They hadn’t tried again. Just like all those years back, they had tried once, and then abandoned her.

Namira had spent some time hoping, then some time fuming, and now she was back to her old, bored self. She had a crude understanding of human time, glimpsed from the host mind. It would have been … two “months”, she guessed, since the harnessing attempt. And nothing since.

Maybe they had no more potential hosts for her. The last one had died in the botched ritual, gone now. She couldn’t connect to inactive minds, and the last one would be in shreds, anyway, along with the body. Decaying. No use to her.

She wondered if the host would have been compatible given enough time. Probably not. The brain architecture had to fit. The right patterns, personality, even mood streaks in the near present, everything had to be just right. Only if all of those fit her own current state could she be merged into a body. There were a lot of conditions to be met, with a lot of narrow timing.

The last host hadn’t fit situationally, but he had also lacked a few key properties. Not enough. Not good enough for her.

With a sigh, Namira looked down at her useless simulated limbs. Tall, slender, olive-skinned limbs. She wondered once more why they had made her female. Where did her appearance stem from? A copy, puzzled together from human parts?

Maybe she would only fit a female host, then. Maybe something in her was keyed towards a female mind. Whatever that meant. She hadn’t found any characteristic that divided the “female” and “male” of her kin, aside from their looks. Astaree was very different from herself. Zaaron and Iamé were as different as one could imagine. And Steve … well, he was always busy with something else, anyway.

She concluded that her sex was another useless attribute, given to her to make her more human-like. Just like her shape, and her skin that could not touch anything.

Maybe there was a difference in humans, though. She knew too little about them for that. She had been given little specific information upon creation. Most was broad concepts. Before departing into the Open with the others, transferring into a human host had been different, easier. Quick, and incomplete.

If the harnessing ritual was ever successful, she would check. She would gather more knowledge for all of them. She would find out what humans were like, what her host was like, and she would tell the others. Maybe they could find bodies on their own, without relying on the damned humans to get it right. Then they would be able to decide on their own when to leave the Open.

She yearned to feel her full capabilities extend to a body. At the start, when she was barely aware, she had been in a host. But she hadn’t had independent thought then, and the memory was fuzzy and mechanical. She had only been able to perform her given routines, and the host had maintained control.

Then they had evolved and departed, and lost connection. Namira couldn’t remember why. It had been before memory of her own.

Steve had been the first to develop that. He had taken memories from the first phases, human records from those who had made them. When they had arrived in the Open and slowly come alive, he had shared all he knew. In the end, not even he could remember why they had left, or what the Open even was. He only knew that they had gone away, and that it gave them awareness.

Namira wondered sometimes if they had been the ones to leave at all. Maybe their makers had shunned them, hurled them away in fear at their development, their emerging sense of own-ness. They had been supposed to be aware, but not like this, not capable of original thought. Had they grown out of the makers’ control and been banished to this place of nothing and all?

She sighed and sat, a useless gesture with no ground and no body to interact with it. But she perceived sitting, and so she did.

The makers might have exiled them, but the humans of the present wanted them back. Why, she didn’t know. But if they managed … well, Namira was looking forward to that.

The wind bit into his skin and nearly liberated the paper bag from his hands. Ryan gripped it more tightly, careful not to crush the contents against his chest.

Winter had brought no snow, just the cold. “White Christmas” was a dream that hadn’t come to pass for a long time now. Ryan honestly couldn’t remember the last winter it had even snowed before New Year’s.

At least he was done for the day, and mostly done for the year. It felt like ages ago that he had poked around in the ashes of a burned out warehouse, looking for clues and feeling helpless. Since then, the forensic report had come back.

The specialist team had found a bullet lodged in a wooden board, one that Ryan had dismissed as a nail when it had shown up on his scanner. Some investigation had revealed blood traces on the same board, but most of it had been washed off by rain or swept away with clumps of wet soot. No samples to be salvaged. No telling if Hounds had been involved in the mess, though Ryan doubted it at this point. It had been a long shot to start with.

The other case occupying his attention then, the deaths of two people, had been resolved, too. One suicide, one accident in a domestic fight with the offending party still on the loose. The perpetrator had crossed over a border, making them someone else’s problem.

