Haydn had listened like an eager puppy to Nadia’s story and promised to not tell anyone of her plan to kill Markus and his friends. He admitted that he had no idea how to kill a krieger, but he’d think on it. “We’ll figure something out,” he shrugged, “I usually do at least.”
“I am putting a lot of trust in you. Do not make me regret it,” Nadia said before returning to her room and collapsing into her bed.
Nadia woke to a sudden chill in the room and the disjointed whistling winds outside. As she pulled her covers closer like a child to a tit, she noticed a figure in the bathroom just before the lights went out, plunging the room into darkness. “Nadia,” Brannon called from the bathroom. “Can you try a light in there? None of these are working.”
“Nothing works,” Nadia called out as she clicked the light switch three times. So now Fried robs me of sight as well. “Is the power out?” Here? I bet this place has a backup generator for every room.
“May-be,” Brannon said, his teeth chattering. Did he have teeth? Presumably, unless he just gummed that burger to bits. Nadia wouldn’t rule it out. “We can wait it out.”
Nadia rubbed at her arms for any measure of warmth. With no light, changing her skin’s refractivity would do fuck all and her enhanced skin would eventually bow to the surroundings. “I do not want to wait. Are you decent?”
“For the dark, yea.”
Nadia shook her head. Why had she expected anything else? “I am going to the lobby to figure out what is going on. Get some clothes and come find me,” Nadia said before grabbing a sheet and pulling it around her like a cocoon. Still chilly, Nadia left the room, sheets dragging behind her.
The hallway was no lighter, the dark expanse only broken up by the silhouettes of other initiates. Nadia trekked until she found the elevator and chided herself for wasting time when she arrived. Of course it does not work, she thought before moving to the stairwell at the end of the hallway. Arriving only a few steps ahead of other maybe-initiates, Nadia took the unspoken task of trying the door first. “Locked,” Nadia called out to the figures behind her. Gesturing for them to move back, Nadia rammed herself into the door, which didn’t budge at all.
“It is stuck,” a stilted voice said. “We are stuck.”
“What about the windows?” Haydn’s voice asked, his rail-thin silhouette pointing out the nearby window where the stadium was still lit up. “We break the windows and get out of here and then we trek to the stadium.”
“Into the storm?” another voice called out. “It’s fucking freezing out.”
Haydn sighed. “Look, this is the next task. They control the weather on this floor, and they definitely control the power to this building. That”—Haydn pointed to the arena—“is lit up for a reason. It’s our new goal.”
“Well, I don’t want to break my legs jumping.”
“Okay. Get some sheets, and let’s lower the frail amongst us down. Brutes”—Haydn sighed—“just jump, you’ll be fine.”
As the figures began to break the windows and gather up bedding, Nadia found Haydn in the dark. “Good work back there. You have a knack for this.”
Haydn waved his hand dismissively. “I’ve found that when it comes to speaking, you only need to speak first and like you know what you’re talking about. The lemmings will do the rest.”
“I see. And how have you come to this conclusion?”
“That’s a story for another day. I don’t want you hating me just yet, your highness,” Haydn said. Before Nadia could chide his use of the title or question him further, Haydn pointed out the window at the trains. “Think they work?”
“This is a challenge. If they cut all of the other power, I would assume they cut power to the train.”
“Maybe,” Haydn muttered, stroking his chin. “But the stadium is so far, and I don’t think they want to test endurance right now. I have a feeling that’ll be later during phase one. I mean, we can’t trek 30 kliks to the arena before the sun turns on in ideal weather, let alone in this storm.”
Chattering teeth had threaded themselves into the symphony of the winds around the village like discordant drums. Glancing around, Nadia saw several of the frailer initiates clutching their sheets tight, and beside her, Haydn’s bony form was a xylophone dropped down a mineshaft. Whatever they were going to do, they had to act fast before the temperature dropped again and left them as icy statues. She sighed. “Haydn,” she cooed, rubbing a modicum of warmth into his shoulder, “I saw Otto and Vogel talking about how Lord Deimos said to thin us down further. They could very well put us through this storm or have us do something in here to restore the power.”
Haydn shrugged and the cold kept his shoulders shuddering. “Maybe,” he managed, they really wanted to disable the trains, they’d blow them the fuck up.” He pointed to the stadium again. “I have to believe they lit that up for a reason.”
Fair enough, I suppose, Nadia thought. “Even still, how are we going to restart the train? Are you also a train engineer?”
