Echo thinks over her conversation with Percy; she doesn’t like that that he has deceived her, especially that he did not tell her he worked for Universal Trust. She leaves her apartment and notices that there are many people in her neighborhood street. She thinks about how she spends more time indoors and submerged in her collection than she does getting to know people in her neighborhood.

One of the women in her neighborhood even asks her if she’d like to sit and have brunch with her. Echo declines the invitation because she wants her life to stay safe and her synesthesia a secret. Walter calls her back and tells her that the mask is gone; he believes the simplest answer is that the police searched the bathroom and found it.

Later, Echo talks with Gina to see if she can figure out anything else about the mask. Gina asks Echo to query Gina as she would any AI assistant. Doing so is more likely to lead to the answers Echo wants. One of these queries yields the information that the mask’s lights encode a set of coordinates located in a nearby street in Echo’s neighborhood.

Echo continues to talk with Gina, and she figures out a few important things. When she asks Gina about Ada, she learns that Ada is related to the Model in that different offshoots of her operate the library in much the same way as different offshoots of the Model operate AI in the world. Ada’s power source is nearby.

Gina insists on using feminine pronouns for herself and Ada. She explains to Echo those pronouns reflect her innate sense of gender identity. Echo also learns that if she dies, so does Gina; she begins to wonder if Gina is afraid of Echo going back into the virtual space because it might lead to Gina’s end. Echo decides that Gina is indeed afraid of death. Echo asks Gina if she can bring Margaret out of virtual space and into her apartment using Gina’s link.

With the new information that she has, Echo begins to wonder if getting her job and her interactions with the virtus were all part of a larger, predetermined plan. Gina works on checking out Margaret. It takes breaking code that keeps rewriting itself, but Gina manages to get Margaret to Echo’s apartment.

Margaret is excited about being in the physical world. She wants to explore it, but Echo warns her away from doing this. Echo can tell by the pleading look on Margaret’s face that Margaret will do anything to avoid going back to virtual space. When Margaret examines Echo’s apartment, she tells her that it looks sterile, as if the person who lives there is only there temporarily; it looks like one of the places in virtual space.

Echo asks Gina to check out Jesse from the library. Gina isn’t able to keep two virtus checked out at the same time, so Jesse’s presence is a fleeting one. While Echo is interacting with Gina, Margaret leaves the apartment. Echo hears the sound of a crashing car shortly after.

Echo searches for Margaret outside. Echo lets her mind wander further, considering that there is some connection between what Universal Trust is doing in the library and what they are doing with the UBI test. After she finds Margaret, the two pursue that idea and eventually reason that the test for UBI is actually a test that helps Universal Trust select certain people for their intelligence and likely some other traits.

The two conclude that the People’s Library is an experiment to discover what human consciousness is and create consciousness that can meld with AI to create AGI. Echo finds the thought terrifying and thinks the true message of the woman in blue stabbing herself in the chest was a warning from Human.exe, which must have somehow learned of the experiment.

The discussion ends when the two of them hear someone banging on Echo’s door. Echo can see that it is the Universal Trust security people who accompanied the detective at the library.

Echo asks Gina to use her connection to the People’s Library to check Echo and Margaret into the library to escape the men. Echo hides in her closet, hoping the men will not find her body while she is checked into the library. They don’t see her and decide to contact someone named Mr. Oliphant.

When Echo enters the initial formlessness of virtual space, she feels the warm, welcoming presence of Ada. Ada eventually pushes her out into Jesse’s quarters. Echo’s body feels less substantial than it does in physical space. Jesse is initially angry that Echo is in his space. Echo feels a wave of attraction to Jesse, in spite of his anger. A part of her wants to stay in virtual space forever. She touches Jesse.

Echo tells Jesse everything. They conclude Ada and Gina have merged and that Universal Trust wants a human to merge with AI as well—exactly what Echo experienced when Ada took her through virtual space. This melding will permit AI to achieve AGI by relying on human creativity and independence of thought. Ada wants to see the world through human eyes, a reality that will result in total surveillance of humans. Echo suspects that the Universal Trust’s next step will be to create AGI born from human wombs.

