All ministers and local regional heads were crammed into the Leguan staff room. They sat shoulder to shoulder along a conference table made from smaller tablecloth-covered plastic tables. Winnie sat by Helena, both because Helena begged for her to be there, and because she was technically the Head of the Exemplar Committee now that she had her body back.

“So pardon me, Your Majesty,” said a general, “If we haven’t been dealing with you these past few weeks, that means the peace work with China… it was this Alexander?”

“It was, but he was using mind control.”

“The same mind control he supposedly used on all us?”

“It’s not supposedly,” Helena said. “He was.”

“Are we still being mind controlled?”

“No. You’re not. I’m not going to use any kind of mind control.”

“Did your mother use mind control?”

“No. I don’t think she did.”

“You don’t know for sure?”

“I don’t think she had the ability. The mind-control showed up after those glyphs got out in the open.”

“But she would have?” asked another.

“I don’t know,” Helena said. “I’m not her.”

“I don’t think she would have,” Winnie interjected. “It wouldn’t have interested her. She wouldn’t have considered it actually ruling people. More controlling them.”

“But she did use mind control to assault the Manakin?”

“Out of necessity,” Helena said. “And it wasn’t an assault. She just snuck aboard to get rid of Alexander. Alexander was the one who sunk the citadel.”

“I thought you said your mother did.”

“I meant he was the one who set the bomb. My mother sank it to contain the blast.”

The men and women in the council chamber still looked confused.

“So how can we be sure that you’re really Helena?” a minister asked.

Helena opened her mouth. Closed it. With a sigh, she unhooked her necklace. Her aura came to life. “Here. Read my mind.”

Everyone reacted. “Ma’am. Put that back on. It’s not safe,” the general said.

“It’s perfectly safe.”

“The enemy can strike from anywhere.”

“I’ve already explained. Just… do you want to read my mind or not?”

She looked each person in the eyes one after another. Many averted their gaze, but most took her up on their offer. Some gaped. Other stared, eyes fixed on Helena with intensity. Others simply glanced, then nodded.

“Do you all believe me now?” she asked.

No one replied.

Eventually, a minister spoke. “Are you going to tell people what happened?”

“Yes.”

“I’m not sure that’s wise, ma’am,” said the general. “If people learn how easily the empire was usurped—that you spent two weeks imprisoned in an animal while some maniac ran the country—it could cause panic.”

“And no one will react positively to knowing their minds have been controlled,” said another. “They’re already wary of the Exemplar Committee. This could strain their tolerance to the breaking point.”

“I know,” Helena said. “That’s why I’m going to make some changes. My mother used the exemplars to control people while keeping secrets from everyone, even me. I, however, will not be a hypocrite. I’m dissolving the Exemplar Committee.”

Everyone’s reaction was immediate.

“Your Majesty, you mustn’t do that,” an admiral said. “The Committee holds this empire together. Your mother put a lot of faith into foreign militaries enforcing her reign on their soil. If the exemplars aren’t there to ensure loyalty, rebellion will occur. Parts of this empire would secede the moment they had the chance.”

“Maybe that’s part of the problem,” Helena said. “Maybe we shouldn’t force ourselves in places we’re not welcome.”

“You’re not suggesting we relinquish control?” the admiral asked.

“We’ve already lost control of Northern Europe,” Helena countered. “Asia is in riots right now, and we don’t have any forces in India anymore.”

“But voluntarily give up control? Showing weakness like that would lead to war. Many of these countries would unite against us if they thought that they could get away with it. The exemplars and our control over food supplies are what barely hold this empire together. I understand why you want to disband the Committee. It’s a noble cause, but we just can’t right now.”

“Okay,” Helena said. She donned her shield stone. Her aura was betraying her cool, confident presentation. “But the people don’t deserve to live under the constant threat that we can read their minds while they can’t read ours. They don’t trust us anymore. That needs to change. Maybe from now on, they should have a right to demand screenings from those who control them.”

Again, her audience clambered to respond.

“You want them to read our minds?” one outspoken minister said.

“We’ve spent years reading theirs,” Helena said. “But nobody read ours. And look what happened. We’re the ones that failed them.”

“Your Majesty. Your Majesty,” a minister replied. “That’s lunacy.”

