Chapter 26
The First Question
Claire refused the chair until the speaker displayed the consent form.
The page appeared on every monitor: her name, her signature, the date eleven months earlier. Beneath it, a question waited.
Who is allowed to remember for you?
“No one,” Claire said.
The system marked the answer unstable.
Noah laughed from his chair. “They hate that answer.”
“How do you know?” Daniel asked.
“I have given it forty-three times.”
Lucy looked at him. “He was the first witness.”
Noah's face changed. “I was the husband.”
“You were both.”
The copy moved around Claire. “The program began with family members because people trust familiar voices.”
“You used Noah to control Lucy.”
“Noah used himself.”
The speaker played a recording of Noah saying, “You are safe. You are home. You are not Lucy.”
Lucy closed her eyes.
Claire heard the same cadence as her own sleep recording.
“They trained you to deny yourself,” Claire said.
Lucy opened her eyes. “They trained us to survive the denial.”
The gym doors unlocked.
Nobody moved.
Beyond the doorway, the corridor filled with men in gray jackets.
Owen Bell spoke again. “The first question has been answered. The next question requires a witness.”
The copy held out the clipboard.
On it was a photograph of Mara.
“Tell us what she asked you to forget.”
Claire touched the photograph.
The gym vanished.