"Sprocket?" Racnaea yells, as the room fills with smoke. "Are you still alive?"

  "Yes, mistress," comes a shaken but still cheery voice.

  "What happened, I suppose?"

  "Number three exploded, mistress."

  "Of course it did." Racnaea coughs. "Turn on the fans, girl!"

  "Yes, mistress!"

  A few seconds later there's a loud whirring and the smoke begins to clear.

  "Ventilation shafts," Racnaea says, pointing upward. "At intervals throughout the tunnels, I suppose. Or we'd all suffocate on each other's breath. I built my lab under one slightly on purpose, for the fumes." She sips her tea again. "Completely a little bit big enough to climb up."

  "That's our way out?" I frown. "It seems too easy."

  "Of course it is," Racnaea says. "There are defenses."

  "Metal gratings halfway up the shafts," Margie says. "Supposed to be kept locked."

  "But they lend me the keys, I suppose," Racnaea says. "Who does a little bit of all the maintenance on the fans?"

  "I do," Sprocket announces, joining us at the table. She's covered in soot and bleeding from a cut by her hairline, her smile a line of white teeth in her darkened face.

  "Yes, ," Racnaea snaps. "My leg no longer tolerates climbing through tunnels, I suppose. But at the time I did it." She gives a tight grin. "And I kept copies of the keys, in case they were ever a little bit useful."

  "Then we can get ," I breathe.

  "And then what?" Racnaea says sharply. "One friendly guard will not be enough. The gates and the walls are watched, I suppose. Will you jump? The guards will shoot before you can even a little bit reach your friends."

  "Fuck." Margie glances at me, then slumps in her seat. "She's right, Kal. It's not enough."

  She right, and that's not even the start of it. I need to grab the commandant's water-of-life before escaping, or all of this is for nothing. But the game is still on, I can it, running through my veins like bubbling fire.

  Another con artist lesson: go big. Big is paradoxically easier than small, because no one expects you to have the audacity to try it. Audacity is my stock in trade as much as a winning smile and a knack for confabulating bullshit.

  "We don't escape," I tell them. "We take the mine."

  Everyone stares at me.

  "Take it?" Racnaea says. "Meaning what, I suppose?"

  "Take over. Beat the guards, capture the commandant. Make the whole thing ours."

  Sprocket claps her hands and gives a little squeak of excitement, then looks down at the table at a sharp glance from Racnaea.

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  "Have you gone a little bit completely mad?" she says.

  "Honestly, Kal," Margie says. "I know you have your girl to get back to, but …"

  I lean forward urgently. "Listen. The guards talk about being shorthanded. How many of them come down here on each shift?"

  Margie frowns. "Never more than twelve, but --"

  "Three shifts a day?"

  She nods slowly. Racnaea huffs.

  "There are more guards up above, I suppose. At the guns on the wall."

  "I had a good look around when I was being brought in, and I counted maybe twenty. One shift sleeping, one shift down here, that makes … fifty or so at most? How many prisoners are there?"

  "Fifty-three on my shift." Margie's frown has turned thoughtful. "About the same on Arborough's and Jena's."

  "It matters not even a little bit, I suppose, when they have ," Racnaea snaps.

  "But the odds won't be three to one. Not even close, if we time it right." I'm thinking out loud, but the fizz is getting stronger, I know this is the right track. "At shift change half the guards are down here. The lift is slow -- it takes a few minutes each way. That gives us a window where they'll only have twenty-odd people up top, and half of will be asleep. We'd have to move quickly -- What?"

  The two of them have locked eyes, one of those gazes between long-time companions where a lot of information can pass back and forth very quickly. Racnaea evidently doesn't like the content, because she throws up her hand and slumps back in her chair.

  "We might be able to do better than that," Margie says quietly. "Racni does all the maintenance on the lift, too."

  "Of course she does!" Sprocket says. "Mistress is the only one who does around here."

  "Could you rig it to fail?" I ask. "Say, right when the new shift is halfway down?"

  "Yes, yes, of course I can," Racnaea says, glaring daggers at Margie. "But will I, I suppose? This scheme is still a little bit completely crazy."

  "I saw the armory," I say. "There were a couple of guards on duty. If Agni can get the keys, we could jump them and get inside. Then they wouldn't be the only ones with guns. A hundred and fifty of us against two dozen. And" -- I hesitate, instinct wanting me to play things close to the chest, but the hell with it -- "I think my friends outside can arrange a distraction."

  "So the rest of the guards would be at the wall defenses," Margie says, excitement creeping into her voice. "We'd only have to deal with a few stragglers. That … could actually work."

  "Mistress!" Sprocket says excitedly. "We could get out!"

  "Get out and do what, I suppose?" Racnaea says. "Die in the desert? You don't remember the outside, girl, but it's not even a little bit as friendly as you think. We survive down here, don't we?"

  "Yes, Mistress, but …" Sprocket bites her lip.

  "We have a ship," I say.

  "Lovely for you, I suppose," Racnaea huffs.

  "But it needs work. A of work. The engine shakes pretty badly at high speed."

  "Hmph." Racnaea shifts in her seat. "Corrosion on the cams increasing friction. Hasn't been kept properly oiled, I suppose."

  "I doubt the cannibals we took it off of did regular maintenance," I agree. "But my friends and I are hardly much better. We were just going to run it until it breaks down, then leave it in the desert."

  " it in the --" Racnaea jumps to her feet. "An engine deserves to be cared for as much as a baby! Running it until it breaks down is not even a little bit --" She stops and glares at me, nervously tugging at her goggles. "Don't think I don't know what you're doing, I suppose."

  I shrug. "I just thought the smartest person in the world might feel a bit wasted, stuck down here fixing laundry machines." I nod toward the big engine taking up half the room. "The smartest person in the world might have larger ambitions."

  "I …" She hesitates, dithering. "I am queen of the mine. It keeps me fed, I suppose. It keeps Sprocket fed!" She draws herself up. "Yes. If it was only me, maybe, but I have responsibilities to my assistant. It's a little bit extremely dangerous out there."

  ", mistress," Sprocket says. "I'm not afraid!"

  "You're not smart enough to be afraid, girl," Racaea snaps. "Margie should know better!"

  "We'll need to get the others on board," Margie says. "Jena and Arborough. I'll set up a meeting."

  "I'll get word to Agni."

  "But --" Racnaea says, glancing from one to the other. Then she sighs.

  We need to move . Gray said Mercy had five to seven days left before she deliquesces. I've been down here two already. One more to plan, another to move…

  It's going to be tight. But the fizz in my blood carries me along. We're getting of here.

  Or else we're all going to die trying.