Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 138217 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138217 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
The storm raged on, Theo’s fists bloodless and her scream hoarse.
He’d never tasted such a depth of anger, of fury, rage in its purest form.
Then the world went silent.
All the objects that spun dropped to the carpet without a sound.
Theo’s body spasmed as a wrenching shiver rippled through her . . . and then . . . nothing.
Chapter 44
I’m getting an itch at the back of my neck. Something’s up at the apartment. Let’s double our usual patrols in the area.
—Message from Yakov Stepyrev to Zahaan Saarinen (4 September 2083)
THE WATCHER STARED up at the window of the apartment where Theo Marshall was yet awake. The blinds had been lowered, so the Watcher couldn’t see anything, but the lights were still on—and that bear was still with her.
The Watcher had thought that the bear must be staying in an adjacent apartment, but none of the other lights had come on since they went inside. Either they were planning strategy for tomorrow—or Theo was the latest Psy to fall for a bear.
The Watcher snorted. “Bears have better taste than to go for a Marshall.” No, it had to be a strategy meeting.
Regardless, the Watcher couldn’t get to her so long as she was in that apartment. StoneWater security was beyond even the Watcher’s abilities. “She’ll be alone sooner or later,” the Watcher said under their breath, speaking to the person inside their mind that was their other self, the one from before. “I just have to be patient a little longer.”
Chapter 45
I can’t believe Neiza is already a year old! A month past it even! I tell you, my dearest D, time passes like water through the fingers when you have a child. I swear I turned around and she’d gone from sleeping fifteen hours a day to clapping her hands and laughing and making the most adorable sounds—and never wanting to sleep!
Oh, listen to me. I sound like every besotted mother there ever was! Thank you for indulging me as you do.
But that’s not why I wanted to write. I suppose I could’ve just come over to the den, but it’s our thing, isn’t it? These letters? I’ve kept each one you’ve ever written to me.
Anyway, they’ve set the date for the Changes to Silence Referendum: July 24th next year. I’m including all available documentation listing the pros and cons, as compiled by smart people on both sides of the issue. You know how much I respect you. Please do read it with an open mind and let me know your thoughts.
Love from your favorite little sister,
Hien
—Letter from Hien Nguyen to Déwei Nguyen (20 February 1978)
THEO’S MIND FELT bruised as it always did after one of her rage attacks. She should probably find something else to call them, but why, when the words she’d chosen as a teenager described them so well?
Today, the bruise throbbed until it blurred her vision and her stomach muscles hurt, as if she’d clenched them so hard that she’d torn something. She knew the latter for an illusion; most often, the damage was limited to contusions and cuts. Once, she’d woken up after hours of unconsciousness—probably caused by a blow from a heavy object she’d sent flying.
That had been before Pax took over the family.
She’d cleaned up the blood, then gone to a medical facility for indigent street people because they wouldn’t record her injuries into any system. The doctor—a human woman with gray hair—had been kind, had asked her if she was being abused.
A question come far too late.
“Theo?”
She whimpered, wanting to hide away. She’d never wanted Yakov to see her this way, as a creature devoid of reason or sanity, a thing without a mind. Just viciousness and violence.
But it was far too late for that, too. He had his arms locked around her, his body at her back. His breath brushed the hairs on the side of her face as he said, “Theo, can you hear me?”
She wanted to just shut her eyes and sink into the throbbing in her head, pretend that this humiliation hadn’t taken place, but all that would do was extend the agony of it. This was her own fault. She should’ve told him, but she’d wanted to pretend she was normal when she wasn’t normal, hadn’t been any kind of normal for a long, long time.
“Yes,” she answered, and it came out a throaty rasp.
Her skin heated on another hot wave of humiliation—she must’ve been screaming. The rages had begun while she was still living with Colette, during a time when the inside of the apartment was under full surveillance. Another attempt at control by her grandfather, one instituted because of Theo’s increasing defiance.
As a result, there’d been recordings.
The worst were the ones where she screamed and screamed.
She’d slapped her own hands over her ears the first time Colette had shown her one of those videos, and she’d rocked back and forth, believing herself a madwoman. She wasn’t so sure that the shocked young woman she’d been wasn’t right—because she should have this under control by now. Only she didn’t.