Interval: Piper

"Piper! Piper! Piper Ann Marie, come back here this instant!"

The woman cupped her hands around her mouth to send her voice booming farther down the highway. The sound welled up from somewhere too deep for a small woman to carry. "PIPER!"

"Mom, quit it." Her older daughter came walking back along the pavement. "You'll bring the whole wasteland down on us."

"Did you find your sister?" she asked, her voice strained with growing panic. "She said she'd scout ahead, just a few minutes. She said just a few minutes."

Her daughter readjusted the straps on her bag. "No, no sign yet. I'm going to keep looking, okay?"

"Rachel, you are not leaving me here," her mother said. "We'll look together. You're not leaving my sight."

"It's not like it's the first time she's wandered off," Rachel said, but she took her mother's bag to help her walk faster. "Just stop shouting like that. That caravan we passed yesterday said they've seen raiders."

The woman bunched herself up like an angry cat. "Your sister wouldn't have been silly enough to get caught by them."

"No, Piper's not stupid," Rachel said. "Come on."

They covered a quarter-mile of desolate road side by side. It was still early morning, just barely after the last stars blinked out into daylight, too early for most travelers yet. It would be safe on the open road for another hour, until the rest of the world woke.

It was prettier here than they'd seen in a long time, and it was a pity they were only passing through. Piper loved the flowers by the side of the road, even when Rachel tried to tell her they were just weeds. Weeds had every right to be pretty, Piper had told her, and anyway, it wasn't like anyone was caring for them, so everything was a weed. Rachel hadn't been able to argue with that, and Piper had worn dandelions in her hair until they wilted.

"Damn it, Pipes, where are you?" Rachel asked quietly.

Her mother had drawn in another breath to start shouting again when Rachel saw something shining at the side of the road. "Mom, stop it for a sec. Does that look like Piper's?"

Piper had a small, off-white metal device that played an hour or so of before-world music when they could spare the energy to recharge its fuel cells. She never let go of it, even when she'd memorized all the songs, even if she didn't have any idea what she was singing. Piper couldn't carry much of a tune, either, but they let her hum along.

The longer she looked, the surer Rachel was that she saw something white near the edge of the road.

"Stay here," Rachel said, and pressed her mother's shoulder reassuringly. She set her bags down and walked to the edge of the pavement, where the road dipped off into a ditch.

The device had to be Piper's. There was the dent where she dropped it two states back, and she'd cried for an hour until they could reconnect the battery terminals. Rachel gingerly picked it up, the metal hot against her skin. "Pipes."

She made an uninformative gesture back at her mother and grabbed the knee-high grass to ease herself into the ditch.

The ditch ran alongside the road for a dozen yards. Rachel walked just above the stagnant water, crushing mosquitoes underfoot and hoping so hard that she was wrong.

But she wasn't that lucky. A large part of surviving on the road was skill and experience, but the rest was pure, dumb luck. And Rachel knew, even before the ditch curved off to the right, away from the road, that there were limits to how much luck they could ask for.

Where the ditch made its turn, Rachel felt the last spark of hope fall away, like a stone dropped into a still pond, and her stomach lurched. Piper's stupid, ugly patterned head scarf lay tangled in the grass, its ends frayed and whipping in the breeze. Rachel knelt to carefully unthread it from the weeds. She registered the sight of blood on the scarf with only faint horror, already seeing it from so far away. "Piper...oh, God, Pipes..." Rachel crumpled the scarf in her fist and pressed her fingertips into her eyes until they ached.

"Rachel?" her mother asked, sounding distant, and she snapped upright.

"Coming," she called, and swallowed hard to steady her voice. "Stay there, Mom. I'm coming."

She folded the scarf carefully and put it in her pocket, and climbed back up to the road.

Six: Gridlock

They found what was left of the bike just a few hundred yards from the main bridge. It looked less like a bike and more like a mech that Monkey had finished with and torn the innards clean out of. At first, it was all Trip saw at the side of the path, just before the rock face dropped away. The engine was still running, sputtering every few seconds.

Geoff tripped to a stop next to her. "Oh, shit," he said, apparently at capacity for language.

Trip nudged herself toward the edge as Geoff switched the engine off. She wasn't sure what she'd do if she actually saw Monkey there, broken and bleeding on the jutting rocks a dozen yards down. She slid each foot forward through the dust and peered over.

