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“You’re a good doctor.”
The words sound like a compliment, but I know they’re not. They come in the clipped, cool, composed tones of a woman who has gotten what she thinks is her revenge.
“Where’s Electra?”
“That’s not your concern anymore, Doctor Ares. It came to my attention last night that the two of you have become rather more close than I had intended.”
“You had us live in the same quarters for weeks at a time.”
“Soldiers do that frequently without becoming insubordinate,” she says. “You got ahead of yourself, Doctor Ares. You started to consider yourself the authority, forgetting my role.”
“So this is about your bruised ego. I thought women were supposed to be above ego.”
“Your misogynistic supposes aside, this is not about ego. This is about order. You defied a direct one last night. And so did Electra. The two of you will not be reunited.”
Her words are harsh, cruel, and devastating. They’re also wrong. I absolutely will be reunited with the woman who trusts me. One way or another. I have nothing but time and the Head has her fingers in too many pies to remain interested in screwing with our lives forever.
“You know you’re never going to be able to control her now. She’s become too human,” I say, sitting up slowly. It’s hard to argue from a prone position.
“She was always human.”
“True, but she didn’t have human expectations. Now she does. She knows what goes on outside your bars and your missions. She knows where I am.”
“Are you saying you think she will get free and try to come back to see you?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”
“I thought that too. That’s why I’ve taken the precaution of moving you.”
At that moment, a powerful gust of wind blows against the window, icy sleet following in its wake.
“Where the hell am I?”
“We have a small base in the Arctic,” the Head says. I should have taken more notice of the way she’s dressed. She’s wearing a long fur coat, no doubt made of the skins of genetically engineered puppies. Nobody is able to approach this place without clearance and specialist equipment. At this time of year, very few people brave the weather.”
“But you did. To spite us.”
“To teach you a lesson,” she says. “About obedience.”
It was a mistake to cross this woman. She has a particular kind of madness which destroys all it cannot control. This, I know, is mercy in her terms. It would be easier for her to kill me. This might still kill me, because I will not sit here in this cabin at the end of the world and abandon Electra to whatever fate the Head has in store for her.
“I understand,” I say, trying to gather my wits about me. “And I apologize that you found our behavior disrespectful.”
“I didn’t find your behavior disrespectful. It was disrespectful. And it is far too late for apologies. I have never cared for them, and I have no time for them now. You will spend the next three months on this base. When the winter ends, you will be able to return to the facility and resume your duties as doctor, perhaps. Or perhaps, I will decide that you will remain here and tend to those sent here to train. I’m not sure as yet. What I am sure of, Doctor Ares, is that you will regret your arrogance. Deeply.”
Box
Electra
Bitch. Bitch. Fucking bitch.
I am back in a gray box. I am ending where I began, and it all feels as though it has been completely pointless.
Tyko’s face appears behind the glass. He better not come in here. I will kill him. He stares at me for a moment, shakes his head, then moves on.
I let out a scream of frustrated rage. Why!? Why did they give me to Tom just to take him away from me? Why did they do any of this? I was bad before, but now I will be so much worse. I refuse to work for this place anymore. I refuse to do anything but find Tom, or die.
I don’t know where the Head is, but I know she won’t be coming into my presence any time soon, and I know if she does, that will be the end of her.
What did she do with Tom? Why did she work so hard at getting me used to the outside world when she was just going to put me back in this box? Was it all some cruel joke? To give me the world so it could be taken away again? I wouldn’t put it past her.
I miss him. There’s an ache inside me that won’t let go. I feel as though I am being squeezed all the way to the middle of me. I don’t feel pain the way normal people do. I’ve always known that. I was engineered in such a way as to be able to hold myself separate from the desperate cries of my nervous system, but there’s something about the agony of missing Tom which overrides all the programming and throws me into a state of inconsolable misery.
