Chapter Nine

I’ve got you…. That’s what he’d said to me when he’d stepped off the elevator and taken me into his arms at the Vector Fifteen facility: I’ve got you. I remembered thinking Yes, you do.

I closed my eyes against the sound of the chopper blades overhead and the weight of Zero’s heavy, ice-cold eyes. They were colder than the helicopter interior by far. The chopper was equipped with a heater, among other modern niceties.

I hadn’t known just how right I was when he’d said those words to me. Zero had clearly been watching somehow when I’d fallen from the roof of Vector Fifteen. It made me wonder what he would have done if Lucas hadn’t caught me. Maybe my plummet to my near death had simply been a contingency he hadn’t planned on and we were both lucky. After all, he’d have had no way of knowing the transporter wouldn’t work. Hell, he probably hadn’t even known it was a transporter in the first place.

Yet when I fell, he somehow acted with impossible speed, sending Jack and Lucas to my rescue. It was like he was figuring it all out before it had happened, as if his programming was filled with algorithms that could foresee the most likely future outcome of transpiring events.

And maybe he was. Maybe Zero was a hell of a lot more dangerous than we’d anticipated.

A different kind of model altogether.

Nicholas would know, if anyone would. Nick had designed the first androids for FutureGen. It was what had made him famous and built a wall between him and his brother for good. True, Nick had retired from FutureGen and sold his stocks a good decade before IRM-1000 had walked through the exit of the transformed Vector Fifteen, but… if there was something logical going on that would make Zero as powerful as he was, Nicholas was probably the only one capable of pinning it down. With the exception of Zero’s creator. Whoever that was.

The rebels of Prometheus wondered about that every day. Who designed Zero? How had he come into being? Why did he look so much like Lucas, but taller? And with those sub-temperature eyes? Why was he so different from the androids before him? So autonomous? So powerful?

Thinking about Nicholas made me think of Prometheus and the soldiers that were attempting to destroy the rebel base even now. Had they succeeded?

Sitting there with my eyes closed and the rotor blades beating out a steady rhythm beyond the air-tight seals of the helicopter doors, I let my mind reach out. I thought of Jack and Daniel and Sonia, of Mabel and Shawn and Nanuk. And I felt nothing. No loss, no pain. Nothing.

Surely if they were dead, I would know? Deep down? They say you know when the ones you love pass. I wasn’t sure if that was true. I’d never lost anyone I loved, at least not that I remembered. But Jack had told me that once or twice since he’d adopted Nanuk, Jack had gotten a funny, unsettled feeling while out on a mission and he’d known he needed to go home and check on his dog. He would arrive just in time to find Nanuk with his massive head in the Halloween chocolates, or taking part in some other equally dangerous venture. Jack had a feeling.

So maybe I would know if my friends and family were gone. Then again, I’d seen Saxon go down with my own two eyes, and when I brought his snow white face to mind, I still felt nothing. In fact, I was completely and utterly numb.

Eyes still closed, I frowned. That was just it. I was going numb inside. Was this some kind of protective mechanism?

I thought back to the brief conversation I’d had with Nicholas before we’d taken the zip lines out of Vector Fifteen. He’d warned me of something that should have scared me a lot more than it had. IRM-1000 had been recording the output of my bioreadings while I’d been strapped to that chair in the systems room on level twenty-seven. And now….

I opened my eyes to find Zero was still watching me, as ever.

“I’d like to ask you a question,” I told him frankly. Chalk one up for being numb. It did a number on debilitating fear.

He cocked his head to the side like Lucas would. In fact, he was still wearing Luke’s skin, so to speak. It was rude, and I wanted to ask him to wear his own damn appearance. But if I was going to get a single favor out of him, I’d rather it be honest answers than a pointless outfit change.

“You may ask me anything you like, Samantha.”

“Will you give me an honest answer?”

“I have never lied to you.”

I thought about that, recalling everything he’d told me since he’d taken Luke’s appearance in the elevator. Even when he’d told me he wanted to speak with me about IRM-1000, he hadn’t actually been lying.

“Are you able to control my mind?”

Zero hesitated a moment before his lips curled slightly. “Not in so many words. Not yet. However, the information I was able to gather while you were my guest at Vector Fifteen was invaluable. At this juncture, I have some minimal jurisdiction over the neurological effects of certain stress-related chemicals in your bloodstream, such as adrenaline. For obvious reasons, it was my primary focus, and it was the most applicable given the extent of the stress chemicals in your system at the time.” He shrugged a very Lucas-like shrug. “I had plenty to work with.”

I processed that as well. I’d suspected as much. The way Zero seemed to be able to make me calm down on the path in Prometheus and what Nicholas had told me at Vector Fifteen added up. Nicholas was right; Zero had been after more than my inventions.

And boy, did that android ever work fast.

But in the dark cloud of this dawning bad news, there was a silver lining. Zero couldn’t keep me from concentrating on escape. And in fact, if I became too frightened to concentrate fully on what I needed to do, his newfound ability might even prove to be helpful. He might delve right into my brain and calm me the fuck down so I could think clearly again – and use my clear thinking to get the hell out of Dodge.