The morning fog was too thick this early, and she couldn't see anything. Wren appeared, wraith-like, at her side. "Where is he?"

"Over here, Trip," Monkey said from behind her. "Fuck."

Trip spun from the edge of the road. Monkey was sitting against the rock face, his arm looped around his chest. "Monkey! Are you okay? Are you hurt?"

He pushed her away gently. "Tell you in a sec."

Monkey levered himself up from the ground. Trip gave him her shoulder to lean on, but he used it lightly, mostly for balance. "Fuck, my head."

"What happened?" Trip asked. Monkey grunted as he tried to step forward, and he did push on her shoulder then. "Okay, easy."

"Brakes went out," Monkey said through ground teeth. "If I hadn't crashed it on purpose, I'd be over the edge."

"Yeah, they did," Geoff said. "Huh."

Monkey surged toward him, but Trip pushed him back, just barely. "You!" he shouted. "You're always fucking with my bike! What did you do to it?"

"Nothing!" Geoff stared at him, indignant. "I didn't do this!"

"You were messing with it! I saw you!"

"I didn't touch it, and if I did, I wouldn't ruin your brakes!" Geoff shouted, his cheeks flushed. "I'm not an idiot!"

"Well, someone here is!"

For a second, it looked like Monkey was fully prepared to take Geoff by the throat and toss him over the edge. He took three steps toward him, his hands already half-raised, when Wren flitted between them. "Geoff didn't do it!"

"Scram," Monkey growled. "Don't stick your nose in."

She spread her arms in front of him and stomped her foot. "If he says he didn't, he didn't."

Wren, maybe a quarter of Monkey's weight, stared him down like a prizefighter from two feet below. Monkey considered her. "Yeah, how do you know?"

"If Geoff said he didn't do something, he didn't, so someone else did and leave him alone!"

Monkey took a half-step back, and in the silence that followed, Trip felt an insane relief wash over her. She started giggling, quietly at first, then loud enough to turn everyone's heads.

"It's not funny, Trip," Monkey said, but the energy went out of him and his shoulders sagged.

"No, I know," she said, but she said it laughing, fresh tears in her eyes. "Wren, my God."

Monkey looked back down at Wren, her arms still outstretched and her expression furious.

"You—oh—fine," Monkey said, at last. "Whatever."

Wren kept her arms up, a stick-thin barrier. "Promise you won't be angry."

"That part's already over, kid."

She gave him a suspicious look and slowly lowered her arms. "Okay."

Geoff stood up and dusted off his pants in sudden embarrassment. "Jeez, Wren. What was that for?"

Wren thrust her hands into the pockets of her sweatshirt and scowled.

"Okay," Monkey said, no wrath left in him. "Let's start over."

"The brakes?" Trip asked.

They crouched by the bike, trying hard not to breathe in the smell of burnt plastic. Geoff hung back at first, but ended up practically underfoot, either brainless or fearless. "Did the brake lines wear down?"

Monkey was trying to remove the dented casing that had been mashed toward the front of the bike. "Nah, I check them pretty often—move your head, would you—and they're new. New enough."

"So what happened?" Geoff asked.

The panel came free, and they all craned their necks to look. Trip didn't see much; it was a tangle of wires and tubing and metal, and she rocked back on her heels.

"Oh," Geoff said suddenly.

"God damn it," Monkey said, right after.

Wren stood on her tiptoes to see over their shoulders. "What is it?"

Monkey pulled the tubing free and even Trip could see that it was cut in half, too clean to have been accidental.

"Bet you the rear line is the same," Geoff said.

Monkey just grunted.

Geoff looked at him with tentative pride, no longer immediately afraid of being pounded senseless. "See? I didn't do this."

Monkey twisted the severed brake line in his hand before drawing in a breath and releasing it through his teeth. "No. You wouldn't."

"Who would, though?" Trip asked.

"I dunno," Geoff said, and shrugged. "Who wants you dead?"

They caused a small fuss, pushing Monkey's bike up the path and into Liberty. Trip took down the security system long enough to let them wheel it through without setting off the alarm, but she doubted it would have made much difference if she hadn't. It was a miracle that they were able to wheel it at all, with the front tire wobbling and scary rattling noises preceding their small parade. Wren brought up the rear, picking up pieces of the bike as they jostled loose and fell onto the path, and stored them in her pockets for safekeeping.

