by Harper North
“Talen!” I rattle his chair, but it does nothing. I spin around, and shove open the partition door. “Emma!”
She shoots up from her seat, followed by Jase, weapon in hand. “What’s wrong?”
“Emma, could you please come help me for a moment?” I ask, calming my voice and eyeing Jase.
“What’s going on?” Jase demands.
I race to Emma, grab her by the hand, and pull her into the communications room. “Something’s wrong,” I whisper. Jase tries to follow. “You stay there,” I growl at him.
Emma pushes past me through the partition and rushes to Talen’s side, quickly following the wires she attached only a few minutes ago.
“What’s wrong with him?”
Emma rushes to one of the computers and taps the display. “I was afraid of this. The nanotech needs to be charged. It drains the host’s bio-electrical energy.” Her finger’s race over the keyboard. “I need to collect the data.”
My heart speeds up. “Talen,” I say, trying to shake him back to life. His face has turned a bluish-grey. I feel for his breath. Again, it’s shallow, and his pulse is weak.
Jase pushes the door open. His eyes go to Talen. “You killed him?”
“No!” I shout. “And I told you not to come in here!”
Elias steps inside. “What’s happening? I thought you said you were just going to talk to him.”
“It’s nothing.” I block Jase from coming closer. “You can’t come in yet. I still have time.”
He scoffs. “You’re not getting anywhere. It’s my turn.”
“No, Jase,” I say, holding my ground. “If you don’t get out of here, it’s not going to matter anyway.”
“What’s going on, Fin?” Elias asks, glancing to Talen, then me and Emma.
I swallow down my fear. “We’ve got it under control.”
Talen moans. He slowly sits up again and blinks.
“No way!” Jase says. He tries to look past me. “You’re wasting time.”
“Calm down Jase,” Elias says, pointing him out.
Jase backs up. “Five minutes,” he says. “Then it’s my turn. If you haven’t killed him already.”
Elias flashes me a look and follows Jase. I close the partition and turn to Talen whose face is less bluish.
“Give me a second, Talen. We’re going to figure out what’s going on.” I rush back to Emma, who’s busily preparing several tubes and setting up a machine in the corner. “What’s going on?”
“Look at the data analysis,” she says, pointing to the screen. “The wires that run from him into the computer monitor his biological changes.”
My eyes jump around the graphs, mind too jumbled right now to work it out. Two separate lines rise and fall. “What does it mean?”
“The red line,” she says, “is the nanotechnology.”
I watch as it plummets in a jagged descent down the screen. “And the blue line?”
Emma smiles. “That is his own biology.”
“It’s increasing. He’s regaining his own bodily control?”
“It appears that way,” she says, flicking a switch on the device. A whirling follows.
Talen’s blank stare has changed. There’s more life in his eyes. He blinks a few times and tears trickle down his cheeks. It’s as if he’s becoming human again.
I retake my seat in front of him. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m not sure,” he says, glancing around. “Where am I?”
“You’re on a transporter in the middle of the desert.”
He scans the room again, a confused look on his face. There’s a good chance Jase is going to burst through the door again in the next minute or two. I need to make my move while I can.
“Do you know my name?”
He shakes his head.
“I’m Finley. We were talking a minute ago about how you became an Aura operative.”
Talen presses his lips together. A vein in his forehead pulses. I look to Emma, but she’s still tapping away at the screen.
“Do you remember anything?” I ask Talen.
“I know what the Aura mods did,” Talen says. “They trapped me inside myself.”
My heart hurts for him. “I can’t imagine what it must be like to wake up every day and not feel in control of myself.” I give him a weak smile. “Do they control your thoughts?”
“Yes,” he mutters, his eyes still jumping around.
“What about your memories?”
“Some of those, too,” he says with a cough.
I stand and grab some water from the supply kit. I hold the bottle up to his mouth and he takes a long draw, then nods that he’s had enough.
“We need to get going,” Emma urges.
I take a deep breath. “I need you to answer my questions. We don’t have much time.”
Panic washes over his face.
“Just a few, okay?”
Talen moves to stand, but the restraints keep him from rising more than an inch out of his chair. We can’t let him loose yet. I have no idea if he’ll snap back into robot mode.
“You have to stay still or else you’ll be hurt again,” I warn him.
“I want to go,” Talen says, his breathing quickening. “I need to move.”
“Not yet.”
“You have to,” he begs Emma. “The nanos will go into survival mode and draw energy from my body. They’ll kill me.”
Emma bites her lip and flicks her fingers over the screen again.
“Is that true?” I ask her. It could be a trap.
“I’m not sure,” she says. “We won’t know until I can figure out how this technology works.”
Talen flinches. His legs push against the restraints. “It’s a proprietary defense mechanism to prevent people from reprogramming Aura ops,” he growls. “I’m not lying. If you don’t let me go, I’ll be dead within minutes.”
“We’re going to keep him alive, right?” I say to Emma.
Emma moves to Talen’s side. “I don’t doubt it,” she says in a steady voice. “But we can’t know for sure until we figure out how things work.”
Talen shakes his head. “It’ll be too late. The EHC will never let you figure out my technology.”
