But he always tried to include her in the plans. Things seemed better between them when he had begun doing so, and they had gone over these particular plans most frequently. Although he supposed care for the baby might have distracted her from their earlier discourse.
“To finish what we started.” He eyed her peculiarly, trying to see if perhaps she’d grown ill, or perhaps lack of sleep was toying with her memory. But she merely nodded, and patted his chest lightly. An odd action, but one he did not find wholly displeasing.
“Sounds perfect.”
She was an odd one, had been from the beginning.
But he wouldn’t change a bit of her.
1
The alarm was growing more than tiresome. He did not understand its purpose, as those who would know its function would have been alerted with only the first few rings.
And yet it lingered.
A constant wail, almost a lament to its master than had been killed. His body was likely still warm, blood forming a halo about his frame.
It was a pleasant image, one that 261 would cherish.
He flexed, not his muscles, but his open rebellion, trying to decide what he should do next. There were plenty onboard that were too dangerous to allow to live. The Seneschal might have been in command, but there were others with knowledge too potent, their work long ago abandoning any code of ethics.
He would not pretend to have any understanding on that subject, only knew the wrongness of them.
Of himself.
He watched others, with their quick shifts in emotion, the way they were able to connect with one another into, on occasion, a semblance of harmony. He had no such ability. He was too harsh, too coarse, lacking in any of the warmth that seemed to ease his prey, despite his efforts to cultivate it.
It was seen as a flaw, his inability to adapt, and he did not disagree. Blamed them for it, yes, as they had been the ones to mess with his biology, to create the killing, emotionless husk that was ready to tend to their bidding.
He had thought it would always be that way, but evidently, he had been wrong.
He was not entirely certain what it had been in 932 that inspired him to action. There had been no feeling as he’d confronted the miscreant, no sense of anger or admonishment, despite the loyalty that the masters’ had attempted to instil in him.
It was simply the awareness of a different path. One that he had not truly considered before that moment. That he could end it all.
And when it was finished, end himself.
It seemed only right, after all. If he had no mission any longer, no set code of who was to die and who wasn’t, what would keep him from doing so simply to satisfy his own urges?
A reasonable course.
When the pod had departed, taking 932 and his female away, 261 considered his options. Others would be coming, and quickly. Not the ones that mattered, only grunts like himself that knew their weaponry and knew how to subdue. Those were not the ones he wanted. Not the ones that mattered.
The ship would have to be destroyed. It was the most logical way ending a rather troublesome problem. He did not have absolute faith in his skills, not when he had never attempted such an action before, but no anxiousness overtook him. Only the usual calm, the sureness that accompanied a set mind and able hands.
He vacated the room with the escape pods. Other than a single-use control panel, there was nothing there that would prove useful, and lingering would only lead to his arrest. He did not know how closely the security footage would be monitored, but it would not be long before the masters knew he had been complicit in the traitor’s escape.
That was fine.
He simply would prefer that they be made aware before their entire vessel imploded into the vacuum of space.
“Pardon me,” a voice called, one tight from crying. He kept walking. “Wait!”
A shuffle, and he did not have to turn his head to know that the figure was making an attempt to stand. He did not have time for this. “I have something to report. Something important!”
He turned, his expression placid. His eyes flicked over her person, and there was no denying the distress she was in. “You are not at your post,” he chastised. The Project’s logo had been embroidered onto the left side of her shirt. One of them. Perhaps she was unaware of its ultimate purpose, perhaps not, but it did not change the fact that she was under their employ.
“Which is what I was trying to tell you,” she grumbled, wiping at her eyes and trying to stand a little taller. For what purpose, he could not say, as it could not possibly be an attempt to intimidate, so useless was the action given her stature. “Someone came and took me from my desk. Held me at gunpoint. Made me take them to the escape pods.”
261 did not have time for this. “I have just come from there. They have already departed, and can cause you no further harm. You should return to your post.”
“But...” she swallowed, fidgeted with her skirt, a frown forming on her features. “You didn’t catch them?”
His eyes narrowed. “Obviously not, or else the alarm would not be sounding, would it?”
She bit her lip, clearly chastened by his words. He had not intended them to be overly harsh, but she apparently found them to be.
“I guess not,” she murmured. “Sorry for interrupting your...” her head tilted slightly, and she eyed him curiously. He was not going the correct direction to report back to his superiors. Those like him did not mingle with the legitimate side of the practice. Unless there had been some issue of security, he should be the first of his kind that even this female had seen at all.
“What are you going to do?”
He paused, considering his course. She would be dead soon in any case, if his intention proved successful to see this entire ship blown to bits. Would it be so terrible to end her now? He eyed her, considering.