At one point, Trip heard laughter, though someone quickly shut their door on the noise. Monkey pointedly ignored it.

They managed to get the bike all the way to Ben's workshop somehow. Geoff went ahead to warn him, and Monkey and Trip stopped just shy of the workshop entrance, both panting. Trip flopped on the ground.

"Is there a reason you built your bike out of lead and cement blocks?" she asked. "This thing weighs a ton."

"It's usually not a problem," Monkey said. "God damn, that's a long walk."

"You okay?"

Monkey rotated both arms in their sockets. "Yeah. Banged up a bit, but I'll live."

"How hard will it be to fix?"

"It's a matter of parts. I've got some back at the canyon, but I can't get the bike there like this."

"I'm sure Ben has something."

"He better, after that walk."

Geoff came back out, with Ben close behind. Ben wiped his hands on a rag and tossed it over his shoulder. "Hell of a day," he said. "What happened?"

Trip stood up. "What happened to you? You look terrible."

Ben rubbed his eyes and gestured toward the clinic window. The glass was gone, replaced with heavy plastic and tape until it could be repaired. "I spent most of last night and this morning picking glass out of my instruments," Ben said. "And the sink, and the floor, and the grass, and everything else."

"Did one of the kids toss a rock or something?" Trip asked, puzzled.

"What did they take?" Monkey asked, catching on quicker.

Ben's shoulders sagged. "Different meds. Anti-anxiety pills, some sedatives...just a lot of different things."

"So much for your inventory," Trip said. "Do you need help cleaning up the rest?"

"No, I got it," Ben said. "So, what happened here?"

Monkey and Trip looked at each other, and Trip blew a lungful of air through her cheeks. "Can we talk inside?"

Wren had left the pile of bits and pieces on Ben's workbench, like an offering to some mech god. Monkey was picking scraps out of it, dividing what was useful and what was trashed beyond salvage.

"Intentionally?" Ben asked. "Are you sure Geoff didn't—"

"Been down that road already," Monkey said. "I don't think the kid did it."

"Okay, but that opens up a whole mess of other problems." Ben kneaded the bridge of his nose with his fingertips. "Okay, so, someone sabotages your bike at the town entrance. No one sees this because...?"

"Maybe it happened when the turbine was going up?" Trip asked.

"Someone should still have been on watch, though," Ben said.

"You can see the turbine from the tower. I'm willing to bet whoever was there was watching it go back up."

"Still worth checking, though," Ben said. "So, someone who knew enough about bikes to sabotage it. Do we want to think that they were trying to kill him?"

Monkey tossed a bit of something or other at the waste bin with more force than necessary. "Probably."

"That's crazy. This is crazy," Trip said, hearing herself repeat like that would make the others see how true it was. "Why would anyone want to do that?"

"Well, there are certain...people...who aren't exactly..." Ben seemed unable to finish.

"Rose," Monkey said, and threw another bolt at the growing trash pile.

"I don't think Rose knows which end of the bike is the front, much less how to cut a brake line," Ben said.

"Any of your team might," Trip thought out loud. "But they were all there putting the turbine blade up. I guess the question is, who wasn't there?"

"I was too far away to tell," Ben said.

Monkey braced his hands on his knees and thought. "I don't know most of the people in town, so I wouldn't know, but I don't think I saw the bridge kid, or the weird kid. Marla wasn't there, either, not that it matters."

"By 'the weird kid,' you mean Neil?"

"Yeah."

"And by 'bridge kid'..."

Ben sat up straighter. "Oh. Oh, I hope not. That's all we need."

Monkey returned to sorting the bits and bobs Wren left for him.

Trip looked back and forth between them, trying to pull whatever they weren't saying out of thin air. "Mark wouldn't, would he? What am I missing?"

"Half of the town could have skipped it, and we wouldn't know to look for them," Ben said. "Let's not jump to conclusions."

"Fine," Monkey said, although he didn't make it sound like it was fine.

"Why would Mark do that?"

"We're not saying he did," Ben said.

Trip didn't like any of it, but suggesting that Mark, or Rose, or anyone she knew by name hated Monkey enough to sabotage his bike was beyond her. "Mark's just weird. I don't think he's dangerous."

"He kept me at the perimeter for two hours once," Monkey said, almost blandly. "Kept yelling at me to prove I wasn't a mech that just looked human. Two hours."

