CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX—BENSON

The opening and closing of a door disturbed the silence of a modest apartment. A light switched on and the flat’s solitary owner stepped into the kitchen, depositing two heavy cloth bags of groceries on the island counter.

She tossed her keys beside the bags and pushed her hood back, revealing short hair that had gone fully gray many years earlier than her peers, a set jaw, and a straight, jutting nose. Shaking out her hair, she rid herself of her wet jacket and disappeared into the nearby laundry room to hang it up.

As she returned to the kitchen, she realized her cellphone still lay connected to its charger under the overhead cupboards, a red light flashing in its top right-hand corner. When she flicked it open with her thumb, the number of the two missed calls was unknown to her, but whoever it was had left a message on the second try. She set her voicemail to speaker as she proceeded to empty her grocery bags on the counter.

“Hello Benson,” said the voice on the message. “This is Evangeline Pérez Delva…” The woman froze, her gray eyes widening. “I don’t know if you remember me. I founded and led Larkspur with your dad for a while way back when. Listen, I wouldn’t bother you if this weren’t extremely important, but I need to talk to you about what happened after you all left Larkspur, and what you know about Michael’s involvement with a place called Empetrum. If you can, please call me back as soon as you get this message. My friend’s kid is in danger, and you may be our only hope.”

Delva gave a phone number, thanked her, and then the voicemail ended.

Alice Benson stared at the phone long after it fell silent, a head of lettuce in one hand and a hard knot in the pit of her stomach.

Delva didn’t know what she was asking.

She nervously continued to put groceries away, considering her options. How had she even found her? Alice wasn’t being careful about covering her tracks, of course, but she wasn’t that careless. If government tracking resources were involved, they would most certainly favor Empetrum.

She could just neglect to call her back. Nothing had to change.

After putting the kitchen in order, Alice lingered for a moment, staring pensively at the opposite wall. Whatever Michael had done, it wasn’t her problem. She had renounced Empetrum. Nobody could bring her back into the equation. Not Michael, not Delva.

Her father’s sick ambitions had already taken years away from her, irreparably infected her life and psyche, stolen her husband and son.

She navigated to her phone’s call history, staring down Delva’s number.

Empetrum could hold no power over her if she just stayed out of the way. Anyone with any sense would see the trap for what it was and put as much distance as they could from the entire situation.

Yet her thumb hovered over the call button.

After nearly twenty years, she was finally ready to try building a life she could learn to accept with grace. She was slowly, cautiously making friends, volunteering in the community, working and paying her bills. If she got involved with Delva, this second attempt at her life would end.
Lawrence was dead, Michael was too, in his own way. Alice was not responsible for their victims.

None of this was in her hands anymore.

Cursing under her breath, she pressed the button and raised the phone to her ear.

Delva picked up almost immediately. She must have been waiting. “Hello?”

“Hi…Mrs. Delva?” Alice said, already impatient to get the conversation over with. Alice was her own brand of insane, she thought, going through with this. “This is Alice, returning your call. I’m willing to help if I can, but I can’t tell you anything over the phone. Are you still on the east coast?”

“No, west, near Worthing,” came the quick reply. Alice was relieved she had sensed the urgency, at least.

“It’s pretty late now, but can we meet at Aisling Park by the fountain. One hour?” Alice said. “He keeps tabs on me, so my window is brief.”

“Of course, see you then,” Delva said, nearly interrupting her. “Thank you.”

Disconnecting the call, she frowned at the looming thunderheads out the window above the sink, wondering if the sky was this turbulent over Empetrum as well.

She figured she would find out soon.

+

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN—WHISTLEBLOWER

Rain hammered onto the pavement, slapping through the foliage of trees and muffling the world in its watery cacophony. Richard took a steadying breath before quickly opening up the car door and stepping outside. He hurried to deploy his umbrella before the downpour drenched him.

He squinted for fellow silhouettes in the dark obscurity of the shower, but couldn’t see far. Fear pounded in his chest, wondering if it would be Michael waiting for them at the fountain instead.

Alice had accepted far too readily. When Eve had left a voicemail that morning, they were both expecting a dead end.

As they neared the fountain in the heart of the area, they saw a single figure, standing alone with a black umbrella, carefully watching the gloom around them.

