Page 31

"Can you stand?" Trent asks, his voice calm despite the urgency of our situation.

I nod, letting him help me to my feet. The world tilts alarmingly, but I force myself to stay upright.

"New memory," I manage to say. "A woman. A laboratory. She said my modifications were stable, that Unity wouldn't know what I am."

Trent processes this in seconds, his tactical mind adapting to new information with characteristic efficiency. "We need to move. Now."

He guides me toward the emergency exit, a maintenance access point designed for equipment transport rather than personnel. Unity's obsession with efficiency means there are always alternate routes through the arcology, if you know where to look.

"Medical personnel dispatched," the system announces. "Remain in current location."

Trent ignores the instruction, placing his hand against the maintenance access panel. It shouldn't respond to his standard Sentinel clearance, but he does something—inputs a code I don't recognize—and the panel slides open.

"How did you?—"

"Later," he cuts me off, urging me through the opening. "We have approximately four minutes before they lock down this sector."

The maintenance tunnel beyond is narrow and dimly lit, designed for service drones rather than humans. We move quickly, Trent leading the way with the certainty of someone who's memorized paths they should never need to use.

"Where are we going?" I ask, still fighting waves of disorientation as my enhanced vision fluctuates between normal sight and something else entirely.

"Secure location," Trent responds cryptically. "Been preparing it since your first enhancement reaction."

This revelation shouldn't surprise me—Trent's always been ten steps ahead—but it does. "You've been planning for this? For how long?"

He glances back at me, expression unreadable in the dim light. "Since I first noticed the pattern in your biometric data three months ago. The modifications weren't random glitches—they were too systematic, too deliberate."

Three months. While I was still blissfully unaware of the changes happening inside me, Trent was already preparing for this moment, the moment when Unity would identify me as a threat.

Good lord.

We navigate through a maze of maintenance tunnels, eventually emerging in a section of Mid-Level I don't recognize. Trent leads me to an unmarked door, again entering a code I've never seen.

Inside is a small but well-equipped safe room with portable medical supplies, civilian clothing, nutrition packets, and what appears to be wasteland survival gear.

"Sentinel emergency cache," Trent explains, securing the door behind us. "Officially designated for deep cover operations requiring temporary isolation."

"Officially," I repeat, noting the supplies that go well beyond standard emergency provisions.

"We have approximately forty minutes before security protocols flag our absence from the training center," Trent says, all business now. "Physical biometric tracking is still locked to our location there, but that discrepancy won't last."

I sink into the room's single chair, still fighting waves of disorientation as my vision continues to shift between normal and enhanced perception.

"What happened back there?" I ask. "You said my eyes changed color."

Trent pauses in his equipment check, turning to face me directly. "Not just color. Structure. The irises exhibited reflective properties similar to Eden's. Brief, but unmistakable."

Like Eden's. Evidence of deliberate modification, not random mutation.

"The memory I saw," I continue, struggling to hold onto the details before they fade. "A woman, I think she might have been my mother. She mentioned modifications, said Unity wouldn't know what I am."

"What else did you see?" Trent urges, recognizing the importance of these fragments.

I close my eyes, trying to recapture the vivid flash. "A laboratory. Fire alarms. She said I just needed to survive long enough for the modifications to activate."

"Which is exactly what's happening now," Trent concludes.

"But why? Why would my supposed mother hide me in Unity? Why make me a Sentinel, of all things?"