Trip made an unimpressed noise. "Well, maybe he didn't recognize you, and we teach them to be cautious."

"He knew who I was," he said. "It was damn near freezing that day, and it was raining. Two hours in the rain. He only let me in when Geoff showed up and asked him what the hell he was doing."

"Still, that just proves he's obnoxious, not a murderer."

Monkey looked at her. "People don't always deserve the benefit of the doubt."

"Not everyone," she said. "But I know these people."

He left that unchallenged, and way down, in the part of her that whispered she ought to know better, Trip started to wonder.

"Do me a favor," Ben said to Monkey. "Don't go accusing anyone. Just...leave the bike here—I'll take care of it, or get it running well enough so you can get it back to the canyon."

"How long would that take?" Monkey asked.

Ben tried to draw numbers out of the air. "A few days? I'll have some of my team work on it, and I'll get the council meeting postponed so we can start tonight."

"You said you had stuff to do at home?" Trip said.

Monkey stood and tossed everything, supposed good bits and all, into the trash. "Yeah, I still need to get there. I'll just go on foot." He looked to Ben. "I don't have much to pay you with, unless you want scrap."

Ben smiled. "Consider it my thanks for saving our lives the other day."

"You fought," Monkey pointed out.

"You didn't give me the Cloud to fight. You told me to get my son and go."

Trip hadn't known that part, and she looked at Monkey in surprise that wasn't totally deserved.

"Don't mention it," Monkey said. "It's just what happened."

"This is my way of repaying you, anyway," Ben said. "Go ahead and bring it around the side and I can get started."

Monkey lurched up off the stool and went back outside, and it was only after he left that Trip realized how much space he took up in the room. She watched him through the window as he carefully eased the bike up and around the side of Ben's workshop. She thought she heard him swear, rougher than he would have in her presence, as the front wheel almost fell off completely.

"Your father would have liked him," Ben said.

"Dad would have thrown a fit," Trip said, and laughed. "Those tattoos."

Ben chuckled. "Well, your father had a few of his own."

"He did not."

"Not in places you ever saw. And your mother—"

Trip mock-gasped and clapped her hands over her ears.

The garage door started to life on the far side of the workshop, and Ben went over to help Monkey guide the bike into the open bay. "Watch it," Monkey said, about an hour too late.

When they'd gotten the bike into place, they started making a short list of the most critical pieces, what it would take to get the bike running again.

"So, maybe four days," Ben said. "Can you do without it for that long?"

"Sure. I've had worse."

"I don't doubt it. Keys?"

Monkey had almost forgotten them. He offered the key ring slowly, like parting with them was harder than leaving the actual bike behind, but eventually dropped them into Ben's palm. "Take care of her."

As an afterthought, he jerked his head at Trip. "And take care of her."

"Would you quit trying to hand me off?" Trip said. "I don't need him—or you—to take care of me."

"Uh-huh. How's your elbow?" he asked.

It hurt like hell, after helping him push the bike all the way through Liberty. "Fine."

Monkey gave her a knowing, exasperated look, and turned back to Ben. "It'll take me the rest of the day to get back. Send a dragonfly when you're done?"

"Will do."

Monkey turned to go. "Let's try this again, huh?"

"Coming," Trip said, but Ben cleared his throat.

"Can I take a look at your face? Your stitches are a little ratty."

Without thinking, Trip pressed filthy, raw fingertips to her cheek, and Ben sighed. "And we might as well disinfect it again."

Monkey caught her eye and indicated the door with his thumb. "Half of what I packed up is scattered on the road, so I'll be down there trying to find it all."

"Don't leave before I can see you off."

"Wouldn't dare."

Monkey gazed at his maimed bike for several seconds, seeming earthbound and forlorn. Then he gave Trip more or less the same look, and turned and walked out.

Trip hadn't even realized she was holding her breath until she released it. "What did—ow, Ben!"

"You are utterly ridiculous," he said, and wiped her cheek with disinfectant. "And insane, and half blind to the things you don't expect to see. You are so your father's child."

"Thanks for that," Trip said. "Is that supposed to mean something?"

"No, I'm just rambling."

Then he flipped her hair in her face—he hadn't since she was a child, since she was as high as his waist and he and her father were close friends, and the sound of them laughing was never far off. It meant the same thing now as it had then: that she had done something adorable, and potentially a little stupid, and Trip felt her ears burn.