“No. But I think with enough of us, we can get it to work. Besides, it’ll be warmer if we do,” Haydn said before beginning his descent. “Now it’s our turn.”
The duo landed seconds behind each other, and Haydn balled his hands into fists as soon as he did. “Why, Nadia, can’t they do a fucking thing?” Haydn asked as they came upon the blob of initiates staring dumbly at the train.
“Alright!” Haydn called out. “We’re going to try the trains, see if we can get them working.” In the glow of the distant stadium, initiates slogged through the storm towards the lead train. As two brutes opened the doors, thick smoke billowed out. “Fuck,” Haydn muttered before stomping his feet. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! They blew the generator.”
A figure pushed her way through the blob in the dark, illuminated by the birds on her dress. “Well, heathen—”
“It’s Haydn.”
“It’s your lucky day, is what it is. I can move this.”
Brannon saddled up beside Natalia. “Are you sure, Nat? With all of them?”
Natalia didn’t answer and instead pushed past Haydn before reaching into the smoking generator. “Yes. These crystals”—Natalia pulled a glowing, blue crystal from the smoke,—“still have energy. I can use that. All aboard!”
The initiates crammed onto the train and Nadia said a quick prayer for Natalia’s gifts before stepping in herself. A steady creaking sound pulled Nadia from her prayer as Natalia pulled the train from the pylons restraining them. A scraping sound followed quickly after, chased moments behind by the sound of… wind? We are flying, Nadia realized. We are flying! The light of the stadium peaked through their windows like a child’s fingers pawing across the top of a counter, beckoning the initiates towards it through the night. Through her window, Nadia saw winged figures that could only be Twelfth Order knights, circling the stadium like vultures. One peered into the window, his jaw dropping as if to say huh, flying train, fuck me, that’s new.
Natalia brought the train over the center of the ring as if Siegfried had called her name, letting it hover two feet from the ground before dropping it. Once the initiates got over the shock, the doors opened, and the blob trickled out. A steaming Natalia stumbled out of the door on teetering legs as Brannon, Haydn, and Nadia opened it. Her dress was stained with sweat and her hair wrapped itself around her like a slick tendril. The grafted skin along her hands had swollen like a pustule lined with hot streaks of orange, shuddering as if she’d been left in the cold and was only now unthawing.
“I got you, I got you,” Brannon said, almost hyperventilating the words as he caught her. “Can we get a medic over here?” Brannon yelled, waving his hand frantically overhead.
Instead of a medic, Siegfried hovered above Brannon. “I am afraid we cannot. The trials are what they are,” he said with a sad smile.
“Bullshit!” Brannon lifted Natalia and shoved her into Nadia’s arms before stepping to Siegfried. “She’s going to die of coil burn, you flying prick!”
“Brann—” Natalia croaked out before Nadia brought a finger to her lips.
“Shhh!” Nadia said, raising a hand to Natalia’s forehead. She tore her hand back quickly as if the woman’s head was a bowl in the microwave. Oh no. “Quick!” she yelled, head jerking to Haydn. “Get all the water you can from concessions,” Nadia commanded Haydn, who was already in motion when she needlessly added, “hurry!”
“You!” Nadia called out to a nearby knight, making him flinch. “Give me your helmet so I can elevate her feet.”
The knight gave Nadia his helmet, which she immediately slid under Natalia’s feet. “Anything else?” the knight asked, scratching sheepishly behind his head.
Nadia pointed to where Haydn had gone. “Get her some water and if you can find some ice or towels, that as well.”
Siegfried fluttered over to Natalia. “That was truly impressive. We were expecting you to make the trek or at least try to fix the trains, but flying it”—Siegfried whistled—“Twelfth would love to have you.”
“I want Sixth,” Natalia croaked.
Siegfried chuckled. “Young lady, with that little stunt, you can pick any order you want.”
“How about Second so she can get patched up?” Brannon asked from behind the flying captain.
Siegfried retracted his wings, dropping to the ground so he could face Brannon. “I cannot make exceptions in the trials,” Siegfried reiterated as he placed a hand on Brannon’s shoulder.
Brannon moved his hand near his ear in the come hither motion, before he whispered something in Siegfried’s ear. “I suppose if that is the case, I can have her evacuated, but if she does not return before the next phase of trials, she will forfeit.”
