Synthetic Dreams

by Kim Knox

  “You just have.” Vyn stood back and folded herself down into a sitting position. She wouldn’t make the standing mistake again. She unclipped the simulacrum, wrapping the receptors and net around themselves, and tucked it into her jacket pocket. “I’ll be back in minutes.”

  A tired smile pulled at his mouth. “Not going anywhere.”

  “Good plan.”

  Vyn straightened her spine and closed her eyes. Her hand rested lightly on Paul’s shoulder, finding a steadiness in the slow rise and fall of his breaths. The tug of the portal ran along her skin, a hot whisper compared to the liquid fire of the portal that had led into the virtual room once holding Liam’s mind. And no strange mirrors or flickering scales. Maybe she was getting used to the madness.

  Grab Paul and drag him along the tunnels back to where they had entered the maze, to the first safe portal, the one they’d hardly felt as they jumped through it. That had to be her best route, the best chance to get his consciousness back to his body.

  A surge of heat swept over her and the hot metal-lined air of the tunnel sank into her lungs.

  “Vyn?” Paul grabbed her arm and dragged her to the wall, his body covering hers. “Why are you here?”

  “I have to get you out.” She struggled against his chest, ignoring the heat, the hard press of his hips. “Liam is waiting.”

  He stilled. “You found him? You got him out?”

  “That’s what you’re paying me for.” She gave him a sharp smile. “Eventually. So—” she held his gaze and tried not to stare at his lips, “—we retrace our path and get out that way—”

  “No.” His thumb hovered over her cheek, tracing the air over her bottom lip. Something lurked in his eyes, an emotion she couldn’t read. “The agents who followed us down. They’re right there.” His shoulder dipped for her to see the men frozen on the other side of a rippling wall of air.

  Fear twisted hard in her gut. Their way was blocked. “What’s holding them?”

  “Luck?” There was a bitter turn in his voice. Whoever was playing them hadn’t finished the game. “We can’t get past them and I can’t go through that portal.” His thumb touched her lip, a slow, warm slide that broke a gasp from her. “So you go. Take Liam. Go to the house next to mine. The vehicle there is ready and programmed with the codes to get you beyond the Corporation.”

  “Paul…” She was not leaving him behind. Trapped in the tier, his body in the cold-world would die, he’d become what she’d said Liam was—a phantom, a ghost lost in the machine. A shadow. “You stay…I don’t get paid.”

  A bark of laughter burst from him. “My bribe.”

  “Your bribe.”

  He pressed his lips together. “The only way out for us is through that portal, the one that will kill me if we take it.”

  She pressed her hands against his chest, the edge of her scars catching the fleece of his jacket. Her skin. Her skin had the insanity of the Goodman gear wrapped up in it. They’d made her their key, the one who could open their security…and more. She was its essence, the blueprint that bound it. They’d given her the power to do almost anything. “Trust me?”

  Paul met her gaze. “Yes,” he said.

  No hesitation, no question. Warmth filled her and her eyes burned. Was she supposed to be falling for a man she hadn’t known existed a few hours before? “I can manipulate the portal.”

  His hands cradled her face, his mouth brushing hers. His whisper burned against her lips. “I trust you, Vyn.”

  She closed her eyes and clutched the front of his jacket in bloodless fists. This had to work. She had a date to keep with him, a date that involved a lot of bare skin, a bed, heat, sweat and lust. Letting out a tight breath and denying the ache low in her belly—the man could get her hot even in a moment of sheer panic—she stepped back into the portal. The raw power of it cut over her and she felt Paul grip her shoulders, his fingers biting into muscle and bone. She thought she heard his bitten-off scream as shards of white-hot light stabbed around them.

  With a cry she jerked up, sweat coating her, her body screaming. “Paul!” His name ripped from her and she twisted, her fingers on his neck, desperate to find a pulse. His skin was clammy and her hand shook, her own pounding heart filling her senses. She bit her bottom lip, closed her eyes and forced her heart to slow.

  There. The thready beat of his pulse. A raw laugh broke from her. Alive. He was alive—

  “Touching.”

  Vyn froze, her fingertips hard against Paul’s neck, then turned her head. “Ossian?”