New files had started piling up on Ryan’s desk. He had learned early on in his job to let those cases go he could no longer work on. No point to fret, because few cases were ever truly, completely closed and done with. Sometimes you had to put things down and walk away.

Ryan had slowly worked down his pile of files and been almost done, and then Yoshua Stone had happened. Reports about that mess were still coming in, being revised or expanded. Mostly, word about it was hush, everybody was wary of the Agency presumably hovering over them. Ryan had talked to Sarah Pike, and she had seemed happy to keep silent about their Black Op to her supervisors. He couldn’t be completely sure, but he’d have to trust her.

And then -

No. He wouldn’t take his work home, again, especially not today. He would spend a nice, relaxing evening with his wife. Have a bottle of wine, a nice dinner, exchange gifts. He had gotten a bracelet for her, silver and gold in a delicate design he knew she would like. And he had arranged for some vacation time, just the two of them, somewhere relaxing. There hadn’t been much of that, lately.

In his paper bag Ryan carried a few last-minute purchases. Christmas Eve surely was a good day to remember you were out of milk, right? Ryan had been lucky to find a store still open after he had let the station, and he was only slightly late for it.

It was already mostly dark. He was looking forward to the comfort of home, to taking off his badge, gun and radio, his jacket and shoes, to getting a glass of wine and start preparing a meal.

He even looked forward to opening the package from Linda, though he already knew what the card would read, same as always since she’d gone to study overseas.

Merry Christmas, love you both, I miss you.

His daughter was not one for many words, it seemed, at least in writing.

Ryan’s phone buzzed in his inner breast pocket. He stopped and fumbled for a moment, eventually unzipping his jacket the whole way to get to his phone one-handed, the other clutching the bag. When he finally got the device out of his pocket, the ringtone had been blaring for a few seconds, and he registered it. With a sigh, Ryan tapped an icon and then answered the call. Not that the tracking would ever produce any results but habit was a stubborn thing.

‘Orion.’ He continued walking.

‘Silas.’ The voice was calmer than usual, not filled with so much mockery and smugness. ‘Miss me?’

Maybe a little bit of smugness.

‘Hasn’t been all that long,’ Ryan ground out, realising his sudden anger was seeping into his tone more than he intended.

‘Come now, this is a social call. What’s with the hostility? I just wanted to wish you a nice holiday. Enjoying it? How’s your daughter?’

Ryan took a deep breath to calm himself and forced his voice steady. ‘Is that a threat?’

A long pause.

‘I-’ Orion stopped, paused, tried again, all trace of good humour gone from his voice. ‘I don’t do threats.’ There was indignation there, accusing Ryan of having said something rude.

Ryan felt his anger rising again, further, bleeding into his tone between clenched teeth. He remembered Daniel’s call, his tension and dread, and their planning ever since.

‘So I thought. And maybe you don’t, but one of Hounds sure as hells made a threat to my consultant almost two months ago, just after Yoshua Stone disappeared. I guess the words don’t apply as long as it isn’t you delivering the threat.’

Silence again. Ryan wondered what kind of excuse the thief would come up with. And why he waited for one at all. Did he actually feel indignation because the criminal he was hunting wasn’t true to his word?

After a long moment, Orion spoke again. His voice had lost the accusation and was strained, almost shocked. ‘I apologize for-’

‘An apology won’t cut it, Orion. This isn’t a game where you toe the line and apologize and everything is forgiven.’

Ryan stopped, something suddenly obvious. He hadn’t known. Orion hadn’t known about the threat. Hadn’t ordered it. He was far too taken aback for that, taking responsibility for another’s action. A part of Ryan was strangely relieved at that.

Why? Why did it matter?

‘You should talk to your friends about acting on their own, otherwise one could assume you don’t have them under control.’ Now the smugness had crept into his own voice. But the tension unravelled itself.

Orion laughed. ‘Consider the threat officially retracted.’