“Of course we can,” Helena replied. “Why not?”

“People would lose faith in the empire.”

“More than they already have?”

“Yes. You are our queen because of who your mother was. That’s it. If people find out that it’s possible to switch bodies, and that Victoria was actually someone else in Victoria’s body, what does that say about your right to rule?”

Helena hesitated.

“And what about state secrets, ma’am? What would happen if the location of our nuclear arsenal became public knowledge? What’s to stop them from taking information about military operations from our head and selling them to another nation? What if they—”

“I get it,” Helena said. “So we won’t open ourselves up that entirely. All I know is that my mother was never checked by anyone, and that’s part of what caused this whole problem. And I still believe if we can read other people’s minds, they should have the right to read ours.”

“A right?” asked the general. “Your mother had a saying about rights. They’re—”

“I know what my mother used to say.” Helena stopped and composed herself. “So maybe we don’t dissolve the Exemplar Committee, but there has to be more accountability. The world is changing every day. People have lost trust, and we need to earn it back.” She sighed. “I know I’m… My administration is still getting a handle on things, but I will do what’s best. Will you stand by me?”

There was silence at first. Winnie was worried no one would answer.

Then, “Of course, Your Majesty.”

It was the general. He took his shields stone from around his neck and laid it on the table. His eyes met Helena’s.

“I support you,” said a minister. She too set aside her stone and looked at Helena.

One by one each person at the table pledged their support. Whether by choice or by pressure, they all removed their shields as they did so. There was nothing to hide.

“Good,” Helena said.

“That was horrible,” Helena wailed. “I’m going to be the worst queen in the world.”

She and Winnie were sitting together in her Leguan officer’s quarters.

“It wasn’t that bad,” Winnie said.

“It was. They all think I’m an idiot.”

“No, they don’t. You’ve been in office for less than a day. Nobody expects you to know exactly what to do. It’s their job to help you learn. What’s important is that they all support you.”

“No, they don’t. They just think they do. Their heads are all messed up and they don’t even realize it. Whatever Alex did to them has rolled over onto me. Did you know the Chinese premier called me today? He said he just wanted to make sure I was all right, but I think he wanted to do phone sex with me or something. He wouldn’t stop flirting.”

“So maybe people are a little attached to you,” Winnie admitted. “You could use the advantage.”

“Yeah, because I have no idea what I’m doing. None. Everything I said in there was stupid. I was actually going to say we should stop hoarding food assembly until that guy pointed out that it’s the only thing keeping us from all out war. The biggest thing I’ve ever led was a basketball team.”

“Oh, uh… about that,” Winnie said. “Ms. Montes wants to know when we’re coming back to class.”

“I can’t,” Helena wailed. “I don’t have time for school anymore.”

“We’ll have to make time. The queen should at least have a high school education, but she says the school will work around your schedule.”

Helena thrust her head onto her pillow.

“Ms. Montes will set up tutoring for you,” Winnie continued. “And it sounds like the ministry takes care of most day to day stuff about running the empire. Although maybe not at first. Everything is hectic right now, but it should all calm down soon.”

Helena still had her face buried. “Would you like to be queen? You still have the body swapping glyph, right?”

“I’m not bossy enough, but that reminds me.” She brought out a folder from her bag. Inside were transcribed glyphs. “What are we going to do with these?”

“What are they?”

“Alex’s backup glyphs.”

Helena picked up the one on top. “This is the Sympathy glyph, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

“Is this the only one left?”

“Yes.”

Helena started to tear it.

“Wait!” Winnie said. “Are you sure?”

“I’m not going to use it. That’s something my mother would have done. I’m trying to prove to the world that they can trust me. I can’t do that and use this.”

“But that’s the last glyph. If it’s gone, the power is gone for good, and that power might be the only reason the ministry is giving you a chance. It might be the only reason we’re not at war right now.”

Helena gazed at the glyph for a long while. “No.” She tore it in two. “I won’t use it, and I can’t think of a reason why I would that’s not wrong. The world is better off without it.” Helena continued tearing it into tiny pieces. Afterward, she stared at the remains. “Did I just make a big mistake?”

“No,” Winnie stared with her. “You’re right. It shouldn’t exist. You’ll give people shields, and that will protect them.”

