Ari wondered what Mina was doing now.

The thought of Mina being dead or horribly injured was too terrifying a thought, so she kept thrusting it to the back of her mind as she took the skytrain into Area Eight. She didn't want to be caught jumping in an unfamiliar area where she didn't know where the cameras were and where the Peacekeepers patrolled.

The train hummed, moving soundlessly over the monorail track. Ari spun her phone, her eyes focusing on the blue light along the finger-length driver-shaped device. She barely registered the chatter from the students around her. The flashing neon signs and dynamic displays on the sprawling screens of Area Five faded to the sleek marble buildings of Area One. Squat, plain structures replaced busy kaleidoscopic architecture. The psychedelic colours faded to sterile white to reflect the healing facilities.

Area Eight was outside of Shon's jurisdiction; she didn't want to chance getting in the way of those people again.

She stepped off the skytrain in Area Eight and hopped into one of the waiting pod cars. The air was different here, more tense and hurried. Busy students marched at speed, lacking the friendliness and calm Ari was used to. The pod car took her down bland grey streets lined by bland grey buildings. When it stopped outside one of many identical building blocks, she realised the office of The Verity's editor was, in fact, just another residential unit, and in one of the poorer sectors of Area Eight.

She couldn't help but wonder if this was a stupid move. Although she had little to fear from thefts and threats of violence, intentionally entering the office of a small-time gossip magazine during a time when suspicion was high for terrorism was perhaps not the smartest decision. She called Fris as she ascended in the stuttering lift. Fris didn't pick up.

Mina always fussed over Ari's hovering. That was how she phrased Ari taking an interest in her work: 'hovering'. Well, look at what happened when Ari didn't 'hover'. She pushed away the negative thoughts and pressed her index finger against the 'office' door bell. A green light ran across her face. Her identity flagged up on the screen. Ari, Class 5-12, Rank A, 'The Transformer'. She cringed. Several seconds later, a suspicious blue eye peeped at her before the door opened.

"You showed up." The voice almost sounded surprised. Before she could retort, he allowed his door to slide back, jerking his head and beckoning her in.

"Of course." Ari swept past, briefly noting his gangly frame and bright eyes staring at her from behind thick glasses.

Ari only knew the sun had gone down by the disappearance of tiny slits of orange light peeping between the dark buildings opposite. The editor's room had no view to speak of; dense flats loomed from all directions, casting a claustrophobic atmosphere. The clutter inside his room did little to alleviate that; heavy wires, flashing machines, and multiple flat monitors took up two sides of his room. Books piled on the third wall. A foldable bed tucked discreetly behind one of the desks. Cushions lay around a small wooden table in the centre.

"Have a seat, Transformer. I'm honoured by your presence."

Ari sat down stiffly, not missing the snideness in his voice. A tablet, which displayed the next issue of The Verity in various draft forms, lay on top of a small pile of heavily-scribbled papers on the table.

"My name is Ari," she said quietly.

He raised an eyebrow, sitting opposite her and tilted his head with mild interest.

"That was the title bestowed upon you when you rank in the top twenty though, was it not?"

"That was when I was ten years old. The title gets snobbish after a while. I'm Ari."

"Humility, huh." He clicked his tongue and pursed his lip. "Unexpected."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

He held up the palms of his hands.

"I'm not here to pick a fight. I'm merely observing how your behaviour compares with those of other high-rankers."

She glowered. "We had an agreement."

"Not so much of an agreement as a bargain..." He pulled his tablet towards him and closed the program that was on display. "Now, seeing as you, The Trans—Ari, came to me, Rale, the Editor of The Verity, with such an interesting proposal, I must grant you an audience, naturally."

He beckoned for her to talk. Ari sat up straight and told him about Mina's disappearance, the lack of progress by the Investigators after a whole year, and the secrecy whenever sensitive questions were asked. He neither confirmed nor denied her speculations, but a knowing smile curved at his lips as she finished.

"How fortuitous. My dear Trans—my dear Ari, you have come to just the right person."

Her heart skipped a beat. His hands flew across the screen, his brows knitting together in concentration. Quiet beeps and machine whirs filled the quiet between them. Ari kept her hands clasped together, trying to keep her breath even as Rale worked his magic.

"I can offer you a deal," he said at last, not showing her the screen. Ari tried not to look too hopeful, but knew she failed miserably. He had a knowing gleam in his eyes and a stylus spinning at top speed between his long fingers.
She nodded.

"My suspicion is your sister Mina was kidnapped after the explosion at Dome Ten." The stylus stopped and pointed at her. "This is based on the fact that many students have disappeared over the past year and almost all of them were after an explosion, but a disproportionately small amount of injured bodies have surfaced — and no dead bodies."

"And you have proof?"

"Most of the information is classified and cannot be accessed by the average student."

"So you don't have proof." Ari deflated. Another dead end.

"I said the average student. I am no average student." Rale spun his screen around. "Behold: this is my genius method of showing you what happened that day."

Ari leant forward. The screen was from one of the CCTVs looking over the entrance into the arena of Dome Ten.

"How did you...?"

"Just watch."

She stared, unblinking. Students filed into the arena after being called in batches. The quality wasn't great; the images flickered regularly but the resolution was clear enough to recognise the small girl with her dark brown hair in a single plait, fidgeting as she waited her turn. She stood just off-centre beside the racks of metal sheets. Several minutes later, the camera shook. The screen flickered out for several seconds before resuming with distorted images and standing off-kilter, recording a room filled with heavy smoke. A broad-shouldered figure, his face masked, picked up a limp Mina, her plait recognisable, and disappeared with her.
Rale swiped past several interrupted CCTV feeds before landing on another one: that same broad-shouldered figure heaving something through the rubble before vanishing again.
Ari's heart fluttered.

