Chapter 271
The lab smells of ozone and antiseptic. Cold, humming machines whir softly in the background, their blinking lights casting sterile shadows across the white tile floors. I stand just inside the threshold, trying to shake the lingering unease of Shoal’s words from my mind. He sees me as a conduit. A lens. Not a person. Not Phoebe.
I’m still thinking about that when Lily looks up from a console and gives me a tight, unreadable smile.
“Glad you came,” she says crisply. “I thought we might continue the research together.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Since when do you want company?”
She shrugs one shoulder and turns back to the screen, flicking through a data stream I can’t parse without closer inspection. “Let’s just say your performance with the Elder Kin was impressive. I think it’s time you saw more of what we’re working on. You’ve proven useful.”
Useful. The word clings to me like a second skin. It feels too much like Shoal’s “divine lens” talk for comfort. But I keep my face neutral and nod.
“Sure,” I say. “Let’s get started.”
She leads me past the dissection tables, past the still body of the creature Wake and I helped kill, now being drained and harvested by a mechanical arm suspended from the ceiling. Its inner organs pulse faintly under the surgical lighting, and the faint smell of iodine and sea salt turns my stomach.
“Still no classification for this one,” Lily mutters, half to herself. “Its DNA is more closely related to an octopus than anything else we’ve seen. But it walks. Breathes air. Doesn’t respond to the siren’s call. Not at all natural.”
She taps a screen, and a hologram blooms before us—waves of brainwave data overlaying one another in pulsing colors.
“We’ve cracked it,” Lily says with a note of pride. “Or at least, I have. The connection between them, the way they move, how they fight—it’s all linked. Like a swarm.”
“Like a hive,” I say quietly.
Lily’s eyes gleam. “Exactly.”
She gestures toward a door on the far end of the lab, and my pulse quickens. Something about the shift in her tone sets off every instinct I have.
“Come on,” she says. “I want to show you something.”
We step into a chamber I haven’t seen before—windowless, quieter, colder. Rows of seats line the walls, but my eyes go straight to the center. There, standing with heads bowed and eyes glazed over, are six Enkians I’ve never seen. Their tattoos are dim. Their skin is dull. They don’t move. Don’t even blink.
I turn sharply. “What is this?”
Lily gives me a serene smile. “Control.”
She walks over to a panel near the wall and taps a few buttons. One of the Enkians stiffens, then kneels. Another follows. A ripple, like dropped stone into water, runs through the others until all of them are kneeling.
“Darklite was only the beginning,” she says. “With enough neural synchronization, the signal becomes irresistible. I just had to find the right frequency.” She taps her temple. “The siren’s call—synthesized. Streamlined. No need for vocals anymore.”
“And the collars?” I ask, voice dry.
Lily turns back to me, holding something in her hands now. A small, black device that pulses faintly with silver light.
“I was hoping you’d ask,” she says, and before I can react, she closes the distance between us.
My body tenses. Too slow.
She slams the collar against my throat.
There’s a hiss. Then a click.
Pain. Just a flash, like a needle pressed behind my eyes. And then—
Silence.
Everything shifts.
I feel… open. Exposed. Like my mind is no longer contained within just my own skull. It stretches outward, tapping into other presences—not voices, exactly, but pulses. Instincts. I can feel them, the Enkians nearby, their quiet compliance humming through my awareness.
But I don’t feel compelled. Not like they do.
Whatever Lily was hoping this would do to me, it’s not working.
Still, I play along.
I let my eyes go a little glassy. I slacken my jaw. Then slowly, I kneel, mirroring the others.
Lily studies me with sharp eyes. My stomach flips. I force my breath to slow, to shallow out, like I’m trying to regulate from the inside out.
She lets out a breath and nods, satisfied.
“Incredible,” she says. “You resisted longer than most. But in the end…”
She trails off, stepping back, turning her attention to the console.
I stare forward, unmoving, heart pounding like a war drum.
This is worse than I thought. She’s building something dangerous here. Not just weapons. A network. A mental prison. If this works on the wrong person—if it works on the right one—it could undo everything.
And she thinks it’s working on me.
I school every flicker of thought into stillness. Every instinct to rip the collar off, to scream, to run—I press it all down.
“I think we’ve made a breakthrough,” I murmur, letting my voice go soft, a little dazed. “This could be… everything.”
Lily smiles wide, proud. “Exactly what I was thinking.”
She moves to deactivate the signal, and as the neural buzz dulls in my skull, I rise with the others, still keeping my expression neutral, my limbs stiff.
“Tomorrow,” she says, almost giddy, “we’ll try something larger scale.”
My fingers twitch at my side.
“Oh,” I say lightly, “I’m looking forward to it.”
But inside, I’m screaming.
Because Lily has no idea that she just handed me the match—and showed me where she keeps the kindling.
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