As long as he couldn’t read my thoughts, there was hope.

“I am also able to glean limited random surface thoughts,” said Nine calmly.

My blood turned as cold as his eyes.

But his smile turned oddly warm, as if he were laughing inside. “On the off chance that it makes you feel better however, it takes a large portion of my allocated energy resources to do so. And I only seem capable of doing it when your thoughts run free due to high emotional levels.”

I blinked. “Why in the nine hells would you actually admit that to me? That you can only do it under certain circumstances?” I couldn’t help but ask.

His smile didn’t budge, and his eyes glittered in the moonlight coming through the chopper window. “It’s as I said. I told you because I knew it would make you feel more comfortable. As difficult as it is for you to fathom Samantha, your wellbeing is paramount to me.”

“Yeah actually, I sorta got that,” I told him. “God forbid anything happen to your little invention factory.”

His smile faded to make way for a solemn expression that I could swear was almost… wounded. “Indeed there is that,” he admitted slowly. “I have never known an individual, man or machine, who was capable of seeing the world quite the way you do.” Then, in a move that was disturbingly human, he turned and glanced out the window as if uncertain he should say anything further. “And there are other reasons.”

I had no idea where to go with that. I stared at his profile, Luke’s profile, and felt a pang in my chest. When seated, there was no height difference between them, and Zero was his spitting image.

I was beyond worried about Luke. But one thing I had to hold on to in all of this was that Zero had assured me he was alive. If nothing else – there was that.

“Why are you still dressed like him?” I asked bluntly. It just came out. It was possible Zero would begin to regret making me calm.

But without looking at me, Zero laughed softly, the way Lucas sometimes did when Nanuk would do something amusing. Or hell, when I would do something amusing, and usually clumsy, and hadn’t known he was watching me.

“You are most definitely a dandelion, Samantha Hart.” Zero faced me again as I frowned in confusion.

“A rose is thorny,” he said. “You are anything but. And an orchid, though one of the loveliest blooms on the planet, is far too delicate. You however, are wild. You are also morally rooted, and those roots are strong. And when you bloom… you impart all that is around you with vivid beauty.”

I stared at him, stunned. He stared right back.

It took me a minute to fully process what he’d told me. When I did, I recognized his choice of words. Orchid. That’s what he’d said under his breath when he’d been looking at Daniel’s painting of me. And rose and dandelion had been what I was thinking.

It dawned on me then that Zero had been reading my thoughts in that art room. Damn, I thought automatically. I wondered how many other thoughts he’d managed to reap from my brain since we’d left Vector Fifteen.

Zero smiled as if following right along while I connected my mental dot-to-dots. He had been leaning back against the seat across from me, but now he leaned forward more intimately, bracing his elbows on his knees and lacing his fingers together.

“And now you have your answer as to why I wear this skin,” he said. “Your feelings for IRM-900 are achingly raw. When you look at me as I am now, it is easy for me to read you just as I did in Daniel’s studio. I hear the thoughts borne of your harrowing emotion loud and clear.” He grinned knowingly. “I find it refreshing.” His grin turned evil. “And slightly amusing.”

“Can you hear this one?” I asked. You frequently suck monster android cock! I mentally yelled at him. My choice of words was awkward, as cursing people out wasn’t as much my forte as it was Captain Hugo’s, but it would have to do.

But Zero was visibly unimpressed. He sat back again and said easily, “I can. But if I may make a suggestion, Dandelion… you might wish to refrain from giving me ideas you aren’t fully prepared to act upon to fruition.”

I let that go. I had to.

But I’m absolutely sure the bastard caught the rapid flux of my heartbeat, no doubt followed by the veritable Niagara Falls-like dumping of adrenaline into my bloodstream.

“And know this, Samantha.” He leaned forward again, and his voice lowered dangerously. “I will only become more adept at reading you. A flower blooms as nature commands. And you will blossom as I command.”

Behind him, the pilot’s moon-shaped EED flickered with information exchange, and Zero turned his head slightly – still watching me. “We’re landing,” he informed me, straightening in his seat. A few seconds later, the chopper touched down, jarring a little as its landing skids struck patches of ice. I glanced out the window to confirm my earlier suspicions. We were not at Vector Fifteen. In fact, I didn’t recognize the area at all.

The “ride” he’d informed me was waiting for us when Zero’s men had infiltrated Prometheus was in fact not only a short car ride, but a chopper waiting on a private landing pad at the top of a nearby building. In the time since, Zero had not once let on to what happened at Prometheus after we’d departed. I knew he probably maintained contact with his men there, but I could read no change in his expression.

I had no idea if anyone was left alive.

What I did know was that whatever had happened at Prometheus, whether Zero’s soldiers had managed to destroy everyone there or not, the confusion of the attack at the very least resulted in Zero making a clean getaway. Once we were in the helicopter, I was cuffed with my hands behind my back and strapped in to my seat with a seatbelt. The chopper took off without incident, and I knew damn well that no one had been anywhere near following us.