There was nothing remarkable about her. There were an abnormal amount of freckles across the bridge of her nose, suggesting time spent on a planet with inadequate atmosphere to prevent damage. Her hair was bound neatly at the nape of her neck, though pieces of it were beginning to disengage in a decidedly disorderly fashion—perhaps related to her earlier distress. She was of a human class, or if interspecies breeding had taken place, it had been many generations ago.
932 had a female with him.
She had ended up being a benefit to a cause, clearly an important factor in his decision to rebel. Perhaps she was a grounding force, a daily reminder not to return to the masters, to carry out his own mission rather than yield to training long buried deep within.
There had been nothing very notable about that female either, but perhaps that was yet another skill that had been deleted from his being. He would not be able to tell when something was important, when someone was important, and he could stand, coolly assessing, trying to decide if they were worth killing immediately or sometime in the very near future.
It troubled him, as much as he could be troubled, that he might dispense of an asset and never know the difference. “What is your function here?” he asked, ignoring her own query entirely.
Her hand smoothed at her skirt again, and yet another effort to appear taller. It failed just as miserably. “I’m a receptionist. I was working when that man came with the gun and brought me here.” A flicker in her eyes, one that he could not hope to place. But he could see it, and wonder what it meant. How did 932 know that the female had been important?
“What is it that you do?” she asked more pointedly, her eyes drifting over his person. Her fingers were twitching, as if wanting to fiddle with the fabric of her clothing, or perhaps merely mingle with their neighbours in an effort to give outlet to her nerves. He had seen such tells plenty of times, and despite her bravado, there was no mistaking her unease.
Her attention landed on the badge at his sleeve, indicating he was a member of special security, and she relaxed slightly. It was a miscalculation on her part, for her to trust such a signet when he was prepared to so u
tterly abandon such a post. Perhaps that indicated she was not such an asset after all, if her judgement could prove so faulty.
He took a step forward, prepared to do what was necessary, and she took an equal step backward, a line forming between her brows, her worry most evident. “What are you going to do?” she asked, a tremble in her voice.
His head tilted, mirroring what hers had done so recently. “Expound.”
It was not something often asked of him before he killed someone. They rarely understood his intentions before he took action. He knew the workings of his face well, and he was certain that nothing there gave away his decision, but she had asked it anyway.
Her eyes darted to the doorway, clearly understanding that she should have kept moving, but he knew he could catch her easily, and it was obvious she was aware as well.
Tears began to fall, though her jaw was set resolutely. “I don’t know. Something’s very... off about you. And I think you’re...”
He eyed her steadily, wanting her to finish. He had already ordered for her to expound, and there should be little reason to do so again. He took another measured step forward, trying to remind her that it was only her speech that was keeping him at bay.
She swallowed, taking another shuffle backward. “Did you help that man? The one with the gun? Are... are you an accomplice?”
If she had spent more time with those in the Project’s employ, she would have known that there were many like him. More akin to those who dabbled with technology, turning machine into something lifelike. But his masters had chosen to do the reverse, fine tuning their system to something much greater than what he had turned out to be.
But still, there were a few left of his class. He had seen a few throughout his existence, mostly when they came to be terminated because their lack of emotional understanding had proven unfavourable yet again.
Couldn’t draw attention. Couldn’t let anyone know they were somehow less than the generations that followed.
Her phrasing was odd. He supposed he did help, insomuch that he did not arrest them both immediately on the spot. He did not see it that way himself, not exactly, but it would be pointless to explain that to her. And accomplice suggested an affinity that was not there. He had no intention of ever seeing 932 again.
If things went as he hoped, he would not be seeing anyone again.
He was taking too much time with her. He had things to do, and they did not include spending precious moments trying to decide if she would be a benefit to him.
Her questions hung between them, silence a tool he had long since perfected. People, normal people, who had been born with all parts of their being still intact, seemed willing enough to fill that silence with whatever answers suited them. It made less work for him, at least.
He needed to end this, and soon. The question of her suitability still nagged at him, but he simply did not have time.
She scuttled back when he came closer, making it a good five paces before he caught her. It always surprised him how warm a person could be. He never noticed temperatures overly much in relation to himself, but then he touched another, and he could see how cold his hands truly were.
The hands currently around her throat.
Not squeezing. Not yet. Suffocation was an arduous business, one that took more time than he had. He would break her neck then, a quick jerk of motion, and it would be over and he could move on to more important tasks.
She was talking. A hurried stream of words that took a moment to penetrate his thoughts. “Please, I’m second eldest of nine. They all love me very much, and would miss me terribly if I.... if I died.” She choked a little at even the mention of it, not because of his actions, not yet, but of her own distress. A curious number of offspring from her parents. Not unusual for the farming classes, but difficult to keep that number alive. So not too poor.
