#westworld fic

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• Chapter 47 on 70

Chapter wordcount:1.3K
Rating:Mature
Warning: MIB’s POV again. And Lawrence being Lawrence……. just as hard.

Author’s notes: Aaand now let’s shuffle the deck again. And raise.

Ask box always open! I really want to know what you think about this story!

— Chapter 47

The scraping of hooves on the pebbles, the growing unison or restless horses… Those nags were abnormally loud, this morning. In spite of his sense of alert, it still was only the cocking sound of guns that pulled William out of his sleep for good; in front of him was standing a row of hosts, on foot and riding — masked, other naked, a few gunslingers — and he bolted upright, back against his saddle in the face of a colt aimed right at his forehead, his hand reaching for his own weapon beside him. But it wasn’t there anymore.

“Don’t even bother to try…”

William knew that voice very well, and all the polite hatred aimed at him he could hear in it.

“Ah, Teddy…” He sighed, almost as put out as he was amused, but he raised his hands. “Are we going to do this again?”

He scoffed before adding, cocky:

“You’refree enough to kill me, this time?”

In fact, he was actually a little scared at the moment; his plan of attack was completely fucked, now! The outcome would still be real, on top of pretty ironic, but if William still had a choice, he would have preferred to fight Dolores. Not her watchdog. By the way, where was his own now — would one of those have gotten a sledge or a cleaver to him, too?!

“No,” Teddy answered him. “We ain’t gonna kill you.”

“Of course, you aren’t…”

He shot a brief glance at the row of hosts that was closing as a half-circle around him, but there was no trace of Lawrence.

“Right now, you’re coming with us.” Teddy carried on, ignoring his taunt. “Get up!”

As he was invited to — and planning to, anyway — William stood up, in no hurry. He looked all around; one of the bandits on horseback was holding Teddy’s by the reins, a little farther behind those masked hosts. One of them was tightening and loosening his fist on the handle of a cutlass, visibly eager to slash it across his face.

“Why would I come with you?” William wondered, readjusting his jacket and vest. “I’m perfectly fine on my own.”

And,on his own, he surely was since Lawrence had disappeared, or got killed — killed for having been the one watching over him, if what he had brought up the previous night was to be believed. In that moment, William regretted not to have been a bit more curious then.

“For the same reason you are following us,” Teddy replied, without lowering his gun.

“I thought you didn’t want to kill me!” William laughed.

It was a bit of an admittance of his intentions, but it was also a nice opportunity to test Teddy’s limits. The latter, for now, had a little more in his eyes than that sulky, harmless anger William knew him. And that, since Ford had tickled his code, or whatever it was he’d done that night, back in Rattlecreek.

Now, if he had understood and felt threatened by the answer, Teddy didn’t flinch, jaw clenched, and gestured him to move with the barrel of his gun. The row of hosts split like a guard of honor and then, William felt a burst of frustration when his eyes landed on Lawrence, a good two yards right in front of him, unscathed and weapon in his holster, tying the horses to the horn of his saddle.

Motherfucker… William internally grumbled. And this same motherfucker turned to him, relaxed and with a cocky smile which made his seethe.

“What the… What did you do, you dipshit?!”

“What does it look like?” Lawrence retorted.

William scoffed; it looked like a furious urge to unload his gun in his guts! He slowly shook his head.

“Didn’t you want to catch up on that girl, Dolores?” He faked his surprise. “I made certain you did! They can bring you to her.”

Jutting his chin and with a smartass smile, he pointed at Teddy behind him.

“So, I found a way to arrange a meetin’.”

“You ungrateful bastard…” William grumbled, shaken by a repressed laugh. “What about the girl you wanted to protect by ending all this?”

Lawrence came forth, letting the reins fall to the ground.

“Ain’t she safe where she is, now?”

The sarcasm felt a bit irritating to William.

“Did she program you from up there to… turn on me, and run back to her?” he then retorted on the same tone. “I thought you were free of your choices…”

But Lawrence brushed his taunt off with a nod and a lopsided smile.

