I stepped out of the car and peeled off the face mask.
Hogsby. Dark and quiet, the way schools are at midnight when the people inside them don't know a mission just happened. Wells, Mute, and Annabelle split toward their wing. Me and Sherry walked toward ours.
The challenge wasn't charging. The challenge was finding someone new. That was the system's specific requirement and it was inconvenient in the specific way of requirements that didn't care about circumstances.
Mable would open her door before I finished knocking. May would have known I was coming before I left my room. Annabelle would offer before I asked. None of them counted tonight.
"What a night," Sherry said beside me.
The blonde wig was still on. It fit her so naturally I had to remind myself it wasn't hers. She was walking slightly off-center, the specific drift of someone running on adrenaline and relief and not quite enough sleep, and at intervals she knocked gently into my shoulder without correcting it.
