The shift ended without any sort of announcement. The clock simply hit 12:00, all the holographic panels turned red at once, and my colleagues practically bolted from that torture chamber. I managed to complete three cycles of qi transfer and downed two cups of tea. My reserve was almost fully restored again, but the next shift of techs was already trying to batter down the door, so I followed my group to the exit.

  Despite the rapid reserve recovery, I wasn’t feeling great: heartburn and the kind of energy rush you’d get after ten energy drinks and a full two-day sleep deficit.

  We dragged ourselves to the main security checkpoint, where we were scanned. The guard’s scanner froze just in front of my chest, right where the pendant was.

  “You’ve got a pocket?” he asked.

  “I do,” I confirmed.

  “You’re not authorised to carry one,” the guard said.

  “They sell them over the counter without any clearance,” I pointed out.

  “You’re not allowed to enter or leave the site with a pocket,” Pete expined.

  “When I came in, no one cared,” I said.

  Most likely thanks to Novak.

  “Not my problem,” said the guard. “You’re not cleared to possess a pocket. It’s a security risk.

  “Take it off.”

  “Not a chance. That’s a gift from my Master.”

  “Don’t give a toss,” the guard shot back.

  He was in armour, Fourth Stage. Felt like he could say that.

  “One moment,” I said, fshing the most sarcastic smile I could manage. “Are you saying you don’t give a toss about Novak? The head of the Hall of Diplomacy?”

  The guard gnced at his partner.

  “Don’t twist my words. You know what I meant.”

  “Do I?” I said. “Because what I heard was that you don’t give a toss about my Master. And I think the ds here heard the same thing…”

  I looked over my shoulder. Byron was clearly enjoying this. The two ‘debt workers’ — not so much.

  “Don’t drag us into this,” Dave, the stockier one, pleaded. “Just give him the bloody pocket. You can get it back through your Master ter.”

  “First of all, it’s a hundred-litre pocket. Second, it’s holding my armour and combat discs — a gift from the head of the Yellow Pine Hall of Order.”

  The guards exchanged another gnce.

  I got it. If someone started name-dropping like that in front of me, I wouldn’t be too quick to believe them either. Still, I had no reason to lie.

  “What’d you do to earn gifts like that?” the second guard snorted.

  “You wouldn’t believe me,” I ughed. “But he had a go at Novak too. Though he phrased it a lot more politely than your mate.”

  The guards froze, uncertain.

  “So… shall I be on my way?” I asked. “Promise I won’t wear the pendant again until I get proper clearance.”

  “No,” the first guard finally decided. “We need to inspect the contents of the spatial pocket. If there’s nothing suspicious, you can go. Empty it and hand it over. I’ll return it after the check.”

  Oh, bloody hell…

  “Fine,” I said, looking around, weighing my options.

  I had to hide the tea. Maybe inside the armour? I was good enough to nest objects while pulling them from the pocket. But the armour didn’t have any shielding against scanners. The stim bracelet? No free space left in it. The disc case? It had room, but they’d definitely be checking it.

  What if I just slipped it into my pocket? They’d already scanned me.

  Sod it.

  The biggest qi and spatial signature would come from the armour. I’d use that moment.

  I dropped to one knee and extended my hand, searching for the pocket by feel. I sensed the pendant against my skin and peered inside while channelling qi into my palm.

  The space beneath my hand warped, and there was no machine waiting to eat the crack. The air tore open, and the armour fell out. Waves of Space Qi rippled down the corridor. While they were still fading, I tried to shift the tea leaves into my uniform pocket, but couldn’t do it without direct skin contact.

  The leaves ended up sliding beneath the pocket, into my trousers, and lodged themselves in my underwear, pressed against my thigh.

  Clearly, I still had room for improvement.

  “Why’s it already assembled?” asked the more reasonable of the two guards.

  “Normally I put it on straight from the pocket,” I said, earning surprised looks from everyone present.

  “No bloody way!” said the first guard who’d started the whole thing. “Show us!”

  “And how am I supposed to hand you the pendant after that?” I asked him. “I haven’t quite mastered shifting the pocket itself through space. Just scan the damn armour,” I told him, pointing at it. “I’ll show you after.”

  While one guard scanned the armour, I dumped the rest of the contents in front of the other: the disc case, stim bracelet, a dozen energy bars, and a few water bottles I’d stashed just in case, thanks to the Yellow Pine range incident.

  Once the pendant was empty, I removed it and handed it to the first guard.

  He hesitated, then passed it off to his colleague.

  The colleague didn’t waste time. He took one of the water bottles, pced it into the pocket, pulled it back out, and returned it to me.

  No idea what kind of check that was. Maybe he just wanted to feel the pocket himself. I didn’t need to put anything in or take anything out to know it was empty.

  Once I got the pendant back, I immediately put it back around my neck.

  “That all?” I asked.

  “Show us how you equip the armour,” the first one reminded me.

  I leaned down, pulled the armour back into the pocket, jumped, and equipped it mid-air.

