Chapter 24
Selina
I stared at the stack of redacted dossiers on the lab table and turned each page slowly enough to test anyone’s patience. Nearly a week. I’d been Dresner’s “guest” that long, and I’d learned to stretch an hour into an afternoon.
“Operative displaying signs of memory intrusion during sleep cycle.” I pitched it like dictation. The pen never touched paper. I set it down again, one more petty refusal.
Blackout held the doorway, statue-still, green eyes fixed on me. He hadn’t spoken ten words today, but forgetting he existed was impossible.
I slid the next folder open. “Subject experienced visual hallucinations of pre-conditioning identity following extended field deployment.” Clinical delivery didn’t hide what the pages showed: men and women splitting at the seams, the person underneath clawing for daylight. Like Specter.
Specter. The name knotted my chest. Zagreb flashed—his memories flooding back, warmth gone to ice in a breath.
Was he trying to find me all this time? The question gnawed through every hour.
I shut the folder. The wall across from me was white and blank like everything here. Money everywhere: humming machines, surgical lights, glass. All immaculate. Nothing human.
“Have you reviewed the file?” Blackout’s voice cut through the quiet. He rarely started conversations.
“I’m being thorough.”
He crossed the room, steps soft on polished concrete. “The Director expects your analysis by this afternoon.”
“The Director can wait.” I turned another page, slow on purpose. “Good analysis takes time.”
He stopped beside me, close enough that I could track the steady lift of his chest beneath black tactical gear. No insignias. No name. Just a uniform filled with a body.
“You’re stalling.” Flat. A report, not judgment.
I looked up. “Yes. I am.”
For a beat, something shifted in his green stare. Puzzlement, almost.
“Why?”
“Because I have no intention of helping Dresner ‘perfect’ anything.”
His posture tightened. “Resistance is pointless.”
“And yet, here I am, resisting.” I pushed the file away. “Five days of it.”
Since the drugged blur at the hotel, I’d woken in one gilded cell after another—bigger, shinier, higher ceilings, different trim. Who knew where. The only constant shadowing me was Blackout.
I made use of the hours. Tested reinforced panes, mapped routes from room to lab, marked security patterns. Every morning he walked me here to read about “malfunctioning assets.”
On the first day, Dresner had brought me in himself, cool delight gleaming as he laid out folders like gifts over shattered lives. He told me my expertise in trauma-induced behavioral change was exactly what he needed, that these subjects represented failures he would correct.
Now, looking at Blackout, I wondered what his complete file would show. What they’d carved out of Xavier Hale to make him this empty.
“You’re not analyzing.”
“No. I’m thinking about you.”
His shoulders drew taut. “I am not relevant to your assignment.”
“Aren’t you? A ‘perfect’ operative babysitting a psychologist who specializes in breaking conditioning.” I tipped my head. “Feels relevant.”
“Your attempts to manipulate me are noted. And ineffective.” He edged back an inch, like distance could fix it.
“Not manipulation. Curiosity.” I stood, rolling the kink from my neck. “Your conditioning isn’t like Specter’s. It’s more complete.”
He stayed silent.
“When I mentioned your sister the other day, your pupils widened. Just for a second. The body remembers even when the mind’s been scrubbed.”
His voice flattened. “You should return to your work.”
I walked to the window; he followed. The glass opened onto clipped lawns and distant mountains. Not Zagreb. Not close.
“Where are we, Blackout? Switzerland? Austria?” I set my palm to the cold pane. “Feels Swiss. The architecture screams money.”
He didn’t answer, but he shifted to place himself between me and the exit. I’d drifted too close to a line.
“What does Dresner really want from me?” I asked. “He already has data. Why my analysis?”
“The Director’s objectives are not my concern.”
“They should be.” I kept my tone low. “Whatever he’s planning targets people like you. New protocols. Cleaner ways to erase what’s left.”
For a second, his eyes sharpened. Not emotion—reception, like a radio catching a station, then static.
“Dr. Crawford.” Dresner’s voice slid into the room as he entered—charcoal suit, neat tie, everything tailored and smug. “I see you’re making yourself comfortable rather than productive.”
“I’ve been reviewing your files.”
“And yet your notepad remains empty.” He glanced at it. “Nearly a week, Doctor, and you’ve provided nothing of value.”
“Thorough work takes time.”
His smile stayed while his gaze didn’t. “Time is a luxury you’re burning through.” He picked up a folder and set it down with care. “These subjects represent millions invested. Their failures cost me. Your resistance will cost you more.”
“Threatening me won’t make me work faster.”
“Perhaps not.” He smoothed a cuff. “What about threatening others? Your friend Dr. Prieto, for example.”
My gut clenched. “Leave Mattie out of this.”
“I prefer to keep all options open.” He stepped closer. Expensive cologne crowded the air.
His smile held. His eyes went hard. “I anticipated this, Dr. Crawford. Disappointing.” He checked his watch. “Perhaps you need a reminder of our partnership.”
I kept my expression steady. “It hasn’t worked so far. Why now?”
“Because behavior becomes predictable when the right variables are applied.” He turned to Blackout. “Bring Dr. Crawford. She needs a demonstration.”
Blackout’s hand closed on my upper arm—firm, not cruel. Cargo handling.
“Where are we going?” I kept my tone even, even as dread tightened, low and coiled.
“To address your motivation problem,” Dresner said, already walking.
I let the idea of a struggle come and go. With Blackout latched to me and Oblivion operatives everywhere, it would be wasted noise. Watch. Wait. Choose a moment that mattered.
