These assholes stripped every weapon off my body but left me the candy. I’d swiped it from five-year-old Gigi’s snack bag on my way out the door; a moment that now feels like a lifetime ago. I rip the packet open, then stare at the melted gummies for half a second, the artificial scent of various fruit flavors generating sense recognition so strong my heart nearly gives out.
“Hey,” I say, narrowing my eyes at my liquid reflection. “Pull yourself together.”
I empty the bag of gummies into my mouth, then stuff the plastic into my pocket. I’m still chewing when I say, “You’re going to go home. You’re going to see everyone again. You’re—”
The room begins to vibrate with a soft, mechanical rumble, and the words die in my throat. I stiffen and back up, shielding my eyes as one of the walls disappears, then reappears in a flare so bright I can’t clock the change.
Suddenly, I have a visitor.
I knew The Reestablishment had seriously advanced tech—we’ve been studying their work for a decade—but this girl materializes as if out of thin air. We’re face-to-face, trapped by steel in all directions, and she’s standing so inhumanly still that for a second I think I’m hallucinating. She looks like an elfin creature out of a fairy tale, so slight she’s practically a beam of light. White-blond hair, icy eyes. Skin like glass.
Really, absurdly gorgeous.
My heart beats a little too hard as I blink and straighten, fake candy flavors coming alive on my tongue at the worst moment. My mouth is full of half-chewed gummy bears. I’m trying to chew without looking like I’m chewing. Jesus.
The tiny elf takes a step toward me, and I flinch.
“State your name and date of birth,” she says quietly, her cold eyes appraising me.
Something about the way she tilts her head—that, and the smooth,measured sound of her voice—and suddenly I understand. This beautiful weirdo isn’t a real person. She’s artificial intelligence.
I exhale, irritation doing the counterintuitive work of relaxing my body.
The fact that she’s a robot makes things easier. First of all, I’m not going to talk to a fucking robot. I might be an idiot, but I’m not uninformed. I know how much The Reestablishment loves surveillance. I know that this cell is being watched. They love mind games. Love to torture. If they wanted me dead, they’d have sent a real person to mess with my head at least a little before killing me. Instead, this thing is probably recording and analyzing my vitals while doing a background check. I bet it’s mining some database right now, figuring out that Aaron Warner Anderson is my half brother; that Juliette Ferrars is his wife; that I’m the youngest son of Paris Anderson, the dead, ex–supreme commander of North America. They’ve caught themselves a big fish.
Mentally, I kick myself in the face.
“I gave you a directive,” she says, and takes another step closer.
I chew a little more, trying to swallow without killing myself. “Look, if the computer in your head doesn’t already know who I am just by scanning my face, I’m not going to answer your questions. So if you’re here to extract information, you’re shit out of luck. Maybe just send in the guy who’s supposed to torture me.”
She hesitates, surprise coloring her features so briefly I nearly miss it. Fascinating, lifelike tech.
She blinks those strange eyes at me before saying, softly, “Are youeatingsomething?”
“Gummy bears,” I say with my mouth full.
She blinks again. There’s something so human about the way she studies me then that it gives me goose bumps.
“I don’t understand,” she says.
“Gummy bears? It’s, like, a chewy candy—”
“You’re not afraid to die?”
“Uh.” I stop chewing. “What?”
And then she moves toward me, closing the gap between us in two strides, and I realize with a sudden, palpable fear—
This is a real woman. Not a robot.
I’m so distracted by this fact, so alarmed by the warmth of her small hand as she touches my face that, at first, I don’t even notice the knife she’s pressed to my throat. She has my head in a surprisingly firm grip, my neck open and exposed to her blade, but I can feel her breath against my skin and it’s messing with my head. She’s got doll hands. She smells fresh, like pine trees and soap. Up close her eyes are a pale grayish blue and her dark coat is moth-eaten and oversized. Underneath she wears a baggy sweater, the collar gaping to reveal a glimpse of skin so fine I feel lightheaded just looking at her.
I don’t think I understand the point of this exercise.
I’m a high-profile prisoner; any idiot would know not to kill me right away. They should be torturing me for information.Using me as bait or leverage. Instead, they’ve assigned me an elf who needs to stand on tiptoe to reach my neck. It feels like I’m being assaulted by a flower.
It’s annoying, though, the knife at my throat.
