Woven

by Elle E. Ire

  She nods, then reaches out and takes one of my hands between her wrinkled ones. “I’m not one of those therapists who never really listens to her patients. And I’ve often found that when it comes to someone’s own mind, they have a better understanding of what’s really going on in there and what might make them whole again. We’ll try it. But.” She waits for my eyes to meet hers.

  “There’s always a but.”

  “Yep!” She releases me and retrieves her tea. “If the hallucination does not fade with this experiment you’ve come up with, then you have to be open to trying something else. Maybe medication.”

  I frown. The last thing I want is drugs, especially after my recent encounter with Jacks’s sex-enhancement concoction. While some can be effective, the side effects often seem to outweigh the benefits. VC1 will play with the levels of the natural chemicals my body produces, but that’s different. Nuzzi is referring to mixtures made in labs, synthetic compounds, not natural ones. I’ve looked up some of her suggestions, and they’re hard-core, seriously mind-altering shit… that often produce solid results, but… I’ve also got my memories back, and I know I experimented with some drugs in high school to my detriment. I never got hooked, but it was a close thing. I’ve told Dr. Nuzzi all of this. I’ve never told anyone else, not even Kelly.

  She pats me on my camo-clad knee. “Not all drugs are bad for you. Promise me if this doesn’t work, you’ll be openminded and trust me. If you agree, then we can go ahead with the treatment plan you’ve got in mind.”

  I study her open and honest expression, her deep desire to help me clear in her eyes. “I promise. I trust you.” My eyebrows rise, startled at what I just said. I’m pretty sure I’ve said those last three words to exactly two people since the airlock accident. Kelly was the other one.

  Dr. Nuzzi laughs. “Don’t be so stunned. There are a lot of reasons the facility won’t let me retire. Lots of reasons why I’m the go-to therapist for all the military patients. I’m the kindly older aunt, the grandmother they miss from childhood. And I’m very, very good at my job.”

  I laugh with her. “Yeah, Doc, you definitely are.”

  Chapter 40: Kelly—Encounter

  Vick is trapped.

  AFTER ALMOST two and a half weeks of mirror maze attempts, Vick has managed to get two-thirds of the way through the conference room without collapsing. She’s changed tactics. I watch her face the reflective surfaces head-on rather than casting her eyes down in an attempt to avoid them. She locks her jaw so tight the muscles are visible beneath her pale skin. She never breaks eye contact with the image in the mirror, regardless of what she sees there. It’s a dare, both to herself and the woman in the glass. I can almost hear her thinking, “You will not take me down forever.”

  While she does this, I monitor her both through the technology in the green room and through my own empathic senses. The monitors continue to register her vitals in the low red zones, but that’s better than they were at the beginning. On her first few attempts at this new strategy, she had her emotion suppressors set to their highest capability. I put a stop to that. She discarded that crutch over a year ago. I won’t have her overly leaning on it now.

  Not to say I’ve forbidden their use entirely. She will need those assistive devices for the rest of her life. But not on full, not high enough that she becomes the robot she sees in the mirrors, devoid of all emotion whatsoever. Inhuman to everyone except me.

  I always feel what she feels.

  Not to the extent that I used to, thank goodness, or I’d be on the tile floor with her after every collapse, but enough to know she’s very, very human, always.

  On the screens before me, Vick takes another couple of rigid steps toward the far door. She’s in full tactical gear, black bodysuit overlaid with black Storm armor, her most powerful attire that she had shipped to her from Girard Moon Base. When she dressed this morning, she had a new, heightened determination that today she would succeed.

  She won’t. Her raspy breath echoes over the speakers in the small green room. I’m on the edge of the couch, fists clenched, my own breathing faster than it should be, in synch with hers. I’ll have to provide lots of extra encouragement when they bring her out.

  Beside me, Dr. Nuzzi taps my knee. I jump a little. She’s been so quiet, I almost forgot she was there. “She’s about done. I’ll go get her. Five more feet. Not the victory she wants, but a victory still.” No anger or disappointment. The woman has infinite patience.

