The burn on my palm throbs with each pulse of my power, but I keep going. Pain's just another job hazard.

  "Next section is reinforced concrete," I tell the team, feeling the density change through my good hand. "About fifteen feet thick, with some kind of metal mesh inside. Probably rebar."

  Vector checks his gadget again, the screen casting blue light on his face in our dark tunnel. "Cell block perimeter. We should be right outside D-Block."

  "Any more surprises we should know about?" Mrs. Synapse asks, eyeing my bandaged hand. She's been checking her case every few minutes, adjusting dosages on her syringes. "More lattice? Motion sensors?"

  I shake my head. "Can't feel anything like the lattice. Just the rebar in the concrete."

  Tarbaby moves alongside me, his substance glistening in the dim light from our headlamps. "How do you want to do this? Go around?"

  "No. Straight through." I press my good hand against the wall, extending my power in careful pulses. "But slow. If we liquefy this whole section at once, every sensor in the place will light up. Modern seismic sensors can tell stuff like that. Gotta do it inch by inch."

  Vector nods. "Like surgery."

  "Yeah," I mutter. "Concrete surgery."

  I focus my power, narrowing it to a beam about two feet across. The wall begins to soften, the concrete turning glossy as it liquefies. I push forward slowly, maintaining just enough solidity that it doesn't collapse inward. Vector's telekinesis helps, holding back the liquid concrete as I carve our path.

  "We're getting signal again," Mrs. Synapse says suddenly, her hand going to her earpiece. "B-Team's engaged. Heavy resistance at the main gate."

  "Anyone hurt?" I ask, not taking my eyes off the dissolving concrete.

  "Mr. Nothing took some kind of impact round, but he's still mobile. Mrs. Quiet has three guards down. They've pulled back to the administrative wing." She pauses, listening. "Mrs. Zenith says the storm's peaking. Perfect cover for extraction."

  I grunt acknowledgment, pushing my power deeper into the wall. The rebar is trickier. Would take too long to liquefy, so instead, I have to liquify the concrete around each bar, then Vector bends them apart with his telekinesis, creating a path just wide enough for us to pass through.

  "This is slow," Tarbaby complains behind us. "Our timetable--"

  "Red Calf's timetable can kiss my ass," I interrupt, not looking back. "You want to set off every alarm in this place, be my guest. Otherwise, shut up and let me work."

  That silences him. Good. Last thing I need is some corporate mercenary breathing down my neck while I'm doing precision work. This isn't just about speed - it's about control. Liquify too much at once, the whole structure could shift. Too little, and we waste time. It's a balance.

  After ten minutes of painstaking progress, my power touches air on the other side. "We're through to some kind of maintenance corridor," I announce. "Service tunnel, maybe."

  I wipe sweat from my brow. Being inside a tunnel of stone and concrete isn't exactly what I'd call "livable conditions", haw haw.

  Vector consults his... doohickey. "Utility access for Ring D. We're right where we should be."

  I widen the opening until it's large enough for us to pass through single file. Vector goes first, then Mrs. Synapse with her case. I follow, with Tarbaby bringing up the rear, sealing our entrance with his adhesive compound.

  The corridor is narrow, lined with pipes and conduit. Emergency lights cast everything in dim red. It's cooler here, the air carrying a metallic tang that reminds me of old construction sites.

  "Her cell should be this way," Vector says, pointing down the corridor. "Block D-7."

  As we move through the utility tunnel, Mrs. Synapse's earpiece crackles again. She listens, then turns to us. "C-Team reports emergency frequencies are lighting up. They've detected the lattice tampering."

  "How long?" Vector asks.

  "Response team deployed, but they're focused topside. We have maybe eight minutes before they realize we're Kansas City Shuffling them," she answers.

  I don't think we're Kansas City Shuffling them, but I'm not going to say that out loud. We pick up the pace, following Vector's gadget through the maze of maintenance tunnels. The floor vibrates slightly beneath us - massive air handlers somewhere below, keeping the place ventilated.