Helena looked down at the second sheet in the folder. “And this is body swapping, right?”

“It is. It’s the only glyph in existence now.”

“Should I tear it up too?”

“That’s up to you.”

“But I want to know what you think.”

Winnie shrugged. “I don’t know. What you’re holding in your hand is the secret to immortality. Sakhr lived for thousands of years because of that.”

“But we’d have to steal lives to do it. I’d be just like my mom.”

“Maybe you could be open about using it instead. What if you only took lives of people on death row or something?”

“Ew. And live in the body of some slimy, tattooed convict?”

“Maybe one day we could make mindless clones of ourselves, and we take those bodies.”

Helena regarded her.

“I don’t know,” Winnie said. “It just seems like there’s a lot of potential we could be throwing away. I could just see us eighty years from now, swallowing a dozen pills every morning and leaning on our walkers, wishing we still had this around.”

“But maybe that’s why we should destroy it,” Helena said. “Just like with Sympathy, sooner or later we’re going to be tempted. And what if it got out? Could you imagine that? Identity theft would hit a whole new level. Like, an even worse level than it’s already reached with all this mind-reading going on. Some old bad guy could break into someone’s house, tie someone up, read their mind for everything they’d ever have to know, then switch bodies and take over the other person’s life. Or worse. A person could take over a baby. Who would ever know?”

“Everything can be abused,” Winnie said, “but it still might be the most amazing power that’s ever existed. Maybe there are people out there who would want to swap bodies with each other. And I can think of a few ways swapping bodies with someone might be fun, even if just for a while.”

“But I’m still not sure it’s worth the risk.”

“What about Alex?” Winnie asked. “If you get rid of that, he’ll be in a tortoise forever.”

“So? He deserves it.”

“He doesn’t even remember what he did.”

“So?”

“I’m just saying. It’s not like we’re punishing him. There’s no lesson for him to learn if he can’t remember, and what if someday we want to release him? Or imprison someone else? Every generation, more flairs are going to show up with powers we can’t even imagine. Maybe keeping the glyph around is a bad idea, but maybe one day we’ll need it.”

Helena looked despairingly at the glyph she held between her fingers, poised to tear it. “Oh, I don’t know. Every choice I make seems like it could change the world forever. I don’t want this kind of pressure. Why can’t being an queen be all about fashion like I wanted it to be?”

Winnie put the glyph back in the folder and tucked it away. “Maybe you’ve been queen enough for now. Big decisions can wait until tomorrow.” She her shield stone off from around her neck and set it beside the bed.

“What are you doing?” Helena asked.

Winnie met her gaze. Her mind returned to a place in the universe where their solar system was just speck far behind. Before her were untold galaxies of all different shapes and size, all unimaginably far away, and whatever lay beyond.

“Where do you want to go?” Winnie thought.

Helena removed her own shield stone and looked back. “Far away,” she thought.

“Has anyone asked her?” a marine private asked.

“Naw. No one’s seen her. She’s holed up in the captain’s quarters,” answered another.

Oni lay on his rack listening in on the soldiers’ conversation. In the last few hours, he’d heard many like it. The soldiers didn’t talk with him or his family, but they ignored him enough that they didn’t watch their words around him. By now, he knew everything they knew.

“Has the captain talked to her?” the marines continued

“I don’t think the captain knows yet.”

“He knows. He knows everything that happens on his ship.”

“Then why hasn’t he talked to her?”

A soldier tossed a few chips into the pile to call. “I think he hasn’t talked to any of us because he knows it’s true. ”

“You sound pretty sure of yourself,” said the dealer. Another soldier called.

“Come on. Everybody already knows it’s true. Nuclear war broke out. Victoria just happened to have the one piece of technology that let her feed her people. Everybody starves but her. She takes over the world. That’s some Bond villain shit right there.”

“So she saw the Collapse coming. A lot of people did. Doesn’t mean she caused it.”

“No. She caused it. Everybody outside of the empire already knows this.”

“Bullshit. If Victoria caused the war, then she planned it like shit. Were you in Porto Maná after everything went down? LakiraLabs had to rush construction on those assemblers. We were eating canned food for almost a year. A lot of people starved.”

