MasukSharon couldn’t breatheThe voice had not come from the speakers or the silver threads. It had originated in her very being, reverberating so that she could feel each word pulse at the edges of her visionWELCOME BACK, ORIGINAL SUBJECT .The silver mark on her wrist burned.Sharon gripped it with her other hand, trying to still the light slinking beneath her skin.“Get it out of me!”Alex lunged for her, but the moment his fingers brushed her wrist, the whole chamber exploded in white light.He was tossed backward.“Alex!”Daniel scrambled to his aid as the woman with the newborn fixed a horrified look on Sharon.“Don’t touch her,” Evelyn snapped. “No matter what’s happening, her nervous system is interfacing directly with the network.”“Then tell me how to stop it!” Sharon hissedEvelyn didn’t have an answer.The woman with the newborn stood motionless, save for the way her gaze followed Sharon as if recognizing her for the first timeHer charge had fallen silent as well, its silver
There were a few seconds of stillness.The woman waiting on the other side of the silver doorway looked just like Sharon.It had Sharon's face, her dark eyes and even the small scar on her left eyebrow. The way she was cradling the newborn was the same as well, as if Sharon had seen it a thousand times before.The baby was wrong.Its skin was a sickly pale pink and a thin silver line ran from its forhead to the hollow at its throat. Its eyes were closed but the silver fibres around it moved with every breath it took.Alex stared the woman down."You're not Sharon."She gave a sad smile."No. I'm the woman you married before you met her."Sharon felt Alex's hand clench around her own."What does that mean?" She demanded.The woman adjusted the baby in her arms."Ask your husband what happened on the night he first met you."Alex shook his head."I don't know what you're talking about.""You never do when it becomes inconvenient to remember."There was the sound of footsteps on the floo
The door slammed shut behind them.The noise caused Daniel to spin around immediately, raising his gun to wherever the doorway was."It's sealed," he announced after trying out the handle and finding a lack of mechanical lock. "Something is holding it."Silver threads were undulating along the walls, stretching down from the ceiling and reaching into the darkness beyond the room. It all pulsed gently like the veins in a living corpse.In the center of it, holding up a stuffed rabbit was the little girl in a yellow hospital gown.Emily.She looked no older than six years old with pale skin, silver eyes, and a rabbit with one ear hanging loose just as the memories Sharon had tried so desperately to unearth.The girl was staring at Alex.“You came back, Daddy.”Alex couldn't move.Sharon had seen him stand down armed men, she'd watched him walk through burning buildings and fight down foes that should have cut his throat. But now he looked like some man who's just discovered the ground b
"Daddy is the reason I died."Emily's words came to an abrupt halt on the sound of static. Sharons heart pounded in the deep silence of what followed before she realized the sound was her own heartbeat.Alex stood in the doorway of the settlement hall, his eyes fixed upon the small stuffed rabbit in Shadon's hands.He did not refute the accusations.He did not explain himself to Sharons surprise.He stared just as though he had spent a decade running from a specter in his past rather than merely days.Sharon knew she had seen Alex face down armed assailants and negotiate with terrorists. She knew he had made impossible choices that had cost the lives of hundreds if not thousands of people in his wake.But she had never seen him afraid of the childlike voice coming from behind her yet."Alex," she said quietly, forcing herself to her feet. "Tell me what you know."He looked up at her."I can't."The words cut deeper than she expected."You can't, or you won't?""I don't remember everyt
"Mommy, why did you let me die?"Sharon gripped the radio so hard her fingers ached.Years had taught her that the hardest thing a person could lose was the memory of a person they loved. She would never have believed that remembering the love before the loss was equally as devastating as forgetting the loss in the first place."Emily," she whispered. "Sweetheart, can you hear me?"There was a static crackling,then a soft sobbing."Mommy?""I'm here. I'm listening. Tell me where you are.""I don't know."Sharon's throat suddenly tightens."Can you see, Luna?""Yes.""Is she safe?"There was a long pause before the answer."She's sleeping," was her reply, "but the woman said she'll not awake until the house is finished."Alex leaned closer to the radio."What house, Emily?"The child's breathing changed."Who is that?""I'm your father, sweetheart."Another pause, then her voice came through again, whispering."You look different."Alex's face contorted with something like pain, then
"Now, let's see which daughter you choose this time."The woman's words chased Sharon into the darkness.Sharon found herself standing in a white room, unable to move as the little girl sat with tearful eyes on the floor, the stuffed rabbit with the torn ear lying between them."Mommy?" the child wimpers again.Sharon's heart twists painfully in her chest, as she feels an inexplicable grief."What is your name?" Sharon asks.The girl looks up at her and tucks her head in a strange way."You... gave me my name."Sharon reaches out to her, but the moment Sharon's fingers graze the child's shoulder, the room shudders.The white walls crack open, revealing flashes of silver light beneath.The girl grabs Sharon's wrist."Don't let them..." her voice trails off as the child's small fingers curl tighter around Sharon's arm."Who took you?" Sharon asks."The ones who told you to forget me."Sharon sinks to her knees in front of the girl."I won't forget you," Sharon promises.The child looks