The woman from the surveillance photos tightened her grip on her umbrella as she spotted them. The Bensons felt more myth than human, dangerous and terrible but forever out of reach. Richard hesitated, but Eve marched forward across the flooded square.

“Been a while,” Alice Benson had to raise her voice to be heard above the downpour.

“Yes, it has,” Eve agreed, reaching through the rain to shake her hand. She gestured to Richard.

“This is the friend I mentioned. Thanks for meeting with us. You have no idea how important this is to us.” She nodded toward where the windows of a coffee shop glowed across the street. “Mind if we go in there to talk? Get out of the rain?”

Alice looked across the square, then made another survey of their surroundings. Finally, she nodded, and they made their way to shelter. Richard walked behind them, considering this specter who had turned out to be a real person.

Richard searched for traces of Michael’s features or mannerisms in his mother’s form as they walked, some kind of proof that this person really was who they thought she was. Alice’s shoulders were slightly rounded from years of careless posture, in contrast with Lawrence and Michael’s prim, collected demeanor. So far, the only similarities among the three of them were the straight angle of the nose, and the hooded, gray eyes. A stubborn pair of traits, Richard thought, to have passed down three generations.

Eve opened the door for them and Alice muttered thanks as she stepped into the warm atmosphere of coffee beans and soft jazz music. A small brass bell clanged as the door closed behind them, pushing back the thundering rain.

Richard ventured forward between the mismatched tables and Alice warily trailed behind as Eve stopped at the counter to order them all coffee. They found a rectangular table tucked away in a corner and took a seat across from each other. Alice selected the chair that faced the entrance.

“So you’re the friend from the voicemail,” Alice shed her coat over the back of the chair and propped her closed umbrella against the bricks of the wall behind her. “My son has put your child in danger?”

“Yes,” Richard said quietly. “At least, we think so.”

Alice nodded, lowering herself into her chair. “Well,” she said. “I hope I can help.”

“Thank you. By the way, my name’s—”

Alice held up an urgent hand, interrupting him with sudden sternness. “I don’t want to know your name.” She hesitated at Richard’s stricken expression, and straightened up a little, apologetic.

“The less I know about you, the better, for your own safety. You’re already on the radar far more than I’m comfortable with.” She glanced out the window, her gaze turning weary and venomous.

“Fuck. I really thought I had put Empetrum behind me…”

They sat in awkward silence after that until Eve returned with coffee. Alice accepted her drink with quiet thanks, removed the cardboard sleeve from her disposable cup and wrapped her hands around the unprotected surface. “So…” she said. “I was very surprised to receive your call.” She lifted her gray eyes from the lid to regard the two across from her. “How did you find me?”

Eve and Richard exchanged a glance.

“We have a friend that’s very good at hacking,” Eve said.

“This ‘friend’ wouldn’t happen to be affiliated with the Bureau or the government?” Alice said, searching their expressions. “Some innocently helpful police agent, perhaps, who suggested reaching out to me was a good idea?”

Richard shook his head vigorously. “I tried to go to two different police departments the night my daughter disappeared, but they refused to help me. I think they’re in on it, somehow.”

Alice stared him down, her mouth set, tracing the rim of her coffee cup with her finger as she considered his words. “My guess is that’s an accurate assessment,” she said finally. “Before we begin, you need to understand that just by agreeing to meet with you, I’m placing us all in a very precarious position, especially with the information I’m prepared to offer up. The more you know about Empetrum, the more of a threat you become to the powers that be. Getting involved in this isn’t something you can come back from.”

“My daughter’s in danger,” Richard said. “I’m already involved.”

“Understood,” Alice said. She leaned back in her chair, arms crossed and coffee cup at her elbow.

“So, bring me up to speed. I’m sure you don’t like dredging up the past any more than I do, Delva. So things must be pretty serious for you to contact me.”

Eve glanced at Richard, who nodded. “Essentially, Larkspur’s still alive and well.”

Alice nodded once. “I suspected. I heard about the relocation post scandal.”

Richard took it from there, “A colleague of ours has created a dangerous machine, and when I asked him to discontinue it, he secretly aligned himself with another lab to pursue it against our wishes.” He swallowed the tightness in his throat. “His actions have led to his sudden disappearance, along with my fifteen-year-old daughter, who was at Larkspur for a summer internship.”

