"What is it with Zenith and heights?" I grumbled, staring up at the Shangri La tower. A holo-advert for the hotel's luxury spa played across its glass façade—complete with a digital waterfall that fell from the very top of the building. It cascaded onto the street, drenching Delta and me in mottled blue light. It was the tallest building in the Chinese Territory by a long way. So of course, Zenith owned the penthouse as her own private holiday retreat.

Delta let out a snort, adjusting the pair of hov-boards she carried under her cyborg arm. "The woman's a gargoyle, what did you expect?"

I huffed a laugh, fixing my hood as it slipped off my head. "Um, should we be standing out front like this?" I asked, with a self-conscious glance around. "Won't their security cameras like, spot me or something?"

Delta craned her neck back to watch the holo water falling over us. "Hate to break it to you," she said sarcastically, "but you're old news now that everyone thinks you're dead."

"They think I'm—?" Her words took me by surprise, but realisation dawned on me quickly. "Because of Zaphron."

"Yup." Delta closed her eyes against the light washing over her and for a moment it looked as though the waterfall was real. "Gotta hand it to him, that crazy plan of his worked in a lot of ways."

I let out a sigh of agreeance, a weighty knot growing in my chest. By faking my death, he'd given me back some of my freedom.

And what had I done in return?

I groaned.

Delta's eyes popped open. "You reconsidering letting the Alliance help us with this?" she asked, casting a sidelong look in my direction.

I shifted my gaze from the tower to Delta and back again, shaking my head slowly. We were so close to finishing this for Dad—and waiting for back-up would cost us time we didn't have. Working things out with Zaphron and the Alliance would have to wait. "No," I said emphatically. "We have our half-baked plan—and we're sticking to it."

She beamed, as though that's what she'd been hoping I would say.  "Then let's get into position before it gets dark."

"I like this," Delta said, kneeling on the concrete rooftop as she made some last-minute adjustments to her hov-board. "We're finishing things the way we started—just the two of us."

I pressed my lips together and stared out at the ninetieth floor of Shangri La beside us. The waterfall had grown brighter in the fading dusk light, turning an almost neon blue.

It was the exact shade of Zaphron's eyes.

"Just the two of us," I repeated, turning away from the holo-ad and doing my best to ignore the fact that months before it had been me and Delta—it had been me and Zaphron.

Even if I had been largely oblivious to his presence at the time.

"It's almost dark enough," Delta said, breaking through the guilty haze that clouded my thoughts. She left the boards and came to stand beside me, staring up at the eighty floors of the Shangri La that still loomed above us. Something about our situation reminded me of when we had broken into ZenTech—only this time Delta wasn't drilling a rope anchor into the roof-top.

"You sure she's going to have an interface up there?" I asked, my gaze finding its way back to the top of the waterfall. "It is a holiday house after all."

"It's a calculated guess, but I'm fairly certain," Delta said, lacing her fingers behind her head as she tilted it back. "Zenith never stops working, even when she's on holidays. So it makes sense that she'd have a full ZenTech interface set-up there."

I figured she had a point; I should have known from my first-hand experience with Dad's poor work-life balance that ZenTech seniors never took actual holidays.

"How did your board mods turn out?" I asked, glancing at the hovs behind us.

She shrugged. "I copied the thrusters from Zaphron's board exactly, so mine should be able to fly at heights—just the same as his." Her eyes fell on the giant drop between our building and the luxury hotel. "But I guess we'll find out soon enough if I copied them correctly."

I swallowed, blinking down at the street below. "Zaph's board can hold two—"

Delta cut me off with a wave of her hand. "We need to make sure we both have our own way out. If something goes wrong, neither of us has to wait for the other before they can leave." She gave me a pointed look. "That means no waiting around for me if things go tits-up. Got it?"

I nodded, unable to form any words around the anxious lump growing in my throat. Hopefully it wouldn't come to that.

Delta pulled two power patches from her pocket and handed one to me, tearing her own open with her teeth. "We should get ready," she said, spitting a tiny piece of plastic into the breeze.