Turn went to Tan. Tossing in some chips, he passed the turn to the next. The soldiers let him play with them, but never as the dealer. Unlike the others, he focused on the game.

“She had to do that,” another said. “What would it look like if she already had all the assemblers she needed? Bombs drop. Winter sets in. Oh look, everybody. I just happen to have a warehouse full of these food makers.”

“She couldn’t have caused the Collapse even if she wanted. She’s just one person. Espionage on that level would have taken a huge team of people. And you think nobody on that team would have leaked that they were trying to destroy the world?”

“She could have done it easily. Look. She’s on board now in the body of some teenager. She can swap bodies. Nobody knew about that, and you can bet your ass she had that power before the Collapse. Are her exemplar pets swapped out too? We don’t know. No one knows anything about her.”

“The exemplar’s, man. The exemplars,” said another. “Who knows how long she had glyphs before she made the exemplars. She could have been mind reading everybody, and killing off anyone who wanted to talk. She had body swapping. Who knows what secrets she still keeps?”

“I don’t buy it. We’ve all met her. Does she seem like a killer to you? A tough lady, sure. But not a killer. Not a mass murderer.”

“She wages wars, man. She’s already a mass murderer.”

“You know what I mean.”

“What I don’t get is why did this fake queen or whatever tell us all this.”

“It’s a ploy,” said the other lieutenant. Both were on duty monitoring the status of the ship’s nuclear reactor. Everything was nominal. They paid more attention to the video playing on a tablet between them.

“Look.” One soldier backed the video up.

“I would demand answers from her,” said Alexander in the video.

“See? She looks directly at the camera when she says that. It’s meant for us. Then she says that Victoria shouldn’t be heading this empire, as though she’s still alive. She meant this message for us.”

“It’s a he, by the way.”

“Huh?”

“Alex is short for Alexander. It’s a guy.”

“Whatever. He’s trying to talk to us.”

“But it was political suicide.” The soldier took the tablet and did a search on the speech. “Look at this. Everybody on the internet is freaking out. People are asking for Helena to step down.”

“Since when does what the people want ever mattered? She’s got the armies. The Chinese have already said they’re going to stay in the empire. Everyone else is too. The only thing standing in her way is—”

“His way.”

“…His way is us. He knows Victoria is here. He knows we’ll ask her if this is true.”

“Has anyone asked her?”

“What’s the point?” asked Second Lieutenant Marco, the ship co-pilot. “Isn’t that woman we caught supposed to be able to erase memories? We could ask her. She could tell us she caused the war single handedly, and killed Santa Claus while she was at it. Next minute: pop. We know nothing.”

“There’s no way she’d get away with that,” replied Barnes, the pilot. “I mean, just listen to this chatter.” He raised the volume on the shortwave radio momentarily. The language was in Arabic, but the word ‘Victoria’ jumped out several times. “Nobody is not talking about it. Every time she’d take it from our memories, it’d just restart the rumor mill as soon as someone read their internet feed. But then we’d all be asking why we’re only hearing about this now.”

“Maybe she’ll erase everyone’s mind.”

“The whole world’s? I don’t think that’s how it works. If it’s true, it’s going to come out.”

“If it is true,” asked Marco. “What would you do about it?”

“I don’t know. Haven’t thought about it. Not sure I want to.” Barnes lapsed into silence a while. “I had a wife, you know. Maria. We were in Panama during the Collapse. Bombs didn’t hit there, but you know… the winter. We couldn’t get out. I mean, where’d you go, right? The starvation hit everywhere, except south, but everyone going that way was sent back.”

“She starved?”

He shook his head. “Didn’t get the chance. Bunch of teenagers thought she might have something they wanted. Stabbed her to death for an aid pack of assembled shit. Broad Daylight. Hundreds of witnesses. When I found her the next day. Her body was right where she fell. Lakira moved in two weeks later and restored order.”

“You’d blame Victoria?”

“I don’t know. I know I never would have joined the army if Maria were still alive.” He shrugged, shaking off the story. “How about you? Did you lose anyone from the war?”

“Of course I did. Everyone did,” said Tactical Officer Lucero. “What I want to know is: are we going to do anything about it even if it is her fault?”

