In yet another quirk of inconsistency, the stayed stubbornly impermeable to the blindfold tied around the back of my head. This resulted in a thin strap of cloth fastened around the mask itself, hiding whatever was directly in front of me and little else—the view both above and below the blindfold was expansive.

Seeing how Nick had applied the blindfold himself, and his squad didn’t seem to notice, I had to assume the mask was projecting a suitably convincing image.

Nick led me through a series of winding concrete corridors. There were several connecting doors that looked as if they could have once been offices.

At the mouth of the hallway, Nick suddenly halted. Playing the part, I ran directly into him, letting out an annoyed grunt.

“Stop.” Nick whispered, then he turned back to face me, his back to the larger room, blocking me from view as two civilians with rifles passed by, escorting a tall man idly twirling a double-bladed staff who looked vaguely European. His beak-like nose was pronounced, and the way it framed his narrow eyes gave him a decidedly predatory look. “Laugh like I just said something funny.”

I forced a laugh.

Nick’s mouth quirked as he gave me a gentle push. As soon as the three were out of earshot, he whispered. “I was thinking more of a light guffaw rather than a maniacal cackle, but sure, that works.”

“Not getting why you’re helping me.” I pointed out.

His brow furrowed. “I’m not. And don’t tell anyone I did.”

I held my silence, searching for any clue that might illuminate our location. What I saw was almost enough to trip me up entirely. The compound was a series of vertical cylinders, each miles across, with a hole in the center. It was reminiscent of pictures I’d seen of a missile silo—and the more I considered that, the more likely it actually was one—only instead of austere, government furniture, the common areas looked like someone had given an interior designer with a low-key leather fetish an unlimited budget and instructions to, “go wild.”

Another group approached, and Nick pushed me into a doorway, waiting until the group passed to take my arm again.

“That’s it. Tell me what’s happening or I take the blindfold off.” I reached up for the cloth. Nick batted my hand away, then looked furtively back and forth to make sure no one noticed.

“Fine! Fine. Just leave it on.” Nick said quietly, maneuvering me through an abandoned section of the compound. “There’s a lot of tension around here. Not everyone agrees on how to move forward, and some people are angry. Some of those people would be happy to take their aggression out on a newcomer who breached our security, regardless of why. If that happened, some other people would be very upset.”

“You’re trying to keep the peace,” I said, trying to wrap my mind around why Nick would give two shits if this place devolved into chaos.

“Something like that.”

“Are you with—what did you say his name was? Sunny?”

Nick snorted. “No. You may or may not know this, seeing as how you weren’t on a first name basis, but he’s kind of asshole.” His eyes widened. “Not that I’m an insurrectionist or plotting anything, of course.”

“Of course.” I smiled. Nick was talking to the geas. My friend was still in there. He’d just gotten craftier, better at playing the cards he was dealt.

Or at least that was what I thought, before Nick dropped a bomb I was entirely unprepared for. “Honestly, I’m with the other guy.”

Aaron?

I nearly stumbled mid-step. “But you’re helping me?”

Nick checked around the corner, reaching back to stop me. He opened his mouth to speak, hesitated. “Look. I saw you fight.”

My pulse raced. Was I already compromised?

“And?”

“You’re good. Technique is a little…” He made a side-to-side gesture with his hand. “But you’re either seasoned and experienced with the system, or a complete natural. You could have shredded zero-team if you wanted to, but you didn’t.”

“Would have been a dumb-fucking move.” I said bluntly. “And I wasn’t throwing softballs.”

Nick shrugged dismissively. “Broken jaw, bruised vocal cords, gouged eye. Nothing our healers can’t fix in short order.” He gave me a knowing look. “Could have been a helluva lot worse if you got vindictive and pulled a weapon or used magic that would have escalated things.”

“Didn’t get the chance.”

“Bullshit. As soon as Katarina got her ass handed to her, you had an opening as large as the Grand Canyon. Regardless, I appreciate it. We’re not supposed to get attached to the people in our strike teams, but that’s just not in my DNA. A team’s a team, you know?”

“What’s zero-team. And for that matter, who is ‘we?’” I asked.

“Hm?”

“You said we’re not supposed to get attached. What differentiates you from them?”

Nick raised an eyebrow. “Sunny hasn’t filled you in on that yet, huh? Guess that’s a line even he won’t cross. Short version, zero-team is something I volunteered for. As for the rest, we’ll talk after you’re sworn in.”

We approached an elevator next to an industrial-looking keypad. Two guards armed with semi-automatic shotguns stared us down as Nick entered the code.

“What’s with the blindfold?” The guard sounded like he’d started smoking a carton a day in kindergarten.

“Sunny’s waiting on someone, right?” Nick said, not giving the guard his full attention.

The guard said nothing.

Nick finished entering the code, and the number pad emitted a low-pitched beep, rejecting the combination. “What the fuck?”

“Never gets old.” One of the guard’s snickered.

Nick crossed his arms and stepped directly in front of the guard who laughed. “Gonna explain yourselves? Or do I have to take this up the chain?”

