Boots.
Several pairs.
Heavy and deliberate. Not the soft-soled shuffle of the overnight monitors. Not the clipped efficiency of the data team. Something with a purpose. My grin slowly returns.
"Ah," I murmur.
The morning crew. I stand up, rolling my neck until something pops satisfyingly. It doesn't actually make me feel better. It's just a thing I dobecause it's mine. A small, stupid piece of routine that belongs to me and nobody in a white coat.
Time for another exciting episode ofWhat Horrifying Experiment Are We Running Today.
The door at the end of the hall buzzes. Another unlocking. Another day beginning in whatever way they've decided it should.
I crack my knuckles and roll my shoulders.
"Okay, Zero," I whisper to myself. The footsteps are closer now. Four sets, maybe five. They bring more people on the days they expect resistance. They've learned. I've taught them well.
"Let's try not to die before lunch."
The lock on the steel door clicks.
A mechanical clunk echoes through the frame. Bolts sliding back in sequence. One, two, three. I've memorized that sound the way you memorize things that matter.
Then the intercom crackles overhead.
Static hisses briefly before a familiar cold voice fills the room.
Flat.
Clinical.
Emotionless.
The voice of someone who has never once asked whether any of this is a good idea.
"Subject O-00."
I look up at the speaker.
"Yes, mysterious voice in the ceiling?"
A beat. The pause they always take, like my responses are being noted somewhere. They probably are.
"Stand by for extraction."
I smile slowly. Let my shoulders drop into something relaxed. Easy. Like, the wordextractiondoesn't mean whatever it means today.
"Oh," I murmur.
The door begins to open. Light floods in from the corridor beyond, brighter than my cell, which takes some doing. Figures appear in the threshold, backlit, reaching for equipment they don't intend to use gently.
I rock forward onto the balls of my feet.
"Definitely a bite day."
Chapter Two
Colt
