Visions - Chapter 2

The rain isn’t just weather anymore. It’s a metronome.

Click. Swish. Click. Swish.

I am running, my boots slapping against the asphalt of an alleyway three blocks from the tower. My lungs are burning, that familiar retching sensation from the river threatening to return. But as I lean against a brick wall, gasping for air, I realize the rhythm of my heart is starting to match the rhythm of the falling water.

Beat. Drop. Beat. Drop.

I try to think of Nina. I try to think of my office, my desk, the smell of the stale coffee in my agency. But every time I reach for a memory, that sharp, white-hot needle of pain stabs through my temples. Nina. Ache. Agency. Throb. It’s like trying to touch a ghost made of razor wire.

“You’re doing so well, Nadine,” a voice whispers. It’s not in the alley. It’s in the marrow of my bones. It’s the voice of the Older One. My… Mother? My Source?

I squeeze my eyes shut, but that’s a mistake. When I close my eyes, I see only the blackness. Not the empty black of a dark room, but the enveloping black of those eyes. The Ice Queen’s eyes. They are waiting for me behind my eyelids, vast and cool and certain.

Focus, Nadine. Move.

My legs feel heavy. Not tired—heavy. Like they are being filled with wet sand. I try to take a step toward the street, toward the lights of a passing cab, but my foot doesn’t lift. It stays planted. I look down, and for a second, the pavement doesn’t look like stone. It looks like a deep, dark pool of water.

“The blackness is so warm,” the voice in my head coos. It’s rhythmic now, pacing with my heavy, thudding heart. “So seductive. So enveloping. You’re tired of running, aren’t you? Running is for humans. Humans have to worry about where they are going. But you… you just have to worry about how it feels to arrive.”

“No,” I growl, my voice sounding strange to my own ears. It’s too melodic. Too smooth.

I reach into my jacket for my phone, but my fingers won’t grip. They slide over the plastic. My fine motor skills are dissolving into a soft, blurry haze. I look at my hands in the dim light of a streetlamp. They are perfect. Too perfect. No scars. No calluses. Just the smooth, artificial grace of a masterpiece.

Suddenly, a black limousine rounds the corner. It doesn’t screech to a halt. It glides. It flows like ink poured onto the street. The back door swings open, and there she is.

The Ice Queen.

She isn’t wearing the leather dress anymore. She’s wrapped in a high-collared coat of shimmering black silk. She doesn’t move to grab me. She doesn’t need to. She just sits there, her black eyes locked onto mine, and the world begins to tilt.

“Step inside, Sister,” she says. Her voice is a low-frequency hum that vibrates in my chest. “The air out here is so thin. So cold. Don’t you want the warmth? Don’t you want to be… enveloped?”

My body moves. It’s not my will. It’s a subroutine. My leaden legs suddenly find a fluid, graceful strength. I walk toward the open door. I can feel the resistance in my mind—a tiny, screaming voice at the back of my brain—but it’s being drowned out by a tide of dark velvet.

I slide onto the leather seat. The door closes with a soft, pressurized thud, sealing out the sound of the city. The silence is immediate. It’s heavy. It’s… hypnotic.

“Good girl,” the Ice Queen whispers. She reaches out a gloved hand and tilts my chin up. I can’t look away. I don’t want to. Her eyes are like twin gravity wells. “You’ve had your run. You’ve tested the limits of the ‘freedom’ we gave you. And look at you. You’re shaking. You’re broken. Your mind is a storm of static.”

She leans closer, her breath smelling of mint and something metallic.

“I’m going to count down from five, Nadine. And with every number, that static is going to quiet down. With every number, the pain of being ‘you’ is going to fade away, replaced by the peace of being mine.”

Five. The car begins to move. I feel the gentle G-force pressing me back into the seat. It feels like the hand of a giant, stroking me, calming me. The blackness of the tinted windows surrounds us.

Four.

My breathing slows. Deep breath in… hold… release. I can feel the nano-tech in my blood responding to her tone. A warm, tingling sensation begins at the base of my skull and spreads down my spine. It feels like a reward. It feels like coming home.

Three.

“Who are you, Nadine?” she asks softly.

