by Hanna, K. T.
“You’re sure?” Dom raises an eyebrow as best he can in the older man’s direction.
“Positive.” Mathur hesitates and then goes a step further with his explanation. “Your original adrium just needs to adapt to the newer adrium implanted into your system by Garr after the accident. It was lucky she had the non-replicated variety. She knew what she was doing and actually did quite a fantastic job, except for with your right thigh, which was not her fault. A piece of metal was lodged in deeper than she had the tools to see. We managed to retrieve it, and your right leg will be back to normal in a few days as well.”
He stands up and stretches. “Overall, you are in amazing condition considering you almost got cleaved in two, as Sai puts it. And speaking of which, I do believe she has been waiting just outside the door, sleeping on a makeshift bed, just in case you woke up. She is worried, Dom.”
“I know she is.” He has to beat down the constant thought that she should be, because he’s still worried about himself.
“Anyway, they tried to move you too quickly after the initial implant. Adrium takes a while to share affinity.” Mathur studies a reader in his hand and frowns slightly. “Garr will come in—”
Dom interrupts him. “Garr is still here?”
Mathur nods. “She couldn’t leave you to travel with Sai alone. You were at dangerous levels. She will be in to gauge your synchronicity levels and see if the graft will hold or if your body will still reject it.”
“I could still reject it? Isn’t it what makes me a domino?” The panic, the darkness, the parasite tries desperately to sink its claws back into him. But it’s a feebler attempt than usual. Maybe it’s wounded.
Mathur looks him directly in his eyes. “It is not quite like that. You’re the domino. Prototype, if you will. No matter what the others have learned or gained or were given when they were created in your image. They are not you and you are not them. Their creation simply sought to emulate you.”
Prototype sounds so much nicer. Dom grins and tries a fresh joke. “Maybe forty attackers was overdoing it just a little bit.”
Mathur’s smile is sad as he lays a hand on Dom’s head and leans down. “Do not do that again please. You worried me. Come talk to me later when you are better. We have elements of your transformation we need to discuss.” His eyes crinkle with fondness, and he walks out.
“Dom?” Sai’s tone is timid as she pushes into the room.
“Last time I checked,” he says, trying to mollify his dry tone with a smile.
“Sometimes I wonder why I bother,” she mumbles, but there’s a soft smile on her face as she suppresses a yawn.
“You bother…” The words trail off and he’s not certain what he should be saying, but he decides to forge ahead anyway. “…because there’s only one of me.”
Sai crosses her arms and studies him, a grin making her eyes shine. “I’m glad you were listening. There’s no other Dom. Who else am I going to go phasing through ventilation shafts with?”
Dom blinks at her and laughs softly. “Good. Just you remember that.”
“Sure, sure,” Sai says as she reaches back to adjust his headrest. He’s certain he can still hear a smile in her voice. “Seriously, though.” She looks at him again. “Are you okay? Can I get you anything? Do you need to talk?”
“That’s a hard question to answer.” And he’s not even lying. They’re all hard questions to answer.
She sits down on the side of the bed, a hand resting on his bicep. “You know you’ll be fine, right?”
Dom shakes his head. “I know, and yet… How was it for you and your legs? Did you find it that easy to convince yourself that you’d be whole again?”
Her face pales and she scowls at him. “No, but you didn’t lose an entire limb set, so I don’t think it’s quite the same.” She crosses her arms and glares at him.
“I’m sorry.” He bows his head, trying to figure out how to say what he wants.
Her tone is gentle and forgiving when she speaks again. “Try again.”
“There’s that part of me that took over, a part I’ve always fought off, a part that never had a direct avenue because of the stupid communication channel…” He looks up at the ceiling, trying to gather his thoughts. “I feel like there’s two people inside me. A switch that gets flipped in such a way that I barely remember what the parasite-driven me does.”
Sai shivers and gives him a quick hug before pulling back and focusing on him. “I think we both need to figure out how to use the parasite without it using us in return.”
