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A small boy lay on the table He was skinny, with a ht: yellow pants and a green shirt with a cartoon crocodile and daisies It wasn’t immediately clear what had killed him

Holden heard a coling to get past A hi hold and an embrace

“It’s not her,” Holden said “It’s a kid, but it’s not her A boy Four, maybe five years old”

When Ao The botanist rushed to the table, flipping the sheet over and giving one quick cry

“That’s Katoa,” Prax said “I know hi a hand on Prax’s shoulder “We need to keep looking”

Prax shrugged his hand off

“It’s not Mei,” Holden said again

“But Strickland was here,” Prax said “He was their doctor I thought if he ith the the sa If one of the kids was dead, they could all be

“I thought that meant they’d keep them alive,” Prax said “But they let Katoa die They just let him die and they put hirabbed Prax and spun hiined a cop would

“That,” he said, pointing at the small body on the table, “is not Mei Do you want to find her? Then we need to keep ”

Prax’s eyes were filled with tears and his shoulders shook in silent sobs, but he nodded and walked away from the table Amos watched him carefully The ht caood idea

Across the room, Wendell whistled and waved a hand He pointed at Naoave the thumbs-up

“Naomi, you in?” Holden said while he pulled the sheet back up to cover the dead boy

“Yep, I’m in,” she said, her tone distracted as she worked with the inco data “Traffic in this node is encrypted Got the Somnambulist started on it, but she’s not nearly as s,” Holden replied, and signaled to Amos “But if there’s traffic on the network, someone’s still here”

“If you wait a ive you the security cameras and a more up-to-date floor plan”

“Feed us what you can, when you can, but we’re not waiting”