I just found out I was created by UniCorp. My parents are a metal tube and a couple of weird old men. Not sure what the point of my life is. Hoping to find that out, actually.

“I gotta do it alone. But thanks.”

She peered inside the narrow access shaft. Sure enough, corroded metal rungs stuck out of the cement wall.

“Listen,” he said, eyeing the necklace that had worked its way out from beneath her shirt. “Don’t forget me, okay?”

She tapped his gear hand. “I won’t.”

Inside the shaft, she stepped on the bottom rung and looked up. Not even a hint of light to mark the exit. She took a deep breath and began putting hand over hand, pulling herself up through absolute darkness. A moment later, Sliv called to her.

“Hey!”

“What?”

“Have fun at college.”

10

CALIBRATION

“LEN,” AMBROSE said, “you’re a friending synth-toad.”

He’d always had conflicted feelings about Len, but right now, miles beneath their childhood home and light-years away from their old life as UniCorp colleagues, Ambrose was pretty sure that he hated his brother. What did their shared childhood—the torment, mockery, and stray moments of surprising kindness—even mean anymore, now that he knew they weren’t related?

“Impressive use of the local slang, little brother,” Len said. “Might wanna put some more fierceness in the delivery, though.”

“I’m not your brother.”

“I know that. I just thought we’d ease into our new relationship.”

Flanked by the unsmiling UniCorp security team, Len looked a bit like a young, earnest Martin Truax: the sandy hair and sharp features were the same, but the movie-star grin and magnetic presence were lacking. It seemed unlikely that Len was sent here to kill him—Martin would want his prize alive—but the standard-issue UniCorp disruptors had very effective nonlethal settings. If Ambrose tried to run, he’d be a quivering ball of floor jelly before he took three steps.

“How long have you known what I am?”

“About a year.”

An absurd montage flashed in his mind: Len and Martin clinking wineglasses and howling with laughter at their shared joke, while Ambrose went blindly about his business like a rat in a maze.

He stepped forward. Eight Security Associates moved eight hands to eight stunners simultaneously. Ambrose displayed his empty, bandaged palms and turned to Ivor.

“What did he buy you with? A corner office at UniCorp? Full Admin access?”

The old man shook his head wearily and rubbed the scruff of his goat-dog’s neck. “Len, please tell him the truth before he pinches a nerve in his face trying to give me a death stare.”

Len gave a casual palms-down gesture to the security team. They took a step back and assumed at-ease slouches.

“Dita contacted me a year ago, Ambrose,” Len said, switching to the warmer tone he used when giving presentations to UniCorp shareholders. “She hijacked my inbox, overrode my transfer log, same as you. ‘Carpe somnium’ and all that. I dismissed it at first, but there was something about the initial message that kept me from bringing it straight to Dad.”