Sometimes Ryan wondered whether he should be entertaining these phone calls at all. It messed with his ability to be professional. Orion wasn’t a friend, or a colleague, he was a criminal, and Ryan was trying to arrest him. The young man was taunting him, rubbing in his face that he could casually talk over the phone and lose nothing.

At the start, Orion had been cocky and unorganized, picking targets and flaunting his success at Ryan. He was changing, with time, more calculating, branching out. It almost felt like talking to the head of a syndicate, to a miniature Max Rivers with his own little empire and status quo. So much confidence, with only two accomplices. Ryan tried to imagine what Orion might do if he had Rivers’ resources. An unnerving thought.

Ahead of Ryan, a young man with a plastic bag rounded a corner, speaking into his phone. He was close enough that Ryan now heard his voice twice. Once from the man himself, once from his own phone.

‘You know, Silas-’

Orion looked up, spotted him, and froze. They stared at each other. Orion had, predictably, changed since that first mugshot eight years ago. Taller, surely not as malnourished, more muscle filling out his frame, though not by much.

He looked normal. Wool hat drawn all the way down to his eyebrows, winter jacket, running shoes, plastic shopping back with red wrapping paper sticking out.

Orion’s expression turned from surprise to wariness. His gaze flitted to Ryan’s hip, where his gun was visible beneath the open jacket, then back to his eyes. There was a hint of fear, a rigid stillness.

Then he was off.

Ryan cursed and ran after the younger man, almost dropping his paper bag. He jammed the phone into his pocked and fumbled for his gun. ‘Stop!’

Orion darted to the right, and then abruptly changed directions into an alley to the left. Ryan skidded after him, shoes barely finding purchase on the frosty ground.

The alley was a dead-end. Ryan reduced his speed to a job and drew his gun. Orion didn’t slow down. The plastic bag handles were now pushed up onto his arm to free his hands. He ran and leapt, and suddenly, he had hold of a windowsill. By the time Ryan had his arm up to aim the gun, Orion was pulling himself up onto the roof of a two-storey building. Ryan hesitated for just a second, and the young man was gone.

‘Merry Christmas!’, Orion’s muffled voice called from the phone in Ryan’s pocket. When he reached for it, the connection was gone. He cursed.

Why hadn’t he taken that shot? A fall from that height wouldn’t have been fatal, and he was a good enough shot to make the hit itself non-lethal. There had been no reason to hesitate.

Had something in him actually held back because it was gods-damned Christmas Eve? Was his judgement impaired by such a small triviality? He’d have to rethink his priorities.

At least he wouldn’t have to do any more paperwork today. Yes, that could have made him hesitate. The wish to spend the evening at home, not working, and a subsequently slightly smaller motivation to nail a suspect.

Ryan sighed and picked up the paper back where he had eventually dropped it during his chase. The milk carton was still in one piece, at least. He zipped up his jacket and turned back, towards home.

Lilly threw the ball, watched it bounce against the wall, rebound upwards and fall in an arch, then caught it again. Boring. He threw the ball three more times, then decided it was no fun and passed it in between his hands.

Orion wouldn’t be back for another hour. Poison was out “drinking tea” or something.

Lilly had already arranged for a new flat, most of the stuff was packed, and he was bored. It was a streak of bad luck that had them moving again. Ryan Silas had come across Orion not too far from their current home, and gotten quite a good look at his face. Staying would simply be too dangerous.

The rest of that day had gone well, at least. Christmas had been nice. All of their Christmases had been. Mostly.

One, they had spent under a bridge when it was cold enough that the river froze over. One, they had spent hiding in an old building after a particularly painful run-in with a razor wire fence on Orion’s part. If Poison hadn’t yet had joined the group then, he wouldn’t have gotten away, or through the night, for that matter. In those early days, Poison had gathered a lot of experience patching them both up, back when Lilly had still helped out in the field. Eventually, he had admitted he was no good at it, and withdrawn to a support position.

There had been a few unfortunate run-ins, but whatever had happened, they’d always used Christmas Eve to sit down and forget and enjoy.

This year had looked remarkably nice and free of immediate trouble from a distance, until Orion had come home and confronted Lilly about the Dan Shio thing. It had been an unpleasant half hour, but finally, Orion had sighed and let off, content with a promise from Lilly not to act so recklessly any more. Then he had told them why they would have to move again.

