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must have been to accept that.
    “Duly noted,” I said. “Look, I’ll… find a better job. Honestly, I didn’t plan on spending my whole life stacking shelves.” Pity even a degree wouldn’t qualify me for more. The exception, of course, being the Alliance. They’d interview anyone for an entry-level position, provided they passed their entrance exams. I probably had more practical experience in the Passages than most of their novices, at least, the ones who hadn’t been to the Academy, and could speak three offworld languages to boot.
    The one job I might be qualified for was the one Nell despised more than anything in the Multiverse. That figured.
    “What’s happening with that family?” I asked. “Do you have their papers sorted out? Need me to get anything?”
    “Actually… you’re changing the subject,” Nell said, sternly. “But yes, we’re out of powdered bloodrock.”
    I frowned. “I thought you had a ton of the stuff?”
    “We burned through most of it three weeks ago.”
    Ah. That had been the biggest job of the summer, when a huge group of people from the collapsing world of Zanthar had come through the Passages at once. There was absolutely no way a Zanthan could pass as someone from Earth—they had gills, for one thing—so Nell’s friends, the Knight family, must have used all the bloodrock to make the concealment concoction using Nell’s recipe, a delightful combination of pure bloodrock and human skin tissue. It worked like magic—ha—to completely change a person’s appearance. Permanently, if you kept applying it every year or so. I’d never used it, but it seemed to be some kind of hi-tech illusion – you only needed to dip your hand in it, and the effect would transfer to your entire body. Pretty ingenious. Except there was only one place bloodrock, a highly classified illegal offworld substance, was available.
    “I get to break into Central’s stores?” I said, cracking a grin.
    Nell turned, hands on her hips. “I never said you had to do it. You’ve been reckless enough this week already.”
    “Might as well keep it up,” I said. “Come on, I’m not working. There’s less risk in it for me than the others.”
    At that moment, Alber came into the kitchen, yawning. “I’m dead,” he announced.
    “You’re walking,” I pointed out.
    “This is my reanimated corpse,” he said, opening a cupboard. The door fell off. “This house is literally falling apart,” he announced, propping the door back in place.
    “It is a bit,” I admitted, glancing up at the cracked ceiling. The house had been “lived-in”, as Nell put it, when we’d moved here fifteen years ago. Now, it seemed like something broke every day. The kitchen light flickered constantly, shelves fell down with little warning, and the dripping tap was a permanent fixture.
    “Well, when you’ve found the universe where money grows on trees, let me know,” said Nell. “I’m going to check on the others upstairs.”
    “Sure,” I said. “Enjoy last night, Alber?”
    “Never speak of it again,” he muttered, running a hand through his blond, spiky hair and downing a glass of water. “Why is there no food in this house?”
    “Because you and Jeth ate it all,” I said. “I have good news, though. I’m breaking into Central tonight.”
    Alber’s eyebrows shot up. “You serious?”
    “Yeah, Nell’s out of powdered bloodrock. You want in?” Hey, I never said I was a good influence on impressionable teenagers.
    “Hell, yeah.” He set the glass down, grinning.
    “Great. Today’s Monday, so patrols are every hour until eight, then every two. I think we should set out at ten, to be on the safe side. They’ll be in the Passages when we get there, so there’ll be fewer guards at Central.”
    “You know all their patrols by heart?” said Alber. “Wow. That’s dedication to law-breaking, right there. And shouldn’t you be at work?”
    “Shouldn’t you be at school?”
    “School finished a