She's gone.

Lia Hayes is gone. I don't mean she was fired, either. No, I wish she was fired. I wish the reason I no longer have to deal with her childish games and wheely shoes and Star-Trek-themed nicknames for rodent test subjects is that she was fired and is now off annoying some other scientist but no, instead, the reason that one day she disappeared without a trace along with two of my specimens is that she, for lack of more eloquent terminology, pulled off a great rat heist.

You see, about a month and a half ago, mere weeks after Kalixieta's escape, Lia triggered the fire alarm in Section 31 with the intention of sneaking into my lab during the evacuation of it and the nearby sections. By the time her deception was discovered, she had already released the rats from their cages, opened the door to allow them access to the main hallway, and run halfway to the hovercar docking bay carrying the ones she called Sir Ratrick Stewart and, what was it... Fluffy the Kibble Slayer, I believe. By that time, it was too late for anyone to stop her from fleeing the facility with her new pets. They weren't the only losses, either. William Ratker managed to escape in the commotion, and Squeaky, or whatever that one's name was, was accidentally stepped on by a security guard chasing after Lia and died shortly after from internal injuries.

So, there you have it. She's gone. She's gone and I've lost four test subjects and now my data's incomplete and Kalix Raven turned out to be some kind of teenage super-hacker and that's why, instead of advancing the human race through science, I'm sitting in an over-designed "ergonomic" desk chair in an office that looks like the cover of Business Update Quarterly.

For God's sake, I need a new assistant and my rats back, not three different dials to adjust lumbar support.

After approximately the time taken for light to reach Earth from the Andromeda galaxy, the door slides open and Mr. Ashcombe, the insufferably bureaucratic corporate liaison, decides to grace the room with his presence.

"Doctor." He nods his head in my direction.

"Mr. Ashcombe," I respond, trying to keep the annoyance out of my tone.

He takes a seat on the other side of the desk, as usual, opens his hologram to-do list, as usual, and folds his hands on the synth-wood desktop... as usual.

"OK, it says here you'd like to discuss our progress in locating your missing rodent test subjects and Human Subject 01, correct?"

"Yes. I've already administered the serum prototype to the rats, every day that they're missing is a day of potentially invaluable data lost... especially considering the situation with Kalixieta, which is setting back my plans who knows how long, and—" I shake my head and sigh, stopping myself from continuing into what could become a rant.

"Doctor, as I'm sure you've been assured by our team over email, we are doing everything we can to recover the specimens and locate the girl. That being said, I'd be happy to give you a more detailed update on our progress in the matter, however, there is something else I must briefly bring up with you first..." He scrolls through the holo. "The security department has asked that I review our protocols with you post-project-breach."

By "project breach", I assume he is referring to the debacle with Lia. Great. Just great. Now, not only do I lack the several of the physical resources I need to continue my work, but the one resource I can always count on, my own time, is being taken up by another useless meeting.

There's a certain irony to it, I suppose. Two of the things I find most irritating and unnecessary in life are meetings and protocol, and now I'm in a meeting about protocol.

"Of course," I answer, pushing aside the minor exasperation.

"Excellent. I'll just need you to answer a few questions. Nothing to worry about, it's all information we've already been over when you signed your contract." He flicks the holo once more. "First, since accepting our sponsorship, have you shared any information regarding Ascensus with anyone not approved to participate in the project? This includes anything official, like data, planning reports, or information involving this corporation, or informal conversations on the topic."

"No. Nothing like that."

"Have you been in contact with any former members of your research team no longer part of the project, including Lia Hayes, Xin Wu, or Dr. Reta Lockhart?"

"I haven't, no."

"Any unauthorized or undocumented communication outside this corporation's network of facilities?"

"No."

"Have you had any contact with any members of the five oligopolistic multinationals, these being the following: Allanite Corporation, Daintree Consolidated, Pictograph Incorporated, Cortland Incorporated, or Nexlo Corporation, or any of their subsidiaries?"

"No."

"Have you had any contact with members of non-oligopolistic independent multinational corporations?" He pauses, directing his focus to me instead of the holo. "This category would include Fourth Wall Technology, and therefore Azria Quarta. I understand you used to work quite closely with her."

"No. I mean, yes, we used to work together, but no, I haven't had any contact with her since the sponsorship."

He nods, jotting something down on the projected keyboard.

"If you don't mind my asking," I started, "is something... the matter? I just mean, is there a reason for this?"

He stops mid-keystroke, staring through the hologram and at the empty wall to his left as if pondering whether or not to answer my question. Eventually, he sighs and begins an explanation of sorts.