“Now why didn’t I think of that?” Dom rolls his eyes—or tries to, because Sai laughs at the effort.
“Stop it. I’m serious.” The laughter is gone, her jaw squared. “Maybe there’s a way we can harness what it can do without letting it take over.”
“Maybe.” He hopes he sounds more certain than he feels, because even sitting here, safely, next to her, he can feel the darkness poking around the edges of his consciousness, just waiting for his control to lapse.
“What the hell is going on here?” Zach slams his hand down on the table with a resounding slap and glares around the room. It’s not one of his postured, “look at me” tactics, Bastian can tell—the man is pissed.
No one answers, and Zach rounds on Bastian, pointing a finger directly at his face, inches from his nose. “It’s you, isn’t it? You said there was no way your people weren’t being as effective as they’ve ever been. Well, what’s your argument now?”
Bastian raises his hands in an appeasing gesture, only to be met with a reinforced glare. “It’s not my people. They’re locked into the grid and doing what they’ve always done. Their abilities are unparalleled. If it’s not a virus or the food, maybe the people are building up an immunity?”
“That’s not possible.” Zach scowls, but Deign stands up just as he goes to open his mouth again.
“It’s been happening for a couple of weeks now. It started slowly and is gaining speed. The protests and unrest in the streets are beginning to get out of hand. Don’t blame someone who was indisposed, by you, at the time of the onset.”
Bastian just keeps his face neutral and crosses his hands on the table.
“However…” Deign sighs and appears a little pale under her makeup. “We need to stop this and we can’t do it until we’ve figured out what it is.”
“You don’t think this might be a natural immunity setting in?” Harlow asks, a frown on her face. “I mean, we’ve been using this on them for years. Just because we know the benefits they receive from the suggestion we use doesn’t mean they’re going to understand once they find out.”
Deign coughs, her poise gone for a split second. Bastian squints at her and at Harlow, at the way the latter can unsettle their leader, and files it away for later.
“They won’t understand the benefits—at first glance. It’s all a part of the bigger picture and none of them are digging deeper.” Deign pauses, her attention squarely on the security chief. “So how do you propose to remedy this?”
Harlow shakes her head in a hurried response, eyes narrowing. “I don’t have a solution for what to do. I was offering a reason for why it’s ineffective now.”
Deign’s gaze remains on Harlow for several weighty seconds before she smiles, a tired version of her usually fake expression. “I know. You and Bastian have always been the logical ones.”
He watches her closer because the tone of her voice indicates some form of wistfulness, perhaps regret. Something entirely un-Deign-like. She must be exhausted.
She breathes in slowly as she brushes her fingers over the glass screen desk below her. A frown mars her usual smooth features. “No one has ever exhibited a natural immunity to psionics before if they don’t have the dormant gene.”
It’s almost like she’s musing out loud, discussing the topic with herself. No one else breathes a word. Deign’s mood is odd today, even for her.
Except Harlow. She glances around at everyone else, onl
y momentarily locking eyes with Bastian. Her history with Deign, their childhood together, and everyone else’s silence seems to bolster her and she leans forward. “We’ve never tested it long-term, Deign. This is the test. This is the long-term.”
Deign focuses on her childhood friend, a hard line between her brows as she worries at her lip. “We’re what? Twenty years in? Shouldn’t this have shown before now?”
Harlow shrugs and leans back in her chair. Her eyes reflect an odd array of colors when her implant is disengaged. “We only recently regained the source after having lost it. We depleted many of the stored psionic supplies and I daresay thinned out the nets’ effectiveness to preserve longevity.”
“True.” Deign’s eyes flash, and Bastian can almost see the thoughts running in the woman’s head. She’s always been quick, smart, and ruthless. It’s why she’s here. “Maybe that was enough of a gap in pressure.”
“I’m not saying that’s the reason,” Harlow cautions softly, “but it’s the only recent difference I can see. That lull in a consistent increase of grid power could have been enough to break the chain.”
