I took it as a sign of personal maturity that I enjoyed watching Karu in the parking lot as she dressed into her armor and diligently mounted and loaded her munitions almost as much as the stripping out of clothes which preceded it.

I mean, it felt right. I liked Karu well enough in clothes. Arguably even more in no clothes, but when push came to shove, her shining white armor was my favorite. It's how I saw her in my mind when I imagined her, it's what she was wearing when we met, and it felt that just by being in it, she was a more confident, powerful woman.

Kind of...weird for a confident, powerful woman to change in a parking lot, but whatever.

She finished pulling on her flightsuit, and before attaching the last of her armor, tugged at her sleeves, pulling the elbow-length hand-warmers out of the flightsuit's sleeves.

"Wouldn't it have been easier to take them off before putting on the suit?" I asked.

"Would it not have been easier to shut up?"

Couldn't argue with that, I guess.

When she was done we headed towards the gate, a huge ugly concrete thing with two sets of metal double-doors for foot traffic and a huge, barred, metal portal for vehicles. On the way, I noticed the was another detached building, enormous, and at least partially a warehouse or hangar, judging by the size and number of cargo doors. Like the city, it was concrete and ugly. I'd missed it at first because it was halfway behind the city and all the grey ran together.

"Hangar, you think?" I asked Karu.

"Mmh, the XPCA must live somewhere on-site, as well. Cursory optics readings indicate it goes underground quite a ways."

"XPCA does love building their shit underground," I said, thinking of the enormous levels of barracks and vehicle bays beneath the Raven's Nest where I'd been living until recently.

We reached the gate and a posted guard looked us up and down.

"More protesters?" he sighed.

"More?" I asked.

"Most of your friends just left. If you hurry, you can catch up to them," he hinted, sounding hopeful.

"We're not here to protest," I said, raising my hands to show no ill intent. "We're just visiting. I'm XPCA, actually, and she's a hunter, as you might be able to pick up. We've got a friend inside is all."

"Oh. Cheers then." His attitude brightened visibly. "Let me just get you signed in."

"You have a lot of problems with protesters?" I asked while he turned on a holo embedded in the wall.

"You bet. Lots of people hate all Exhumans...as well they should, even the docile ones we've got locked up. Other whack jobs want them all set loose." He shook his head. "There was some hotshot pro hunter going around campaigning for Exhuman rights or something a few months back, really touched a lot of people. In the head. They're no end of trouble, and keeping them away from the anti-Exhumans, it's a constant headache."

"Mmm," said Karu like she wasn't even paying attention.

"You know, all Exhumans aren't bad," I said.

He stopped typing and turned to squint at me. "You're sure you're XPCA?"

"Here's my ID."

"Huh. Well, if you say so. I guess if you're wasting your off days visiting someone, you would be a sympathizer."

"Tell me," Karu said, hands now on her hips. "Does this gate actually move, or just your mouth?"

He gave her a glare which withered under the glow of her visor. "Yeah, keep your stupid space-pants on. You got a permit to bring all these guns in there--?"

Possibly because Karu and I had opened our mouths, the sign-in process took several verifications and checking with a few systems before our new friend was finally satisfied with the amount of our time he'd wasted and opened the door for us with a press on the holo.

"Don't cause any trouble, and don't do anything stupid. There's over three hundred Exhumans in there, and despite the pleasant cohabitation, they're still Exhumans. Entering the premises constitutes an enforceable agreement to the terms on the holo...to wit, our job is to keep the Exhumans in and people out, not to save you if you piss off a superpowered freak."

Karu gave the terms and conditions a glance, but I just headed for the door.

"Oh," he added before I went in. "And they're all really cranky. So try extra hard not to do anything stupid."

"Gee, thanks."

We entered into a middle room where we were scanned, logged, and Karu had to once again explain her weapons, and then through another gate and into the city, where past some metal railings, it was all a spread of rectangular concrete, metal, and pre-fab as far as I could see.

Karu was looking around intensely, staring at the people inside who looked more like homeless than Exhumans, huddled or lying around.

"This is…" she said and trailed off for a moment, tapping through filters on her visor. "This is not at all how it was when I first visited, when New Eden was newly open."

"It wasn't always a sad, grey, depressing dump?" I asked.

