"The situation has serious operational implications," he said.
"Yes."
"The Final Directive message—"
"I know."
"Ablation will—"
"I know." Alistair shifted finally, rolling slightly to look at him. His eyes were barely open, his expression warm with sleep and lacking any of its usual management, and he studied Tav with the direct uncomplicated regard of someone who had decided, at some point in the last twelve hours, to stop conducting his feelings at a safe distance. "I know all of it, Tav. I thought about it too. But right now, this minute, it's five in the morning and we're both alive and here, and I'd like to have the thing before the crisis, just for one minute."
Tav found his face.
At the uncombed hair and the morning eyes and rings that he wore even in his sleep, apparently, because they were present on the hand resting on Tav's chest.
"One minute," Tav said.
Alistair smiled. Real and slow and tired. "One minute."
Tav's phone vibrated.
Both of them went still.
The single, sharp vibration of an emergency Ablation contact.
The minute was over.
Tav reached for the phone. The message loaded. He read it and held it so Alistair could see.
PAIR STATUS: COMPROMISED. FINAL DIRECTIVE PENDING.
Yesterday it had been pending. Now it was imminent. The escalation of language was direct and deliberate.
Alistair read it twice. Then he looked at Tav with an expression that was not afraid — not of this, not of Ablation — but had the type of seriousness that sat in a person's face when they understood that a thing they'd been hoping to avoid was no longer avoidable.
"How long do you think we have?" Alistair asked.
Tav considered the language. Pending meant authorized but not deployed. A directive pending was a directive with an active countdown rather than an open timeline. "Days," he said. "Not weeks."
Alistair exhaled slowly.
Then he sat up.
The warmth of the bed and the morning and the particular grace of the previous minute evaporated, and what was left was two people in a serious danger making assessments about what came next.
"We need information," Tav said.
"Yes."
"The previous pair — what happened to them in detail. The Protocol's current structure, who runs it above Evelyn. What the Final Directive actually involves." He studied Alistair. "And who sent that shooter last night."
"The shooter wasn't Ablation," Alistair said. He was thinking, his eyes moving in the way they moved when he was assembling something. "The operational profile is wrong. The aggression pattern, the exposure level—"
"Someone else knows about the Protocol."
"Or knows about us." He met Tav's eyes. "Specifically."
The morning light was increasing, grey and flat through the rain-covered windows. Outside, the city was waking up to what the news channels would be reporting as a shooting at auniversity gala, cause and perpetrator unknown. Ablation would be managing the narrative. The foundation building would be temporarily closed. Voss would be treated for a minor wound and his disappearance from the city would be accelerated.