"Someone took her," she murmured, hope burning bright. She met Rale's smug face. "So where is she now?"

"Well, that's a mystery that will take some time. Take this as a token of my good faith that there is no ulterior motive, darling. As for our deal..."

Her smile fell. There was a price to the proof that Mina didn't die in the explosion, of course.

"Now, rest assured we both have our vested interests in these explosions—" The stylus continued to spin again. "—and there is a way where we both come out winning in this. You want Mina back. I want to find these perpetrators."

He turned the tablet to face himself again and connected the display to one of the large screens mounted on the wall.

"You don't have the Centralia app?" Ari said in surprise, noting the absence of a familiar spiral 'C' icon on his desktop display.

"Nope." He brought up a folder of videos. "All the major news outlets parrot the same version of the same events. There is never just one single truth in reality, which makes all the news outlets unreliable sources."

"But I thought it's required to have it on all your electronic devi..." Ari's voice trailed off.

The first video was a news report from a while back, with a different reporter standing solemnly before a smoking department store. Peacekeepers patrolled the edges, keeping the barrier erected.

"How do you get these archives?" There was no way a regular student could just bring the old files up without special access.

He gave Ari a knowing, smug look. "What do you remember of this?"

"Some terrorists?" Ari racked her brains. It was such an insignificant event she could barely even remember when it occurred.

"These were alleged terrorists charged with destroying the peace of March City by illegally amplifying their own powers."

"Oh, they were jailed, right?"

Rale skipped to another video. The Student Council chamber replaced the smoking department store. The Council members, seated high above on the wooden benches with their faces hidden by overhead shadows, passed the verdict via the Central Decree: guilty for terrorism and abuse of powers. A skinny boy with white-blonde hair and heavy bags under his hazel eyes and a girl with curly brown hair tied in two bunches and glasses, both Ari's age, were led away by Investigators.

"Yes, but the curious thing was the charges against these two — the terrorism — were about a series of explosions last year that looked exactly the same as the ones we're seeing now. But the records state all the scientists involved in these terrorism acts were caught. All of them. And all are incarcerated under Area Ten. But you know what the fascinating thing was?"

Ari wasn't really that interested, but she nodded to hurry Rale along.

"What I found curious was how, when I interviewed students who matched the ages and classes of those students jailed, none of them knew the terrorists personally. All of the information they could give me were what I also found in our archives."

Ari shrugged. "Terrorists don't have friends. It's not surprising."

"Perhaps, but you know what else was interesting?"

Ari could feel her attention span waning, like whenever Hine the class monitor went on one of his rants about respect and punctuality.

"These scientists were researching ways to amplify their powers. They kidnapped weak Users to experiment on, but the failed experiments started surging — resulting in the same explosions we've been seeing now." He brought up the official released images from the past several weeks. Each of them bore a dark crevice and deep, jagged black lines reaching out from the centre: damage that should not occur in these almost indestructible alloys — but the very same damage occurred today. "These are features of energy overload, not anything synthetic such as a bomb."

Rale laid down his tablet and gave her another knowing look. Ari had an uneasy feeling.

"The students who have disappeared these past few months were also weak Users, like your Mina."

"Weak Users can't surge."

"Indeed, that is a correct observation."

Rale's robotic vocabulary unnerved Ari even more than his implications.

"But those scientists' experimentations caused weak Users to surge exactly like this."

He picked up the tablet and brought up stills from old news feeds. He was right: the same jagged cracks and the same bottomless hole. Ari's mouth ran dry. Her body chilled.

"What if they experiment on Mina?"

"I don't believe you," she croaked.

Rale shrugged. "I'm merely speculating. I'm also speculating there's a scientist who either evaded capture in the first place or escaped from jail. Probably evaded capture. March City has cameras everywhere. It would be impossible to hide."

He pulled up a black screen with green text flowing down. A few taps brought up a database, but several boxes were blacked out, leaving only the names of the files: Niku, Lexa, Rime, Kena.

"These are the archived student files of the arrested scientists — all expunged. There are countless students like Mina who have disappeared, all low rankers."

"Your proposal?" she said with a hoarse voice.

"Although the pictures and the academic records of those students disappeared, I could still access some basic information. Their ranks, classes, and their addresses. But when I tried to access their previous homes, I found their blocks of flats shut down. The official reason was for maintenance, but that had persisted for many months now." He gave her a knowing look. "Now, tell me, would the poorest streets of Area Nine get refurbishment lasting months? I didn't think so, but I was denied access."

"What makes you think I would be treated any different?"

"You're a high ranker. Use your methods."

She glared at him.

"My methods might be against the rules."

He snorted. "As if I give a damn."

She pressed her lips together.

"And in return, I will use my methods to find Mina."

"How?"

He raised an eyebrow at her. "I have my ways, as I have already demonstrated. I'm sure you have yours."

Ari's eyes flicked to the screen of hidden archives, which Rale accessed with ease. He held out his hand.

"Give me your phone."

She hesitated. He waggled his fingers at her. She slid the driver into his hand with reluctance. He pulled out a wire from his tablet and attacked it to the base of her device.

"I will install a program on your phone. This will scramble our calls for any eavesdropper."

"That's a bit excessive?"

He gave her a pointed look, unattached her phone, and slapped it back in her hand. Not breaking their locked gaze, he pulled out an earpiece and slapped that in her hand as well, almost knocking her phone to the ground.

"When you've seen what I've seen on here, darling—" He waved a hand at the screens behind him.  "—you would do the same."
Ari touched the battery necklace at the base of her throat, a knot tightening in her stomach.