CHAPTER 1 Are you afraid of falling, baby? No, I’m afraid of landing. [He’s laughing, and I’m smiling.] Stupid idiot smile, don’t you know what comes next? Wake. Wake now. I don’t want to see this, not again. It’s not helping me deal. This thing is broken— Oh no. No. I sit up, shuddering, shoving the dark mop of hair out of my face, and my fingers come away wet with sweat. With trembling hands, I yank the patch away from my skull. It hurts. But then, what doesn’t? What the Unit Psych calls dream therapy, I call torture. Seems too cruel to do this to someone on purpose, and I know they’re going to find a way to blame me for the tech malfunction. They always do. But it’s not my fault they’re using gear that should’ve been decommed after the Axis Wars. That’s what I want to believe. But it’s getting harder. There comes a point when you want to accept culpability simply because you’re the only common denominator. So yeah, maybe it’s my fault. I push to my feet, off the sleep-mat, restless, haunted, although they proved a long time ago that it’s all just electromagnetic energy, nothing spiritual. Nothing left of the soul, nothing left of him. My AI asks, “Lights on, Sirantha Jax?”