He snapped around and led them forward through an automated turnstile that scanned their retinas. Praetorians flanked them as they walked, their metal camera eyes fixed on the passing trainees.

As Tom walked, the undeniable sensation of being watched tickled up his spine. He threw a careless glance over his shoulder.

All the Praetorians had their camera eyes fixed straight on him.

Tom was so jolted by the sight, he almost sprang a foot in the air. The crowd jostled around him, mounting a set of stairs. Weird. Creepy. Tom moved on, darting his own eyes around warily.

There was something distinctly unsettling about Obsidian Corp. All the corridors were dimly lit and very chilly. They passed massive, warehouse-sized rooms with elaborate supercomputers. Those rooms were devoid of people. In fact, there were almost no humans around, not even custodial personnel or mechanics. Just Praetorians and mechanized surveillance cameras. It took Tom a few minutes to pinpoint what was so wrong about the complex, but then he figured it out: the building seemed to have been created for the machines inside it. It was like human beings were unwelcome intruders.

Even the low-level Obsidian Corp. techs who led them on a tour of the facilities seemed nervous and out of place. They joked uneasily about the way Antarctica saved the company billions in air-conditioning. When trainees laughed, the techs blinked.

“That’s the truth. It really does save the company billions in air-conditioning. Quantum supercomputers get very hot,” one tech said. “We actually have to wear parkas to move through most of the facility.”

Then they led the trainees past expansive windows overlooking the icy tundra. The sky was a dull gray. It was the time of year in this part of Antarctica where night never descended, but there was no brightness this day.

In each room, Tom couldn’t help darting his eyes to the surveillance cameras and the stationary Praetorians. Tom kept waiting for Vengerov or someone else to approach him about using the virus on Medusa—Vengerov had said he wanted Tom to answer him during this visit. But no one came. He was never summoned or signaled. And the mechanized eyes followed him, always long enough for him to detect their scrutiny, never long enough for anyone else to notice—not even Vik, a foot ahead of him. Tom’s skin was crawling.

Vengerov knows somehow, Tom thought. He knows I’m going to say no.

Tom pictured Joseph Vengerov’s sharp, angular features and pale eyes and those silvery eyebrows that blended into his forehead—lurking on the other side of that surveillance system, just watching him. But how could Vengerov already know his answer? How could he be sure?

Tom hadn’t talked to anyone about it except Yuri, but he wasn’t even here.