  Her friend stood under the vent, his blond hair shining in the rim of lights running down the wall. He smiled at her, something cold, tight and unlike any smile she’d seen before.

  A sick, heavy feeling sank down through her bones. The game player. The one who’d put them in the tiers, who held back the agents, who’d made it too easy to yank Liam out of the Box. “Who are you?”

  His head tilted and the crazy shine of the hacker was back in his eyes. Fear skittered down her spine as a smile cut across his mouth. It was as if glamour fell away from him. She’d never known this man.

  “Hugo March-Goodman.”

  A stone dropped into her gut. Her friend belonged to the family that had hacked her life. Paul stirred beside her and Vyn gripped his shoulder. Ossian—Hugo—swept back his coat and drew a projectile weapon from the band of his trousers. He aimed it unerringly at Paul’s back.

  “Stay still,” Vyn murmured, squeezing his shoulder again. “We’re not alone.”

  “I’ve always found you loyal, Vyn.”

  Her gaze darted to Liam, slumped against the wall, his eyes closed. Her heart clenched, a fierce, tight pain in her chest. After everything they’d done… Anger swelled through her. “What have you done to him?”

  “Him? He passed out. He’s my leverage as well as my dry run. I needed to see what you could do.” Ossian pulled a small touch pad from his coat pocket and ran his thumb over the gleaming surface. A soft beep followed and it jerked her attention to Liam. A red glow suffused his skin.

  “Bastard,” Vyn muttered. He’d tagged him, planted a subdermal explosive under his skin and armed it.

  Paul groaned and turned over. He sat up, rubbing a steady hand over his face. He stared at his brother, his emotions locked away, but his body vibrated with tension. “What else do you want?”

  “This—” Ossian waved his hand and Vyn tracked the touchpad, her heart in her throat, “—was all a test. I had to know if she could manipulate her way into the tower. What my father and my uncle did to her perfectly suited skin, the organic gear they created, gave her the skill to create the simulacrum. A lock with a key that created itself.” He drew a circle in the air with his weapon. “Ouroboros. Self-protecting, self-renewing.”

  She’d seen the symbol that day. A hint of it, the shimmer of a dragon’s scales, jaws locked onto its own tail, caught in an endless turn. That’s what she was? Still, she lied to Ossian. He was her enemy now. “We worked this out for ourselves, thank you, Ossian.”

  His familiar smile—quick, bright—caught her by surprise. It hurt. He’d been her colleague and the closest thing she had to a friend for years.

  “Your next mission is to infiltrate the upper tier. To use the simulacrum. Become my cousin. He’s in the final stages of a deal for Hall technology. He’s insane—a family tradition—in wanting to open it up to others. He has no clue what he’s doing. What he’s sacrificing for greed. I stopped him seven years ago. Had the unwitting help of my beloved but aging father and uncle. Latched onto you when they died.” Sarcasm lined Ossian’s words and his mouth thinned. “Lucas needs a surge of power in the Halls to impress—which is why a lot of the Fomorians are vanishing—and his selling out will put a chunk of Southern Europe under his purview.”

  Ossian drew vague circles with the touchpad and Vyn pressed her hand to her mouth. The Goodmans were using the creativity, the raw essence of trapped personalities to power their fucking depraved games. There w
as also a touch of what she was in how the Halls converted organic energy. Ossian was right, the CEO was a moron for exposing the Mind’s security for profit.

  “It’s the last meeting, the final face-to-face with the Tydeus Group.” Ossian’s gaze fixed on Paul. “You kill their CEO, Dia Mylonas, and you, her and him—” he jabbed the touch pad back to Liam, “—go free. I, of course, keep the simulacrum gear.”

  Ossian’s thumb teased over the shiny pad. “Yes or no?”

  Chapter Ten

  Paul frowned. “How do I know you’ll keep your word?”

  The other man shrugged. “You don’t. But if you say no, he’s dead. You’re dead.” A smile touched his lips and Vyn held down a shiver. “And she’s dead.”

  Paul pushed himself up and took Vyn’s hand, watching as Ossian’s fingers flexed around the weapon’s trigger. “We go now and we come back here?”