She didn't ask again, and he finished re-dressing her wound without ever really answering.

The second time Monkey tried to leave that day, he lingered. Wren gave him extra berth, always within arm's reach of Geoff in case Monkey suddenly changed his mind and tried to launch him from the bridge.

"You can stop that," he said, as she circled around Geoff, keeping herself squarely between them like a guard mech. "I said I was sorry."

"No you didn't."

How so much attitude was packed into such a tiny, ordinary girl, he'd never know. She must save it up for outbursts like these, like a violent storm after weeks of dry weather. "Yes, I did."

"No. You changed your mind, but you didn't apologize."

"It's okay, Wren," Geoff said, but she scowled at him.

Monkey found a half-crushed pastry in the dust, wiped it on his pant leg, and stuffed it into his bag.

"Are you going to eat that?" Wren asked, horrified.

He found another bolt from the bike, an empty water canister, and something that looked vaguely mech, but could have been anything. The water canister he kept. "Sure. It's just got...more fiber."

"Dirt is not fiber!" Wren exclaimed. "It's just dirt!"

There were blood splatters, too. Monkey rubbed those into the earth with his foot until they were buried. "Will you quit bothering me if I say I'm sorry?"

Wren considered the offer. "Maybe."

"Enough, Wren," Geoff said. "You're gonna make him mad."

Monkey scattered the dust from his pants and stood. "Geoff," he said, as non-threatening as he could manage.

"Yeah?"

Monkey tried hard not to see the faint fear in the kid's eyes. "Sorry. Of course you didn't do a damn thing to the bike."

"N-no," Geoff said, abruptly falling all over himself in embarrassment. "Don't worry about it—it's okay. You could have died, so..." He blinked rapidly, very aware that Monkey towered over him without even trying, and was twice his width. "Forget about it."

Monkey knelt down to Geoff's tiny protector. "There. Happy?"

Wren grinned right in his face, and didn't say another word.

"Did I miss something?" Trip asked. She came down the bridge, her face bright after its recent scrubbing. "That took longer than Ben expected. Sorry."

"Just leaving," Monkey said. "I think we're all good here."

"Good." Trip smiled and winced simultaneously, and very suddenly, Monkey remembered that he had to get home as soon as possible.

"Geoff, Wren, go back to the watchtower to wave me off, huh?" he asked.

"Yeah. I have to check on the dragonflies," Geoff said, fully understanding they were dismissed. "Come on," he hissed, when Wren lingered. He grabbed her hand and took them both back to the tower.

"You," Monkey said, and jabbed a finger in Trip's direction.

Her face pinched. "What did I do?"

Monkey hadn't had enough time, even before the accident, and now everything was lurching forward without him. He didn't know any more than he had that morning, and with the added bonus of someone trying to kill him, urgency crashed through his thoughts.

Trip stood, waiting.

"Listen," he said, quietly. "I want you to be careful."

"You too—" she said, just repeating him, but he grabbed hold of her shoulder gently.

"Listen," he said again. "For once, listen. Be careful. I have a few things I need to do, but I'll be back. Try not to trust every goddamn person who walks up to you, okay?"

Her eyes narrowed. "I'm not a child. And I'm not an idiot."

"No, Trip. God, no. I just— Promise me you'll think. Promise you'll watch for anything strange, okay? Something's not right here."

"You're being paranoid."

"You know someone tried to kill me this morning, right?"

She looked away, back to the place where it had taken every ounce of his willpower to crash the bike. "I still can't believe—"

"You don't have a choice."

He almost asked her to come with him, but he needed time, and there were favors to call in. "I can deal with mechs. People—this sneaking around crap—I'm not good with. I can't help you here."

"I don't know what I'm doing, either," Trip said. "But okay. I get it. Go take care of whatever it is."

"You sure?"

She smiled at him, so tired it was lopsided. "I trust you. And I'll come see you if I get bored."

He almost, almost let his hand go to her face, to push her hair out of her eyes so he could see them, but he shouldered his bag instead. "You be safe," he said. "I'll look for the dragonflies."

"I'll send them," she said, a little late, and he wondered if she saw his hand move after all.

He didn't turn back on his way out of the city. He knew he'd be able to see her as far as the first turn, but he could imagine her after that, still waiting for a few more minutes, to see him further down the road, just a speck by the time he reached open ground. She'd climb the watchtower with Geoff and Wren, and see him fade into the wasteland.