  After a few minutes, Vector holds up his hand, stopping us. "We're here. Cell block D-7 is on the other side of this wall."

  I press my palm against the surface, feeling the composition. "Thinner here. Standard concrete, no rebar."

  "Do it," Vector says, checking his watch. "Clock's ticking."

  I focus my power, liquefying a section of the wall about three feet across. As it melts away, we can see through to what looks like a narrow inspection corridor running behind the cells. More emergency lighting, more pipes, and a row of small access panels.

  "Which one?" I ask as we step through.

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  Vector checks his gadget, moving slowly along the corridor. "Cell 17. Should be... here."

  He stops at one of the access panels. It's reinforced steel, about two feet square, with a keypad lock and what looks like a retinal scanner. Next to it is a digital display showing the cell's status: OCCUPIED.

  "Burrowing in won't trip an alarm?" I ask.

  "If you work fast, they won't have time to notice anything's wrong," Tarbaby assures me. Sure, buddy. Its your operation.

  I nod, placing my hand on the wall next to the access panel. The concrete liquefies around it, slowly exposing wires like nerves. Don't touch anything. Make the thinnest possible gaps. Figure out where the wires are and do everywhere but that.

  Damnit, man. It's all wires. Vector slowly - very slowly - bends them into place, keeping them held in their normal structure.

  As the opening forms, we get our first glimpse inside. The cell is small, maybe ten by twelve feet. Reinforced walls. A glass layer between the concrete and her, or some kind of glass-like thing, but it melts just the same when I put my hand to it. Basic furnishings - bed, metal desk bolted to the floor, shelf. The girl lies on her side, facing away from us. Her hair is short, almost shaved. She looks small under her blanket - a kid's blanket with penguins on it.

  I pause, the liquefaction halting momentarily. Something about the scene hits me wrong. This is a supermax cell, but there are personal touches. A stuffed penguin propped against her pillow. Drawings taped to the wall. Books stacked neatly on the desk. Like, first grader books. "All about birds". "All about penguins". "All about dinosaurs". I stop for another second.

  "What's wrong?" Vector whispers.

  "Nothing," I say, resuming my work.

  When the opening is big enough, Mrs. Synapse carefully reaches through with a device like a small spray bottle. She aims it toward the sleeping figure and depresses the trigger. Something fine, red, and vapor-y spreads out from her doohickey and wafts over with a little telekinetic push from Vector. He shapes the cloud, shoving it into place and forming a little TK bubble of it, directly over Deathgirl's head.

  She inhales, inhales, inhales, until her body visibly relaxes even past this sleeping state. Mrs. Synapse counts breaths. Times them on her wrist.

  "She's under," Mrs. Synapse confirms after a minute. "We can proceed."

  I widen the opening, carefully liquefying more of the wall until there's a gap large enough to pass through. Vector goes first, stepping silently into the cell. He approaches the bed, his hands raised, telekinesis ready if needed.

  But the girl doesn't stir. The sedative has done its job. Up close, she looks even younger - maybe thirteen or fourteen. Thin but not frail.

  Mrs. Synapse follows, checking the girl's pulse and pupils with practiced movements. "Sedation is holding. Vitals stable." She frowns slightly. "She's healthier than the file indicated. Better weight, better muscle tone."

  "Problem?" Vector asks, already gathering the girl's limp form with his telekinesis, lifting her gently off the bed.

  "Could be," Mrs. Synapse admits. "I calculated the dose based on her medical records. If she's healthier, the sedation might not last as long. We should move quickly."

  Vector nods, guiding the girl's floating form toward the opening in the wall. As he does, my eyes drift to her belongings. The penguin plushie. A journal on the desk. A few framed photos I can't make out from here.

  "Wait," I say, surprising myself. "We should take her stuff."

  Vector pauses, the girl suspended in air between us. "What?"

  "Her things," I say, gesturing to the penguin and the other items. "Kid's already getting kidnapped. Least we can do is let her keep her stuff."

  Tarbaby makes an impatient noise from the corridor. "We don't have time for--"

  "It'll take ten seconds," I cut him off. "And it might help keep her calm when she wakes up. Easier to get her to come with us."