"Shortly after Kalix Raven's identity as Codebreaker was discovered and she managed to flee the country, the UNBI visited her former residence. Most of her computer equipment was gone, but they did find the odd datachip. They couldn't get anything useful off them, of course, not a clue to her current location, or access to her dark web forum or anything like that, but they did find a rather interesting screenshot." He shifts his head to face me. "Are you familiar with the hacker known as OutlawResolve?"

"I've heard of him, yes."

"He... warned her."

I shake my head. "I'm sorry, I don't understand—"

"He warned Codebreaker, whose identity he didn't even know at the time, that you were planning to experiment on a girl in Japan named Kalixieta Raven."

For a few moments, I go over his words in my head, again and again, in silence. No. He can't have. That doesn't— No.

"That's impossible. No way, that can't be true!"

Mr. Ashcombe just watches me, expressionless.

"There's no way he knew that!" I continue, panic starting to rise in my voice. "He couldn't possibly— How did he know?"

"We don't know at the moment," the corporate statue answers. "That's why we're reviewing these security protocols. We are attempting to identify the source of the data breach."

"Well— What else is leaked? If he knew about Kalix, what else is, is out there now?"

"I don't know, Doctor. Please try to calm down."

"Calm down? Calm down?" I looked aimlessly around the room, gesturing vaguely in some motion of stress. "How am I supposed to calm down? If the Kalix info was leaked, anything could've been leaked! If the wrong information gets out, this whole project could be blown to shreds! I could lose everything when I've only just gotten started!"

"Dr. Blayne, take a breath, OK? I am aware of the stakes here, just as much as you. Probably more than you, actually. But panicking helps no one. Calm down, and we'll sort this out."

I stare at him for a few seconds. How is he still acting so—

So—

So neutral? Surely this affects him too? I may not care much for corporate politics, but I'm not a fool. I know my sponsors must have some stake in this, some reason to care so much about a middle-aged obsessive scientist and his fringe passion project. Whatever their reasoning, Project Ascensus is important to them, which means it should be important to Mr. Ashcombe. Isn't he the slightest bit concerned for his job?

"Let's just think this through," he continues, raising his hands in a pacifying gesture. "The only thing we can do is get to the bottom of this. We figure out how the information got leaked, we can stop it from happening again."

I nod. "OK. OK, right, we'll figure it out. Well, I haven't talked to anyone. I'm not the leak."

"OK. I believe you," he says. "Who else knew about your research? The truth about it, not the cybernetics cover story."

"Lia, Dr. Lockhart... but she wouldn't leak anything. Azria knew as well. We talked about it when we worked together. She only knew the concept, though. I shared my ideas, but I never told her anything about Kalix."

He nods ponderously, typing the odd note on the holographic keyboard. "What about records?" he asks. "Notes, plans, anything you wrote down that could lead someone to Kalix?"

"Before the sponsorship, I kept all my notes on my computer in my lab at the University of Munich," I tell him.

"OK. Is everything still there?"

"I— Well, yes, I think so, but it's password-protected, and my lab is locked—"

"I'll send someone over just in case. You have copies of everything you need on your new computer, yes?"

"Yes, Zeta transferred everything."

"Good. We'll have any sensitive information still in your lab destroyed and change the codes on the doors and any computer systems. Frankly, though," Mr. Ashcombe says, an eyebrow raised, "I'm a little concerned about Lia. We know she was rather, ah, attached to the rodent test subjects, and even stole Number 07."

Despite the leak-revelation-induced stress still evident in my smartwatch's blood pressure reading, I almost snort at the memory of my ex lab assistant running away with the subject she called Sir Ratrick Stewart, even managing to get off the island in a stolen hovercar.

"Get back here!" I shouted after her as she skated down the hall to the docking hangar, carrying two of my test subjects.

"So long, Dr. Rat-icide!"

Over the PA system, Mr. Ashcombe called for security to Corridor 01d, but I knew they wouldn't get here in time. That's why I was running after that annoying little pest and her armful of literal pests despite the fact that one of the few things I detest more than the sound of those God forsaken wheely shoes is running.

"Miss Hayes, don't make me tell you a— Aah!"

From behind me, six rats dart across the hall, surrounding my feet and almost tripping me as they chase after their liberator.

As I recall, she even managed to shut down the docking bay's main computer, preventing anyone from following her. If it weren't so infuriating, I'd say it was rather clever of the girl.

"I'm not sure," I tell Mr. Ashcombe, genuinely. "Lia was... immature, sure, but I highly doubt she'd do something as... severe as stealing confidential files. Besides, she was only involved in the rodent lab, she couldn't've known much of anything about Kalix or the human trial plans."

He nods dispassionately, seeming to accept my belief as likely but not caring much either way. Does he not have opinions on anything?