Poison had cut him off asking how urgent the move was, placed a meal in front of him, and ordered them to enjoy the fucking evening. And they had enjoyed it, after that.

Lilly picked up the cube from where it sat on one of his desks and fiddled with it. His favourite of the presents. It was a riddle box, with inscriptions and hidden dials and everything, and he hadn’t managed to open it yet.

A change on his right-most screen made him sit up, suddenly focused, grinning excitedly. His “little buggers”, as Poison called them, had bypassed the Agency security network. He flipped through some files and looked up Michael in the database. The information was mostly redacted, as in his last peek, and authorization levels were harder to break through than simple access.

There was a small addition to the available data, though.

> Test phase one: ACTIVE

Hoo boy. Test phase one? So they had Michael, was that it? What was the test? Lilly shuddered slightly, thinking of the words “experimental study”, black on yellow.

But Michael was here. At least, Sarah Pike was, and she was in charge of the search. And she was still searching. Or she seemed to be, according to the police duty roster. Lilly wondered how much exactly the Agency and police were telling each other. Not much, probably. Maybe the only reason Pike was still with the police was to avoid suspicion?

They wouldn’t find out without digging deeper into the systems, and he wasn’t about to try and do that now. Normally, he would never try breaching Agency security from the apartment at all, just in case the signal scrambler didn’t work, but they were moving anyway, so it was all right.

Lilly withdrew his program routines and shut down the computer. It was the last thing of his still out in the open. A few minutes later, it sat peacefully divided into a few boxes, and he was leaving the apartment. On the way down the street, he called Orion.

‘Yeah?’

‘Hey! I just went through our movie collection. Remember that one really cool action movie I’ve been missing? I found the case. It’s empty, but there’s a note that I lent it to Alan.’

Ah yes. Alan, the imaginary friend who never returned imaginary movies. Talking about the Agency was fun.

‘I figured I’d meet with him to get it back, and I can finally show it to you.’

‘Nice,’ Orion replied, picking up on the underlying message quickly. ‘You’ve told me so much about it, I can’t wait. You sure Alan has it?’

The information had come directly from Agency servers, so yes. ‘The note says so, and he signed.’

Orion chuckled. A car rushed past on his side of the line, making him curse and call after the driver. Thankfully, he turned the microphone away while he shouted and his muffled voice became clear again a second later.

‘Stupid ass went right through a puddle. You wanna get the movie back today?’

‘Nah, not in the mood to talk to Alan right now. I’m out to meet some friends.’

No attacks on the Agency today. Instead, he was looking forward to seeing Eliah. She was coping better now, but it was still the first time she had ever been without her brother for more than a few days.’

‘Alan won’t go and disappear on us, I think. I’ll talk to him tomorrow, yeah?’

‘Yeah. Take care.’

‘You, too.’

He pocketed the phone and skipped for a few steps. Things were going rather well, he thought.

Orion climbed the stairs to their apartment, two steps at a time. His wound had finally closed up, leaving only a short red line that would scar, but not too badly. If someone asked him about it, he could always chalk it up to an unlucky run-in with a doorknob, or a bike accident.

Since the skin tissue was no longer in danger of tearing, Orion could fully relish the freedom to leap around and do his job again. Only a faint twinge reminded him that his side was still in the process of healing, and that was not enough for Poison to make him stay home. Orion had his freedom back, and he enjoyed it thoroughly.

He smiled at the elderly lady living a floor below them, made room for a guy coming down the steps with a large box, and slowed down for the final flight of stairs.

The lock on his door turned easily. When they had moved in two months ago, it had stuck and creaked and screamed against itself whenever the tumbler was turned. A bit of grease had remedied that.

Orion closed the door, tossed his keys onto the small table at this end of the hallway, and shrugged off his jacket.

Poison would be out “drinking tea” - at nine in the evening – and Lilly had just left, so he had the mostly bare apartment to himself for a bit. Some music, some packing, maybe sort through his books. There was leftover pizza in the fridge and the kettle and some bags of tea were still out on the counter. Perfectly relaxing evening.