"Actually, exactly correct. When I was here before, there was a vitality and optimism to the place. Those moving in seemed excited for the chance to do so, and they found themselves welcomed by their neighbors. Now there is merely…lethargy."

As we stood and watched, a small din approached and came into view around a corner in the form of a young man. He stomped around, banging his fists against walls as he went, and whenever he stomped or hit a wall, it trembled and wavered as though it were made of water briefly. Each impact echoed with the sound of grating rocks, a noise I was intimately familiar with after our stint in Eryendria.

He approached one of the bodies lying on the ground and stomped near it, the ripples in the ground making the man bounce up and down. Instantly, the despondent man yelled and threw fistfulls of a smokey yellow substance back. Within moments, there was a small-scale Exhuman event unfolding right before our eyes. I glanced up and back at the guards on the walls, but they showed such extreme disinterest in this event, I guessed it was completely commonplace.

After the two had exchanged a few blows and powers and plenty of coarse words, the tremorer kept moving and the gas-chucker went reluctantly back to his post, both a little more bruised and tired.

"What the heck was that all about?" I asked. I'd been so shocked by the exchange I hadn't even had time to consider stepping in, which given the brief and relatively peaceful resolution, I guess was a plus.

"Perhaps they have gone stir-crazy, as it were? Too much time incarcerated?"

"I guess. But Jack said Steffie was also becoming more and more irritable, and she didn't mind the confinement as best he could guess."

"There are plenty of rumors of what is amiss in New Eden. From XPCA experimentation to the first-ever Exhuman plague. In truth, such rumors were a large part in why I agreed to accompany you...I was...curious."

"Yeah," I said, taking in more of the scenery properly now and noticing a large number of buildings were just destroyed. "This is a lot worse than I thought. I mean, I never expected the red carpet treatment for Exhumans from the XPCA, but still."

"I do not believe there is much we can do here and now. Let us discourse with your friend and perhaps a different avenue will come to light." She sniffed at the air twice. "Or perhaps just leave afterwards."

We started walking. "Not like you to want to just up and go when people are in trouble."

She didn't even glance at me. "These are not people."

"Right. Sometimes I forget you hate all Exhumans."

She sighed. "Perhaps that was too harsh. You have proven there are exceptions possible, but I still refuse to entertain the notion that the population of Exhumans could be considered 'good'. Perhaps that is the source of their malady, even--when thrown together, humans band together and form civilization. When Exhumans are thrown together…" she trailed off and gestured around us.

"This is still a ghetto, Karu. Regular humans thrown into a ghetto don't do so well either."

"The accommodations here seem luxuriant compared to what we had during my deployment. They are plenty to support civilized life, should the lives in question desire it."

I checked the number on the door and confirmed this was Steffie's unit. Not too far from the gate, on the main road. A good place to stay out of trouble. I knocked.

"Look, I know at least Steffie's a good one," I said. "I'm sure there are tons like her."

"There is nobody home," Karu said, looking at the door and tapping studs on her visor again. "There has been nobody here for several days at least."

"Days?"

"Indeed. If there is a clue to her presence, it would lie within. My visor is not omniscient, we will need a closer inspection to gather further information. I propose a bit of criminal breaking and entering."

With a thought and clenching her fist, one of the retractable blades on her arms popped out halfway, and she began work jamming it in the crack of the door.

"Or, I can call AEGIS and as her to check her app thingy. If she can track where Soran is in relation to Steffie, then that means she knows where Steffie is."

"A remarkably good idea. However--" she wrenched her arm down, and the door opened with a pop. "The locks here are of poor quality, even for a private residence. Let us call her after we have had a look inside."

"Yeah. Well. It was unlocked when we found it, right?"

"I doubt very much that anyone cares."

The first thing that drew my eye was the smashed computer holo on the floor. I moved towards it but Karu stopped me with a gesture, sweeping the scene with her visor.

"As surmised, a few days worth of dust on everything," she said, keeping up a commentary for my benefit. "I am...this may take a minute, but I can isolate the cause and extent of the damage to this holo."

I sat down by the door. "Go for it, Sherlock. If you need anything elementary, Watson will be sitting right here."

She smiled at me. "Sherlock was the one who deduced the elementary as well."

