Story so far
Katia does not appear in the epilogue, and that absence is the point. When Quasar describes The Eleventh Floor - a vehicle race called Don't Come in Last - Carl's immediate thought is that Katia would have excelled at it, because conveyances and construction have always been hers.
The thought fills him with anxiety instead of comfort. He does not know how she is doing or whether she is okay; he knows only minutes have passed. Would he ever see her again? Would he ever even know? The book ends without answering, leaving her fate as the open wound Carl carries out of Faction Wars.
Role
The absent friend whose survival Carl cannot confirm as the crawl moves to the next floor.
Relationships
Carl — Fears he may never see her again or learn what happened to her
Earlier in this series
Also appears in books you've already read — spoiler-safe to their endings:
Sources — 63 recorded facts, by chapter
Chapter 1
- Estonian doppelganger tank whose only way off the ninth floor is a flower that might make her a servant of a goddess.
Chapter 4
- Estonian doppelganger tank, the general Donut intended to appoint - until she learned officers have to be touched in person.
Chapter 6
- A crawler whose occasional personalized item descriptions help Donut recognize how the AI may have manipulated Quan's cloak text.
Chapter 7
- The doppelganger crawler who chased down Samantha before her vendetta could bring the college guards down on everyone.
Chapter 9
- Shapeshifting crawler who restores Carl's hair with the Rev-up tonic and begins building vehicles on his automaton table.
Chapter 10
- Crafter who identified the Party Planner as a tilt rotor, read its description, and pronounced it a death trap.
Chapter 11
- Crawler fabricator hosting Tran's new conveyance build while working recruitment chats for the faction.
Chapter 14
- Crawler who helped Carl assassinate Astrid, an act that now hangs over Hamed's takeover of the club.
Chapter 16
- Crawler and builder who flies out on Party Planner after fabricating Tran a new upgraded wheelchair.
Chapter 17
- Crawler due to arrive at the Princess Posse base camp aboard the airship Party Planner.
Chapter 19
- Crawler who arrives at the flag room with Bonnie at her side and no patience for Donut's indiscretion.
Chapter 20
- Crawler engineer about to begin rehab treatment, with Carl attending for reasons he hides from Donut.
Chapter 22
- Changeling crawler who takes a modified second dose of Glory Bound to break her addiction by reliving her worst memory.
Chapter 23
- Freed of her spider passenger, Katia trades frantic messages with Carl and admits her treatment probably worked.
Chapter 24
- Icelandic crawler whose hand-touch trapped Carl's consciousness inside her, and whose private nightmare the adjutants replay.
Chapter 25
- Changeling crawler whose visible transformations Carl contrasts with the instantaneous Shi Maria possession.
Chapter 27
- Crawler who leaves for the northern front to join Florin, postponing Jamal's new harness until after the fighting.
Chapter 28
- Crawler engineer who built Tran's two-part mechanical crab wheelchair and battle armor from an automaton recipe.
Chapter 29
- Crawler holding the northern front with Florin, reporting the heavier enemy force massed there.
Chapter 30
- Crawler who helped plan the assault but is deployed to the other front, badly missed by Carl.
Chapter 34
- Referenced as a cautionary tale — what happened with Katia and Eva is why Carl wants this fight kept short.
Chapter 38
- Crawler still deployed with the bulk of the 101st while the castle is assaulted without her.
Chapter 39
- Crawler crafter whose backlog leaves Jamal legless when the attack comes.
Chapter 40
- Crawler deployed with Florin on the northern front rather than at the castle council.
Chapter 41
- Rolls out with Florin and the 105th to hold the western corridor, while her undecided fate hangs on Eileithyia's orchid.
Chapter 42
- Crawler sponsored by Princess Formidable, who gifted her the bolt meant to kill Prince Maestro.
Chapter 48
- Crawler returning to base whose escape from the floor depends on the naga raid succeeding.
Chapter 49
- Crawler and shapeshifter who drains Donut's charged hats and inks Carl's first blood tattoo.