An expression of dread and surprise crossed Alice’s features.

Richard went on before he lost his nerve. He hadn’t expected her to be surprised. “I don’t think he meant for the situation to go where it did, and he left a recording for us to find, citing your son Michael, and Empetrum as being involved.” He purposefully neglected to mention Sesame as a conscious entity. He didn’t trust Alice at all. “He gave no indication that he expected my daughter to be wrapped up in it too.”

“What does his machine do, if I may ask?”

“It’s a neural transfer device. It moves the consciousness of an organic organism into a mechanical replacement body.”

“Yeah, that should be destroyed as soon as possible,” Alice said.

Richard nodded, unsettled. “When the two of them disappeared, an android we had been working on vanished as well. I was tranquilized by one of Larkspur’s security guards, and the police fought me to drop the matter when I tried to involve them. Because of this, we think Empetrum may have governmental ties.”

“Your suspicions are correct,” Alice said. “Is Larkspur still under the FBSI?”

“Yes,” Richard said.

“Empetrum is too,” Alice said. Her words hit Richard like a punch to the gut. “The Bureau keeps it far under the table, of course, but the government likes having places like Empetrum around. That neural transfer project sounds like a doorway to Armageddon. I hope Michael doesn’t have a lot of interest in it.”

Richard thought he should be more stunned by how easily she absorbed his account, but he was starting to take everything at face value at this point too. He would have to deal with the implications of the Bureau’s ties to Empetrum later. Heather took precedence. James too, if he wanted to come home. If he hadn’t hurt her.

“What is Empetrum, exactly?” Richard asked. “How is Michael involved?”

Alice took a long draught from her coffee cup, as if to steady herself. “About a year after my father left Larkspur, he managed to strike up a deal with the feds through the Bureau, proposing to develop technology no one else would deliver. The company is now in the hands of my son, who succeeded Lawrence as director.”

“We found the obituary,” Eve said. “What happened?”

“Massive stroke,” Alice said, her voice quiet. “It was sudden, unexpected. When the directorship changed hands and Michael wasn’t yet settled, I took the opportunity to leave, and I’ve been trying to escape having anything else to do with that horrible place ever since.”

“Lawrence didn’t pass Empetrum to you?” Eve asked.

Alice scoffed and showed her palms. “I’m not management material. I never wanted the damn place anyway. I worked there because it was easier.”

“You did work there, then,” Eve said. “Why on earth did you follow him after the fallout?”

“He was my dad…” Alice turned a sad, uneasy smile on Eve. “And you know better than anyone how he could talk—how he could make his ambitions sound like your own.” She let her gaze drop to the table. “It just seemed to make so much sense back then. He made such noble speeches about sacrifice and progress, he made you feel like you were trying to make the earth stand still if you didn’t follow his lead.”

Eve nodded slowly. She gestured at Richard. “I’ve told him what happened between Lawrence and me.” She lowered her voice, “The human experimentation, why Larkspur had to go underground…”
Richard stared intently at his own coffee cup. He felt Alice’s eyes on him.
After a long pause, Alice said, “At Empetrum, he continued it. But test subjects don’t volunteer anymore.”

“You can’t be serious,” Eve said.

Richard shuddered.

“They’re funneled in from death row,” Alice said. “People no one will come looking for. The source makes it easier for some to justify, I suppose, but it’s sick, all the same. Nobody deserves that kind of treatment.”

“Where is Empetrum?” Eve asked.

“It’s in the area,” she said. “Forty minutes from here, maybe.”

“That close—” Richard muttered. He leaned forward, incredulous and angry. “That close? Where?”

“Up in the hills,” Alice said. “Northwest, secluded. It’s in the middle of a big nature reserve.”

“What happened after he set the facility up?” Eve asked.

Alice hesitated, looking at Richard, who nodded for her to continue.

“After a couple of years,” Alice said, “everything was built and ready to go, and we moved into the living arrangements there—my parents, my husband and son, and myself. It was okay there for a while, and I let Michael come in and watch. We homeschooled him.” She paused. “Then my mother passed away the year after. Cancer.”

“I’m so sorry,” Eve said.