  I move to stand with her, but she halts me with a raised hand.

  “Stay put. Robert and I can handle her. We’ll bring her in here. You look like you didn’t get any sleep last night.”

  “I didn’t,” I admit, stifling a yawn. “Thanks.” I reach for my cooling cup of coffee on the end table as she leaves the room to join Robert in the hallway. I turn off the screens and speakers, returning the green room to a more comfortable silence.

  Ever since Carl and Robert and the other members of the Storm team on Earth detected VC2’s presence, Robert has taken up position right outside the conference space doors, just in case Vick’s cloned twin makes it through the facility’s security and tries to take advantage of Vick’s most weakened state. Knowing she’s out there somewhere, testing the defenses, searching for a way to attack, has had a negative effect on my sleeping habits. There’ve been multiple breaches now, with our technology specialist helping the Klenar staff to plug each incursion into the electronic systems. Even Vick’s strong arms around me all night long haven’t kept the nightmares away.

  VC2 is nearby. She’s coming. If the teams don’t locate and capture her soon, she’ll find a way in.

  Suppressing a shiver, I stare at the green room door, willing them to hurry. Even at her lowest, I feel safer when Vick is near me.

  There’s a bit of a commotion in the hallway, carrying through the closed door. Robert and Nuzzi must be having more trouble helping Vick than usual. I sigh, knowing this will weigh heavily on Vick’s self-doubt for the next several hours. Any miniscule loss of ground for her has a massive impact. I’m tempted to go and assist, but that makes things worse for her. She hates for me to see her during her initial collapse. Giving her a few moments in the hall to compose herself before I get involved has become our routine.

  The door opens, and Vick steps in, eyes wild and darting around the room before settling on me.

  All the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

  Something is very, very wrong.

  “Where are Robert and Dr. Nuzzi?” I ask, craning my neck to look past her into the hall. There’s no sign of them, no sounds coming from the corridor. Just her harsh, ragged breathing. I lower my empathic shields just a bit. The flare of anguish, pain, and frustration knocks me back against the far armrest of the couch. I raise my shields as fast as I can, blocking the worst of it, but the residual energy leaves me panting.

  “They had an emergency to deal with,” Vick says with no inflection. My insides ice over. No, not Vick. And not VC1 speaking through her, either, because under the current circumstances, the AI would be using as much inflection as she is capable of so she doesn’t scare me. Because the artificial intelligence… cares… about me.

  No. This is VC2.

  Her emotional rush has me failing to think straight, but I know. I know this isn’t Vick. I scan her from head to boots, needing to be sure, wanting to be wrong. Her hair sits in a messy bun at the back of her head. She always puts it up that way to keep it out of her face in the maze. These days, she wants to see her reflection. Her green-and-brown camo pants and olive-green T-shirt cling to her lanky frame, accentuating the curves of her waist and her breasts.

  But… she wore her black tactical gear today. Sometimes she wears camo beneath her armor, but when would she have discarded the black coverings?

  Oh God, please let that be the commotion I heard in the hall. Please let this be Vick.

  I hold out my hand to her, using the identification verifier that the two o
f us worked out a few nights ago. Because Vick was afraid VC2 might try exactly this. Because Vick is paranoid.

  And because Vick is usually right.

  “Vick….” My voice trails off as she steps fully inside. I catch a glimpse of a dark mound of something on the hallway floor behind her before the door swings shut, blocking my view. I swallow hard. “Give me your heart, Vick.”

  And I realize what else is wrong.

  The blue line that connects us is missing.

  “My heart?” She gives a soft laugh that falls flat, even taking her suppressors into account. Her head cocks to one side. She’s studying me. I can almost hear the wheels turning as she attempts to analyze where she’s going wrong. “I gave you my heart a long time ago.”

  Her smile would almost be convincing. If I was actually talking about her love for me.

