Hard Wired Trilogy DeAnna Pearce (if you give a mouse a cookie read aloud txt) 📖

when the session was out. If she wanted answers, she needed them now.

Friday morning, Ari entered VLEX as Kari. Before she started the day, she reached out to Hailey using her contact info with the European Union. Unfortunately, she didn’t reply right away. So, Ari turned to her work for a distraction. Even with a long conversation with President Higgins, she finished before lunch. When she was about to give up and head out to meet Antoine, a message came through from Hailey.

Meet me by the fountain.

After messaging Antoine a lame excuse, she headed out. The sun lit up the fountain in the courtyard, the one of a merman rising up out of the colored stone waves. The statue mirrored those of old, the colored marbles with flecks of gold shimmered in the sun. She approached the fountain and with no sign of Hailey, Ari dipped her hand into the cool water.

“You ready to know the truth?” Hailey spoke behind her.

Ari spun around. “Where did you come from?”

“I asked if you’re ready to take off your training wheels.”

She couldn’t help her eye roll and was more than a bit tired of being treated like an idiot. “I want some answers.”

“Do you know the questions?” Hailey’s demur look held a lot more of an attitude today with her lips pursed tight.

“Stop playing games or I’m gone.” Ari stepped away from her.

“Okay.” Hailey reached out a hand to stop her. “It’s this way.”

Ari followed her down a row of shops. They turned towards a coffee shop, but before they went through the door, Hailey entered a code. When she opened the door, there wasn’t anything that resembled a coffee shop in sight.

A long corridor of a shiny black material stretched out towards them. The never-ending hall had no decorations, only black doors with silver door knobs.

Ari glanced at Hailey. “If you’re going for a dark ominous bad guy feel, you nailed it.”

It was Hailey’s turn to roll her eyes as they stepped into a room. “It’s to protect our butts, and it keeps the look of the regular code in place for the others.”

“Is it like a different dimension?”

“If you want to consider it that.” Hailey continued down the hall to the fifth door on the right.

“What do these other doors hold?”

“Nothing but place holders.” She knocked once and then entered. “Hey, Emil.”

He sat at a desk but when he saw the girls, he waved it away with a wipe of his hand. The desk disappeared, and he stood to greet them. “Good to see both of you. Please have a seat.”

Ari sat down in the dark chair and sank back into the smooth interior.

“What I can help you with?”

“What do you know about VisionTech? How do you do what you do? What did you mean when—”

He held up a hand. “One at a time. First, VisionTech. The company you work for is one of many that have a limited role in the government here. I’m not personally familiar with them, but I had Hailey conduct some research.” He turned to Hailey.

“As far as blood-sucking corporations go, they aren’t the worst.” She gave Ari a look like that was supposed to be comforting. “They were one of the first to jump on the VR bandwagon and soon pulled ahead as a major competitor.”

“Skip ahead to the essentials.” Emil urged with a wave of his hand.

“They have been searching for a warper for some time. You first appeared on their radar when playing online games.” Hailey glanced at her. “Not your best move showing off in a public arena.”

“I didn’t know what I was doing.”

“That’s obvious.” Hailey’s lips drew up in a smug smile.

“Continue, Hailey,” Emil ordered.

“Since that point, they have monitored all of your family. They have detailed notes, pictures, and information on your mother, your father in the VR coma, even your boyfriend’s family.”

Ari straightened, remembering the folders VisionTech had on the people for Ari to impersonate. She was just like Kari, her life scrutinized to the last detail. It was no accident when Dave ran into Ari and Reed on their date. They must have been watching her at school. “What about the people I impersonate?”

“That varies. No one has seen Kari personally. So that usually means she’s hidden away in some induced coma of some sort.”

“Is it possible they paid her to leave?” Ari hoped some of what Niomi said was true.

“Anything’s possible,” Hailey laughed. “But you’re still not asking the right questions.”

Ari leaned back and thought for a moment. She wanted to know the truth about VisionTech but that seemed impossible. Not until she talked to Kari herself. That may be impossible now, but maybe one day. She did think of one thing.

“What about your powers? How can you manipulate this world so easily?”

“Closer.” Emil answered. “We’ve been perfecting our abilities for some time. You can learn to do what I do.”

“No one is better than Emil though,” Hailey interjected.

“But you can learn. Your trainer is not a warper, though. It’s like the someone who is colorblind teaching a normal person how to decipher colors. Your trainer can’t see the possibilities in front of you.”

Ari’s mind whipped about what those possibilities were. “How did you hurt me before? How do I protect myself?”

“I didn’t hurt you.”

“I can still feel that migraine haunting me sometimes.” Ari hadn’t felt that type of pain before, ever. Emil couldn’t pretend that he was any better than VisionTech at this point.

“You did that to yourself. When trying to fight me, you exhausted yourself. You need to be more careful in the future.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t restrain people.”

“Have you ever felt that before?”

“No…” then she remembered her fight with Williams when she visited her father in the VR world and the confusion after that. “Once, when I got into a fight with an Advisor from school.”

“Only twice. That’s not a bad start.” Emil glanced at Hailey, and something unspoken passed between them.

“What?” Ari asked. “What aren’t you telling me? I want to know how to