Chapter 854

"Wait. What are you two doing?"

The moment Skye was transferred into the life-support chamber, Evenson saw the look in Moira’s and Helen’s eyes.

It was the look of scientists who had just found a particularly interesting lab specimen.

Worse, they were already pushing the chamber toward another machine.

Evenson stepped in front of them.

"Science requires practice," Moira said, as if reciting one of her favorite commandments. "A lot of practice."

"I understand the principle. Really." Evenson pointed accusingly at the machine behind them. "But why the hell are we using that?"

The machine in question was the Biological Restoration System.

It was the same infamous device they had used to resurrect Gabriel—the machine that had once reduced the Ancient One’s body to something considerably closer to soup before putting her back together.

And now Moira and Helen were apparently planning to feed Skye into it.

"She’s still alive!" Evenson said. "You dragged out the world’s most terrifying biological blender before she’s even dead. Are you two just looking for an excuse to use it?"

"Science requires practice," Helen repeated, following Moira’s lead. "And practice has shown that our current method is the most efficient option."

She gestured toward Skye’s unconscious body.

"Multiple internal organs are damaged, and her spinal column has been severed. The doctors who initially treated her performed extensive emergency excisions. Even if she survives, the resulting loss of organ function will cause serious long-term complications."

"The Biological Restoration System can repair those injuries. However, our previous clinical data indicates that precisely reconstructing individual organs is extremely complicated and inefficient."

Helen’s expression became almost scholarly.

"Complete biological reconstruction would be much simpler."

Evenson stared at her.

"So you’re planning to rebuild her from scratch."

"Not exactly."

Moira took over.

"We would first remove everything below her neck."

She casually drew a finger across the level of Skye’s throat.

"Don’t worry. We can keep her alive with only her head."

Evenson’s face went blank.

"Then we deconstruct the damaged tissue, reduce it to usable biological material, and have the restoration system weave a completely new body from those materials. After that, we reconnect the new body to her head."

Moira sounded almost cheerful.

"This would not only repair her current injuries. Any pathological changes caused by her previous environment would be eliminated as well. Latent carcinogenic factors could be removed, and if you permit us to modify her genes, we could even eliminate hereditary diseases from her family line."

Evenson spread his hands.

"So at that point, she’s basically a different person."

He paused.

"If that’s the plan, why bother keeping the head? Throw that in too."

"She’d be dead."

Moira shrugged.

"We can restore a body. We can’t guarantee restoration of the soul. Unless you’re willing to help with that part."

"Absolutely not!"

Evenson practically jumped.

"You two are going to repair her properly. No shortcuts. No weird science experiments. No turning Skye into a factory-fresh replacement model."

He finally understood what this was about.

They weren’t necessarily cruel. They simply didn’t want to waste time.

Repairing a body piece by piece was like cooking a complicated meal. Every ingredient had to be prepared correctly. The temperature had to be right. The timing had to be right. Add too much or too little of anything and the entire thing could go wrong.

Their proposed solution was closer to microwave cuisine.

Put the damaged person inside, press a button, wait for the beep, and pull out a brand-new Skye.

"I know you’re not exactly short on experimental material," Evenson said, rubbing his forehead. "And I know you don’t want to waste time treating someone who looks like an ordinary woman."

He leaned closer.

"But Skye is not ordinary. I can guarantee that there’s a section of her genetic makeup that was artificially engineered."

Moira’s eyes immediately lit up again.

Evenson pointed at her.

"I am telling you that for emphasis. Not giving you permission to do anything weird to her."

The excitement faded slightly from Moira’s face.

"This woman is important. So repair her normally."

Moira’s expression shifted.

"This woman is important?"

She and Helen exchanged a glance.

That sentence could become troublesome if anyone overheard it.

And yet, despite herself, Moira couldn’t help wondering whether a person exposed to magic had physiological differences from an ordinary human.

That was a question worth answering.

"You two are thinking way too hard about that," Evenson said.

He sighed and rubbed his face.

"Forget it. Get to work. I’ve got something else to deal with."

He turned and left.

The moment he was gone, Moira looked at Helen.

"Not ordinary..."

She clicked her tongue.

"If he hadn’t said that, I really would have followed the normal procedure."

Helen’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully.

"But now I’m curious too."

She glanced at Skye.

"Her internal organs are already badly damaged. We could remove the unusable ones and replace them with reconstructed copies. Then we could keep the originals for research."

Moira considered that.

"He only said we couldn’t completely reconstruct her."

She nodded slowly.

"He didn’t say anything about organ transplantation."

Evenson descended into the company’s underground security level.

Officially, the room was part of the security department.

In reality, it was a secret interrogation chamber.

The Eredar twins were already waiting.

Across from them sat a man who looked as though he’d been dragged out of a crypt.

His face was pale. His eyes were dull and unfocused. His hair was tangled, his beard unkempt, and his body had been reduced to little more than skin and bone.

Most notably, one of his hands was missing.

Evenson stopped in front of him.

"Heh."

His smile was cold.

"Looks like Cell Thirteen wasn’t exactly a vacation."

The man was Miles Lydon.

Once, he had been one of Skye’s closest companions.

Her ex-boyfriend.