“What motherfu—”
“Brannon!” Natalia yelled before coughing several times, her body contorting like a black snake. “I will be fine,” she said before craning her head to Siegfried. “Can I at least be given a spare change of clothes, Lord Captain?” Natalia asked with a smile, her voice gentle and ladylike. “I am quite soaked, and I look hideous.”
Siegfried nodded. “It can be arranged,” the captain said before fluttering off.
Natalia tried to push herself onto her arms before Nadia stopped her. “Not too fast,” she cooed.
“I’m fine,” Natalia said before coughing overtook her again, forcing her back into Nadia’s arms. “I suppose I can wait.”
“At least until Haydn and that knight come back,” Nadia said softly.
Brannon knelt by Natalia’s side, rubbing his thumb over the top of her palm in a slow circle. “My loyal knight, always by my side.”
“Always,” Brannon said. “Tell me what you need.”
“I need for everyone to stop acting like I’m going to die,” Natalia said before more coughs racked her body. “Tell me a joke, Brannon.”
Brannon stroked his chin for a moment before saying, “I went to the battalion’s barber the other day, but he’d only shave privates.”
Natalia’s body convulsed with laughter. “But Brannon, you don’t have hair or a penis!”
“Shh!” Brannon hissed. “I’m working on that.”
“I know,” Natalia said. “Just a little while longer and you’ll have the biggest dick that implants can graft.”
“Can’t wait.”
At least she is smiling and laughing now, Nadia thought, tuning out the rest of their conversation. Haydn and the grey knight arrived minutes later and Nadia wrapped a bag of ice in a towel to lay across Natalia’s forehead.
“Thank you,” Natalia said after Nadia had her drink some water. “You’re like a doting mother.”
Nadia froze and only regained herself when she realized Natalia was no longer drinking and that she had spilled onto the alterist’s already soaked dress. “I had a daughter named Natalia.”
Natalia cocked her head to the side. “Had?”
“Before I decided to become a knight,” Nadia quickly clarified as she batted away tears that had welled up in her eyes. I should not have said that.
“Why did you leave it behind?”
“I wanted to better serve the Ironclad. Why did you leave it behind, weapons heiress and all?” She asked, hoping and praying that Natalia talking would save her from her own sinful admission. Lifting the weights with Markus’ face on her mind was easy; lifting her tongue was an order more difficult. Drop it, please, by the Ironclad, just let this go.
Natalia sighed. “I wanted to prove to myself I could do something beyond family’s domain, that I’m not just a weapons heiress.”
Before Nadia could say more, Siegfried returned with a bundle of clothes. “Here you are, my lady.”
Nadia briefly saw the frustration on Natalia’s face at lady before she quickly covered it with a smile, like a lady should. “Thank you, Siegfried,” Natalia said as she pushed herself off the ground and onto her hands. “Nadia, would you please help me out of this dress? It was hard enough to get on without being soaked.”
Nadia nodded and helped the younger woman to her feet. “It would be a pleasure.”
“I brought some soap as well,” Siegfried, said, pointing sheepishly toward the toiletries resting atop the bag.
Natalia smiled. “Thank you once again Siegfried,” she said before taking her first heavy step towards the locker room.
“Twelfth is not one for subtlety, it seems,” Nadia said once they were what she deemed far enough away from Siegfried.
Nadia chuckled. “You would think that one as old as Siegfried would have picked up tact in his many centuries”—Nadia sighed—“alas, there is no saint of tact.”
Natalia scoffed and rolled her eyes. “There is a Saint of Discernment though. Surely it applies to discerning when to talk to and when to not.”
“Well, twelve is very far from three, I guess,” Nadia said.
“A bunch of fucking heretics is what Twelfth is,” Natalia mumbled, “but I suppose having a captain dote on you is hardly the worst thing.”
“Not entirely ready to leave the weapon heiress behind, eh?” Nadia asked, immediately regretting it when Natalia glared a dagger at her. Please do not incinerate me, it was only a joke! Like the flash that Nadia expected to fry her to dust, Natalia’s anger was gone from her face in an instant, replaced with a small smile. “I am sorry, that was rude of me.”
“No, ‘twas only a joke,” Natalia said. “But you are right, my status does have its perks,” Natalia sighed as they came upon a shower pod.
“Are you able to clean yourself?” Nadia asked, hoping for both of their sakes that the noble lady could do so. Touching another woman was simply uncouth past a certain age, but rendering aid to a fellow daughter of Fried was of more importance. She could swallow her pride for a few wipes.
