that he had been there himself, they might have been more than scary stories to keep kids from leaving their homes at night, after all.

"How come my parents were there but not the Security Corps? Or were my parents ..."

"No, your parents weren’t in the Security Corps. They belonged to some group that did the jobs that the Security Corps couldn’t do because they were totally overwhelmed by the world outside the Citadel. Bandits, family feuds, corporations, and other factions all did what they wanted."

The history books she had consumed through the learning program made no mention of such incidents. On the contrary, it pointed out how structured the development of the outside world had been. Bandits and dinosaurs existed but did not last long. And, as Wave knew from her own work, nothing could stop the city’s expansion.

"So they really risked their lives for the citizens?"

"They risked their lives for everyone. Without them, the monster’s fire would have burned me completely."

"Completely? Oh ... that’s why." That’s why they gave him a wide berth and were disappointed when they saw his true face.

"Yes, I was too close and couldn’t run away. It was your mother who grabbed me and carried me out of the heat while your father faced it alone."

"He alone?" In the past, she would have never thought something like that was even possible, him alone against such a monster. Today she knew he was a monster himself. So, he had always been and had only hidden it. "Thank you Aki for telling me this. I only know my parents from their time in the outside world. They never set foot in the city again, not until they declared war on it. Do you know why they moved to the outside world?"

"No. I don’t have that memory. It ends in my childhood and doesn’t begin again until you showed up in the city. The outcry then was impossible to ignore."

"Outcry?" Wave knew the city wasn’t thrilled when she applied for citizenship, but this sounded a lot more dramatic.

"Yeah, they were all afraid you’d turn out like your parents. But they were wrong. You never used your powers, always kept yourself in the background." He laughed. "Leaving aside the fact that you wanted to climb the Citadel."

"That of all things I’m known for that ..." Wave sighed. "My powers, what do you mean?"

"Well, you didn’t turn into a monster that would reduce the city to rubble."

Wave slapped her hands in front of her face. "God, those idiots."

"What do you mean, Wave?"

"I don’t think anyone in the city knows that they just adopted me."

"What?" There was a moment of horrified silence, then Aki laughed out, so loudly that it rang in her ears.

"That’s really funny. All those blowhards on the other channels. They’ve been talking about nothing else for weeks. About the countdown to disaster. They warned their viewers to get too close or mess with you, but none of it ever happened. Eventually, they lost interest."

"But people’s suspicions remained," Wave said bitterly. "Can you give me some names that have spread these rumors? And don’t be surprised if they disappear without a trace."

"Are you serious?"

"No. It’s just so depressing. I came to the city wanting to go a different way, but ..."

"I’ve heard about it. They made fun of that topic, too. I’m sorry. You want to protect the settlements, near the city?"

"Oh, I want to protect so many things that the city destroys. Settlements, biotopes, rare plants and animals, and, of course, the people. I had big hopes that if you just talked to each other, you could ensure peaceful coexistence."

"But no one listens, huh?"

"My words don’t even reach those who are supposed to hear them. I don’t know if any of my requests have ever been presented to the City Council. They’re all intercepted in the agency before that."

"I’d love to lend you my voice now that we know each other. But alas, I’m dead."

"It’s always too late for some things." Had it been too late for her parents to turn back, too? To choose a path, without violence? Could any of the parties have even allowed that to happen? The city had to punish the terrorists and her parents knew only revenge. They went so far that not even their own daughter understood them anymore. "Aki, what did you think when your childhood heroes suddenly turned out to be villains?"

"That’s a good question. I ... didn’t know if I should believe it. You know, Wave, a lot of things in the city are really different from what they seem. I assumed the same was true for things in the outside world."

That would have been a nice explanation, that it all was just a lie put on her parents. "I have to disappoint you. My parents did almost everything the city blames them for. After that one day, everything changed."

"What happened on that day?"

"I wasn’t there, so I can only tell you what I was told. One of the settlements asked them for help in mediating with the city. They went and were sure they could do this job, with thoughtfulness and the right words. Mostly, it was just a matter of the settlers being able to take whatever they wanted undisturbed, or at least being compensated. That is all you can do anyway because you simply can’t stop the city."

Wave stared at the ceiling, trying to remember that day more clearly, but couldn’t get a grip on it, didn’t want to.

"It didn’t work. It failed in such a bad way that the settlement was completely wiped off the map and my parents returned injured. Since then, they haven’t missed an opportunity to attack the town, without regard for innocent lives. And then they just disappeared and left me behind, left me a legacy of death and destruction."

Silence reigned. Surely Aki had to digest that for himself first.

"Wave?"

"Yes?"

"You’re not like your parents. No matter what they did."

Wave took a deep breath, trying to shake off the tension this topic caused her every time. "I’m glad you recognize that, Aki. I can count the people who can on one hand."

Now the bitterness she had forgotten at the beginning of their conversation came back again. By now, she knew a fraction more about what her parents had done before they took her in. It didn’t change her view of the big picture. A few more heroics on the plus side weren’t enough to outweigh the blood they’d spilled afterward.

"Can you hum that song again?" Wave asked, hopefully. "I could use a bit of peace and quiet right now."

"Sure." He started humming and the frustration vanished instantly. How that was possible, she didn’t really want to know. Now she didn’t want to know anything at all and just curl up under the covers and enjoy the peace that enveloped her.

She dozed off. How long, she couldn’t say. At least not long enough, because already a call jolted her out of sleep again. It was Hammer.

"Yes," she reported, still half asleep.

"Get ready, I was able to arrange a meeting."

"Seriously?" Now she was wide awake. " It’s always amazing, what your connections can do."

"Will you vote for me if I run for Council?" he asked jokingly.

"Only if you accept all my agency requests."

"Deal. So, we’ll meet at midnight, I'll just send you the coordinates."

Wave checked them out. Not exactly the safest part of the city, but she wouldn’t worry about that until she got there, to begin with.