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“What the hell—?”

He flinched back, light spilling up at him.

Too late.

My hand tightened on his, flesh scalding at my touch. He gasped, too surprised to scream. Because something was coming, spiraling up inside me, spilling out around me. Ground zero for the wave, arched fifty feet high. Shimmering.

And hot.

Harry looked back, already half-thrust to safety, and froze—so I pivoted and kicked him the rest of the way through.

“Lady—” my hired gun said, or started to. But the dust motes burst aflame, all at once, and seared his throat to silence.

I put a finger to his lips.

“Sssh,” I said. “It’ll be over before you know it.”

He threw up his hands, pleading, and the room went white.

* * *

It was raining steadily now. Police cars screamed by as I dragged Harry through the alley, clambering over piles of old magazines and split garbage bags. He paused, mouth open, at the curb to watch me scrape a crushed tomato from my bootheel, simultaneously suturing my rip (fire in the hole, Vosloo; bank it quick) with some electrician’s tape from my backpack.

“Call a cab, Harry,” I said without looking up.

No reply.

“Harry.”

Harry licked his lips, and swallowed hard.

“You blew up my office,” he said.

I straightened, glove firmly re-rigged. Much trial and error had determined the quickest way to button up and prevent secondary explosions. The effort was proving well worth the cost.

“What are you?” Harry asked.

My shadow spilled over his like dark wine. Our eyes met. He flinched.

I shrugged. “What I’ve always been, Harry.”

Over his left shoulder the moon resurfaced briefly, a fish’s dark belly breaking water. “What Dar es ‘alaf made me. Saddam had gas bombs, so they issued us suits?

?but nobody really knew how they’d react under combat situations. They needed rats for the maze, and we were elected. It was a test. Operation Flare, they called it. And when that big wave finally came down, most of us melted down on impact to so much rubberized ash—but I rode the fucker all the way back home.

“Remember my platoon, Harry? Flax. Anderson. Doon. They’re spread thin across a ten-mile blast zone, out in the middle of the desert somewhere, because they just didn’t have what it takes to stare the fire down . . . whatever the hell that is. But me—”

I opened my eyes, only to find that the moon was gone. Inspected the tape: That famous Flare Effect once more safely throttled back to a hot little molecular shiver. Just an itch—which would eventually have to be scratched.

But not now. Not here under the rain-diffused streetlight with Harry trembling at my side.

“Me, I’m still here,” I finished at last. “And I do as I damned well do.”

* * *

It was 3:30 a.m. by the time we reached the Fallout Shelter. I prised the staff restroom window open, slipped inside, and settled down on the nearest toilet seat to wait. Harry stayed out under the sign, still shivering, hands thrust deep in his pockets. No complaints, no commentary, just a numb bemused kind of silence.

I can’t really say I minded.