Nobody knew where to look. The room had three things that needed explaining and no agreement on which to start with — Raizen on his knees with his palms still shaking, Hikari standing over a couch she'd just detonated a spring out of, and Kori with her coat still off one shoulder and a sentence about Kenzo hanging in the air behind her. Every head kept swinging between the three of them like a crowd at a game with too many balls to track.
Kori looked around, breathed in a couple of times and then clapped her hands, startling almost everyone.
"Everybody sit, get yourselves comfortable. I'm getting you some food."
She was gone before anyone could argue with it, which was the point.
Outside the windows the light had gone entirely. Somewhere above the western, industrial district, the first of the petal walls had started its slow fold inward, the great overlapping plates swinging closed against the night with that long low grinding note the whole city knew.
