You’re nothing but a spy. No, I’m so much more than that, Raine, and somewhere down deep you know it too. Or you will. You’re just too wounded to admit it.

* * *

A cloudy night. I couldn’t ask for better to muffle light and sound. I stake out a section of the north wall that’s hidden from the street, analyzing the best path to the top. I find a dark section with no footholds more than three feet apart. I begin my ascent, finding hand- and footholds between the stones, on broad window casements, and on the narrow three-inch stone ledge marking the lines between floors of the seven-story office building. Another ledge, another casement, carefully making my way to the top until I finally hoist myself onto the roof. Roosting pigeons are disturbed by my presence, flutters rising into the air, but they quickly go back to their bird dreams.

The roof tiles are steep and slick with fungus. I crouch low as I move across to the rooftop edge and I eye the chimney of the building next door looming another three stories above me. I walk farther up the steep roof trying to get the best angle I can until I’m nearly at the peak. I’m about to pull the rope from my pack when a tile slips loose beneath my foot and I find myself sliding down the roof toward the edge at breakneck speed. I frantically grab at anything, my fingers digging in but only catching mold, my feet, my knees, every part of me trying to stop my deathly descent, and finally, just a few feet from the edge, my right hand catches a vent pipe. I barely reach out in time with my other hand to grab my pack as it slides past me. The loose tile falls to the ground seven floors below, a dull thud on the soft earth.

With a desperate grip on the vent pipe, I carefully pull myself back up. Half-humans couldn’t stop me, but a simple loose roof tile nearly did. Sometimes it’s the smallest and most innocent things that you have to watch out for.

I retrace my steps back to the peak, crouching even lower this time, and pull the rope from my pack. I need to be there before she is. I throw the looped rope, missing the top of the chimney by a good twenty feet. I rewind and throw again, closer but still missing it. I widen the loop and try again, this time hitting my mark. I pull the rope taut, testing it, hoping the old chimney stones hold and that I can pull myself up to the roof garden without detection.

I grab tight and am just about to make the swing to the wall when I see something falling from the rooftop above me. I stop breathing, fearing the worst, but then I see it’s only Raine’s rope ladder swinging directly in front of me, like a wagging invitation. I’m not sure what to think. It’s not where Raine would normally drop it. Did she see me coming?

I look at the ladder. Regardless of her motivations for dropping it here, it’s an invitation and I swing to the wall with my rope and climb it. When I’m almost to the top I look down at the staggering distance to the ground and I’m jolted by all the times Raine has taken this risky path. I crawl over the ledge and look for her but no one’s here. “Raine,” I whisper.

Hap steps out from behind an arbor.

“You,” I say.

“Yes, me.”

“Where’s Raine?”

“Still inside.”

I look around, wondering if the Secretary is watching from the shadows. “So this was only a trap.” I let my pack slip from my shoulder to my hand and reach inside for the knife.

“Yes, a trap,” Hap confirms. “But probably not the kind you’re imagining.”

“A trap is a trap. And I bought it. But if you think I’ll go easily, you’re wrong.”

Hap eyes my hand in my pack, like he’s amused at whatever defense I might be reaching for. “This trap isn’t for you,” he says. “It’s for Raine. She’ll be coming out soon. I suggest you conceal yourself until I can lock the door behind her. That way she’ll be forced to stay and listen to whatever you have to say. And I assume you have a lot that needs to be said.” He waves me to a dark corner.

I don’t move. He’s trying to help me?

“Why so surprised?” he asks. “Who do you think carried you up to your apartment the night you were injured?”

I shake my head. It makes no sense. “Why?”

“Word gets around.”

Hap has an odd weakness for talking to other Bots.

Like CabBots?

“Dot isn’t the only Bot who has ever dreamed of Escape, Mr. Jenkins,” he says. “However, Raine is my priority. My assigned task is to guard her, but even for a being such as myself, assigned tasks can develop into something else. My task as guard has evolved into protector, and sometimes that even requires protecting Raine from herself. I’m not doing this for you. I’m doing it for her.”

I can’t quite believe what I’m hearing. It’s more than loyalty. He loves Raine. He loves her like a protective uncle. I shake my head, still in disbelief. “Why do you portray yourself as such a hard-ass?”

“That’s my job. I’m not a chatty Tour Bot the way Dot was. And if you must know, I don’t have the ability to smile. It was not considered a necessary add-on for my job—rather, a hindrance. But trust me, it’s far more debilitating than having no legs, especially when one comes to care for the Eater and Breather one is assigned to look after. But you above all others should know about limitations.”

If he carried me up the stairs, he saw the BioPerfect oozing from me. He knows everything, including my unique limitation. He could have turned me in at any time and gotten me out of the way. But word gets around. I never would have guessed that he was a Bot like Dot, one with hopes for being more, maybe even with hopes for Raine to have more.