“Maybe all she can do is receive,” said Heron, “with no ability to transmit.”

“Or the transmitter’s been turned off somehow,” said Samm. “I don’t know why, though.”

“To hide me from other Partials,” said Kira, “or to protect me from them. I’ve never gotten any of the ‘command’ data you’ve talked about, either. When Dr. Morgan tried to force you to obey her, I didn’t feel a thing.”

Samm’s expression was dark. “Count yourself lucky.”

“I wonder if she’s a spy model,” Heron mused. “Strength and reflexes slightly boosted, physically attractive, heightened intelligence, human communication skills, and apparently engineered for independence. It fits.”

“You have spy models?” asked Kira.

Heron laughed, and Samm cocked his head in the most human expression of confusion she’d seen from him yet. “What do you think Heron is?”

“But if I’m a spy, then what’s my mission?” asked Kira. “Am I going to wake up someday with a data download telling me to assassinate a senator? How could they have even planned something like that five years before the Break?”

“I have no idea,” said Heron. “I’m just saying it’s a possibility.”

“Moving on,” said Samm. “Dhurvasula built the pheromone system, but what about Nandita?”

“That’s another of our big holes,” said Kira. “Nandita and one other guy, Graeme Chamberlain, were working on something called the Failsafe. Of all the things that went into making the Partials, this is clearly the most secret. I have absolutely no records that explain what the Failsafe was, or what it did, or even who ordered it.”

“What do you know about this Chamberlain?” asked Samm. “I’ve never heard of him before.”

“That I can tell you,” said Kira, “but it’s going to creep you the hell out.” She opened a manila folder and pulled out a single sheet of paper: a death certificate. “As soon as he finished building the Failsafe, he killed himself.”

The three fell silent. Kira had gone through Afa’s records as thoroughly as she could, and they simply didn’t have the information they needed—they raised some tantalizing questions, like this one about Chamberlain, but they never actually answered them. All the most important secrets were still locked away somewhere: Who was the Trust? Why did they create RM? What was the Failsafe?

What am I? Kira thought. What purpose do I have in all this? Without more information, there was no way to know.

It was Samm—always pragmatic, always straightforward—who broke the silence again. “We have to go.”

“Where?” asked Kira.

“To ParaGen,” said Samm. “To wherever they were when they did all this—when they made all these decisions. If the information’s not here, that’s the only other place it could be.”

“That’s not going to be easy,” said Heron.