Juliet finished her shower and dressed in the same clothes she’d had on earlier; they were spotless and smelled fresh. She had a feeling the people holding her had dressed her only a short while before they woke her. “You really think they’re watching me? I didn’t see any cams . . .”
They’re definitely watching. I’m sure at least one camera can see you from any angle, and there’s probably a scanner array pointed at that comfy little daybed they gave you.
Angel’s voice felt more and more familiar to her. She’d taken such a long shower that it had felt criminal while she listened to the strange, chipless ghost of a PAI summarize everything she had supposedly been through in the last couple of years. During that time, she’d feigned mental exhaustion, sitting on the floor under the drizzling warm water, sometimes laughing, sometimes weeping. She was sure it was convincing because she wasn’t faking all that much—she felt insane.
Luckily, you and I are more than close, and when you subvocalize, you don’t really move your throat. Have you noticed that? Slow down and think about it; when you spoke to Tig, didn’t you have to form each word clearly in the back of your throat? With me, it’s different. I can see the words forming in your mind.
While she applied some lotion to her face and hands, Juliet did what Angel said. She paid attention to how she subvocalized as she replied, “I feel like I can trust you, like, deep inside, but that doesn’t mean I can’t rationally look at all this and think I might be nuts. What if Kline was telling the truth and a haywire PAI messed me up?” Angel was right; she wasn’t really forming the words in her throat as she used to do when communicating with Tig. It was automatic, too, not something she’d consciously decided to do.
Just pay attention to that feeling. You always trust your gut, Juliet. You know I’m telling the truth, even if you don’t know how yet. When I start freeing your memories, you’ll know what to do. You’ll know how duplicitous Kline is being.
“What will I remember first?” As she subvocalized, she ran her fingers through her hair, amazed that towel-drying had been enough; the strands were dry and already laying exactly where they should be as though she’d been brushing for half an hour.
I don’t know. I can see the structures they put in your mind. They’re made of some kind of bonded chemical that carries a tiny electrical charge. I’m going to use your nanites to break them up, but I have no idea what will come to you first. It might be extremely disorienting, and I think I should do the work while you sleep. After I’ve started, I’ll be able to estimate how long it will take.
“Won’t they know?” Juliet opened the bathroom door and hesitantly re-entered her little apartment space. Her prison. She felt very different about being there after hearing everything Angel had told her. Knowing she was likely being watched from multiple angles changed everything. With every move, she felt like she was subconsciously thinking about what her observers would think.
They may. I hope you start to remember the lattice right away. If you can begin to pick up their thoughts, we might gain some insight. We’re going to have to figure something out—some way to fool their scans. When Kline comes in the morning, you should ask for a deck or even a hobbled PAI. If I could get some more processing power—Juliet, try to act like you don’t know they’re watching! You’re standing like a deer in headlights!
Juliet jerked into motion, hurrying over to the food dispensing machine while trying to keep a relaxed expression. “I never understood that one. Deer in headlights. What do they do? Freeze up?”
Yes.
The machine had several different dispensers—hot drinks, cold drinks, food “patties” with a dozen different sauce options, and various flavors of protein bars. Juliet went through the menu, selecting a plain “cola” drink and a lemon-vanilla protein bar.
I’m hopeful they’ll need to take you around to different departments for your so-called therapy. Maybe we’ll find something we can exploit. If they don’t, if they say they’re going to bring specialists to you, try to find a way to get out. Say you feel stir-crazy. Say you’d like to visit a gym or even just walk in the sun. As you begin to remember what you’re capable of, you’ll understand. You have many skills at your disposal, Juliet.
Juliet tried to convey her understanding without subvocalizing specific words, and, to her amazement, she felt like she knew Angel understood. She took her drink and snack and walked toward the blue couch-bed, and as she did so, she carefully scrutinized it, looking for a panel where hidden components might be located. As far as she could tell, it was seamless. She sat down, felt the soft gel beneath the fabric surface, and wondered if Angel was right—were there scanners hidden in it? Restraints? Mechanical arms that could extend to inject her with diabolical mixtures? The idea made her want to sit on the floor.
Still, she forced herself to look relaxed as she leaned back and folded her legs beneath her, sipping her cold soda and slowly nibbling the too-sweet protein bar. “I’ll complain about the food. Maybe we can get access to someone new or a cafeteria or something.”
That's a good idea. I wish we knew what time it was. Do you feel sleepy? Kline acted like leaving you until morning was natural. It might be the end of the day.
“I’m definitely not feeling too alert. Shit! Do you think there’s something in the food?” Juliet feigned a cough to cover her sudden, startled expression.
Likely, but don’t worry. As I said, I can use your nanite battery’s processor to some effect. Setting it to complete routines I’ve already established is nothing; the nanites will dispose of anything harmful or unnatural in your food and drink. I’ll get a report when they cycle back to the battery.
“A nanite battery isn’t a power source, right?” Juliet was trying to keep up, but Angel had told her a million things in a short amount of time, and she was feeling overwhelmed.