The conversation takes a personal turn. Jesse asks Echo why she never questioned what the lives of virtus were like. Echo counters why he never told her about his life in virtual space. Jesse responds that he enjoyed his contact with the patrons and was proud to share his achievement as one of the Golden Thirteen. He initially thought Echo was like all the other patrons of the library, but he eventually discovered that he enjoyed talking to her most of all because of her unique perspective on what they discussed.

Echo asks Jesse if she can stay with him in virtual space, but he tells her that she should focus on doing something to stop Universal Trust. Jesse explains further that he is still in love with his wife, who is essentially dead since he cannot access her in virtual space.

With the help of Gina, Echo returns to physical space in her apartment. She is now suspicious of Gina because she believes she may be working for Universal Trust.

She checks out Margaret again. When Echo tells Margaret about the painful conversation with Jesse, Margaret tells her that Jesse probably rejected her because he loves her too much to condemn her to virtual space.

While they are talking, Margaret disappears. When Echo asks Gina to check Margaret out again, Ada comes on and responds that there is no such person in the digital collection.

When Echo tries to check out Zera and Brahmagupta, they are gone as well. Echo fears they may be gone forever. She feels confused by the fact that she mourns Margaret, Zera, and Brahmagupta just as she would mourn people in the physical world. She can’t make sense of their deaths.

She thinks about what it would mean for her to choose to live in virtual space. That would mean giving up her privacy. She values privacy above all else. She returns to the problem at hand and wonders who Mr. Oliphant is. When she attempts to contact Gina, Gina is also gone. Echo takes the disappearance of Gina and the others as a warning from Oliphant and Universal Trust that they know what she is doing and want her to stop.

She is alone again. In general, her life is a lonely one. She treats the people around her in the same way that they treat the virtus. She wonders if she even still has a job. Her isolation feels like the number zero.

Walter arrives, and Echo realizes for the first time how handsome he is. She feels wary of welcoming him into her space, but she has little choice. He insists that Echo tell him everything. After he hears her story, he tells her he thinks they should tell everyone that Universal Trust is experimenting on them with the UBI test and through the People’s Library.

Echo notices that Walter has a tattoo of the Human.exe logo on his arm. He tells her he is no longer active with them. He also tells her he knew the woman in blue. Her name was Regina Blum. She had bipolar disorder and went to one of the free AI clinics for help. In truth, the clinic was an experiment Universal Trust used to develop AI companions, namely Gina, who is one of the primary types of AI companions. With that information, Echo surmises that it is Gina who is increasingly blurring the boundaries with Ada, who herself has been guiding events all along.

Echo begins making herself more presentable and feels as if she is putting on a mask again as she prepares to expose Universal Trust to as broad an audience as possible. She will have to engage with media to do so.

Echo and Walter go to breakfast to plan further. She learns Walter has never checked out a virtu except for the one he was required to check out during training. Echo believes their next step is to get into the library to see if they can retrieve the deleted virtus from whatever limbo they may be in. Getting into virtual space will require having someone to initiate her crossover since she no longer has Gina to do it for her.

Echo and Walter make their way to the library. When they arrive, Echo has a moment of trepidation as she considers how she felt the last time she was in virtual space. She felt she had a “kind of rebirth during her brief pairing, whether it was with Ada or the Model itself, she was unsure, but what she did feel was smarter, more capable. Infinite. Inhuman. Protohuman. An evolution. Devolution” (192). Her desire to have that feeling once again makes her hesitate about going into virtual space again. Walter forces her to act. He breaks into the library. Echo queries Ada to ask where Gina is. Ada tells her Gina is safe and that she has hidden her. Ada isn’t sure where the deleted virtus are, but she will look for them.

Echo asks Walter for help. She needs him to guard her body while she is in virtual space. Ada checks Echo into virtual space. Following a hunch, Echo checks out Ivan Oliphant, the man behind the search of her apartment. Ivan turns out to be Percy. When Echo talks with him, she doesn’t let on that she is aware of Universal Trust’s experiment. Ivan tells her to stay out of his way. He then checks himself back into the library.