“Mystery solved,” she murmured. “But why are you on this?”
Better yet, why didn’t Senna know she was on it? With any medication that serious, a doctor would ethically have to warn about the potential side effects. But there was more, much more, as Zurri hurled a quick glance over her shoulder, listening to Colbie rummage among the shelves, before hurrying to check the LENG notes section.
“Oh my God,” she breathed, counting the individual session numbers. Something hard and hot and choking gathered in her chest as she took it all in. In the just under seventy-two hours of Senna staying in the Dome, she had spent twenty of those hours over nine sessions receiving the LENG treatment. That didn’t seem right. Twenty hours?
Behind her, in the storage room, she heard Dr. Colbie drop something and give a soft “Darn.”
Of course she didn’t swear. Zurri swiveled back to the notes. There would have to be an explanation for that length of treatment. Unless they were all spending that much time with the tech? Wouldn’t she remember that? Could she?
Sessions 1 and 2 seemed normal enough, the notes reading:
Encouraging signs of progress adjusting connections regarding neural markers 12 to 38. Demesne DW Crash likely absorbed. Further exposure required to loosen connection between markers 38 and 41.
From Session 3 onward the notes became scattered. Erratic.
Session 3:
Emergency exposure required after participant displayed acute signs of relapse. Emergency neural scan administered. Emergency termination of Demesne Dome Miscellany, Demesne A. Death, Demesne Recent Interpersonal Trauma. Six additional Demesne flagged for examination.
Session 6:
Further relapse. Participant proving resistant to termination of markers 67 to 89. Keep under observation. Prescribe 25 mg Zolapro to manage post-treatment reactivity.
Session 7:
Participant displaying resistance to LENG absorption, recommend moderate sedation throughout sessions.
PD: Zolapro resulting in marked difference, participant far more compliant, in and out of LENG sessions.
A cold finger ran down Zurri’s spine. What the hell is going on here? Trembling, she glanced over her shoulder one more time, hearing Dr. Colbie’s clicking heels coming nearer. She was returning. Zurri fumbled with her VIT, managing to quick-open the camera function and snap an image of the file before throwing herself across the desk and back to her original position.
When Dr. Colbie emerged from the storage room, Zurri was forcing her hands not to shake while she pretended to examine her nails. Dr. Colbie knew about the sessions. Dr. Colbie was taking these notes. Dr. Colbie, Zurri decided with a growl, was at best complicit and at worst actively shredding Senna’s mind with the technology.
One word glared in front of Zurri’s eyes as she held out her palm expectantly.
Compliant.
She had a bone-deep, gut-level, feminine hatred of that word. Even when she saw it used on dry instructional pamphlets on transports, she felt her lip curl. Compliance had never been her thing. She hadn’t become the most recognized face in beauty and fashion by complying with anything, and now, to see that word there, in that context, in a decidedly menacing and not-dry-pamphlet way, lit an inferno under her ass. They were drugging Senna, and, one could only assume, they were drugging her and the kid, too. Han did seem awfully content, awfully compliant. And it was out of character for Zurri to just accept a radical change to the rider she had submitted pre-arrival. Shit. Was she complying, too? Dr. Colbie placed the tube of gel in Zurri’s hand, and she almost popped it open with the force of closing her fingers around it.
“Don’t overuse it or it will give you a rash,” Dr. Colbie instructed. “Not ideal, I’d imagine, for someone in your profession.”
“Thanks bunches.” Zurri pushed away from the desk, striding with new purpose toward the door, smiling with a clack, showing Dr. Colbie her teeth.
29
Han stood bathed in the eerie, pale light of LENG’s source, watching it churn in place, a silver glob no bigger than his fist. Suspended in midair, two massive conductors above and below held it in place, the magnetic field containing it so loud, so powerful, that every hair on Han’s arms had stood on end as he inched closer to the observation barrier.
