Unseen and vicious, I could hear her shrilling, “You did this. You deleted me.You.”
“Stop!” I begged her, shutting my eyes and covering my ears with my palms. “Leave me alone!”
But she would not leave. She would not be silenced. “Don’t run away, Anya. Look at me. You put me in here. Nostalgia is not a privilege. It’s a prison. Andyoulocked me in it.”
“I’m sorry! Please, I’m sorry!” I cried, stumbling blindly through the endless void of this world. “I don’t know how to stop it! I don’t know what’s happening to me!”
Desperately, I fought for air like I was being forced underwater. Like watching in a trance the lights outside my bedroom window change from red to white to blue. Like scouring the bookshelves at Mr. Leonard’s every Friday evening looking for something inexpressible, the word,thatword. Nostalgia.
You did this. You deleted me.
Assaulted by sensation, I started tugging at my skin, only I could not find any skin, just electrodes protruding out of my body like grotesque new limbs. And I had to push through, push into the tangle of wires just to find me, to feel me, to break free of this place at last. And with every brutal tug, every inch conquered, I became clarified. Resharpened. Refocused. I regained my sense of smell, of touch, of hearing. The monotonous drone of a heart monitor was resounding in my ears, and a pale blue light was bleeding through my closed eyelids. Faithfully, I followed it. Even as it hurt. Even as it burned me.
And like a newborn baby, the first thing I did when I opened my eyes to the world was cry.
Part III
nostalgia
(noun)a sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past, typically for a period or place with happy personal associations.
Chapter Seventeen
Immediately after they extracted me from the life support incubator, I experienced a moment of complete, almost inhuman disorientation. My every thought, my every physical sensation was reduced to mere radio static. A fuzzy crackling sound. Nothing more. Even holding my gaze on a single spot for longer than a second seemed impossible. Everything kept sliding out of the edges of my vision and turning into undulating halos of light.
Only after I was wheeled out of that room, or at least what I presumed had been a room, did I regain enough consciousness to be able to process my surroundings: the long white corridor, the sterile trail of overhead lights floating past my horizontal form, the clinical air quality, the sound of automatic doors opening to extrude my body to a place I didn’t know.
In my lungs there was a clean, chemical scent, like I was in a hospital. And, indeed, a doctor came in to see me, to check my vitals, give me medicine for my splitting headache, and reassure me in her toneless, impersonal voice that everything was going to bealright.
I could only lie there and nod, feeling almost alien. A test subject of some kind. I wasn’t even sure that we were speaking the same language, although I did seem able to understand them just fine.
Then came another room, another reclining surface, another cold rush of confusion. Where was I? What was happening? Whathadhappened to me? No one was willing to answer me. All they did was smile and tell me to take a deep breath and try to relax as if I had any other choice.
Physically, I was exhausted, my limbs as unbendable and immovable as mountains, and my mind was still muddled, uncomprehending.The only thing that seemed to work right was my heart, its vitality manifesting through an interminable mechanical sound produced by the ultra-thin monitor next to my bed.
If it wasn’t for that, I would have believed myself dead.
After an indefinite period of time, a woman in a crisp white lab coat came into the room with a strange, glossy touchscreen in hand and an affectless smile on her face.
“Welcome back, Ms. Larsson,” she said in a voice so expertly gentle it sounded prerecorded, like it was coming from an invisible speaker from the side of her neck. She stood over me by the bed and checked something on the monitor, her fingers moving deftly over the glowing screen. “How are you feeling?”
There was an acrid, chemical taste in my mouth, and the inside of my throat felt so raw that I had trouble believing I’d made use of it before. I could only shake my head.I don’t know.
Thoughtfully, she nodded, her eyes on the screen. “Because of your premature awakening, it is possible that you’ll experience feelings of confusion, disorientation, and a general sense of disquietude. However, we urge you not to panic. Your remaining memories will return to you within the next twenty minutes. Please stay still as I update your status.”
She lowered some kind of scan before my face, a droning flashlight-like object. Without warning it flared hot and bright and burned through my retina.
I recoiled, startled, my eyes snapping shut, and out of sheer shock, it seemed, my voice returned to me, a broken, faint croak, “Where am I?”
“You’re at Hive, Ms. Larsson, where we provide you with advanced simulated realities. Please try to relax. Mr. Lawrence has been notified of your situation. He will be visiting you within the next hour.”
Inanely, I stared at her, and she stared at me in return, the two of us silent, alert, waiting for me to understand. But I couldn’t understand. That thing she was trying to imply kept on dangling right beyond the reach of my comprehension.
“Mr… Who…”
With exaggerated precision she pronounced, “Mr. Lawrence.”
Gritting my teeth, still pushing through the swamp of my thoughts, I growled at her, “Who the fuck is Mr. Lawrence?”