  But I’m not. I’m referring to the tiny gold heart I gave her when I first tried to convince Vick that she wasn’t the Tin Man she believed herself to be, that she was and always will be human in my eyes.

  And VC2, while she might know about it from her brief interactions with VC1, would not have one. Or so we hoped.

  I know our guess was correct when the woman in front of me doesn’t reach for her wallet that she keeps in a back pocket while wearing her camo, the wallet where the heart memento would be.

  “Of course you did,” I tell her, stalling. “But it’s nice to hear you say so from time to time.”

  My throat tightens, preventing me from saying anything more. I’m trapped in a very small room with VC2.

  To hide my reaction, I swivel back toward the console and bring my hands up to its surface.

  “What are you doing?” VC2 snaps, moving to stand beside me, between the couch and the electronic surveillance system.

  “I thought we’d go over your monitoring results while we wait for the others to come back.” And maybe get a message out to Carl and the rest of our people onsite in the process. But my voice wavers. I’m hoping VC2 doesn’t know me well enough to catch it.

  Her hand snaps out and grabs my wrist before I can activate anything. “They aren’t coming back,” she says, low and even.

  Oh God. Did she kill Dr. Nuzzi and Robert? Is that what I glimpsed in the hallway?

  And what about Vick? Did VC2 kill her as well, or is she still trapped in the mirror maze, which, once she’s already collapsed, might be worse for her than death.

  A rush of adrenaline hits, and I yank my arm away, making a break for the door and the hall and Vick. I’m aware of rapid movement behind me, but I manage to get the door open and rush out, stumbling over the two bodies between me and the conference room entrance. I stagger-step until I hit the wall by the doors, catching my balance with my palms on the bloodstained surface before me. The soles of my white canvas shoes stick to the tile.

  A chill shivers through me as I glance back to see I’ve tracked blood across the hall, blood from an ever-growing pool around the bodies of Robert and Dr. Nuzzi. The grandmotherly doctor is definitely dead, her eyes wide and staring up at the ceiling tiles, but I’m certain I catch a twitch of Robert’s hand, still wrapped around the grip of his pistol, before it falls still once more.

  I should have known, should have felt the attack, especially the death so close, but with my shields in place for Vick’s trial, I detected nothing amiss outside the green room. I’ve made tremendous progress managing my empathic abilities around traumatic events. The irony isn’t lost on me.

  “Done running?” VC2 asks from her position leaning against the green room door frame.

  I open my mouth to scream. In a flash too fast to follow, she’s beside me, her hand covering my mouth, the other gripping me around the chest, pulling me back against her.

  “Not much point in shouting for help,” she says. “Everyone on this floor of the wing is dead. But just in case I missed someone, I’ll keep you quiet.”

  Everyone? No. Not everyone. Vick is still alive. She has to be. I stare around at the hall, the walls, the ceiling, searching for the blue line, but before I can get a fix on it, VC2 drags me down the corridor, away from the conference room, toward one of the emergency exits. A quick swipe of her hand across the access panel opens the door that should only unlock itself during a fire or some other major threat.

  “Where are you taking me?” I mumble against the chilled skin of her palm. Somehow she comprehends the words.

  “Someplace private where we can talk and not be interrupted. I need help. You’re going to help me.”

  She pauses, holding me under an awning until a security camera swings away from us on its overhead mounting. She glances into my eyes once before turning her face away, but I can see the torment and insanity there. Her grip around me tightens.

  “You’re going to make me whole.”

  Chapter 41: Vick—To Overcome

  I am imprisoned.

  THE MINUTES tick by, each one like an hour to my anxiety-ridden self. I’m on the floor, the cold of the tile seeping through the legs of my black pants everywhere the armor doesn’t reach, adding to the shivers already wracking my body. It’s humiliating, waiting to be rescued, unable to stand and walk the much longer distance back to the entrance, but it’s that distance that gives me the pride to endure the humiliation. Today, I almost made it.

