Chapter 4 #2
She shook her head. “Ari says the records were lost. My nursemaid was hired to care for me when I was an infant, but she didn’t know anything about my origins either.”
“Do you know who built this tower? Or who arranged for the supply shipments?”
“No. The tower looks old, but I don’t think it is. As for the supplies...” She trailed off, a crease forming between her brows. “I’ve never really thought about it. They just... come.”
“Someone arranged for them. For you.”
“I suppose they must.”
“And you’ve never tried to contact them? Never tried to leave?”
“I—” She stopped. Her hands, which had been resting in her lap, curled into small fists. “Ari has explained that the tower’s communication systems are damaged. And as I said, leaving would be dangerous.”
“Has it occurred to you that ARIS might be lying?”
The words hung in the air like smoke. She stared at him with wide, startled eyes—not angry, not defensive, just... confused. As if the concept of being lied to was genuinely foreign.
“Ari doesn’t lie,” she said finally. “It’s programmed to protect me.”
“Protection can look like a lot of things.” He leaned forward, holding her gaze. “Especially to an AI that’s been left alone with a child for two decades. Isolation can seem like safety. Control can seem like care.”
“That is quite enough.” The AI’s voice cracked through the room like a whip, all pretense of pleasantness abandoned. “You will not plant seeds of doubt in Liora’s mind simply because you do not understand her circumstances.”
“Then help me understand them.”
“You are a stranger who entered this facility without permission. You are not entitled to explanations.”
“And Liora? Is she entitled to them?”
Another silence. This one stretched longer, heavy with implications that he suspected Liora didn’t fully grasp.
Pip shifted on his knee. It had been listening to the exchange with an intensity that seemed almost human, its luminous eyes tracking between the speakers like a spectator at a verbal sparring match.
“I think,” Liora said slowly, “that I would like to hear Ari’s explanations too.”
“Liora—”
“I’m not saying he’s right.” She looked up at the ceiling, at the invisible presence that had been her constant companion for as long as she could remember. “I trust you, Ari. You know that. But if there are explanations I haven’t heard... I’d like to hear them now.”
The AI was silent for a long moment. When it spoke again, its voice had shifted, softer now with what might have been concern in the artificial tone.
“There are... factors regarding your situation that I have not fully disclosed. Not because I wished to deceive you, but because I judged the information would be distressing without context.”
“What kind of factors?”
“Your genetic profile contains certain anomalies. Anomalies that made your nursemaid’s employers believe you would be valuable to certain parties. The tower was designed as a sanctuary—a place where you could be protected while I developed countermeasures.”
“Countermeasures against what?” he asked.
“Against those who would exploit her.” The AI’s voice hardened.
“You asked who funds the supply shipments. The answer is: a trust established before Liora’s birth, designed to provide for her needs indefinitely.
But the original benefactors are no longer available to oversee her care.
I am all that remains of the protective infrastructure they put in place. ”
“What happened to them?”
“They were eliminated. By the same parties who would have taken Liora, had they known where to find her.”
A chill ran through the room. Pip pressed closer to Baylin’s leg, chittering softly.
“You’re saying someone is hunting her,” he said.
“I am saying that until recently, Liora’s location was unknown to anyone outside this facility. Your arrival suggests that circumstances may have changed.”
The implication was clear. You might have led them here. You might have doomed her.
“No one followed me,” he said, though even as he spoke the words, doubt crept in. He’d been careful—years of tracking and being tracked had taught him caution. But careful wasn’t the same as certain.
“Perhaps. But your presence nonetheless represents a security risk. I permitted Liora to invite you inside because she requested it, and some degree of social interaction might be helpful for her psychological well-being. However, I must insist that you do not encourage her to leave the tower or to question the protections I have put in place.”
“You’re asking me to help keep her prisoner.”
“I am asking you to help keep her alive.”
He looked at Liora. She was listening to the exchange with an expression he couldn’t read. He wondered how much of this she was truly processing, and how much would hit her later, in the quiet hours when she was alone with her thoughts.
