by K. Gorman
She stumbled back, wavering. Snow crunched under her heel. An immediate shock of cold went through her as a few loose flakes shoved up the bottom of her pant leg.
Tia turned to her, hands in her pockets. She made a pretty picture against the backdrop, the red scarf at her throat so vibrant against the muted snowscape. Her long, straight hair spilled out of a brown knit cap, flakes of snow catching in the strands. Her cheeks had a rosy glow to them.
“What’s happening?” Karin asked.
“The loading process is almost complete. I’ll need to put you under soon.” Her boot scuffed at the ground, thick treads rubbed with flakes of snow. “The Cradle transfer works two ways. Normally, it would load a subject’s consciousness into the brain matrix for processing, then store the completed program. That’s why you’re able to come here. But I’ve modified the process to instead tap into your Eurynome base and copy myself back into you.”
“A copy?” Karin arched her eyebrows. “Like a computer file?”
“You saw me outside,” Tia said, her voice blunt. “I am, for all intents and purposes, a computer at this point.”
“So, you’re copying yourself into me, but your original will stay here?”
“Yes.”
“How is this even possible?” Karin began, gaping, then held up a hand. “No. No, I’m not sure I want to know.”
“The human brain has a remarkable capacity for storage, and my consciousness has already been stripped of its extraneous parts. There will be some modifications.” Her mouth opened again, and her tongue rested against the top of her teeth as if she wanted to say something, but the light show in the sky rolled over them again.
Prickles of feeling ran over Karin’s body. She swayed. The world seemed to tremble around her.
“Modifications?” she asked, her voice weak.
I’m going to change. She’s going to change me.
Fear clawed at her throat. She’d known it already—had suspected something exactly like this—but actually hearing it sent her reeling.
She shuddered, trying to rein in her panic.
Again, Tia’s expression returned to that indecision. But then, she seemed to shake herself out of it and step forward.
“Never mind for now. It’ll be much easier to explain on the other side. I—”
“No!” Karin gripped the woman’s arm hard, the strength surprising her in her weakened, shaking state. Her fingers dug into Tia’s arm, half in support as she swayed and half in threat. “I didn’t come all this way to get dicked around by some fucking scientist again. You tell me now what is going to happen.”
Tia gave her a strong, steady regard. If she felt any pain from Karin’s grip, it didn’t show in her face. But her expression had changed. Gone was the nostalgia she’d seen only moments ago, along with the sympathy that had been feeding her earlier explanation. In its place was the wary, stoic front that she recognized from their first interaction.
“Fine.” She jerked her arm away from Karin’s, the movement making her almost stagger to the snow.
She retreated a step, slowly straightening.
“The human brain has a remarkable storage capacity, but it is not enough to handle what I’m about to put into you. I need to re-allocate parts. You will lose things. You will change. It is necessary.”
I’m going to lose more of myself.
That’s what she’d been afraid of. A dry pit opened in the bottom of her stomach as she realized the full implications. It would be like before, when they cut away her memories, only worse. And it would happen all at once.
Nomiki’s face came to her, then Marc’s. She remembered his hand around hers, the care in his eyes when he looked to her, the way her heart seemed to pull when she looked at him.
Will I even know they’re gone?
“I will store them in the Cradle for potential retrieval,” Tia continued. “But I can’t…”
“You have no idea whether we’ll be back or not,” Karin finished for her.
Tears blurred her eyes. Her lungs emptied in one big puff, like she’d been punched. She ran her fingers through her hair hard enough to pull.
“Obviously, I hope we will be back. But it has been a long time since my systems have been maintained. I’ve already… lost things.”
Karin laughed weakly. “Well, the good news is I brought a cybernetics guy with me. And a neurospecialist.”
“Then maybe this will work.”
“Maybe.”
The light show rolled again, and a buzzing energy ground through her. She gritted her teeth as it dragged through her nerves.
Tia watched her. “It’s time. Are you ready?”
Was she? How could anyone possibly be ready for this?
