Shadow Fall (The Shadow Saga) (40 page)

“The Discipliner,” 301 said. “My sessions with him had nothing to do with overcoming trauma.”

“No,” the matron said. “The sessions
were
the trauma. Before the Persians invaded, the Discipliner spent the better part of his time working for an elite intelligence agency in the area of memory reprogramming. I authorized him to use his techniques on you.”

“What techniques?”

“Pain,” she said, and he could hear the remorse in her voice. “In his adult subjects, he had learned certain ways that memory could be repressed. If certain events could be associated with pain, the mind’s self-preservation instincts would kick in and seal that memory away in order to avoid further suffering. It was only successful on targeted memories, but with children he thought it would be different. Most of us only remember bits and pieces of our childhood before five anyway, large or innocuous events that for some reason our mind decided to record. His theory, then, was that he could discover and repress these bits and pieces, after which the mind would more readily accept a new set of ideas and goals. He called this process Fragmentation.”

“So you took my mind apart piece by piece. You reprogrammed me like a machine.”

“Machines were what Alexander wanted, and machines were what we gave. You were not the first child who received the Fragmentation procedure, nor were you the last. The only difference is that with you, a new set of ideas and goals was not enough. We had to create a new identity, and make you believe it was true. The Discipliner used his skills to insert you illegally into the World System databases, installing a subroutine that ensured your DNA could never be matched against that of your parents. But difficult as that was—impossible, some would say—erasing Elijah Charity proved to be ten times as hard. You were an obstinate child, and held so tightly to your convictions that at times we thought the procedure simply would not work. But eventually, as you know, you gave in to our efforts. It took nearly two years, but in the end the Fragmentation succeeded. You ceased to be Elijah Charity and became 301-14-A.”

301 looked down at the floor, exasperated. Certainly he wanted to hear the truth from her after all these years, but how would that help him? If his mind was broken, it was broken—no matter how it had happened. Knowing about the Discipliner’s procedure couldn’t serve for anything more than to inflame his anger, and he didn’t have time for that. The clock was ticking down to Grace’s doom, and he needed more than what the matron was offering. There had to be some reason he had been led here.

“So why have you brought me here? Why tell me this now?”

“I have brought you here to give you a choice, Shadow Soldier,” the matron said. “And the choice is this: do you want to undo what has been done to you, or not?”

301 gazed down at the matron skeptically. Two years to erase his memories and complete the Fragmentation process…it would be foolish to think she could just wave a magic wand and undo everything. There had to be a catch. “What would I have to do?”

“It’s important to remember, 301, that your memories have simply been repressed. They are not gone. As such a partial defragmentation is inevitable. Just as your present life experiences will cause you to recall things from soldier training, for instance, they will do the same with the things we repressed. You will begin to remember them with greater frequency—fragmented and nonsensical at first, but clearer over time. I suspect, however, that time is of the utmost importance in your case and you may not have years to wait. There are ways, then, to speed the process.”

“What do I have to do?”

“Understand that it wasn’t enough to simply target your memories of events. The Discipliner eventually was forced to target your memories of
people
. The more of those people you come in contact with, the clearer those fragments will become. If you experience an emotional event that parallels one from your repressed memories, it is possible that the reprogramming sessions will be completely negated. However, you must be wary of this, 301. Some things are too much for the mind to handle.”

“Meaning what, exactly?”

“A sudden defragmentation will cause your old self and your new self to collide, resulting in one of two eventualities. If your two selves can be reconciled to one another, they will merge into a new singular identity, carrying traits of both. But if not, it could spark a cataclysmic event in your mind that will sever the two selves and leave you with a multiple personality disorder. In this scenario you would scarcely be aware that your other self existed. You would become a danger to yourself and those around you, and it is possible you would never recover.”

301 struggled for a moment over whether to confess everything to the matron, in the end concluding that he had nothing to lose. She would pass from the world soon and take her secrets—and his—to the grave. “I’ve already been seeing these fragments. Mostly in my dreams, but sometimes while awake as well.”

The matron nodded weakly, “Yes, I thought as much. Word travels fast, and I heard that you had come in contact with Jacob Sawyer. That may have been the event that started your defragmentation. But when I later heard that Grace Sawyer had been in the palace, that she had lived with you as your slave for more than a month and a half, I had no doubts. In your sessions, you held on to her longest of all.”

“I’ve also been seeing…a boy,” 301 continued cautiously. “A child who calls himself Eli. A child who isn’t really there.”

“I see,” the matron rasped, unsurprised. “A manifestation of your subconscious, no doubt, trying to work out the conflict however it can. Rare, but not unheard of. And also advantageous for you—if a relationship already exists between your two selves it may provide the bridge for the defragmentation.”

“And to do that I need this parallel memory,” 301 said flatly. “How exactly does that work?”

“I can’t say,” the matron coughed, even the simple action of lifting her hand to cover her mouth a difficulty. “Only you know what lies in those memories. Search them, find the person they concern, and attempt to relive it. You might even consult this boy you see—your subconscious knows the way back to unity better than you or I. But, as a starting point I suggest you take a look in the room at the end of the hall. There is information there that will help you on your way.”

She grimaced in pain and began to draw short breaths, “Time grows short, Shadow Soldier. If I could say one final thing to you, it would be this: find something to live for, and protect it with all your might. Do not follow me into the abode of wretches where I now must go.” A tear fell down her cheek and she suddenly reached out to take hold of his wrist. He wanted to recoil, but at the desperate look in her eyes he did not move. “You were your father’s son, and can be again. Save the children of this city from what I have done.” She gave another long sigh, and her life left her. The sickly hand fell limp back to her side.

