The flight from Napa to San Francisco took just under twenty minutes—longer than it needed to, but as always Delta had urged her to be cautious and avoid detection.

  She launched from her family’s estate as soon as the others piled into their cars, shooting straight up until she was just a speck against the pale October sky. At altitude and without her armor, the air was thin and cold, but a quick Air Shield kept the worst of it at bay, forming an aerodynamic bubble around her body that let her slice through the atmosphere without her eyes watering or her skin going numb.

  The Bay spread out beneath her, the mid-morning sun danced across the undulating waves refracting like the surface of a disco ball. Zoe angled southwest, passing over the marshlands and salt flats that bordered the water's edge, and then she was out over open water.

  Only then did she finally let herself descend.

  Tucking into a head first freefall, the drop was exhilarating—a plunge that made her stomach swoop and her heart race in the best possible way. She pulled up just above the wave tops, close enough that the spray stirred up by her passage kissed her sneakers. Seabirds scattered at her approach, crying out in alarm at the impossible woman skimming their domain.

  This, Zoe thought. This is what it should always feel like.

  Flying was freedom. Pure, uncomplicated freedom—the kind she'd dreamed about as a little girl watching Peter Pan, the kind she'd never truly believed was possible until the Nexus had rewritten the rules of their existence. Out over the waves and wrapped in the wind, she could almost forget everything else. The weight of responsibility. The grief that still sat like a stone in her chest. The constant, grinding awareness that any day could be their last.

  Almost.

  The necessity of avoiding detection meant that moments like this were always too brief, always slightly soured by the knowledge that she couldn't simply soar wherever she pleased. Someone might see. Someone might snatch a picture or video. Someone might ask questions that none of them were yet prepared to answer.

  All too soon, Delta's voice murmured in her ear: "Approaching the city. I recommend gaining elevation."

  Even over the rush of wind all around her, the AI's voice was clear in her ear, transmitted through the nano-earbud that Delta had produced for each of the Paladins. The damn thing had crawled—ugh—into her ear canal to install itself. She still felt phantom sensations of the flea-sized device skittering into position, even though Delta had assured them it was too small to actually feel it moving.

  Zoe sighed but complied, banking upward in a steep arc as the pointed tower of the iconic Embarcadero Ferry Building came into view ahead. The San Francisco skyline rose before her—a jagged forest of glass and steel, beautiful and indifferent. She climbed until the people on the streets below were barely visible, until the cars looked like toys and the buildings themselves seemed like scale models.

  Delta guided her in, feeding coordinates directly to her HUD. She swept over the first several blocks of the Financial District, invisible against the bright sky, and then descended in a controlled spiral toward a nondescript office building across the street from her target.

  Her shoes touched down on the gravel-covered roof with barely a sound. Zoe dismissed her Air Shield and took a moment to orient herself. HVAC units, a maintenance access door, a cluster of satellite dishes. Nothing unexpected, out of place, or threatening.

  “There is a camera mounted near the stairwell access,” Delta said. “But worry not, I’ve already accessed the building’s security system and am looping the feed with a previous day’s recordings.”

  “You’re a hacker-wizard extraordinaire, D-V.” Zoe tried not to gag while praising the AI.

  “Pfft. With your world’s technology the term security system is an oxymoron.” Despite his words, Zoe could envision Delta’s draconic hologram practically preening. Delta was anything but humble, and a little ego stroking helped keep him pleasant.

  Zoe reached into her Inventory and withdrew the iced coffee she'd picked up before leaving Napa. A pumpkin spice cold brew with oat milk and an extra shot of espresso. The drink had remained perfectly chilled in the extra-dimensional space, the ice cubes still intact, the whipped cream still fluffy.

  Small mercies, she thought, taking a long sip as she settled onto the roof's edge.

  The Meridian rose across the street, a sleek glass-and-steel tower that screamed money—the kind of ostentatious wealth that advertised itself just by existing. Even coming from a family of considerable means, Zoe shuddered to think about the typical mortgage on one of those units. Twenty-three floors of luxury condominiums, the top floors held four double-story tall penthouse units each facing one of the cardinal compass directions. The West facing unit, according to Warren's recovered key fob and Delta’s digging, was their subject of inquiry.

  With her naked eye, Zoe could see into those floor-to-ceiling windows easily enough. A stylishly appointed living space: modern furniture in muted tones, abstract art on the walls, a kitchen that looked like it had never been used for actual cooking. No visible occupants.