Not exactly. It has a power source, a bio-batt, but it’s more like a little factory where your nanites report what they’re doing, get repaired or replaced, and receive new instructions. It’s a very high-end medical nanite suite. I’m sure that if WBD knew you could interact with it, they would have removed it.
“I think I get it,” she subvocalized, yawning. “I do feel sleepy, though, and maybe that’s not a bad thing. I want to start remembering. I’m going to try to sleep, okay?” Not sure if it mattered, Juliet turned her back on the door and curled onto her side, using her arm as a pillow. The lack of bedding felt strange; shouldn’t there be a pillow? Shouldn’t she at least have a blanket? She determined to ask Kline about it when he returned. In the meantime, it didn’t really matter; the temperature in the room felt perfect, and her bodysuit was the most comfortable thing she’d ever worn. She sank into the couch’s gel padding, and it wrapped around her like the palm of a friendly giant’s hand. With that image in her mind, Juliet almost immediately drifted off.
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She caught herself falling into sleep’s embrace and jerked her eyes open. How could she? How could she sleep with everything that was happening? Her entire life was like the plot of a crazy action spy thriller. She was trapped in a room! That alone should make sleep impossible. On the heels of that thought came another, equally disturbing one: she had a voice in her head that carried on conversations with her, and it wasn’t a PAI.
As that thought struck her, she absently reached back and gently peeled away the synth flesh on her data port. Idly, she let her perfect, diamond-hard nail scratch at the empty slots, ensuring there wasn’t anything in there, no tiny, secret chips. She clicked her nail against it, and that’s when a wave of vertigo struck her. She wasn’t the same person she thought she was. Her body was different.
If she were to believe everything Angel said, a lot more than her nails were different. Superficially, as far as augments went, the nails and her hair and eyes were about it. She could wrap her mind around that, but there was so much more. She gently touched the weird lump of plasteel near her wrist where, according to Angel, she could deploy an actual data cable. She had upgraded optics, ears, reflexes, and lungs. More than that, her perfectly normal-looking right arm was supposedly cybernetic. It felt normal, but then, so did her bones and armored skin. Was that right? Was it armored? Angel had given her so many details that she couldn’t keep them all straight.
Putting aside all of the cybernetics, Juliet had seen herself in the mirror. She was living in someone else’s body. That was the only way she could explain it. First of all, her body hair was gone. What was that all about? Angel said DNA, but the details were all mixed up. Then there were the muscles and the . . . posture? Was that right? She stood differently and moved differently. It was an uncanny thing that she couldn’t adequately explain, but she felt like she was in someone else’s skin. Finally, Juliet focused on the scars—so many scars. None of them were all that terrible—just faintly discolored, pinker skin, not keloid; Angel credited the medical nanites for that.
Juliet had to squeeze her eyes and force herself to think of something mundane—cutting scrap, chugging a cheap beer, laughing with Felix. She had to do something to keep all the craziness at bay so she could sleep. Things would be better when she woke; they had to be. If she could start to remember, maybe she could reconcile her current situation, Angel’s wild story, and her altered person into a single conglomeration that made a little sense.
She pushed away the impossible situation of her present and focused on her past. She remembered her times with Felix, laughing at each other, at friends, and at themselves. She remembered her sister and the many fights they’d been in, along with a few happy moments when she felt like Emma actually wanted her around. It was with one such memory, a time she’d helped Emma fix her hair for a date, that she finally drifted off and began to dream in earnest.
#
Rutger Tanaka kicked the man out of his chair, sending him sprawling over the plasteel floor to smash against an overturned lab table. “I won’t keep asking,” he growled, his monoblade’s holographic, magenta edge sizzling and popping to punctuate the statement. He stalked toward him, the blade held out to the right menacingly. The man’s eyes were trained on the sword, but they flickered down to the bisected, highly-armored corpo-sec agent who lay near the broken door.
“Leo reports the lab is clear; all corpo-sec accounted for,” Kim reported. Tanaka grunted, then tuned her out as the lab director began to blubber, mumbling into his hands as he covered his face.
“I swear! I don’t know anything about any ‘Angel Project.’ I don’t know what was in that fluttercraft! I didn’t even know it came to this facility! This is all above my pay grade!”
“I’ve seen the payroll for this facility. You make more than the city manager of New Atlas.” Tanaka knelt, deftly swinging the sword close to the man’s face, just a centimeter from his peering eye. “One more chance to tell me something helpful.”
“If . . .” the small, slightly rotund man licked his lips and lowered his hands, trembling as more sweat built up on his brow. “If it’s anything important, anything Mrs. Gentry—ack!” He coughed and shook, and Tanaka moved the sword away, peering at him in confusion. This was a first. Was he being shocked? Poisoned? Fast as a viper striking, he reached out and snatched the back of the man’s neck, pulling him forward so he could see his data port. Without a second thought, he ripped his PAI chip out.