But he couldn't stop imagining the shadows he left behind, writhing near her, near Ben and the others. Something dark, nipping at the edges of their precious, fairy tale city.

He promised himself he'd only be a few days. Four at the most, and then he'd be right back.

The council meeting was postponed, and Ben didn't want or need her in the workshop, so Trip had finally run out of excuses not to repair her EMP. She set out her father's tools, a little reverently, and sat down to take her first good look at it.

Monkey was not especially good with delicate equipment. There hadn't been time to tell him that force wasn't exactly a requirement when discharging the EMP. Then again, there hadn't been any chance for half-measures against the scorpion, and the EMP's casing was tattered metal. She picked it apart, slowly peeling back the shards until the power cell was visible.

After that, there was no real need to think. She replaced all the pieces mechanically, her mind a dozen other places.

The break-in at Ben's clinic, the mech attack, the dog in the alley. Whispers of the enslaved, still suffering, months after Pyramid. The fear that someone had been crazy enough to go back, to pull something out of that place and re-engineer it to their purpose, whatever it was.

And Monkey's bike.

She snipped some frayed wire and carefully reconnected it, her breath close enough to warm the metal.

Most people in Liberty didn't have the kind of tools that they'd need to cut a brake line that cleanly. A kitchen knife would leave rugged edges as it was sawed back and forth. Scissors were simply too weak, and would warp around the wires. The only thing Trip could think of was bolt cutters, and there weren't many sets in Liberty. Ben had some in his shop, and a few of his crew might. Trip eased the cover back over the EMP and started to wind in the tiny screws.

She left two of them undone and got up abruptly from the table.

She had the roster for the watchtower, and Ben had a point: whoever was there should have seen someone creeping near the bridges, or at least heard him crossing over to Monkey's bike.

Trip pulled the schedule from her databand and flipped through to last night's watch, and stopped on the names.

Early that evening, it was Mark. They'd seen him on their way back from the perimeter check. He should have been relieved at five by Carl, but Carl had called off sick, and Mark had taken a double shift.

His name was there twice, right in a row, overlapping the time the turbine went up with a few good hours on either side.

Trip didn't remember grabbing either, but she was suddenly standing with the half-finished EMP in one hand and a butter knife in the other, headed for Mark's.

Mark was on patrol with Nash, just their usual walkthrough of the watchtowers and the main levels of the city. Trip double- and triple-checked her databand as she walked to make sure the schedule hadn't changed. Mark should be gone for another hour, at least. It was enough time to find a pair of bolt cutters.

Trip made sure to stick to the lesser-populated parts of town, where the walkways went under catwalks and she wouldn't be as visible. She pried the back panel off the EMP again. She pulled a few connectors out of place and snapped the cover back on, lopsided. It was a poor excuse for stopping by, but it might work.

Mark lived in a nondescript house fairly close to the watchtower, but not visible from it. Trip paused outside and tried to keep her hands from shaking. She had never broken into anyone's home before—never had the need to.

"Mark? Are you home?" She banged his door for good measure, in case anyone saw her, but no one so much as peeked down the road. "Mark?"

She jiggled the door handle, not at all surprised that he locked it. Trip looked up and down the street, just in case, and jammed the knife behind the latch. She pushed down on the handle at the same time and, after a few seconds of careful negotiation, eased the latch out of place and the door swung in. She opened it just enough to slip inside, then closed it gently behind her.

Trip had only been to Mark's home a few times before, and there wasn't much to remember. He had the same essentials that every Liberty resident had, but they all tried to add their own touches, like Marla's vain attempts to dress up a metal basin with doilies, or Neil's need to cover every flat surface with beakers. Mark had nothing, absolutely nothing, and the emptiness of it made her feel uneasy.

She set the EMP on his table and tried to think of all the places where Mark might keep bolt cutters. The drawers were the most obvious, and she started pawing through them, scattering papers and tools as she went. She cleared all the drawers on one side of the room, and was about to move to the other when she thought of the console. If there was any history of Mark looking up information on motorcycles, it would be there.

Trip made a few cursory guesses at the password but failed each time, and had to force herself to stop after the first five. There were limits to the number of times she could try before the machine automatically locked for an hour, and if Mark saw that, he'd know someone had been here.