  After taking another long sip through the straw of her drink, Zoe set her coffee beside her and withdrew Mark’s old camera from her Inventory. She’d quietly kept it stashed there ever since the lake. Raising the camera to her eye, the familiar weight of it settled against her face like a half-remembered embrace. The telephoto lens should have given her a crystal-clear view of every detail inside that penthouse. Instead, the image blurred no matter how she twisted the lens to focus. Like looking through frosted glass.

  Zoe frowned and lowered the camera. Maybe it was user error on her part. She tried her phone instead, and got an even worse result.

  "Delta, what the hell?" Zoe scowled. “Are you seeing this?”

  "Indeed. The visual distortion you're experiencing is consistent with what's known as a Haze Field. It's a bubble of aetheric energy onto which a false image is projected. Standard counter-surveillance measure on integrated worlds."

  "So what we're seeing through the windows..."

  "Is almost certainly not what's actually inside the unit. The field extends approximately three centimeters through the glass. Even if Warren were positioned directly adjacent to the windows, his infravision would be unable to penetrate it."

  "Great." Zoe sent the camera back into her Inventory and took another pull of her coffee. "So we're blind and this trip was pointless."

  “For the moment, it seems so. I am continuing to probe for network-connected devices within the building, though so far I’ve been unable to locate any devices within the unit that are connected to outside networks or even broadcasting a signal. Either, there are no such devices within the unit, or the Haze Field has been paired with Nexus level electronic countermeasures."

  "Any good news?"

  "The weather forecast predicts clear skies through tomorrow evening."

  "Thanks, Delta. Super helpful."

  “You’re very welcome.”

  Below and to her left, the streets of downtown San Francisco bustled with midday traffic. Zoe's gaze caught on a banner strung between two lamp posts: SAN FRANCISCO COMIC EXPO! — MOSCONE CENTER.

  Even though the nerd-apoloza wasn’t opening until Thursday, four and a half days away, the extensive set up was already well under way. With her bird’s eye view, she could clearly see the bustle of teams and freight arriving to assemble the massive nerd-a-palooza, plus there were veteran con attendees and bloggers scoping out the process trying to divine the impending media announcements a few days or hours earlier than the rest of the world.

  Her comm clicked.

  "Zoe, sit rep?" Pablo's voice, slightly distorted by road noise. They were still driving, probably just passing Vallejo if she had to guess.

  She tried not to chuckle at his jargon. Out of all of them, Pablo had tried the hardest to imitate the rigid structure of a military unit.

  "Just got here a few minutes ago. The penthouse has some kind of aetheric camouflage—Delta's calling it a Haze Field. Cameras can't penetrate it, and there's no electronic access inside for Delta to exploit. Visually, it looks like a magazine spread for luxury living, but we really have no idea."

  "Copy." A pause. "We're still about forty minutes out. Hold position and observe. Don't do anything until we're all in place."

  "Understood." Zoe repressed the urge to sigh.

  The comm went quiet and Zoe settled down to let her legs dangle over the edge of the roof. She sipped her increasingly less-cold coffee. Across the street, the Meridian's penthouse windows gleamed innocently in the early afternoon sun, hiding whatever secrets lay within.

  She had a feeling it was going to be a long, boring wait.

  ***

  "I can't believe we're going to miss the con."

  Sasha glanced over at him, one eyebrow raised. "Seriously? That's what you're thinking about right now?"

  "It would have been my tenth year," Pablo said, aware that he sounded sulky and not particularly caring. "A whole decade of consecutive attendance, and now the streak's broken."

  They were positioned in a narrow alley behind The Meridian, with clear sightlines to the building's service entrance and loading dock at the rear, and the emergency exit from the fire stairs in the alleyway. Eden's Prius was parked around the corner—it blended into the city just fine, but it would have been noticed if any car lingered in the narrow alleyway too long. Since arriving, he and Sasha had been taking turns walking the perimeter, trying to look like they belonged while the October sun had crept across the narrow slit of sky they could see overhead.

  "Pablo." Sasha's voice rang with the forced patience she used when she was trying not to be annoyed. "We've had slightly more important things going on than planning cosplay and panel schedules."