"Okay, well, if you need a towel or something then."

Over several minutes, she slowly advanced on the wreck on the floor, making sure she wasn't disrupting any evidence as she moved. Meanwhile, I took in the place, out of boredom.

Small, but two stories. Built with only a couple of other neighbors in the same building, looked like the whole city was made of buildings like this, two or four units together in a free-standing structure. Windows on each external wall, lots of natural light, a thin beige carpet which ran through the whole unit except the kitchen which looked like tile.

Steffie had taken this drab place and given it a lot of life, it seemed. She had small brightly-colored rugs almost everywhere, and as befitting a florist, had potted plants and cut flowers in vases all over. If the walls weren't painted concrete, it might be nice in here.

Had been once, anyway. The flowers were wilted and dry, and the darkness inside and the smashed holo helped the grim atmosphere.

"Nobody touched this holo but her," Karu mused. "At least, I presume it to be her, I do not have her fingerprints on file, but the ones on the holo are consistent with others all over the place. It looks like the holo was simply gripped on both sides and thrown into the wall. It collided only twice, once with the wall and once with the ground. There was no struggle here, simply a thrown holo."

"Thrown at an attacker, maybe?"

"A possibility. It is not the most elegant of weapons, and from what I know of the Exhuman, I would not put accuracy as one of her defining characteristics. But given the lack of any other signs of conflict, I am inclined to think if there was a battle, it did not occur here."

"Well, that's good I guess. I'll call AEGIS."

"I shall peruse the rest of the house for other clues."

And we did exactly that.

"Problem, Athan?" AEGIS asked instead of saying hello, picking up on the first ring.

"No. Hi. How's it going?"

"It's...awkward. Restless. A little worried you're getting into trouble. Or into Karu. Lia says hi, beeteedubs. Tell me you've got something for me to work on."

"I've been gone a day and you're already bored?"

"Yeah sometimes being a super-genius is a real curse."

"Well, I have like, thirty seconds of work for you," I laughed. "Then you can go back to being restless. Maybe you should spend the time…" I stopped myself, thinking of the conversation I'd just had with Karu.

"What?"

"Never mind, sorry. Hey, we don't know where Steffie is. You can track her from her app, right?"

"Sure can. I can tell you where she is...oh, or more fun would be tracking the two of you in relation. Oh, even better, I'll write you a new app which does that for you. And I can throw in the XPCA drones in case you need to hide from them--"

"Uh."

I lost some of what she said because she started talking to herself instead of me, but this wasn't a good sign. AEGIS got really frisky about doing work and keeping busy when she was stressing about things, and it sounded like she was currently stressing, and currently without work she thought she could put herself towards.

Without hanging up, I began messaging Lia.

> Hey...is AEGIS freaking out?

> Big time

> Can you...stop that?

> I think she's freaking out 'bout you bro

I sighed. AEGIS had talked herself into silence and I just heard the tapping of keys.

"Uh, AEGIS?" I asked.

"Huh? Oh. Sorry. Forgot to hang up."

"Yeah, so about Steffie--"

"Working on it. I'll have it to you in a minute." Then she hung up.

The girl was a bit frustrating when she was stressed. But who wasn't, I guess?

"Any luck?" Karu asked, the white plates on her calves appearing as she came back down the stairs.

"She's whipping up an app for us, says she'll have it in a minute."

"Why could she not simply tell you the location?"

"Because she's a girl, Karu. I don't know." Karu's glare let me know I wasn't funny but I just shook my head and crossed my legs. "Are you done with the crime scene? Can I move around the house now?"

"Certainly."

We made ourselves at home for a while until my holo rang and I downloaded the new app from AEGIS. Same minimal interface, just a pair of blue dots where Karu and I stood, a green dot far to our north, and a swarm of red dots buzzing all over the place.

"Does she not label her figures?" Karu asked, looking over my shoulder at the hive of dots.

"She's not selling it, she just whipped it up in a minute. And uh, she's never really concerned herself with aesthetics beyond Rua that I've ever seen. Works great and never crashes or errors though, that I've seen."

"If only the same could be said about its author," Karu mused. Kind of a dick thing to say, but I wasn't about to pick a fight with her right before we stepped out into a city full of Exhumans again.