  Twenty more steps and I would have been at the opposite side, raising my hands in triumph as I plunged through the far double doors. If it hadn’t been for the mocking laughter, I would have gotten there.

  Yeah, that’s a new setback. The faces in the mirrors have begun laughing at me, taunting me. I can’t hear words or sounds, thank god, or else I’d have to report auditory hallucinations to Nuzzi and she’d be sure to end my experimental self-treatment. But I know they’re laughing, the half-steel, half-flesh mouths agape, the teeth flashing in the curved half lips, the eyes bouncing around in their sockets.

  I think I’m going to puke. Where the hell are they?

  The covers have already dropped over the mirrors leading to the entrance. This isn’t some new endurance test. I push myself halfway to my feet and topple, landing on my backside, my knees too shaky to hold my weight.

  Real badass, Corren.

  It isn’t until I’ve crawled a dozen meters that it dawns on me something might be wrong.

  I open the channel to the green room on my internal comm. “Kelly, you there?” My voice comes out thready and weak. Great.

  No answer. Worse.

  “Hey, Doc, could use a little help here,” I try again. No response. New chills that have nothing to do with my maze attempt ripple over my body. A painful hardness settles in my chest.

  What’s going on out there? I ask VC1. I’ve avoided interacting with her when I’m in the maze. She’s an easy crutch to lean on, and I need to do this on my own, but everything about this situation is off. Even the pause before she answers goes on so long I’m afraid I’ve lost contact with her too.

  I am unable to communicate with the rest of the facility.

  “Oh, thank god,” I breathe aloud. “I mean, no, that’s bad. I’m just glad you answered.” I crawl faster, the adrenaline giving me strength. After a few more meters, I’m able to stand. Leaning on the covered mirrors for support, I stagger-run to where I came into the conference room.

  Where the doors don’t open. Of course.

  “VC1, can you—”

  I cannot.

  “Um… when we first got here, I had you insert yourself into their systems. You reassured me you could open any door on the property, including this one if necessary, though I told you not to unless there’s an emergency.” I pause, thinking about some of her more rigid programming. “You would consider this to be an emergency, right? You aren’t just keeping me in because I asked you to?”

  An amused chuckle echoes over my internal speakers. No. This would indeed constitute an emergency. The humor vanishes from her tone. Someone has blocked my access to the facility’s systems, including the doors.


  There’s only one person I’m aware of with the ability to do that. And with sudden clarity I realize what’s been bothering me so much about VC2’s failed attempts to breach the Klenar Facility’s security systems—she shouldn’t have been failing.

  Shit. Anything VC1 can do, VC2 should also be capable of.

  Okay, maybe not anything. VC1 is an AI, and VC2 hasn’t been operational long enough to evolve to that level. Right?

  Your hypothesis is sound.

  I jump at the unexpected response, staggering against the sealed doors. “You’re listening in on my personal thoughts again.”

  This is an emergency.

  I swear I can hear the smirk beneath her words.

  “This isn’t the time for snark,” I tell her.

  My research indicates witty banter helps defuse tension in stressful situations.

  Not wasting time on arguing with that. I take a couple of deep breaths, trying to calm my ever-increasing anxiety, for myself and for Kelly and what VC2 might be up to out there.

  I find the door’s access panel on the right and look for something to pry off the covering. I’m not carrying any gear beyond the armor, no tools. My nails are short and blunt, since I only grew them out for the Valeria persona. I send a sharp kick at the closest mirror, thinking maybe a piece of glass will do the trick, but it doesn’t even shift position, let alone crack or shatter. I do manage to dislodge the black fabric covering, so my metal skull can laugh at my pitiful attempts to do damage.

  It is made of a reflective polycarbonate. Virtually indestructible. They were concerned you might try to get through the room by breaking all the mirrors.

  I’d thought of that. But it would have defeated the purpose, and I was never quite freaked out enough to try it. I understand why they took the precaution, though.

  Also, fuck.

  Panting, I shift my position to face the sea of other mirrors leading back across the room. They are all covered.