She nodded. “It tore my father apart. He was already going downhill before, but after Mom’s death, he became—pathological. He obsessed over the Q-13, as that project he started at Larkspur came to be called, terrified he’d never see it to completion. He often complained at me about how no one understood his vision, how no one was truly loyal. Somewhere in there he decided on his own that Michael would be his successor, and so my son began to spend quite a bit of time with him. I didn’t interfere. I was too afraid of how he would react if I pushed back.”

“Eventually you changed your mind?” Eve asked.
 Alice nodded again, slowly. “By the next year, my husband had had enough. He filed for divorce. Empetrum has a policy where if someone wants to leave, they have to agree to a mindwipe—via this machine one of the other scientists presented to my father as part of the initial employment process.” A cloud settled further over Alice’s features.

“He was so fed up, and felt so guilty about everything we were doing that he agreed to give up several years’ worth of memories, and he even forfeited charge of our son. He didn’t dare fight Lawrence for him. Michael didn’t understand. He was only fourteen. He tried to blame himself.”

“Have you been in contact with your ex-husband at all since then?”

Alice shook her head. “Michael’s likely found him by now, but he hasn’t mentioned anything about it to me. He may be keeping his distance out of respect for him.”
Eve and Richard weren’t sure how to reply. They waited for her to continue.

“Losing him was hard,” Alice said after another weary, thoughtful pull from her coffee cup. She took stock of their surroundings again, making sure no one was eavesdropping before she continued. “I retreated into my work for a long time, trying to cope with it. Michael was devastated, and my dad gave him direction and attention I just couldn’t manage at the time. The Q-13 grew more and more dangerous. I had nothing outside Empetrum—no family, no friends, a blacklisted career— so I did as I was told.”

Richard tried hard to stop fidgeting as his cold apprehension grew.

“Life continued on like this,” Alice said, wearily. “Eventually, Michael went to college, working at Empetrum during the summer. After graduate school, he came back there to work full time, specializing in the Q-13, as designed. He had only been officially employed at Empetrum for two years when Lawrence died, launching him into the director’s position. By then, he was fully trained.

“By that time, I wanted out, but I didn’t have the guts to defect. Attempting to leave Empetrum without a mindwipe could land me in mortal danger. Injection with the latest Q-13 prototype was a favorite threat of Lawrence’s.” She glanced out the window to her right. “In the early days of Michael’s directorship, I begged him to steer Empetrum toward better ethics, but he made his intentions clear.”

Her fingers tightened around her coffee cup. “I left, then, certain he was going to try to stop me—but he didn’t. He didn’t even threaten me, he just let me go, and didn’t say why. He still refuses to explain.”

Alice made another brief survey of the coffee shop, which remained empty, except for a couple who had come in and taken their coffee to go.

“But he keeps tabs on me,” she said. “Just as he monitors Larkspur.”

Richard’s stomach dropped. “What?”


“The security guard that attacked you was most likely part of this,” Alice said. “And I doubt they were the only source. Next time you go to Larkspur, I would advise checking your video cameras, walls, and furniture for surveillance taps, microphones and the like. Also, running additional background checks on all your other employees, if you can do it quietly, would be advisable as well. So you know who you can trust, if anyone.”

“And are you on that list?” Eve asked.

Alice’s eyebrows rose, surprised by the question. She cracked a haunted, sideways smile. “Best to assume not.”

“Why would Michael want to keep us under surveillance?” Richard asked.
 Alice shrugged.

“Control. Convenience. Any number of reasons. It’s beneficial to him to have that information available. If your colleague works at Empetrum now, it sounds like this contact came in handy for him.”

Richard worried that Michael already knew about Sesame, who was currently at home with Su. Richard itched to check on them.

If Michael had been watching them this whole time, how much did he know? Luckily, Alice had called Eve back once she had already left the facility. Unless Michael had bugged their personal spaces as well.

Eve was studying Alice. “So, you’ve been in recent contact with Michael?”

Alice fidgeted with her sweater. “Yeah, he called me about a month ago to gloat about finding me again. I’ve been moving around a lot these last few years trying to avoid him, but I’m tired of running. I’m too goddamn old for this nonsense.”

“What did you tell him?”

“That I had no intention of crossing him, so he should just forget about me. He didn’t buy it.”

“Sounds like he was correct in being suspicious of you.”

Alice gazed out the window, eyelids lowered. “Guess so.”

Silence closed in. Across the room, the sudden hiss of the espresso machine made Richard jump.