  I briefly considered doing something with the tea leaves, but as soon as I moved, they started crumbling, and little bits of debris spread under my clothes.

  “Ha!” said the first guard. “That’s it, I’m buying essence.”

  “You ever seen pockets like that for sale?” asked the second. “I haven’t.”

  “Give it a few years,” I said, unequipping the armour with another jump. “Essence should be dirt-cheap by then.

  “Can I go now?”

  “Go on. And don’t even think about compining to your Master about us!”

  “You mean about you,” the other corrected. “I didn’t say anything to him.”

  “You’re a crap friend.”

  “Friend? Mate, we’re just colleagues.”

  Their mutual betrayal didn’t interest me in the slightest. I was far more worried about losing my only sample for analysis.

  “Well then, all the best,” I said, and headed out.

  We went down to the metro, and the guys tried to drag me into a cafe to get to know me better. They even offered to pay. I figured they’d already put me on some list of useful contacts. I turned them down, said I had another meeting pnned, though I didn’t.

  I just needed to get the tea analysed.

  I could have gone through Doc Robinson, he owed me, but I was spying for Novak, and his person was Doc Bulsara. Zo, in turn, was one of Bulsara’s people.

  I called Zo and, without going into detail, arranged to drop by in fifteen minutes. Her pce was closer than mine — same dormitory, just a few floors below.

  On the way, I finally managed to scrape some leaves into my pocket. It wasn’t easy. The skin of the thigh isn’t exactly sensitive, so I had to rely on the prickle of dry leaf edges digging into me.

  Still, it wasn’t much. I’d only grabbed a pinch to begin with.

  At Zo’s, I had to expin what exactly I wanted from her. She had no issue with passing the tea to Bulsara. The bigger problem was collecting the sample, which had crumbled, scattered, and travelled all the way down my leg to my socks.

  “You’re joking,” Zo said. “You want my boyfriend to walk in and find you here with your trousers down?!”

  “He’s coming over?”

  “No, but he could. He’s got full access to my ft.”

  “That wasn’t the smartest decision.”

  “It was smart. I don’t keep anything important here!”

  “I’m not going to get another chance to smuggle that bloody tea out. You want to be the one to expin it to Novak…”

  Zo growled and cut me off. Then she id out a clean sheet on the floor and made me undress, slowly rolling down my uniform trousers. She armed herself with a pair of tweezers and started picking bits of crushed tea off the fabric and my legs, occasionally yanking out a hair or two for good measure.

  I’m pretty sure that part was out of spite. Not that I bmed her, she’d be the one sorting it ter.

  All in all, we collected just under a teaspoon of dried leaves. Looked like less than I’d grabbed initially, but it was all we had. Hopefully it would be enough.

  Thank God, Tom didn’t walk in on us mid-procedure. Especially while I was turning my underwear inside out. By the end of it, I was so worn out and irritated I didn’t even try to hurry anywhere. Zo packed the sample into a sealed container. She had containers. I would’ve wrapped it in a chocote bar wrapper again. She promised to hand it to Bulsara personally, then shoved me out the door.

  My reserve was full, three points over max, but it felt like I’d chugged an aggressive energy drink and my body didn’t know what to do with itself. Maybe burning off a few points through training would’ve helped, but it felt more like I needed to smother the internal fire instead.

  I did end up draining my reserve a little, just pulling out and stashing a water bottle back into the pocket. But I did that on the way to the nearest cafe I hadn’t been to before. Looked like Tangerine from the side — just a cluster of vending machines and basic tables.

  I ordered milk porridge, a milkshake, and a slice of cheesecake. For some strange reason, just thinking about dairy made my mouth water.

  After eating, I felt a bit better. Not good, just tolerable. The heartburn eased, and the energy stopped overflowing past my limit. I sat there for another ten minutes, staring at the forest behind the fake window, trying not to think about anything.

  But thoughts kept creeping in. Since I had to leave the pendant and pocket at home before the next shift, there was no time for training.

  Ah well, screw it. I spent the free hour with a book, then headed off for the evening shift.

  Without the pocket, I felt weird. Like I’d left my room without clothes on. What bothered me most was being without my armour.

  The guards at the door had changed, so no one was around to appreciate what a good boy I’d been. The scanner didn’t detect any remaining traces of tea.

  Maybe I was overthinking it. Maybe it was just a well-made stimunt…

  I arrived for the evening shift ahead of most. Got there before the previous techs had cleared out and before Pete, Byron, and Dave showed up. Pete looked even worse than he had in the morning. His face wasn’t just grey, it had turned a bluish-grey, like freshly poured concrete.

  We barely had time to exchange greetings and approach the hated machines when Novak stormed into the room.

  Li followed behind, tablet in hand, and even dared a sarcastic tone when addressing my Master.

  “Master Novak, please! That’s utter nonsense!”

  Novak didn’t reply. He simply stepped aside, making room for Bulsara.

  The bald doctor paused for a second, locked eyes on the tea table, and marched straight toward it like it was his sworn enemy.

  Yeah. That tea didn’t sit right with me for a reason.

  MaksymPachesiuk