‘No, you’re right, I suppose, yes, it is based on lies. But it’s still a better and more truthful life than the one I had before. Now I have a purpose, I have passion, I have a sense of self. I’m …happy. For the most part. Or at least I was.’
It wasn’t the answer Charlie had hoped for. He wanted her to admit that she was like him and found it impossible to feel anything, no matter what the provocation. But she was quite the opposite.
Time passed as they discussed some of the sensitive information they carried inside them and what had shocked and appalled them the most. They spoke about the programme itself, the treatment they had undergone, the training and the side effects. Charlie thought he recognised a flicker of disappointment in her when he admitted he didn’t suffer night terrors or multi-layered dreams as she did. But he held back from detailing his diminished empathy or the lengths he’d gone to kick-start his emotions, such as killing Milo.
‘I used to be a bit of a conspiracy theorist before this all began,’ Charlie added.
‘You must be living the dream with all that you know now.’
‘You’d think, wouldn’t you? It doesn’t feel like the dream, though, does it?’
‘No. Have you given any thought as to what we’re supposed to do now that our only contact within the programme is dead and there’s no safe house we can trust?’
‘There must be a backup plan in place,’ she said. ‘Karczewski will have had deputies or people higher than him pulling his strings who are aware of us. I think our only choice is to sit it out.’
‘I don’t know whether I can do that for another four and a half years without knowing what’s going on.’
‘Five years is the maximum amount of time it takes for the bead that contains all this data to dissolve into our systems, right? And it will take all the classified information that we know with it. So even if we are stuck in limbo for that long, there is an end date. But I don’t think it will come to that. Karczewski told me many times that this was a temporary measure until they built an impenetrable fortress around their servers and bunkers. Once that’s done, we’ll have our freedom back again and we’ll be sipping rum on a beach in Barbados for the rest of our lives.’
A noise coming from her friend next door interrupted them. They paused until they heard her toilet flush.
‘What does she know about you?’ Charlie whispered.
‘The same as everyone else – that I don’t like to talk about my past.’
‘Is there anyone else you’ve gotten close to?’ Charlie picked up on her guilty expression. ‘I’m the only person you don’t have to lie to,’ he added.
‘I have a boyfriend and that’s brought with it an unexpected complication … I’m pregnant.’
‘Shit! Didn’t they put you into temporary sterilisation?’
‘Yes, but either my body rejected it or something went wrong.’
‘You know you’re supposed to get rid of it, don’t you?’
‘It’s not an “it”,’ she said sharply.
‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to cause offence.’
‘No, I shouldn’t have snapped. I’m just a little confused right now.’
‘Are you going to keep it? I mean, the baby?’
She shook her head. ‘What about you? Is it serious between you and the woman I spotted you with earlier?’
‘No.’
‘Does she know that?’
The question caught him off-guard. ‘No, I suppose not.’
‘In the end we’re going to hurt everyone around us, aren’t we?’
The question was rhetorical so they sipped from their drinks.
‘So now that we know about one another, where do we go from here?’ Charlie asked.
‘I know there’s usually safety in numbers but I don’t think that’s the case with us.’
