I wake with a start and jackknife into a sitting position.

The dark outlines of my room calm my breathing, but my heart rate is still through the roof. Also, I’m still as horny as a rhinoceros in heat.

I reach into my night dresser for Copperfield (my nickname for a Hitachi magic wand “massager”), but growing anger stops me from utilizing my trusty friend.

It’s bad enough I haven’t gotten vision dreams when I’ve needed them, but now I’m having wet dreams instead?

Or was it a vision?

Just as importantly, who was that in my dream?

Nero again?

The voice didn’t sound like my boss’s distinctive deep growl, but then again, who knows how it would sound in a dream?

Flushing, I put Copperfield away.

There’s no way I’m going there with Nero’s image in my mind.

I look at the clock.

It’s two in the morning, which makes it officially the weekend. No wonder I feel like I could sleep ten more hours.

Recalling the upcoming gun range excursion with Ariel, I realize I might not have that luxury, so I lie back down, determined to get as much sleep as I can.

I cuddle under the blankets, trying to drive the dream from my mind, but it’s another hour before sleep graces me with its presence again.

The gun range smells of testosterone and gunpowder, and there are posters of guns and mentions of the Second Amendment everywhere.

The few dudes who are here at eleven a.m. (a.k.a. crack of dawn) on a Saturday stare at Ariel with awe that borders on drooling—which is to be expected, I guess. Besides being gorgeous, she’s a regular at this place and can probably shoot them all under the table.

We’re approaching the large gun display when someone in the other room fires his weapon. Even with the earplugs stuck deep into my ears and special earmuffs over that, the bang is louder than a dentist’s drill—and about as fun.

“Pick a gun, any gun,” Ariel says. Or at least I assume that’s what she says—it’s hard to hear over the safety gear. To make sure I understand, she temptingly waves her hand over a display case of weapons that all look nearly identical to me.

“A revolver?” I shout and point at the smallest one I can see. “What kind is that?”

“Ah,” the guy behind the counter shouts back. “A great choice.”

He then screams out a spiel about the gun, but even though his volume is high, I still only register two things: that this is an example of the classic Smith & Wesson J-Frame revolver, and that the caliber is .38, the smallest they carry.

I tug on Ariel’s sleeve. “Is that caliber going to be good enough for an—”

A harsh, unbearable pain stops me cold before I can utter the word “orc.” It’s over very quickly, but in that moment, it felt like someone stabbed me all over with needles.

Ariel eyes me worriedly and waves toward my invisible-to-everyone-besides-us Mandate aura.

Of course.

I nearly broke the Mandate by saying the word “orc.” Like vampires and other types of Cognizant, orcs are beings that mere humans aren’t supposed to know about.

Maybe I got lucky this time. Ariel bled from her eyes, mouth, and ears when she nearly broke the pact of silence enforced by the Mandate. Wiping under my nose, I confirm that I dodged the more severe bleeding phase of the Mandate discouragement program.

I’ll have to watch what I say a lot more carefully going forward, since the Mandate is so overzealous. The word “orc” is part of pop culture, and the guy would’ve surely taken my question as a joke instead of suddenly believing in orcs—

“This caliber might not put down a bear,” Ariel says. “For that, you would need something like that .44 magnum.” She points at a large revolver. “It’s what Clint Eastwood used in Dirty Harry.”

“It’s the size of my forearm,” I mutter. “I’d have to start carrying a messenger bag to hide a weapon that huge.” Realizing I’m planning an illegal activity out loud, I look at the guy as innocently as I can and add, “Hypothetically.”

The guy winks at me and makes air quotes. “Hypothetically. Of course.”

“Okay,” I say firmly. “I’ll try out the magnum.”

“Are you sure?” the guy asks as he and Ariel exchange annoyingly knowing smiles. “This has a pretty strong recoil.”

“I can take anything you can,” I say and look at both of them, wondering why Ariel is putting up with (and participating in) what seems to be, at the core, a sexist attitude.

Then I recall her super-strength, and some of my bravado deflates.

Solemnly, the guy takes the behemoth weapon out and shows it to me. The gun has a morbid beauty to it.

If I ever wanted a weapon that would look great on stage, this big boy would do really well.

Done with the demo, the sales guy designates each of us a lane, and Ariel eagerly starts firing the gun she brought for the occasion while I get a lesson.