Well, it’s not like I have much of a choice. If I don’t do this, Sasha will erase all of existence as we know it.
She let out a savage laugh.
Gods fuck old men playing god in their labs.
She straightened, chest still quivering with laughter. Then, she held a hand out to Tia.
“Sure. Let’s do it. Fuck me up.”
Tia gave her a strange look. Then, slowly, she took her hand. The gloves were gone, this time. It was bare skin on bare skin, the cold press of her fingers connecting. Tia’s thumb brushed over hers. Their eyes met.
She had one more glimpse of Tia, the snow, and the scene around her before everything went black.
The next thing she knew, she was waking up in the tank.
Chapter Thirty-Six
The room wavered, reality seeming to fluctuate. Her hands shook, water rippling, a solid hum wailing in the back of her mind. Thoughts and memories tugged at her. There were people in the room. Vague, blurry silhouettes. She couldn’t focus on their faces, but she could feel their stares, hear a voice speaking to her—a low drone, rolling like waves in the ocean.
She tried to reconnect herself, to concentrate on it, but it was like reforming a fractured mirror.
Slowly, shard by shard, splinter by agonizing, jittering splinter, she strung herself back together. She became aware of her breaths, slow and even, rasping through her throat. Cold touched her body, the water’s chill sinking into her skin and flesh, making it as numb as a corpse. She had trouble connecting her brain to them. The space tripped again, and she shuddered, resisting the pull that came at the edge of her power.
Eventually, the room focused. Warm breath slipped over her face—not too close, but within a meter of her. She got a sense of movement, smelled blood, coppery, with a taste of salt. A large, gray silhouette took up the right side of her vision, shifting a little, the light behind it.
Slowly, the blur dissolved. As his features sharpened into place, she found herself staring up into the steely countenance of Azrikam Devnath Leisler, Grand Regent of Arms of the Menassi Tri-Quad Alliance.
He looked worse for wear since their last encounter. Though his left side had been cleaned up, the metal around his arms, neck, and body had a warped, blackened look, with fresh replacement parts sticking out like polished chrome on a coal stack. Clear bandages stuck to his face like grafts, covering red, healing skin. A distinct ridge of angry scarring next to his left eye showed where the damage had gone deeper. His mouth was a thin, tightly pressed line, but the side closest to her had tensed, and he had a gleam in his eye—triumph, victory. Like a tiger that had finally cornered a pesky mouse.
She blinked once, twice. Took a breath, felt the tank water roil around her. She was moving before she realized it, hands grasping for the edge of the tank, heels tucking under her as she righted. The injector crown weighed her down, made her head loll back into the water before she corrected it. Pain twinged from the needles in her skull as she brought her head up, meeting his stare. The drone in her brain paused, not going away, but quieting, as if something had captured its attention. A scent came back to it, salt and copper.
Nomiki. Blood. Close-by.
The thought was a whisper of instinct, as if the shadowy parts of her brain c
oalesced the data together, pressed it into a conclusion, and fed it to her. She didn’t know how they knew her sister was in the room, but she didn’t question it.
What was she doing here? She should be on the Nemina, far away, safe with the others.
Did they not get away?
She winced. It felt like her entire brain was swollen, pressing against the inside of her skull. Bits and pieces hummed, droned. Moved against each other. A slice of exhaustion cut through her. She tried to shake it off, to focus on his face. His mouth was moving, words coming out of it.
“Good evening, Ms. Makos. Are you finally awake?”
His voice felt like a shock against the front of her brain. Too loud. Too much resonance. She hid a second wince, attempting to school her features as her mind whirred.
“It would seem that way.” She grimaced, gaze darting lower as she processed the other part of his sentence—good evening, he’d said. “What time is it?”
Twenty fifty-three, a voice inside her whispered.
“Close to nine,” he said.
Shock spiked through her. Her breaths quickened.
I’ve been under for six hours.
For a second, her perception shifted, the entire room splaying like some pinned insect. She grimaced, reeling it back, fighting for control. Her next words came out in a breathless whisper.