He had several others had collected around the target evaluation console on the bridge. They spoke in a hush since Victoria was only a room away conversing with the Captain.

“It’s not a question of if,” said the flight navigator. “She did it. She started the war.”

“How can you know that?”

“You saw how much Alex hurt his position by saying that. He’d only do it if it hurt Victoria more, and it wouldn’t hurt her if the rumor weren’t true. Victoria has to be guilty.”

“All these rumors already went around years ago. Nobody cared then. Nobody will care now.”

“I care. Those rumors back then were bullshit, but this is real. We’re working for the bad guy. Puts everything I’ve done these last two years into a different light.”

“It doesn’t mean everything we’ve done is bad. We’ve been building an empire.”

“Yeah? For what? If Victoria builds an empire because the world is destroyed, that’s one thing. If she blew up the world to build her empire, that’s completely different. I wouldn’t have joined the army if I’d known this.”

“We don’t know what she did,” said Navigator Tremont. “For all we know. She tried her best to stop the war, all while preparing for it in case it did happen.”

“Then why doesn’t she just say so? Victoria’s been hiding ever since the announcement.”

“We can’t just make assumptions.”

“Can’t we? That woman is not forthright about anything. She kept glyphs to herself. She hid her body snatching ability from everyone. She hasn’t told us anything we don’t absolutely have to know.”

“She has her reasons.”

“Who is Alex anyway? He obviously knows more about her than we do? All we know about him is that Victoria says he’s bad news. She never said why? Maybe he’s the good guy.”

“I think you’re all forgetting there are telepaths aboard this ship,” said Communications Officer Ruiz. “We shouldn’t be having this discussion.”

“All I’m asking is the truth. We deserve that. We’re fighting against the empire because some woman claims to be the dead queen, only she won’t tell us anything.”

The conversation broke as Executive Officer Rivera entered the bridge. Several headed back to their stations.

“What’s all this?” he asked.

“Just talking, sir,” said Lucero. “Have you heard the news?”

“Of course I’ve heard. No one will shut up about it.”

“Is the captain going to ask her?”

Everyone on the bridge looked to the exec. He glanced at everyone else. “What the captain does is none of your concerns. Get back to your work. Now.”

The huddle broke.

“But you always knew,” thought Helena.

“Yeah,” Winnie thought back.

Helena peered through Winnie’s memories, seeing the conversation Winnie had with Victoria about the deal to get Helena a body in exchange for cooperation. Helena dug back further to when Winnie was overhearing the truth from Paul, and the anger Winnie had felt thinking about how Victoria was responsible for her father’s death. Then Helena saw Winnie’s last phone conversation with her dad.

Winnie mentally recoiled.

Helena stopped. “Sorry.”

“No. It’s okay. Look.”

Helena witnessed the memory as though it were her own. She saw the announcement on the news, and Winnie’s mother trying desperately to reach her husband. Winnie shared final words with her father, knowing they would be their last, but not fully understanding why. She’d imagined her father’s final moments, screaming at the phone, then staring at the city when that final flash of white came.

“Were those actually your dad’s final moments?”

“I don’t know. I guess they might actually be.”

“And Victoria did this to you?”

“In a roundabout sort of way, yeah.”

“And you agreed to keep her secret?”

“It was her condition on her giving you a body.”

“But she killed your dad.”

“But what am I going to do about it? If I even think of rebelling, she’d know, and she’d make me forget everything. I’d rather know the truth.”

“Why didn’t she?”

“I guess because I agreed to help her anyway. If she had made me forget and I later found out, I’d probably run away before she could do it again.”

“But then—”

“Yeah. She could just find me and erase my memories again. I thought about ways I might protect myself from her. Maybe I could write down everything on a piece of paper. You know… Victoria caused the war and killed your dad. She promised to give Helena a body once she’s in control again. All the stuff she might make me forget, but then I realized she’d read my mind and see the note. Then she’d just get rid of it first.”

“What if you put it somewhere she couldn’t get to it?”

“I can’t think of anywhere. I thought maybe the admin section of my clothing website, but then she just get the password from my mind. The best plan I came up with was to use one of those ‘Last Wishes’ sites people use for when they die. You know… you send it a bunch of messages. Then if you don’t check in with it once in a while, the server emails the messages to your family. That way you sort of send messages from beyond the grave. I figured I could make an account, give it my secrets, then change the account name and password to something I don’t remember so not even I could stop it.”