After the guy is done explaining the basics to me, he warns me to watch out for “strong recoil” again, and I find myself standing in the proper position and preparing to aim the thick barrel at a paper target.

The target is much, much smaller than one of the orcs, so if I can hit that, I should hit an orc, no problem.

My heartbeat speeds up.

Holding death in your hands like this turns out to be surprisingly exciting.

I feel powerful. As though someone should step in and stop me, but no one does.

I can see why Ariel comes here so often.

“Lean forward,” the guy shouts, and I comply. “Always keep your finger off the trigger until you’re ready to fire.”

Since my right eye is my dominant one, I use it to line up the rear and front sights, leaving the target a little blurry. Unsurprisingly, aiming a gun isn’t the same as knife throwing.

Trying to calm the excited shaking of my hands as much as I can, I hold my breath and squeeze the trigger.

The air is knocked out of my lungs as the boom shakes the gun range to its foundation. The kickback makes me nearly drop the weapon.

It’s as though an ancient cannon just unloaded in my hands.

Ariel and the guy are looking at me with smirks on their faces, so I grit my teeth and pretend not to feel the pain in my wrists.

Face as close to placid as I can manage, I aim again.

Because I now know what to expect, my heart is hammering even faster, but I ignore the jitters and shoot again.

Though I’m steadier on my feet this time around, the recoil hurts even worse—perhaps because I tensed up?

I curse under my breath. To call this recoil “strong” is an understatement.

I shoot again.

The pain is easier to tolerate this time—that or my hands are going numb. If the Council hadn’t forbidden me from performing illusionism, I’d probably need to worry about developing every sleight-of-hand artist’s biggest fear—carpal tunnel syndrome.

Deciding to push myself, I go through the rest of the six rounds as quickly as I can.

When I ask for a reload, the guy looks at me with a hint of respect.

The second round isn’t easier, but I start to feel more comfortable with the weapon.

On the third reload of my gun, Ariel stops her own practice and comes over to look at me with almost maternal pride.

“That’s enough for the first time,” she says after I go through my last six rounds. “Let’s see how you did.”

The guy pulls in my paper target and calculates my hit ratio to be forty percent.

“That’s really not bad,” Ariel says as she examines the holes in the target’s chest and head. “Especially for the first time.”

Maybe it’s the financial analyst in me, but I understand that hit rate to mean I would miss more than half of my shots. That’s not good to me, but who am I to argue with an ex-soldier?

Taking out my phone, I snap a picture of my very first target, trying—and failing—to feel any pride. Then I look at the phone’s clock and realize I should soon head to my meeting with Dr. Hekima.

“I’ll take you there, of course,” Ariel says when I remind her about my plans. “We just need to make a quick stop here in New Jersey on the way.”

She must mean the illegal gun purchase.

Great. Can’t wait.

We get back into Ariel’s Hummer. A gift from her dad, this car brings Ariel joy that seems to be directly proportional to the thing’s gasoline consumption. Part of the reason my friend is so broke all the time is the exuberant parking fee she has to pay to our landlord—or I guess I should say “Nero,” given Felix’s earlier revelation.

We drive for a half hour, during which I surreptitiously massage my hands. Not that Ariel would notice if I did it openly. She seems to be in one of her strange, laser-focused driving modes, where she pays attention to the road and nothing else. When she’s like this, she doesn’t talk or reply to questions. I think it has something to do with her tour in the army, so I haven’t pried much. Everything related to her service is a minefield.

Finally, she parks next to a building that looks like a haunted house turned into a crack distribution center.

“Wait here,” she says when she sees me gingerly unstrapping my safety belt. “I’ll be back soon.”

I lock all the doors and wait, wondering how ironic it would be if I got killed in the process of buying a gun that was meant to protect me from this very scenario.

After what feels like the longest ten minutes of my life, Ariel waltzes out of the haunted crack house with a noticeable bounce in her step.

“This is your Jubilee gift,” she says, opening an oily brown paper bag to take out a gun that’s identical to the one I just played with on the range. “Please use it wisely.”

“Not sure having this thing is that wise,” I say, but can’t help taking the gun from her reverently.

“It is when you’re up against orcs.” Ariel hands me a box of bullets. “Like I said before, let’s hope you have it and don’t need it.”