At last, the flame of the candle by her bed flickered and died, sending the room into darkness with a puff of smoke.

33

301
STOOD OVER THE
matron for several minutes in silence, not knowing what to say or do upon the death of the woman who had made his childhood a living nightmare. He thought he would feel relieved, vindicated, free—but he felt nothing. She had promised him answers and given a fool’s errand instead. Create an event parallel to one of his repressed memories? How was he supposed to do that when he couldn’t even remember them clearly?

He turned away from her, shielding his heart against pity, and left the room. Darkness still reigned outside, as the sun had not yet broken over the horizon. He set his gaze on the door at the end of the hall, feeling an intense sense of foreboding as he walked slowly toward it, unable to fathom the irrational dread that rose within him as he drew nearer.

His hand hovered over the doorknob for a moment as he considered not going in at all. The woman downstairs should be told that the matron was dead so that all necessary preparations could be made, and he needed to focus on finding a way to get Grace out of harm’s way. Continuing this personal crusade when so much else was at stake was madness. But he had come so far already, and the possibility of retrieving the life they had stolen from him was too much for him to pass by.

Taking hold of the doorknob, he turned it and pushed, crossing the threshold into the dark, closet-sized room. Only one of the monitors that lined the walls top to bottom was on, and the only furniture was a single chair. But 301 could tell by looking at it that the chair was not meant for an adult. It was for a child. He walked around it slowly, experiencing traces of some unknown terror, and ran his hand over the coarse wooden back.

“I see you found your way here at last.”

301 whirled around in the direction of the voice, gun drawn and ready to fire. But all he saw was darkness, and he cursed himself for being so stupid. There was only one exit to this room, and if the speaker was an enemy 301 was an easy target. The light of the monitor might as well have been a spotlight.

“You’re him, aren’t you?” he demanded, brandishing his sidearm at the black pit in the hall. “You’re the one who led me here.”

“There are things in this building that you need to see.”

“Agreed. Show yourself!”

“Put away your weapon,” the man replied, “and perhaps I’ll be more comfortable doing so.” 301 hesitated, and the voice continued, “Have you forgotten what it is to trust, Specter Captain?”

“No,” 301 said. “I am simply well-acquainted with betrayal.”

A short, half-hearted laughed echoed off the walls, “I suspect that is true. Luckily I’m not here to betray you. I only want to talk.”

“Tell me who you are, and we’ll see about the weapon.”

Silence reigned for a moment, and then, “We were very close once, you and I. In fact, as a caregiver I was second only to your parents. But as I had no son I held none above you.” Despite the fact that 301 had not yet holstered his weapon, the man appeared in the doorway and emerged into the monitor’s eerie glow, lowering his hood as he came forward. 301 felt something tingle at the edge of his mind upon beholding his face, like a memory hanging just out of reach.

He could tell that the newcomer was a hard man, cool and calculating—a dangerous man. Yet for some reason he found himself trusting him…or was it Eli who trusted him? Either way, he lowered his weapon and returned it to its holster, “You knew my parents?”

“I did,” the man nodded. “I was with your father on the day he died, when he ordered us to leave him behind while he blew up the first Specter Spire. He died saving the lives of all those in the Silent Thunder dome. And your mother…well, I knew her better than almost anyone.”

“Who are you?”

“My name is Ellis Crenshaw.”

301 breathed out a long sigh.
Of course it is
. “Ellis Crenshaw,” he said dryly. “The man I left Grace with on the night I set her free…a rebel leader yourself, no doubt.”

“Yes, I am a rebel against this government,” Crenshaw replied. “And you, a son of rebels. That fact alone will be your doom, if Napoleon Alexander ever learns of it.”

“If you’ve come here to recruit me, don’t waste your breath. Jacob Sawyer already tried that, and I’m not interested in joining a losing side.”

“I’m not here for you at all,” Crenshaw said. “I actually came upon you in the tunnels while searching for Grace Sawyer, and followed you here. But our meeting is an event long overdue, Shadow Soldier, and we are running out of time.”

“Why? What am I to you?”

“Your mother,” he said quietly. “What do you know of her?”

301 paused. Truthfully, he knew very little…only what he had read in history books—tales tainted by the propaganda of the World System. He had spent so much time trying to run from the truth of his past that he hadn’t taken much time to think about the people in that past.

“She was Lauren Charity,” he said. “I know only what the World System has told me.”

“The world knows her as Lauren Charity,” he said, and a deep sadness settled on his brow. “But for the majority of her life she was Lauren
Crenshaw
, my sister.” 301’s eyes widened in shock as the rebel leader went on, “I am your mother’s brother…your last living relative. I fought with your father in both the great wars of our time, through fire and blood and betrayal and despair…until that final moment when he asked me to leave him. ‘Take care of Eli and Lauren,’ he said. Your mother I never saw again, but I sought you out for years after her death, even abandoning my men and the war I had sworn to fight on the merest chance that you were still alive. Three years I looked before giving you up for dead, adding you to the list of names I would one day avenge. So when I finally learned of your survival it took everything in my power not to seek you out and tell you everything.

“I watched you in those days, during your progression through the Great Army, and I saw nothing of your mother and father in you. You were a shadow of what you could have been, a tool in the hand of your enemies. It nearly destroyed me, seeing this cruel twist of fate. But I held on to hope that you could be turned, even after Jacob’s death, even after your denial of Grace on that Tower…but now, seeing you here without her, I can only assume you gave her up in exchange for your own life. And if that is that case then my nephew is truly gone. I need you to tell me what happened down there, Specter Captain. Tell me if my nephew, the last of my blood, is dead within that husk of the World System’s machine. Tell me if my dreams have all been a waste.”