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T he lab is quiet the next morning, each scientist hunched over their computer or a microscope. I don’t interrupt.

“Here we go.” Gene hands me a cup of coffee, his hands shaking a little.

“You all right?” I ask.

“That?” He holds out one of his wrinkled hands, the brown skin weathered from sun and life. “I’ve had that little tremor for a decade now. Not sure what caused it, but it doesn’t hurt me none. I suppose I won’t be doing surgery anytime soon.” He smiles and puts a donut on a little paper plate for me.

“Thanks.” I take a big drink of coffee, slightly burning my tongue—the sort that lingers only for an hour or two. Worth it.

“Sure.” He looks around the lab. “If there’s anything you need me to do for you, just say the word.”

“Will do.”

He nods and limps off toward the corner of the lab he’s claimed for himself.

I take a bite of donut and walk toward one of the empty desks—the one farthest from Aang, who’s already scowling at me over his reading glasses.

“Morning.” Gretchen rolls from her desk and comes over to me. “Sleep well?”

I shrug.

“Yeah, it takes some getting used to.” She has an accent I hadn’t noticed before. It’s sort of Midwestern maybe.

“We haven’t really gotten to know each other.” I pull up my rolling chair and sit. “Where are you from?”

“Missouri,” she says. “A tiny town outside Kansas City.”

“Do you miss it?” I ask.

“Oh.” She rolls back and forth a little. “Sometimes, yeah, I guess. But I’ve been gone so long now, it feels like I was in school for more of my life than I lived at home.”

“Family?” I hesitate to ask this question. The plague has taken a huge toll, and everyone has lost someone.

“My dad is still there.” She glances down. “That’s all. You? I mean, other than your sister?”

“She’s all I have.” I fire up my laptop. “We lost Dad before the plague, and then Mom after it started.”

“I’m sorry.”

“So am I. For you, I mean. For all of us, I guess.” Like everyone else, I shove the grief away. If you dwell on it, you’ll never be able to move forward, never be able to take another step. So many people have lost everyone they ever loved; some have lost everyone they ever knew. I’m not the only one who’s hurting, but I can do everything in my power to stop others from losing even more.

“The sample completely degraded overnight,” Aang, always a ray of sunshine, calls.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean it’s congealed crap.” Aang spins in his chair and glares at me. “It was so old it couldn’t last one more day even with refrigeration. We have nothing to look at. Nothing .”

“The plasma too?” I ask.

“We still have that, but it’s pretty much barren.”

“If we don’t have the blood, we work with what we do have, all right? Wyatt, send me the imaging you did of the cells. I’ll start there with my research. This can’t be the only instance of this blood to ever exist in scientific record.”

“I’ll work on the plasma,” Evie offers.

“I can take the electrolytes if you do the proteins?” Gretchen wheels back to her desk.

“Deal.” Evie snaps on some gloves.

“I’ll sit here and despair,” Aang chirps.

“No, you’ll comb through what’s left of the sample with me to see if we can find anything at all to work with.” Wyatt walks past Aang and claps him on the shoulder. “There’s my favorite guy.”

“I hate forced positivity,” Aang grumbles but gets up and follows Wyatt.

I get to work on my research, but my thoughts keep straying to the note in my pocket. I’d looked at it this morning while I pretended to put on makeup—it was lucky I even had a compact and a brush to accomplish this ruse, given my lack of experience with cosmetics. But the note was coded, only a set of eight letters and numbers along with four more markings I didn’t recognize. I know just as little now as I did before I bothered to read it. What’s worse, I’m no code breaker. I wouldn’t even know where to start with trying to figure out what the hell it says.

We work through the morning, and by the time noon rolls around, Gene pokes his head through the lab doors and says lunch is waiting out in the open area beyond the ballroom.

The gargoyles are still standing watch as we filter out and around the corner to a folding table where Gene’s laid out a steaming platter of chicken breasts smothered in some sort of sauce, a bowl of salad with a half-full bottle of Greek dressing, and a basket of rolls.

“Nice!” Wyatt’s already reaching for a plate.

“And—” Gene pulls open the lid to a red cooler beside the table. “I found some Cokes.”

“Holy shit.” Aang reaches in and grabs a ‘Dr. Thunder’. “I haven’t had one of these in years.”

“Move.” Gretchen digs around and pulls out another one. “It’s like Christmas,” she whispers reverently.

“An embarrassment of riches.” Wyatt grins.

“Doctor?” Gene motions to the cooler.

“When in Rome.” I reach in and grab one. They’re still cold and slushy. “Thanks.”

“Of course.” Gene smiles. “Now eat up while it’s hot.”

We do just that, making our plates and carrying them to the atrium to eat at one of the round tables. I glance at the front doors and spot Gage—or Captain Howard, I suppose—outside. How can I give him the note without the other guard seeing?

“Already got your sights set on a man in uniform?” Evie asks, the question teasing.

“No, just looks like a nice day out there. Sunny.”

“It’s supposed to be warmer today,” Wyatt offers. “Maybe we could go for a walk after lunch. We’re allowed out as long as we stay in the green zone.”

“Sun exposure? To this flawless skin?” Aang shakes his head. “Count me out.”

“I’ll go.” Gretchen stares out the high windows. “I need some fresh air.”

“Same.” Evie cuts her chicken breast into neat strips.

“Oh, so everyone but me is going?” Aang drinks his soda with relish. “I guess I’ll go too. But I need to get my hat.” He stands and heads toward the elevators.

“Diva,” Evie says under her breath.

“You know it,” Aang calls back and puts more hips into his walk.

Once he’s gone, Evie says, “I know he seems like a pill, but once he warms up to you, you’ll love him.”

I shove a forkful of lettuce into my mouth and say “mmhmm” with as much enthusiasm as I can manage.

“Just wait. You’ll see.”

“Evie is our optimist.” Gretchen finishes her drink, getting every last drop from the can. “Wyatt is our pragmatist. Aang is our?—”

“Pessimist. Yep. I caught that.” I smirk.

“Takes all kinds, right?” Gretchen wipes her mouth.

By the time Aang returns, we’re all milling by the front doors.

“Ready.” He walks past us and swings the door open, the crisp air like a cool caress as I follow.

“To what do we owe the pleasure?” Gage smiles at us, his eyes lingering on me for a moment too long.

“Exercise.” Gretchen rolls down the sidewalk, her pink hair almost electric-looking in the sun.

“Yep.” Wyatt waves two fingers and follows, and Aang and Evie walk side-by-side behind him.

“You too?” Gage asks.

“Me too.”

“I didn’t take you as a joiner.” His eyes are shaded by the brim of his cap, the green of his uniform highlighting the deep auburn of his hair.

His counterpart stares off after the others, boredom written all over his features as he stifles a yawn.

“I can be peer pressured into tons of stuff.” I shrug.

“I’ll make a note of that.” Gage grins.

I reach down and fumble with my zipper, my fingers trying and failing to get it to catch.

“Allow me.” He gently moves my hands away, but not before I slip the scrap of paper between his fingers.

He doesn’t make any move to show surprise or even that he noticed. Instead, he easily fixes the zipper and pulls it up for me. “There you are. Ready to promenade.”

“Thank you.”

“My pleasure.” His smile is genuine, his eyes warm.

“Okay bye.” I turn on my heel and follow my colleagues, doing my damndest not to look suspicious and doing my extra damndest not to look at him over my shoulder.