“Sure,” I say. In my best announcer voice, I enunciate, “I shall call it Harry.”

“After Dirty Harry?” Ariel starts the car. “Or Harry Potter?”

“After Harry Houdini.” I put the Queens address into my phone GPS and place the phone into the window holder. “Obviously.”

As we get on the highway, I put Harry and most of the bullets in the glove compartment, leaving a single bullet in my hand. When Ariel isn’t looking, I experiment with it for sleight of hand.

As it turns out, some of the sleights that work for coins work just as well for a .45 caliber bullet.

At first, I simply practice what it feels and looks like to really transfer a bullet from one hand to another. I find that this kind of exercise makes sure the moves look as natural as my real movements. Then, I try the old classic move called “the French drop,” where I hold the bullet between my thumb and first two fingertips of the right hand and let the left hand pretend to take the bullet, while in reality, the bullet drops to remain palmed in the right hand. From that starting point, I develop a variation of what’s called a “Retention of Vision Vanish,” where you let the bullet (or coin) shine in the hand that supposedly took the object, and the spectators swear on their mother’s health that the object must be in the hand in question, because they “saw it” go there. Then I try to do the move with my eyes closed, then with—

“This is your stop,” Ariel says, and I realize I got so absorbed in my bullet sleight-of-hand practice that I didn’t even notice when she parked the Hummer.

“Hold on to this bullet for me,” I tell Ariel, and do a move for her so that the bullet seems to be in my right hand.

“Sure,” she says and extends her palm.

When I open my empty hand and no bullet falls out, Ariel gasps out loud.

Recovering quickly (she’s seen me do something like this with many small objects), she says, “Good job. Just please don’t pull bullets out of little kids’ ears. We wouldn’t want you to end up on some list.”

Not dignifying her dig with a reply, I pocket the bullet and head into the building in front of us.

“I’m here to see Dr. Hekima,” I say to the flabby security guard in the lobby.

“He’s expecting you,” the man says. “Just go straight to class.”

I verify where “class” is, and in a few minutes, I find myself on the fifth floor, “in class.”

I’m not sure where the moniker “class” came from, given how much of a dump this place is. It seems better suited for the Glue Sniffers Anonymous support group on those days when they can’t find a better location. With folding chairs against the walls, a stale coffee pot station, and peeling wall paint, it doesn’t resemble a classroom at all, and is overall lacking in the classiness department.

A man—the only person in the room—gets up from one of the folding chairs with a warm smile. “Hello, Sasha. I’m Dr. Hekima.”

If Morgan Freeman were cast to play Albert Einstein (and hey, if he can play God, he can play Einstein), the result might look a lot like Dr. Hekima, right down to the wild gray hair and the blaze of intelligence in the man’s eyes.

“Hi,” I say. “Nice to meet you.”

“Take a chair.” Dr. Hekima shuffles back to his chair and carefully sits.

I try to take the least worn of the folding chairs and settle on one that has only a slightly buckled seat with traces of paint still clinging to it. Ignoring the spider web attached to the back of the seat, I unfold the chair in the middle of the room with a loud screech and sit down.

“Now,” Dr. Hekima says. “You have a choice to make.”

“A choice?” I fold my arms across my chest. “What choice?”

“You can start with the new class in the next semester, a few months from now,” he says in that soothing, slightly accented voice. “Or you can start tomorrow, in which case you will have only missed a few lectures.”

“Can we take a few steps back, please?” I unfold my arms. “Maybe start with an explanation of what Orientation actually is?”

“Of course,” Dr. Hekima says with a smile. The word “explanation” seems to make the man practically giddy. “Orientation is an institution at which instruction is given to new members of the Cognizant community.”

“Like Sunday school?” I ask warily, repeating Felix’s words.

“The only commonality we have is that we meet on Sundays.” He pushes his power specs higher up the bridge of his nose with a practiced poke of his middle finger—clearly unaware of how much the gesture looks like flipping the bird. “Orientation doesn’t have a direct equivalent in the human educational system.”

“So what kind of things do you teach?” I look around the dingy room but see no Cognizant equivalent of the periodic table, or even a map of the globe. “More importantly, if I join tomorrow, what will I have missed?”