  Vector and Mrs. Synapse exchange a glance. Then Vector nods. "Make it fast."

  I grab the penguin plushie from the bed and spot a small backpack hanging on a hook. I stuff the plushie inside, along with the penguin blanket, the journal, and a couple of books. I hesitate at the photos, then grab those too.

  "Moving in two," Vector says, already guiding the suspended girl through the opening.

  Mrs. Synapse's earpiece crackles again. This time her expression turns grim.

  "What is it?" Vector asks as we reenter the maintenance corridor.

  "B-Team reports heavy resistance. Mr. Nothing is down. Mrs. Quiet is extracting him to the rendezvous point. If we're not out in ten, they're dropping T-Rex on the place."

  "Tyrannosaur," I mutter under my breath.

  "Is the distraction holding?" Vector presses.

  She nods. "Barely. They're regrouping faster than expected. We need to move."

  Tarbaby immediately begins sealing the breach with his adhesive compound, working faster than I've seen before. "This will hold for a while, but they'll know something happened when systems come back online. The resin will melt the wires, just to give them a little more to panic about,"

  "I don't care," I bite back. I don't need his explanation. Let's just go, man. "Explain after," I say, turning my attention to creating our exit path, liquefying the concrete ahead of us as we retrace our steps toward the tunnel. The girl floats between us in a telekinetic cradle, still deeply sedated. I've tucked her backpack in beside her.

  Our comms suddenly burst to life as we reenter our original tunnel - our shitty, short range, low power ones, not the high power one Mrs. Synapse has - picking up signal from repeaters Tarbaby placed earlier.

  "A-Team, this is C-Team," comes a voice I recognize as Mr. ESP's. "B-Team is withdrawing. Repeat, B-Team is withdrawing. You have approximately six minutes before security redirects to your position."

  "Acknowledged," Vector responds. "We have the package and are en route to extraction point."

  "Package status?" Mr. ESP asks.

  "Sedated and secure," Vector replies, guiding the floating girl through the narrow tunnel as I continue liquefying our path forward.

  We're making good progress, faster than on the way in, when Mrs. Synapse suddenly stiffens. She's watching the girl, her expression concerned.

  "Her breathing's changing," she says. "Sedation's wearing off already."

  "How long do we have?" Vector asks, not slowing his pace.

  "Five minutes? Maybe less. She's metabolizing it faster than expected."

  "We'll be at the extraction point in four," I say, pushing my power harder, ignoring the renewed pain in my burned hand. "Just need to get through the lattice again."

  As if on cue, our comms crackle. "A-Team, be advised," Mr. ESP says. "Lattice grid shows power fluctuations in your sector. They're running diagnostics."

  "Can they tell it's been tampered with?" Vector asks.

  "Negative. Storm interference is masking it for now. But they're sending a maintenance team to check. ETA three minutes."

  I curse under my breath, pushing forward faster. The tunnel walls blur around us as I liquefy more rock, less concerned now with being subtle. We need speed more than stealth.

  We reach the lattice breach point, where Tarbaby's compound still seals the path we created earlier. Vector's sabotage seems to have worked - the wires aren't pulsing with energy anymore.

  "Careful," I warn, extending my power to test the area. "Just because it looks dead doesn't mean it is."

  "Who cares?" Vector says, grunting. He spreads his hands apart the sort of way you'd spread a lady's legs, and with a grunt of effort, the entire wire structure screams and buckles onto the edge of the tunnel. Screams and buckles, screams and buckles, while he sets Deathgirl down on the ground. "Let's go,"

  The girl suddenly twitches on the floor, and lets out a weird kind of groan.

  "She's waking up," Mrs. Synapse says urgently. "The sedative's metabolizing too fast."

  "Give her more," Tarbaby barks.

  "You want her brain damaged?" Mrs. Synapse snaps, "or alive?"

  "That's not my fucking problem," Tarbaby replies coolly. "Whatever you do, don't let her wake--"