Heart of Iron (Heart of Iron #1)(53)

“Subject is now free to disconnect,” the computer repeated.

Something cold and metallic bumped up against his cheek, bleeping.

“Subject is now—”

“I heard you,” he rasped, and rolled over onto his side, pressing the heels of his hands against his forehead, afraid to open his eyes because the light was too bright. It made his head ache.

It . . . It what?

Hesitantly, he tried to open his eyes again. His vision, blurry at first, focused. He looked at his hands. Flesh. He told himself to move his fingers, and the fingers in front of him moved. Those fingers—his fingers? His hands?

He sat up, slamming his head against something hard. He hissed in pain as E0S whirred up, beeping angrily at him. It yanked something out of the back of his neck—a cord.

The infirmary—why was he . . . why was he here?

He rubbed his head where they’d collided, and hissed against his throbbing headache. It hurt—no, that must have been the wrong word. His programming must be corrupt. He tried to think, but his processors felt heavy and sluggish, as though his head was full of molasses.

Molasses. There it was again. A metaphor. A metaphor?

Something was wrong.

He tried to slide off the gurney, but his legs tangled in a black tarp. A body bag. He was in a body bag. With a cry, he scrambled out of it, but his legs didn’t want to cooperate. They slipped out from under him. He caught himself on the medic console and pulled himself back up.

Something was very wrong.

E0S nudged his cheek.

“I do not understand,” he told it—and with a jolt, his hand went to his throat. His voice?

Not metal. Not broken.

“Reflection,” he said to the infirmary’s computer console, and a screen swirled into color, showing an image. A serious face, strong cheekbones, shoulder-length red hair. And incredibly naked. When he bent closer, the reflection did too, dark eyes staring at him. He blinked.

So did the reflection.

He recoiled, his foot bumping up against something on the ground. Something dull and silver. A silver arm. A bent shoulder. A Metal face. His Metal face.

Staring down at himself, he trembled.

This was not right—he was malfunctioning. Glitching. Everything in his system was chaotic. He scratched at the side of his head with his fingernails—why did he scrub at his head? Why did he have fingernails?

Why was he here?

He. D09. But . . . not. Not D09. That was quite evident by the skin, the length of his fingers, the sudden dire need to find clothes, and the collision of thoughts and emotions in his head. Not D09—not anymore. But who, then? Who was he if not— Just thinking about it made his head hurt worse.

At least he was on the Dossier, but how had he gotten back here? The last thing he remembered was being on Rasovant’s fleetship. He remembered the malware, he remembered it screaming as he pulled out the ship’s hard drive. . . .

And then the program invaded. Told him things. Whispered. He remembered it whispering, but he couldn’t remember what it said. Its cold code creeping into his functions like a virus, curling around his processors, and— And like a sunrise, he remembered Ana.

Pain blossomed in his chest. A pulling, constricting kind that tasted like panic. She had to be alive. She must be.

E0S bumped into his shoulder, beeping.

“Where is everyone?” he asked it. “What happened? Did you do this?”

The bot began to beep again when they heard a voice from the cargo bay.

“C’mon, Captain, just tell us about the rest of your fleet. I know you got some outlaw friends, don’t you? No?”

—And then the sound of something being struck.

“Sixteen,” replied a familiar voice. Siege. Captain Siege.

He pressed the lock on the infirmary door, and it slid up. He followed their voices, E0S hovering over his shoulder, and hid behind the skysailer.

On the other side of the cargo bay, the captain knelt in front of two guardsmen. Crimson uniforms. The crest of a snake eating its own tail—Ouroboros insignias.

They were Valerio guards.

One of the guards struck her in the face again, but the captain did not even let out a sound. She licked her busted lip, glaring up at the man. “Seventeen,” she kept counting.

“I can start breaking her fingers,” the other Valerio guard said—a female. “Or I can start killing her crew. It’s all she got left, isn’t it? I heard she used to be an Ironblood, but she deserted them.”

“You’re shittin’ me.”

“That’s the rumor. I could start with her wife—”

“Our orders are to turn them in, not kill them.”

“But she isn’t talking. She’s just counting.” But then the female guard sighed. “Fine, I’ll start with her pinkie finger.” She moved around behind Siege to untie her hands. “You know, Captain, I can break your fingers so you can never fire a gun again. Or you can just tell us about that fleet of yours.”

The captain stared straight ahead. The wires in her fiber-optic hair flared a bold orange.

Di hesitated behind the skysailer. What could he do? He did not have full control over his body. He did not even understand his body. Despite that, he searched for a weapon.

There was nothing around he could use as a—

The female guard began to bend Siege’s pinkie finger. “One . . .”