The lab under the ice felt like a dream that was slowly going bad. The kind where you know you should run, but your feet won't move. Elena sat by her mother’s cot, holding her hand, talking about nothing. The old apartment. The cat. Summer vacations that never happened because her mother was always at the lab.
Dr. Aris Thorne and the other scientists hovered like nervous birds. They’d give Elena a question. “Ask her about the retroviral capsid structure.” Or, “We need the sequence for the neural protein binding.” Elena would translate it into something soft. “Mama, remember that puzzle you were working on? The one about the key that fits just one lock?”
Anya Petrova’s eyes would swim into focus. For a minute, she’d be her daughter’s mother. She’d squeeze Elena’s hand and say something ab
