"She didn't want to start a trend." It was a little more complex, possibly, but that's the heart of it. "In addition to the personal risks of amputation, we don't know of any other way to close rifts. If everyone got rid of their anchor shards, we could watch the rifts all day, but we couldn't close them. She thought staging the accident would keep it from being a public vote in favor. I don't."

Cosima sighs, a small shake of the head. "I don't blame someone for being scared of death; it's pretty natural. And she was trying to be thoughtful. I'm not putting her on blast. But I don't think the fiction is serving us. Us rifters or us Riftwatch."