  “The rest of your plan stays intact. House. Vehicle. Codes to escape.”

  He didn’t release her hand. “What’s to keep the CEO from joining us?”

  Her former friend snorted. “Doesn’t know much about gear, does he?” He let out a slow breath, his expression full of false patience. “The simulacrum itself. If it replicates the neural patterns of a specific individual, then that flesh-and-blood mind is blocked from the virtual layer. The Mind doesn’t allow identical patterns. Vyn’s dominance over the system will force Lucas out. And the CEO of the Corporation is the simulacrum’s default image. The one necessary to bypass security.” He grinned. “There is a reason why making his image is illegal.”

  Ossian’s grin faded, but the sharp gleam in his eyes didn’t. “But you have to act fast.”

  Paul cursed. He closed his eyes, his face tight, and a muscle jumped in his cheek. Vyn didn’t break the silence. She’d made her decision, but she wasn’t the one ordered to kill. He scrubbed a hand across his jaw. “Vyn…” He didn’t look at her, his gaze fixed on his brother. “I have to.”

  “I know.” She eased her fingers free and tugged the wrapped wires of the simulacrum from her pocket. She fixed the receptors to her skull, letting the net drop and the familiar fizz wash over her. “I’m ready.”

  He glared at Ossian. “Deal.” He took her hand again and sank to the floor, pulling her with him. Lying down, he laced his fingers through hers, his grip tight. “Get comfortable.”

  Vyn followed his example, stretching out her spine against the metal floor. She stared at the shadowed ceiling before closing her eyes. Too quickly the fire of the Mind swept over her and she hunted for the upper tier, finding the portals, pushing up, pushing on, using her skin to break through codes to which only the Goodman family had access.

  Her consciousness burst through the final portal and there, on the edge of her thoughts, was the CEO.

  Sensations from his brain, his body rushed her. He’d only just sat in the cold-world chair he always used to enter the Mind, his body moulding into the padding. Soft, comfortable. The hint of leather and cigars clinging to its surface filled her thoughts. His grandfather’s chair, how Lucas had sat in it as a child with his own father. A sudden stark image of his father, his uncle, their faces pale and the copper scent of blood cut the air. The shadowed weight of a blade filled her hand. It came with a dark satisfaction.

  Lucas had killed them? What the…? And short heartbeats later, the cold-world faded. Images of a glass-walled office rose, his home, his secure base within the virtual world his family had created, streaming with warm light and scented with open pasture. His. All his. His to use. No one else’s…

  Stabs of panic cut her. His thoughts had thrown her. He’d murdered his family to grab the company for himself. Had he killed them before he knew what she really was? Had Ossian kept that from him? And shit, he was entering the Mind. Ossian had said he wouldn’t be there. Fuck. Would he be aware when she pushed him out?

  Lucas’s mind lapped over hers, calm but then disoriented. Her skin and the gear she’d created surged over and around him, working beyond her control, ripping him from the virtual world with a violence that ran fire through her veins. Vyn fought to find control, but whatever they’d created in her was closing against him. He was a threat to security. She couldn’t stop it. Her pulse raced. What was she doing? His scream rioted through her…and he was gone.

  Vyn opened her eyes and drew in a calming breath. Her hand reached out to steady herself, feeling the smooth cool fabric of the walls under her fingers and palm. The air smelled fresh, the hint of plants and lemon polish sliding over her senses in the soft light. She needed a second, a moment to let her thoughts settle, to will her heart to slow. Ossian was playing yet more games. The CEO’s pain had felt all too real and sharp. Too sharp.

  “Vyn?”

  Paul. Her heart turned over and she lifted her head, surprised to find her gaze level with his. She darted a glance at her hand and found the strong, supple fingers of Lucas March-Goodman in its place. The Mind still recognised him as the CEO, until there was a replacement. “He’s gone.” No, she still couldn’t get used to her words coming out in a man’s smooth, deep voice.

  “You’re sure?”

  There was a hint of uncertainty in his tone, reflecting in the tension around his eyes. He wasn’t handling her transformation to a man any better than she was.

  She wished the thought could make her smile, but her belly was sour. “He’s gone, Paul.”

