Recursion - Blake Crouch Page 0,69
Helena?”
She says nothing. She’s watching her worst nightmare unfold—the chair in a government laboratory.
Raj walks over to the terminal, tees up a new recording file, and carries over the tablet that functions as a remote control.
Taking a seat on the stool beside Timoney, he says, “Best way to record a memory, especially in the beginning, is to talk your way through it. Try to go deeper than just what you saw and felt. The memory of sounds, tastes, and smells are all critical for a vivid retrieval. Whenever you’re ready.”
Timoney closes her eyes, takes a deep breath.
She recalls standing at the copper-topped bar of a whiskey place she frequents in the Village, waiting for a bourbon she ordered. A woman squeezed in beside her to flag down the bartender, and bumped into Timoney, close enough for Timoney to smell the fragrance she wore. The woman looked over to apologize, and they locked eyes for three seconds. Timoney knew that any day now, she’d be climbing into the tank to die. She was excited and terrified by the prospect. In fact, the reason she’d gone out that evening was because she needed some physical connection.
“Her skin was the color of coffee and cream, and her lips just slayed me. I wanted to touch her so badly. God, I needed to get rag-dolled, but I just smiled and said, ‘It’s fine, don’t worry about it.’ Life’s made up of a thousand little regrets like that, isn’t it?”
Timoney opens her eyes. “How was that?”
Raj holds up the tablet to show everyone—SYNAPTIC NUMBER: 156.
“Is that sufficient?” Shaw asks.
“Anything above 120 is in the safe zone.”
He runs an IV line into Timoney’s left forearm and mounts the injection port. Then Timoney strips out of her fatigues and heads over to the tank.
Raj opens the hatch, and Shaw gives her a hand as she climbs in.
Looking down at his soldier floating in the saltwater, Shaw says, “You remember everything we discussed?”
“Yes. I’m not sure what to expect.”
“To be honest, none of us are. We’ll see you on the other side.”
Raj closes the hatch and moves to the terminal. Shaw sits beside him, and Helena comes over to study the monitors. The reactivation protocol is already initiating, Raj double-checking the dosages for the Rocuronium and sodium thiopental.
“Mr. Shaw?” Helena says.
He looks up at her.
“Right now, we are the only people in the world who control the chair.”
“I would hope so.”
“I am begging you. Show restraint. Its use has only ever caused mayhem and pain.”
“Maybe the wrong people were at the controls.”
“Humanity doesn’t have the wisdom to handle this sort of power.”
“I’m about to prove you wrong.”
She needs to stop this, but there are two armed guards just outside the door. If she tried anything, they’d be on her in a matter of seconds.
Raj lifts the headset and speaks into the microphone, “We’re starting in ten seconds, Timoney.”
The woman’s breathing comes fast over the speaker. “I’m ready.”
Raj activates the injection port. Slade’s equipment has improved vastly since their days on the rig, when it required a medical doctor to be on hand to monitor test subjects and advise when the stimulators should be fired. This new software automates the drug sequence based on real-time vital sign reporting and engages the electromagnetic stimulators only when the dimethyltriptamine release is detected.
“How long before the shift?” Shaw asks.
“Depends on how her body responds to the drugs.”
The Rocuronium fires, followed thirty seconds later by the sodium thiopental.
Shaw leans in toward a split-screen that displays Timoney’s vital signs on the left, and a night-vision camera feed of her inside the tank on the right.
“Her heart rate is off the charts, but she looks so calm.”
“Yours would be too if you were suffocating while your heart was stopped,” Helena says.
They all watch Timoney’s heart rate flatline.
Minutes elapse.
A line of sweat runs down the side of Shaw’s face.
“Should it be taking this long?” he asks.
“Yes,” Helena says. “This is how long it takes to die after your heart quits beating. I promise you it feels much longer to her.”
The monitor that shows the status of the stimulators flashes an alert—DMT RELEASE DETECTED. The previously dark image of Timoney’s brain explodes with a light show of activity.
“Stimulators are firing,” Raj says.
After ten seconds, a new alert replaces the DMT notice—MEMORY REACTIVATION COMPLETE.
Raj looks over at Shaw and says, “Any moment—”
* * *
Instead of the terminal, Helena is suddenly at the conference table on the other side of the lab. Her nose is bleeding, head