Chapter 52
- Absent from council but central to it: Vinata offers to kill her, and Carl fears for her on the twelfth floor.
Chapter 54
- Sets up the capacitor wire in Shanty Town and waits on Carl to begin the temple operation.
Chapter 55
- Afflicted with the Sepsis Whore problem alongside Donut, and staged with Carl's group four in Shanty Town.
Chapter 56
- Changeling crawler and tattooist who shifts into a mantaur for infiltration and secretly promises Carl the flower.
Chapter 57
- In mantaur form, she restrains Samantha, warns her off Prepotente's dead mother, and confirms a required kill.
Chapter 58
- One of four crawlers slated to breach Club Vanquisher and storm Khepri's buffet temple.
Chapter 59
- Crawler holding the wriggling Samantha with both hands, waiting to be called into the club vestibule.
Chapter 60
- Shapeshifting crawler who plays a gore-drenched mantaur to trigger the false alarm that opens the infiltration.
Chapter 61
- Changeling crawler still disguised as a mantaur, manning the portal desk and entering Khepri's temple with Carl.
Chapter 62
- Crawler who refuses Carl's order to flee the god fight, staying despite everything riding on Vinata's death.
Chapter 63
- Crawler who escapes the temple ambush by black nimbus potion and messages Carl to get out of the club.
Chapter 64
- Carl's shapeshifting partner, trapped in the Club Vanquisher lobby and named a blood heir of the Sepsis Whore.
Chapter 66
- Shapeshifting crawler preparing to eat the Orchid and leave the crawl once Operation Ruin is finished.
Chapter 67
- Katia backed giving Li Na the ring and has been eating Carl's junk rings to test what happens.
Chapter 68
- Coalition planner praised for timing the pre-battle preparations perfectly ahead of open hostilities.
Chapter 73
- Crawler ally teleported in as one of Carl's four chosen infiltrators for the Madness castle raid.
Chapter 74
- Crawler on Carl's strike team who first spots the beacon's odd effects and pushes the hard call on Prepotente's placement.
Chapter 75
- Changeling crawler on Carl's team, talking with Bautista at the line before the Witness spell freezes her.
Chapter 76
- Crawler frozen in Eris's pile of witnesses, to whom Louis sends a dying apology.
Chapter 79
- Icelandic changeling crawler whose potion-induced dream reveals the adoption denial and dying baby at her core.
Chapter 82
- Remembered by Carl for a moment with Annie from the dream, mirrored in Mordecai and Ruby.
Chapter 83
- Named by Li Na among the crawlers she plans to save after conscripting Harpocrates.
Chapter 86
- Named as the possessor of Hamzo, the stun-and-summon spell first considered for the War Crime combination.
Chapter 87
- Crawler who has secretly worked out a plan with Donut, deliberately hidden from Carl so he can't Carl it up.
Chapter 88
- Coordinating the ground assault on the castle below while Carl watches the massacre overhead.
Chapter 89
- Crawler freed from the Witness spell, who says the worst part was waking mid-fall not knowing what was happening.
Chapter 90
- Crawler who walks up with Bautista asking if they're ready to move on the Reaver Castle rescue.
Chapter 91
- Katia rides with the rescue party, tells Carl the truth about Louis's past, and hints at what's coming next.
Chapter 92
- Maps the Reaver castle's shifting corridors in real time from Bautista's stuffed-animal probes.
Chapter 93
- Katia drives the royal chariot with the strippers piled on the back and reassures Jamal about his ruined cybernetics.
Chapter 94
- Absent here, but named among Carl's moments that cannot be taken back — the killing of Astrid.
Chapter 96
- Eats the orchid on Carl's frantic order, dropping into a one-hour coma to await the goddess.
Chapter 98
- Changeling crawler who takes Eileithyia's pregnancy boon, becomes human again, and leaves the dungeon.
Chapter 99
- Gone from the floor, Katia is present only in the two things she left on the table: a crow card and a joke bra.
Chapter 100
- Carl's fellow crawler, absent from the epilogue and the source of his sharpest fear at the book's end.