“Alright,” Zanna said as she put the truck in park under the cloud and killed the ignition. “You take the eastern end, I’ll take the west.”

“Sounds good.” He couldn’t meet her gaze in the rear view mirror. Instead, he busied himself getting his bots unpacked, pretending not to notice as Zanna’s movements grew increasingly frantic in his periphery.

“What’s up?” Ravi asked with a yawn.

“My remote.” Zanna dug through her satchel a third time. “I can’t find it anywhere.”

Ravi frowned. “Huh. You sure it’s not—”

“It is always in my satchel. Always.” Her dark eyes cut to Milo. “You. You did something.”

“I’ll, uh, check the truck bed,” he offered.

“It’s always in my satchel!” she shrieked behind him.

Milo hopped into the truck bed, making his final checks. He couldn’t help but glance at Tess standing alone beside the research van. Even with her eyes still puffy and red from crying last night, she was beautiful. Had the other engineers even acknowledged how upset she looked? Or did they plan to ignore her until her sensitive spirit hardened and rusted, same as their own?

Vaughn brought his hands together in a thunder strike of a clap. “How we lookin’?” His gaze swept over the herders with disinterest, not lingering on any of them long enough to make eye contact.

“Almost set over here,” Milo said, as Zanna fumed inside the truck cab. “Zan’s having some trouble, but I can dissipate it on my own.”

“Fine by me, let’s get on with it.” Vaughn crossed the distance to the research van with long, even strides. Unlike the day before when the geoengineers had been eager for the novelty of a dissipation, to break up the monotony of the days prior, today they met Milo’s task with an impatient indifference. What was the difference between what he’d do today, and what he’d done yesterday?

Quite a lot, if his overnight scheming had been worth anything. But he was grateful that the engineers chose to mill around, making small talk instead of watching him too closely. The only person staring him down was Zanna.

“You stupid, stupid slug,” she said, shaking her head in quiet disbelief. Milo truly did feel bad for the way he’d tricked her. He’d spent most of the night carefully untethering Zanna’s bots from her remote while she slept, but it was slow going. When he’d only gotten through half her swarm after two hours, he’d had to resort to his backup plan. Later today when he pulled Zanna’s missing remote out of the yellowed foam of the Thunderberry’s patchy backseat, they’d share a laugh. Probably.

Ravi was yards away, sipping bitter black coffee from his dented travel mug. He hadn’t put together what was about to happen yet, the way Zanna had, but soon he wouldn’t have a choice. Milo’s remote clattered to the ground as he opened the crate he’d unlatched in the night and pulled out a cannister of silver iodide. Hands moving too fast to tremble, he jammed the cannister into Ravi’s launcher and struck a match. The fuse’s hiss was the first sign for everyone but Zanna that something was wrong, but by the time they’d placed the sound, the rocket was sailing toward the massive cloud above. In his haste to fire the rocket before anyone could stop him, Milo forgot to aim. The rocket swung wide, clipping the cloud on its left side, instead of dead center where he’d wanted it. Damn.

“What in the hell do you think you’re doing?” Vaughn bellowed, sprinting toward Milo faster than his sixty-year-old frame suggested was possible. There was no time to mount the second rocket; Milo steadied it on his shoulder, aiming for the widest part of the cloud. The match lit, the fuse caught, and Milo slammed into the truck bed as the rocket hit a perfect bullseye in the middle of the cloud. Rough hands grabbed either side of his collar and dragged him onto the ground. He couldn’t hear Vaughn shouting over the ringing in his ears. But nothing the man had to say mattered anyway, because the sky was growing dark. Vaughn glanced up, his neck growing pink splotches above the collar. He reached into the truck and grabbed Milo’s remote. Milo could make out bits of his speech now, demanding he teach him how to use the bots, so he could dissipate the damn thing himself. Milo said nothing, but watched as Vaughn flipped the remote on, and eight hundred nanobots homed in on the signal. Vaughn’s eyes went buggy as he saw the swarm approaching. He mashed buttons randomly in vain, then took off running toward the geoengineers. They parted for him as he ran screaming into the plains, the bots hovering a respectful distance away, but pelting him every so often as a reminder of their power. Milo could’ve told him not to panic, that all he had to do was drop the remote, and the bots would leave him alone.

He could’ve, but he didn’t.

“Milo,” Zanna said, the anger stripped from her voice. He turned to see her, palm outstretched, a tiny splash of water pooling in the center. Another drop fell. Then another, and another, until the sounds of each individual raindrop fused into a soft roar on the plains and the hood of the Thunderberry. It pelted Milo’s skin, stinging a little, but he didn’t mind. Like everyone else, he marveled, shivered, cried. It was a gift. It was a release.

The music of Tess’s laughter made him turn. She spun with arms outstretched, tears and rain running together on her face, as she communed with some invisible presence that he couldn’t see, but thought maybe he could feel, for the first time in a long time. And there, at last, was her smile.

He didn’t think it was possible, but the rain began falling even heavier, streaming down Milo’s face and making it hard to see the moment Tess turned and walked toward him, her boots squishing with each careful step.

“Thank you,” she said, still beaming.

“Oh, this wasn’t for you,” he said.

“It wasn’t?”

“Mm-mm. It was for me.” He brushed a thumb against her cheek, right at the edge of her smile. “So I could see this again.”

Do you ever feel like maybe we missed a turn?

He didn’t. Not anymore.

Tess lifted onto her tiptoes. Her hair still smelled of cucumbers, but her lips tasted like the purest rainwater.

Cleansing the world.

Making everything new.