Chapter 20 · Reset Protocol - Chapter 20: The Core Makes Mark an Offer

"Subject 447, you have reached the core chamber."

The voice came from everywhere. From the walls, from the air, from the pulse under my ribs. I was standing in a room that looked like the inside of a throat. Wet metal, curved walls, veins of light running through everything like something alive.

Vera was on her knees ten feet ahead. Her hands were pressed flat on the floor. The bone spurs along her spine were glowing, pulsing in time with the lights in the walls.

"Mark," she said. She didn't look at me. "Don't come closer."

I came closer.

"Subject 447," the voice said again. "You have survived seventeen iterations. Your adaptation index is point-nine-two. You are authorized to access termination privileges."

A panel opened in the wall to my right. Inside was something that looked like a handprint scanner, but the surface was moving. Breathing.

"Place your admin mark on the interface," the voice said. "Confirm termination. Protocol will end. Subject 719 will be restored to baseline human parameters."

Subject 719. Vera.

I looked at the mark on the back of my hand. The one Lucas's daughter's copy had burned into my skin three loops ago.