I sat perfectly still. The only motion my body produced was the slow rise and fall of my chest.

I didn't find this difficult. It came to me naturally, at this point. The things that had happened to me in that lab made me uniquely suited to 'sitting around and doing nothing.'

What I didn't find quite so easy was ignoring the world around me.

I was acutely aware of the sound of Amelia's breathing to my left. Of the AC's breeze as it washed cool air over the room, fighting off the heat that the burning midday sun shed over the city. Of my clothes pressing against my skin. Of the strand of hair that had fallen out of the rough ponytail I'd tied my overlong hair into, which was now tickling my neck…

I wanted to snarl. I wanted to claw something up. I wanted to loudly cuss out whoever had come up with the meditation exercises meant to let a novice experience Essence for the first time.

I didn't, but only because doing so would break Amelia's focus.

I cracked my eyes open, taking in her appearance.

Unlike the frustration that marked my own features, her face displayed perfect contentment. If I snapped a picture of her, it would be listed under that word in every online dictionary by the end of the day.

I breathed out all my anger slowly, trying to purge the shred of resentment that had lodged itself in my heart over the last week of effort.

Amelia was succeeding where I had done nothing but fail.

'Emptying her mind' was something that came naturally to her. She claimed it was a result of all the times she'd forced herself to just blank out and listen to her father's orders. That had done an amazing job of blunting the resentment building up in me. But 'blunted' didn't mean 'gone', as much as I hated myself for it.

After all, Amelia was a distinctly hard person to dislike.

She'd been cautious around me, those few first days. It wasn't obvious. She didn't seem to have any trouble plopping herself down next to me and making herself comfortable. Still, I didn't miss the looks she kept sending my eyes, and especially my arms.

But she got over any lingering reservations in record time. I had a decent guess as to why.

She was starved for company.

It felt like I was taking advantage of her, really. Her friendliness escalated until she was treating me as someone she'd known for years rather than days. Jokes came easily. She seemed perfectly at ease cuddling up against me, even when neither of us found a reason to talk for several hours at a time. She was downright eager to guide me through all the files on both Essence and the scans the doctor took of me.

In the face of her relentless friendliness, I could admit that my own walls were crumbling. Slower than hers, yes. I still got flashes of Mela's face, or other Kittens, at times when I let myself just relax and laugh along. But I was getting there.

That only made me feel worse whenever my frustration almost made me lash out.

I couldn't help it, though! I was the one who had more Essence. I was the one who needed it in order to cling to sanity. I'd even felt it, briefly, when I turned that one guy into a shadow. In spite of that, it was Amelia who was 'getting flashes' of 'something' when she got deep enough into meditation. Not me.

All I ever got when I let my mind wander for too long was a collection of flashing images: the Eye snapping open within a digital reality, weeping shadows, and other things humans just weren't supposed to witness,

Every time that happened, I felt… odd, afterwards. Floaty. Like whatever bound my mind to my body was unraveling and making all sensations muted and distant. It faded quickly every time, but I hated it while it lasted. It left me feeling like I wasn't myself anymore, even more so than what I'd already lost.

When I wasn't trying to meditate and accidentally drudging up forbidden memories, though, I was doing slightly better overall. Time had done wonders for me. So had the freedom from constant pressure, pain, or fear. Some of that stiffness and anxiety that made me want to lash out at the slightest fright had bled away, leaving me more capable of just functioning normally.

Not that there weren't moments when my condition worsened.

I had woken up several times feeling more like an animal than a human. Hunched over, claws out, ready to attack every shadow around me. Afterwards, I could never figure out what had triggered the episode.

There was one time, though, when my eyes had snapped open and I could have sworn I saw the silhouette of something hovering over my bed. It was gone before I could even blink, but I still found it impossible to fall sleep again that night.

Back in the frustrating present, I groaned into my chin and sprawled out on the floor. I knew Amelia would still take an hour or two before dropping the meditation nonsense. In the meantime, I brought up my HUD and dug into the code I'd been examining recently.

It belonged to my eyes, and with Amelia's help, I was making great strides forward in understanding it. After all, while she wasn't supremely skilled, her job of designing and installing cybernetics had required her to study up on programming. She was actually a bit ahead of me in that field. This meant that instead of trying to learn a brand new and advanced coding language all on my own, I could have her break it down to the basic building blocks for me.

Already, my efforts here and on several other different fronts were paying off.

Adrian Flinn

Strength: 5

Reflexes: 10 (-10)

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

Acuity: 20

Physique: 5

Recovery: 3

Stamina: 5

Soul: 10

Adaptability: 10

Tolerance: 10

Cognition: 10

Essence: 10

Mind Synchronicity: Reluctant Symphony

Body Synchronicity: Blooming Acceptance

Shadow Runner Package:

Clairvoyance 2 (74/100) → Clairvoyance 2 (89/100)

Programming 1 (0/100) → Programming 1 (99/100)

Movement 2 (0/100)

Quickhacks 1 (8/100)

Assault 2 (6/100) → Assault 2 (21/100)

Tongue of The Ravening Observer

Unseen Stalker Package:

Stealth 0 (0/100)

Tracking 1 (0/100)

Focus 0 (3/100) → Focus 0 (28/100)

Grace 1 (0/100)

Faultline 0 (17/100) → Faultline 0 (31/100)

My level one Programming was almost ready to advance. My use of Clairvoyance for coding was letting me make solid progress. My occasional 'play fights' with Shadow Buddy had done wonders to get me further along in Assault, which was still… all kinds of funky, really.

Assault wasn't so much hacking or breaching or anything like that. You could use it against AI defenses, but it was really built as a tool against netrunners. Or, well, shadows. Basically, it meant pitting minds against each other and exerting pure will to cause damage. It kind of hurt my brain to contemplate too much.

