The demon turned back to me from the surveilnce node.

  “Proposal delivered. The decision is yours,” he said in an even, almost official tone, stripped of any emotion.

  I sat silently, finishing off the juice and alcohol mix. The decision certainly wasn’t mine, not personally.

  I held a long pause, just in case Mendoza wanted to ask a question. When none came, I waved my hand.

  “Get out.”

  “You’re not going to detain me?” the demon asked, smiling again.

  “So you can off yourself right here and leave me to deal with the body? No thanks. Get moving on your own two feet and do it somewhere else.”

  “I was expecting at least a token attempt,” he said with mock disappointment. “Would’ve added a bit of drama to your side.” He stepped towards the door.

  That’s when Mendoza chimed in.

  “New guest approaching. It’s Zhang. We won’t interfere.”

  What?!

  I shot to my feet.

  Why the hell not? Why let those two meet?

  The demon caught the shift in my posture, frowned, and backed away from the door.

  “Someone waiting for me out there?” he asked.

  “Sullivan?” came a familiar voice from the door chime. “We need to talk!”

  It was Zhang’s voice, no doubt. Alive, direct, and very, very irritated.

  I cursed silently. Everything was falling apart. A moment ago, I thought I was done with this headache and at worst I’d be stuck sipping tea in Mendoza’s office for hours. But the world, as always, had handed me another lemon.

  The demon turned back toward the door, then to me, raising an eyebrow.

  “Zhang,” I said. “Soro’s friend.”

  “Interesting. Perfect timing. Either she’s got a gift for foresight, or there’s something else going on,” he hinted.

  "You wanted drama," I snapped.

  "And Master Mendoza decided to indulge me? How thoughtful."

  "Sullivan! I know you're in there!" Zhang pressed from behind the door.

  "It’s just a coincidence," I told the demon. "Keep your mouth shut and get lost."

  He squinted at me with mock cunning. "Just when I’m about to leave… Are you pying a deep game, or do your people simply have no control over the situation?"

  "She knows about demons too!" he shouted.

  "She knows nothing!" I shot back, stepped past him, opened the door, and gave him a hard shove.

  A first stage rarely matches a second in brute strength, and he wasn’t expecting it, so he stumbled forward easily and nded straight in Zhang’s arms.

  She was smaller, lighter, but stronger. She caught and held him without effort.

  "And who the hell are you supposed to be?"

  "Uninvited guest," I said, trying to sound calm. "He was just leaving."

  "Yes, exactly," the demon agreed with a faint smile. "I was just on my way out. I wouldn’t want to interrupt... a lovers’ quarrel?"

  "You’re awfully cocky for a first year," Zhang said coldly.

  "Oh! I'm a real demon," he announced, proud as anything.

  Zhang narrowed her eyes and repeated slowly.

  "You’re too cocky. Who the hell are you, and what business do you have with Sullivan?"

  "Ummm." He pulled a face that was supposed to look sincere, but the gleam in his eye ruined the act completely. He id a hand on my chest. "I’m sorry, I can’t hide it any longer. We’re lovers."

  "What?" Zhang and I said at the same time.

  She gnced at my sour expression, then at his smug one, and the surprise drained from her face. Her gaze hardened.

  "No first year in their right mind would mock a second period like that. And no second would tolerate it."

  She stepped past the demon, shoved me back into the room, then fisted a hand in the front of his jumpsuit and flung him in after me.

  This time, I had to catch him.

  Zhang stepped in after him and closed the door.

  “Now we’re going to talk,” she promised.

  She crossed her arms. Her gaze was sharp as a bde.

  That look moved from me to him.

  “You’re suspicious as hell. This is the third, no, fourth shady thing tied to Sullivan. And when that much weirdness happens in such a short span of time, I’m inclined to believe they’re all links in the same chain,” she said, studying our reactions. “So, to get to the bottom of it, let’s go back to where this all started.

  “What do you know about Cadet Soro’s death?”

  “Zhang,” I said sharply, annoyed. “He’s got nothing to do with it. Let the bastard leave and we’ll talk about Soro.”

  She didn’t believe me. If anything, my eagerness to push the cadet out only confirmed her suspicions. Uncrossing her arms, she raised her right hand and pointed a finger straight at the demon’s face.

  “What do you know about Soro’s death?” she demanded.

  I clenched my teeth and flicked a gnce at the security AI’s sphere. The lenses inside were moving slowly, but deliberately. They were tracking every motion. Zhang’s behaviour clearly registered as aggressive, and the sensors would have fgged the threat in her voice. The system was already prepping for activation. I saw a tiny aperture open beneath one of the lenses, now trained on Zhang.

  It was hesitating, for now, because the aggression wasn’t directed at me, but at another possible threat.

  That meant I had a chance to try and de-escate.

  “If you’re done talking to me,” I offered, “maybe you’d like to take your new friend somewhere else and talk it out there?”

  Both of my guests gave me a suspicious look.

  “No, we’re good,” the demon said.

  “Yeah,” Zhang agreed, even raising a finger towards the ceiling, “we can talk right here.”

  The orb registered the drop in tension, and Zhang followed the gnce I’d thrown her way.

  “What is that?” she asked.

  “Autonomous guardian,” the demon answered before I could, trying to read her face as he spoke. He gestured towards the barely noticeable sensors scattered around the room. “Sensor net,” he said, then pointed at the sphere. “AI brain.”