He readjusted his glasses, uneasy. “So what is the Q-13, exactly?” Empetrum’s pet project, a cruel punishment hovering over would-be dissenters.

Alice glanced past them toward the door again before refocusing on her interviewers. “It’s a human weaponry serum,” she said. “It’s based in an artificial protein that rewires the body’s physiology to generate a high temperature, high abrasion projection without sustaining any self-inflicted damage—In theory, at least.” She lowered her voice. Richard and Eve stared at her, horrified, as she went on, “In the earliest stages, it caused cancers or organ failure, but later on, as Lawrence made more headway, many of the trials became combustive. As far as I know, it’s still unviable. An organic vessel simply can’t handle that much power crammed into it without the serum first overhauling the body’s fundamental makeup in a molecularly stable way. The last trials I saw, though it’s been three years since I last worked on it, the body rejects it just as the Q-13 activates for the first time. It doesn’t integrate quickly enough, so the substance breaks down, and completely atomizes the host.”

Richard felt sick. “And people who rebel get injected with that?”

“It was a threat,” Alice said. “I don’t know if Michael’s taken up the practice.” Her gaze fell to the table, sorrow weighing on her. “I haven’t told anyone about this until now. I had resolved to keep it a secret for the rest of my life.”

“Why are you telling us now?” Eve asked.

“Not sure. Saw an opportunity. There’s nothing I can do to make up for my complicity in Empetrum, but it’s something, at least.”

She reached into her pocket and produced a memory stick, which she handed across the table to Richard. “This contains everything we’ve discussed—the whole story, along with directions to where the facility is located. It’s pretty much anything that came to mind in the time between your phone call and driving out to meet you here. I would appreciate if you contacted me again in about a week or so. If I can’t be reached, take this to the nearest prominent news station and tell them everything. Despite Empetrum’s governmental ties, enough public involvement could seriously throw a wrench into things. The Conxence seems to have the right idea. I’m sorry, I wish I could offer you stronger leverage than this.”

“No, you’ve been a great help,” Eve assured her before Richard could. “Thank you.”

“Do you have any theories on why Michael recruited our colleague?” Richard spoke up.

“Empetrum is in the business of bioweaponry,” Alice said. “Sounds like your colleague had the right amount of talent and crazy to fit that picture. Empetrum always has use for scientists who want to push boundaries.”

Richard considered the device in his hands. “If we publicized this information, as you asked, my former colleague will get scorched too, and I’m still not even sure if he’s done anything.”

Submitting the matter to the press would undoubtedly spiral everything even further out of control. In the uproar, Empetrum might sustain a hit, but James might not survive.

“It sounds like he’s not completely innocent, either, bringing your daughter into this.”

Richard shrank back. “I don’t know.” They had no idea whether or not James had done anything to Heather. Perhaps she was just a prisoner, held there to secure James’ compliance. Maybe she was still unharmed. “What else can we do?”

Alice’s lips tightened indecisively. She glanced out the window again, thinking. “It could take time for politics to get going, which may or may not even work due to Empetrum’s connections. If at all possible, I’d try to get a hold of either your daughter or your colleague, however you can. Empetrum is heavily guarded inside and out, so if they are there, as you suspect—” Her gaze trained on Richard, grim, “—it’ll be nearly impossible to get them out yourself.”

+

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT—ACCESSORY 

The boy lifted his gaze to consider his disquieted reflection in the chrome elevator doors: shoulders forced straight, the fluorescent lights glaring off the large lenses of his glasses. A thick cocoon of gauze shrouded his dominant hand, and despite the pain killers, the wound still burned, deep, throbbing, and livid.
The director presented a much more confident picture—sharp, direct features, better posture, with hard, stern lines around his mouth and eyes. Michael knew he looked timid and inferior standing next to his grandfather.
Everyone knew.
“I’ll put you on data entry duty today, Michael,” the director said, his steady, calculating voice bouncing faintly off the corners of the compartment. “Try to only use your left hand.”
Michael nodded. “I’m sorry…”
“Accidents happen,” was the simple reply. Michael knew his grandfather was annoyed.
A few days before, Michael had forgotten an important buffer when preparing one of the Q-13 variations for the upcoming trials. He’d heated it too quickly, and the flask had boiled over.
In panic, he had impulsively reached out to turn off the hotplate, and the substance had splashed onto his hand.
He still felt it radiating in his metacarpals. Sometimes numb, sometimes so hot he could barely keep from sobbing at the pain of it.
The director had assured him it would fade.
“It was an incomplete mixture,” he had said. “It didn’t take. You’ll be fine.”
His grandfather would be running a trial today, and Michael was glad he didn’t have to watch. It had been hard enough to stomach when he hadn’t tasted the Q-13 for himself.

