A thumping noise woke her. Behind it, her name was being called – called out of sleep. She was still so tired and sore; shut her eyes and tried to ignore the noise.

Althea, you must wake up.

“Althea,” Kyso’s muffled voice added to Dorian’s urging. She opened her eyes, closed her heavy lids.

“What is it?” she rasped, repeated in a stronger tone.

“There are people coming,” Kyso’s muffled alarm brought her out of sleepiness. Mind running over the possible options, Althea pulled herself out of bed grabbed at her heavier garments. It was an effort to put them on – she was weak and stiff – but still made it to the door without collapsing. Kyso didn’t react to her shakiness. He looked at her, nodded, then turned away.

What?–

“There’s a bunch out front!” she heard Traejan call out.

“How many?”

“Five or six,” she looked out of the room, at Traejan at the end of the corridor, a silhouette in the moonslight. She nodded, shrugged her itchy coat on. If they hadn’t tried to break in yet, they were likely waiting for reinforcements.

“I’m coming,” she told him, touched Kyso’s shoulder to reassure him, hurried down the corridor.

Traejan turned from the window, frowning.

“Look down there, outside in the alley,” he told her, a hint of superiority in his voice. She ignored the tone, moved to look out the dirty, frosted window, felt the chilly draft. In the shadow of the building there were three figures hugging the wall. She looked up above the rooftops – the sky was still dark, but for the shining moons. She turned back to Traejan, fully awake now, fully ready. Kyso had joined them.

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“I only see three of them,” she told him.

“The other three moved off.” Traejan told her. “I don’t know where they went.”

“Do you think they’ve broken into the hall already?”

“Haven’t heard anything,” Kyso offered.

“I’d be quiet about it,” Traejan told her. She nodded.

“We have to go. Now!” She told them tersely, adding as she caught Traejan’s gaze: “thanks, I’m glad one of us wasn’t dead to the world.”

He might have smiled – she wasn’t sure – that part of his face was in shadows.

“Traejan, once we’re done with this, once the Macro’s destroyed,” she tried a brief smile. “I’ll turn my skin back to the way it was.”

“Good.”

Althea told them to collect their equipment, then ran back to her room. Her energy was building up, but she knew she didn’t dare get into another physical fight.

“People are coming,” she told Dorian. He already knew.

There are heat signatures on the first floor, he told her. New ones just appeared.

“How many?”

Four.

“Any implanted?”

I should have that information soon.

“Transmissions?” she breathed.

None so far.

She caressed his case, pocketed it. Of course, he would know soon enough. If they were implanted, any of them – it might be an opportunity. Althea gritted her teeth, sucked in a breath. Could she do it? Now?

She reached into another pocket, felt around for her projector – held it up in the dim light, the thin wedge, adjusted the control wheel a third of the way, energy wheel to a sixth. There was no reason to kill – it was far better not to. The level she set would launch on a cohesive stream of superconducting molecules guiding a high voltage shock – more than enough to subdue.

Traejan and Kyso were waiting at the top of the stairs, straining for the sound of the intruders.

“Anything yet,” she whispered. Kyso shook his head.

“Not yet,” he told her. “But this is the most likely way up – providing they’ve been told where we were sleeping.”

“Do you think they’ve been told?” She wanted to know, looking pointedly to Traejan.

“I expect they have,” he told her in a grim tone.

She whispered to Dorian, accepted his stream of info on the intruders’ movements. She felt Kyso’s closeness to her as she leaned against the wall near the stairs. Three heat sources were heading towards them, grouped close together – what weapons they had, Dorian could only confirm limited info – weren’t powered. Looking back, she spotted the pistols, slug throwers the men had drawn.

“Keep your weapons down,” she told the men, held up her projector. “I can deal with them.”

Traejan gave her a pained, disbelieving look.

“That’s a weapon?”