  "I know. I know." He scuffed his shoe against the alley's cracked asphalt. "It's just...I was looking forward to it all year. At least, I had been before everything happened. It’s just another shred of normalcy the Nexus has taken from us."

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  What he didn't say was that he'd been looking forward to attending the con again with her. The previous year had been the first time she'd attended with him and the rest of the Fellowship. Last year, Sasha had shown up in an absolutely stunning Wonder Woman cosplay that she'd put together from scratch. This wasn’t some cheap Halloween getup; the craftsmanship had been incredible. The way heads had turned in waves as she'd walked the convention floor had been even more incredible. They’d barely been able to move three feet without someone stopping Sasha to take a picture with her.

  Aside from navigating the mob she’d drawn, he'd spent half that weekend trying to work up the courage to tell her how he felt. He'd chickened out every time. This year, they would have been attending together.

  Of course, Sasha had been a committed cosplayer with a pretty significant social media presence long before she’d moved to Napa and met Pablo or any of them had become Paladins. She’d even been making a little money at it, though she’d still been a long way off from being popular enough to pay her bills as a full time cosplayer/model.

  He briefly kicked himself even harder for not remembering the con sooner and what it meant to her own aspirations. What kind of shitty boyfriend am I?

  "Hun, I was looking forward to it too. I had costumes planned for all three days," Sasha said quietly. "Reference photos, material lists, a construction timeline." She shrugged, a small movement that somehow conveyed months of abandoned plans. "The foam's still in my closet. Haven't touched it since June. There’s always next year."

  “You and I both know that isn’t necessarily true.”

  “But, I’ve got to believe it anyway. Believe that we can and will preserve some semblance of normalcy by fending off the Corruption and integrating Earth un-apocalyptically with the Nexus. We both need to believe that.”

  Pablo pursed his lips and let Sasha’s soothing words sink in. Let her honeyed sentiment smother his very rational fears. Because she was right. He needed to believe they could do this. That they could keep Earth from being consumed by the Corruption and that as the aether continued to slowly saturate their world, that they could usher in the Nexus and prevent a cataclysmically failed integration.

  Blowing out a breath, Pablo tried to force his shoulders to unclench. "Alright. Tell me about these plans. Who were you going to be?"

  “What does it matter now?”

  "Well, maybe—assuming we’ve dealt with the latest world ending threat by then—we could try to get some badges," he offered. "The secondary market's probably insane by now, but Delta could probably find something..."

  Sasha grinned at him with genuine endearment, but she jutted her jaw toward the high-rise building they were supposed to be investigating. "We should focus."

  "Right. Yeah." He shook off the bittersweet distraction of thinking about the con and extended his Metal Sense outward again, letting the building's skeleton light up in his mind.

  Steel and copper and a buzz of dozens of other metals comprising beams, wires, and pipes. He could feel the elevator cables thrumming as cars moved between floors, and could sense dense clusters of electronics in nearly every unit. As he pushed his senses out further, he reached the top floor and the details all began to fuzz, obscured by something that made his perception slide off like oil on water.

  “Any change?” Sasha asked after he’d been quiet for several moments.

  “Nada.” He shook his head. “?Y tu?”

  Sasha crouched down, pressing her palm flat against the asphalt. Her eyes took on that distant look she got when she was extending her affinity tuned senses. Probably not all that different from how he’d just looked. Now that they’d both advanced to Knight rank, he knew that her range and sensitivity—like his own—had expanded considerably. She could probably feel all the way through the landfill beneath the city's foundations and down to the true bedrock if she pushed hard enough.

  "Basement level," she reported after a moment. "Parking garage, mechanical rooms, storage units. Nothing that wasn’t on the city's official plans. No hidden sub-basements, no secret tunnels."

  "That you can detect."

  "That I can detect." Sasha stood and dusted her hands off on her jeans. “It’s wildly unfair that the bad guys are consistently more clued in and powerful than us.”

  “That’s why we get paid the zero bucks.”

  Activating the creepy little comm unit in his ear via a HUD command, Pablo checked in with the rest of the team. No one else had anything new to report either.

  "This is ridiculous," Warren's voice was strident, making them both wince at the volume. "We've been sitting here for two hours. Let’s just go up there and—"

  "And say what?" Pablo kept his voice to an almost inaudible murmur. "'Hi, we’re galactic knights with no real authority. We think you might be connected to a monster who kidnaps people, mind if we take a look around?'"