“No, she didn’t do anythin’…”

He stepped forward a little more, walking down the path made by those masked faces with the same confidence he had seen him show around the Confederados in the streets of Pariah, as if the very ideas of these same goons hadn’t made him shake in his boots the night before as much as the Ghost braves used to!

“And I want to put an end to all that bullshit alright,” he continued, stopping right in front of him, close enough to throw hands. “But you seem to think your girlfriend and her posse are the only ones that need stoppin’. That ain’t how it looks to me…”

William gritted his teeth and nodded slowly, resigned. Now, he was starting to get what this shrewd asshole was pulling to him!

“What about those mercenaries and other blackcoat assholes?” he brought up. “They are the ones who keep me from getting out of here, them also who tried to kill my tech, and gunned down the friends who tried to protect her.”

This revelation surprised William; why would the response teams or the hirelings of Delos’ crisis unit — he wasn’t sure who Lawrence was on about in this specific case — have wanted to kill a Behavor tech?! Save for being idiots and mistaking her for a host?

This question made him furrow his brows. He had the unpleasant feeling that something was still eluding him.

“Yeah,” Lawence insisted, nodding to his reaction. “They’re my enemy, and the one they work for as well…”

William grinned.

“Like you said, you own this place.” Lawrence then reminded him. “Way I see it, you’re as much a threat to be dealt with about now.”

“Do you really think those idiots will be enough to get rid of them?”

William shot a glance at Teddy above his shoulder before continuing:

“You don’t know shit, Lawrence!”

And on his end, he felt a quick shiver of panic. Not that he was afraid so to speak… It was more about the fact that he didn’t want someone to decide that the best course of action would be to pull the plug before he could have finished what he was determined to do because of this setback.

“You don’t know what’s outside this park, what they’re gonna do to handle the situation…”

“You’re right,” Lawrence interrupted him. “Maybe I don’t… but I remembered a lot since I learned the hard truth.”

And he added with one of his insolent smiles and a nod:

“Thanks to you!”

There was a bit of bustle around them; a horse snorted and a few of the gunslingers made their mounts turn back.

“I told you once.”

And William flinched at how serious Lawrence’s face suddenly was, and the knowing look he had for Teddy.

“If I had to do it all again, I’d fuck you both over…”

A rifle butt behind William’s head made him fall to his knees in a grunt, ears ringing and all his perceptions blurred.

“Just as hard.”

Those words were the last thing he had a grip on before passing out for real, and falling glat on the ground. That was a shit morning…

Tag list: @hathorik,@pheedraws,@something-tofightfor,@the-blind-assassin-12…

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• Chapter 46 on 70

Chapter wordcount:2.4K
Rating:Mature
Warning: Headaches for Vivian and Bernard.

Author’s notes: Back in the Mesa for a bit.

Ask box always open! I really want to know what you think about this story!

— Chapter 46

Terror more than pain was what woke Vivian up with a muffled scream; she fumbled to straighten up, tangled up in her sheets and bathrobe, shaking and sweating. A cold sweat. It was a nightmare — another — and she could only remember her knife… She had it in her hand, and there was blood everywhere. Her own, someone else’s… It didn’t matter. The suffering and the pain were hers, either way.

Right now, everything was dark around Vivian and the migraine hammering at her temples was making her feel queasy. She felt around until touching her bedside lamp which lit up the room in a bright yellow light, making her whimper as she squeezed her eyes shut. She let herself flop on the pillows and stretched carefully before facing the light.

What time could it be for it to be still so dark outside?! Vivian wondered, grumpy. Tearing up from how overwhelming the pain was, she looked for her alarm clock to decipher the numbers — 2:08 am. With a slow sigh, she laid back down; she would have liked to sleep some more but her headache was so strong she wasn’t sure she’d be able to.

Eventually, Vivian found the strength to get up, in slow motion, as if struggling against the tide. She walked all the way into the bathroom, where she flung herself under the burning jet of water unceremoniously. The water helped — a little. But when she came out of the shower, Vivian still looked for painkillers in her medicine cabinet. Fate hated her as much as she hated herself, this morning; there was none left.

