Chapter 20
1066 Words
The tracking bracelet pulsed against my wrist, so faintly I almost missed it. Elena was still monitoring us, which meant our location was being tracked. I just had to keep Dr Thorne talking.
“So, brother,” the words feel odd on my tongue, “do you really know what happened the day we were taken?”
Dr Thorne's eyes narrowed slightly, his clinical demeanour briefly disrupted by something that might have been genuine emotion. "I've studied the records extensively. Father was quite meticulous in his documentation."
"Records can be falsified," I pressed, sensing vulnerability in his perfect facade. "Tell me what you believe happened."
He hesitated, then gestured toward a pair of elegant chairs positioned near the window. "Perhaps we should be comfortable for this conversation."
Costa helped me from the bed, his touch communicating caution as we moved to the seating area. I noticed how Dr Thorne watched our interactions with analytical interest, as if cataloguing every gesture between us.
"The official record states that you were both arrested for treason after publicly defying your respective family obligations," he began once we were seated. "But Father's private journals tell a different story. He had been monitoring Prince Costa for months, ever since their genetic profiles had been flagged as exceptional by the preliminary preservation algorithms."
"Monitoring me?" Costa's surprise seemed genuine.
"The Emergency Preservation Committee had access to most major medical facilities," Dr Thorne explained. "Your annual royal health assessment provided comprehensive genetic data. When you appeared in the same venue as my sister..." he nodded toward me, "...the system automatically ran compatibility projections."
"So my father knew about Costa before we even met," I said, piecing together the implications.
Dr Thorne's smile was coldly appreciative. "Precisely. The Le Glow Club wasn't a coincidence. Father arranged for your paths to cross, though he couldn't have predicted the intensity of your connection."
Costa's face had gone pale. "You're saying our meeting was engineered? That none of it was real?"
"On the contrary," Dr Thorne replied. "The attraction was entirely real, genetically predetermined, in fact. What Father couldn't control was your mutual rebellion against your assigned matches. When you both refused your arranged marriages, he had to improvise."
The manufactured sunlight shifted subtly, casting Dr Thorne's features in sharper relief. For a moment, I could see our father in him, the calculating intelligence, the absolute certainty of his own correctness.
"So he had us taken," I said flatly.
"He had you preserved," Dr Thorne corrected. "Father understood that the Collapse was imminent. Most of the Committee was focused on preserving political leaders, scientists, artists, and people they deemed valuable. But Father recognised that genetic viability was the true currency of the future."
My bracelet pulsed again, more insistently this time. I shifted my position to conceal the subtle glow.
"And now?" Costa asked. "What's your plan for us? More preservation? More resets until we comply with whatever breeding program you've designed?"
Dr Thorne actually laughed, a sound so startlingly normal it seemed out of place coming from him. "Your Highness, we've moved far beyond such primitive methods.”
“I find it strange that your attendants blurted out the change in your sister, no longer being a virgin, but not me? Up until last night, I was as well.” Costa stated flatly.
Dr Thorne's eyebrows rose with what appeared to be genuine surprise. "Interesting. The medical scans should have detected that change in both subjects." He moved to a wall panel, fingers dancing across its surface. "The oversight suggests either equipment malfunction or... deliberate interference."
Costa's jaw tightened, but he maintained his facade of confused cooperation. "What kind of interference?"
"The resistance has been more resourceful than we anticipated," Dr Thorne mused, studying readouts that materialised in the air before him. "No matter. Physical virginity is irrelevant to our current objectives. What matters is the neural bonding patterns that intimate contact creates."
He turned back to us, his expression shifting to something almost predatory. "You see, consciousness isn't just stored in the brain, it's distributed throughout the nervous system. When two genetically compatible individuals form deep emotional and physical bonds, their neural networks begin to synchronise. Mirror neurons fire in harmony, creating a shared psychic space."
"And that's what you want to exploit," I said, understanding dawning with sick certainty.
"Exploit is such an ugly word," Dr Thorne replied, waving his hand dismissively. "I prefer 'harness.' Your synchronised consciousness represents the perfect template for what humanity could become, two minds working in perfect harmony, free from the chaos of individual will."
The bracelet's pulses were becoming more frequent now. Elena's team had to be closing in on our location.
"The old preservation program tried to force compliance through repetition," Dr Thorne continued, beginning to pace with growing excitement. "But we've discovered something far more elegant. Consensual consciousness merger, two willing minds choosing to become one optimised entity."
"We would never consent to that," Costa said firmly.
Dr Thorne smiled, the expression chilling in its confidence. "Oh, but you already have, Your Highness. The moment you chose to come here, seeking the stability you claimed to need, you consented to whatever treatment we deemed necessary for your well-being."
The comfortable room suddenly felt like a trap, its pleasant facade unable to disguise the prison it truly was. But before I could respond, alarms began blaring throughout the facility, harsh, mechanical sounds that shattered the manufactured tranquillity.
"What..." Dr Thorne spun toward his control panel, his face flushing with anger as new information flooded the displays.
"External breach detected," an artificial voice announced. "Multiple aircraft approaching from seven vectors. Defensive protocols activated."
Costa and I exchanged glances. The resistance had found us.
Dr Thorne's mask of clinical detachment finally cracked completely. "Impossible. This facility is shielded, mobile..."
"Did you really think we'd walk into another trap without insurance?" I asked, rising from my chair as the bracelet on my wrist pulsed in rapid succession, the signal that extraction was imminent.
His face contorted with rage and something that might have gone wrong, and we had set a trap within a trap.
“Father always said that you were too smart for your own good. Besides, I’m sure he's on his way to us right now,” Dr Throne said, eyes blazing with rage.
My blood turned to ice. "Father's dead. He's been dead for six hundred years."
- Writer
