Kelly always figured the bridge collapse was her fault. A direct result of that chaotic stampede she’d orchestrated while turning Genecorp HQ into a combination demolition derby and abstract sculpture. She could have tested it—spent a loop without leveling the place to see if the bridge stayed up.

  But honestly, who had the time for that? Not her.

  She could have pinpointed the exact cause and fixed it—but that felt annoyingly responsible. Prevention was better than cure anyway. Modern bridge tech was impressive, and city planning had learned from past wars, demigod fallout, and glassed cities. Key buildings were built to protect the people inside from most—but not all—catastrophes. The people in that lab were probably buried alive. Or trapped underground.

  With the portal creatures.

  The image hit her all at once: humans, screaming and panicking, while slimy things with too many teeth and too many eyes stared back at them. That was a truly terrible way to go. Slightly worse than accidentally stepping on your own foot… repeatedly.

  That single, vivid realization made her swerve hard from her usual morning routine of wanton destruction. She had researched the people working there, and one name—just one—rang a bell.

  Kelly was going to stop the bridge from crushing the lab entirely.

  Kelly watched a building collapse in the distance. "Let's say I did it. So what? I'm heading there now. If I'm the problem, then me being there is the fix. I'm the best bad luck those people will ever have."

  Kelly drove toward a walled-off sector in the outskirts. The Mistmarket.

  She thumbed her comms. "Mistmarket. The locals call it a mess." She eyed the reinforced barrier. "They're selling themselves short. It's a masterpiece."

  A recorded civic warning crackled over her dashboard: "Hazardous atmospheric conditions. Masks required beyond Perimeter Gamma."

  "Yeah, I got the memo," Kelly said, cutting off the message. She adjusted her mask. She powered up the truck's ramming array—just in case. "I’m only here for some retail therapy, no need to be uptight about it."

  A few decades ago, the area was so thick with irradiated toxic atmosphere that just stepping into it could cause permanent changes. Now, after years of failed attempts and an abandoned city project, Mistmarket was merely unlivable: the air was polluted, and a thick mist clung to everything that moved through it. It wouldn’t mutate you instantly, at least not in the first few seconds, but you still couldn’t enter without a gas mask unless you wanted to wake up with gills and a tumor that could predict the weather.

  That made it the perfect place for slightly questionable purchases.

  As Kelly drove through the thickening mist at a speed that could make a snail feel rushed, she began to make out the fortifications separating the misty market from the rest of the outskirts encircling much of New York. Calling them ‘fortified walls’ would be generous—they looked more like a chaotic Pinterest board of hastily constructed death traps: rickety towers, blinding lights, wired fences, cameras everywhere, and enough low quality early-warning surveillance systems to make Big Brother look proud.

  "Look at that," she muttered. "They had a panic attack and turned it into architecture."

  Peak-thresholders watched from their towers, eyes scanning for creatures, opportunists, and the worst offender of all: a portal hanging low and ugly in the sky, practically in the street.

  She drove right past it. The thing was encircled by automated defenses—drones and turrets forming a lethal ring, a fortress of automated responses whirring to life. The market's denizens had the right idea. Automate the defense. Stay far away. Use things that can't die to shoot the things that shouldn't live.

  "Smart," she noted. “Nice job.”

  There was no filtration system in sight—just piles of gas masks and every inch of skin wrapped like a mummy. The city cared only about staying in power, and the corpos cared only about profits. The permanent pollution here hadn’t done anyone any favors financially, and Kelly suspected the whole city was built so the rich would never have to set foot in places like this—or breathe the air without a designer gas mask.

  As she drove around the high walls and the occasional goblin, giant centipede, or giant wolf-octopus-eagle-thing, her truck took over the drive, headed to the entrance through the thick syrupy mist. The magical-battle-maniac scientist idly connected to the news streams, and a screen appeared in her vision, projected to her eyes.

  “‘—ensuring public safety is our paramount concern," a smooth, familiar voice declared. A face filled the screen. All smiles, shepherding civilians toward a gleaming evac bunker, his armed retinue keeping the path clear. "Genecorp stands with you.—’”

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  Kelly watched as Adrian Ward, Genecorp vice president and last reset’s attempt-on-her-life enthusiast, grinned for the cameras while shepherding civilians into a bunker, armed retinue forming a perfect, menacing fan club behind him. Every frame screamed “hero,” but Kelly caught the tiny things—the twitch in his jaw when a civilian hesitated, the way his eyes scanned for cameras, the faint smirk that said, this isn’t about saving anyone.

  '—Genecorp Vice President Adrian Ward, seen here personally escorting civilians to safety, assures the public that corporate shelters are the most secure option during this crisis. His armed security detail is ensuring a smooth and orderly evacuation—'

  The feed cut to a global map, flashing with conflict zones. Cities walled off by shimmering, unnatural barriers. Others swarming with creatures that bent light and space around them.