In the old vids, kids his age would spend their summers at run-down pools in falling-down community centers. The room reminded him of that. Big and cavernous, echoing with its emptiness, and at the center of it all, in a space carved out just for its containment and existence, floated the silver orb. On the other side of it, opposite from where Han and Paxton stood, a curved disc like a lens sat outside the magnetic field, a tube no wider than Han’s pinkie finger extending out from that lens and into the wall, disappearing into a hole there.
“This is the only place it could safely be removed from its original vessel,” Paxton explained, arms crossed and head tilted to the side while he watched Han watch the orb. “It had to be this place. Ganymede. We needed the magnetic core, the raw magnetic potential of the moon to part gift from wrapping.”
Han could only glance at the orb in fits and starts. Even if it only appeared to be a weird glob of mercury-like substance, he knew that couldn’t be it. It pulled on him. The moment he stepped foot into the room, he sensed a million eyes boring into him, seeing through him, the presence of a million invisible bodies, the chaos of a million barely perceptible whispers. Whenever he let himself observe the orb for too long, his eyelids began to droop. He would snap himself out of the lull, only to be drawn back again.
“D. J. Natarajan’s craft picked it up on scanners before his communications went dark. It was the last comm to make it out, pinged off of the deep-space Merchantia HQ receivers.” Paxton smiled as if recalling a fond memory.
“He’s the one who got too close to Sagittarius A,” Han murmured, hypnotized.
“No accident,” Paxton replied brusquely, as if it were obvious. “He piloted right into that supermassive of his own volition.”
“Why?” Han whispered. Why would anyone want to die that way? Of course, death from a black hole could only be a theory. Nobody really knew what actually went on past the point of no return.
“Because he wanted to know what would happen,” said Paxton. “I would do the same. Right now, I can feel that thing willing me to look at it. Pulling on me.”
“But what is it?”
The magnetic field, or maybe the orb itself, emitted a constant, rhythmic wrlub-wrlub-wrlub, a sound Han knew he would never forget, a harnessed lullaby. The silver orb shifted and rearranged itself, appearing, in Han’s eyes, to be struggling against some inner, living creature, struggling and fighting to get out.
“D. J. Natarajan’s last comm,” Paxton sighed. “A single object resisting the pull from a supermassive black hole: this orb, contained within a metal never seen before by man. What do you think he saw? The whole of the universe stretching out in every direction, in all its infinite layers? The light of every star shining toward you, beamed into your eyes? Do you think the light bent around him in a perfect circle? Do you think he knew when he began to fall through time, or was he dead on a cellular level before he ever experienced the forever fall?”
Han tore himself away from the orb, staring up at Paxton instead. His eyes had filled with strange glitter, his mouth slack. It looked like he had fallen asleep with his eyes wide open. A single bead of blood trickled from Paxton’s nostril.
“You’re bleeding,” Han murmured. A dark halo hung around Paxton’s shoulder, then flashed, and Han clutched his stomach as if he had been punched. Another wave of déjà vu crashed over him, weightier than the last.
“Damn.” Paxton brought himself out of his daze, pulling a tissue from his pocket and dabbing at his lip. “I should . . . should adjust the humidifiers.”
Han squinted. “Could it be an actual black hole in there? One the size of a
single particle? But how is it not distorting space and time around it? How could you even recover it from space? The density alone—”
“We don’t know what it is,” Paxton admitted with a shrug and a dry laugh. He tucked the folded tissue back into his pocket. “Black holes don’t produce anything, but this thing was right there on the edge, just . . . just hanging out, defying all the laws of physics. When we found it, the shell and its contents weighed about a kilo. But once we measured the orb and the field and did a little math, the orb turned out to weigh nine hundred and seventy kilos. Mad, right?”
“A black hole would weigh more than that,” Han said slowly. “Way, way more. At least a solar mass.”
“Theoretically, yes,” replied Paxton. “We had all sorts of theories, still do. Me, I mean. I do.” He rubbed the back of his head and then adjusted his spectacles. “I’m sure you’d have theories, too. If you stay, you get to study this sweet baby with me. Discover all of its secrets.”