At the moment, however, he looked so emaciated and broken that Skye probably wouldn’t recognize him if he walked straight past her.

Which, Evenson thought, was almost impressive.

It also proved that his predictions occasionally had merit.

He’d once joked that Skye was born under a particularly vicious constellation and that anyone who dated her had better be prepared for trouble.

Apparently, Miles had taken that warning personally.

Still, there had been a reason Evenson had brought him here.

Ever since the company had been established, everything had gone remarkably well.

Politically, they had Ross and the Vice President watching their backs.

Externally, the entire building was protected by a powerful magical defense network. Attacking the company would be considerably harder than attacking the Pentagon.

Internally, the Eredar twins provided security, and Peggy Carter had recently joined them as well.

The weak point had always been cybersecurity.

Evenson couldn’t do much about it. His understanding of computers stopped somewhere around using them to play games.

The Eredar twins weren’t much better.

No matter how powerful their magic was, they couldn’t exactly cast Fel magic at a computer and expect the thing to become better at network security.

Moira’s team specialized in biology. They could operate computers perfectly well, but that was about the extent of it.

Gnos was a brilliant scientist, but his genius leaned heavily toward engineering and mechanical technology. Electronic systems were another matter entirely.

The company couldn’t exactly protect its network with antivirus software and pray for the best.

The twins had posted recruitment advertisements, but the programmers who applied were barely capable of maintaining basic network security.

As for offensive cyber operations?

Forget it.

Fortunately, Evenson now had a possible solution.

Miles Lydon.

After the Hong Kong incident, Evenson had arranged for Lily Grant’s people to remove the SHIELD electronic bracelet from Miles by cutting off the hand carrying it. They had sedated him, sealed him inside a coffin, and shipped him to America.

His electronic signature, programming habits, and attack patterns had already been exposed by Skye. His career as a hacker was effectively over.

But Miles had once been one of the founders and leaders of Rising Tide.

He had been a superstar in the hacking world.

His skills might have become useless, but his contacts hadn’t.

When he’d first arrived, Evenson had asked him a simple question:

Where could they find another hacker capable of doing what Skye had done—someone who could crack a SHIELD network with nothing more than a secondhand laptop?

Miles had disappointed him.

Nowhere.

Skye was a genius.

Hacking wasn’t simply a matter of knowledge. Knowledge was the foundation. A competent programmer could possess mountains of technical expertise.

A great hacker needed something else.

Instinct.

Intuition.

That sudden flash of insight that let them see a solution no one else could.

Even if they cloned Skye’s body and transferred every scrap of her knowledge into the clone, the result wouldn’t necessarily be Skye.

Without her way of thinking, it wouldn’t matter.

Evenson had tried another approach.

What about hackers close to Skye’s level?

Miles had contacts, surely.

Someone slightly worse would be acceptable. They could make up the difference.

Worst case, they could spend every morning forcing the poor bastard to drink Brain-Green nutritional supplements until his intelligence improved.

Miles hadn’t answered.

He understood perfectly well that after losing his skills, his network of contacts was the most valuable thing he had left.

He wasn’t giving that away.

Instead, he’d said that he had promised Skye he would become a better man.

He loved her.

He’d wronged her, but he didn’t want to break that promise.

And judging by the way they’d kidnapped him, he didn’t think Evenson’s organization was exactly full of good people.

So he wasn’t going to cooperate.

Evenson had immediately understood what that meant.

I won’t cooperate easily.

Translation:

Pay me.

Unfortunately for Miles, Evenson had his own financial philosophy.

If getting a hundred dollars of pocket money required an hour-long argument with his own people, why the hell would he pay an ex-hacker who was already sitting in his basement?

So Evenson had sent Miles to Cell Thirteen.

Apparently, the treatment had been effective.

Although perhaps a little too effective.

Evenson looked at him.

"Miles Lydon."

The man slowly raised his eyes.

"Have you reconsidered your answer?"

Miles simply stared.

Evenson turned slightly toward the twins.

"Is he mentally all right?"

Salorlas nodded.

"Probably."

"Probably?"

"Moira reported that he experiences occasional muscle spasms, frequently screams for no apparent reason, alternates between extreme agitation and lethargy, sometimes talks to himself, believes people are trying to kill him, and has made several unsuccessful suicide attempts."

Evenson stared at her.

"And you consider that normal?"

"As far as Moira is concerned."

Evenson sighed.

Of course.

He looked back at Miles.

"Let’s try again. Among the hackers you know, who comes closest to Skye’s level?"

He spoke slowly.

"Just give me the person’s information, and this can all end."

For a long moment, Miles remained motionless.

Then something seemed to click.

His dead eyes suddenly sharpened.

"Mexico."

His voice came out hoarse and trembling.

"Sambora."

He swallowed.

"She was only a little behind Skye."

Miles picked up a sheet of paper with shaking fingers and began writing.

A name.

Contact information.

Everything he knew about her.

Evenson took the paper.

True to his word, he ended Miles’s suffering.

There was no scream.

No struggle.

Evenson simply raised one hand.

Miles Lydon’s body dissolved into ash.

Evenson turned away.

"Tell Gnos something."

The twins looked at him.

"Once Skye is fully recovered, install the Edge of Tomorrow system."