Trip moved to the other side of the room and resumed opening drawers. This was the kitchen side, and most of what she found was hand-me-down pots and pans, some dented beyond reasonable belief, and she started to wonder how he didn't starve.

She slammed the drawer shut on a collection of odd cutlery and opened the next when the front door creaked open, and she cursed brutally.

Mark stood in the entrance and looked more tired than bewildered, and not at all as angry as she'd expect. Trip could only imagine how she looked, her hand halfway in an open drawer, Mark's home well and truly looted.

He closed the door behind him, and Trip swallowed down panic.

"Hi," he said, a little cautiously. He set his rucksack on the table and eyed her. "Um...I don't know...what I should be asking, exactly?"

"I can explain," Trip said, and immediately felt ridiculous. "I mean...the EMP."

Mark considered her with far less suspicion than she'd earned. "You need help with it? Oh." He picked the EMP up and turned it over. "Well, you've made a mess of it."

"Yeah, well, it won't hold a charge. I tried everything, and it's just...dead, or something." Trip fidgeted madly in front of the half-open drawer. When he flipped the EMP over to pry the back cover off, she pushed the drawer closed with her foot.

Mark hadn't noticed. He peered into the EMP. "Did Monkey break this?"

"Yeah," Trip said, and wanted so badly to wipe the smirk off Mark's face. "I guess so."

"Figures. Well, you didn't connect the terminals, for one," he said, and started rummaging through his toolkit. "That helps. It also helps to use a screwdriver, instead of a fork." He glanced up at her. "That is the drawer you were going through, right?"

Trip's embarrassment was genuine. "Oh...I—yeah. I don't know where you keep everything."

Mark spread everything out on his table, and Trip felt obligated to join him as he made the final fixes to the EMP, completing the last steps of the repairs. After ten minutes spent rewiring parts that Trip was sure were perfectly fine before—and probably broken now—he handed it back to her, flushed with pride that made Trip feel guilty. "There you go."

"Thanks." She clipped it to her belt and stood to go. "Sorry for walking in like that. I didn't mean to pry."

"Don't worry about it." Mark smiled, like she'd done him a great favor by breaking into his house. "You're welcome to visit whenever you want."

Trip smiled back and began drifting toward the door. "Sorry, again. I'll catch you later?"

"Just a sec." Mark had seen something across the room, maybe another drawer Trip didn't manage to close. He stood slowly and turned toward her. "Did you try to get into my console?"

She could see the vidscreen behind him, still blinking, waiting for the password. If he'd been gone for hours, it should have defaulted to standby to conserve power. Trip could have kicked herself as Mark's expression began to darken. "Did you?" he asked again. "I mean, I assume you had a good reason...?"

"I..." Trip started, then pressed her mouth tight before continuing. "You said...you heard something about Monkey," she said quietly. "I don't... I keep thinking about it, and I wanted to see for myself..."

"You could have asked," Mark said, but the energy that had been gathering in his face emptied. "I wanted to show you."

Trip shrugged, embarrassed for the easiness of the lie, embarrassed for both of them. "I just... I don't know, Mark. I'm so sorry I even tried. I just...don't know if I should be worried."

He gazed at her, and Trip smiled nervously, like she was asking for a favor. "What did you find?" she asked. "Can you show me?"

Something in her voice did exactly what it needed, and Mark waved her over. "Okay. You should have asked me, though."

"Sorry."

Mark sighed and went to his console. "Hang on."

He logged in too quickly for Trip to catch the password. He pulled something up and Trip joined him to look over the data.

There were dozens of messages from other settlements, cataloged by date. The audio data was converted to text and stored according to whatever system Mark had devised. Trip was a little surprised at the amount of it, but Mark merely scrolled through the mess to show her a few things in particular. "Do you remember when we came here?"

"From Pyramid?" Mark had been enslaved for only a few months; his scars were shallow, but still there. Trip usually didn't see them under his hair. "Yeah, I guess."

"The story was everywhere, about what you did to Pyramid. There are hundreds of messages from the months right after that. Probably thousands, but I couldn't get them all."

Trip saw them all as they zipped by, a little awestruck. "Oh. But what does that have to do with Monkey?"

"People were asking who did it, who freed everyone."

"Okay?"

"Your name, obviously. And Monkey's."

Trip shrugged. "So?"

Mark highlighted a few files for her. "Then the stories started coming in."