~

Heather lay on the bed in her cell, her hands docked behind her head and bored out of her mind.

Beds weren’t even comfortable anymore. Regardless of the surface beneath her, she either chose to be awake, or she chose to hibernate, but neither felt better than the other. The main difference was that time spent in hibernation was time she didn’t have to deal with living.

Eighteen hours and thirty-two minutes had passed since James had separated them. As promised, he had brought her reading material—mostly scientific journals. She figured her prison didn’t stock young adult fiction or video games in their data library. He had also brought a blank notebook and a pen, but Heather felt distinctly uncreative, given her situation.

Heather had spent most of her time in solitary confinement sitting against the door, listening to the guards patrol. They came by every ten minutes like clockwork. She didn’t have to write any of her notes down. She remembered everything perfectly.

She listened for signs of the other prisoner, Erika Hodgson, but she was either too far away, or too quiet for Heather to hear.

Earlier, she had heard a man come down the hallway and open Erika’s door, judging by the location of the sounds. Heather caught him say, “Good morning, Ms. Hodgson.”

A woman’s voice, minimalistic and monotone, had responded to the dusty, chipper voice of the man. The latter was another scientist, Heather guessed. Doors closed, footsteps retreated, and the hallway had gone silent again.

Heather had sat under the security camera for some time, staring up at it and hoping Larkspur’s android had secret electrokinetic powers, or wireless hacking abilities to take over the surveillance system remotely and direct it to her bidding.

But as far as she could tell, it was only a body. Just the wrong body, nothing more.

She had dug around the cell, but the faucets didn’t work, and the cabinets were empty. She suspected her quarters were even more sparse than the cell that held organic prisoners.

She wondered how many test subjects there were. Maybe she and Erika could work together somehow, if only they could get in contact.

James certainly wasn’t going to help. If she even mentioned the possibility of escape again, Benson would find out and shut down that avenue. As things were, she expected James wouldn’t just try to discourage her, but might actively rat her out to the director—eager to please, frantic to obey.

Heather had experimented with moving her bed, testing how strong Larkspur’s android was. She found it stronger than she used to be, due to the metal supports and wire contractile units populating her limbs. She had picked up the end of the bed and didn’t feel any strain, holding it until her chest began to hum and her whole body started getting warm. It took about five minutes.

This body had been made to double as search and rescue equipment, but she didn’t know where its limit were, and with that security camera staring at her, she avoided actions that might attract the director’s attention.

She heard footsteps, and she hastily sat up as the locks on her cell door pulled back. The door opened, and James appeared, carefully, and pushed the door shut behind him.

Heather’s robotic brow constricted, simulating the human expression as much as it could. James was a shell of himself. Somewhere, her brain compared this image with a memory of him at Larkspur. It was like looking at the husk of a house that had caught fire in her hometown a few years back. Still standing, still house-shaped, but dead. Uninhabitable.

He carried a small toolbox. Heather shifted position so her legs dangled over the edge of the bed, waiting as he came near.

“I have to install some things in your neural network,” he said quietly, setting the box beside her on the bed. “Can you open your cranial panels, please?”

Heather complied. He looked so fragile, she didn’t feel like fighting with him today.

As he set to work undoing the screws in the protective frame locking down her neural network, she asked, “What are you installing?”

“A better heat sensor, first,” he said. “I know it’s not as good as the real thing, but I thought it may be useful to you, for now.”

“Thanks,” she mumbled.

“If I have time, I can start on advancing more of your sensory systems, which might help you feel more—I don’t know—normal.”

“But I’m sure He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named keeps you too busy for that.”

James sighed, conceding. He placed screws in an empty compartment of the toolbox as he freed them from the frame. Heather held still as he worked. She glanced down at the toolbox, considering two small devices in the compartment next to the screws. One, she presumed, was the temperature sensor.

