"What about this. You can knock on my door any time. I'll make up the sofa for you." He thought of Mimi and cringed inwardly. She'd have to stay upstairs and be quiet if there were strangers in the house. Then he remembered his promise about her wings. He bit his lip. She let out a harsh chuckle. "Will I be any safer there?" "What does that mean?" "You're the weirdest person I've ever met, Alvin. I mean, sorry, no offense, but why the hell would I knock on your door?" She stood and turned on her barefoot heel and took herself away, walking at a brisk and gingerly pace. Barry moseyed over and sat in her seat. "She'll be okay," he said. He picked up her spoon and began to finish her breakfast. "You know, I can't watch the way I could yesterday, not anymore. Too visible. What do I do now?" Aaron shrugged. "Find a job. Be visible. Get a place to live. We can have each other over for dinner." Brett said, "Maybe I could get a job where I got to watch. Security guard." August nodded. He closed his eyes. "She's very pretty," Barry said. "Prettier than Mimi." "If you say so." "Kurt's awake." "Yeah?" "Yeah. You could introduce me to him." I did it for your own good, you know. She couldn't bring herself to say the words, for the enormity of what she'd done was overwhelming her. She'd found three of his friends and treated each of them to an evening of terror and hurt, and none of them would tell her where her brother was, none of them knew. Maybe they'd been innocent all along. "Where are you?" "Far from you," he said. In the background, she heard a girl crying. # "It's going to happen, we're going to cover the whole Market," Kurt said. He had the latest coverage map out and it looked like he was right. "Look at this." The overlapping rings of WiFi false-colored over the map were nearly total. "Are those our own nodes, or just friendlies?" Alan asked, all his confusion and worry forgotten at the sight of the map. "Those are our own," Kurt said. "Not so many friendlies." He tapped a key and showed a map of the city with a pitiful sprinkling of fellow travelers who'd opened up their networks and renamed them "ParasiteNet." "You'll have more," Buddy said. Kurt looked a question at Alan. "My brother Brent," he said. "Meet Kurt." They shook. "Your brother?" Adam nodded. "Not one of the missing ones?" He shook his head. "A different one." "It's nice to meet you." Kurt wiped off his palms. Adam looked around the little private nest at the back of the shop, at the small, meshed-in window on the back wall. Danny watched at that window sometimes. "I'm gonna send a screengrab of this to Lyman, he'll bust a nut." It made Anton smile. Lyman and Kurt were the unlikeliest of pals, but pals they were. "You do that." "Why aren't you wearing shoes?" Anton smiled shyly. "No volunteers today?" Kurt shrugged, a jingle of chains. "Nope. Slow day. Some days just are. Was thinking of seeing a movie or something. Wanna come?"