“Hmm.” He pulls out his phone and consults some kind of notes. “Ah. Yes. We covered the history of the Mandate system,” he says in a professorial tone, eyes not leaving the screen. “Relatedly, we also went over the necessity of keeping Cognizant existence hidden.” He looks up, more animated. “We thoroughly discussed the religious, philosophical, political, and other implications should the secrecy of our species be penetrated one day—a topic that always generates very good class participation. This time around, we took some scenarios from human fiction, from X-Men to the Jedi, and—”

I chuckle, but nearly choke on my mirth when he gives me a stern look. Clearly, Dr. Hekima is a black belt when it comes to dealing with impertinence during his lectures.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “Please go on.”

“The X-Men reaction,” he says, “would be to fear us—following the proverbial ‘fear what you do not understand’ tactic. Those of us with great powers would be treated as weapons of mass destruction, while someone with powers like yours might be used as an intelligence gathering tool—”

“Sounds dystopian,” I say, suppressing a shiver at picturing myself locked in some underground bunker and making geopolitical predictions for the CIA—a task that would make even Nero’s research fun in comparison.

He nods. “Dystopian indeed. And well contrasted with the ‘Jedi scenario,’ which is quite utopian. In The Star Wars franchise, the Jedi were extremely powerful, but they were neither feared nor used for anything they didn’t wish to be used—”

“Until they all got wiped out,” I mutter. “Spoiler alert.”

“Right, but that was the Sith.” Still holding his phone, he sneaks a peek at his wristwatch.

Since I find the conversation fascinating, I pretend I didn’t see the gesture.

“I’d consider the Sith a sub-type of Jedi,” he continues, “at least for the sake of this analogy. It wasn’t humans who committed genocide—which is the main thrust of this scenario.”

“But don’t vampires have powers that can make people forget the Cognizant exist, even if the secret did get out?” I say. “Doesn’t that make this discussion moot?”

He glances at his watch again, and I pretend not to notice again.

“I can already see how stimulating it will be to have you in my classes,” he says. “You ask the right kind of questions.”

“Thanks. But I notice you didn’t actually answer.”

“Given how young and impressionable my students are, I typically stay clear of this topic,” he says, this time sneaking a look at his phone. “However, you seem like a mature and intelligent young woman, so I can tell you that yes, even if our secret got out, depending on how it got out, things could be managed.”

He glances at his stupid watch again. “The vampires and other Cognizant have access to humans at every level of power, from heads of corporations to leaders of countries. They can nudge them in the direction that’s good for the Cognizant. In some cases, the Cognizant themselves are in important positions. For instance, the lynchpins of most organized criminal enterprises are probability manipulators, as that position in society lets them thrive on chaos in a way that doesn’t reveal the existence of the rest of the Cognizant.”

I find it easy to picture someone like Chester in charge of a drug cartel. I also recall Nero’s comments about the vampires at Goldman Sachs, and my head starts to spin.

He must’ve meant that literally.

A bunch of questions swirl in my head, so I blurt out the one that seems most pertinent. “What if the secret got out in a big way? Say, some shifter turned into an invisible pink unicorn on live TV?”

“Humans might still deny the truth,” he says. “Explain it away as CGI or something of that nature. But if they started to believe it, I fear we’d find out which of the many fictional scenarios was the most realistic.” He unlocks his phone this time and stares at it for a moment before finishing with, “I personally suspect we’d be—as my students would say—screwed.”

“Right, but what if—”

“I’m so terribly sorry to cut this short.” He looks up from the phone with genuine remorse in his gaze. “I have another engagement scheduled, and we’re running over our allotted time.”

“Just a couple of last questions,” I say swiftly. “If you don’t mind.”

He bobs his head.

“Was the material you covered in the early lectures a prerequisite for the upcoming curriculum?”

“No.” He runs his hand through the wild tangles of his hair. “I don’t think we’ve covered anything too fundamental thus far.”

“In that case, can I start tomorrow, but then take a few makeup lectures when the next group of Cognizant starts their semester? I’d hate to miss anything, but I’m also very eager to start learning as soon as possible.”

“Hmm,” Dr. Hekima says. “It’s unorthodox, but Mr. Gorin spoke so highly on your behalf that—”

I’m in such shock I miss whatever he says next. Nero spoke highly on my behalf?