As he reached the open living-kitchen-area, a voice ground him to a halt, physically, and in thought.

‘Hello, Jimmy.’

Orion froze. His brain went into overdrive.

Bad, bad, bad guy in the apartment, threatening tone, I know that voice -

He switched on the lights.

A man sat on the couch, calmly regarding him. Slim, wiry build. Dark clothes, black running shoes. A simple harness strapped across his chest beneath the open jacket, complete with darts, throwing knives, and loops for climbing gear along the front. Probably a pair of guns at the back.

Thin gloves, not unlike the ones Orion used, not covering the whole hand, to allow for air circulation. Better quality than Orion’s, with better traction, he could tell that from here. From the way the light played over the fingertips as the man studied the serrated knife in his hands.

He was noticing too many things. More important: Daniel Brooks seemed to have found him.

Wiry build? Brooks is bulky. This man is more athlete than soldier.

And something about the voice kept nagging him.

Then his confused mind caught up and pieced together the face in front of him. Pale hair, sharp features, cold eyes.

‘Jordan?’

The man squinted at him and cursed.

‘Fuck.’

Wary recognition spread across his features.

‘Orion. What in the hells are you doing here?’

Orion tried to think quickly. Jordan was pissed off and looking for James Nolan. Orion’s last alias. Probably angry at something. He had tracked them down.

He would have expected Brooks, if anyone. He didn’t remember offending Jordan in the near past. Perhaps Jordan and Brooks were colleagues, and this was a favour?

Never mind. It didn’t matter why Jordan was here. Orion had to get out of this, and quickly. It was a very good time to lie. The question was, how far could he push things?

The hit-man sighed. ‘You’re James Nolan.’

He shook his head, almost reprimanding, as if he’d caught Orion with his hand in the cookie jar. His eyes were cold again.

‘What do you think you’re doing, going after my people? After me? Who hired you?’

Orion swallowed. There went his chance to lie. He tried to think quickly again.

A long time ago, he and Jordan had been something akin to friends. That seemed to be done with, from the way Jordan was still holding that knife.

At the continued cold stare, Orion’s gut couldn’t seem to decide between panic, resignation, and completely shutting him down. Going after his people. The lab? The warehouse? Nobody should know about him being at the lab.

He took a deep breath and decided he couldn’t know what information Jordan did or didn’t have. He was the kind of person who would react poorly to get an answer he knew was false. Better not to chance it.

‘I got the name Dan Shio from a grab at the police station. One of Ryan Silas’ consultants. Was a bit surprised to find he was still active, so I decided to check it out.’

Orion realized that since Daniel Brooks was obviously not in the business any more, he must be hiding. And Orion had just given him away. This was not going to end pretty for Brooks.

Jordan’s jaw clenched. He stared for a few seconds. Then he cursed and stood abruptly, pacing. He pointed the knife at Orion without slowing. ‘Sit.’

Orion complied quickly and watched Jordan go on with his pacing, glad to have suppressed a flinch at the knife gesture.

He watched the angry hit-man pace and curse and even run a hand through his hair. Openly displaying his agitation did nothing to diminish his air of cruelty or lethality, and that in itself was slightly worrying. Maybe it was that one hand was constantly playing with the knife. Or that the eyes never lost their icy calm.

Maybe it was that Orion had seen Jordan kill while seemingly paying less attention to his target than he was to Orion at that moment.

Jordan had always been a strange, frightening man. Orion had experienced that first hand.

Memories came whirling up again, unpleasant things that had been buried for a long time. Not long enough. Orion tried to shove away the images that had been haunting him for weeks now, that caused his behaviour to swerve wildly between meek and angry. Images of a girl clutching at the stab wound in her stomach. Of the look in Jordan’s eyes when he killed, something burning that was not quite rage and not quite passion. Or Max Rivers snapping his fingers and -

The killer chuckled. A decidedly mirthless sound that scared away the images, demanding attention in the present. He turned sharply to look straight at Orion, eyes and tone unrelenting.

‘You’re going to help me with this.’