Word traveled fast. Over the course of the afternoon, a steady stream came through the police station to check on Jude — Star Labs people, Barry, Danton, a few of the Nagisa regulars, officers from the precinct who'd watched the confrontation that morning. It was, in its way, genuinely touching.
"You shouldn't be out here," Jude told Snart, when he came by a second time. "You might get yourself stuck in a cell."
Snart accepted this with equanimity and left.
Satsuki's voice came through the earpiece, quieter than usual. "If you're actually going inside for a while — what happens to me?"
"Your call. I can store you in the system space if you want. If not, run a holographic projection in the driver's seat, take Yomogi, and wait. If things go the way I'm expecting, this clears up in a few days."
A pause. "Yomogi. Thoughts?"
"Is there food in jail, meow?"
Jude had to laugh. "I'll be using the detention-and-investigation cover for the first stretch, so cooking is off the table."
"Boss, I hope you're comfortable in jail, meow."
Satsuki's body shimmered — a fine silver-white particulate rising from the chassis, gathering like quicksand, and then flowing upward to Jude's sleeve. The nanobots settled against his skin, adjusting to his tone.
"Communication, monitoring, limited disguise capability, surface projection. Be careful with them."
"I know." He looked at the building in front of him. "There aren't many people in a detention cell. Mostly unlucky civilians. I'll be out soon."
Satsuki, now carrying a holographic driver and one palico cat, pulled away from the curb. Jude and Joe walked back inside.
Two hours later, Barry came in through the front door at something approaching normal human speed, which meant he'd made a deliberate effort. He'd gotten Joe's call, understood the situation, and come to explain in person before finding Jude.
The detention cell was private — no other occupants, a modest mercy. Barry sat on the edge of the opposite bench.
"How are you holding up?"
"Fine. How's Bette?"
Barry understood the shorthand immediately. "Testing's done, results are about what we expected. Gloves — special material, should let her interact with the world normally. It's not a cure, but it's functional."
"Full recovery?"
A pause. "Current technology can't do it. Not completely."
Jude nodded.
"She said she's not interested in working with the lab the way I did — not until the control is more stable. She wants to find somewhere quiet and get back to a normal life first."
"That's reasonable."
"She also mentioned settling scores with the surgeons who operated on her, but we talked her down." Barry's tone shifted slightly. "The person everyone at the lab is actually worried about right now is you. Eiling's watching you."
"He's watching everything I do," Jude agreed. "He's given up on finding Bette through me — he doesn't think I'll lead him anywhere useful. What he wants now is something he can use. Dirt, association, anything that gives him cleaner justification the next time he comes for me."
"I could get you out right now."
"If I disappear from custody, what does that look like?"
Barry was quiet.
"It looks like I'm guilty of something." Jude folded his arms. "I'll stay."
"Then I'm going to talk to Dr. Wells. He'll think of something."
"Don't rush—"
Barry was already gone.
Jude sat back and hoped Wells could hold Barry's instinct to fix things immediately. Otherwise the situation would get considerably more chaotic before it got simpler.
As it turned out, Jude had underestimated Eiling.
Not in the sense of misreading his character — the character was obvious. But the speed of it. Normal people, even ruthless ones, tend to let revenge sit overnight. They wait for a better position, a cleaner angle. Jude had calculated on at least a few days inside the station before Eiling found his lever.
Eiling, apparently, had found it by 8 p.m.
The noise from the lobby reached the detention block first — overlapping voices, the specific acoustic quality of an argument happening in an institutional space with hard floors and low ceilings. Jude released a small cloud of nanobots through the ventilation and listened.
"General Eiling, I've already told you — as I told you at noon — this individual is the subject of an active investigation. You do not have the authority to remove him from this facility."
"What was your name? Something with an S—Singh? Inspector Cindy?" Eiling's voice was deliberate, unhurried, the tone of a man who has just received confirmation that he holds every card. "It doesn't matter. You can explain your position to your superiors."
"And that Black detective from this morning — where did he go? Never mind. Both of you, go explain to your superiors."
Singh's phone rang.
The lobby went quiet except for the sound of Singh listening. Five minutes. Then the call ended.
Singh's voice, when he spoke again, was a register lower than it had been. "Bring Jude out."
"Singh—"
"Go home, Joe." A pause. "I need to as well."
The lobby held its silence for a moment. Then Eiling spoke again, the particular quality of a man who has just confirmed something he already suspected.
"From this point forward, I do not recommend that anyone in this building obstruct the handover of a suspect connected to classified military matters. You have ten minutes to bring him to me."
The smug satisfaction in his voice carried clearly through the nanobots even without a direct line on his face. Jude could practically hear the expression.
Someone got to Singh's superiors. Probably made some calls from a secured line during the afternoon, laying groundwork while Jude was counting on institutional friction to buy time. The general had been patient enough to let the bureaucracy work for him instead of fighting it directly.
That's actually more sophisticated than I gave him credit for.
He didn't have long to think about it. The officer who came to his cell had the expression of a man who has been asked to do something he disagrees with and has no recourse. He opened the door without speaking.
Jude stood up and patted him on the shoulder. "It's fine. Not your fault."
They walked out into the lobby together.
Eiling turned when he heard footsteps. The smile that crossed his face at the sight of Jude had something layered underneath it — not just satisfaction at the outcome, but the particular pleasure of a man who has been made to look foolish twice and is now watching the table turn.
"Mr. Criminal. Nowhere left to run this time."
Jude looked at him. Not with anger. With something closer to genuine pity.
"I knew from the start that someone like you wouldn't be stopped by logic," he said. "Innocent or not, evidence or not — you were always going to find a way." He tilted his head slightly. "I saw a dog on the street once that had the same look in its eyes. Couldn't be reasoned with either."
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