”I’ll just need help with my back, can’t lift my shoulder much without the alteroids getting angry,” Natalia said. “Now, help me out of this.”
“How did you zip this thing at all?” Nadia asked. “The zipper is so high.”
“Breezeshaping—“Nadia knew that wasn’t a word”—I used energy to manipulate the air to do it for me.”
“Fried gave you such gifts and you use them for every little thing? Do you not think that is a bit of—”
“A waste?” Natalia’s silhouette shrugged. “What can I say? There wasn’t a train on hand at the time. And”—Natalia giggled—“you did say Fried gave me these gifts. Would he want me to not use them to the fullest?”
That is not what Fried gives us gifts for! Nadia thought, steam billowing from her ears like a kettle. He gives us iron for knives, but not to kill our brothers and sisters. “I suppose,” Nadia ended up saying, not looking to get into a shouting match with a naked woman. That is the last thing I need right now, especially when this naked woman can fry me.
Natalia stepped into the shower, the arms of her silhouette rising and falling in slow circle. “Ok. I need you to do my back now,” Natalia called out softly minutes later, offering Nadia the washcloth through the small gap in the curtain.
Nadia opened the curtain enough to slide her arm in before moving it in a circle once over Natalia’s back. “Is that good?” Nadia asked, not looking inside. There were shower curtains for a reason and Nadia wouldn’t intrude on privacy to inspect her work
“Yea, that’ll fucking do,” Natalia muttered, annoyed, taking the washcloth and setting upon herself twice as fast as before. She pressed into her own back with an angry vigor, and Nadia could hear the scraping sounds as if she was washing festival makeup from her own face. Natalia turned the water off, rubbing a circle into her shoulder as the comforting heat fled the pod. “Hand me my clothes and the towel
“Will you need me to help dry—”
“No,” Natalia hissed, her words cutting through Nadia’s own. “Just hand me my clothes, I got it from here.”
Nadia did so before returning to her contemplation until Natalia emerged from the shower. Her black shirt clung to her like a second skin. As she brushed her hair, Natalia winced each time she had to lift the brush arm back into place. “Do you need help with—”
“No,” Natalia said through her teeth as she glared at Nadia. “Unless you can do more than a single circle, I’ll manage from here.”
“I am sorry, but—”
“Save your excuses,” Natalia scoffed. “Are you really so much of a prude that you can’t even wash a back right? Didn’t you have a daughter?”
“Yes, but that is—”
“I bet she was filthy if you—”
Nadia jabbed the next words out of recorded memory, then rewrote them with a hook to the stomach. “Do not talk about my daughter!” Nadia hissed “You know nothing!”
Natalia sucked in a breath before slipping out of sight. Where did she go? Two straight punches connected with her gut, followed by an uppercut that lifted her off her feet. Fuck! Nadia thought as her back hit the ground, and her body undulated.
“You want more, you crazy bitch?” Natalia panted out, chest heaving like a bomb. She curled her hand as Nadia stood, palm faltering and dropping an inch before she hastily lifted it back into place. “Because I got more motherfucker.”
Nadia stood, wiping the blood from her lip before raising her hands. “Bring it princess.”
“I’m not a princess!” Natalia yelled, sending two sloppy jabs high at Nadia. Nadia parried easily before flicking a jab of her own at Natalia’s chin. Payload delivered, Nadia shot for Natalia’s legs and secured the woman’s back with a quick twist of her hips, eating of one Natalia’s elbows in the process.
“And my daughter is not filthy!” Nadia shouted as she wailed on Natalia like an angry sloth. Natalia brought one hand to her face to block as her other hand dislodged Nadia’s feet from her waist. With the hooks gone, Natalia rolled the larger woman over her shoulder, but Nadia quickly scurried to her feet and threw her hands up.
Nadia wasted no time in closing the distance and renewing her barrage, each punch sloppier than the last. “She is not filthy,” Nadia sobbed. “She is not. She was not,” Nadia said, her words piling up in her throat before her knees gave out and she stumbled to the floor. Nadia held one arm up, a weak defense against whatever blows that the younger girl would surely hit her with, but a defense nonetheless. “She was”—Nadia sucked in a heavy breath as her hands faltered in their guard—“not, filthy.”
