The Eye of Minds

^{CHAPTER 25} AWAKE

Michael heard the familiar, distant sounds of the LiquiGels and AirPuff dispensers retracting, felt the prick and tug of the NerveWires retreating from his skin. His breath was smooth and even, and not one part of his body hurt or ached. He opened his eyes and saw the glow of the internal light in the Coffin.

It was over. He’d made it back alive.

Alive. Not dead. He didn’t move, just lay there as his mind went back through all the things he’d experienced since that day the girl named Tanya jumped off the bridge. The Path, the terrible head pain, the confrontation with Kaine and the strange things he’d said, the bizarre way the battle had ended in the Hallowed Ravine.

None of it fit together, and Michael didn’t understand the Mortality Doctrine any more than he had the first time Agent Weber mentioned it. But he’d done his best and he just had to hope the VNS had gotten what they wanted. Michael was officially finished.

He sighed with relief and popped the lid of the Coffin, pushed it open on its hinges, and carefully let it lower to the floor. The room was dark—he’d been in the Sleep so long that he’d actually lost track of what day it was in the real world. He climbed out of the oblong structure and got to his feet, stretched his arms toward the ceiling, not caring that he was naked. Despite being shrouded in night, things seemed brighter than ever, his mind clear, his muscles strong. The air even tasted sweet. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in such a good mood.

Then he remembered his parents. What Kaine had said about wiping them from existence. Panic rattled his chest.

He moved toward the light switch and bumped into something, toppled over it, and crashed onto a hard wooden floor. Swearing, he grabbed the knee he’d just banged on the wood—which made no sense. His entire apartment was carpeted. He fumbled around until he found a wall, then a piece of furniture that didn’t belong. There was a lamp on top, and he flicked the switch as he got back to his feet.

In the light, Michael sucked in a quick breath. Not one thing around him looked familiar. He stood in the bedroom of a stranger. Walls painted a dark green, a bed with rumpled sheets, a dresser with model trains on top, paintings of mythical creatures on the walls: unicorn, dragon, griffin. The Coffin from which he’d just emerged—and its ancillary equipment—took up an entire corner of the room.

He saw all of this in stunned silence. No logical explanation jumped to mind—how could someone have switched him to another location without disconnecting him, waking him? Was the VNS behind it somehow? To protect him in the Wake?

There was a window that looked out onto a city street, lights shining through like stars in the sky. He ran over to it and peered through the glass, saw a street that was completely foreign. Huge buildings all around, skyscrapers. His room was at least fifty stories from the ground, where he could see cars passing in the night.

Something weird in the reflection caught his eyes, caused a stir of something horrible deep inside him. An awakening panic that felt like a growing sickness. He was starting to understand what had happened even as he spun away from the window, frantically searching for a bathroom. He had to run across the bedroom and out into a hall, stumble down a dark passage. He found what he was looking for, slipped inside, turned on the light.

Michael looked into the mirror, bright white lights spanning its length along the top.

A stranger stared back at him.

Michael recoiled from the reflection, crashed into the wall behind him, then slid to the floor. His hands flew up to his face, feeling it. Nothing was familiar.

He scrambled back to his feet, looked again into the mirror, studied the hair and face and body of someone he’d never seen before. Looked into… his eyes. Eyes that weren’t his. A face that wasn’t his. His breath came in short, ragged bursts. Sweat beaded along his skin, slicked his arms. He could feel his pulse in his neck, hear the beat of his heart in his ears.

And he stared at the stranger in the mirror. As if it was a window into another room—his mind couldn’t accept anything else as an explanation. Yet the person looking back mimicked his every move without fail. A perfect reflection.

Michael was… someone else.

It seemed as if the world itself had stopped spinning, the moon turned to ash, the sun winked out like a spent flame. Nothing was right in the world, nothing made sense. The foundation of his entire life had just crumbled to dust. And all he could do was stare at the face in front of him. Stare at the person he’d never seen before. He knew it would haunt him forever, floating in his thoughts day and night like a vision.

Then he remembered hearing a voice right before he passed out in the Hallowed Ravine. And somehow, in that moment, Michael finally understood what the voice had been saying to him.

Read your messages.

Michael hurried back to the room he’d never seen before that day, flopped onto the bed, pinched his EarCuff. A bluish NetScreen popped out and hovered before him, with almost nothing on it except a few standard icons. Everything had been erased. The Bulletin said he had one unread message. With a feeling like someone about to discover an alien race or the cure for cancer, he reached out and touched it, opening the message.

Dear Michael,

You are the first subject to successfully implement the Mortality Doctrine. There is only one way to explain it, and that is simply this: You were once a Tangent, a program created by mankind to be used by mankind. Now you are a human yourself. Your intelligence, your thoughts, your life experience have been transferred to the body of one we deemed unworthy to continue his own. I created the KillSims for exactly this purpose. They erase the Aura and render one’s brain, in effect, empty—clean for your free rein.

