Raven continued. “I know that Katerina brought her back to Earth and adopted her as a teenager. She trained her like any other agent, and when Katerina finally showed up here with her daughter in tow, Section 9 didn’t have much choice. It was either hire Andrea or kill her, at that point.”
I had never doubted Andrea’s loyalties before, but it occurred to me that she might have more reason to be loyal to her adopted mother than to the Sol Federation. After all, Katerina had shaped her as a Section 9 agent. It was possible—
“I see you furrowing your brow, Tycho,” Raven announced. “You can cut that out. Andrea is one hundred percent loyal to the Federation, not her mother.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Whatever drove her and Samara apart left a scar, and it carried over. You should hear her when she talks about Katerina. She admires her in a way, but there’s no question she hates her too. Especially for disappearing the way she did.”
I didn’t find that too convincing. After all, if Andrea had hard feelings about her mother’s disappearance, then she might want nothing more than for Katerina to turn up again and make it alright somehow.
I almost shrugged, then I remembered that it would hurt if I did. I gestured with my new hands instead. “Well, I just hope she turns up soon.”
Raven stood and folded the hand towel into a neat square. “So do I,” she said as she placed it in the sink and ran the tap. “Andrea was the youngest spy to join Section 9, but she earned her keep. She lived up to the expectations that came with being Katerina’s daughter many times over. When Katerina disappeared, it was only natural that Andrea became field commander. That brings us to today, where Andrea is probably out hunting her mother down.” Raven turned off the water and shook her hands dry.
“That’s quite the epic. Why did no one tell me any of this before now?”
“Her death was never confirmed. Was she actually killed in action, or did she defect? Did she fence state secrets to a third party? We didn’t know, and that uncertainty was divisive. The Operator eventually directed that no one was to mention Katerina’s name. Not in the training classes, not in the official history, not even in private conversations like the one we’re having right now.”
“So they kept all her training curriculum but erased her from her own story?”
“In so many words, yeah. She’s become a ghost haunting this place. You were part of the first generation of Section 9 agents not to be told about her, until now.”
I thought of what that must have meant for Andrea, to see her mother and mentor erased from the record like that. The greatest legend in Section 9 history, and no one was to mention her name.
“That reminds me,” said Raven. “I didn’t tell you anything. Right?”
“Tell me what?”
She smiled that beautiful smile. “Good man.”
“So what about that strange machine I found?”
She frowned a little. “You found? I thought Thomas did.”
“Thomas was nosing over my shoulder through the door behind me.”
She laughed. “Typical Thomas. Well, it’s apparently called a Warwick node, but that’s all I know about it.” She regarded me thoughtfully for a second. “You know, the doc wanted me to help you go for a little walk. We could take a trip down to Thomas’s lab, see what he’s come up with. How about that?”
“You expect me to walk halfway across this facility? I can barely even put on a pair of pants.”
“Ah, but you did put on a pair of pants. I think you can handle it. These prosthetics are really something, Tycho. You’ll see as soon as you use them. I think it’s time.”
“Okay, okay. Hold on just a sec.” I slid myself to the edge of the bed.
“Hey, no. No way. You’re not going to be able to do this on your own. I’m helping you down.” She came over and placed her arms under my shoulders from behind, then she clasped her wrists across my chest. Quietly grateful for the help, I leaned my weight into her arms and swung my feet out over the floor. When I placed them down on the tiles, I was surprised to feel the cold floor underneath me.
“Hey, I can feel that.”
“Well, of course you can. How would you be able to walk if you couldn’t feel?”
“I guess I was thinking of them like crutches. It’s different, but I can feel the tiles beneath my feet.”
I tried to stand, but my legs felt like liquid at first and I wobbled on the way up. Raven caught me and kept me from falling.
“Okay, here comes the hard part. You need to take a step.”
“I can do that. Hold on.”
I told my right foot to take a step, but the step it took was far too big and I stumbled. I told my left foot to follow it, but my second step was far too little and I was still unbalanced, leaning against Raven until she could swing me over to sit on the bed.
“This might not be easy, but we’ll get there eventually. Up we go, Tycho.”
It wasn’t easy at first, but after three or four steps I got the basic idea. From that point onward, it was just a matter of holding on to Raven Sommer and moving as carefully as possible. As we went through the door, it occurred to me that I had a long way to go before I could possibly expect to return to field duties.
“Where’s that head right now, Tycho? You think too much, you know.”
“That’s what everyone tells me. I’m thinking about the field. How the hell am I going to be of any use?”
“I guess you’ll have to ask Andrea how she did it when she gets back.”
12
The walk down to Thomas’s laboratory was a trial by fire. Prosthetic limbs are miraculous, but they aren’t part of your body. At least not at first. It takes some time to get used to them, and until you do you’re just confused and clumsy and in a lot of pain.
With Raven helping me, I put one foot in front of the other and we made our way through the Headquarters. Every step took conscious effort. Not falling down took a fair bit of planning, because the whole world seemed to spin and lurch on me whenever I lifted one of my new feet off the floor. Setting the same foot down on the floor sent a stab of pain up through my spinal cord. Closing one eye helped, but it was frankly hellish no matter what I did.
After a few minutes, Raven started talking about nothing in particular, just to take my mind off the ordeal. “Do you remember where the lab is,” she asked.
It was an effort to speak at all, but I made that effort because I saw what she was doing. If we could get a conversation going, however difficult, then the arduous journey to Thomas’s lab would be that much easier. We were slowly edging our way down a long, empty corridor, and the idea of taking my mind off that seemed like a good one.
“Sure.” I took a short, sharp breath. “Thomas is the one who taught the training course.”
“You mean he actually let you touch his lab equipment?” She sounded aghast at the prospect. Thomas was not exactly open to sharing his equipment with others. Even Andrew Jones, who was the closest thing Thomas had to an assistant, was often denied permission to actually use any of his devices.
“No, not really.” I rested and caught my breath for a moment. “It was mostly theory.”