"You're crazy," Antonio said flatly. "NEXT always try to rise up. They always get smashed flat."

I don't want him to be right. Kotetsu looked between Antonio and Yuri, solid strength against liquid flame. "Yuri," he said, trying to sound reasonable, "even if I agreed with you, now isn't the right time. There's too much still to protect."

"For how long?"

"What?"

"For how long?" Yuri repeated. "How long do you wait before deciding it's the right time to act? How long are you going to let evil win without punishing it yourself?"

"Why does that have to be my job?" Kotetsu growled. He hated the way some of the rebels would do that, make it his fault that anything bad ever happened to any NEXT ever, just because he wanted to live a quiet life with his daughter.

"It's everyone's job. My father said that evil flourishes when good people don't stand up."

"And you agree with that, do you?"

"No." Yuri's face was hard, cold. "I don't think there are good people who don't stand up."

Kotetsu bit back a furious retort. Yuri couldn't be blamed for thinking the things he did. Ten years ago, Kotetsu would have been thrilled to hear him talk. Now, he just shook his head. "Nothing has changed. You can stay here until you can walk. After that, you're on your own."

He had one foot up the stairs when the banging at the front door started.

"Kaburagi Kotetsu! This is the police." The words echoed, as through through a megaphone. "We have received information that you are harboring a dangerous escaped NEXT slave. Come out with your hands above your head."

Kotetsu's blood ran cold. He looked from Antonio's shocked expression to Yuri's calm acceptance. "Kaede," he blurted, and ran for the stairs. He had to get to her, had to keep her safe-

"Kotetsu!"

He turned at the urgency in Yuri's voice.

He wasn't expecting the blow that knocked him unconscious.

"Kaede?" Ivan's voice was panicked as he banged on her door. "Kaede, did you call the police? Kaede, what did you do?"

She opened the door, stunned. "I...I thought...I thought he was making everything-"

Ivan grabbed her by the shoulders. "Kaede, what were you thinking? We're all going to-we're-how could you?"

"Stop yelling at me!" she screamed, terrified at the fear in Ivan's voice. She'd thought he'd be glad. She'd thought he'd be pleased that the NEXT was gone where he couldn't hurt anyone. "They could turn on you at any time," her father had told her long ago.

The hammering on the door got louder and louder. "Why hasn't Dad opened the door?" she asked, lip quavering. "H-he's got to open the door! I said we'd cooperate!"

Ivan looked like a rabbit, tensed and ready to bolt under the bed at the slightest sign of danger. "Kaede, there's a lot you don't understand. Your father is going to be in a lot of trouble if they find out he's got that man in the basement. If they find out..." He bit his lip.

"I'm sorry! I just wanted to make everything go back to the way it used to be."

There was no more knocking at the front door. Now, the policeman's voice said, "We're breaking down the door. Do not attempt to resist. Anyone who does so will be shot on sight."

Kaede ran to the top of the stairs just in time to see the door crash open, flying out of its frame, raining bits of wood and hinge everywhere. At the same time, a blue-green streak of flame shot up through the basement floor, and in less than a second, the NEXT in the basement was standing behind Kaede with a hand around her throat.

He turned and said something to Ivan over his shoulder, but Kaede couldn't hear over the thud thud thud of her heartbeat in her ears. His hand wasn't tight around her throat, but it was there, and her father was nowhere to be found. She couldn't breathe, couldn't think.

The policemen were aiming guns at her. Well, at the NEXT probably, but she was in the way. She started to cry.

"Good," the NEXT hissed into her ear. "Cry. I'm here to hurt you."

"Put the girl down!" a policeman yelled.

The NEXT laughed. "Took you long enough to get here. I guess my threats weren't good enough, eh, little girl?"

Kaede had no idea what he was talking about. Threats? He'd never even spoken to her before.

The policeman in front, a large man with a mustache, spoke into his radio. "He's got a hostage, sir."

"That's right," the NEXT said from behind her. "I'll tell you what I told her father: get out, or I kill the girl."

Is that why Dad kept him in the house? Oh god, oh god, I shouldn't have been mad at him. She tried speaking, and her voice came out a trembling whisper. "D-d-did you kill my d-dad?"

"Shh."

There were more policemen now, filling her living room, all carrying big guns. Kaede could just barely hear the little voice coming through the policeman's radio, "Check the rest of the house. There might be more of them."

Then, all of a sudden, the NEXT shoved her hard to the side, so that she hit the wall, and raised his hands. "All right, all right," he said, standing tall at the top of the stairs. "I'm coming down."

The policemen all raised their guns, making horrible metal noises. "You surrender?"

"I do."

The man with the mustache nodded at two of his subordinates, neither of whom looked happy. "Cuff and collar him. And put that bag over his head. If he starts flaming, I want him in a fucking oven, you hear?"

The men obeyed. Kaede watched them wrench the NEXT's arms around his back, heard him groan in pain when there was a wet popping sound. They tried to force him onto his knees, but the cast on his leg made that impossible. Instead they shoved him flat against the stairs on his stomach, pushed his head down, and clicked the blinking Arestium collar around his neck. Then they covered his face with a silver bag. It looked like the kind of material in the shiny emergency blankets Kaede's dad always brought when they went camping outside the city. "It reflects warmth," he'd said. She'd called him a dork.

"Little girl, you're the one who called the police?"

Still dazed, Kaede nodded. "I...I just wanted things to go back to how they were before."

"You did a good thing." The man's words were kind, but there was a hard, ugly look in his eyes. "I'll make sure Mr. Cromden knows who called it in. There's a lot of money in it."

Kaede didn't care about money. She hugged herself. "What about my dad?" she asked.

"Take him away. And be careful, boys." The policeman ignored her, and kicked the NEXT in the stomach with a booted foot. Kaede heard a grunt from inside the bag. "This little shit is worth a lot of money. Let's go."

Kaede knelt, trembling, until the last sounds of the policemen died away. "They didn't even look for my dad," she whispered to herself. "They didn't even check to see if I was okay."

"Kaede?" The voice from behind her was Ivan, but she didn't want to listen to him. He'd disappeared when the NEXT was holding her.

They broke my door. They pointed guns at me. They didn't even ask if I was okay, and they didn't look for my dad.

"K-kaede?" Ivan sounded scared now.

"They didn't look for my dad. They didn't look for my dad."

"Sweetie, what are you doing? Stop it!"

"They didn't look for my dad!" Kaede shrieked, and the stairway exploded in flames.