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flight of stairs, every time the nerve implants jolted his muscles into action with a painful blast of electricity or his transplanted liver failed. I'd spent a lot of time pumping the network these past few months. I knew what doctors could fix and what they couldn't. "Just as I believe the skinners don't want to damage society. They honestly believe they're harmless. But I learned that motives don't matter." He raised one arm and used it to lift the other one, the limp, discolored one. "The skinner I took as my friend didn't chop off my arm. But I still lost my arm because of the skinner. I nearly lost everything." He left out the part where he'd wanted the download for himself and been denied, thanks to a genetic tendency for mental instability that might never manifest itself--unless it already had. Believing that, at least, would have made it easier for me to watch.
    Auden began coughing, his face going red and flushed with the effort to suck in enough air. When he spoke again, his voice was ragged. "It doesn't matter that the skinners mean us no harm. Some things create danger just by existing. But our eyes are open. Our spirits are willing." The crowd began to cheer. "Together, we will face the threat!" he shouted over the roars. "And together we will defeat it!"
    Jude muted the applause.
    "He doesn't mean it," I said, though even I was aware how lame it sounded. "He's been brainwashed by that lunatic."
    "Or he's just trying to hurt you," Riley said quietly. "The way he thinks you hurt him." He was the only one not looking at me. His eyes were still fixed on the screen, where Savona was helping Auden off the stage.
    "You don't know anything about it," I snapped, but of course he did. They all did now.
    "He's an arrogant little bastard," Jude said. "Always was."
    "Shut up," Ani and I said together. She brushed Quinn's hand off her leg and stood up. I backed away. Ani was into hugging, and I didn't want anyone touching me.
    "I'm going to my room."
    Jude raised his eyebrows. "Twice in one day?"
    I shrugged. He thought he knew everything. Let him.
    "Stay," Jude said. "This is going to get ugly, fast. We need to be ready."
    "You be ready. I'll be in my room."
    Jude ran a hand through his shock of dark hair. "Why can't you just--"
    "Let her go," Riley said. He still wouldn't look at me.
    "She shouldn't be alone," Jude said in a low voice.
    "Let her go," Riley said again.
    I went.
    Alone was easier said than done.
    "Go away!" I shouted. The knocking stopped. But then the door eased open, enough for me to glimpse a patch of blue-black hair through the crack. "Unwanted visitor," I told the room. "Terminate."
    The room didn't respond, nor did it deploy countermeasures to keep Ani out. Apparently the new smartchip tech had its limits. Quinn had had the house fully equipped the month before, moments after the AI chips hit the market, promising us it would change all our lives. Like the automated plane, it was a perk of excess credit, a luxury the rest of the world would enjoy only through vids. So far it had been less than earth-shattering, learning who liked what when it came to lighting, temperature, noise level, all the little things that can make life so irritating. When you were walking around with a computer in your head, it was hard to be impressed by an artificially intelligent doorbell. Especially one not intelligent enough to keep out unwanted visitors.
    Ani paused in the doorway, as if waiting for the termination order to be carried out. "Since I'm still alive--"
    "Don't let Jude hear you say that."
    "Since I'm still intact ," she clarified. "Can I come in?"
    "Would it stop you if I said no?"
    "Not really. But you might hurt my feelings." She flashed me that strangely shy smile, the one that always made me wonder how she'd hooked up with Jude and Riley in the first place, much less how she'd managed to score even a minimal quotient of Quinn's attention. Not that she wasn't pleasant enough, even sweet. She was just