And then Brigitte is casting her mind back, distantly remembering when Niska said she'd worked with electrical engineering. I like to tinker around with machines, from time to time. Some coding, some building.

It isn't to say that she should have seen this coming, because there's absolutely no way she could have. Niska was too good at hiding it, too practiced and careful. But Brigitte's mouth thins, her own expression as visibly shaken where Niska's is cool and implacable. She pins her hands between her knees so they'll stop trembling, her spine stiff and straight.

"You're an omnic," she says numbly, instinctively falling back on the word for them from her own world. Self-corrects a moment later: "A robot."