So I’d paid close attention to the route we’d taken. I noticed the helicopter traveled neither east nor west, so it clearly wasn’t headed to either Vector Fifteen facility. Instead, we went north, and now we were landing a full hour to an hour and a half later, if I was estimating accurately. I gauged that we were in Canada, but I had no idea where in Canada.

Being a member of Prometheus meant studying all sorts of things, including getaway vehicles and their speeds. This chopper was fancy. Given its shape and size and the fact that it was equipped with what we called a FIPS, or Full Ice Protection System, to keep the rotor blades and engine from icing over, I was guessing it was some sort of Vectored-out version of the AugustaWestland helicopter from years back.

That model had easily been capable of reaching speeds of 300 miles per hour. I didn’t feel we’d maxed out our speed, so given how long we’d traveled, I was betting we’d gone about two-hundred and fifty miles north of Pittsburgh.

And that was where my knowledge of our location ended, such as it was.

We landed in a field of snow that stretched as far as the eye could see. The human eye, anyway. I wagered androids could see further. But for me, the only thing marring that flat white surface was a single gray structure that jutted out from the powder like an Arctic pyramid.

“Where are we?” I asked, staring out the window.

“This is my home,” said Zero. “Well, one of them that is. And from this moment forward, it will also be yours.”

I turned away from the window to face him. His expression had returned to unreadable, hard. He captured my gaze, and just as I had in Prometheus, I felt his eyes pierce my soul.

I knew he was exerting some form of control over me, most likely to keep me from running. But there was no way I was going to run from him out here in the eighth circle of Hell anyway. The landscape looked like it would make ice cubes of my digits in minutes flat. I was stubborn; Zero was right. But I wasn’t stupid.

One of IRM-1000’s men prepared to open his door from the outside as Zero leaned forward and reached around me, bringing us very close. I stiffened when I felt his fingers deftly manipulate the lock on my cuffs, and the cuffs slid away. He placed them somewhere at his back, most likely in a case the way he’d holstered his gun. Then he unbuckled my seatbelt.

Once he had however, he remained where he was and braced his hands against my seat back on either side of me. I was effectively caged within the confines of his inhumanly strong arms.

I froze in the intensely personal proximity of his face to mine. “It’s a short walk into the building,” he assured me in a soft voice that might have even been considered caring if it weren’t for the frozen shards in his eyes. “I removed your handcuffs to allow you further balance as we cross the ice. You’ll be warm once we’re inside. The temperature of my home has been adjusted for your comfort.”

How chivalrous, I thought loudly and sarcastically, intending him to hear. You really pull out the stops for your prisoners. I mean guests.

His brow rose in quiet amusement, so I knew he’d indeed heard. But I wasn’t “mouthing” off to anger him. A part of me was in science mode as always, and that part of me wanted to know exactly where in the levels of my mind he was able to “see” and “hear.” If I tried various tactics while mentally speaking to him, and always ribbed him when I did it, I was sure to narrow it down based on when he responded.

He straightened and climbed gracefully out of the helicopter, then turned to offer me his hand like a gentleman.

In that moment, I realized that I was the only person remaining in the chopper. My hands were free. If I was fast enough, I could spin around, jump over the partition into the pilot’s seat, start the engines up, and fly out of there.

Zero lifted his chin slightly, his eyes flashing. “I don’t have to read your thoughts to know what is going through your head right now, Samantha. So I feel I should take this opportunity to inform you that the helicopter is out of fuel.”

I looked over my shoulder at the fuel gauge. He was right. They’d timed the fuel supply perfectly for a one-way trip.

“And more importantly,” he continued, “a friend of yours anxiously awaits your advent inside.” He turned slightly, and with a mere look gestured to the pyramid-like structure of stone and metal that waited a hundred feet away. “You wouldn’t want to keep him waiting any longer than absolutely necessary, would you? He’s already endured so much in your absence.”

For the umpteenth time since I could remember, IRM-1000 won the day with me. His words forced the blood from my face and sent my heart into painful overdrive. Fear ramrodded through me, and I shuddered.

He noticed, and smiled ever so slightly in dark victory.

I placed my now trembling hand in his and let him help me out of the chopper. I was actually grateful for his assistance as dread filled my limbs, my fingers, and my toes, making them go numb. On the step down, I stumbled a little, but he caught and supported me easily and readily, as if he’d known full well his threat would have this effect.

As he walked me to the pyramidal structure and the door I could now see in the side facing us, the wind hit me hard like a warning. It brushed through my long white hair and stung my yellow-gold eyes. But I didn’t need that extra portent from the wind. I already moved like I was in a nightmare. I already didn’t want to go inside. And at the same time I couldn’t get in fast enough.

Because I knew what I would find. I knew Lucas was in there.

But only IRM-1000 and God knew what Zero had done to him.