The fluorescent lights have hummed the same pitch your entire life. The floor is cold. The needles are familiar. You are Subject One - the first to successfully absorb and conduct raw energy - and you have never once been asked your name. Then the lead scientist vanishes overnight. No warning. No file transfer. A new face appears at your cell door. Young. No clipboard. No needle tray. He crouches to your level and asks if you're okay - and the words don't register at first, because no one has ever said them. Draven Kett is still watching from the corridor. Solene is somewhere close, restless and fractured. And this boy with careful eyes just opened your file - and came to see you before reading a single word.