My chest tightens. I believe what he’s saying is true, but I also know what Talen’s capable of.
I stand and pull Emma into the corner. “What’s the chance he’s really becoming more human?”
Emma glances back to Talen, and then to me. “I’d say he’s telling the truth, but we can’t assume anything. I’d like to run a blood test to determine how things work.”
I glance to the clock. “How long will it take?”
“Just a few minutes. If his own biological energy has replaced the nanotechnology, then his free will should kick in. If we can trust his natural state, though.”
I furrow my brow, knowing our chance to get the truth out of him is almost up. “Maybe I can convince Jase to give us more time.”
“Good luck with that.” Emma turns and grabs a needle from the supply kit. “I’ll work as fast as I can.” She moves to Talen’s side. “I need to take a blood sample.”
The veins in his neck strain as he turns to look at Emma. Before he can argue, she moves to his other side and jabs him with the needle. Talen winces as she slowly extracts what she needs and moves back to her instruments along the side table. A trickle of blood leaks down his neck onto his uniform. I grab a bandage from the kit and secure it to him.
“I forgot what pain is like,” he whispers.
I step back and study him. All the signs of his robotic demeanor are gone. I have to do whatever I can to keep him alive, at least until he tells us what he knows.
I turn and head to the partition, pushing open the door. Jase sits eagerly on the edge of his seat, a wild look in his eye. “Ready for my turn?”
“Look, Jase,” I say, stepping closer. “He’s useless to us if he’s dead.”
Elias stands. “Did you get anything out of hi
m?”
“He’s not as robotic as I thought. We’ve been able to wear down some of the nanotechnology.”
Jase laughs. “He’s pretending. You can’t trust him. The minute you release him, he’ll burn us from the inside out.”
“I don’t think so,” I snap. “He’s different. His eyes are more focused on who’s talking to him, plus he felt pain.”
“Wear down the nanotechnology,” Elias echoes. “What does that mean?”
“Emma says it’s his own biochemistry. It’s becoming more dominant and pushing the nanotech out.”
“No way,” Jase scoffs and turns to Elias. “Don’t believe it.”
Elias ignores him and heads toward the back. “I want to see it for myself.”
“You’ll get us all killed!” Jase shouts, following him.
I work my way around to Emma. “Have you figured anything out yet?”
She narrows her gaze on the computer screen. “The nanos are attacking his cells for energy. I can reprogram the nanos now that the blood sample gave me access to their frequency.”
“And what will that do?” Elias asks.
Emma moves her finger as the data unfolds on the screen. “If I can turn off the nanos’ control on him, he might be more willing to help.”
“I’d rather see him dead,” Jase mutters.
Elias examines Talen’s face more carefully. “He does look more human now. Something’s changed in his eyes.”
“We can’t punish him,” I say. “It’s not fair to hold him responsible for what the EHC forced him to do. And if Lacy is really an Aura op now, we’ll need to figure this out to be able to save her.”
“Are you kidding me?” Jase moans. “You were there at the training camp. I don’t care who programmed him to try and kill us, that thing is the one who did it.”
“He wouldn’t have if the nanotechnology was shut down,” I argue.
“Listen, Fin,” Jase says, stepping closer, “if you think he’s going to just curl up at your feet and help you destroy the EHC, you’re wrong. This guy is enhanced with the best possible technology to destroy, and he will. Our only chance is to destroy him first.”
Emma looks up from her computer. “You will never get Talen to agree to anything if he’s under their control. We have to try and bring him out of their control.”
“You’re letting revenge cloud your judgment,” I say. “Give Emma a few more minutes.”
Jase shakes his head.
Elias traces the data on the screen. “I agree with Fin. It looks like there’s a shot to bring him back around. Talen is too valuable to let die.”
Jase backs away. “It won’t work.”
“Let’s just try,” Emma says. “It’s our best chance, and I’ve almost broken through the coding.”
I glance back to Talen. His face is lined with worry. Beads of sweat dot his forehead. “We’re going to try and help you,” I say.
Talen tenses his jaw and clenches his fists. “It feels like I’m being torn apart.”
“Can you hurry?” I plead to Emma.
Her fingers fly across the screen. “Almost there.”
Talen squeezes his eyes shut. “I remember how I became enhanced,” he whispers.
I lean closer. “How?”
“They told me my life would be better. They said I would be protected and strong. I believed them, I—”
Suddenly, Talen seizes. His eyes stare at the ceiling as he buckles in his seat, shaking uncontrollably.
“What’s wrong with him?” Elias shouts.
I step back, afraid of what might happen next. “I don’t know!”
“I’ve got it,” Emma says. “I’m turning off the coding that controls emotions.”
“Quick, Emma!” I shout. “He’s not going to make it!”
“Done!” she says.
With a flick of a switch, Talen’s body stops convulsing, slumping back into his seat. I reach over and feel for his pulse. It’s there.
“Talen, are you okay?”
His eyes flutter open as he takes in a sharp breath and sits up. “I’m alive?”
“Yes,” I say.
Emma walks around the table. “You will probably be weak for a while. Your body has been flooded with stress chemicals for quite some time. It may take several days for them to wear off.”