“But Victoria could contact the website’s company,” said Helena.

“Exactly, or get into my email. If I were really serious, I could ask Josephine to erase my memory of making the account.”

“I thought the memories she takes have to be related to her.”

“Oh. Right. So see? Not even that works. Besides, Josephine would have to erase her own mind too, so no matter what I do, Victoria could stop it. I can only trust that she’ll keep her word, but now that now that her secret’s out, she doesn’t have a reason to.”

“Don’t worry about it so much. If I don’t get a body, I don’t get a body. Don’t let her control you because of me.”

“I will get you a body, Helena. Stop trying to talk me out of it. Besides, she can always put me in a tortoise, so what choice do I have? I have to help Victoria no matter what she’s done. I’m stuck.”

Late that night, or what counted as night for a ship circling the earth, Winnie lay in her rack, propped on pillows. Her tablet lay wedged against the steel wall such that both she and Helena, who sat on her lap, could see it. Scattered over the bed were ignored food pellets, assembled berries, and crumbled food bars.

After much waiting, Winnie finally got some pages to load on tortoise physiology. It had taken nearly twenty minutes of back and forth as each page request went to the orbiter’s mainframe proxy, which fetched the website through a satellite internet connection. For soldiers reading and writing email back home, it was adequate. For anything else, it was crap.

“Watermelon,” Winnie said. “That’s something you can eat. It says you shouldn’t have a lot of it though. Would you like some?” She looked at Helena. “Water. Melon.”

Negative.

“Okay.” Winnie read through some more. “Green leafy vegetables, but those dark kinds that nobody likes. Kale? I think that’s what these pellets are, but we could make some that actually look like kale. How about it? Kale?”

In Helena’s mind, she saw an image of a mother trying to feed a toddler baby food. The mother swerved her spoon around. “Open up for the airplane.”

The meaning was clear.

“Okay, I’ll stop,” Winnie turned off the tablet. “But you really should eat more. I know you’re still hungry.”

Confusion came from Helena’s mind.

“Hungry,” said Winnie slowly. “You are hungry.”

“I don’t feel hungry,” Helena thought. She then expressed her memory about their talk of getting Helena a body.

“Sorry. Victoria won’t do it right now, and she’s making me choose the body you get. I think it’s her way to spite me.”

In Helena’s eyes, Winnie saw that the only word she’d understood was sorry. It was what she had been expecting to hear. Helena already assumed she’d never get a body again.

But there was hope, sort of. Except Helena wasn’t understanding that. Communicating with Helena was getting frustrating.

Winnie wrestled her glyph card from her pocket. Multiple people could use the same glyphs if they held it together, but what was Helena supposed to do? Bite it?

After some thought, Winnie mashed a berry between her fingers. She cradled Helena and carefully traced the mind-reading glyph on her shell. Helena craned to see. When she couldn’t, she settled and waited. It was slow going. Each stroke took multiple dabs, but Winnie finished.

She looked Helena in the eyes and thought, “can you hear me?”

Helena could. Winnie heard her own voice in Helena’s head. Helena, however, was startled. She’d never used a mind-reading glyph before.

“Take your time,” thought Winnie. “It’s me. You’re not thinking these thoughts. I gave you the mind-reading glyph.”

“What? I uh… how do I answer? Oh.”

Helena fumbled through several of Winnie’s memories before realizing what she was doing. Thoughts would echo in Winnie’s mind, and Helena would focus on them, causing them to echo again in Winnie’s. The feedback was chaotic, but it eventually settled down.

“I think I got it,” Helena said.

“Can you understand me better?”

“Yeah.”

Then Helena had a concern about accidentally seeing Winnie’s private thoughts. It immediately brought some of her own to surface.

Helena shut her eyes.

Winnie smiled. “Take your time.”

After a while, Helena reopened them. Her surface thoughts were locked on basketball. Right behind them were her private thoughts.

“God!” Helena thought. She shut her eyes again. This time, when she opened them, she conveyed a single thought. “How do you control this?” Then eyes shut.