  '—Debate rages on Capitol Hill over the proposed Interplanetary Draft, a controversial measure to bring in off-world military assets for rescue and pacification operations—'

  A new banner: 'Global Defense Initiative.' Stock footage of US military, National Guard, and police rolling through streets played. Then, slicker shots of private security from Crystal Nanotech, Han Cybernetics, Vaughn, and Genecorp, all under a joint operations logo. Corporate helicopters circled, every rescue choreographed for maximum PR points.

  A brief clip showed a very short, heavily armed mercenary clearing a street with a squad. It was definitely Reggie, playing the hero for hire.

  "Reggie!" Kelly barked a laugh. "Getting paid to be a hero. That's a new look."

  A statement from the Alien Tuin Empire followed, one of their ambassadors coolly stating, "We are not responsible for this incursion. However, we have dispatched humanitarian aid to the human homeworld."

  '—The prevailing theory continues to point fingers at the terrorist organization known as the Artificial Alliance, despite their released video denying responsibility—'

  Talking heads on a news panel argued. A pundit slammed his fist on the desk. '—It's the synths! It's always been the synths!—'

  The feed cycled through ads for Crystal Nanotech luxury bunkers, Han Cybernetics security systems, and Vaughn off-world relocation services. Images of crowded evacuation bunkers and sleek civilian starships flickered past.

  Armed off-world evacuation—with a price tag you needed to sell a planet to afford. Not the regular civilian holes in the ground. Promises of rescue for everyone else, always incoming. "Any minute now," she laughed, the sound hollow in the rumbling truck. "What a show."

  Kelly killed the feed. The silence in the mist was a relief.

  “Oh, so that’s where Reggie is at this part of the day. Playing hero,” Kelly murmured. It turned out Genecorp even outsourced their heroism, probably focusing their real money-making activities—like taking priceless samples to off-planet labs—to the real heavy hitters.

  Reggie's crew was a little further west than she'd like, but judging by the clips, that had looked like the city's artificial river. Or was it a lake? Kelly didn’t remember. She decided to ambush Reggie's crew for her precious missing best friend’s tech when the opportunity presented itself. She had kept a low profile today, and even if they checked who she was, the result wouldn't return anyone special. A standard identity scan would flag her as a civilian, a non-entity. She probably wasn't on their kill-on-sight roster. Their corporate employers wouldn’t have enough information to be thorough. A portable DNA or energy-signature scanner cost extra, and Reggie's crew wouldn't waste one on a random person. They were hired muscle, not scientists.

  Would the immortal scientist turned fighter try to secure the terraforming box again? Save half the city? No. Better to stay in the botanical lab and uncover as many secrets as she could—get started on ‘Project God-Catcher?,’ maybe. Let the place turn into a real angelic warzone, then switch to another part of the city. Avoid the encounter with the AI overlords and the thing that wore a god's name. That meeting had ended the last loop and nearly broke every loop after it.

  Kelly eventually reached a hastily fortified entrance gate guarded by four security guards and two armed makeshift watchtowers. All of them carried riot gear and laser rifles. The guns looked mostly self-printed, low-spec, barely capable of harming anything beyond the 6.0 threshold, enough for the early invasion of the outskirts, she supposed. But among them, Kelly spotted a few clearly illegally obtained heavy-hitter weapons that would possibly help them stay alive as the day got progressively worse. Good for them. Their chief made Kelly a sign to stop via a raised palm, and the battle-maniac scientist did her best to look innocent.

  It was pretty hard with the large rifle strapped to her back, a customized gas mask she’d coded to look like a grinning skull, and a mana-infused, magical synth-fleshed, custom-augmented, troll-homunculi–boosted resting EQ score that made everyone jumpy and nervous—but it was the thought that counted.

  “Halt,” the guard said, blocking the path with his body armor. “No entry without authorization or membership.”

  “‘I’m just passing through,’ Kelly said. ‘I heard they have a museum.’

  “It was a museum,” the guard grumbled. "Now, it's a market. Look, judging by your clothes and that freaky mask, you're not from around here. Beyond is the lawless wilderness, and we’re the only people protecting this entire block from all the crazy shit falling out of the sky. Past these gates, there's no government surveillance, and the law won't protect you—they're already busy.”

  Kelly rolled her eyes behind the mask and laughed, a sharp, grating sound. “Oh, wow. I’m thrilled. You’re the heroes,” she said. “I heard you only do shakedowns on Mondays.”

  The man stared, his brain processing the words and finding no purchase. “So if you want to pass with proper authorization—maybe even gain membership— you will have to contribute to our community’s mutual defense.”

  “Absolutely,” Kelly said, gesturing toward her vehicle.“You aren’t going to check me for drugs, weapons—I mean, aside from the rifle, the sidearm, and the probably-illegal explosives—or anything shady? I swear, I’m innocent, I promise. Pure as driven slush.”

  “Depends on how much you give to the community defense.”

  “Community defense, sure,” Kelly repeated, pulling almost every credit chip she owned on an intern’s salary, from the shadow in the fold of her jacket. “Let’s contribute.”