"Is it? Because this doesn't feel like standard interrogation procedure. Usually there's more screaming. More blood. Less..." He gestures at the tablet. "Clinical observation."
"You want screaming and blood?"
"I want to understand what you're doing." He leans forward, elbows on his knees. "Because right now, it feels like you're studying me. Not extracting information. Studying. Like I'm some kind of science experiment."
"You are."
The bluntness surprises him. I see it in the slight widening of his eyes, the brief pause in his constant motion.
"Well," he says finally. "Points for honesty, I guess."
Then I shift to the real material.
"Westpoint Academy," I say, and show him a photograph of the building before the fire.
His body tenses. The tapping foot goes still. His pupils dilate, and I watch his breathing speed up, shallow and fast.
"I know that place," he says, and his voice has lost its mocking edge. "I was there, before. Outside, I mean. Taking pictures. There was a fence… no, no a church, and guards, and..." He presses his palm against his forehead. "Children. There were children going inside. In uniforms. They looked wrong. Too quiet. Too... controlled."
I make a note on the tablet. "What else?"
"I don't know. It's just flashes. The building. The cross. A feeling that something was very, very wrong." He drops his hand, and his eyes are slightly unfocused. "Why do you have pictures of a college?"
"It's connected to what you were investigating."
"No shit." The sharpness is back, defensive now. "I figured that out from the way my brain is trying to crawl out of my skull. I'm asking why you care."
I don't answer. Instead, I pull up the next image.
"The Pineridge boys."
The reaction is immediate and violent. He lurches forward, hands gripping the edge of the desk, face draining of color. His breathing goes ragged, almost hyperventilating.
"Jonah."
"I know that name. I know it, I know it, there were files, there were—" He squeezes his eyes shut. "Boys. Young men. They were trained to take over the Board and then they... they turned when it was their turn to hunt. They killed people. Important people. And after that, something changed. Everything got murky… it sped up. Project Omega. Ugh, why can’t I remember what it was about? Something—"
He stops. Opens his eyes. Stares at me with an expression I can'tread.
"Harrison Protocol," he whispers. "That was in the files. Harrison. Like you."
My chest goes cold. "What do you remember about the Harrison Protocol?"
"Nothing. Just the name. Just..." He shakes his head, hard, like he's trying to dislodge something. "It was connected. Pineridge, Westpoint, Harrison. They were all connected. And there was links to Project Omega.” He makes a sound, low and pained, and his hands come up to cradle his head.
“What else?”
"Stop," he gasps. "Please. I can't—it's too much, it's all coming at once, I can't—"
His hands are shaking. His whole body is shaking. I can see the whites of his eyes, the rapid pulse at his throat, the way he's one breath away from a complete psychological break.
I should push. This is exactly the kind of breakthrough I've been waiting for. His walls are crumbling, his defenses shattered. One more trigger and he might remember everything.
The Architect would push. The weapon the Foundry created would push. That's what I was designed for—to break people, to extract what I need regardless of the cost.
Instead, I say, "We're done for today."
He looks up, surprise cutting through the pain. Tears track down his cheeks, and he wipes them away roughly, embarrassed, his chest rattling with the force of his breath.
