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cross their open sky. “Now!” “Mason.” “Mason, what?” “Mason Shaw!” “And who am I?” It was hard to resist a sarcastic answer to that one. Mrs. Claus. Abraham Lincoln. My partner. My lover. Jeremiah the Reefer Thief. But Dakota’s face with those intense eyebrows told him to speak straight. What he didn’t understand, she very much did. And though she’d never admit as much, she was terrified by it. “Dakota. Dakota Ward. Former internal affairs for USPD, now director of intake for the Revival Corporation’s privatized HRO 22, Union Station, California. What do I win?” She blinked but said nothing. It looked like a reserved comment held for later. Then she startled yet again at something above them that Mason couldn’t see and ducked back without answering. Dakota planted one foot on a box then sprung upward with her arms extended overhead. She grabbed a machine just above the gutter — a giant thing, churning in her grip like the deck of a running lawnmower. She used gravity and her core to pike the thing downward, driving it hard against the concrete with a devastating crack. The machine sputtered before slowing. Dakota popped a compartment on its back, one she’d clearly known where to find. Its lights died, and the hulk became a hunk of dead metal. Dakota threw something ― whatever she’d yanked from its innards ― away with a clatter. “Is that a prison drone?” Mason asked, gawking. “How … How did you …
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