I peeled the wrapper off my patch and slapped it on, my fingers catching on the golden chain around my neck. "Here." I slipped it off and offered it to Delta. "Before I forget."

"Thanks." She put it on, tucking the star pendant into the high collar of her flight jacket. "I'll take good care of it, I promise."

We headed over to the boards and my legs jittered with a combination of stimulants and anticipation as I locked my boots into place on the stolen hov. Beside me, Delta tested out the new turbines on her self-modified board. She floated well above what would have been considered standard hov range—I just hoped it was enough to get her across the gap and up to the penthouse.

I was preparing to launch, when Delta suddenly zipped forward, her momentum carrying her toward the roof edge. The jet of her turbines blasted over me like a half-second hurricane and I watched on in horror as she flew straight out into the open air—and plummeted down.

Bile filled my mouth as she dropped out of sight, my view of her downward trajectory cut-off by the roof edge. I didn't—couldn't—breathe for the longest second.

And then I heard laughter.

Delta rose slowly back into view, her board elevating her until we were at eye level with the roof ledge between us. "Gotcha," she chuckled. "You should have seen your face."

"What the fuck was that?!" I gasped, widening my eyes at her. "You trying to kill me before Zenith does?"

Her smile disappeared, replaced slowly by an apologetic grimace. "Did I misjudge the hilarity of that prank?"

"Yes." I glared, clutching my chest. "I just about had a heart attack."

Instead of apologising, she gestured flippantly in my direction, her sheepish expression betraying just how pleased she was that I cared. "Just get out here," she said, motioning me over.

With a grumble, I fired up my board and took off, joining Delta momentarily in the ninety-storey drop, before we both shot upwards. My hair whipped into a frenzy and my eyes watered against the bite of the evening air as we steered our boards higher. In the half-minute it took us to reach the Shangri La's penthouse terrace, my face had gone numb with icy tears.

We cleared a screen of tropical trees and came in to land, both adjusting our course at the last minute to avoid falling into the largest roof-top pool I had ever seen. Delta performed a complete 180, the tail of her board sending a tiny arc of water out around her. She landed on the faux wood decking beside me, a grin plastered across her face. I rolled my eyes at her.

"Oh come on," she said, the reflected light of the water turning her a face ghostly colour. "When are we going to get to ride these over water again?"

"On the way out, I hope," I replied—very much meaning it.

She unclipped her boots and dismounted the board, still grinning. "Quit your worrying. The simpler the plan, the less there is that can go wrong."

"You know that's not always true," I said, raising an eyebrow at her.

She shrugged. "Doesn't mean it can't be true for tonight."

I sighed and dismounted my board, hoping with all of my heart that she was right.

"So... that's one big-ass pool," Delta said, stating the blatantly obvious. "The gargoyle's got a pretty amazing hideaway up here."

I nodded in agreement, soaking in the tranquil opulence. We were so high up that the city's usual sounds were nearly non-existent—easily overcome by the rustle of breezy palm leaves brushing against one another in the garden beds. The pool ran the entire length of the roof-top, ending in a glass infinity edge that formed the beginning of the façade's holographic waterfall.

Calling it a big-ass pool probably didn't do it justice.

The bottom of the pool was also made of glass, providing a warped view into the penthouse apartment below. I peered down, my breath hitching as I caught sight of movement inside.

"Delta?" I hissed.

"Hm?" She dragged her gaze away from the pool's infinity edge and the view of the Chinese Territory beyond it.

"Were you expecting someone to be home?"

She stared down at the apartment through the watery window, her brows pinching together. "Zenith isn't due to holiday here for at least another month. Plus, she has a gala tonight. I've been tracking her."

"So who's that?" I asked, watching a distorted figure move out of our line of sight.

Delta titled her head and crouched down, looking an awful lot like a cat that was about to ambush a mouse. "I don't know," she whispered, "but it's not Zenith."

I threw my eyes heavenwards and let out a long exhale. So much for simple plans.