The first thing I smelled was antiseptic and cold, recycled air. It was a sharp, clinical scent that cut through the chemical fog in my brain. My head throbbed with a rhythmic, dull ache—a heartbeat that wasn't my own.
I opened my eyes, but the world was a blur of fluorescent white. I was lying on a hard, metal table. My wrists were cold. I tried to move them, but the sharp clink of steel against steel told me everything I needed to know. I was handcuffed to the bed.
"Amara. Stay still."
The voice was low, devoid of the jagged anger Zane usually carried. I turned my head slowly, my neck stiff. Zane was standing by a glass partition, his silhouette illuminated by the glowing blue lights of a dozen life-support monitors. He wasn't looking at me. He was looking at the body in the tank behind the glass.
"Where am I?" I rasped, my throat feeling like it had been scraped with sandpaper.
"In the place where legacies are grown," Zane said, finally turning to look at me. He looked older than he had ten minutes ago in the office. His eyes were bloodshot, and his expensive suit was wrinkled. "This is Sub-Level 4. Not even the board of directors knows this floor exists. This is where the 'Echoes' are stabilized before they are sent to their assigned positions."
I struggled against the cuffs, the metal biting into my skin. "Where is Tobi? You said he was here."
Zane walked over to a terminal and tapped a command. A curtain slid back on the far side of the room.
My heart stopped.
Tobi was there. He wasn't in a bed. He was suspended in a vertical glass cylinder filled with a clear, shimmering fluid. His eyes were closed, his face peaceful, but his body was covered in thin, glowing filaments that looked exactly like the silver thread on my family's Great Loom.
"The Silk Code isn't just software, Amara," Zane said, walking toward the cylinder. "It's biological. We aren't just copying his memories. We are weaving his neural pathways into the fiber. He's the first 'Master Echo.' A prototype for a world where genius can be manufactured."
"He's a person, Zane!" I screamed, my voice echoing off the sterile walls. "He's my brother! You can't just turn him into a hard drive!"
"I already did," Zane replied, his voice chillingly calm. "But the weave is incomplete. The fiber is rejecting his DNA. That's why I needed you. You're his sister. Your genetic signature is the only 'needle' that can bridge the gap between his mind and the machine."
He walked over to my bedside and picked up a long, slender needle connected to a spool of that same shimmering silver thread. "I'm not going to kill you, Amara. I'm going to make you part of the pattern. You wanted to save the mill? Fine. You can spend eternity weaving the data that keeps it alive."
He reached for my arm. I felt a surge of raw, desperate adrenaline. My "Designer" brain, even through the haze of the drugs, began to analyze the room.
Structure: Reinforced glass. Pressure point: The oxygen intake valve. Weakness: The saline solution in the tank.
"Zane, wait," I said, forcing my voice to steady. "If you do this now, you'll kill the connection. The 'Silk' is too dry. You haven't balanced the pH of the solution."
Zane stopped, the needle inches from my skin. He looked at the tank, then at the monitors. "The monitors say the levels are stable."
"The monitors are lying to you," I said, leaning back, trying to hide the fact that I was picking at the lock of the handcuffs with the small copper wire I'd hidden in my palm earlier. "I'm a Weaver. I can see the tension in the thread. If you don't adjust the salt levels in the tank, the moment you link our DNA, the static electricity will fry Tobi's brain."
Zane hesitated. His greed was fighting his ego. He needed the code to be perfect. He couldn't risk the "Master Echo" failing now.
"Adjust it," Zane commanded a technician I hadn't seen in the corner.
As the technician moved toward the tank, I felt the click of the first cuff. One hand was free. I kept it under the sheet, my fingers working feverishly on the second lock.
"Now," I said, my voice barely a whisper.
I didn't go for Zane. I lunged for the oxygen tank next to my bed. I kicked the regulator with every ounce of strength in my legs.
The hiss of escaping gas filled the room.
"What are you doing?" Zane roared, lunging for me.
I swung the heavy metal handcuff like a flail, catching him across the temple. He stumbled back, blood blooming on his forehead. I didn't wait. I scrambled off the table, my legs feeling like lead, and ran for the glass tank where Tobi was held.
I didn't try to break the glass. I knew it was bulletproof. Instead, I grabbed the technician's tablet and entered the code Sloane had sent to my phone in the office—the "Architect's Backdoor."
[EMERGENCY DRAIN INITIATED]
The fluid in the tank began to roar as it was sucked out. Tobi's body slumped against the glass.
"Amara, stop!" Zane screamed, his hand reaching for his sidearm. "If you drain that tank, the atmosphere will kill him! He can't breathe on his own yet!"
"Then I'll be his lungs," I said.
I grabbed a nearby medical axe and smashed the emergency release valve. The glass didn't shatter—it hissed open. Tobi fell into my arms, cold and wet, his skin smelling like ozone and salt.
"Tobi, wake up," I sobbed, pulling the silver filaments from his skin. "Please, wake up."
The lights in the basement began to strobe red. A voice boomed over the speakers—not Zane's.
[CRITICAL FAILURE. INITIATING SITE PURGE IN 60 SECONDS.]
Zane looked at the ceiling, his face pale with horror. "The Director... he's closing the node. He's killing us all to hide the evidence."
I looked at the door. I looked at my brother.
"We're leaving, Zane," I said, hauling Tobi's arm over my shoulder. "With or without you."