“What’s the other thing you’re installing?”

“We’ll get to it…”

“I don’t like the sound of that.”

With a gentle, calculated jerk, he unclipped the frame, and set it aside on the bed.

It was still so odd for Heather to see something that was inside her head just come out and lay beside her. She almost tried to compare it with what it would be if her body were still organic, but she knew it could never be a true comparison. Those rules didn’t apply anymore.

James picked up one of the devices and pulled a cap off one end, betraying a chip adapter. He craned his hands into her head, and she felt the pressure as he plugged it in.

“It’s in,” he said. “Go ahead and see if you can support it.”

Heather took a moment, searching. She found the awareness, the presence of a different area in her mind that wasn’t there before, like an additional room had been tacked on with the door closed.

In her mind, she opened the door.

James lit up before her in blues and oranges and yellows, a 360-degree signal superimposed on her vision in a way that was overwhelming at first, but she found she could push it back to the periphery of her awareness, and bring it forward again by degrees.

She focused her attention on the door to see if she could detect the guard through the walls, or more importantly, the other prisoner several doors down.

But the thick concrete walls blocked her vision.

“It works,” she said. “But I thought thermal cameras could see through walls.”

James shook his head. “Not really.”

“Oh.”

“The next thing, I would like to plug in and then explain,” he went on, selecting the other device from the toolbox.

“I’m gonna need you to explain it before you plug it in,” she said, warily. She prepared to snap her cranial panels shut if he tried to force it again.

James stared at the device in his hands, thinking it over. “It has to go in either way.”

“Order from the boss?”

He nodded.

Heather buzzed a sigh, hunching her shoulders and turning her head to look at the adjacent wall.

She traced a path of discoloration on the concrete with her eyes, weighing her options. She activated the camera in the back of her head. James hadn’t moved.

He didn’t seem keen on even trying to spin this one. They both knew their situation was despicable.

Heather looked at him. “So, what is it? This other one?”

“Pain simulator,” James said. More words hastily followed, “It was either that or paralysis on command. I thought maybe you’d be able to…live with this one better.” On that last sentence, he glanced up, and stared directly into her eyes.

Heather searched his expression. She tried to assess whether coded phrases and secret information were still on the table, or if his brain had just finally fried.

“It’s activated remotely,” he went on. “And I have no intention of using it with any regularity. I’m hoping it just existing will mean security will ease up on you.”

Heather cocked her head, eyes narrowed.

“I have to install it and test it,” he said. “The director will be here in a few minutes to watch. I’ll make it quick…I’m—”

“Don’t say you’re sorry,” Heather cut him off.

James swallowed it. He nodded, his gaze falling.

Something in his pocket beeped, and James stiffened, all color draining out of his face. It filled Heather with rage. Maybe when the director showed up, she would break his glasses.

“He’s on his way?” Heather ventured.

James nodded again. He ran a hand through his hair, exhaled heavily.
She shifted position and offered her open cranium. “Fine. I’m going to trust you on this for now, in the name of survival.”

“Thanks,” his voice trembled.

She narrowed her eyes at the floor as, with shaking hands, he plugged the device into a port on the other side of her neural network. The connection registered, but the door remained inaccessible, silent and ominous like a parasite.

James replaced the frame inside her head and after reattaching the screws, she closed her head.

They waited in injured silence for a few minutes. When Benson finally did arrive, Heather glared at him, but he pretended not to notice.

At Benson’s direction, James produced a small, flat remote with only a few buttons.

“You may want to lie down for this,” James said.

Heather obeyed, watching Benson, recording every inch of him to scrutinize later for clues to their location and how to get out.

“Just so you aren’t alarmed,” James said as she got situated. “This device works at different levels of signal that should process like a pain response, with no actual damage being inflicted. I’ll start on the lowest setting. Are you ready?”

“Just get it over with,” Heather said. She closed her eyes and tried to ignore the director’s serene attention.

She heard a modest click as his thumb depressed a button on the remote, and Heather became aware of a dull pain easing into existence. A nagging headache coupled with minor muscular pain was an odd, almost welcome sensation, reminiscent of her organic body. She hadn’t realized she missed pain, even.

“What does it feel like?” he said.

“Like I have a fever,” Heather said.

“Okay.” He pressed the button again. “This is two.”