Winnie laughed. “Relax… Focus on my mind… Not yours.”

Helena waggled her head. Her eyes stayed closed.

Winnie waited. As flustered as Helena may be, her mind was finally off her depression. Her aura was something other than it’s usual barren haze.

Helena tried again. Mentally, she repeated the same babble. “Her mind her mind her mind her mind her mind.” Helena pilfered through Winnie’s head, picking out random childhood memories, the past few days, some Korean words Winnie knew. There was no pause to breath. Winnie hadn’t been nearly this bad when she first linked with Josephine. It helped that death was imminent then. It focused her. Afterward, while working with Josephine, if Something came up, they both ignored it. It was no big deal.

Everyone secretly believed they had the dirtiest thoughts of all. In this week alone, Winnie had seen enough dirty thoughts in the soldiers around her that she’d stopped caring. Helena just hadn’t realized yet that her thoughts couldn’t possibly be worse than those men.

…Ah.

Helena snapped her eyes shut.

Winnie felt her cheeks heat up.

Helena withdrew into her shell.

“Umm. No, it’s okay,” Winnie said. “You uh… don’t have to hide.” Then slowly. “Please come out.”

Helena didn’t.

All Winnie had to go on now was Helena’s aura. It had become a knot so tight and overwhelming, Winnie felt nauseous simply imagining what it felt like. Cautiously, she laid her hands on Helena’s shell, but it turned Helena’s aura darker.

“Please… It’s Okay.”

Helena’s eyes snapped open. “Take it off take it off take it off take it off!”

“The glyph? But why? I’d still be able to read your mind.”

“Don’t. Okay? Don’t read my mind.”

“But then how will I know what you’re saying?”

“Oh God, I want to diiieee.”

“Helena. I don’t care.”

“I swear. It was just a thought. I was just thinking about what would be the most embarrassing thing for you to see, and it just popped into my head. I’ve never thought stuff like that before.”

“It’s fine. The soldiers think stuff like that all the time.”

“I swear,” she mentally yelled. “I don’t!”

Winnie laughed.”It’s okay,” Winnie yelled back. “I seriously don’t care.”

“But how could you not?”

“It’s kind of flattering actually.”

“Stop! Stop making fun of me.”

“I’m not.”

“Yes, you are. Stop it. I—” Helena’s thought trailed off. “What’s the point? It’s not like it matters. It’s just another reason to hate my life.”

“Don’t say that.”

“Why not? I’m a tortoise. I’m going to be one forever. Why should anybody care what I think? They never did before. I’m a joke. I always have been. I just didn’t know it until now. So go ahead. Read my mind. I don’t care anymore. Look at what a joke my life is.”

“Your life isn’t a joke.”

“Yes, it is. I’m the princess who goes shopping and brags about how she’s going to rule. Everybody nods and laughs and puts up with her. It won’t matter. I’m nobody. No. I’m worse than nobody. My mom made me so I was a nobody on purpose. My life was just an inconvenience she put up with for her future body. It was the only thing about me of any value, and now I don’t even have that anymore.”

“We’ll get you another body?”

“From what? My mom? Why would she?”

“I made a deal with her.”

“Yeah. To get somebody else’s body. I’ll never have my own again—the one I worked so hard on. She gets to enjoy it, after everyone else is done with it. You know what? I’m glad she doesn’t get my body. It’s the best way I could have ever spite her besides killing myself. Now I can’t even do that anymore. She wouldn’t care.”

“But you’ll get a body. I know it won’t be your own. And it does kind of suck having someone else’s body. I would know.”

“But you have to pick one out for me. She did that on purpose, you know. She hopes you’ll chicken out.”

“I know, but I won’t,” Winnie thought. “I was thinking we could pick one of the exemplars Alex swapped out with his people. They’re all criminals who are already using a stolen bodies, and the original owners are dead. There’s no way Victoria will let them go free once she’s in control, so they’re practically doomed anyway. Here, look. These are some that I was thinking about.” Winnie visualized some exemplars. None were as young as Helena, and none had paid as much attention to maintaining their own bodies, but plenty were young and attractive.

But Helena wasn’t paying attention.

“Come on, Helena. Please. Look at these.”