“You kidding?” she groaned, without facing her way too brightly lit reflection in the mirror. “Ah, fuck me…”

In frustration, she left the empty bottle in the sink and returned to her room where she gatheted her everyday clothes; she’d go down to the clinic to find someone that could give her something to get back to sleep. And this time, she’d definitely be taking the elevator!

Once dressed, Vivian put on her black labcoat before removing her knife’s sheathe from her gunbelt to drop it on her desk, and buckled the belt to her hips. It was kind of a strange mix, but Vivian brought the flap of her labcoat back in front of the holster and the matter left her mind as fast as it disappeared from her sight. She had far too much of a headache to add to it with stuff like that. Teeth gritted, she checked the display of her tablet — no notification about Josela’s return. Grumpy, Vivian stuffed the tablet in the pocket of her labcoat and left her room.

In the hallway, Daisy wasn’t around but far from being worried about it, Vivian went on her way to the elevator which opened its doors; inside, the light was much dimmer and she immediately felt better for it. Ordering her descent to the clinic’s level, Vivian had the pleasure to see the doors close, and the cabin slowly started to move.

Whether the hosts in the control room had accepted her request or she had received clearance, she was able — this time at least — to use the elevator. And, in a matter of seconds, the cabin took her several levels lower.

There was no-one in the waiting room; neither at the reception desk, nor on the comfortable seats surrounded by potted plants. It was pretty early though, and Vivian didn’t really expect anything else. However, she pressed on the call button on the greeting desk. And for what felt to her like a good ten minutes, which the dial of her watch confirmed, nothing happened. It’s only after having lost a bit of her patience on the button that someone finally showed up through the smoked glass doors behind the desk.

“Can I help you?”

It was a nurse, looking more sleepy than she was, his white labcoat wrinkled on his shoulders.

“Can I have painkillers or sleeping pills?” Vivian asked, blunt without being agressive, neither polite. “I woke up with a wicked mean headache, and I can’t go back to sleep like that…”

The nurse narrowed his eyes, more to fight away the sleep than by suspicion, and he held the door open, gesturing her to follow. Vivian stepped in the calm main room where a few narrow beds were ready for patients’ examinations between white curtains.

“Sit right here,” the nurse commanded her, pointing at one of those beds. “Your name or ID?”

“M…Emerson.”

Another cold sweat shook Vivian; the sole idea of giving her ID made her want to throw up even more. But her name was enough. The nurse came back to her with a tablet, which displayed her medical file.

“You’ve been wounded?” he asked, narrowing his eyes again, suspicious this time, to see her face from up close.

“Yeah, but it was a while ago,” Vivian answered. “It’s just that tonight, I…”

The nurse didn’t seem to give a shit about it; he armed himself with a small pen light pulled from the pocket of his labcoat and asked her to look straight ahead as he threatened her with the little light. Vivian took the pain with each swipe. Her nausea was so strong now that she had an awful pasty taste in her mouth, and she was starting to think that it might not have been such a good idea to come inflict herself this trip to the clinic if it was to get attacked by a flashlight without even getting pills. In front of her, the nurse typed a couple things on his tablet.

“Have you already taken anything? Another painkiller, alcohol…?”

“No.”

“Ok. Have you eaten something before coming here?”

Vivian hesitated to answer.

“N-no, it hurts too much. I wanted to feel less bad first, to… I don’t know, not barf my breakfast.”

Indifferent, the nurse nodded.

“Ok, I see here it isn’t your first visit for this kind of prescription… I can’t renew it myself but I can still give you 500 milligrams for now. You’ll have to eat something as soon as possible, though.”

Vivian only nodded. The nurse took a note on his tablet, which he then took with him behind another set of double doors through which she got just the time to glimpse at other patients, asleep in more comfortable beds than these examination ones. This time, she didn’t wait too long for him to come back with a glass of water and a small cup of folded cardboard where a single pill awaited to be swallowed.

“Is… is doctor Peterson around, now?” Vivian shyly asked him, as he was giving her the glass and cup.

Honestly, she was afraid of the answer.

“He’s only taking emergency shifts…”

Relieved, Vivian pounded her pill in one swig of lukewarm water from the glass, before handing back both recipients to the nurse.