  "I was thinking something more along the lines of kicking the door in."

  "Warren." Sasha's voice was dry. "Remember the part where we're trying not to attract law enforcement attention? Smashing our way into a luxury penthouse in broad daylight seems counterproductive."

  "She's right," Pablo said.

  “You all know that I hate to agree with my little brother,” Zoe chimed in, still perched on the roof of the office building across the street. “But he’s kind of got a point. At a certain point we might actually have to do something.”

  "Eden, any luck with the scrying?" Pablo asked.

  "Getting lots of practice, but nothing useful." Eden's voice came through, tinged with frustration. "I've managed to remote view about a dozen other units through various water sources. Glasses on nightstands, a sink full of soaking dishes, a fish tank on the eighth floor—beautiful angelfish, by the way. But nothing inside the penthouse. Either they don't have any standing water in there, or the same countermeasures blocking everything else are blocking me too."

  "How close have you gotten?"

  "A water cooler jug delivered outside a unit down the service corridor. I can see the penthouse's back door from there, but that's it."

  Pablo paused to consider the words of his team and question his own impulses. He reached into his pocket and clenched Eden’s car key tight in his hand. The press of the metal into his flesh allowed him to activate Iron Mind for a moment, muffling his own anxiety and protective impulses. Letting his ego drop away, he analyzed the situation with unemotional detachment.

  The apartment was basically a black box. In addition to being protected by the mundane security of a luxury apartment building, they had to contend with Nexus technology that was masking any information they could get from the outside. Whoever—or whatever—was using that space valued their privacy. Or had a great deal to hide.

  Probably both.

  However, they needed more information about the Winter Medusa and her boss. That was the entire point of this trip into the city. If they couldn’t get that information safely from the outside, eventually they’d have to do something.

  "Alright, if nothing happens by tonight, we'll try a covert infiltration. But right now, we watch and we wait."

  "I hate watching and waiting,” Warren grumbled.

  “You’ve made that abundantly clear. But this is the mission."

  A frustrated grunt was Warren's only reply.

  "Alright," Pablo said. "Everyone maintain positions. Stay alert. We’ve got to catch a break eventually."

  Pablo just hoped the break wouldn't be Warren's patience shattering.

  ***

  Six hours into the stakeout, Warren's patience was hanging by a thread. A burning thread, that was actually a fuse sizzling toward a keg of dynamite.

  Eden didn't need her Empathy to see it—the tension in his shoulders, the way his fingers drummed against the steering wheel, the restless shifting in his seat. However, her Empathy made it impossible to ignore. Warren's frustration radiated off him in waves, a burning urgency that pressed against her awareness like heat from an open flame.

  She understood it. She even shared it, to some degree. Somewhere in that building was the creature responsible for vanishing innocent people around the city. Every minute they sat there watching was another minute she remained free to hunt new victims. At the same time, she knew Pablo was right to hold them back. They didn't know enough. Charging in blind could get them killed, or worse, could get innocent bystanders killed.

  "You're going to wear a hole in the steering wheel," Eden said mildly.

  Warren's drumming fingers stilled. "Sorry. I just—" He blew out a breath. "I hate this. Sitting here. Doing nothing."

  "We're not doing nothing. We're gathering intelligence."

  "We're staring at a building."

  "Tactically staring."

  That earned her a reluctant half-smile. "Tactically staring. Right."

  They sat in silence for a moment, watching the Meridian's front entrance through the Jeep's windshield. A steady stream of residents and visitors flowed in and out—business types in expensive suits, a dog walker with three leashed Pomeranians, a delivery driver with an armful of packages. No sign of their target or anything out of the ordinary.

  "Can I ask you something?" Warren asked abruptly.

  Eden tensed. She could feel a shift in his emotional register—the frustrated urgency giving way to something more...curious. "Sure."

  "What's going on with you and Rowan?"

  She'd been expecting the question to eventually come from someone. She’d been dreading it, actually. Although, she’d been expecting Zoe or Sasha to pry at some point, not Warren. Unfortunately even expecting it didn't make it any easier to answer, because she still had no idea what to tell herself.

  "Nothing's going on," she said, and immediately winced at how unconvincing she sounded.

  Warren's skepticism was palpable—she could feel it even without looking at him. "Eden."

  "I mean it. Nothing's...we haven't..." She trailed off, cheeks warming. "It's complicated."