Bastian wants to hug her, but forces himself to remain neutral as he watches Deign mull over the thoughts in her head. No one else brought this up, and Harlow’s attention is once again on the blue-green flicker that’s reengaged in front of her pupils.
“Where is Owen?” Zach interrupts. His sullen expression screams that something is on his mind and that he’s paid the barest of attention to the current conversation. Tempting as it is to try and read the man’s thoughts, Bastian resists, even if tapping into his core would make it easy.
“Owen is dealing with an incident from last night in PC 4. Several of the alarm receptors didn’t activate, and the security imprint footage seems to have malfunctioned.” She focuses on Zach for a moment, her eyes narrowed. “You seem oddly concerned with Owen’s whereabouts these days, Zach. I assure you he has the Damascus well under control.”
Zach blanches slightly, but it doesn’t detract from his overall sliminess. There’s little of the Zach he once knew present anymore. Instead of mere bravado, he’s turned into a manipulative, power-hungry man. Bastian isn’t entirely sure how much of Zach’s act Deign has fallen for.
Markus breaks the glaring match. “Is it something airborne?”
Deign shakes her head, her attention off Zach for the moment. “We tested the air emissions in each of the PCs. There’s nothing registering as dangerous or different on any of the monitors.”
Bastian lets his breath out slowly. He’s not sure how Kayde managed it, but at least she thought of almost everything. Even if they catch on eventually, at least there should be enough of a delay.
“We could get the Damascus to beat the truth out of them.” Zach taps his foot underneath the table, a scowl on his face.
“You think we haven’t cornered suspected rebellion leaders and questioned them?” Markus speaks up, his quiet voice menacing in tone and his expression not far behind it.
“It’s not like you broadcast it. If we’re all going to work on this together, then we all need to work together. And that includes knowing what it is that hasn’t or has worked.” Zach is half-standing now, his eyes gleaming, ready for a fight. His breath comes short, and there’s a slight sheen of sweat on his forehead. Bastian watches him as discreetly as possible. Something is making him uncomfortable, right down to the slight tremor in his voice as he speaks.
But they don’t have time for this and Bastian reaches a hand to Zach’s shoulder and gently tugs him back into his seat. “Plenty of time to knock each other out after we figure out the solutions,” he comments softly. “What were you saying, Markus?” Bastian chooses to ignore the daggers Zach is glaring at him.
“We’ve taken in several of the protestors. They don’t know specifics but are completely aware that everything they get told and reassured about is a guise for what really happens. Like the truth about the last infiltration by the Exiled. There’s a deep-seated anger beginning to fester. We’re going to need a lot of psionics if we plan to try and push back on this. Now that they’re questioning, I don’t see how even the strongest push will win them over.”
“I’m not even sure if that would work.” Owen closes the door softly behind him, one of the new lieutenants going to stand with Bastian’s own, towering a foot above it.
Bastian can’t help but be awed. A beautiful specimen of machinery. If they had anything close to human inclinations, they’d be amazing assets. What makes the dominos so remarkable is the humanity was married to temper the adrium’s true nature. But the Damascus don’t have that boundary. They’re mostly machine, and anything biological that was a part of them has long since been discarded. With no moral compass, the adrium parasite takes control of all actions.
He switches his attention to the scientist. This time his hair is sticking out in all directions, but the eyes behind those glasses flit around every part of the room. Enigma though he remains, Bastian has a soft spot for him.
“Markus, can you tell them what you told me?”
Markus rises from his seat with a nod, and Bastian blinks at the direct look Owen gives him. But after that split second, it’s gone and it leaves him wondering if he imagined it.
“We’ve been getting information that our guards have been waking up in multiple PCs and not remembering quite how it was they got knocked out.” Markus puts up a grainy image of the darkened areas beneath the cities so that everyone can see it on their desk in front of them. The short is of two blurs disabling guards. “That’s the cleanest passage we’ve got. No other camera appears to have caught anything. We have no idea how it is or why it is that these rebels managed to get down there, nor how they managed to hack into our systems.” He glances over at Harlow.