Heather’s headache intensified, stabbing behind her eyes. Her neck felt cramped and sore as the ache spread throughout her body. The moveable parts around her eyes tightened, and she pulled her head to one side, realizing after she had done so that nothing but the remote could alleviate the pain. She didn’t have traditional muscles anymore.

“Are you doing okay?” James asked, tentative.

“It hurts. Good job, I guess.”

He swallowed, and turned his attention back to the remote. “Three…”

Heather stiffened as the pain intensified with sharp, unexpected stabs. “How many levels are there?”

“Ten.”

The process continued on, the signal climbing up to level six. Heather pressed her arms into the bed, trying to stay calm and still. Pain pounded viciously in her head, radiating throughout her torso and down her arms and legs. She felt like she was back in her old body, and that it had been hit by a train.

“Can you try to sit up?” James asked.

Heather simulated a tight scoff. “Are you serious?”

“That should do it,” James said, looking at Benson, who shook his head.

“Take it all the way up,” the director said, calmly.

James hesitated. Heather braced herself.

“Seven,” James said. “Eight…”

It was only two clicks of a button, but her whole body suddenly felt like it was imploding on itself, bones fracturing, joints dislocating, organs ripping and muscles tearing under the pressure. Panic flooded through her, a need to rip out the device. She curled up in fetal position, gripping her head with a ragged, artificial gasp. She popped open her cranial panels, ducked her head and reached in, as if to rip out the frame, crush the device. Anything to make it stop.

“No, don’t—” James started forward. His hand touched hers, and at a sharp snap of electricity, he gasped and jerked away.

Heather needed to breathe, hear her heartbeat, something living and rhythmic to focus on that might help her block out the signal, but there was nothing to latch onto. Just cold metal. Just wires and deadness and pain.

Suddenly, the screeching in her limbs and head snuffed out, and her body went quiet. She relaxed, closing her eyes, feeling the need to rest for the first time since the transfer. For once, she reveled in the robotic stillness, felt an odd sense of comfort that, outside of that device, her body was incapable of experiencing that kind of suffering.

She slowly dragged herself to a sitting position. She cradled her head in her hands, despising the modest click of metal against metal as they touched.

“Impressive,” Benson said. “Finish up here and meet me outside so we can leave.”

“Yes sir,” James replied.

Benson departed, and then it was just the two of them.

“That really hurt,” Heather said, the volume of her voice very low. She blinked a few times, trying to pull free from the lingering disorientation. Her irises readjusted and she glanced up at him, the tops of her eyes lowered in confusion. He was favoring his hand, looking at her with a strange, soft incredulity. “What?” she said.

James snapped out of it. He shook his hand in the air a bit and picked up his toolbox with the other. “Nothing I just—you electrocuted me. It caught me off guard.”

Heather’s eyes widened. She tried to think back, sifting through her memories to see if she had remembered anything through the pain. It was hazy. There was panic. A breach of the electromagnetic field on her hand. A sharp jolt of power flashing from her chest and up her arm.

“Thanks again,” James said, holding the toolbox close to his chest, preparing to take his leave. “I have the only remote for that device, and I won’t ever use it again if I can help it.”

Heather moved the arm the electrical current had passed through, testing its connectivity, then hugged it to her middle. “Lose that remote, please.”

“I’ll try. See you later.”

After a beat of silence as he crossed the room, she asked quietly, “Are you still going to save your dad?”

James stopped at the door. He didn’t turn around.

“No,” he said. He knocked on the door for the guard outside to open it for him. “He doesn’t need my help.”

Heather straightened up a little more, dread creeping through her circuits. “Is he…?”

“He found a treatment that seems to be working,” James clarified. The door opened.

“So this was all for nothing.”

“Yeah,” James said.

Heather watched him go, and once the onerous door closed, she listened to his and the guard’s footsteps recede down the hallway.

James might have become connected to this place with or without his machine, but supporting his project had helped them become friends. Without it, she probably wouldn’t have gone down to the lab that night. She could still be home, safe, with her family.

For now, she knew she couldn’t sink into what could have been, or the brain-fracturing grief and rage of how senseless this all was. She had to focus on what was in front of her.

She looked at her robotic hands, then at her chest, curious.

And maybe Larkspur’s android could help her after all.

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