Page 374 of Eight of Swords, Part Two

‘I never—’

‘It was on my orders,’ Riley cuts over softly. ‘And Sorrenko has allowed us access to his research about them too. Boys.’ He gestures to Finn and Cole. ‘Explain.’

‘The Resonyx in the other Resets appears as a foreign element; a drug circulating through the body. In Roman, the compound has bound itself to living tissue. Blood cells, receptors, bone marrow. It’s altered his gene expression.’

‘Meaning?’ Kade asks.

‘It isn’t quite part of his DNA,’ Cole says, reaching up to enlarge a slowly turning helix, ‘but his body behaves as though it belongs there.’

Kade looks at Vasily, whose expression reveals little beyond focused concern, one gold-ringed thumb moving slowly across the knuckle of his opposite hand.

‘Four days until it wears off, yes?’

‘In ordinary subjects, four days is the typical length of time we see the compound last before it degrades, yes.’

‘But?’

‘Looking at how completely his body has bonded with this shit,’ Finn says bluntly, ‘we can’t predict what withdrawal will involve. If the compound does degrade, I’d expect acute symptoms.’

‘Like what?’

‘Neurological collapse, seizures, psychosis. His organs may begin failing without the compound maintaining whatever changes it made.’

‘You see here?’ Cole touches the projection, expanding a set of neuromuscular readings. Pale blue threads spread through a model of Roman’s body, concentrated around the brainstem, spinal cord and major muscle groups. ‘The Resonyx has integrated with his motor pathways and neuromuscular junctions. It regulates the speed and precision of every signal travelling from his brain to his muscles. Reaction time, coordination, force of movement.’

Vasily stares at the model. ‘So without it…?’

‘Best case, severe tremors and loss of motor control. Worst case, paralysis, respiratory failure or complete autonomic collapse.’

Finn sits back. ‘Kindly put, he’s a puppet, and this compound might be the strings holding him upright.’

‘Nothing about that was kindly put,’ Cole hisses at him.

‘Kindly meant, then.’

‘Is it duration of intake?’ Lee asks. ‘Or dose strength?’

‘Again, we would need to test this on other Resets that were slightly less dead than the ones Kade left for us in the tunnels, but at a guess I would say duration.’

Vasily stares at the helix.

‘The least I can do is let my brother die as himself.’

Riley asks, ‘What about the connection to Penhalyx?’

Finn expands a set of different readings.

‘The water in his cells moves with unnatural synchrony. Blood, muscle, brain. We see the same minute oscillations everywhere, like a tide responding to something outside his body. We think this might be the neural connection to Penhalyx, but we would need weeks if not months of study to confirm.’

‘Can you disconnect it?’

‘No. Even killing him wouldn’t stop it. Like we said, the Resonyx stays active for days after death.’

‘Did you see anything like this in Tanner’s blood?’

‘It coagulated far too fast for us to get anything.’

‘What Penhalyx did to Lachlan is different, I believe,’ Blaire says, stepping forward. ‘If I may?’