We moved through spotless corridors. The elevator dropped. White walls gave way to concrete. A parking level under the building. My pulse kicked. Opportunity, or escalation.
The garage was dim. Our footsteps carried. Two operatives waited ahead, holding a slack figure between them. I knew the shape before the face.
Specter. His head hung, blood matting his hair. Shallow rise, shallow fall.
“Specter!” The name tore out of me. I surged forward. Blackout’s grip hardened—far stronger than I’d gauged.
At my voice, his head came up. He found me. Despair followed, cold and exact. He fought the hands on him.
He shouted my name, blood trailing from a split lip. “Selina!”
Dresner watched like he’d bought front-row seats. “Fascinating, isn’t it? How attachment undercuts training?” He drifted around Specter, pleased. “Your noncompliant solution delivered himself to my door. Convenient.”
The look on his face told me everything. This was the trap. Specter had stepped right into it—because of me.
“I’m sorry,” his lips formed.
Professional distance cracked. “Let him go! I’ll do it—I’ll write your protocols, analyze your failures, whatever you want.”
Dresner made a small motion. The operatives let go. Specter drove straight at him, momentum carrying—
“Mangrove. Amaranth. Empty,” Dresner said.
Specter collapsed mid-stride, hands to his head, a raw sound tearing out of him. His body curled, as if trying to crawl away from a fire inside his skull.
I yanked against Blackout’s hold. “Stop it! What are you doing to him?”
Dresner paced around him and spoke the sequence again. Each word hit like a hammer. Specter convulsed, a scream ripped from somewhere deep, his back arching hard.
“Stop! You’re killing him!”
“Hardly.” Dresner’s tone didn’t shift. “The conditioning keeps him alive while lighting up every pain receptor in his central nervous system. Elegant.”
Specter dragged at the concrete, fingers scraping, blood smearing. Red leaked from his nose. His eyes rolled white.
Dresner stepped close to me, face inches from mine. “That was a demonstration of operational parameters. Shall we test his limits?” He turned. “Specter. Asset designation JD-24601. Kill protocol authorization: Selina Crawford.”
Specter’s head snapped toward me, horror and refusal at war. “No.” The word broke around blood. “No, I won’t…”
His body didn’t listen. He hauled himself to his knees. Up, unsteady, pulled by invisible lines. He fixed on me, panic raw.
“Run.” He choked on the word. “Selina, run.”
Blackout’s hold made escape pointless. I could only watch Specter fight himself, shaking with the effort. More red tracked from his nose.
“Entertaining,” Dresner said. “The programming is pushing back against the directive. Corruption’s more extensive than I thought.” He glanced at me. “Your influence has damaged my asset beyond repair.” Ice slid into his voice. “We’ll reset him.”
“What does that mean?” I asked, though the answer was already a knot in my throat.
Dresner approached like he had all day, unhurried. Shoes clicked on concrete. Specter’s bloodied face twisted as Dresner crouched just out of reach.
“JD-24601.” Dresner lowered his voice. “It’s been a while.”
Specter tried to lunge. Nothing. His split lip dripped.
“I won’t do anything for you.” His voice shredded. “I’d rather die.”
“A predictable answer.” Dresner studied him with the interest of a man peering into a jar.
“Leave him alone!” I fought Blackout’s hand.
Dresner ignored me. He leaned in and whispered near Specter’s ear, too low to catch.
Specter went rigid. Shock or pain froze him. Every muscle locked. Then he dropped like cut wire.
Silence. No movement. No breath.
“No!” The scream ripped out of me. I tore free of Blackout’s grip and hit the concrete at Specter’s side.
“What did you do to him?” My fingers pressed to his neck, searching fast. Cold skin.
Nothing. Then there it was—a faint flutter. A beat.
Air returned as his chest lifted, shallow. Alive.
“Specter.” I held his face. “Can you hear me?”
His eyelids trembled and opened. Gray eyes, once steel, stared past me to the ceiling. Completely Blank.
“Specter?” I tried again. “Wolfe?”
No change. No recognition. No warmth. The man who’d protected me, who’d reached for me in sleep, who’d chosen children in Prague—gone, or buried where I couldn’t reach.
I brushed my thumb over his cheekbone, the same line I’d traced days ago in a hotel room. No flinch. Nothing.
“Stand up,” Dresner said.
Specter rose at once. He didn’t look at me. He waited, blood drying on his skin.
Dresner adjusted his cufflinks, admiring the shine more than the man he’d gutted. “Our Reset Protocol. It’s extreme, still experimental, but effective. It overrides everything, even corrupted sections.”
He circled. Specter remained, eyes forward.
“No data yet on long-term effects,” Dresner went on, almost casual. “We’ve tried it on three other subjects. One died within a day. Another lasted three before complete neural collapse. The third”—he shrugged—“we’ll see, won’t we?”
I couldn’t stop staring at Specter’s face. There had been a person there. He’d kissed me on a train. He’d taken my hand in the dark. He’d remembered enough to save lives. Now, there was just void.
Tears slid without permission. I didn’t wipe them.
“Didn’t he become a fascinating research project for you, Doctor?” Dresner’s voice cut the quiet.
I took Specter’s hand. My fingers closed around his. His remained slack.
Dresner flicked two fingers. Blackout moved in beside me. “Return Dr. Crawford to the laboratory.”
Blackout’s hand locked on my arm.
As he pulled me away, I looked back. Specter stood exactly where we’d left him, waiting. Blood dried on his chin. Those smoke-gray eyes that once cut through every defense saw nothing.
Something inside me gave way. In saving me, he’d lost himself. And I’d lost him.