Storm (Swipe Series)

into her pocket for something sharp.
    “I know what you’re thinking,” Mr. Arbitor said, hands out and heading her off at the pass. “But I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
    “Why?” Jo asked. “DOME got reinforcements on the way? ’Cause I got news for you, Mr. Arbitor. There’s a new threat in town. These IMPS are scarier and better at this than DOME ever was—and we’ve outrun them a dozen times now. So if you think we can’t fight off a couple of overweight has-been DOME agents, then you’ve got another think coming.”
    Mr. Arbitor’s grip on the boys only tightened. “You don’t understand,” he told her. “I’m not threatening you. There are no reinforcements. We aren’t going to DOME. And we aren’t going to Acheron.”
    And then, as if to drive the point home, Mr. Arbitor took a tablet out of his pocket and made a call to his wife right in front of the Dust’s very eyes. “Olivia,” he said. “I have them. They’re safe.”
    “Thank Cylis,” Olivia said. “I’ll make sure we’ve got something ready to eat by the time you all arrive.”
    Just two blocks away, a whole new round of IMP reinforcements ran through Tier Two, closing in on the group and announcing formations over some type of megaphone.
    “Thanks, Liv,” Mr. Arbitor said, ending the tablet call and holding eye contact with the Dust. “Now we have to move. Please. Those IMPS aren’t far behind.”
    And with that, Mr. Arbitor, the man who just six months agotore his own life apart trying to lock these kids up, found himself deliberately sneaking the Dust all the way across town, away from DOME, away from the IMPS, to his own private apartment.
    To apologize.
    And to ask the Dust for help.
    6
    Inside the chancellor’s palace, Cylis led Lily through a maze of ornate hallways and rooms, each one decorated in a style reminiscent of one of the many historical cultures that had been subsumed by his own under the Mark. This particular hallway was adorned with Picassos and Dalís and Goyas and El Grecos, the artwork of pre-Unity Spain; that one with the portraits of kings and queens and royalty of pre-Unity England; and on and on, like a graveyard of culture, a memorial to ethnicity and divergent ways of life. Cylis’s palace was the greatest museum the world had ever known, available only to him.
    Finally, Lily and the chancellor made their way to the palace’s grand dining hall. Lily estimated it at around the size of a soccer field, and while she’d only ever actually seen one of those matches via television frame, the estimation wasn’t far off.
    Lining the dining room’s walls were the remains of sculptures from all over the world, from all throughout history. Michelangelo’s David , intact except for its right arm; the ancient Greek Discus Thrower, missing its head but still holding its discus; a bust of Julius Caesar; Rodin’s Thinker , still pondering some great mystery; the Venus de Milo; and, breathtakingly, at the far end of the hall, the head of the Statue of Liberty itself, long thought lostin Lamson’s great Rupturing of the Dam toward the end of the Total War, but preserved here and forever for Cylis to see.
    “Please,” he said with a warm smile. “Sit.”
    And Lily did.
    On cue, a team of Head-Marked servants arrived and laid out a series of dishes across the long table before her. Lily leaned forward, examining them wide-eyed. On one of the plates was a pile of lightly fried and salted grasshoppers. Next to it was a dish of grub sausage, and beside that, hash browns sprinkled with scarab beetle bits.
    Lily had heard talk of this, and yet still it surprised her to see it. Ever since the agricultural collapse that followed in the wake of the Tipping Point, the world had dealt with its meat shortage in two very different ways. Americans, slightly more squeamish about such things, transitioned mostly into a vegetarian diet. Europe, on the other hand, began eating bugs.
    “This looks delicious,” Lily insisted, and she took a scoop of cockroach porridge for herself.
    For a moment, there was quiet while Lily ate. Her chewing echoed across the dining hall. She swallowed, and it felt to her like the whole world must have been able to hear. Eventually, the chancellor sat down beside her, and he said, “Lily. It would not be insubordinate of you to ask me why you’re here. It was a difficult trip. You had no notice. I’ve ripped you from your duties out west . . .”
    Lily looked up at Cylis,