The director convulsed, foam erupting from his mouth, and Tanaka swore. He stood, sheathed his sword, and slammed his fist into the plasteel wall. Kim was quick to notice his distress, “Rutger, are you all right? I noticed your conversation was cut short—”
“Hai,” Tanaka said, moving his hand in a chopping motion to signal that he didn’t want to hear from his PAI at that moment. She was clever and helpful but not nearly as intuitive as he’d like. The damn thing didn’t realize his “conversation” was an interrogation and that his prisoner had just been killed by something. He wasn’t naïve enough to think the director could be salvaged. If some kind of kill switch had been thrown, there was no doubt his brain had been the first target; they wouldn’t get anything useful out of him. “Signal protocol F,” he muttered, turning and jogging out of the lab. He had three levels to get through before they blew the place.
“Books is placing the last charge. Protocol F in five minutes.” Kim put a timer on his AUI as she spoke, and Tanaka nodded, hurrying up the stairs.
When he reached the roof and climbed into the transport section of their waiting fluttercraft, he said, “Kostas is still waiting?”
“Yes, I have an open line. Do you want to speak to her?”
“Hai.”
A call window popped open on his PAI, and Selene Kostas’s beautiful face greeted him. She narrowed her brows. “Bad news?”
“Does my face say so much?”
“I’m afraid so. To me, at least.”
“Another dead end. Nine days of planning, two million bits in bribes, and not a whisper of information, let alone our missing people. The director was about to say something, but then he . . . died. I took his PAI out, but the damage was done.”
“The time is the only concern. The bits are nothing. I have as many as we need. Show me the director’s last words.”
“Do it,” Tanaka grunted, knowing Kim was listening in. She initiated the file transfer, and he watched Kostas’s eyes flicker left and right while she watched the footage.
After a minute, she nodded. “I’m afraid I should have assumed as much. I should have assumed Gentry would want Juliet close. It's very hard to track the woman’s movements, but I have a good guess. More and more of the WBD execs have been relocating to Mexico City. They’re doing something big there; I’m tracking massive shipments off-world. Most are heading to either Mars or Ceres, but there’s a huge WBD installation in Mexico City, and it seems they're consolidating their operations there. They’re planning something big. I’ve been dreading it—I’d so hoped we’d find success here today, but it looks like they probably brought our people there.”
Tanaka started to speak, almost yelling, but he caught himself as he saw Leo burst out of the stairwell along with Books and two of his men. They ran for the fluttercraft, and Tanaka turned and walked to the far end of the compartment. There was room enough for twenty soldiers in the hold, so it wasn’t hard to get a little privacy as he continued the conversation. “How long have you known that?” he asked, reigning in his irritation.
“Since day one, but these two installations had just as much of a likelihood, by my estimations, of having our people as the one in Mexico City.”
Tanaka stared out the bay door, watching for the fire bursts their bombs would create. The two installations she mentioned included this one in Texas and the one they’d hit prior to that in Arizona. He shook his head, his words almost a growl, spoken quickly and forcefully, “It doesn’t sound like they were equal—not if all the executives are moving to Mexico City!”
“Rutger, I tracked the fluttercraft to these two installations. They must have offloaded and moved her by different means. I’ve tracked thousands of vehicles that have come and gone, but think about it! There are a dozen cities and millions of vehicles between where they took Juliet and Mexico City. I’m not God!”
Tanaka continued to scowl, but he nodded. He was frustrated, but operating with Selene’s intel was better than without, not to mention her resources. He still didn’t know where the fluttercraft had come from. Shaking his head, he looked into Selene’s eyes and said softly, so his voice was drowned out by the whining, buzzing rumble of the fluttercraft as it sped away from Lewisville, “Are we too late?”
“No! No, Rutger. They want Juliet, and they won’t kill people she cares about. I’m sure of it, not if they can help it. To them, your people are leverage against her. They’ll want to keep them viable for that purpose.” Tanaka still wasn’t used to Lucky’s real name. Whenever Kostas referred to her as Juliet, he had to draw a mental connection between the word and the woman he knew.
“So, the next move? Mexico City?”
“Yes, but we’ll need to be a little more careful. We’re talking about an installation with upwards of a hundred thousand employees. We’ll need to infiltrate. I’ll start building new identities for you, Leo, and Charles. Start preparing with the idea that Leo will be acting as a visiting exec from an allied corporation. You and Books will be his security.”
“All right, and in the meantime?”
“I’m coordinating with Frida. We’ll get you a base of operations in the city. I’ve already arranged flight clearance for the fluttercraft, and it’s en route. The WBD facility is on the spaceport proper and utterly air-gapped—I’m in the dark about what’s going on there, but not for long. I’m working on a solution. You’re going to be receiving a package via courier. Contact me when it arrives, and I’ll walk you through the next steps.”
“Hai.” Tanaka tried not to sound defeated, but he was dead-tired and frustrated by yet another failure.
“Rutger?” Selene leaned closer to the camera, and he could see the concern in her big, olive-green eyes.
“Yeah?”
“Are you with me? Do you have the stamina for this?” The question sent a rod of steel into his spine, and Tanaka’s eyes snapped open.
Selene’s mouth opened in a small “O” of surprise as he growled, “I will pursue them until they’re found, until I’m dead, or until I’ve killed everyone involved in their capture.”