Natalia had aimed a soccer kick at Nadia’s ribs but let her foot drop. Adrenaline fled from her like air from a winded woman and she stumbled forward, catching herself on her knees. Nadia did the same, each of their heads bowed as they sucked in heavy breaths. “You done, you crazy prude?” Natalia asked, reminding Nadia that she was there at all.
Nadia shook her head. “You done talking about my daughter?”
Natalia nodded once, too exhausted to manage another. “I’m sorry,” she said weakly, slumping onto one of the room’s benches. “That was shitty of me. Are you alright?”
“No. I just attacked you,” Nadia said, dropping onto a bench a locker away from Natalia. “I I should not be a knight.” My lord, I have harmed one of your children. Please, I can ask only for your mercy and if you deem it necessary, the clarity to mend my wrongs and give me the patience to see your will fulfilled in this.
Natalia shrugged. “I’ve never had a daughter, but I’d like to think I’d swing at someone if they called her filthy.”
“She was not filthy,” Nadia muttered, head still bowed in shame. “Natalia was a good girl.”
“Is—“Natalia took a breath heavy with caution”—she still alive?”
Nadia looked up and shook her head, once. “No. She has been dead for six months now.”
“Shit,” Natalia muttered, “and you decided to go through these trials as a way to grieve, Fried have mercy, you are insane, woman.”
Nadia chuckled weakly. “When you put it that way, it is a bit insane, but it is all I can do to make this right,” Nadia said, wanting to pull the words back as soon as they had left from her mouth like a false start. I have said too much.
“Make, what, right?” Natalia said slowly, running her tongue over each word like a possible landmine.
“Forget it,” Nadia said as she stood up, mind dizzy with possibilities, intents. “I am sorry for hitting you, but I have said too much already,” she said, hoping and praying to Fried and all the saints that the younger woman would let her go.
Nadia took one step before she heard a sound like aerosolized spray. “Stop right there,” Natalia said icily. around, Nadia saw the woman’s finger pointed at her like a gun, an icy marble hovering near the tip. The skin around her hands pulsed like lungs, the marble fizzing and uncoiling but still retaining its rough shape. “Why are you here? Did someone kill your daughter? Are they chasing you?” The marble was suddenly solid as if pounded into shape by a gavel and court order. “Did you bring them here with you, like vultures? I swear, if the skeletons in your closet interfere with my trials—“
“No, they think I am dead,” Nadia said through her teeth, “burned in my house with the rest of my family.”
Natalia’s hand didn’t fall an inch. “Who’s they? The Ruhr Union? The friekrieger bands? A crooked officer in the polizei?” Natalia rattled off the possibilities like a revolver spitting out rounds. “The Handernacht? The Orders? Who? Who? Tell me, or else I’ll send this through your brain.”
Tears stung Nadia’s eyes, and her arms burned with the same tired strain. If she swung now, she’d be luck to hit the lockers opposite her. I cannot tell her the truth either, not when she is so set on the Orders. “You will kill me if I tell you anyway. Please”—she brought her hands together—“just let me go. I swear you will never see me again.” My lord, please make your will known to all, I beg of you, Nadia prayed. I do not even care if I must leave these trials, my lord. I will find another way to make your will realized.
What if this is what he wants for me? Nadia thought to herself. Natalia is so much more blessed by the Ironclad than I. Is this the end? Will my lord no longer tolerate this quest of mine now that I have hurt one of his children. NO. Tell me it is not so. My lord! Spare me! I beg of you!
“Maybe. I’ll be the judge of that,” Natalia said through her teeth, eyes locked on Nadia. “Is whatever failed to kill you coming to these trials? Tell me, before I drag you to Siegfried and have him rip the answer from you in pursuit of keeping the trials running smoothly.”
Nadia sighed and closed her eyes, her mind recreating the picture of her family she had thrown into the fire a day and change ago. If I die, let it be to this, Nadia thought. My lord, give me mercy and guidance, and if not, I ask only for passage and peace. The image still in mind, Nadia opened her eyes and spoke. “My children and husband were murdered in our home, and I have been tasked by the Ironclad to bring the perpetrators to justice.”
Natalia raised a brow, hand dipping an inch as her heaving breaths caught up with her. “Tasked?”
