Doc pushes off from the wall and paces the office. “I’d do anything not to be that guy who has to make choices that haunt him night after night. But here I am. It’s me and no one else. Do you understand?”

What I understand is that he chopped up my baby sister and turned her into an “abomination.” “And just how are you helping the human race?”

He looks at his shoes. “I’ve tried a few experiments that I kept secret from the angels. Stole some angel science, or magic, or whatever you want to call it, and implemented it here and there. They’d kill me if they knew. But all I have so far are tantalizing possibilities. No confirmed successes yet.”

I’m not interested in making this butcher of children feel good about his job. But accusing him won’t get me answers.

“Why did you make my sister move like a machine?”

“What do you mean?”

“She sits with her back straight, moves stiffly with every motion, turns her head as if her neck doesn’t work the same any more, you know—like a machine.” Except when she’s attacking, of course.

He looks at me as if I’ve lost it. “The girl has been cut and stitched everywhere like a quilted doll. And you have to ask why she moves stiffly?” The guy who did that to her looks down at me like I’m the insensitive person.

“She’s in pain.” He says it like he’s saying Duh. “Just because she’s fully functional doesn’t mean she’s not suffering from excruciating, soul-shattering pain. Imagine being cut up everywhere, having your muscles ripped out and replaced, stitched up, every fiber of your body altered. Now imagine that no one gives you painkillers. That’s what it’s like for her. I guess I can safely assume that you didn’t even give her aspirin?”

It’s like he’s punching me in the lungs.

“If that never occurred to you, then it’s no surprise she left, is it?”

I can’t even think about what it must be like for her without feeling like I’m breaking.

I even offered Raffe aspirin when he was unconscious before I ever got to know him. I offered the enemy pain relief but never considered it for my own sister. Why?

Because she looked like a monster, that’s why. And it never occurred to me that monsters might feel pain.

“Do you have any guesses as to where she might be?” Hearing the tremble in my own voice sucks out my confidence.

He glances at the dark TV. “She’s not here. I would have heard about it by now. But if you’re right and she was here even briefly, then she’s looking for something. Or someone.”

“Who? She’s already come to me and Mom. We’re all she has in the world.”