“For a corpse you’re certainly…vivacious,” he says, amused.
“I ain’t been in the Core as of late, but broadcasts make it through thejamming sometimes. Same with the holoNet. So I know there’s two things on the minds of every person in the Core. Is the Reaper dead? And where did that coward Quicksilver sneak off to?”
He strokes his chin. “It’s strange, being synonymous with someone who is not you. But I suppose that is marriage—writ even larger when you’re married to the father of the Rising.”
“Fitchner Barcawas the father of the Rising,” I say, surprised by my own sharpness. If there’s one hero who never lost his shine in the mud of 121, it’s Ares. Eo too, but she was always the romantic part of the Rising. Darrow was its promise. But Ares, Ares was always its father.
“Ah, yes. But Fitchner would be nothing without Regulus. Surely you know that, or is it perhaps that you cannot conscience two fathers, Lyria of Lagalos?”
I swallow. “You know who I am?”
“I never forget a face, nor a dossier, especially not those of guests in our house. It was a lovely birthday, wasn’t it, when you visited our estate as the fox walker of the Telemanus entourage?” He smirks. “Lovely until the afterparty, I suppose.” I wince. That’s when Pax was kidnapped. “Oh no, don’t think I think you’re to blame. We’re well aware of the freelancer Ephraim ti Horn. Uniquely crafty fellow, at least when he got out of his own way. Performed a few jobs for us actually, not that he knew.”
He leans back, and he becomes so somber and sincere that the lights in the room seem to dim. “I know what happened at Camp 121, and my heart breaks for it. For your sister, your father, your nieces, and your nephews. I cannot imagine your pain, nor how it must shape how you see the world.”
He licks his lips, reflective, showing his own secret pain. “I know a little of suffering. The worlds are very big. The people in them…and the systems…well they are very cold and very uncaring. I know what it is to be small. To be…stepped on. There’s dignity in holding up your hands against the boot. But it crushes all the same.” He touches his breast. “On this fragile heart of mine, I promise no harm will come to you here.”
I feel love radiating from him, and acceptance. I take a deep breath. “The hardest thing about being a Pink must be knowing that you can never be trusted. You are made to lie so well that the rest of us can never be sure.”
“No,” he says with conviction. “If you think that, then you still wearthe chains fashioned by our oppressors. It’s easy to break the chains on your wrists, but the ones in here linger.” He taps his head. “Please sit. Have tea. Trust me or don’t, your existence is at my mercy, and I gave you your hand back after those…brutes took it.”
I sigh, seeing his point, and sip his tea while watching him like a soldier behind a parapet. “If you know who I am, then you know how annoying it is to have Sun Industries tech in my head. Your husband cheated millions of Reds out of their mines.”
“No. That was actually demokracy in action. Each mine got to vote. Is it our fault they chose the immediate payout instead of maintaining their ownership? How can we promise freedom and then be the arbiter of a people’s choices? That is not freedom. That is social engineering. That is the long road to tyranny.” He pauses and looks around the room with a sigh. “Benevolent or malevolent, still tyranny. How is your tea?”
“Warm,” I say. “What is this place?”
“Let us play a game. For every question of yours I answer, you must answer one of mine in return. We must swear to be honest.” He spits in his hand like a Red clansman. I ain’t got much to lose. I spit in mine and we shake.
“This place is a self-contained ecosystem within an asteroid. A construction on a scale that has not been seen since the terraforming of the spheres. Why did you come here?”
I’m a little baffled by his question. “You already know that answer.”
“Play fair, Lyria.”
“The thing in my head brought me here.”
“Lyria.”
“This thing in my head, it came out of the Figment. The freelancer. It came out of her as she died. It crawled in my bloodydamn nose, man. Horrifying stuff. Sometimes it talks to me or shows me things. But then it went quiet, except to tell me it needed repairs. So, I followed this urge to get it repaired. Happy?”
“That’showyou’re here. Why are you here?”
“Play fair, Matteo,” I mock.
“Why are you here?” he asks, harder.
“I’m here because I’m sick of being small. This thing in my head, I know it’s a weapon. One that makes me stronger. And I got things I need to do. I’m sick of being at the mercy of bastards. My turn, Matteo: what is this thing in my head?”
“It is called apsyche.It was developed several decades ago by a brilliant but fragile woman named Agala si Ken. Agala specialized in neurobionics. Thepsychewas created to be an AI partner for the brain to enable the user to be…a god among machines, for lack of a better expression. It was to link the nervous system to drones, ships, computers, missiles.”
“Blues can already do that.”
“They can sync on a limited scale. But they cannot control their body while in the sync. Thepsychewas made so that they could do both, concurrently, on an unlimited scale. Imagine sitting here, having this conversation, and running a war a hundred kilometers away.”
“Shit,” I murmur.
He nods. “Before Fitchner came to my husband, he was a very wrathful man, very…controlling. He had been much wronged by Gold, and he sowed many seeds for his revenge. Thepsycheproject was a seed that did not come to fruition. Agala could not see what she was making when she was making it, but after it was complete, she realized her folly.
