Chapter 47 #2
“We knew that already,” Nate says flatly.
“But you didn’t know you were in danger from someone who wants revenge and will get it any way that she can.”
He’s right about that. The idea that Julia is still alive and out there and plotting feels like ice sliding into my guts.
I know how obsessed she was with Vanguard before, but now that he’s turned on her, and chosen me, she’s never going to let that go.
I think she’ll chase Nate and I to the ends of the earth.
“Did you know that President Vasquez is compromised?” my father suddenly says.
That makes us both look up.
“Compromised how?” I ask.
“Blackmail, almost certainly. I don’t know the specifics, but some have indicated she’s not as free to act as she appears.
There are people with leverage over her, people who won’t allow her to move against Global Dynamix without consequences.
” My father sets aside his tea and leans forward, elbows on his knees.
“This is bigger than two fugitives on the run. Global Dynamix has connections everywhere—Congress, the Pentagon, the intelligence community. I know they’ve been running Project Prometheus for almost a decade, trafficking human beings for experimentation, and no one with the power to stop them has been willing or able to do so. ”
Seems my father probably knows more about it than I do.
“But you’ve seen inside that particular machine,” my father continues, his attention shifting back to include both of us.
“You’ve survived it. That makes you dangerous to them.
And potentially useful to anyone who wants to see that machine dismantled.
A lot of people want to see that bloody machine dismantled.
There are very few people actually willing to step up to the plate.
” He gives Nate a faint smile. “Very few people like you, Nate.”
Nate swallows and looks away. “Yeah, well, I’ve spent my whole life being useful to people. Being their weapon, their symbol, their asset. Forgive me if I’m not eager to sign up for another round, if I’m tired of stepping up to the plate.”
“I understand your reluctance. But this isn’t about using you—it’s about giving you a choice you’ve never had before.
” My father spreads his hands. “Right now, you’re running.
Hiding. Eventually, they’ll find you, and when they do, you’ll have nothing but your fists and your powers.
But if you understand what they did to you, what they made you into, then you have something else.
Knowledge. Leverage. The ability to expose them to the rest of the free world. ”
“Assuming you can figure out what they did to me,” Nate says quietly, looking down at his mug.
“But I can,” my father says brightly.
It’s exactly what I was hoping to hear.
Nate looks up at him and he gives us a quick smile, adjusting his glasses.
“I can run tests on you here in the lab. We have a state-of-the-art facility. Whatever you want to know about yourself, I can help you.” He pauses.
“I’m going to assume that whenever you had scans or appointments, you were kept out of the loop for a lot of them, correct? ”
“Pretty much,” Nate says. “I don’t think they made my brain as strong as the rest of my body, I could never understand most of their mumbo jumbo.”
“That was probably on purpose.”
“Why?” I ask. “Were they hiding something?”
My father gives me a pointed look. “Of course, they are hiding something, angel. It’s Global Dynamix.”
Angel. The name my father used to call me both grates on me and gives me a sense of comforting nostalgia.
“The voice in my head,” Nate says, voice still low, his body shifting uncomfortably beside me. “Can you help with that?”
“Voice inside your head?” my father repeats.
Nate shrugs. “I think it’s always been there but lately it was getting worse. Ever since, well, I met Mia. I know that Julia had a remote, she was controlling some of it but…it’s still not gone.”
“Well, now that we know she’s not dead, she might be trying to control you still,” I say, “just at a distance, so the signal is weaker.”
“Could be,” my father says. “I don’t know what they did to you, Nate, I only know what they said they did to you.
And I won’t know until I examine you properly.
” My father stands. “My equipment is probably not as sophisticated as what Global Dynamix has access to, but it should give us a baseline understanding.”
“And then?” Nate asks, but for the first time in a long time he actually looks hopeful.
“And then we figure out what we’re dealing with. And how to fix it.” He pauses. “If it can be fixed.”
I don’t like the hesitation in his voice, but it’s a lot more than we had yesterday.
“Fine,” Nate says, pushing to his feet. “Let’s do it.”
The walk to the main facility takes ten minutes, through forest paths I know by heart.
My father leads the way with a flashlight, Nate and I following in silence. The trees press close on either side, their branches heavy with moisture from the sea air, and I can hear the distant crash of waves against the rocky shore.
I know these paths. I ran them every morning and every evening for years, trying to outrun grief, trying to exhaust myself into something like peace.
I know every root that could trip you, every turn where the canopy opens to show the stars, every spot where you could hide if you needed to disappear.
I never thought I’d be walking them again, and definitely not with someone like Nate by my side. Someone I can kiss without consequence, such a rare unimaginable thing, and yet haven’t been kissing at all. The almost-kiss from this morning plays over in my mind.
“So, this is where you spent your high school years?” Nate asks quietly, falling into step beside me.
“Yes. From eleven onward.”
“Must have been isolated.”
“That was the point, I think.” I duck under a low branch. “Wanted to keep me safe. I wasn’t totally alone though, someone took me in the boat every morning to Sidney just across the water there where I went to high school. I had friends. I was starting over…”
Until Toby. Until I found out what I was.
Nate is quiet for a moment. “There’s a lot you haven’t told me. About your father. About this place.”
I sigh heavily. God, the air is so sweet here, it fills your lungs like nothing else.
“I know,” I say. “And I will.”
“Copy that,” he says, his hand brushing against mine in the dark, sending shivers up my arm and down my spine. Then it brushes again and then his hand stills as it makes contact, his fingers wrapping around mine and holding me.
My heart skips a beat and I have to remind myself to breathe again. Funny how something as small and chaste as holding someone’s hand can mean so much.
We carry on like that in the dark until the facility looms ahead, all concrete and security lights. It looks smaller than I remember, less intimidating. Or maybe I’ve just faced scarier things since then.
Then Nate’s hand falls away, creating distance, leaving my palm cold and bare.
My father swipes a keycard at a side entrance, and we slip inside. The hallways are empty—it’s past midnight, and his assistant probably won’t be back until morning.
“This way,” my father says, leading us deeper into the building. Past labs I remember, past equipment I recognize from years of poking around where I wasn’t supposed to be.
We stop at a heavy door marked DIAGNOSTIC IMAGING.
“The scan will take a bit of time,” my father says to Nate. “It’s non-invasive, mostly—magnetic resonance, neural mapping, the standard battery. I’ll need you to stay as still as possible.”
“And Mia?”
“She can wait in the observation room. Or—” My father glances at me. “There’s a cot in my office, if you need to rest. You look exhausted.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You’ve been beaten, tortured, and flown across a continent in the space of a week.” His voice softens, just slightly. “Let me help him. You don’t need to keep watch every second.”
“But I do,” I tell him. I’m not leaving Nate’s side now, even if we are safe. “I’ll watch from the observation room.” My father nods. He opens the door to the imaging suite and gestures for Nate to enter.
He disappears into the imaging suite and I stand in the empty hallway for a long moment, surrounded by the hum of equipment and the ghosts of a childhood I’ve spent years trying to forget.
Then I push open the door to the observation room and settle in to wait.