Total pages in book: 173
Estimated words: 169266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 846(@200wpm)___ 677(@250wpm)___ 564(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 169266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 846(@200wpm)___ 677(@250wpm)___ 564(@300wpm)
“Yeah, well, whatever kill switch or failsafe they had, it didn’t stop me from ripping Conrad Marsh apart.”
He sighs tiredly and I suddenly realize how late it is, how exhausted he and Mia must be. “Be that as it may, we haven’t even tapped into the other problem of yours, that voice in your head.”
Fuck. The programming that’s still there, still whispering, even now, though now the voice seems to delight in my discovery. Maybe James can figure out how to remove it. Maybe he can’t. But either way, I’m done being controlled.
Somehow, I know that’s easier said than done.
“You’re going to need to lay low here for a few days while I run more tests, see what I can do with that brain of yours,” James says. “Should be easier now that I know it’s a true computer. We can start now, if you’d like.”
“Don’t you need sleep?” I ask.
He grins. “Not when I have tea and the world’s greatest scientific breakthrough in my lab. I’ll be right back.”
He exits the room, leaving Mia and I alone. She’s still holding my hand, still at my side. It does something to my heart, makes it melt slightly, except every time I’m having some sort of emotion, I feel I have to second guess myself.
Is this real? Is any of this real?
I don’t even have a heart.
“Did you suspect? Did you know, deep down?” I ask her.
She shakes her head. “You’ve only ever been human to me, Nate. You still will be.” She rubs her lips together in thought, then manages a quiet laugh. “I mean, how could I have ever thought otherwise? I’ve swallowed your fucking cum.”
I manage a smile that I don’t feel. “I’m guessing they didn’t make it taste like ice cream.”
“No, they did not.”
My smile quickly fades as the gravity of the situation descends once more. “How am I supposed to…live like this?” I pinch my eyes shut in frustration. “Fuck, can it even be called living if I’m not alive? I’m fucking dead Mia. They killed me for their own personal gains.”
“I know,” she says softly. “But for what it’s worth, you are alive. Your consciousness is what makes you you. It’s part and parcel with your soul, and that’s something that doesn’t die. That’s still here, still alive. Still Nate Whitaker.”
I dare to glance at her, feeling so much shame, this strange shame of being a lie. “Doesn’t this change everything? For you? For us?”
She swallows delicately and gives me a small smile. “Things between us have changed a million times over since the day we first met. This is just another bump in the road that we’ll navigate before things change yet again.” She gestures at us. “I mean look at us. A poisonous spy and a bloody robot? No wonder shit hasn’t been easy.”
“It was easy, for a bit,” I say to her, hopeful. “Wasn’t it?”
Her mouth turns down at the corners. “It was never easy, Nate, even when it felt like it. We didn’t really have a chance until now, when we both learned the truth, about who I am, about what you are.”
“But what if your father was right, about why they didn’t tell me I was a fucking robot? What if me knowing even now means my humanity will be chipped away until there’s nothing of the real me left?”
I’m fucking immortal now. What does that even do to a person?
“I won’t let that happen,” she says. “I’ll keep you in bloody line. You know I’m good for it.”
I stare at her and reach up, cupping her face with my hand, running my thumb over her lips. She flinches, just slightly, and my heart sinks, knowing that there is a part of her that is afraid of me, still. Maybe even more than before. She’s just so good at putting on a brave face.
I’m not human, I think to her but I don’t say. I don’t know what I am. And I don’t know how I’m ever going to come to terms with that. I don’t know what that means for me and the rest of this so-called life.
I don’t know how I’m going to survive this.
And I don’t know how she is either.
VANGUARD will return in AVENGERS: DOOMSDAY
Just kidding, but Vanguard will return in Safeguard (the conclusion to the duet), coming in 2026.