“—and thank you so much for coming to see me today,” I hear when I refocus on what Dr. Hekima is saying. “I look forward to seeing you tomorrow at three.” He gets up, extending his hand. “It was very nice to meet you, Sasha.”

“Pleasure to meet you too.” I shake his hand and reluctantly take my leave.

On the way to the car, I ponder the things I learned. Despite the prospect of being surrounded by teens, I’m extremely psyched about tomorrow’s class—and the others after that.

“How is good ol’ Dr. Hekima doing?” Ariel says as I climb into the car.

“I don’t have a good point for comparison,” I say. “He was pretty busy.”

“I’m surprised he made time for you at all.” She starts the car and pulls out of the parking spot. “No one ever sees him outside those classes.”

“It might’ve been a favor for Nero.” I buckle my safety belt. “I guess my boss is performing some Mentor duties after all.”

“I’ve always had a feeling Nero isn’t as bad as you make him out to be,” Ariel says with the most evil expression on her face. “In fact, it’s almost as though you’re—”

“Starving,” I say sternly. “Should we stop by somewhere to eat?”

“Felix texted.” She honks at a yellow cab and flips off another driver as she suddenly switches lanes. “He made something called ‘dolma’—which, according to my Google search, is stuffed peppers and/or cabbage with meat.”

“Then home we shall go,” I say, my stomach rumbling. “We wouldn’t want to discourage Felix’s cooking hobby.”

“Right.” Ariel smiles mischievously. “Remember the evil plan—we say thank you as though we mean it, even if we don’t, and don’t forget to compliment the chef profusely.”

“I came up with this ‘evil plan’ myself, remember?” I say and take out the bullet.

This way, I can practice some more when we get on the highway, and Ariel goes into that non-talking driving mode again.

“This is amazing,” Ariel says as she bites into a large bell pepper stuffed with spicy meat.

If she’s faking, she’s so good that even I (the mistress of deception) can’t tell, and Felix is practically beaming with delight.

“Mom emailed me the recipe after our lunch with Sasha,” he says. “She meant for me to give it to one of you—but I figured that would be offensive, plus you know how much I like to cook.”

“Also,” I say through a mouthful of delicious pepper and meat, “if Ariel cooked, it certainly would be offensive. To our taste buds.”

“You’re one to talk.” Ariel licks her fork clean. “We all remember the illusion feast.”

Felix visibly shudders at the memory, and Ariel laughs.

“Hey.” I have to work really hard to keep a straight face. “I still say it was one of my best ideas.”

“I have no idea what everyone is talking about.” Fluffster raises his head from a plate of alfalfa hay. “I didn’t know Sasha cooked.”

“I cook,” I say defensively, but Ariel and Felix snort.

I glare at them, then turn to Fluffster. “In any case, what they’re talking about is that one time, I wanted to create a culinary illusion using synsepalum dulcificum. It’s a plant also known as the miracle berry,” I add when everyone looks at me with a blank face. “The miraculin in this berry does something very strange. It binds to the sweetness receptors on the tongue, so a person eating acidic foods, such as lemons, perceives them as tasting sweet.”

“Right.” Ariel chuckles again. “So she made a cake out of lemons. Not to be confused with a lemon cake.”

“The sourest cake ever,” Felix chimes in.

“Right,” I say. “But I snuck the miracle berries into our pallet cleanser.”

“Without explaining anything,” Felix says.

“In her defense,” Ariel says, “the result was very sweet. On the day of the illusion, that is.”

I grin. “Yep, they loved it. But the next day, I came rushing out of the bathroom because there were all these desperate curses and screams. You see, they tried to eat the leftovers—without first munching on the miracle berries.”

“It was horrible.” Felix shudders again. “My jaws literally seized up.”

“Sounds like more food being wasted,” Fluffster says, his mental voice disgruntled, but I detect some laughter in it too.

Felix shakes his head, then looks at me and Ariel. “So, I have a question for you two.” He gives Fluffster an apologetic look. “As females.”

Ariel—who was stuffing a stuffed pepper into her mouth—chokes so badly I prepare to perform the Heimlich maneuver.

“So anyway.” Felix drops his gaze to his nearly empty plate. “Say I was going to entertain a lady… Do you think I should cook this exact meal for her?”