  “Son-of-a-bitch.” His curse was soft, bitter. He pressed his lips together and straightened his shoulders. “We have a meeting to get you to, sir.” He fixed the knot on his tie and tugged down his jacket. He stepped from her path. “After you.”

  Vyn pushed her fingers through her hair. She hadn’t walked as Goodman before and the way his hips moved, the length of his legs, his upper body strength, and most of all the disconcerting weight of his cock filled her thoughts. Damn thing kept…moving. “I have a dick.”

  “I was trying very hard not to think about that.” Paul winced. “Sir.”

  She had to keep her mouth shut. She was certain Lucas March-Goodman didn’t randomly announce such things. “Sorry.”

  “No need to apologise, sir.”

  Vyn focused on her stride, ignoring the odd weight in her trousers. She could feel her way to the conference room, though she’d never experienced the locked-off areas of the Mind. The technology cut into her skin guided her. What the Goodmans had created in her was almost magical. She could feel it now that she was in the Mind proper with the perfection of the simulacrum wrapped around her. Something of her flesh—something they’d grown from her own body—permeated the virtual world, moving, resonating within her.

  She provided the security for every square centimetre on a quantum level. Distance away from the servers generating the Mind had never been a problem. A threat forced her, and the false her, to react as one, creating the simulacrum to protect the system from danger. Ouroboros. A dragon wrapped around itself. An endless, impenetrable loop. She might have admired the genius of the Goodmans, if they hadn’t destroyed her life.

  She stopped at a pair of large wooden doors. Her head bowed and the solid thud of a stranger’s heart beat in her chest. Her nerves strained, her grip on the image of Lucas strong. The Goodmans had made her. She wore them well. Still, panic ate at her.

  The corridor was shielded from the room beyond, so she risked questions. She had no love for any of the Goodmans, but Ossian had forced her to kill one of them. “Why is he doing this? All this show? The man who was risking security with his deal is…gone. He caught the agents, can hold them until their bodies wither. He could do the same here.”

  “He wants to break something in the Corporation. I don’t know what. But a senior security officer and a rival CEO? It could bring it all down.” Paul stood at her shoulder. “The event will be witnessed by both boards. Maybe that’s what he wants.”

  “You’ve attended here before.”

  “Once or twice.”

  A wry smile cut over her mouth. �
��You’re very high-level security, aren’t you Paul?”

  “Yes, I was.”

  Vyn glanced at him. The soft light from the ceiling lit gold in his eyes. She wanted to survive this and she wanted him at her side, but the knot in her stomach didn’t believe they could survive. Ossian was playing them from every angle. And the Tydeus Group would most certainly have claws in the security, claws in her. Ones she couldn’t begin to suspect because Lucas had been selling off information. Rescuing Liam had given her a stupid burst of overconfidence. It was a little late for that reality to hit.

  “So he wants the Tydeus people to see a senior security officer take out their CEO.” She frowned at the realisation that protocols existed in the Mind for just that action. “And you already have permission to do it.”

  Paul nodded. He gave a quick wave of his fingers and a personal opaque screen shimmered before him. His fingers moved quickly, tapping out information before another wave closed it.

  Vyn lifted an eyebrow.

  “I’m dumping my houses, my Goodman stock. I don’t want to be sucked into the implosion.” He gave her a hard smile in return. “I like being rich.”

  She let out a laugh. “Always prepared, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  Vyn paused. Her heart hitched up, beating too hard, her skin itching. It had nothing to do with the simulacrum. Goodman was a perfect fit. She turned to face Paul. Fear burned hot. He’d prepared for a future. But he knew as well as she did how completely fucked their situation was. Her shoulders dropped. “We’re not getting out of his alive, are we?”

  “Honestly?” He held her gaze, calm and resolved. “No.”

  “Then I have to do this.”

  Her hand framed his jaw and she leaned in, covering his mouth with hers. He didn’t resist. Even as her own palm felt large and thick on his cheek, the pads of her fingers too smooth. As a stranger’s tongue slid over the hard line of his teeth and the rasp of her bristled jaw and chin met his. Paul tasted the same. Delicious, hot, and the incredible pleasure of something so simply him sank through her flesh.