“Is my sister alive?”
He regarded her, cool blue eyes piercing hers like light through water. Nomiki had been fighting him the last time, she recalled. Had left him in a bloody, disabled mess.
Time stretched after the question. She held still, senses reeling. It felt like his stare went straight through her head and throat and pierced into her chest.
“For now,” he said.
She let out a sigh of relief.
Nomiki was alive. She could work with that.
Others shifted in their periphery—soldiers, the silhouettes she’d seen before, surrounding her like trees in a forest. She could feel their attention on her, the whir of their own thoughts. Metal glimmered in the crowd. She smelled blood, electricity.
Then, the drone returned, brimming across her mind.
A shiver ran through her. Power pulled in her bones like a moon on a tide. The room slid out of focus as her head dipped back, weighed down by the clunky bulk of the laser injector. Inside, she could feel her brain working, humming like a computer processor. Thoughts overlapped her own—Tia’s face, the interior of a lab, the Cradle, freshly new, its tank empty and still wrapped in delivery tape. She could still see the snowy field in her mind. If she wanted to, she could drag herself back there.
She didn’t.
A buzzing hum ran through her, making her body shake. Leisler looked down on her as she cowered against the tank, her breaths short and shallow. She hunched over, legs curled under her, nudity hidden under the arch of her back.
It passed, and she relaxed again. The corners of the room righted their drift.
Slowly, she reached back to feel along the top of the laser injector, found the catch release, and hissed when all twelve needles snapped out of her skull. It slid off her head and fell to the water with a splash. A brief flash of blood came to her, a hot press on the side of her head. Weak and shivery, she clasped the edge of the tank in a gentle, shaking grip and made to stand.
“There’s a person trying to end the universe,” she began, gritting her teeth as a wave of goosebumps filled her flesh. Water sluiced onto the floor, dripping from her hands, legs, buttocks, hair, and chin. Her head reeled, exhaustion turning it heavy, like lead. She struggled to bring her gaze up to his, to keep her focus within the conversation. Someone was screaming in her mind, had been for some time. “She plays with dimensional fields, has her own universe she wants to replace ours with.”
He quirked a brow. “Like you?”
“No.” The room spun when she shook her head, and she cut off the move with a wince. “I don’t want to take over the universe.”
An emotion flickered across his face—surprise, comprehension—and she realized that she’d just confirmed her powers for him. Perception tripped again, the room elongating and shifting, twisting like a kaleidoscope in her mind even though it stayed still in her vision. She stumbled, clung to the Cradle for support, felt her knee hit the edge of the tank.
The scream caught her mind again, high and piercing, more computer whistle than human, and she shoved it back.
It cut off as if she’d flipped a switch.
The drone in her brain changed, shifted. She found her attention slipping to Leisler again. He watched her. He didn’t seem to care that she’d stood up, but then, she made a sad sight, naked and wet, shaking, swaying as if she were drunk, obviously having trouble focusing. Cold air pricked against her body—all of her body. When she looked down, her skin reflected a soft glow from the tank’s lighting, breasts slack to the side, her legs below tinged with the blue light of the brain. Her hair fell in a soaked curtain over her neck and shoulders, a few blond locks so dark with water, they appeared black in her view.
For a second—just a second—a memory of black hair came to her. Long and thick, straight as a curtain.
Not hers. Tia’s.
She pushed it aside, forced herself to focus on the conversation.
“I don’t care whose custody I’m in.” He watched her as she struggled to form words. Her hand dropped to it as she eased herself over the edge of the tank, bare feet dripping onto the pre-fab floor, giving herself a little shake. Her mind was scattered, useless. Heavy. Like it had been reamed with drugs, then run over by a cement mixer. “Fallon, Alliance, Centauri—it doesn’t matter to me. We’re all facing this together, whether we know it or not. If I can stop her, I don’t care who has me.”
She fought to keep her gaze on him. All her head wanted to do was bow down, close her eyes, curl herself into a ball on the floor, and sleep. The tension around the side of his mouth had grown, curving it into the distinct line of a smile, and his eyes had brightened on her—hungry, sharpened.