Her hands reached up to scrapple with the ones about her neck, trying to prise them away, even as he kept his grip just enough for her to be unable to do so. “My parents love us all very much, and they didn’t want me to go, but I... I didn’t want to spend my life in the colonies.” A strain in her voice, a flicker of her eyes suggested this was a falsehood. He wondered why she would bother with deceit, especially in her last moments.
Yet still, she pressed one. “I got this job and Papa said that I’d find no good up here, but I just wanted something new.” Her face crumpled, devastation clearly flooding her at the idea that she would never be able to speak to her progenitor again, never inform him that he was right to caution her choice of employ. “I need this job,” she near whispered, more to herself than to him. An odd thing to say, for her to plead for her work rather than her life.
If only her work was not a grotesque mockery of conception. Perhaps not directly—he did not doubt that she was nothing but an underling in the greater cog of the Project’s workings—but that did not absolve her of involvement.
“If I kill you now,” he informed her, “it might be seen as preferable to what is coming next.” He tried to smooth out his voice, so that it might be seen as a comfort, but he was unused to such a practice, so it retained its usual grumble instead.
She blinked at him, his words evidently slow to take meaning through her haze of fear. “What do you mean? What comes next?”
261 glanced upward to the light shining above them, flickering persistently as the alarm continued to wail. “You will not have this job after today. You should have stayed in the colonies.”
He could see the tension in her facial muscles—the desire to frown was there, but her crying was preventing the expression.
Why was he still talking to her?
Because doubt niggled, and that was not something he had felt often. Whether following an order or simply performing the route task of existing, numbness had been his constant companion. There was no need to question, no care for ethical implication. Only tasks and orders, obedience and performance, with nothing else to consider.
Now, there was purpose.
One that did not include pleasing the masters.
Quite the opposite.
He had killed many before, and this should be no different. And maybe, once it was done, it wouldn’t be. He would forget her, she would be another faceless nothings in the recesses of a mind already prone to purging unwanted memories, and that would be the end of it.
The end of her.
Yet still, his hands did not squeeze.
“We help couples have babies,” she asked, her eyes full of confusion. “Why is that so wrong?”
He shook his head, his hands falling away from her entirely. She rubbed at her throat, though he was confident he had not hurt her, the impulse an unconscious once. “You do not know what that facility truly does?” He eyed her speculatively, looking for any hint of deceit still in her. She had already lied once, and he would not tolerate her attempting to do so about something that actually mattered.
The history of her family did not.
This... this did.
If she was a knowing participant, if she was far more than the receptionist she claimed, then there was no doubt in his mind that she deserved to be a part of the ship’s imminent disaster.
Her brow furrowed, her tears beginning to dry on her cheeks. Her skin mottled red, mixing with her freckles into a fascinating conglomeration. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she insisted, shaking her head and clearly willing him to believe her.
He did.
For now.
He grunted before reaching into a pocket of his uniform and producing a set of tether-cuffs, placing them on each of her wrists before she had time to react. A tether, invisible to the naked eye, would keep her tied to him, until he could decide what to do with her.
She did not seem to understand their function, and hurried feet tried to take her in the opposite direction, only to be yanked backwards toward the unit still settled on his person.
“You will follow,” he informed her. It should have been
unnecessary. If she’d had any sense, she’d have recognised the tug and understood she was meant to keep close, but evidently she required verbal instruction.
Inconvenient, but he would not berate her for it.
“Why?” she asked, a catch in her throat. “I...”
He turned, patience leaving him. That alarm was unceasing, the sound piercing in his skull, and he wanted to enjoy the taste of his new purpose for as long as possible before circumstances prevented him from fulfilling it. “You will be quiet now. And you will follow.”
Lips formed a mutinous line, but no sound came from them, and that was exactly his aim.
He knew this ship well. Passages that he had not personally traversed were still well charted in the plans in his mind, each corridor carefully imprinted so he would know how to secure, how to fetch and carry, how to see to any of the masters’ tasks.
He had only been in the engine room once. A child accompanying his parents to an appointment had wandered free—entirely negligent on the part of everyone. Scans of the ship had finally located a small, unauthorised being huddled beside one of the consoles, frightened, but unharmed.
261 had not offered much comfort, and the boy seemed more upset after being found than he had when lost, but that had not been his rescuer’s fault. Not entirely. He was made to tend to a mission, not soothe a child’s fears.
Just as he did not think it his responsibility to tend to the woman’s tethered to his hip. She frequently seemed to test the limits of the bond, falling back and grimacing when it demanded she keep a better pace, and more than once he had to give it a tug in order to force her into a lift.
She was reticent to be close to him, and he did not blame her for it. No one was pleased with his company, and he had very recently threatened to kill her.
Perhaps it had been a mistake not to.
“What do you intend to do?” she asked quietly while the computer showed them moving steadily downward.
Designation 261 (The Wholeness Project) Page 2