With a loud gulp, Ariel swallows the pepper she was choking on and rattles out, “Who? What? When? How?”

I’m about to join her in bombarding him with questions, but then I recall he mentioned a girl to his parents.

Looks like he didn’t make one up just to appease them.

“It’s not someone you know,” Felix says. “I’m not even sure where this might lead. I’m just trying to decide what activity would be best and—”

“I think cooking on the first date might be a bit much.” I put down my fork a little too suddenly. Something about this bothers me, and I have no idea why.

Could I actually be jealous?

No. That doesn’t make sense.

If I am upset, it’s only because Felix has always kept his girl crushes in-house, lusting after either me or Ariel—as a good polygamous husband should. Now it turns out that his heart is a fickle creature.

Oh, well, good for him. If he wants some floozy, he can have her.

“I’d ask her out for coffee,” Ariel says. “And if it goes well, Netflix and chill.” Apparently, she doesn’t share my qualms about this situation.

Felix doesn’t redden, so he must not know that N&C is code for sleeping together.

I force myself to smile and say, “I second that.” Picking up my fork, I stab another pepper. “And if she does come over, and you happen to have yummy leftovers of something you personally have cooked, she’ll be properly impressed, without any undue pressure.”

“I’d suggest ‘leftovers’ of your smoked salmon deviled eggs.” Ariel takes a hungry bite of stuffed pepper. “Or maybe that Russian version with the red caviar?”

“And,” Fluffster says in our heads, “let me show her how I wash myself in a dust bath. It seems to really impress the two females I’ve been exposed to.”

“Or anyone with eyes,” Ariel says.

“And sense of cuteness,” I second.

“Thanks, you guys.” Felix takes out his phone and makes notes.

“Of course,” I say, “you can scrap everything we just said and bring your new friend with us to Earth Club tonight.”

“Assuming she’s a Cognizant, of course.” Ariel almost jumps up and down in excitement. “There will be dancing, music—”

“She’s not Cognizant, and she’s busy tonight.” Felix hides the phone and takes his plate to the sink. “Besides, I like the low-key idea much better.”

“How about you, then?” Ariel asks him. “Are you coming with me and Sasha tonight?”

“I don’t think I should.” Felix rinses his plate and puts it in the dishwasher. “It would be like cheating.”

Ariel goggles at his back. “You didn’t even have a proper date.”

“And we’re just going to a club to dance, not to partake in an orgy,” I say, then look at Ariel. “Right?”

“No orgies,” she confirms. Under her breath, she adds, “Unless you want one.”

“Imagine what my lady will say if we got married, and then I told her that I went to a club without her, after we’d already met,” Felix says, looking utterly serious.

“What’s an orgy?” Fluffster asks.

We all (with the exception of the chinchilla) nearly fall on the floor laughing.

Through spasmodic guffaws, I manage to squeeze out, “I guess we found the limits of YouTube-based education.”

My comment makes my friends laugh even more, until I notice Fluffster staring at us with his black eyes narrowed into slits—at which point I nearly burst with more laughter.

Eventually, we stop teasing Fluffster, and Ariel volunteers to explain what an orgy actually is.

“We have to go,” she says after she’s done corrupting the poor chinchilla’s innocent mind. “Sasha and I have mani-pedi appointments before our quest to Earth Club.”

I didn’t realize we had anything of the sort. If I’d been consulted, I would’ve pointed out that my nails still look perfect after the Jubilee, but what are you going to do?

Ariel always gets her way in this sort of thing.

We get the mani-pedis, which escalate into facials.

Soon, it becomes clear that Ariel decided to recreate the Jubilee makeover Nero had organized for me the other day, but on a more reasonable budget and with me choosing my clothes.

When we get home after all the pampering and shopping, I escape into my room to get dressed.

I put on the new jeans, the stylish buttoned-down blouse that was my concession to Ariel, and the new pair of boots. A glance in the mirror is all I need to confirm that this ensemble will work really well with my new leather jacket.

As usual, to make the chore of putting on makeup more palatable, I remind myself that face paint is a type of illusion. That way, I can force myself to apply some, so Ariel won’t have to pretend we didn’t arrive together.

To complete my outfit, I stick my new gun into a messenger bag that I sling over my shoulder. If I’m going to carry the gun around like this, I’ll have to get more bags to go with various outfits.