“Sunny’s unavailable.” The guard said, mimicking Nick’s standoffish posture. “There was an incident. He’ll be in lockdown until further notice.”

“What’s your name?” Nick asked me, never averting his eyes from the guard.

“Myrddin,” I said. Both guards visibly reacted, displaying varying degrees of surprise for a split-second before they returned to their earlier stoicism.

Nick casually extended a hand towards me. “Myrddin here needs to report to Sunny. I’m not sure what Sunny’s doing with an outsider—not my business, but as far as I can tell, he’s not sworn in. And instead of being routed to the Sieve, he somehow got redirected to the facility proper.”

Both guards exchanged a meaningful look. One shrugged his shotgun onto his shoulder and punched a quick combination into the keypad. I caught the first few digits before he hunched over the pad, covering it.

Starts with One-Nine. Five numbers in total. Could be random if he’s smart, but the last combination also started with nineteen. One-nine-four-two-six. 1942, June. Battle of Midway? Didn’t take him for a history buff, but it could track if he’s fond of melodrama. Assuming I’m not tin foil hatting myself, the new combination could be another year-month combination, with the last number indicating the month.

was sounding more and more like the type of conspiracy theorist I’d walk across the street to avoid, but at least it was a place to start.

The elevator opened, bright overhead light reflecting on the tile. Nick guided me inside, then stepped in after me.

A guard caught the elevator before it closed. “You brought him here. Now piss off.”

Nick shook his head. “And catch a stray for leaving an outsider to his own devices? Not on your life. I’ll mind my business after I hand him off to Sunny.”

The guard looked ready to argue, but must have seen something in Nick’s expression that made him think better of it.

The doors slid shut.

There was no telling when I’d see Nick again. My title detected no cameras or listening devices in the elevator. And as far as I could tell, there was no magic or enchantments active in the elevator. No one to overhear us.

I needed to understand what Nick was doing—but even if I was reasonably confident we weren’t being watched, I couldn’t speak freely. No mistakes. No moments of weakness. I needed to be perfect.

“How the fuck is someone like you even here?” I asked.

“What do you mean?” Nick said.

“Whatever this place is, I know from experience they don’t exactly play nice.” I said, adopting the affect of someone who was weary, but curious. “That’s fine with me. In fact, I prefer it. But then you come in—and you’ve locked down some authority, but you clearly don’t belong here.”

Anyone else would have taken it personally. But Nick embraced dissent wholeheartedly.

“Because I’m helping a stranger?” Nick raised an eyebrow. “Or because I didn’t splatter you all over the training facility as payback?”

“Both. Either.”

Nick nodded. The forward momentum that carried him to the elevator seemed to drain out of him, and he relaxed. “You’re right that I’m not their usual type. Not that it’s a high bar to aspire to, exactly—most of these bastards would rather kill you than look at you. Sunny’s no exception, so be careful. I—uh. They brought me here through a series of events that wasn’t exactly voluntary.”

“You were a prisoner.”

“I didn’t say that.” Nick gave me a meaningful look that I took to mean he couldn’t say that. “The first few days were rough. They had me isolated. For good reason. I was… angry.”

“Angry enough to do something about it?” I baited.

Nick sighed. “Oh yeah. If I’d gotten the opportunity, I would have. But they were too buttoned up. My meals were delivered through a slot. Every day, someone came to talk to me. He was just a normal guy. No cackling or mustache twirling. The first day, he apologized for the ordeal that brought me here. Said he made no promises but was working on a fix to at least right some of the wrongs.”

Aaron and the necromancer grift.

That still didn’t explain why Nick was walking around free.

“That’s it?”

Nick chuckled. “Hardly. The guy was shockingly upfront with me. Told me exactly what they were looking to achieve, and how I could help. Even gave me the chance to decline if I agreed to have my memory wiped.”

Other than my own, it was the first time I’d heard of a power capable of altering memory to that degree.

“Must have been one hell of an offer, if you were willing to bury the bad blood.”

Nick’s expression grew thoughtful, probably piecing together how to say whatever he wanted to express without breaking the geas. “Think about the direction this is going. There are dozens of domes now, maybe even hundreds. Imagine if—hypothetically—I told you a there was a way to end this whole dog and pony show early. Peacefully. Maybe even before the second event.”

I scoffed. “I’d tell you to shove the snake-oil up your ass.”

Nick laughed loud enough that I couldn’t help but jump. “Sorry. God, you remind me of someone. Anyway, you’re right. That’s pretty much what I said. I told him I hated him, and that even if the snake-oil was real, there was no way in hell I was helping his people get a hold of it.”

“What changed?”

“I uh… talked to the snake-oil. Jeez this metaphor really isn’t holding up.”

“Hold on. Tell me what you mean.”

“Sunny and the other guy? It might seem like they’re in charge here, but that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Someone else is pulling the strings.” Nick’s smile faded. “And they assured me that once everything was in its proper place, there would be reparations.”

Deity. Has to be. No way Aaron got this much of a head start, otherwise.