“He has appeared as my children and spoke through their voices to me, and through the statues in lamps as well.” Hallucinations and visions were not uncommon in the Atlasian canon, all 12 of the saints and many of the saint candidates possessing some form of foresight. A great number of the heretic also claimed to have foresight, and if that fact wasn’t lost on Nadia, it wouldn’t be lost on a high-society woman like Natalia
“Why are you here then?” Natalia asked, waving her free arm around but not looking away from Nadia. “Shouldn’t you be avenging your children?”
“My children were killed by a knight, by the direct actions of one, and by the indirect actions of at least two others.”
Natalia’s hand dropped, and while the marble began to fizz again, it didn’t disappear. “So you’ve come here to kill them then,” she mused. “Have you considered in all of this time that, perhaps, your husband did something to earn the Ironclad’s ire?”
Nadia’s blood bubbled like glue on a stove. “They were children,” she snarled. “They did not deserve that at all. My husband, maybe, I will grant you that, but my children did not deserve to die, and they did not to deserve to be slaughtered! My daughter, the one who shares your name, did not deserve to have her eyes cut out and her throat slit while she ate dinner in her own home!” Natalia flinched, her icy marble evaporating. “If that makes me a heretic, then so be it.” She closed her eyes, counting the seconds before Natalia sent another marble through her head. My lord, I am in your hands now. Do as you will.
Natalia took a moment to thaw from her fright. “I am sorry.” Natalia held her hands defensively in front of her. “I just—”
“And what did you mean to imply?” Nadia asked icily. She might not be able to hit Nadia, but use holes in the lockers like a cheese grater? Nadia reckoned the other woman’s hair provided a good enough handle.
“Maybe you, or your husband, did something,” Natalia said, tiptoeing around each word like they were landmines.
Oh, we did. “Yes, then kill us, but not our children. They have not sinned against their lord as their parents have done.” We kept the faith, better than others who still live, Nadia reasoned faultily. Already, several verses of condemnation came to mind, and unlike times past, Nadia did not simply brush them away. The sin that gives us life, is the sin that brings us death. The Book of Hands, 3:11. Is this all my punishment? To lose everything I have for my sale of sin?
Nadia’s throat was dry like she had eaten a mouthful of sand. Were our sins that great to warrant death? Tobias had made the final days more comfortable, carried final correspondences from those with the marks to usher them along, but he had never extended the time on death’s door or lessened the volume of souls through it. She had sold opium, true, but opium didn’t kill unless it was refined several steps beyond what she sold in her kiss of death specials. It wasn’t meant to kill—not like the assassin who had come knocking—barely meant to get high. She sold to women in their forties who wanted a treat for their book club, for Fried’s sake, not the gangs of the nether-cities. She hadn’t killed anyone, and even if she had missed an obituary in the news, no just lord could have deemed the death of her innocent children as fitting punishment. No, it was wicked work, done by wicked men.
“You didn’t just run a flower shop, did you?” Natalia asked gingerly.
Nadia shook her head. “I grew and sold poppies on the side and my husband was an executioner who took bribes for better accommodations until he did not.”
“We are not to cheat the Ironclad of anything in his kingdom,” Natalia rattled off, like a good, high-class lady, “especially not of life or—”
Nadia held up a hand. “Or death,” she finished. “Yes, Palms 11:14. My husband said it practically every other day, believe me, I know it.”
“Did he know it by word or did he know it by action?”
“My husband was asked by one of the conspirators to turn his watch from a prisoner so that he may be spirited from the prison. He did not, and I believe when the prisoner died as intended, one of the knights involved sought revenge. And the one who asked”—Nadia pointed toward the stadium floor—" was none other than that Vogel.”
Natalia’s jaw flexed. “That is quite the theory. How do you know of this?”
Well, I did torch the laptop with those message, Nadia thought regretfully. “Did you happen to sneak your dex into these trials as well?”
Natalia nodded. “Of course.”
“May I please see it so that I may lay forth the evidence and plead my case?” Nadia asked, throwing in every formality she could muster with hope they would help sway the weapons heiress.
Natalia nodded before walking to where she had put her dress. The woman ran her hand over one of the birds on the dress, pulling her dex from a hidden pocket.
“That dress is amazing,” Nadia said breathlessly.
Natalia sighed. “It’s alright,” she said before she handed Nadia her dex. “Now, show me this evidence of yours.”
Nadia snapped herself out of her trance as the mist was sucked up into the vents above. Nadia’s typed in the username and password to Tobias’ mail account—NataJanKonr12—before she explained each of the dex-mails. “You are familiar with Zündung, are you not?” Nadia began.