does. Damned cuckoos, too privileged to understand how lucky they are.)
“Who was your friend?” she asks, leaning against the doorframe, effectively trapping Dodger in the room. The redhead would have to touch her to get out, and Erin knows she won’t do that. Dodger isn’t a touchy-feely person. “He stayed for hours. I didn’t know there was anyone whose company you could stand for that long.”
This is it: this is the point where an answer must be given, where things must be put into words and framed for someone else to understand. Dodger hesitates. Erin narrows her eyes, waiting. One cuckoo is dangerous. Two of them together is just shy of the end of the world as everyone knows it. If they’re still in denial . . .
“My brother, Roger,” says Dodger. “We haven’t seen each other in a while, and we needed to catch up.”
Erin lifts an eyebrow. “I didn’t know you had a brother.”
“It’s . . . complicated,” says Dodger. “We didn’t grow up together.” Except for the brief periods where they had. Too brief, broken up by silence and mistrust and misunderstanding. They should have been longer. They should have been always.
“Huh. And you both decided to go to Berkeley? Why? Family reunion? You should’ve gotten an apartment together, spare the rest of us your pre-coffee crankiness.”
“He’s worse than I am in the mornings.”
“Now I know the two of you should have gotten a place together.” Erin continues to watch her closely, measuring her replies. “Who’s older?”
“Roger.” A quick answer: no time taken to think about it. If she’d taken the time to think, she would have agonized over which was the correct response, or whether a response mattered at all. The first answer is almost always the correct one, with Dodger. Instinctive math doesn’t lie to you.
“Huh. He talks funny. Where’s he from?”
“Cambridge.” Dodger realizes with a twinge that anyone who remembers her “assault” might find it strange that she’s spending time with someone from the Boston area. The past is never really past. It’s always lurking, ready to attack the present.
“Wow. When your parents split up, they really split up.” Erin stays where she is, watching Dodger intently. “He seeing anyone?”
“A few girls.” She doesn’t want Erin dating Roger. It’s not possessiveness, quite: she isn’t bothered by the idea of Roger dating, not the way she was when they were teenagers and she was still trying to work through her own complicated ideas on the subject. (Her main objection to Alison, and to the idea of girls like Alison, had been the thought that Roger might find someone he liked better, someone who came with physical, rather than quantum, entanglement. But that was a long time ago, and she’s better now.)
“Aw, too bad. Well, if he’s going to be around here pretty often, maybe I can convince him I should be one of them.” Erin pushes away from the doorway, eyes seeming to darken. She looks at Dodger, and Dodger does her best not to squirm under that black-and-blue gaze.
“Yes?” she finally snaps.
“Be careful,” says Erin, and she sounds serious for the first time: she sounds utterly and unquestionably serious. “I know it’s nice to rebuild bridges, but you need to remember why you’re here. For your education. To arm yourself for the future. It’s coming, and when it gets here, it’s not going to care how often you and your brother braided each other’s hair, or how much time you spent laughing. It’s going to care whether you have the weapons you need. So be careful. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to do the dishes. You people live like animals.” Then she turns, and walks away, leaving Dodger blinking after her, bemused.
After a moment, Dodger goes back to wiping the marks off the walls.
REPORT
Timeline: 11:19 CST, September 4, 2008 (the next day).
“Master Daniels tolerated your foolishness, but I am not he, and this has gone on long enough,” spits the new High Priest of the Alchemical Congress—a useless title. The religious aspects of what they do have faded long since, replaced by skepticism and stoic scientific method. “What you say you would attempt—”
“I attempt nothing,” says Reed, voice smooth and calm. “I appeared before Master Daniels to tell him it was done, and to ask for readmission to your number, that you might all share in the glory to come. I did this to honor Asphodel’s memory, and not out of any obligation. I am here, now, to tell you as I