“And you just… believed them?”

There was no way he was falling for such a simple ruse.

“They were very convincing.” Nick said, his expression esoteric. “So I had a choice. Go along with it and grease the wheels, use my position to guide things in a less volatile direction until the third-party comes into power, or sit there isolated and alone, feeling sorry for myself.”

It took a monumental amount of self-control not to out myself right there. I wanted to scream at him for so being so gullible, falling for whatever Wizard-of-Oz horseshit these assholes were pulling.

“Sounds like you have it all figured out.” I said, not bothering to keep the coldness out of my voice.

“It’s not just for me.” Nick’s voice was so quiet I could barely hear it.

I rolled my eyes.

Nick smiled a sad smile. “When I first got here, after I was… uh…”

“Not taken prisoner.” I filled in, tired of the vagueness of the conversation.

He inclined his head. “All there was to do was wait and sleep. I paced at first, wore a hole in the linoleum. But when I finally ran out of steam and sat down, I realized how tired I was. It wasn’t the physical exertion—that, I’m pretty used to. But surviving, fighting for your life, it takes a toll.”

“The quiet moments are the hardest.” The words escaped me before I could stop them.

“I have this friend. Might be the last real friend I have in the world, now. He kind of has a monopoly on bad luck. Dad passed away, mom with substance abuse issues who can’t hold down a job, two siblings that he basically raised himself.”

“Sounds like a real sad sack.”

Nick’s eyes flicked back and forth. “He isn’t. I mean, sure, he’s surly, and has zero tolerance for bullshit—never really stops moving, which always drove me nuts. But when the dome came down, it was like he wasn’t even phased. Like it was just another crisis he had to adjust to. And I realized that was exactly what it was to him. As tired as I was from surviving for days? He’s carried that weight his whole life.”

My throat felt scratchy. I needed to say something, anything, before Nick noticed the lapse. “Where is he now?”

“Mad as hell, looking for me.”

“How do you—“

“I know,” Nick said, sounding infinitely more confident than I felt. “That fucker’s too stubborn to give up. Always has been.”

“Putting that much faith in any one person usually ends in disappointment.” I couldn’t help but try to temper his expectations.

“Maybe I’m just a better judge of character than you are.” Nick shot back.

“Maybe.”

Nick smiled thoughtfully. “It’s stupid. But imagining him out there, looking for me? That’s exactly why I couldn’t just crawl into a hole and wallow in my misery. I want to change the world into a place where no one has to suffer. Where life is more than worrying about making ends meet, fighting like hell just to maintain the status quo. And the next time I see my friend, I want to be able to tell him it’s over. We won. He can finally rest.”

The proclamation echoed in the small bounds of the elevator, so earnest it was almost embarrassing. Nick’s cheeks flushed as he likely realized he’d gushed to an unaffiliated stranger. I found myself grateful for the mask’s anonymity, yet again. I rarely cared what people thought of me, but somehow, Nick was the exception.

Whatever path this took me down, whatever measures I took to extract Nick and derail the suits, I didn’t want the ugliness of my actions to tarnish his image of me.

Even if I didn’t deserve it.

I blew air between my lips. “Christ, this elevator is taking forever.”

“They’re made for efficiency, not speed.” Nick said.

“Clearly.”

“Sorry for talking your ear off.”

“It was a good distraction. From this snail of a fucking elevator.” And to be fair, it wasn’t entirely his fault. We’d fallen back into a familiar cadence of argument and discussion that was uniquely ours. Nick had picked up on it subconsciously, though he hadn’t connected the dots. It was a reminder that I needed to be careful. Sunny had no idea we were affiliated, but Aaron did, and the lie I’d fed him—that I was glad to be rid of Nick—wouldn’t hold up a day if Nick suddenly got friendly with Myrddin.

It was safer for both of us if I distanced myself from Nick as much as possible.

The elevator dinged. “Hold on, always wanted to say this.” Nick cleared his throat. “I can only show you the door. You’re the one who has to walk through it.”

I made a disgusted noise. But I’d missed him, down to his stupid barrage of dated pop-culture references. Nick didn’t let Jinny’s death break him, as I’d feared. He was misguided. Gullible. But still standing.

I could work with that.

The elevator doors opened to reveal a study. Sunny was standing in the center of the room. He held a bloody paring knife in one hand, muttering something unintelligible. His rolled-up sleeves were soaked in crimson. Behind him were several Users, sitting on a couch next to a bookshelf in varying states of exhaustion.

“Boss.” One of them said, eyeing the elevator.

Sunny stared into the painted sunset that hung above his desk, twirling the knife idly in his hand. “Prepare for the delve. Come back with nothing to show for your efforts and there will be consequences. Now get out.”

The Users jumped to attention immediately, filing past us into the elevator. There was something in Sunny’s posture that conveyed danger in a way I hadn’t felt before. He’d come unraveled since our last meeting.

Without looking, he pointed the paring knife at me. “Stay. We have business to discuss.”

Reluctantly, I stepped out of the elevator. The doors slammed shut behind me.