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CHAPTER 63
CONFLICT DETECTED. ONE CLAIMANT HAS BEEN LYING ABOUT WHICH ONE OF THEM WAS BORN FIRST.The warning hung in front of Adrian's eyes. Nobody in the room moved.He turned to the boy in the fourth chair. "How old are you?""You already asked.""I asked how old you look. Now I'm asking how old you are."The boy's jaw tightened. His gaze slid to the hospital cards spilled across the cabinet."Eight."Eight. A child wearing Adrian's face. A black ring burned into his right palm. Eyes that flickered between silver and gold."Eight years since what?""Since I was supposed to wake up."Seraphine edged toward the desk, keeping her distance. "That's not an age. That's an event.""You understand more than she did.""Who?"The boy stared at her pendant. "The woman who chose."Her fingers closed around the chain under her collar. "Which woman?"He didn't answer. He pointed at Adrian instead. "He thinks being born first makes him the original.""I never said that.""You were about to."Pain knifed und
CHAPTER 62
The boy stood up from the fourth chair, and the whole room stopped breathing.He looked eight years old. Pale skin, dark hair, a white hospital uniform Adrian had seen only in broken memories. His eyes slid from silver to gold and back again.On his right palm sat a black ring.It was whole.Adrian raised the witness strip like a blade. "You're older than I thought you'd be.""You're younger than I thought you'd be." The boy gave a tired half smile. "You're counting the wrong thing."Behind Adrian, Seraphine shifted her weight. The pendant was still wrapped in cloth, but silver light leaked through the threads. Elysra said nothing. Adrian noticed that, and filed it away.Then he noticed the shadow. The boy's pointed at the wall. Everyone else's stretched toward the emergency lights.In this building, small wrong things were never small."What's your name?""You know it.""I know the name on the authorization. Adrian Vale."The boy's smile died. "That's *your* name." He tapped his ches
CHAPTER 61
"That's what I said the first time."The voice came from right beside his ear. It was Seraphine's voice, down to the small catch she got when she was angry.But Seraphine stood three steps away, one hand clamped over her wrapped pendant, the other flat against the wall.Adrian didn't turn toward the voice. He looked down.The dust on the floor held three sets of prints. His. Seraphine's. Elysra's.Nothing stood next to him. Yet he could feel breath on his neck."Nobody move."Seraphine froze. Elysra stayed silent. Down the corridor, dozens of phones kept ringing, one long, ugly chorus.He raised the black witness strip. It swallowed the light."Who are you?"A soft laugh. "You used to ask better questions.""Then answer one. Who approved Seraphine's identity?"Every phone stopped at the same instant."You already know.""No." His jaw locked. "I know someone wants me to say her name.""Good." The word came from behind him now. "You're learning."He spun. Empty air.The black ring on hi
CHAPTER 60
The lift was falling, and Seraphine's reflection was smiling.Seraphine wasn't.Adrian saw both of them in the scratched mirror. His fist clamped around the witness strip."Don't move.""I'm not moving," Seraphine said."I wasn't talking to you."The reflection tilted its head. It raised its right hand and waved, slowly, like a child at a window.Seraphine's real hand stayed at her side.Elysra stepped between them. "Cover it. Now.""Why?""If it can see you watching, it can copy you.""Copy me into what?"She looked at his palm. The black ring had split. A thin silver line crept out from it and ran under his sleeve. It pulsed once, in time with the reflection's wave."I don't know.""You keep saying that.""And you keep asking people who helped build this to be certain. It'll get you killed. Ask something I can answer."Adrian let it go.Elysra yanked a white medical cloth from her coat and threw it over the glass. The reflection vanished.A speaker crackled in the ceiling.DESTINATI
CHAPTER 59
WITNESS CONDITION: DECEASED.Adrian read the words twice. Then he turned to Elysra."Ravian was alive when we left him."Her face had gone gray. "The system isn't reporting his body.""Then what is it reporting?""His standing as a witness. If someone erases the event he saw, the system can kill his identity. He could still be breathing.""So someone erased it.""Or they're trying to.""Those are very different things.""I know.""Do you?"She didn't argue. That scared him more than another lie would have.Behind the glass, Subject Zero had stopped screaming. She sat against the partition with her silver eyes locked on Seraphine.Adrian looked at his palm. The black ring had split. A thin silver line now crept from it toward his wrist, and it pulsed whenever he glanced at the surgical pod on the monitor.He looked away. The pulse died.He looked back. It returned."Seraphine, look at the screen."She did. Nothing happened to his hand."Now look away."Still nothing."It isn't pain," h
CHAPTER 58
"Then let the rejected one wake up."The black ring on Adrian's palm split down the middle. Silver light poured out of the crack.Pain tore up his arm. He grabbed the edge of the surgical table before his knees gave out.Behind the glass, Subject Zero screamed.Every monitor in the theatre woke at once.TRANSFER THREE — CONSENT ACCEPTED.IDENTITY ASSIGNMENT: STARTED.WARNING: ORIGINAL BODY CLAIM CONFLICT."Elysra!" Adrian shouted. "Stop it!"His mother was already at the control panel, tearing the casing off with her bare hands. Blood ran down her knuckles."I didn't authorize this!""Your signature is on the transfer order!""It's twenty-six years old!""Then why did your name just light up the screen?"She ripped out a fistful of wires. The lights flickered.Nothing stopped.Seraphine slammed both palms against the glass. "Mother! Look at me!"Subject Zero's head snapped toward her. Her silver eyes flooded gold.When she spoke, the voice wasn't hers."Seraphine Sterling. Stabilizer
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