Page 174 of Pulse Zero
Then he adds, “It’s also for the best. Some of them needed to be weeded. There are too many Ascended up there protected bystructure rather than strength. Too many who rely on hierarchy instead of proving their worth.”
My stomach twists. “You’re talking about your own people like they’re fucking livestock.”
“I’m talking about survival,” he corrects. “The weakest of them would never survive what’s coming, Cason. Better to expose that weakness now than let it endanger everyone later.”
He says it so casually, like all those lives upstairs are just variables in an equation.
“And the ones left?” I ask.
Malcolm’s expression almost softens. “The strongest remain. The ones capable of protecting you.”
That lands somewhere deep and ugly in my chest because…
No.
Fuck him.
He has to be manipulating me again. Right?
“It’s time you know the truth.”
“What truth, Uncle? That everything—my kidnapping, Reese, the resistance, the entire last seven years of my fucking life—it was all part of your twisted little plan? So that I would Ascend?” I can’t stop my voice from rising in volume along with my rage. “Yeah, I fucking figured that out on my own. What I don’t know iswhy.”
Something in Malcolm’s expression shifts. It’s not guilt or regret, of course. But I think…I think it’s almost somethingsad.
And that catches me off guard nearly as much as his next words do.
“To save your life.”
That hits me so hard I actually stop breathing for a second. Because, no, that makes no fucking sense. He’s being his usual manipulative asshole self. Buying time. There’s no waythatis the fucking truth.
I stare at him across the dim laboratory, the way he standsthere so casually in his suit, both of us surrounded by what he and my father built together like he’s not the reason everything has fallen apart. My pulse hammers unevenly in my throat as confusion crashes violently into even more anger.
This is just another one of his manipulations. Ithasto be.
“You had me kidnapped,” I say slowly. “You manipulated me. You got people killed. You held a gun to my head two fucking days ago!”
“A test,” he replies easily. “For Reese. One he…kind ofpassed considering he was lying.”
“You ruined my fucking life!”
My voice cracks slightly on the last word, and even still, Malcolm’s gaze doesn’t waver.
“I know.”
And, somehow, it still sounds like he thinks it was necessary.
“You had to ruin my life in order to save it?!” I’m shouting now, having to hold back the electricity trying to zap out from every pore in my body just to get to him. “What kind of logic is that?”
He blinks.
A second passes.
And then…
“The kind that makes sense if you can see the future.”
And just like that, the monster in front of me now sounds terrifyingly sane.
