Good.
The only sound is dripping water. Nothing has moved. No one has disturbed the dust.
No one has been here since my last visit.
I back out and ignore the little voice in the back of mine telling me the paranoianeeds to stop.
I know. But I can’t.
We all know the Maker is dead… But what if we’re wrong?
What if the day I stop searching is the day he comes back?
Shock thought Chrys would keep me home. She only added to the reasons Ineedto do this.
On the edge of Breaker’s sector, where it meets Ward’s, the burned remains of the only lab I won’t enter cuts into the ice and rock.
Thisis where he made us.
This is where he died.
There’s nothing left here to inspect.
I’d thought the years would soften the charred remains, that the ice would wash away some of the ash, but this place is frozen in time and in truth.
Unlike all the other labs I’ve found, it had visible external structures.
It’s the only one on record anywhere.
It makes my stomach sick to know thatwewere the experiment he didn’t try to hide.
What he did to us wasn’tcommonknowledge, but like the search for a compatible species of mates, too many people ignored the methods on the promise of their results.
This place needs to stay burned and buried.
And thankfully, I’m not the only one who keeps a watch on this one.
I glance at Ward’s outpost. He’s awake, I know, so I don’t linger here.
Most people have too many thoughts. Listening to him is like flooding my mind with static.
I don’t understand it, I can’t ask, so I avoid it when I can.
The rest of the labs are hidden away. They’re dusty, empty, and most importantly of all… silent.
No thoughts.
No one hiding.
No experiments waiting to be freed.
He’s dead.
Everyone would tell me as much if I voiced this fear that lives deep inside of me.
And that’s why I don’t tell them.
It’s why I check these places on my own and why I haven’t told any of them that I’ve found more than we ever thought were here.