  “You know a lot,” Zhang said.

  The demon nodded.

  “You know about Soro’s death?” Zhang asked him.

  The demon tilted his head to the side, weighing his options.

  I had no idea what was happening in that scrambled mind of his, but then he said, “Yes.”

  “What exactly?”

  “Everything,” he replied simply.

  “What?!” Zhang blurted out.

  I caught the flicker of hesitation in her eyes, a brief glitch in the system. She’d been expecting lies, dodging, denial… but not that.

  “You absolute piece of shit!” I snapped. “He’s bluffing,” I lied, stepping forward cautiously, positioning myself between Zhang and the demon. I locked eyes with him and said pointedly, “He’s not right in the head — brain damage from overusing a certain mental technique.”

  “I know who killed her. And I know why,” the bastard added, just to spite me.

  What an arsehole! There was no logic to what he was doing.

  Zhang grabbed my shoulder and tried to shove me aside, but the difference in our cultivation was negligible, and physically, I had a solid edge.

  “No one’s that brain-damaged. Unless he’s got a death wish,” she said.

  Exactly! Damn him! The bastard was begging to be killed.

  “If she kills him, it’s going to be a problem for all of us!” I shouted at Mendoza.

  The demon understood, and his grin widened.

  “You’re not pretending. She really doesn’t know.”

  “And she really wants to be told!” Zhang shot back, full of fury. She couldn’t push past me, so she tried to go around.

  “Raises a question, though,” the demon said. “If Mendoza can’t even control a random cadet, is she really the right person to negotiate with?”

  “What the fuck are you two talking about?” Zhang snapped.

  “She didn’t move me to a controlled room right away. I could excuse that, maybe chalk it up to some hidden agenda. But this farce?” He pulled a face and pointed at Zhang.

  That was the st straw — girl finally snapped.

  She took a quick step past me. I moved to intercept, but she shot her arm out under my shoulder. I didn’t see what happened, only heard the crack of an electric discharge and a sharp bup!

  By the time I turned, the demon’s body had already hit the floor.

  And just as I crouched to check on him, a sharp paff cut through the air and a tiny capsule zipped past above me.

  “Shit!” Zhang cursed, grabbing her cheek where it had struck. The capsule burst in a puff of white powder that dissolved into gas. Her legs buckled beneath her, and she colpsed to her knees before slumping sideways to the floor.

  A moment ter, the numbness hit my arms too. Breathing became harder, like the air itself had grown heavy and was pressing down on my shoulders. Still, it wasn’t unbearable. My legs trembled, but they didn’t give in.

  As soon as the symptoms kicked in, I felt a jab beneath my bracelet and the searing burn of liquid being forcefully injected into my bloodstream. The burn spread through my arm and chest, washing away the numbness, and the other symptoms weakened right after.

  I gnced at paralysed Zhang and the fear in her eyes. Her eye muscles had seized up the instant the contaminated blood delivered the agent.

  By pure chance, her line of sight nded squarely on the demon’s body. Mostly his legs, and the piss-stained trousers.

  “This could’ve been avoided,” I told Mendoza.

  “It could,” she replied coolly. “But should it have been? Are you so sure the girl isn’t working with the demons?”

  I looked at Zhang again. Even frozen, her eyes brimmed with fear. It was spreading wider and deeper, like the stain on the demon’s trousers.

  “What do I do now?” I asked Mendoza.

  “First, keep your mouth shut. Second, open the door.”

  “Sullivan, it’s Patel,” the doorbell announced.

  Patel wasn’t alone. He had another cadet with him: tall, coal-bck shaven head, with the square frame of a heavyweight boxer. Big, solid, no unnecessary muscle bulk. Together, they carried a rge container that barely fit through the doorway.

  The container stayed by the entrance. Patel immediately crouched by Zhang to check her condition. The new face offered a grin, teeth unnaturally white.

  “Kwabena,” he said, offering his hand.

  “Jake,” I said, returning the handshake as I pulled up his interface info.

  K. Y. Mensah, Late Third, Lightning-Water.

  Patel, meanwhile, turned his attention to the corpse.

  The demon had nded on his back, lying fairly ft. A trickle of blood had leaked from his ears and nose, but not much. His eyes were gssy, blood pooling in the whites.

  Patel grabbed a napkin from the kitchen counter and gently wiped away the blood. He nodded to his partner, who opened the container lid. The napkin went in first. Then Patel grabbed another, gently lifted the demon’s head by the hair, and checked the neck and base of the skull. The napkin stayed clean.

  Patel flipped the body onto its front.

  There was a faint blue bruise on the nape, but the skin was intact.

  “Lucky,” he said to me. “Less mess to clean.”

  Then he lifted the body as if it weighed nothing and tossed it into the container, not too worried about keeping it in one piece.

  His partner closed the lid.

  “Now, let’s have a little chat with our lovely dy,” Patel said, pulling an injector from his pocket. He pressed it against Zhang’s neck and injected something. Within a few minutes, she started to stir.

  Patel gnced at the AI orb, its many lenses still tracking, and warned her:

  "Let’s skip the sudden aggressive moves this time. Too much paralytic gas could cause sting and even permanent damage."

  MaksymPachesiuk