“Oh my,” Felix exclaims when I strut into the living room. “You look great.”

Fluffster looks me over as well, and since he doesn’t complain about the unnecessary shopping, I take his silence as a compliment.

Then Ariel walks in.

No one finds the words—not even Fluffster, who can speak telepathically.

She cheated.

This isn’t something we just bought—because we didn’t shop at BDSM“R”Us.

Ariel’s entire body is tightly wrapped in black leather—though it could be latex. The shiny skintight pants show off every muscle of her dancer-like legs, and the black pumps further highlight her assets. Her top adheres so closely to her skin that it outlines her abs. I have no clue how she got into it, or the pants for that matter.

To top everything off, her hair is up, held together by something like a knitting needle or a screwdriver—it’s hard to see under the waves.

She couldn’t exude more sex appeal if she were standing there in Victoria’s Secret lingerie.

“Are you a dominatrix or Catwoman?” I ask, trying and failing to break the spell. “And if it’s the latter, don’t you think you’re taking your Batman addiction too far?”

“No,” Felix says, his voice hoarse. “I think this is a much, much tighter version of Trinity’s outfit, from The Matrix.”

“This is just something that’s in vogue at Earth Club these days,” Ariel says, smoothing her palms down her torso. She sounds a bit self-conscious. “I can change if—”

“No,” Felix and I say in unison.

“You look amazeballs,” I clarify.

“You don’t need to change.” Felix clears his throat. “Trust me.”

Ariel gives everyone a megawatt smile. “Great. I’ll go put on some makeup.”

“That was without makeup?” I say to no one in particular.

“She’d make so much money modeling,” Fluffster says in my mind. “I already told her that. Why doesn’t anyone in this household care about building up savings?”

“You furry pimp.” I grab the chinchilla and rub the heavenly fur against my cheek. “If Ariel wants to be a doctor, she should be a doctor, not a model. Besides, doctors do make good money.”

That seems to pacify the domovoi, and we settle in to wait for Ariel.

She comes out after what feels like an hour. We all gape at her again, struck speechless—though I’m not sure if it’s the newly applied goth-style makeup or the continued impact of the sexy superhero outfit.

“We better get a head start,” she says to me. “Time flows differently at our destination.”

I get up from the couch and stretch.

“Make sure to bring something warm with you,” Fluffster demands in our heads. “It’s nippy out.”

Resisting jokes about someone looking like a perfect fur mitten, I pocket my black leather gloves, loop my favorite scarf around my neck, and put on a beanie hat.

Ariel slips into a long raincoat, which brings to mind scenes from romantic comedies where the girl comes to the boy’s house wearing nothing under a coat like that.

“Leave the bag,” Ariel says about my gun holster/messenger bag.

“But I have the—”

“They wouldn’t let you in with such a… crime against fashion.” She purses her lips and shakes her head as though to say, “Don’t argue, or else we’ll have to explain the gun to the others.”

“Fine.” I take off the heavy bag with some relief.

“This is why you keep me around,” Ariel says, and I can’t help but smile at the double meaning.

“You’re not driving?” I ask Ariel when I see her leave the keys to her Hummer hanging on the hook by the door.

“Parking at JFK is a headache,” she says, opening the door. “Besides”—she smirks—“I might be somewhat intoxicated on the way back.”

“That reminds me,” I say as we leave the apartment and walk to the elevator. “Is JFK airport the best way to get to the Otherlands?”

“Sadly, yes.” Ariel gracefully glides into the elevator, and I follow. “If there are gates at LaGuardia, they’re not accessible to those of us on the bottom of the Cognizant food chain.”

“Those things are officially called gates?” I can’t help bouncing in place in excitement. “That’s what I dubbed them in my mind.”

“Gates is what everyone calls them, but there might be a more official term that I don’t know.” Ariel tucks a loose strand of my hair back under my hat.

“How could you not know these things?” I ask as we exit the elevator.

“I think you’re so curious because you just got thrust into all this.” Ariel takes out her phone to summon us a ride. “You’re like a tourist visiting New York for the first time.”

“Hey,” I say in mock offense. “Take that back.”

“A domestic tourist,” she says deadpan. “With a fanny pack and a paper map.”

“Riiight. And you’re the too-cool-for-school local who has never been to the Statue of Liberty or the Empire State Building?”