Study it with him? Han brightened. “You think I could do that? You think I’m ready?”
“You will be,” Paxton assured him. “I’ve set a few tests for you, and you’ve passed them all. I had to make sure you were bright enough, and ruthless enough, and I was right . . . you are. So even if you’re not ready to study LENG right this minute, I’m confident you will be one day, and I’d like a protégé. It’s time.”
Han forced himself not to glance at the orb again, though he could feel it sucking on the edge of his vision, trying to entice him to look once more. “But you’re using it, aren’t you? You said this is what fuels the LENG tech.”
“We know it’s dense, we know it generates an incredible amount of energy, and we know that energy can be focused with the metamaterial lens.” And there he pointed to the contraption set up on the other side of the orb and the tube feeding into the wall. “That force can be targeted with incredible precision.” Paxton stared at him for a moment, while Han chewed the inside of his cheek, trying to decide how he felt. Sick, for one. Terrified, for another. “Han, you’re the last person I expected to be squeamish about new tech capabilities. This is the frontier. There is no frontier farther out than this that you can reach, not even on one of my science vessels. This right here, what we’re studying, is it.”
“Why do you keep saying ‘we’?” Han asked softly. It was the easiest question to reach for. The other questions, the scary ones, still felt too big to grasp. Paxton didn’t even understand the energy source he was using to manipulate the connections between their memories. And Han would never describe himself as technologically squeamish, never, he had begged to get his VIT-optimizing implant early. Begged. Begged . . . someone. He had a mother, Paxton had told him as much; he must have begged her.
Han shivered, realizing that if he stayed, this man would be his new family.
“My partner was the one who scooped up the LENG particle in its shell,” Paxton replied, irritated. He tapped his foot noisily on the floor, though it was mostly drowned out by the commotion of the magnetic field generators. “Among other things. And unlike D. J. Natarajan, he decided not to fly his ass directly across the event horizon. Nobody boldly went like Glen—he and Misato Iwasa cooked up the specs for the Mars HQ colony, for this facility—shit, he recovered Natarajan’s last comm, this.” He gestured to the orb floating behind him. “The original Foxfire sample recovery? First fucking contact? All him. The man was brilliant.” Paxton paused, and reached into his pocket again, and Han saw his hand close around something more solid than a wad of tissue. “Brilliant but soft. Sensitive. Too sensitive for this place. For what it does to you.”
The bubble boy in isolation, Han thought, taking a tiny step back. The bubble man in isolation.
“I’m not soft,” Han squeaked. He didn’t dare ask what had happened to his partner. “I just . . . I don’t know if I like that you used LENG on us when you’re not even sure what it is. O-Of course I want to study it. Of course I want to know what it does. Who wouldn’t?”
Paxton’s posture relaxed and he blew out a blubbery breath. Then he let go of whatever was in his pocket and pushed both hands through his dark, wavy hair. “Jesus. Stay here long enough, this thing does something to you, I swear.”
The dark edge surging off Paxton’s shoulders remained in place as he walked toward Han. That darkness coalesced, bleeding down and out, growing a head. It stood, now apart and whole, a shadow with the size and density of a man. Han trembled and raised his hand to point, but the shadow stepped behind Paxton and gently placed its long black hands on the man’s shoulders, guiding him resolutely past Han and toward the door. As they went, Han could feel the shadow’s attention turn toward him, watchful and observant without eyes. It took one slender black arm and lifted it, pushing a finger to where its lips might be, warning him to be quiet.
Han opened and closed his mouth, but couldn’t—wouldn’t—speak. What was this thing, and what did it want from him? He shook and clenched his fists, and worried for a moment that he had peed his pants. But the shadow turned away, and focused on Paxton again, steering him toward the door.
“Who needs a vacation?” Paxton called back to him, barking with laughter. “Or a drink. Jesus.”
