The office was quiet as the children digested the news: an AI launched to the moon. Both children respected Iapetus immensely, immediately.

Meanwhile Powell hadn't even considered considering how she felt about Iapetus. In some ways it was the thing furthest from her mind. She continued speaking, a severe frown creasing her face with all those wrinkles of natural aging. "I'm glad you came, Colton. Your run will be drawing UN heat soon and you're going to have to stay here until it blows over." She explained. "Arbanathum is trying to stay under the radar, and we want to keep our people safe. That goes for you too, Charlotte, unfortunately."

The enforcers flanking the children shifted slightly. "Unfortunately?" Charlotte echoed, staring Powell straight in the eyes. She thought SolSys would notice if they were absent. Powell was throwing them under the bus, probably after she wiped their minds of memories linked to Arbanathum.

So Charlotte continued, voice monotone with a smile on her face. "It's not unfortunate at all; this is a big opportunity. Iapetus was a British military AI. Right now British opsec is probably in tatters. If your information's correct–if this was Iapetus–we can exploit the gap it left." She knew the registry details of every AI. The UN made it public.

Coulton jumped in, a little more eager. "What was your information source? Like you say, we're already implicated. We can at least try to help."

"...Arbanathum wants to wipe their hands clean. We'll keep you safe and then send you home." Said Powell blandly, face riddled with creases.

"Get us to a third party, untraceable." Coulton pushed. "You knew I was disposable when you gave me the run. You've got the opportunity of a lifetime here. Military grade software and hardware, national infrastructure. You only stand to gain."

Powell became sad when she heard that, although neither child knew if it was genuine." I don't want to get rid of you, Colton. Either of you." Weariness, strain came back into her voice. Also possibly faked. "I don't..."

"SolSys will notice our absence."

As Colton spoke bravely a beep sounded on Powell's computer. She looked at it startled, frowning; her computer wasn't supposed to beep. "Just a minute."

One of the enforcers coughed and gave Powell a significant look, posing to leave. She just shook her head. Then the four waited in silence as she read the strange interruption with a frown. The children wavered and shifted their feet. The enforcers were motionless. Powell's office was lit comfortably with warm colors slightly dimmed for nighttime. A dilapidating nanocycled filing cabinet stood in the back, white and yellow stains on the gunmetal grey walls.

After four minutes, each one stretched far beyond its ordinary length, Powell broke the silence by drumming her fingers on the desk. Another minute and she looked up from the screen. "Without wetware, what could you two do in this scenario?"

"Depends." Said both children simultaneously.

"We don't have details ma'am," Coulton explained. "We need to know how and when Iapetus extricated itself from the British network. What kind hardware, software it left behind. Need to case the scene."

"But," Charlotte added in her monotone. "Casing is something we can easily do. Give us pseudo-stim interfaces connected to consoles with quantum and classical capabilities, a connection to the British nets and any program you've got. We'll extricate data, do whatever you want to the British system. Coordinate with meatspace crimes, steal military hardware, anything."

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Powell looked at the children and then back at the computer screen. "Elizar, Catania. Leave us."

"Ma'am." The two enforcers filed out of the room. Just the three of them.

"Colton. Charlotte." She looked at them evenly, face relaxing as if a burden had just been lifted. "I'm not going to send you on a suicide run into military cyberspace. Your 'plan' is ridiculous and sad."

"Actually–"

"Neither am I going to keep you two here." The older woman plowed ahead, gaining back what Colton recognized as shards of her usual dignity as she did so. "You were right, we've been treating you, Colton, as disposable...but that's not what the gangs used be. Should be. We didn't prey on children and our own people...Gangs protected the common person, fired back at the corporations and government for what they do to us." Powell found it hard to continue. "My higher-ups sent me a message just now, they want to use you two..." She trailed off vaguely. "Something real strange has been going on with them...World's moving too fast...everything's getting swept up.."

She sunk into listless thought and the office was dreadfully quiet.

At length she spoke. Cool and collected. "Go home and never come back here again."

"Ma'am." Said Colton. The children quickly moved for the door before she changed her mind. They froze when she spoke again.

"1-4-36, Abe Street. Winnipeg." Said Powell. "Doctor Ramanda can get you back."

Colton tensed, and then understanding and ecstasy flashed his face. "Thank you ma'am."

"And Colton," she continued. "You were a shitty runner. Try out something different."

"Ma'am." He replied with a bit of a grin. The old woman looked proud when they left.

Outside, the punk was still smoking by the door. Shook his mohawk at them in disbelief, fingertips clanged. "So...I'll see you kids tomorrow, huh?"

Colton just nodded.

That got the punk going. He cackled. "Yeah, you sleep tight, kids."

The moon was high in the sky as they made homeward. Warm wind shot through the streets unimpeded, howling and hissing. A few murky figures waded in the shadows between streetlights that would give you afterimage. Not a police-trooper in sight.

Charlotte started coughing when the wind roared, bringing dust, sand and black clouds of mites with it. Colton pulled her shirt over her nose and they ran as best they could, hands holding shirt to face and coughing. The children were both red and itchy with bites by the time the SolSys arcology loomed overhead.

–––––––––––––––

Charlotte's voice was still monotone when she settled into bed. The mites had died in the airlock but their bites still hurt, by morning would swell into pustules all across her body. "It would have been a suicide run."

"I know." Colton said matter-of-factly, almost proudly, unzipping his pillowcase and arranging cash flush with the flat side of the pillow. His bed was still put away, the lithe boy choosing to reorganize his cash caches first. "But it got us out of there."

"I did, didn't I?" She stuck her tongue out.

Colton couldn't help but laugh, coughing a little as he did. He would wake up with pustules, too. "You did. You know, you seem older than me." He pulled out his bed. "Think you got the wrong body, neh?"

"Eh." She shifted. "I think it's because I spent a lot of time dilating...they said I had underdeveloped cortices and good plasticity for my bracket."

Colton turned bitter hearing that, but he didn't want to make this about complaints: the night had put them both at ease and in the end he simply said. "I hope our friend made it."

"Eh." Neither wanted to risk using Iapetus' name. Powell's building had been secured but the arcology was certainly not.

Coulton turned out the light and got into bed, did some acting for the AV recordings. "In the end we didn't learn much, did we? What the missiles were, why they were shot. We didn't even get to see them outside."

"Yes, it was a waste of time and we learned nothing, but now my curiosity is satisfied." Charlotte added her bit.

The children laid still in the dark, staring at the ceiling with hard, alien eyes. Eventually, tentatively they fell into strange sleeps.