We followed the green dot north, into the part of the city furthest from the gate, and the deeper we went in, the more Exhumans we saw, and the crabbier their dispositions grew.

"Hey," some girl yelled at us. I looked, but Karu kept walking. "Not you, her. Hey."

"I think she's talking to you, Karu," I said, hopping forward a bit to catch up to Karu's determined stride.

"And I believe I am ignoring her."

"What's yer powers, ice queen?" the girl shouted at our backs. "Squeezing into that suit? Gravity-defying chest? I'm talking to you!"

"I guess you were right," I said.

"The vitals of everyone we've seen indicate agitation. It seems the rumors of some kind of affliction have some basis. I pray it is not contagious...it would not do for you to become irrational as well."

The fact she didn't mention how annoying that would make me, or the obvious snipe of being merely more irrational made it clear that Karu was focused on this as working time. She was ready for any of these Exhumans to jump her at any moment, though I doubted anyone who knew her less well than myself could read the tension on her.

I respected her perspective, however paranoid it was or wasn't, and followed silently beside her, cutting quickly down the street as the number of Exhumans, their stares, and their jeers increased.

"This is surely madness," she said under her breath as we passed under an arch with two Exhumans sitting atop it with bare feet and dirt-stained legs dangling at us. "We will die for certain."

"We're just visiting--" I got cut off by another smartass Exhuman yelling at us. "Karu, this way," I said, steering her from behind with a nudge on her shoulder armor.

"This is a house," she said. She glanced back at the three or four Exhumans now overtly following us.

"The signal says she's in there." I held up my holo and she just shook her head. She slammed her gun-covered fist against the door twice.

"What do you want?" someone yelled from indoors.

"We're looking for Steffie," I said.

"There's no Steffie here, piss off."

The ones behind us were closing in on us now, sauntering slowly, slovenly forward, emitting a nasty, dumb chuckle that had nothing to do with laughter as they approached. Karu snapped her blade out of her wrist and jammed it in the door, working a lot less gracefully than last time and popping the door open in moments.

"Hey, you can't just come in here!" he yelled as we barged in. Karu slammed the door shut behind us and fumbled with the lock.

"Lock is broken," Karu informed me.

"Where's Steffie!" I shouted at the middle-aged man inside.

"Who the hell is Steffie? Get the hell out of my house!"

"Look old man," I said and held up my holo, showing him clearly the now-overlapping green and blue dots. "This tracker tells me that our friend is right here on top of us. So if you want us to leave, tells us where Steffie is."

"Damn it, I said get out!" his arms sparked with electricity and his thin hair rose like a halo around his bald spot. At the same moment, the door opened in front of Karu, a young man and woman filling it.

I crackled with energy myself as the air materialized into blades around me. Karu raised her arms towards the two in the doorway, her weapons thrumming to life.

And all of us stood there for a pregnant moment, weapons and powers in each other's faces in this old man's living room. Abruptly, the girl in the doorway laughed and turned to go, sounding bitter, but also the first actual laugh this place had heard in a long while.

"I get it," she said. "I know where your friend is."

"Trish, you're gonna help these jackoffs?" the man in the door asked.

"Maybe. Might be fun to take them below. Know what I mean?"

At this, he laughed as well, though his was a lot more angry sounding a lot less happy. "Yeah. Yeah. Good idea, Trish."

"Now get the hell out of my house!" the old electropath barked at us again. "Break down my damn door, fucking kids!"

Rather than risk a lightning war, I headed out, following Trish, and Karu moved in my wake, keeping a gun trained on the man in the door as she passed. Trish took us to an alley just next to the old man's house and her boy extended one arm downwards.

Literally extending it, the arm grew and distorted, his fingers threading like tentacles through the holes on a manhole cover, which he pulled aside with no effort.

"Down there," she jeered. "Try to amuse us before you die."

"Very reassuring," said Karu, who dropped into the hole without a second glance, skipping the ladder and instead filling the chamber below with the blue glow of plasma as she landed.

I looked down seeing the ladder disappear into the blackness below and swallowed.

"Scared? Puss. Puss, puss, puss," Trish commented.

"Yeah, fuck you," I said and grabbed the ladder, descending into the pitch beneath the world. I made it halfway down before the metal disk slid back into place, and I could no longer even see my hands.