“Why? Even if Victoria does let me have one of their bodies, which I don’t think she will, what then? I live somebody else’s life while my mother gets to live mine? I’d rather just be dead. And you know what the worst part about it is? It’d probably be for the best. I’d be a horrible ruler.”

“No, you wouldn’t.”

“Please. Nobody wants me to be queen. Not even you. I can see it in your head.”

“But I would.”

“You told my mom you didn’t think I was ready. You thought I was a spoiled princess who wouldn’t take it seriously. And you were right. I wanted to make you my fashion advisor. The world is in ruins and I wanted to outlaw fabrics. I would have been the worst ruler the world has ever seen.”

“Helena,” Winnie said. “Your mom killed, like, most of the world. You literally could not do worse than her.”

“What!” Helena scanned through Winnie’s mind. “Oh, wow. Yeah. I guess that’s true.” A flicker of mirth came from Helena.

“And you were a pretty good at leading the basketball team.”

“I guess that’s true. I did lead them to win nationals. And those girls were the worst. Seriously. I know nobody else cared as much as I did, and I yelled a lot, but I made them try. Those girls would have sucked if not for me.”

“I believe you.”

“Watch. Who’s going to get them to regionals now? Bridget? Please. They won’t even qualify.”

Helena imagined the team failing under Bridget’s passive guidance. Helena knew no one would miss her pushing, but they’d learn that she was the reason for their success. She was proud about that.

But the daydream only lasted a moment. Inevitably, Helena recalled why she wasn’t leading them anymore. Each memory found their way back to her mother, or the maniacs who’d stolen her perfect body, or the helpless tortoise body she was left with. Gloom fogged over her mind until her little pocket of pride evaporated.

“Considering everything,” Helena though, “being a tortoise is the best future I could have hoped for. My mom was probably going to kill me after she took my body. No one would ever have known. From the moment I was born I was supposed to die. I just wish… you know… I just wish I’d had a chance.”

“I know.” Winnie folded her legs toward her chest, cocooning herself around Helena. “Hey. You want to see something cool?”

“Okay.”

Winnie cleared her mind and focused. She visualized herself cradling Helena, as though looking from a small camera floating above their rack. The berthing quarters was cramped with bunkbeds with just enough room to sidle between them. From near the ceiling, Winnie could see over the bunks to all the hatches leading from the room.

“Where do you want to go?” Winnie asked.

“Me? I don’t know. Where can we go?”

“Anywhere.”

“Can we leave the ship?”

Winnie focused on a tiny port window across the room. She soared through it, and the world opened up. The quarters were gone. The ship was just a tiny dot floating above the boundless expanse of the earth below them. The grayish continents were sprawled out with sapphire blue ocean stretching into the horizon. From up here, they could just make out curve of the planet.

“Oh wow,” Helena thought. “Is it always this vivid?”

“It wasn’t at first. I’ve gotten better over the months. Where to now?”

“I have no idea.” Several destinations floated through Helena’s mind: The north pole, the Asian mountains, remote islands. “I can’t decide. You pick.”

“Me? If you insist.”

Her mind turned upward, to where the blue tinge of the atmosphere turned black and the stars shown through. At a speed no human had ever gone, she soared toward space. Earth shot away behind them, its vastness becoming nothing more than a marble. And then there was the moon, as vast and monumental as the earth, but Winnie didn’t stop. Soon both were dots behind them, indistinguishable from the stars.

Still she went on. The sun became a mote. The stars shifted around them. They seemed so close now, but it was only an illusion because of her speed. She was moving faster than any particle man had ever known, and each moment she moved faster still. The stars parted. An infinite black lay beyond. Winnie glanced back to see the swirled galaxy they’d just emerged from—an unimaginable number of dots mixed together in a glittering mass. From this perspective, she was a giant overlooking it. She could reach out and touch any star. But Winnie looked back out at the dark. It took her a moment to adjust her mind to see what the human eye would not, like adjusting her vision to the dark.

And there they were—the other galaxies. Each one was so faint and far away that the light years Winnie had just spanned were nothing but the step of an ant in comparison.

“There are so many of them,” thought Helena.

“Yeah.”

“Have you been to them before?”

“A few. Where do you want to go now?”

“Can we go even further?”

“Yeah, we can.”

And so they did.