A shot rang out, and Maggie’s mom let out a cry and tumbled to the ground, clutching her stomach, a red patch spreading beneath her fingers.

I hit the ground and pulled Maggie with me as she screamed, “Mom! Mom!” I crouched and scanned the area and saw no one. I ripped off my shirt and handed it to Maggie to press against her mom’s wound.

“Shhh, I’m okay,” Dr. Gooding said softly, reaching out to run her hand down Maggie’s hair. Damn, even now she was trying to make Maggie feel better.

She’d become like a second mom to me, and now she had taken a bullet because I’d gotten her tangled up in this crazy conspiracy. Was she going to die? Maybe I should’ve let Alpha fix the jarred implant in my head, so I could be as unfeeling as the rest of them.

I looked back and spotted two men now standing behind an outcropping. The tracking device on me must have been working after all.

As they stepped forward, I saw that both men were wearing those telltale black suits.

And one of them was my father.

Maggie gasped.

“It is regrettable,” Dad said as he approached me, “that you would try to stop the work of Ishango, who improved you so substantially.”

“Do you have any of my father left in your body?” I asked, standing up to my full height, a sense of terror and despair coming along. I knew he was controlled by the implant, but it still devastated me to see him like this. “You’ve helped kill so many for the sake of a computer’s crazy scheme to take over the world.”

“Omicron and I are part of Ishango,” he said. “As are you, Rho.”

“You named me Jordan.”

“That was your mother. I was not involved in the procedure on your mother or your conception as you may have been led to believe,” he stated.

“What do you mean by ‘procedure’?”

The suit named Omicron spoke. “Rho, your selection was not accidental. Ishango began experimentation on the consciousness transmigration process approximately twenty years ago. One solution involved breeding a host with a particular set of non-rejecting antibodies. Your mother was chosen to gestate the host: you.”

I shook my head as Maggie clutched my ankle while using her other hand to continue applying pressure to her mom’s wound. None of this was making sense. I turned to my father but found no comfort in his cold brown eyes.

“Dad—”

“It is true.”

“You’re lying,” I seethed, infuriated by his matter-of-fact tone.

“Ishango has authorized me to confirm this information,” he droned on. “The fertilization and embryo implantation occurred when your mother was ostensibly hospitalized for fibroid cyst removal.”

Tears welled up and spilled out, and I grabbed my head with both hands, wishing I could rip out whatever had become woven into my brain. Even if that took me down, at least the nightmare would be over. “I know Ishango is making you say this,” I cried, not caring that Maggie was seeing me break down.