MINE TO POSSESS

Ashaya Aleine was an M-Psy with a Gradient rating of 9.9. The latter made her very unusual. Most Psy that powerful tended to make the 0.1 leap into cardinal status. There was no measuring cardinals. Some were more powerful than others but all had the same eyes—white stars on black velvet.

Distinctive. Memorable.

Ashaya was neither. Her eyes were an unremarkable blue gray, her hair a plain black. It was curly but once pinned into a severe knot, it became forgettable. Her dark brown skin, too, was nothing surprising among the genetically mixed population of the Psy. But Psy weren’t the only ones she had to consider. For her plan to succeed, she had to learn to become invisible among the humans and changelings, a far harder task.

The clear panel of her computer screen flashed an incoming call. She answered it to find herself facing a woman with almond-shaped eyes and ruler-straight black hair. “Councilor Duncan. What can I do for you?”

Nikita Duncan put down what appeared to be an electronic pen. “I’d like a progress report. How far along are you?” Her face was a static wall, a testament to perfect Silence.

“Back at the start.” She remained as unmoving as the Councilor. “The saboteurs’ attack on the previous lab destroyed the majority of my research.” And her little twist in the programming of the prototype implants had taken care of those few that had been liberated from the lab without her consent.

“Nothing can be salvaged?”

“It may be possible,” she admitted. “However, in my opinion, it would be more effective to start from the very beginning. There were errors in the earlier prototypes I was unable to pinpoint. If I restart with those errors in mind, I may be able to eradicate them.”

“Of course.” Nikita’s dark eyes were unblinking. Like a snake’s. It was an apt comparison, given that Nikita was reputed to possess the deadly ability to infect other minds with mental viruses—an excellent, untraceable way of getting rid of competitors. “When can the Council expect a full update?”

“I’ll send one this week, but it will simply be a detailed reiteration of what I’ve already indicated.”

“Understood. I’ll wait for that report.” Nikita clicked off.

Ashaya found nothing unusual in the Councilor’s ready agreement. As the head M-Psy on the team dedicated to the implementation of Protocol I—also known as the Implant Protocol—Ashaya had complete autonomy over research and development.

Their goal was simple: to develop an implant that could be fitted into all Psy brains—but with a focus on infants—in order to create a totally unified society. In other words, a hive mind.





CHAPTER 6


By the time Talin made it up to her apartment, having no idea how long she’d spent in the Jeep, her eyes were swollen, likely bloodshot. Tasting salt on her lips, she pressed her palm against the scanner beside her door, waited for the lock to disengage, then pushed the door open. The lights came on automatically—she hated being in an enclosed space in the dark. Being outside in the dark didn’t scare her. It was the sense of being shut in that got to her—and she didn’t need a degree in psychology to figure out why.

Closing the door behind her, she took a step forward. And froze. At first, she couldn’t comprehend what it was that she was seeing. Then it hit her in a stomach-churning rush, a kaleidoscope of color and destruction perfumed with the smell of death.

The intruders were gone, that much was obvious. But they had left their mark. She slid down the back of the door to collapse into a sitting position, unable to take her eyes off the message dripping down the opposite wall in a dark red that screamed with the iron-richness of blood.

Stop. Or you’re next.

What a stupid message, she thought, childish in its sniggering simplicity. But it worked. The chill of a visceral fear crawled up her body until it closed around her throat, making her want to gag. Still she didn’t blink, didn’t look away.

How dare they? How dare they!

She didn’t care about the intrusion or the mess. Those things meant little to a woman who had never allowed any place to be home. But to do what they had done with the photos of her kids?

The holo-image frames had been crushed into the carpet, but they hadn’t stopped there. The hard copies had been shredded, the pieces stuck into the blood creeping down the wall. That desecration she couldn’t forgive. It made her want to scream and cry and crawl forward to gather up the broken pieces.

But she wasn’t a fool. Though anguish and a bone-deep anger roiled in her gut, she didn’t attempt to rescue those small things that meant so much to her. That was what they wanted, the monster or monsters who had taken and murdered the children under her care. They wanted to shred her credibility, turn her into a crazy woman no one would believe.