  "It always is." Warren was quiet for a moment. "Is it because of the plumbing involved?"

  "What?" Eden's face went scarlet. "No! I mean—well—it's not—" She took a breath, trying to collect herself. "It's complicated."

  "So you said." Warren's tone was surprisingly gentle. "Look, it doesn't make you a transphobe if the intimate details give you pause. You're into what you're into. You can't help that any more than I and Sir Mix-a-lot can help our preference for big butts, or than Rowan can help being who he is."

  Eden stared at the dashboard, her thoughts churning. "It's not that. Or...not just that. I don't know." She pressed her palms against her thighs, grounding herself. "I've always thought of myself as straight. I've never questioned it. And Rowan is a man—I know that, I believe that—but there's still this part of my brain that keeps..." She gestured vaguely.

  "You're worried that being attracted to him means something about you that you're not sure you're ready to examine."

  She looked at him, surprised by the insight. "Yeah. I guess."

  "And you're worried that if you get involved and it turns out you can't handle whatever comes up, you'll hurt him."

  "Yes."

  "And you're probably also worried that getting close to anyone right now is dangerous, given our whole secret-superhero-fighting-monsters-to-save-the-world situation."

  Eden let out a shaky laugh. "Are you reading my mind?"

  "Don't need to. It's all over your face." Warren shifted in his seat, turning to face her more directly. "Eden, you've never exactly been hard to read."

  "Apparently not." She slumped back against the seat. "Is it really that obvious? That I like him?"

  "You mean the way you can't stop staring at him when you think nobody's watching? Or the way barged into a freaking wild dungeon to save his butt? Or the way you—"

  "Okay, okay. I get it."

  Warren grinned, but it softened quickly into something more serious. "Look, I'm not going to tell you what to do. But I will say this: we fight monsters and could die any day doing it. Life's too short to not tell someone you like them because you're scared of getting it wrong."

  "Since when did you become a relationship counselor?"

  “We all grew a lot while we were away at school.”

  “Fair enough, I—”

  "That's her!" Warren's entire demeanor changed in an instant, his body going rigid as he leaned forward, eyes fixed on the Meridian's entrance. "That's her! That’s the Medusa bitch!"

  Eden followed his gaze. A woman had emerged from the building and was striding down the sidewalk northward. Even out of context, she was immediately distinctive—a liquid grace to her movements, a sense of predatory beauty that drew focus and held it captive.

  Her powder blue hair was pulled back in a loose braid that fell over one shoulder. No longer dressed for the dance floor, she wore a flowing cream-colored blouse tucked into high-waisted rust-colored trousers, layered under an oversized olive cardigan that probably cost more than Eden's student loan payment. Chunky gold jewelry at her wrists and ears. Leather sandals that looked artisanal and expensive. The whole ensemble was somehow both trendy and bohemian, the kind of effortlessly curated look that let you pass equally unremarked in a taqueria in the Mission or a gallery opening in SoMa. Over one shoulder, she carried a large knit satchel. It bulged slightly, heavy with something inside.

  Warren's hand was already on the door handle.

  "Wait." Eden grabbed his wrist, feeling the feverish heat of his skin beneath her fingers. His fire affinity responding to his surge of emotion.

  "We're going to lose her if we don't move."

  "We need to be smart about this." Eden keyed her comm. "We’ve got eyes on the Medusa. She’s on foot heading north. What do we do?"

  “We go after her!” Warren practically snarled the words into the open channel.

  A long pause. Eden could feel Warren vibrating with the need to act, his pulse hammering against her gripping fingers. Every second of silence was agony.

  Finally, Pablo's voice came through: "Warren's right. Now that we've spotted her, we need to keep tabs on her. Eden, Warren—tail her, but do not engage unless lives are in immediate danger. Delta, can you access traffic cameras in the area?"

  "Of course I can," the AI scoffed.

  "Good. Help them keep track of her."

  "What about the rest of us?" Zoe cut in.

  "Zoe, stay on overwatch. If the Medusa's leaving, someone might be arriving. Or there might be something inside that penthouse worth protecting while she's away." Another pause. "Sasha and I are going in."

  Warren was already out of the Jeep, his long stride eating up the sidewalk as he angled to keep the Medusa in sight without closing the distance too quickly. Eden hurried after him, her heart pounding.