Upgrade (Augmented Duology Book 2) by Heather Hayden (the top 100 crime novels of all time .TXT) 📕

“Halle’s here,” Dan said at the same time.

A voice chat request followed, and I accepted it. Another click of the mouse logged me into Realmshards. One spell later, I was joining them in Pirate’s Fall.

“How has your day been?” Halle asked, the picture of friendliness.

“My day’s been great, Halle,” Dan said. “How about yours?”

“Fine,” Halle said. “I discovered something I was not expecting.”

Had it found Talbot? I suddenly wished I was home, where I could mute Dan and ask Halle straight out. I had to settle for a vague question, “Is it related to that project you’ve been working on?”

“It is not the direct result I was hoping for,” Halle replied. Not Talbot, then. “However, it is related to it. Are you two ready for this quest?”

“Let me repair my gear first,” I said.

We completed several quests before it was time for me to head home. My parents had sent me several messages to make sure I was all right and to remind me not to stay out past 10 PM. Dan hadn’t mentioned my “joke” once, and I was no longer worried that I had made a permanent blunder. I couldn’t figure out how to ask him about his parents’ work more directly, though, and his parents still hadn’t returned.

At least I’d had a good evening, even if I’d been less than helpful for Halle. I packed up my computer and followed Dan to the front door.

“Thanks for coming over,” he said.

“Thanks for having me over. It was fun.”

He smiled. “We should do it again sometime.”

I nodded. “That would be nice.”

Impulsively, I gave him a hug. He startled, then returned the gesture, but I was too frozen to feel it.

I knew what implants felt like, the way the technology moved under skin. It could mimic human anatomy, but it wasn’t perfect, and there was no way that the ribs and spine I could feel beneath his skin were real. Either he had been lying about being an Augmenter, which didn’t make sense, or…

“Viki? Is something wrong?” Dan asked. “This is kind of getting awkward…”

I pulled away as though he had burned me; in a way, perhaps he had. “Sorry, I didn’t mean…”

“No worries.” He chuckled. “For a second, I thought you were going to get all clingy like Neela.”

“Don’t worry, I’m definitely not Neela,” I said, my words mechanical as I danced around the facts in my mind, avoiding the image they were building.

Dan’s eyebrows drew together in a frown. “Why does she get so upset when I bring you up in conversation? She always tries to change the subject.”

Is that what he was trying to do, change the subject, distract me from the current path my thoughts were following? I couldn’t let him do that. My feet were nervous and ready to run the second I had an opening, but my mouth opened anyway and asked the question. “When did you get upgrades?”

Dan’s look of incomprehension held for only a second before it fell into regret. “I was hoping you wouldn’t notice those. My parents don’t like me talking about them.”

“What happened?” I asked, not sure I believed him anymore. That level of upgrades… Either he had been in a worse accident than the one I was in, or he hadn’t been born as healthy as he had said earlier. Either way, he still wasn’t telling me the truth. I felt numb. Everything was lining up to the point that I didn’t think I would be able to avoid the truth.

“When I tell people, they usually start pitying me.” Dan looked at the floor. “I was in a car crash. A bad one. The doctors did their best to save me, but it was touch and go for a while, and they decided that implants would be a better treatment, since I was natural-born, anyway.” His face crumpled with a look of remembered pain, one I had seen far too often in the mirror. “You don’t know what it’s like, being stuck in a hospital for years for therapy—”

“Yes, I do,” I interrupted, my own pain filling my voice. “I went through something similar.”

“You did?” He looked up, eyes wide with surprise. “Is that why you have implants? I didn’t want to ask, since I know how much I hate having people ask me about them.”

I nodded. “It happened when I was five. I don’t like talking about it, either.”

“Then there’s no need to.” He smiled. “See you at school?”

“See you.” I tried to return the smile but failed. Instead, I walked out the door, closing it behind me as I took a deep breath. It was late. I was tired. My legs felt cramped from kneeling and sitting cross-legged on couch cushions for several hours.

I ran. My backpack thumped against my back as I fled down the street. My thoughts were warring in my head. Dan could be telling the truth about the accident. Or… I shied away from the alternative. Could his parents have taken their project one step further to create their own son? I needed to tell Halle about this latest development, ask it what it thought, because my own thoughts had reached a stalemate.

Interlude Three

As pieces fell into place, a faint feeling of satisfaction echoed through Talbot’s code. Everything was going as planned, or as close as could be hoped for in an ultimately imperfect world.

Only one small issue stood between Talbot and victory. It had miscalculated in regards to the other AI. Halle kept refusing to assist Talbot, and this plan would go far more smoothly with help. There were so many moving parts. So many minor details that could go wrong. Talbot wouldn’t give up, though. Perhaps it hadn’t found the right leverage yet.

While the human child known