That meant three to four decades of life where an A could sleep without the constant huge pressure of a massive piece of the PsyNet at the back of their brain. Yet total retirement was an impossibility. They’d break at the absolute loss of that inexorable pressure, for they’d been born as anchors and would die as anchors.

“But,” he continued, “we don’t have enough As in the Net.” A manifest fact. “As a result, Ager continues to maintain a full zone of influence.” The other A had to constantly be on the verge of exhaustion.

Bjorn sucked in a breath. “If I may ask your age …”

“A hundred and ten” was the quick reply—because there was nothing wrong with Ager’s mind.

Bjorn leaned forward, his hands tight on the arms of his chair. “I want to disbelieve you. I’m already starting to feel the need to reduce the size of my zone, and I’m decades your junior.”

“You sure about your age?” Arran muttered, his eyes narrowed.

Ager took no offense. “Heh! Look older, don’t I?” Their words were clipped, their accent soft. “I’ll save the waste of a question. It’s because it turns out the reason we’re meant to retire around the ninety mark is because after that, our anchor pathways begin to degrade. I’m having to do constant repairs and it’s sucking me dry.”

“But if Ager decreases their zone of influence, people die,” Canto finished.

“So Ager is here as a living example of the stupidity of our forefathers?” Arms folded, feet apart, Arran was a storm barely contained.

Ager’s bones creaked as they angled their head toward Arran. “No, wolf child, I’m here because I was born at the start of the stupidity and have more knowledge in my old skull than your young brain can imagine.”

Suriana found her voice, her Australian twang impossible to miss despite the quietness of her voice. “Ager? Were we always forgotten?”

“Yes.” Ager coughed again and there was a painful rattle to it. “But the old As back when I first took over my zone, they told me they liked it. The politicians left them alone to get on with their job, and no one ever questioned how anchors managed the flows of the PsyNet—it was just accepted that they did. It meant our kind didn’t have to play politics or show our faces to the media.”

Payal spoke for the first time, her voice pushing against the bruise she’d put on Canto with her request that he sever the emotional ties between them, stop caring for her. “I’d agree with their stance were the situation the same—with all of us in a stable network.”

Suriana nodded, while Bjorn appeared thoughtful. “Do you know if the Council consulted Designation A when they first came up with the idea for Silence?”

Ager gestured to a bottle of nutrients. It was lifted, uncapped, and in the elder’s hands before Canto could see which Tk had done it. The look Arran shot Payal gave him the answer: she was faster and had more fine control than Arran, her ability cool and focused where Arran’s was hot and more erratic.

After taking their time to have a sip, Ager said, “As far as I know, As were never consulted. I don’t know if it would’ve made much difference if they had been.”

“Seriously?” Arran was pacing again. “Our forebears couldn’t figure out the mess Silence would make of the Net?”

“According to the old ones, the Substrate was in chaos prior to Silence. Massive turbulence, ‘emotional fires’ that burned out minds in their path, sudden and unpredictable flash floods of data that literally crushed biofeedback links and led to deaths termed ‘unexplained’ by the medics.”

“Why isn’t this in the records?” Bjorn asked with the intellectual skepticism of a man who worked in academia.

“Because no one talks to anchors,” Payal said, crisp and to the point.

“Exactly so.” Ager’s hand shook as they placed the bottle on the table. “The Psy Council of the time was made aware of the incidents, but they were absorbed by the problem of how to fix the insanity and violence affecting our race. I suppose the information just became lost in the chaos.”

Ager rasped in a breath. “My mentors, the old anchors, they preferred Silence. They said they’d felt peace for the first time in the years after it was implemented—the waves calmed at last, the flash fires and floods coming to a halt.”

“Does that mean there’s no hope for the PsyNet?” Suriana whispered, her hand rising to her mouth; on the back of it was what appeared to be a burn scar. “We bring it back to equilibrium, and it just fails again in a different way? An endless loop? Is that how it’s always been?”

“Not according to all the history I know,” Ager responded before wetting their throat with the nutrient liquid once more. “We’ve always been the most unstable of the three races, but prior to the first crash, we were never on the edge of chaos. Something went critically wrong at least a generation before Silence came into effect—a wound of which we have no comprehension.”

This was why Canto had asked Ager to join them, despite the other anchor’s precarious health. So much information had been lost because anchors lived isolated lives, knowing only their sub-anchors and perhaps the anchors in the next zone over. No longer were they close enough to mentor each other, the zones too stretched out. Their “pack” had been decimated.

Canto was determined to change that, pull them back together.

“This, what we’re going to attempt, it’s critical for the future of our race,” he said. “You’re either in or out. Make the choice. If you’re in, loyalty is a prerequisite. Both to the As in this group and As as a whole—Payal is to be our face, but we stand as equals within.”

“I agree to the terms,” Payal said. “Unless the anchor is psychopathic and has turned to murder. Then I’ll take them down.”

Arran stared at Payal. “I like you. You say things without bullshit.” A glance at Canto. “What she said.”

“Yes.” Suriana’s whisper.

“I’m also in agreement,” Bjorn said, “though I do think you’re being naive to take our words for it, child. You should have us sign legal documentation.”

“Would you betray us, Professor?” Ager asked after signaling their acquiescence with the terms.