CHAPTER SIX
They didn't call it training.
That would have implied direction.
Morgan called it decompression.
"You don't unlearn conditioning," she said as we walked down a long hallway lined with glass rooms. "You overwrite it."
Inside the rooms, people moved—some alone, some paired. No uniforms. No weapons. Just bodies learning how to exist without orders.
"They're like you," Lisa whispered.
"Yes," Morgan replied. "Or they were."
I stopped walking. "How many made it?"
Morgan didn't slow. "Enough."
That wasn't an answer.
They gave me a room with no locks and no instructions. A chair. A table. A wall-length mirror.
"No cameras," Morgan said. "As far as you know."
I sat.
Minutes passed.
Then longer.
Nothing happened.
The system didn't guide my posture. Didn't optimize my breathing. Didn't correct my stillness.
I didn't know how to sit without purpose.
My leg bounced. My fingers twitched.
"You look like you're waiting to be yelled at," Lisa said from the doorway.
"Habit."
She stepped inside and sat on the floor, back against the wall. "Mom used to say silence tells the truth faster than noise."
"That sounds like something the system would steal."
She nodded. "It did."
I closed my eyes.
The boy appeared immediately.
Not standing.
Sitting across from me.
Same chair. Same posture.
"You're doing it wrong," he said.
"There's no wrong," I replied.
"There is," he insisted. "You're still waiting for permission."
My jaw tightened. "You're not real."
"I am to you," he said. "And that's enough."
I stood abruptly.
The mirror reflected me—and only me.
Sweat dampened my collar.
I was shaking.
Morgan watched from the doorway.
"You see him more often now," she said.
"Yes."
"He's not a ghost," she said. "He's an anchor."
I looked at her. "Explain."
"He's the version of you they couldn't erase," Morgan said. "The age you were when they started."
The room tilted.
"How old?" I asked.
"Eight."
Lisa inhaled sharply behind me.
The boy smiled sadly.
"See?" he said. "I told you."
I staggered back, catching myself on the table.
"They didn't kill him," Morgan continued. "They buried him. Built something useful on top."
Lisa's voice trembled. "You were a kid."
"I still am," the boy said quietly.
The system surged then—not loud, not violent.
Protect asset integrity.
Reduce cognitive fragmentation.
Pain flared behind my eyes.
I dropped to one knee.
"Don't listen," Lisa said, rushing to my side. "Scott—look at me."
I tried.
The boy stood and placed a hand on my shoulder.
"You don't have to hurt anymore," he said. "You just have to stop."
"No," I whispered. "That's what they want."
The pressure spiked.
Then—
Nothing.
The system withdrew.
Morgan stared at the tablet in her hand. "That's new."
"What?" Lisa asked.
"It disengaged on its own," Morgan said. "No override."
I looked up. "Why?"
Morgan met my eyes. "Because you didn't replace it."
I frowned. "Replace what?"
"Pain," she said. "Most of them do. With anger. With orders. With obedience."
I stood slowly.
"What happens now?" Lisa asked.
Morgan hesitated. "Now we see if you can function."
They tested me with ordinary things.
Conversation.
Choice.
Waiting.
No combat.
No threats.
I failed more than I succeeded.
I answered questions too fast. Sat with my back to walls. Flinched at sudden sounds.
Human errors.
At lunch, Lisa slid her tray next to mine.
"You didn't finish your food," she said.
"I forgot."
She pushed it closer. "You need fuel if you're going to stay."
"Stay where?"
She looked at me. "Here. With us."
That word landed harder than any command.
Later, Morgan stopped me in the corridor.
"You should know," she said, "the system isn't idle."
"I assumed."
"It's watching how you function without it," she continued. "If you stabilize, you become proof it failed."
"And if I don't?"
"Then you become justification."
I nodded.
That night, I sat alone in my room.
No mirrors this time.
The boy sat beside me on the bed.
"You're scared," he said.
"Yes."
"Good," he replied. "That means you're finally doing something new."
I looked at him. "Do you ever go away?"
He shook his head. "Not until you stop pretending I'm a weakness."
I leaned back against the wall.
Outside, the facility hummed softly with life—people trying, failing, trying again.
For the first time, I wasn't being sharpened.
I was being taught how to hold together.
And somewhere deep inside, beneath years of orders and silence, something fragile and dangerous began to form.
Not obedience.
Not defiance.
Identity.