August

June 29

It worked.
Everything worked, and the young man who had been brought before Will Mackenzie like a lamb led to slaughter was successfully changed, resting now under observation. The doctors had elected to keep him under for most of it - to spare him the discomfort, they had said. The discomfort, they did not say, of knowing how close he was to death.

But now the young soldier was fine - he was awake and eating sweets and reading pamphlets about his life.

Will Mackenzie felt relieved at this, of course, but it was a relief bridled by the sharp edges of fear. The experiment was not an end. Only a very, very serious beginning. What had he done?

There was a meeting going on, right now, in one of those rooms so secure that they'd shoot you just for looking at the door. The meeting, Will knew, was to determine what to do with him. And what to do with Dothan.

To tell the truth, Will wasn't sure what he wanted them to decide.
His family was here now, shaken out of the reverie of Woodacre life by the upset of his confession. The government had given them two of the most luxurious holding suites they had, and now they were all clustered in them, silent and waiting.

Sean and Adrian shared one room with the Normand, the eldest; Will and Ren and the youngest Mackenzies took the other. Adrian slept most of the day now, and the children were restless. Ren was quiet and somber, as if in mourning, and his wariness unnerved Will.

~:~

Harley woke up in the same hospital room he'd been waking up in for days now. Every day it was the same.
He tried to sit up; pain shot through his abdomen. He gasped and called for meds, and the agony eased off a little.
Aaron Soyinka was sitting in the chair across the room from him. Harley hesitated for a minute.
"Is he - "
"Yes." Aaron Soyinka looked up only briefly from the newspaper in his lap. "He's dead."
Every day it was the same.

~:~