Final Protocol Read Free

rest.
    They weren’t on my trail.
    If they had been, they would have followed me and I’d have already been on my way, gagged and bound, to my keeper.
    I’d once wondered why he didn’t just have some sort of locator device embedded in the bioseal, but I’d figured that out quickly enough. If it could be used to trace me , then it could be traced back to him as well. Considering the jobs I did, he wouldn’t risk anything that would be so easily tracked back to him.
    Stars forbid he dirty his hands in such a fashion.
    That’s why he had us, after all.
    Us.
    His pets. His toys.
    His personal army of trained thieves and killers.
    His slaves.
    I have no memory of how I came to be…this.
    My earliest memories are twisted and dull, little more than flashes. I can’t even call them mine —they feel more like a story somebody told me long ago, one I can barely remember. The few things that do feel real, that do feel like mine, I can’t even call them memories, really. Just…fragments. Echoes. There are images of a world that isn’t this one—someplace green and lush, where the air was thick with flowers.
    I can recall screams and shouts. Then pain.
    Always pain.
    That is one thing that is a constant in my life even now.
    While I’m hardly a child, I can claim no true memories up until ten years ago. I was told I’d misbehaved . When I emerged from a fogged, pain-filled stupor, those insubstantial memories were all I had, and my keeper smiled at me as a health intern bustled around me.
    “Are you going to continue to cause me trouble, pet?” he’d asked.
    Apparently, I’ve never been a very good little slave.
    My life has never been mine.
    I belonged to my handler.
    My keeper.
    My owner.
    My own personal demon.
    He controlled the choices I made in life, even if he did let me live off on my own, pretending that I was my own person.
    He chose my jobs, he provided my clothing, my shelter and my food. I could always refuse the clothing, shelter and food, but then I’d end up back on my knees while he took his time reminding me of his claim on me.
    So I took the jobs, the clothing, the shelter, the food.
    The one thing he couldn’t control were my thoughts. He’d tried that and it had nearly killed me. The bioseal buried in my brain matter might be keyed into my thoughts and memories and emotions, but he couldn’t change my thoughts, memories, emotions. He could just punish me when those little acts of rebellion displeased him.
    I had one escape from him, and only one.
    I had a decision to make—either take that escape or take a chance that this botanist could do something about the bioseal. I needed to decide. But first, I had to get some rest. I was running on nerves and adrenaline and if I didn’t recharge soon, I’d regret it.
    I checked the defenses around the perimeter of the cave and then checked the sec system I’d set up high on the outer cliffs. Nobody around the perimeter. I was safe. They hadn’t followed.
    I stretched out on the floor and closed my eyes.
    Dreams started to tug at me almost the moment I did.
    I went willingly.
    Sometimes, when I slept, I almost remembered… something .
    “—choose which you’d rather have.”
    Pain licked at her and blood streamed into her eyes. She wanted to wipe it away but she couldn’t. She couldn’t do anything. Trapped. She was trapped.
    “Just leave her alone!”
    That voice! I thought he’d killed you, she thought desperately, struggling anew to free herself from the unseen bonds. Pain wracked her with every movement, no matter how small, but she couldn’t break free, couldn’t do much more than twist her wrists or arch her back. Even her head was trapped, making her unable to follow the sound of the voice. Rolling her eyes from right to left, she tried to see, but the blood streaming down from the laceration on her brow blinded her.
    “I’ve already discussed the conditions under which I’ll leave her alone. Do you agree?”
    No! She wanted to