Unlike Programming or Clairvoyance, where I'd gotten solid knowledge on the mechanics of what I was doing, Assault was still imparting nothing but instinct. It was like using level 0 skills: pure reaction and flailing around, instead of something guided by intent and understanding. And that worried me.

I mean, if I was on level 2 already and still just building up the base instincts for the skill, how potent would Assault get? Would I become a shadow for real, and just devour the minds of anyone I encountered in the netspace? As much as I wanted that power, I wasn't sure I wanted to pay the price that would come attached to it.

And I had little doubt there would be a price.

This was why I was so obsessed with figuring out Essence. If I could just grow my Essence pool, then I could firm up my mind against anything the packages threw at it.

And the stupid exercises just. Weren't. Working!

A few deep breaths were required before I could turn my attention to the two outliers from the Unseen Stalker package. Both Focus and Faultline were way more complex than I'd initially assumed.

Focus helped with just about everything. It was the only way I'd been able to clear my mind at all, those few times I'd succeeded during our meditation sessions. Every time I got an exp alert for Focus, my attention would sharpen.

Of course, clearing my mind just provoked the eldritch imagery lurking inside of it. Even when I did everything right, all I got were those stupid, frustrating memories.

Faultline, meanwhile, was not just useful for getting guaranteed kills using people's weak points. The skill instinctively guided me towards finding the… well, 'fault lines' in anything I was examining with enough attention. It synchronized extremely well with the Focus skill. I'd even earned a couple exp points for both at the same time.

In other words, the Faultline skill let me find the weaknesses in a variety of things, from digital defenses to my own code. It even helped me get a more satisfying cut when dicing ingredients. I'd been extremely amused to learn that the pile of veggies and meat I'd prepared had a more satisfying 'texture', according to Amelia.

A long exhale jolted me out of my examination of code. I let my eyes drift over to Amelia, who slowly blinked awake.

"Had a nice nap?" I drawled, holding back a smile when she narrowed her eyes at me in annoyance.

"It wasn't a nap!"

"I don't know. I'm not the one who completely loses track of the world around me while 'meditating.' I swear you were drooling a little that one time."

The raven-haired girl flushed, but she still wouldn't give up. "I keep telling you, deep meditation is just… relaxing. Everything falls away, and you can feel this energy wrapping around everything, and… it's easy to lose track of time!"

I felt a twist of something ugly inside my chest, but I shook it off as I dragged myself up into a sitting position. "Sure, sure. If it makes you feel better. Have you anything to actually show for all your napping, then?"

Amelia's eyes lit up. She confused me when she suddenly scrambled over to her scroll, which she'd left on the coffee table near us. It booted out of sleep mode, and then she was furiously scrolling through it before letting out a whoop of excitement.

"Here, here, look at this!"

Amelia Harkness

Strength: 1

Reflexes: 3

Acuity: 0.5

Physique: 0.8

Recovery: 1

Stamina: 0.7

Soul: 2

Adaptability: 3

Tolerance: 3

Cognition: 2

Essence: 2

Wait… Essence 2?!

"You did it?" I breathed in disbelief, eying the number 2 like it would jump out of the scroll screen and shank me.

"I did! It was harder than I thought it would be, but I did!" She was fidgeting so much that I thought she was going to start bouncing off the walls. A brilliant smile stretched across her face, making her green eyes literally shine.

"That's great! Congratulations!" I managed to get the words out in what I thought was a convincing tone. Judging from the way she beamed at me and immediately starting making food orders for both of us to celebrate the moment, I was pretty sure I'd succeeded.

I further managed to keep any negative emotions off my face as she ranted about her experience. I kept it up as we ate the takeout, pressed together on that same couch we'd shared back on our first day in the apartment. I even stayed neutral as she cuddled up into me with a contented sigh, head leaned against my shoulder.

Finally, though, I couldn't hold back anymore.

"I… don't think this is working," I admitted quietly into the silence that had settled.

"Hmmm? What do you mean? What's not working?"

"The meditation. The exercises. I just… I can't do it. I'm giving myself nightmares, and that's it. Couldn't even 'feel the Essence all around me' or whatever."

"Adrian… I'm sure you'll get it! It's just taking you a while."

"That's not it, though. You managed to sense Essence for the first time on what, the second day?"

"The… third, I think…"

"Exactly! And I can't even clear my mind or whatever. I can't. Every time I try, I…"

"I — I understand, you don't have to talk about it again if you don't want to. You told me about it already," Amelia cut in, probably because she'd pulled away and seen the expression on my face.

It wasn't exactly the look of a happy man.

"I can't keep trying and failing forever. I need Essence, Amelia. I need it. What — what if —"

I was starting to breathe harder, faster. I could feel the panic attack coming on, and I wasn't sure what I could do to stop it.

Then Amelia's arms closed around me.

I stiffened. For once, it wasn't murderous intent that welled up in me as an instinctual response to a sudden move like that.

It was relief.

"We'll figure something out," she whispered. "I promise."

"I — I think I know what I need already. I just… need to find a gang or something. The worst kind of gang. Scavs, if there's any around here. I need people I can… experiment… on…"

I trailed off, ready for disgust or something similar.

Instead, when she said nothing for a minute, I glanced up to find her looking thoughtful.

"Maybe…" Her lower lip caught between her teeth as she stared at the wall, her eyes distant. "Well, I mean, I'm not sure it's a good idea, but I might have a place in mind…"

Relief, hope, and all sorts of other complicated feelings tangled up inside of me, but my tongue got ahead of all that.

"I'll try anything."

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.