Her face is pale and she blinks through screens, hands motioning in the air rapidly. “Trying to find the loop. There’s…” She frowns and Bastian feels bad. She’s always been a voice against Deign, always had a calm level of reason, and none of this is her fault. Kayde is just damn good. “I’ll make it my top priority.”
Deign nods, her eyes shadowed in thought. Bastian suppresses a shiver, knowing it’s only a matter of time before she figures it out. She motions to Markus to carry on.
He sips a glass of water before continuing. “Some have disappeared. Likely dead. While this could have something to do with the incidents, we still have no idea why.” He looks at Owen, who nods again, finally settled in his chair.
“After searching the warren of tunnels down there, we still can’t quite figure out why they’ve broken in. Because the hubs are the center for the air filtration, we did test the air as Deign mentioned. But there’s nothing. However, we are wondering if they’re just testing the extent of our security and perhaps seeking to overthrow from within.” Markus takes a seat.
“How is this related to the skirmish from last night?” Zach practically growls out the words. The patrols are usually under his watch, and the sheen of sweat has turned into a constant trickle down his temples. “I only had one patrol out, and it reported nothing.”
“I was getting to that.” Owen’s voice shakes a little, one of his nervous tells. “We’ve had a few alarms go up over this last week. This time, we staked out the corridors of the facility in PC 4. Basically, we set an ambush for them. But here’s where it gets weird.” He coughs and takes a sip of his water. Bastian is pretty sure he’s paler than usual. “The guards couldn’t see them properly. They whisked in so fast. The patrols were confused but waited for them when they came out of the hub area. Since their recorders were working, I don’t doubt it when they say the infiltrators escaped so fast they could barely see them. I believe them.”
“The two of them, from what we can tell, headed through the tunnels and ventilation shafts to make their escape. We sent troops after them—some Damascus mixed with a few special forces and regular army. About fifty people all told. Not one of them made it back to base.”
; “Not one?” Harlow asks, eyebrows raised in disbelief.
“Not one.” Markus bows his head, and this time Bastian knows he’s legitimately upset. Some of those guys would have been his.
“Domino.” Zach’s voice is soft but firm. “There’s nothing but a domino that uses invisibility. That freak of nature should have been put down long ago.”
Bastian clenches the fist on his knee. “I thought you disabled the dominos?”
Deign shakes her head, lips pursed thoughtfully as she looks at Zach. “No, most of them sort of disengaged themselves. Others completely devolved. We have no intel regarding where the others are. Why is that Zach?”
He shrugs and shifts slightly in his seat, eyes avoiding her as he shakes his head. “I assumed we lost them in the bowels of the city.”
“Assumed?” Bastian asks, affecting shock.
“Fantastic.” Deign’s voice is suddenly very small, tired, and oddly vulnerable. Her father handed her an iron-clad reign, and it’s breaking apart beneath her watch. He almost wants to feel sorry for her—almost.
“Did you find whatever it was?” Zach asks, although his tone no longer fools anyone. He knew all along that the dominos weren’t all defunct. He had to.
Owen shakes his head. “We found a lot of blood and another substance we’re still trying to determine. Fifty-odd bodies’ worth of blood, not to mention pieces of Damascus. Whatever did that…is not something I’d like to come across in a dark alley.”
No one speaks this time, not even Zach. The silence stretches uncomfortably. Bastian does his best not to fidget and hopes his expression doesn’t give away his own shock. He knew Sai and Dom had faced an ambush, but he wasn’t aware of the extent. She must have improved tenfold since she left for the Exiled to pull that off. His sense of pride is diminished by the sadness at her having to kill again.
Deign glances at the clock on the wall. Regardless of all the technological advancements society has made, Deign still leans toward things that reflect the past. She loves clocks and high heels, motor vehicles versus hovercraft, paper versus her reader. The woman is an odd juxtaposition, considering the position she holds.