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"Teeks? Not so very far" Dr Cable pulled a black knapsack from beside her desk and started to pack the various objects into it "You ht just make it"

"Make it? Makewhat ?"

"The trip To the Smoke"

"Me?"

"Tally, only you can understand these directions"

"I told you: I don’t knohat they mean!"

"But you will, once you’re on the journey And if you’reproperlyyou wanted to know I gave you the note You promised!"

Dr Cable shook her head "My promise, Tally, was that you wouldn’t be pretty until you helped us to the very best of your ability I have every confidence that this is within your ability"

"But why me?"

"Listen carefully, Tally Do you really think that this is the first time we’ve been told about David? Or the Set there?"

Tally flinched at the razor-blade voice, turning away froer on the woman’s cruel face "I don’t know"

"We’ve seen all this before But whenever we go ourselves, we find nothing Smoke, indeed"

The lump had return to Tally’s throat "So how a?"

Dr Cable pulled the copy of Shay’s note toward herself "This last line, where it says to ’wait on the bald head,’ clearly refers to a rendezvous point You go there, you wait Sooner or later, they’ll pick you up If I send a hovercar full of Specials, your friends will probably be a bit suspicious"

"You oalone ?"

Dr Cable took a deep breath, a disgusted look on her face "This isn’t very coe of heart You have decided to run away, following your friend Shay Just another ugly escaping the tyranny of beauty"

Tally looked up at the cruel face through a pris tears "And then what?"

Dr Cable pulled another object from the briefcase, a necklace with a little heart pendant She pressed on its sides, and the heart clicked open "Look inside"

Tally held the tiny heart up to her eye "I can’t see anythingow!"

The pendant had flashed, blinding her for a moment The heart made a little beep

"The finder will only respond to your eye-print, Tally Once it’s activated, we’ll be there within a few hours We can travel very quickly" Cable dropped the necklace onto the desk "But don’t activate it until you’re in the Smoke This has taken us so, Tally"

Tally blinked away the afteri to force her exhausted brain to think She realized now that this had never been si questions They had alanted her as a spy, an infiltrator She wondered just how long this had been planned How ly to work for them before? "I can’t do this"

"You can, Tally You must Think of it as an adventure"

"Please I’ve never even spent the whole night outside the city Not alone"

Dr Cable ignored the sob that had cut through Tally’s words "If you don’t agree right now, I’ll find soly forever"

Tally looked up, trying to see through the tears that were flowing freely now, to peer past Dr Cable’s cruel ray eyes, a cold, terrible surety unlike anything a normal pretty could ever convey Tally realized that the woman meant what she said

Either Tally infiltrated the Sly for life

"I have to think"

"Your story will be that you ran away the night before your birthday," Dr Cable said "That ot to make up for four lost days Any uess what happened So decide now"

"I can’t I’m too tired"

Dr Cable pointed at the wallscreen, and an ie appeared Like a ht now: puffy-eyed and disheveled, exhaustion and red scratchesout in all directions, and her expression turning horrified as she beheld her own appearance

"That’s you, Tally Forever"

"Turn it off"

"Decide"

"Okay, I’ll do it Turn it off"

The wallscreen went dark