None of it surprised her. A man, living alone in the wasteland. Appearing at random to scavenge food or fuel, and vanishing again. Sometimes taking on mechs single-handed, and winning.

"So?" Trip asked again, after skimming the first few. "I've seen him do that."

"Okay," Mark said. "But we've seen him be violent against people, too. I mean, he went after Geoff today."

"Only because he'd almost just died," Trip said. The adrenaline had subsided, and her patience was wearing thin. "Is this all you have?"

Mark bristled. "He doesn't belong here, Trip. He makes you do crazy stuff. That scorpion—"

"You think he asked?" she demanded. "He yelled at me, too, so don't you start."

"And...he wanders, at night," Mark said. "No one knows where he goes. Maybe he finds a way out of town, maybe he's talking to slavers. He could sell a way into Liberty, sell us all off."

"He wouldn't."

"Then where does he go at night?" Mark asked. "Who wanders like that? I bet he's checking out the defenses, or maybe he sabotaged the perimeter when he was with you, and he's just waiting for a chance..."

"This is ridiculous," Trip said, so angry her voice was wound tight. "What would he even do with the money?"

"I don't know," Mark said. "Buy shoes?"

Trip snapped the console off in front of him, and Mark blinked in surprise. "Forget it," she hissed. "This is stupid. Monkey saved all of you from Pyramid, remember?"

"You did that."

"I didn't do it alone. Where do you get off, saying this crap about him?"

Mark hesitated. "Look, there's something else."

"I don't care anymore." Trip stormed to the door. "You know what? I changed my mind. I don't care, and I don't want to hear it."

She had the door halfway open when Mark slammed the palm of his hand on the table.

"Then at least check his house," he said, leaning over the table with desperate eagerness. "You think you know him? Check that house you gave him."

Trip let the door drift shut a few inches. "Why?"

"He doesn't use it. He goes wandering, but he doesn't come back to it. Or if he does, he doesn't stay. You'll see if you go there."

"This is pathetic," Trip snarled, and stepped outside.

Mark called after her as she left, and his voice rang out into the street. "Check his house. Then tell me I'm still wrong."

Trip went home after that. Ben might have had some good advice, or Marla would have enough pastries to drown out fears with sugar and warmth, but Trip wanted home, she wanted her own bed. It was enough for one day—it was beyond enough.

By the time she reached the center of town, she was almost jogging, and she very nearly missed the man as she passed through.

He stood by the fountain, his back to her. Trip didn't recognize him, but he could have been any of Ben's crew, or one of the new arrivals. He must have heard her footsteps, but he didn't react, even when she tripped over a metal dustbin and the noise screamed into the night. She quickly righted it, her ears ringing, and skirted around the edge of the square to avoid disturbing him further. Trip had just reached the other side of the square, near the street that would lead her home, when she heard the man singing.

It was an old song, from forever ago. The low, steady humming was hauntingly familiar, and Trip edged closer, just to make out the words. The man tilted his face skyward and she saw in the starlight that his slaver scars were deep, old marks that pressed in his skin at the temples. He swayed back and forth, rocking from toe to heel and back, riveted on the sky.

Trip could hear him now, and she stopped a dozen steps away, shadowed under the entryway to the war room.

"...to you," the man sang, quietly, so sad that Trip's heart ached. "Happy birthday...to...you. Happy birth...d..."

He was pantomiming something with his hands, and Trip left the shadows to see. She was well within sight of him now, but the man carried on, his eyes overhead. His hands were out in front of him and, as Trip watched, he began to mimic handing out pieces of cake, or presents—something. The vacant smile never changed.

A gate clanged shut down the road, and the man jolted. His hands fell limp to his sides, and he stared at the fountain for a few moments before turning away. He almost ran into Trip, but peered through her as if she were smoke, and she stepped aside to let him pass. He shuffled off, back home, muttering softly to himself.

Trip's breathing felt loud enough to wake the town. She stood where the man had been and looked first at the fountain, then the sky. There was nothing there now, if there had been. There were no visions: only the fountain gurgling quietly at her feet, and weak clouds passing over the stars.

His presence lingered there, like he'd been standing in one place for hours, and Trip shuddered. She looked to open sky and saw, for the first time in months, true, bright stars, and could only think that something in her world had fractured, like tiny cracks spreading out in glass, and she couldn't tell how far they reached.