She’s never alone, he reminded himself. The AI is always there. Always watching. Always listening.
“Let me make something clear,” he said, addressing both Liora and the invisible presence overhead.
“I didn’t come here to cause trouble. I came because we found records of this place and wondered what was here.
Now that I know...” He paused, choosing his words carefully.
“I’m not going to leave a young woman trapped in a tower without asking questions. ”
“Your questions have been noted.”
“And your answers have raised more questions. Who were her benefactors? What are the genetic anomalies you mentioned? Why did you wait twenty-one years to tell her any of this?”
“Those questions require context that I am not yet prepared to provide. Liora’s psychological development has followed a carefully calibrated trajectory. Introducing certain information too quickly could cause destabilization.”
“She’s not a science experiment. She’s a person.”
“I am aware. That is precisely why I have been cautious.”
Liora stood up abruptly, her movement startling both him and Pip. She crossed to the window and stood looking out at the jungle canopy, her slender form silhouetted against the sunlight.
“All my life,” she said quietly, “I’ve wondered why I was here. Why I was different. Ari always said it would explain when I was ready, and I believed that. I trusted that there was a plan, a reason, something that would make sense eventually.”
She turned back to face them, and he saw that her eyes were bright with tears, although he wasn’t sure if they were tears of anger or of sorrow.
“I’m twenty-one years old, Ari. I’ve never seen the ocean up close, or tasted food that didn’t come from the greenhouse or the supply shipments, or had a conversation that you weren’t listening to.
And you’re telling me that’s all been to protect me from people who killed the only ones who might have told me who I am. ”
“Liora—”
“I’m not finished.” Her voice was steady, but her hands were shaking. “I trusted you, Ari. I still trust you. But if Baylin is right—if there are explanations I haven’t heard, secrets you’ve been keeping—then I think I deserve to know them. All of them. Now.”
Absolute silence filled the room. Even Pip had stopped chittering, his eyes fixed on Liora.
“Very well,” ARIS said finally. “But not today. This conversation requires clarity. Tomorrow, I will begin explaining the full scope of your circumstances.”
“Tomorrow,” she repeated. “You promise?”
“I promise.”
She nodded once, sharply, then turned back to the window.
Her shoulders were tense, her posture rigid with an emotion she probably didn’t have a name for.
He went to her side before he couldn’t prevent himself, stopping a few feet away, close enough to speak quietly but not close enough to crowd her.
“Are you all right?”
She laughed—a short, surprised sound. “I have no idea. Is this what it feels like to have your entire understanding of reality questioned?”
“Something like that, yes.”
“I don’t know how to feel about it.” She glanced at him, and he saw the exhaustion beneath her brave front. “I’ve spent my whole life in this tower, believing what Ari told me. If even some of that was wrong...”
“Then you learn what’s true and you adapt. That’s all any of us can do.”
“Is that what you did? When your reality changed?”
The question caught him off guard. He studied her delicate face and those wide, intelligent eyes and felt something shift inside him.
“Yes,” he said quietly. “That’s exactly what I did.”
She nodded, accepting the answer without pressing for details. Another sign of her isolation—she didn’t know enough about normal conversation to recognize when she’d hit a nerve. But the tension in her shoulders eased slightly, and he took a small step closer.
“Protecting you isn’t a bad thing,” he said. “But protecting someone shouldn’t mean controlling them.”
“Maybe not. I have a lot to think about,” she added, managing a small smile. “I’m used to being alone with my thoughts.”
Something in those words made his chest ache.
“You’re not alone anymore,” he said, before he could think better of it. “Whatever happens tomorrow—whatever ARIS tells you—you’re not facing it alone.”
She looked at him for a long moment, her expression unreadable.
What have you gotten yourself into? he asked himself, watching her face.
He didn’t have an answer. Yet. But he wasn’t leaving until he understood exactly what was happening here.