Then he gasped, his back arching slightly as he blinked rapidly, returning to himself.
“What just happened?” I asked, not bothering to hide my alarm. My hand found his shoulder, as if it could somehow ground him.
“Memory fragment,” he muttered, pressing his palm against his forehead as though trying to physically contain whatever was breaking loose inside his mind.
“The files indicate very few Prima subjects survived for long,” I said quietly. “Most were decommissioned within two years. You’ve lasted five.”
Reaper abruptly lurched upright, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed. He staggered, one hand shooting out to catch himself against the wall, fingers splayed wide for balance.
“I need water,” he said, the simple admission of physical need jolting me more than his sudden movement.
I scrambled after him, snatching his discarded t-shirt from the floor and pulling it over my head as I followed him to the small kitchen area. Early morning light now cut through the blinds in harsh strips that illuminated the blue-black lines spreading visibly up his neck and across his shoulder.
“Let me help,” I said, reaching for a glass from the drying rack by the sink.
He brushed my hand aside. “I can manage.” But his fingers trembled visibly as he turned on the faucet, belying his words.
When he reached for the glass, his coordination faltered completely. It slipped through his grasp, shattering against the metal sink with a sound that made me flinch.
“Damn it,” he muttered, knuckles going white as he gripped the counter edge for support.
“Sit before you fall down,” I said, moving quickly to his side. “Let me look at your wound again.” He didn’t move. My gaze narrowed. “Let me help you. Please.”
Reluctantly—the reluctance itself a sign of how bad things had become—he lowered himself onto a rickety kitchen chair. I touched his forehead, drawing back at the intensity of the heat radiating from his skin.
“You’re burning up,” I said, rising to wet a kitchen towel with cold water. “Whatever that toxin is, it’s spreading fast.”
I pressed the damp towel against his forehead. He closed his eyes briefly, the moment of surrender more terrifying than any resistance could have been.
“How bad is it?” he asked, voice rougher than before, as though the words scraped his throat on their way out.
My clinical examination shifted into something more intimate as I traced the dark lines spreading up his neck. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen anything like this.” And that worried me. We needed proper help to assess this, not to blindly guess what may be wrong.
He shivered violently under my touch, though his skin remained dangerously hot.
Something shifted in his expression then—confusion giving way to a flash of recognition that had nothing to do with me or our current situation. His eyes widened slightly, focusing on something only he could see.
He grabbed my wrist suddenly, his grip painfully tight. When his gaze locked onto mine, the intensity feltdifferent—deeper, more personal, as though someone else entirely looked through those eyes.
“Sofia?” he whispered.
I froze, the unfamiliar name hitting me like a physical blow. Something twisted in my chest. “What?”
His focus sharpened momentarily, eyes widening with something like horror before clouding again with confusion. He released my wrist abruptly, bewilderment washing over his features.
“Who’s Sofia?” I asked.
He shook his head, wincing at the movement. “I don’t...” He broke off, pressing his palm against his temple. “There’s nothing.”
But we both knew that wasn’t true. A name had surfaced through the poison-induced delirium—a real memory breaking through his conditioning. The toxin was tearing down walls in his mind even as it attacked his body.
“It’s getting worse,” I said, watching fresh sweat break out across his forehead despite the cool cloth pressed against his skin. “If you don’t want to go to the hospital, we need to get you back to bed.”
When he tried to stand, his legs buckled completely. I caught him, nearly collapsing under his weight. His arm fell heavily across my shoulders as I helped him stagger back toward the bed, the sheet trailing behind us like a surrender flag.
There was a question I was unable to chase away from my mind. Part of me thought it might help if we kept digging into things, trying to uncover whatever pieces of his past were stillout there, no matter how small. But also—and maybe even more than that—I wanted to know about her. I wanted to understand if she meant something to him. And if she did, I needed to know how.
“Who is she?” I asked, the question burning through me even as I knew it shouldn’t matter. Not now. Not with him practically dying. “Sofia—is she from before?”