A familiar voice cut through her thoughts like smooth velvet.
You should kill him.
Tia. She felt her presence like a knife in a hidden sheath.
Yes, I know you’re very set on killing men, she thought back.
A chuckle jerked her back to the present—to reality. Leisler’s eyes glittered, his mouth twisting slowly, baring teeth in her direction, sly with amusement.
“I don’t think so.”
The drone thickened in her head. Numbness shot through her muscles. For a second, she thought she’d misheard him.
“What?” she said, confusion wrinkling her brow.
Another chuckle. This time, there was no mistaking the sneer on his face. He took a step forward, crowding her space. She didn’t move, wide eyes staring up into his. He towered over her. Powerful. Imperious. Half his body destroyed or dismantled from his fight with Nomiki. When he spoke, every syllable rumbled from the effort of his carefully concealed anger.
“You will be drugged, bound, and transferred to my fleet in orbit under heavy security, where my scientists will take you apart, piece by tiny piece, and wring out every last mutation in your system. Then, they will affix a slave tag into your frontal cortex.” He flicked her temple with his finger hard enough to make her wince. His face turned from sneer to snarl. “You will be by my side, mute and helpless—a living doll—while I use your power to take over Centauri Prime, rip the halkam from his throne, and take my place as Supreme Leader.”
She didn’t dare move. His eyes were intense. Then, a sadistic smile slipped over his lips.
“But,” he continued. “Before all that, I will kill your sister, and you will watch as part of your soul dies with her.”
Her eyes went wide. With horror, she looked beyond him as he angled his body away, and she finally caught sight of Nomiki.
She sat several meters from her, disarmed and bound against the back cabinetry, a cyborg guard beside her, casually aiming a
Centauri blaster at her head. A bloom of new bruises decorated her cheeks, and her brow had a swollen, asymmetrical look to it. Her right arm was obviously broken, limp at her side. They’d stripped her out of her combat suit, leaving her in only a tank top and briefs. Her dark hair had come out of her bun, fraying in a messy way around her face. Everywhere she looked, there was skin. Naked, soft, vulnerable. Her eyes met Karin’s, sharp and grim.
Something clicked inside her.
Her mind had sharpened. Thoughts became more concise, acute. The background hum faded. The room stopped warping. Like flicking a switch, her entire attention was suddenly in the moment, aware of every speck of air, every atom of movement, every gun, every soldier, every breath taken, heartbeats, shifts of gaze, weight, smells, sounds. Everything focused, like a lake gone dead from the wind, the water nothing but a still mirror.
You should kill him, Tia whispered through their thoughts.
Nomiki watched her, giving nothing away. Her eyes widened slightly.
“I wouldn’t do that,” Karin said.
“Slaves don’t get a say,” he sneered, then made a gesture with his hand. In slow motion, she saw her sister’s eyes round, saw her start to move, saw the tendons in the Centauri guard’s forearm tense.
Time slowed. Karin tilted, moved. Reality shifted like light under blown leaves, and she bent through it, mind whirring. The world shivered like a strobe, moved around her. She pulled on it, power rising, her entire focus on the guard’s gun arm as she reached forward.
Then, blood.
She tore straight through it, cut her dimensional power into the guard’s flesh as if it were nothing, splitting it between worlds.
Splatter hit the wall in a violent spray.
His hand and blaster fell, gushing red, pouring blood, a mangled stump that had been his arm. The weapon went off, cracking a hot flash of backsplash and ricochet across her hand and wrist as she grabbed for it, now standing several meters from where she had been next to the tank.
She’d crossed the distance in an instant.
The dimensional warp shivered around her body like a second skin, making the space ripple. She slammed the blaster into the counter. Warmth flooded her skin, wet and red. Several inches of his forearm were missing, lying on the floor of the Shadow world in a bloody pile. The slice of his stump was a brief, meaty glimpse of muscle and bone.