A quizzical look overtakes his face. “My memory is so scattered. Piecing things together is hard… I just know there is a large chunk of time missing.”
“Maybe it’s best you don’t remember,” Elias says. “You don’t know what you’ve done or who you’ve hurt.”
Jase steps forward. “I can tell him that.”
“Not now,” Elias says, cutting a warning look Jase’s way. “First we need to get answers. Do you remember anything about where the EHC is holding Lacy or Sky?”
Talen shakes his head in frustration. “Who are Lacy and Sky?”
“See?” Jase spits. “He’s worthless. We’ve wasted all this time, and now he’s the same as us, only useless. He can’t even stand on his own without help.”
“I can recharge the nanos,” Emma suggests. “It’ll shut off the nanos’ hardwired self-destruct systems for now, and maybe that will help him reconnect those neural pathways where his memories are stored. It’s worth a shot.”
I cringe at the thought, the risk it might hold, but hear myself say, “Do it.”
Emma nods and works a few more wires into Talen’s skin before returning to her screen.
“What if he bounces back to what he was a few minutes ago?” Jase asks.
“I’ll be careful,” Emma tells him. “I’ll keep the programming under control.”
“Just keep those wires on him,” Jase says, watching Talen warily.
We wait a few more minutes while Emma makes adjustments. “The encryption is beyond anything I’ve seen,” she mumbles. “Hacking him will be tough.”
As she works, Talen’s eyes flit back and forth. “It’s coming back. The enhancement… being transported… the settlement camp… the resistance camp.” His eyes grow huge, as if he’s drawing the connection between us and Mason’s camp. “I can tell you what I know.”
Emma rises from the computer. Talen’s eyes glaze over, and his face stiffens. Did we go too far?
“I remember what happened that day,” he whispers and glances to Jase. “I know what I did to you.”
Jase crosses his arms.
Something about Talen’s narrow gaze unsettles me. I think the robot is back. I take a step closer and he whips his head my way, his stare boring into me as if he’s biding his time.
The time until he can kill us all.
Then Talen’s eyes roll back and he’s out again.
CHAPTER 20
“If we can’t get him to talk, there’s no sense in sitting around here,” Elias says, ordering us outside.
I glance back to Talen one last time. His eyes shift away, resuming their despondent gaze. I rub the back of my neck. “Lead the way,” I say, following Elias down the aisle.
An electrical snapping comes from the front of the transporter.
Emma pushes past me. “The system is overheating.” She throws herself in the front seat and flicks a few switches. “The transporter must have been hit back there.”
“Can we fix it?” I ask.
Emma stands and runs her hands through her hair. “Shouldn’t be a problem. I’ll let it cool down for a few minutes, then rewire the frayed circuitry. First, we have to find where the bullets hit.”
I follow her down the stairs and out of the transporter, wrapping my arms around my waist. There’s a nagging ache in my stomach. Hunger, no doubt, mixed with all the stress of the day, even though there’s not much time left in it anyway. The darkness is going to leave us blind to the EHC.
“Another night in the desert,” I sigh as Emma and I walk to the back of the transporter. “There,” I say, spotting a small hole. Beside it are two others.
“Straight into the cooling syste
m,” Emma says.
Drape comes around the side of us. “What’s going on?”
I point to the marks. “The Leeches got a few bullets in.”
“Won’t affect us driving, right?” he asks.
“No,” Emma says. “But it won’t make for a pleasant ride tomorrow without cool air. It’s an easy fix. If they had been closer, there could have been more damage. Their vehicles are built to withstand gunfire, unlike ours. These transporters aren’t built to be in the middle of a battle. Non-military field work only.”
I sigh. No matter what we do, they will always have better technology, enhanced killing machines, bigger settlements, and more weapons. I blow out a series of short breaths, trying to get control of my thoughts.
“You okay?” Drape asks.
“I’ve been better,” I say. “It’s just been a long day.”
He nods. “You should get some rest.”
That’s all I want right now. If only I could get my mind to stop trying to figure things out, like how to get Talen to talk.
I grab Drape’s arm and pull him back toward the others. Jase stands guard by the stairs, gun in hand. “Make sure to lock the door after Emma’s done out here,” he orders Knuckles. “I don’t want that thing getting loose.”
Elias glances to me and mouths the words, You okay?
I nod, but lean over and place my hands on my knees. “Yeah, just tired and thinking about Lacy and Sky.”
“We shouldn’t be worrying about this now,” Jase barks to Emma. “We need to wake that thing up and get some viable intel.”
“He’s not going to give us any information now,” Emma says from behind him, grabbing some tools from a compartment at the side of the transporter. “I don’t think he’s capable of remembering in his current state. The nanotechnology has virtually destroyed his memories. Hopefully his brain can re-wire itself.”
“He’s a busted piece of EHC tech, that’s all,” Jase snarls.
“He can do it,” I insist, straightening up. “He was remembering things right before Emma upped the nanotech.”
Emma shrugs. “Maybe Fin’s right. Only time will tell. He may begin to remember more of his humanity, and perhaps then he will see the benefit in helping us.”