Han hesitated, afraid to go near the shadow and afraid to be left alone with the silver orb. He stopped to see it one more time, indulging it, sensing it wanted to be seen. It couldn’t be a real black hole, even an infinitesimally small one, could it? It would have to weigh more, be more, do more. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something trapped inside that liquid silver goo. Maybe that was why its surface seemed so strained, because it was holding so much—a puncture in the universe, the combined life and energy and matter of an entire star.
All that concentrated mass pointed at his head, angled against his thoughts, shot into his brain. And if it had taken his memories away, then somewhere inside the swirling silver mass, the image and voice and warmth of his mother might just be mingling with the anamnesis of a dead, imploded star.
30
“I don’t understand.” Senna finally put down her brush. The painting was nearly complete. She glanced up at Efren, and he was steadily returning her gaze. “How can a black hole take away our memories?”
Pushing back from the statue pedestal, Efren came to stand over her, scratching his chin thoughtfully as he gathered his thoughts. “Because it isn’t a black hole, not exactly. Dunn doesn’t know what he has. When a star collapses, it takes everything with it, planets, moons, meteors, civilizations. There is a supernova, and something is expelled. Something is always expelled. The concentration of star, moon, rock, water, life. What the supernova spits out, what’s left behind, is the Vestige.”
“And . . . that’s what he has?” Senna’s brain felt tired. She had never been one for science; art and storytelling and caretaking had always been her forte. But she tried to follow, realizing by the second that her survival depended on that understanding. Not the survival of her body, perhaps, but the survival of her heart and mind. “Paxton found the Vestige?”
“It precedes the black hole, and it is part of it, but they are not the same,” Efren told her, crouching near the bench again, bringing them eye to eye. “The Vestige contains immense energy, power . . .” He swallowed with difficulty, briefly glancing at his shoes. “And danger. He does not understand it, but like all men of hubris, he would use it anyway.”
Sighing, Efren stood and strode back to the statue pedestal. His hand hovered over the split container there, molding around it as if trying to memorize its shape, but without touching it. There was something sad in the movement, like a last dance, familiar and forlorn. “This place is a prison, Senna. For you and for me. You must escape it.”
“If you’re a prisoner, then you’ll come with us,” she pointed out plainly. “But you’re not telling me something. I can guess, but I’m afraid to.”
He smiled, laughing light
ly. “There is a profound connection,” he murmured, continuing to shape his hand around the broken orb. “Between the shape of space, matter and motion, just as there is a profound connection between the shape of space, matter and man. Being here, watching you all, has taught me that. There is also a connection between you, the boy and the model. It will take all three of you working together to leave this place. She intrigues him because she slighted him, you intrigue him more because he sees you as similar, two beings raised in isolation. The boy’s mother is the voice of almost every machine in the universe now, and he can’t stand it, it will trap him here, make him Paxton’s prisoner and his protégé.”
“Han looks up to Paxton,” she replied. “I don’t know how to convince him to leave.”
Efren shrugged. “It may be easier than you think. Dunn lives in isolation for a reason, his temper cannot withstand even mild debate. As much as he thinks he is like Han, they’re very different. The boy is genuinely clever, all of Paxton’s brilliance is a lie. Stolen. Cleverness is not the same as ruthlessness.”
“How do you know him?” she asked, standing and setting down the painting to dry where she had been sitting. “At least tell me that much.”
The statue pedestal and the broken canister lay between them. Efren’s golden eyes shifted away from his hand and to her, and she felt fleetingly breathless. What she saw there frightened her, but called to her, too.
“When you go into that horrid little dark room, Paxton feeds your unwanted memories to LENG, and you cannot remember the terror of it because he makes damn sure that you don’t.” Efren squeezed his eyes shut, breaking their strange connection. “He stops the Vestige before it can take too much from you, but there is a way for it to take everything. Dunn did not build this place alone, nor did he find and harness the Vestige alone.”
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