Page 136 of Winterveil

Rural Virginia

The helicopter ride back to Valeran passed in a blur. High above the mountains, the trees lost their details. They were smudges of color, deep green and faded orange beneath the ever-present azure haze.

As soon as they landed, Giselle was maneuvered roughly out of the helicopter by Deckard. Her wrists were still red and raw from the handcuffs that had pressed hard into her skin. When she looked down at her hands, she didn’t recognize them. Nadiya’s blood was dried into every crease of her palms.

It was just after dawn, the grass still damp with morning dew, too early for any of the students to be out. Giselle was sure that Deckard appreciated the privacy. His gait was brisk and businesslike, his gaze obscured beneath his dark glasses.

He led her into the main building. The halls were empty and seemed cavernous. Giselle remembered the fear that had shivered through her belly when she had entered them for the first time. The blood had rushed to her cheeks and her mind had supplied the words I don’t belong here.

Now she felt only vacant and cold.

Deckard directed her down the stairs and to the subbasement. Steel walls and winding corridors. The metal seemed to radiate a chill, as if it were pure ice. Giselle was retracing the initial journey she had taken through the tunnels, barely more than a week ago, when Deckard made a sharp, sudden turn and led her down a different path.

At the end of the hall was a door with a biometric scanner. Deckard pressed his thumb to the pad.

The door opened with a hiss of steam. Giselle hesitated, but Deckard nudged her shoulder none too gently and said, “Go on.”

Giselle stepped into the room. When the haze cleared, the first thing she saw was an array of glass pods. Four of them, long and coffin-like, clearly intended to hold a person—or at least a body—within them. Each was linked via a coil of multicolored wires to a blinking, flickering machine in the center of the room. The enormous screen above it was black, but it hummed with latent power.

A lab. Giselle blinked furiously, as if this were a scene from a dream and she could wake from it. But she knew it was real when Professor Blanchard emerged from behind the machine, glasses slightly fogged, smiling that thin, familiar smile.

“Giselle,” he said. “I’ve missed you.”

She took an instinctive step backward. “What are you doing here? What . . . what is this place?”

“It’s a satellite location of the CIA’s Extended Reality Lab,” he replied. “Group A.”

Extended Reality? She looked up in bewilderment at Deckard, but his expression was unchanged, unreadable.

“I don’t understand,” Giselle said.

“For many years,” said Professor Blanchard, drawing closer, “the CIA has been hard at work replicating technology that the Soviets discovered more than a decade ago. Led by Dr. Moritz Satow, the Russians and their allies were able to create a fully immersive virtual reality.”

Giselle froze.

“The virtual reality,” Professor Blanchard went on, “is very likely where the next phase of the war will take place. The Germans call it Projekt Traum. Here, we call it Project Dreamscape.”

“That’s why you want Satow. So that he can help you re-create his work.”

“No,” replied Professor Blanchard, with an airy laugh. “I have no interest in Satow’s work. We have fully replicated it ourselves now—with your help.”

Her heart stuttered. “My help?”

“But of course,” he said. “Why do you think we had you brought here in the first place? You see, the Dreamscape is constructed and maintained by the human mind. Think about it. A neuron firing is an electrochemical reaction. It generates power. The more minds that are feeding the Dreamscape, the more complete its reality. And when a mind of your caliber is feeding it . . . well, it allows you to exercise control over the virtual reality itself.”

Understanding began to trickle in, a slow drip of horror. “The nodes,” she said. “You’ve been using the minds of all the students here to feed the Dreamscape.”

“Naturally,” Professor Blanchard said. “As I said, the caliber of the mind matters a great deal. Better to have the Dreamscape constructed by Klaudia Shimonova than by some mook on the welfare list, no? Valeran is the perfect testing ground. All these generational minds, both brilliant and young enough to be ripe for molding.”

Giselle looked back at the glass pods, gleaming under the fluorescents.

“The simulation in Traumstadt,” she said. “That was part of the Dreamscape, wasn’t it?”

Deckard nodded. “When you arrived in Traumstadt, you were fitted with cuffs that connected you to the virtual reality. While your minds wandered our maze, your bodies were safely held at the local hospital. The function of the L-pills was to remove you from the Dreamscape. To wake you up.”

Memories assailed her. The silver cuffs, the pills, the strange surfacing in the hospital. The visions that were as bright and colored as they ever were, and as detailed as a photograph—

“Thanks to your contributions,” Dr. Iver said, “the simulation’s edges have been smoothed considerably. It’s close to flawless.”