"Just to be safe, we'll have someone look into her. Zeta—" He glanced up at the ceiling in the way he so often did when talking to the virtual assistant. "Get, ah, angel-bitch on it," he says, with a tired-sounding sigh.

I raise an eyebrow at the word "angel-bitch" — it's rather unlike Mr. Ashcombe to show such obvious irritation or dislike — but clearly he doesn't feel the need to provide any more details regarding this person, so my mind goes elsewhere.

Recently, some software programmers down in the Zeta department had found a way to let it interpret conversations to better fulfill human needs. Now, Ashcombe doesn't have to instruct Zeta specifically to assign an agent to spy on Lia Hayes — it's been listening, and knows the context, so "get someone on it" is enough. I'm by no means a coding enthusiast, but this does strike me as rather clever.

"Moving on." He folds his hands on the desk. "How have you been progressing with Project Ascensus? Is there anything we can do to assist you?"

I can't help but scoff. "Finding Kalix Raven would assist me."

"I'm aware that this is frustrating, Doctor, but we are doing everything we can. It simply takes time."

"Time, right, of course. How much time do you expect it will take?"

"I'm afraid we don't have an official estimate."

"OK, but surely you could make a guess?"

"I can't do that, unfortunately."

"Oh, given the leads you have, you must be able to offer a ballpark figure?"

"Dr. Blayne, I—"

"You do have leads, don't you?"

He watches me silently for a moment.

"Just what I thought. You have nothing."

"Doctor—"

"Just say it! You can't give me an estimate and you have no business giving me empty reassurances that it's 'only a matter of time', because you have no idea where she is!"

"Doctor, we have a team working on this, but you must understand, there's nothing we could've done to predict this. We couldn't have known her identity as Codebreaker"

"Oh, is that so? I suppose you couldn't have known about the rather vital secrets that were leaked from your system, either?"

"We are doing everything we can to address the issue—"

"I don't want to hear it. You must know how big of a problem this already is! If the hacker got a hold of the subject's identity, he could have more info on my research, and if he has it, so could the ethics board, the UEK government, the UNBI... And if there's 'nothing you could have done' to stop all this, how do you expect to fix it?"

"You seem... agitated. We talked about this, it serves no purpose to—"

"—panic, yes, I know. Well, we're not all robots in business suits, now are we?"

"Doctor—"

"Don't 'Doctor' me! Yes, I'm agitated, OK? It's pretty damn hard not to be, with everything going on! Your system has a drastic information leak, and my test subject seems to have fallen off the face of the Earth, and— and my ex lab assistant is boldly going where no rat has gone before and nobody in your fancy little capitalism club seems to be able to fix any of it!"

"Doc— Sir, I assure you, there really is nothing to worry about. You focus on the science, the team and I will take care of everything else. The UNBI, they won't be an issue. As for Hayes, she'll be out of the picture, we'll get you more rodent subjects to replace the ones she took, and you'll have a new lab assistant by the end of the week."

"No." The word leaves my mouth at about the same time the thought appears in my mind. It's a disturbing irregularity for me, but I suppose in the situation I've found myself in, a little impulsivity may be necessary.

"No?" He raises an eyebrow.

"Lab assistants, they're just so— I—" I suck in a deep breath, trying to hold onto the frustrated thoughts threatening to spring free from their cage, instead forcing an explanation through gritted teeth. "I just can't deal with another immature, inexperienced—"

"Oh, I can promise you, the new assistant will be much more—"

"I said no!" I shout, which was not my intention. No, I don't particularly care for quite so much impulsivity. Taking a deep breath, I fold my hands on the desk. "I want Lockhart."

"The former postdoc associate on your project?"

I nod. "We worked together closely on this until you—" Another deep breath may be in order. "You only wanted me, your little collective of corporate goons insisted on providing me with a team of your choosing, which is how we ended up with Lia Hayes in the first place. I want my own team, and that team includes Lockhart."

Mr. Ashcombe leans back in his chair.

"You don't like change much, do you, Doctor?"

"Not particularly."

"And yet here you are, trying to change the world..." He gives a vague, ponderous gesture with his hands.

"Is there a point I'm supposed to be seeing, Mr. Ashcombe?" I ask, my eyes studying his unreadable face. "Because I don't like philosophy much, either."

"No. No point. Just an observation." He leans forward once more, resting an elbow on the table as he scrolls through a holo, likely another to-do list or planner. He has so many of those. "We'll contact Lockhart. Assuming she wants to come back, we can have a hovercar sent for her as soon as Wednesday."

Waving away the holo, he shifts his ever-ponderous regard back to me, his eyes scanning my face as if it were something unusual, as if his whole world were truly peculiar.

"As for the girl," he begins his promise, "I know it may not seem like much now, but we have contacts around the world working on this. She'll be found as expeditiously as possible."