“That’s right.” Ariel folds her arms across her chest. “And I loathe Times Square.”

I can’t help but smile. Neither of us has been to the Statue of Liberty despite living within walking distance of the Ellis Island ferry.

“So,” I say. “Which of the Otherlands are we going to?”

“It’s called Gomorrah,” Ariel says as a black minivan pulls up at the curb.

“Does it have lots of fire and brimstone or something?” I ask, pondering the name.

“You’ll see.” She walks up to the car. “Let’s go.”

When we get to JFK, we make our way to the secret door Ariel used the last time we were here.

Since I’m not wearing a blindfold today, I examine the walls of the hallways that lead to the big room with gates.

The tunnels are painfully ordinary—which I could’ve guessed, based on the plain linoleum I saw under our feet the last time.

The only odd thing about our path is how unnecessarily labyrinthian the corridors are—there are forks at every step. However, Ariel confidently takes each turn; she clearly has the path memorized.

Staying quiet, I take out my phone and start a new note: typing L for left and R for right every time we take a respective turn. Later, when I have a moment, I too will memorize this path.

“Where would we end up if you took a wrong turn?” I ask when we enter a longer corridor.

“A pit with snakes?” Ariel shrugs. “When my dad showed me the way to the Hub, he said to never turn the wrong way—so I never have. For all I know, all these corridors lead to their own Hubs.”

How can she not care about such things? Is it simply the tourist analogy? Because I’m beginning to think Ariel is missing the curiosity gene—at least when it comes to all matters Cognizant.

We make a few more turns, and I decide to make sure Ariel reviews my notes before I try to navigate this place on my own. If there is a pit with snakes out there, I don’t want to fall into it. I also stop talking, so I can keep mapping out the place as accurately as I can.

Eventually, the floor under our feet changes to the slippery chrome material I recall from our last excursion.

We must be nearing what Ariel referred to as the Hub.

The next door is closed, so Ariel opens it, and with fanfare says, “Ready?” Then, without waiting for me, she goes in.

My pulse quickens in excitement as I follow her.

“Wow,” I mumble in an awestruck whisper as I take stock of where I am.

The circular room is the size of Madison Square Garden, and all around us are the multi-colored plasma gates. Giant cables snake from the ceiling to the base of each gate, and electricity-like energy is visibly pouring down, as though some mad scientist is trying to reanimate Frankenstein. My mind boggles at the sight.

The utilities bill for this room must equal the GDP of a small nation.

“No hops today,” Ariel says, pointing at a turquoise gate nearby.

“By ‘hops,’ you mean taking a gate to another Hub, then another gate?” I ask, my neck feeling the strain from all the staring up, down, and around us.

“Right.” Ariel promenades toward the turquoise gate.

“Are there as many worlds as there are gates?” I ask, gesturing with my hand to encompass the multitude around us.

“Not even close,” Ariel says, her nonchalance incredibly annoying considering how much she’s blowing my mind right now. “There’s an infinite number of worlds. What we call the Otherlands is merely a small drop in that river—just the ones that can be accessed with existing gates. The gates here at JFK lead to only a small fraction of all accessible worlds, but with enough hops, you can reach all the others—even if you shouldn’t, in some cases.”

“How can you know that there are worlds the gates don’t lead to?” I stop and look around to estimate the number of gates in the room, but soon give up. “And what do you mean by ‘shouldn’t?’”

Ariel shrugs and resumes walking. “I’m just going by what Dr. Hekima told us during Orientation. He’s an expert on gates, so he’d know. As to the dangers, he also told us that we shouldn’t go backpacking willy-nilly. There are worlds where you’d die as soon as you exit the gate.”

“Die?” I follow her. “Why?”

“It varies.” She stops next to the turquoise gate. “You ready for this?”

I want to stay and learn more about the Otherlands for a few months, but I yearn to see an example of an actual other world even more. Figuring I can quiz her, Felix, or even Dr. Hekima later, I violently bob my head. “Ready.”

Ariel steps into the turquoise plasma. Wherever her body touches the shimmering surface, it disappears, as though sliced off.

When she’s gone completely, I take a shuffling step toward the gate.

Gooseflesh rises on my neck.

“Here goes,” I say to the empty room, and step into the gate.