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father’s personal physician, the one who was going to transplant his father’s brain into Partridge’s body—his father’s plan for immortality, requiring Partridge’s death. Weed performed his father’s autopsy and declared his death to be by natural causes, but Partridge hasn’t seen him since. He wonders if Weed knows the truth, if he covered up the murder for Partridge, if he can be trusted. Partridge could use an ally.
    Also, Weed might be the only one he can ask about his father’s “little relics,” the bodies his father suspended—frozen, but still alive—and kept in the building Partridge lived in before his father’s death. Weed might know who’s trapped down there and how to free them. Pressia’s grandfather is down there and Jarv Hollenback, who’s just a toddler. Partridge’s father pawned Partridge off on Mr. and Mrs. Hollenback—both on the academy faculty—for the holidays, and Partridge has grown fond of them.
    Mr. Hartley, an old neighbor, is next in line. Behind Hartley is his wife and then Captain Westing and the Elmsfords—their twin sons are Partridge’s age; he knew them in the academy, and they’re now in Special Forces. They’re teary-eyed—because they’re mourning his father or because Partridge reminds them that they have, in a way, lost their sons? He’s not sure.
    They shake Partridge’s hand with both of theirs—smothering it. They slap his shoulders, hug him so close he can smell their powders and colognes. They cry and pull tissues from their pockets and purses, and blow their noses.
    Some others bring their children, as this is as close as they might ever get to the new leader. The heir. “Shake his hand,” they tell their kids. “Go on.”
    “We’re so sorry.”
    “It’s such a loss.”
    “You’re holding up so well. He’d be proud of you.”
    He wants to tell them they’re right; his father would be proud of him. When a murderer is killed by his own son—the one he always pegged as weak and worthless—isn’t there a glimmer of pride, just before death?
    Partridge still hates his father. Can you hate someone for forcing you to kill him? Forced. That’s how it felt. It doesn’t seem right and yet it’s why he hates his father most right now.
    Partridge watches a young mother, holding a toddler, steady herself by putting one hand on the glass enclosure surrounding his father’s urn. Her thin ribs contract under her black dress as she sobs. One of the cameramen in the crew gets a close-up of her tear-streaked face and her child, who seems to know that this is a somber occasion.
    His father doesn’t deserve this outpouring.
    I killed him , Partridge wants to say. I killed him, and you should thank me for it.
    Then, when he least expects it, there stands Arvin Weed.
    Partridge grabs Weed’s hand and pulls him into a hug. “I want you to do a favor for me,” he whispers. “Those people suspended on ice. You know about them?” That’s all he can get out before the hug is over.
    Weed nods. “Yes.”
    Partridge looks at the line of mourners, the guards—and, not too far off, Foresteed’s talking to Purdy. How can he get his point across with all these people around? “I miss the academy,” he says. “How are Mr. and Mrs. Hollenback?” Mr. Hollenback taught science. Mrs. Hollenback taught domestic arts at the girls’ academy. “And their kids?”
    Weed nods, like he understands that the suspended people and the Hollenbacks are linked. “Fine, I think.”
    “Check on them for me. Especially little Jarv. I miss him.” He remembers finding Jarv in the row of glass-enclosed egg-shaped beds that held children with tubes in their mouths and ice crystallized on their skin.
    Weed says, “I’m sorry for your loss. I imagine it’s almost impossible to get over something like this.” Does he mean the death of his father or the fact that Partridge killed him?
    “It’s good to see you, Arvin,” and then, as if overcome with emotion, he grabs