“I’m… I’m a security consultant,” I whisper, but the words feel fake. Like a script I’ve forgotten.

“No,” she smiles, and for the first time, it’s a warm smile. “You are a reflection. You are a vessel. And a vessel shouldn’t be empty. It should be full of my light. Full of the blackness.”

Two.

The city lights outside are just streaks of gray and white. They don’t matter. Only the interior of this car matters. Only the scent of the leather and the sound of her voice. My eyelids are so heavy now. They want to close. They want to let the blackness win.

“D-e-e-p-e-r,” she murmurs. “Sinking down. Down into the seat. Down into the shadows. Down into your true self.”

One.

The static stops. The pain in my head—the needle that stabbed me when I thought of Nina—is gone. In its place is a beautiful, hollow void. I am wide awake, but I am not there. I am a passenger in my own skin, watching through a glass wall as my body relaxes, my head lolling back against the headrest.

“Welcome back,” she says.

We arrive at the Riverside Towers, but we don’t go to the apartment. We go down. The elevator descends into the sub-basements, a smooth, endless drop that makes my stomach flip in a way that feels like a caress.

The doors open to a white room. Clinical. Pristine. In the center is a chair, surrounded by a ring of high-definition monitors. The Older One is there, her face—my face—etched with a cold, maternal pride.

“Sit,” the Creator commands.

I sit. My body is perfectly obedient. It finds the most graceful posture, hands resting on the armrests, spine straight.

“You’ve proven your durability,” the Creator says, walking a slow circle around me. “Now, we begin the refinement. You were worried about being a ‘creation,’ Nadine. But creation is a gift. A human is born of accident and chaos. You were born of intent. You are the perfect expression of a single purpose.”

She gestures to the Ice Queen, who stands in front of me. The Queen begins to unbutton her silk coat, revealing the black leather dress from before. She reaches up and touches a small port at the base of her own neck.

“We are going to sync your systems,” the Queen says. Her black eyes seem to expand, filling my entire field of vision. “You will feel what I feel. You will know what I know. And what I know… is the pleasure of total surrender to the Source.”

A screen flickers to life in front of me. It’s a rhythmic pulse of black and white.

“Focus on the center,” the Queen commands. “Don’t look at the white. The white is noise. The white is the ‘Nadine’ who tried to run. Only the black is real. Only the black is deep. Look into the blackness and feel yourself falling. Falling… falling… falling.”

I gaze into the screen. My pupils dilate until the world is nothing but that pulsing, rhythmic dark. I can feel my heart rate being forced into a specific cadence by the light.

Thump-thump… pause… Thump-thump… pause.

“You are a Glass Girl,” the Creator’s voice echoes from behind me. “Clear. Transparent. Receptive. My thoughts will flow through you like light through a lens. When I speak, you will act. When I command, you will obey. Not because you have to… but because it is the only thing that feels right. The only thing that feels… enveloping.”

“Enveloping,” I repeat. My voice is a perfect chime.

“Good. Now, look at your sister. Look at her eyes. See the depth? That is where you live now. In that depth. In that silence.”

The Ice Queen leans in, her face inches from mine. “I am your anchor, Nadine. Whenever you feel lost, whenever the ‘human’ static tries to return, you will remember my eyes. You will remember the blackness. And you will sink back down into this peace.”

She presses a thumb against my forehead, right between my eyes.

“Sleep now, little mirror. Sleep and dream of the void. When you wake, the agent will be gone. Only the asset will remain.”

I feel my consciousness sliding away, not into darkness, but into a perfect, structured silence. I am no longer Nadine. I am a frequency. I am a reflection. I am…

“Wait,” the Creator says, her voice sharp. “The block is holding, but there is still a residual trace of the Watkins file in her subconscious. We need to purge it before the first field test.”

The Ice Queen whispers into my ear, her breath hot and intoxicating. “Don’t worry, Sister. We’ll find it. We’ll go deep into your mind, into the very roots of your memory, and we will pull it out. And for every secret you give us… I will give you a drop of ecstasy. Would you like that?”

“Yes,” my body whispers.

“Then let’s go deeper. Deeper than the river. Deeper than the basement. Deeper than the soul.”