This plan has been long in the making. My activity in the VirtNet was so that I could find those able to seek me out. To find those Tangents with the greatest intelligence, cunning, bravery, and potential to survive in the Wake. To meet the physical demands of being human. It has all led to this day.

You are only the beginning, Michael. The first step in a massive leap forward in evolution. Congratulations. You no longer have to worry about experiencing Decay, which means the headaches will finally end. Excellent news, I’m sure.

We’ll be in touch shortly. We need your help.

Kaine

And in one horrifying moment, it all made sense.

Michael was a creation of artificial intelligence, a Tangent, a computer program. Everything about his entire life had been fake, and he now understood every bit of it. His “home,” his “Wake” had been within Lifeblood Deep—those signs he’d seen every day outside his window weren’t advertisements. They were labels. Location plates.

Lifeblood Deep had represented his programmed life. When he slipped inside his Coffin and sank into the Sleep, he was actually exiting the Deep and entering the normal VirtNet that real humans entered to game. All the memories of his childhood had been fabricated. He was nothing but a computer program.

And the headaches, the strange visions—just as Kaine said, he’d been experiencing Decay. It had nothing to do with the KillSim attack at the Black and Blue Club. Tangents could only last so long before they began to break down. It also explained why his parents and Helga had disappeared without explanation. He’d always been told that was what happened—that elements of your life began to vanish from the programming and you didn’t even realize it half the time. At least, not at first. He remembered the sinking feeling he’d had when it hit him that his parents had been gone for weeks and it hadn’t seemed strange until that moment.

Michael wasn’t real. He was fake. It sickened him. As if someone had poured poison down his throat in big, choking mouthfuls. He didn’t want to be alive anymore. He didn’t deserve to be. He was a Tangent.

But Kaine had given him life. Had stolen a human body, made it Michael’s. The Path had been a test—but one he wished now that he hadn’t passed. Michael was nothing but a guinea pig for a Tangent that had somehow become self-aware. And now he wanted him to help make it happen again and again. Take over the entire human race, maybe. It all fit, and he understood why the VNS had wanted to find Kaine.

And what about Bryson and Sarah, his parents, Helga? Had anyone in his life been real? Could he ever find them if they were? A rush of despair overwhelmed him.

Michael turned off the NetScreen, leaned his head against the wall, and closed his eyes. His first thought was of Tanya, and how she’d ended her life by jumping off that bridge. If he really was a human now—flesh and blood—then he could do the same thing. And perhaps it would even upset Kaine’s plans—slow them down a bit. Maybe they needed Michael as a template so they could duplicate what they’d done.

But even as he thought it, he knew that following Tanya’s path wasn’t an option.

There was only one thing he could do to make things right.

Live.

Live to face Kaine again.

The doorbell rang.

Michael walked through his unfamiliar apartment with his unfamiliar body. He was tense, his heart beating rapidly. There was no way of knowing who else lived there, who might come home, who might be waiting outside in the hall. But he knew, absolutely knew, that he had to answer the door.

When he pulled it open, Agent Weber stood there—all dark hair and exotic eyes and long legs. Her expression was hard to read. It seemed like another lifetime when he’d met her at the VNS headquarters. He almost laughed out loud when he realized that, indeed, it had been. Michael could never have known if she was real or not until that moment.

“You must have a thousand questions,” she said, her voice tight.

“More like two thousand.” His new voice sounded strange to his new ears.

“Our meetings were real,” Weber said. “Our interactions—your mission—were real. We were all duped by the Tangent. By Kaine.”

“You did know I was a Tangent, though. Right?”

She nodded. “Of course we did. We knew he was gathering Tangents to his lair, testing them somehow. That’s why we used you. We met you in Lifeblood Deep and used you. I’m sorry, Michael, but it was the only way.”

Michael felt a hitch in his gut, but he had to ask the next question. “And Bryson? Sarah? Are they…”

“Yes.” Weber nodded. “They’re real, Michael. And they didn’t know that you weren’t. You’ll have to do a lot of explaining to them yourself.”

Michael laughed. He had no idea where it came from, but he laughed.

“So,” he finally said, “what’s next? I’m sure Kaine knows you’re here.”

“I just wanted you to see my face. To know that I really exist—that you’re not alone. To know that the VNS is still determined to catch Kaine and stop his plans. I’m going to leave now, Michael.” Weber paused. She looked almost sad. “We’ll be in touch with you. In the meantime, do your best to play the part of the human you’ve replaced. There’s simply no other choice.”

And with that, Agent Weber turned from him and walked away, her high heels clicking on the tiled floor of the apartment hallway. Michael stared after her until she was gone, then closed the door and headed for the kitchen.

He was hungry.