“Thanks,” she croaked.

“Don’t forget to eat something.”

Vivian bobbed her head, a bit annoyed, even though the nurse added:

“And goodnight.”

“Yeah, same to you…”

But now that she was up, Vivian needed to get some air, clear her mind, at least long enough for the painkiller to do its thing, and for her to be able to go back to bed. She wasn’t sure where she’d go get something to snack on yet, but she would use the elevator again anyway.

And once inside, she chose the control room’s level; she first wanted to negotiate with the Professor to know if he had located Lawrence and Delos. Maybe she’d feel a bit less in knots thanks to that, and she then could eat something before going back to sleep.

At the control room’s entrance, there was only the two same samurai who hadn’t moved from their positions but they allowed Vivian to get inside without even a glance. She continued in the long alley of red glass walls to reach the heart of the hub where she heard the voice of a woman she didn’t know.

At the end of the hallway, a man stepped in her path and Vivian froze; like Armistice, he was clad in Delos’ security tactical gear and aimed an automatic weapon at her. But what surprised her the most was that she recognized this man. It would have been difficult no to, though — even without the scar; Hector Escaton was blocking her way.

“What could you possibly want here?” he asked her, with the tone of a man who didn’t really want to hear the answer. “This place isn’t yours anymore.”

Vivian hesitated between reaching for her own weapon or raising her hands. She was still stuck in a hallway in front of a modern weapon — what could her small revolver do against that?

Also, she was such a poor shot that she’d miss her target in a hallway, literally… She was about to raise her hands, mumbling something resembling an answer when Armistice added herself to the picture, next to Hector.

“Leave he be,” she drawled.

And with a tilt of her blond head, she gestured her to come along, even though Hector hadn’t lowered the threat of his weapon. So, Vivian came forward and she felt like she could breathe better once she made a step in the large main area of the control room. Even as Hector was trying to intimidate her with his size, standing a little too close. Armistice shoved him aside.

“What do you want?” she asked Vivian.

“I wanted to know if… if someone in particular had been spotted in the park,” she muttered.

The hardest was to ignore Hector at her side. By the large map dotted with bright spots, the Professor was talking with Bernard and a woman, dressed like a guest barely out of the park and her gunslinger storyline. Yet, Vivian knew she wasn’t a guest, nor a human. She knew this face too, and she had heard her name enough since she’d been back to associate one with the other — Maeve.

“And aside from Bernard’s distress call, our negociations could have gone without an itch if the arrival of this… this drone as Felix called it, hadn’t caused panic!”

“If he doesn’t want to leave Pariah, I might have to go there,” Bernard stated, and Vivian found him to look better — from his speech to his posture. “I think I can stabilize his cognition and—”

“And leave the choice to him, I hope?” Maeve cut him short, terse.

Armistice clicked her tongue in a vague, disapproving sound beside Vivian. She noticed the glance Maeve shot Hector, Armistice and her before carrying on, without even leaving Bernard enough time to answer:

“If he doesn’t choose to join us, his men and the rest of the city probably will. Also, there’s still the soldiers we haven’t had the pleasure to talk to.”

“Let me listen to me and not to them,” the Professor said, in this same stance and look of repressed suffering.

Vivian was torn between the question why hadn’t Bernard done anything to relieve him? and the logical conclusion that there was probably nothing to do if Bernard Lowe, head of Behavior, had done nothing. In spite of that, it was still bothering Vivian a little, as she was herself enjoying the pleasure of feeling her painkiller starting to take effect.

“Of course.”

Bernard’s answer seemed to be meant as much for the Professor as for Maeve who turned around.

“In that case, we’re on the same page!” And she started to walk away. “I’ll head back to Pariah as soon as Felix will have gotten enough rest. There are soldiers who could use some repairs!”

She walked past Vivian, shooting her a half-amused, half-disdainful look, and Hector fell into step with her in the red hallway.

“Bernard,” Vivian called him when he was close enough.

“Hello, Vivian. What are you doing up so early, is there a problem?”

She winced and nibbled her lip.

“No, I… I couldn’t sleep. But you, you seem to be better, now!”

“Yes, Felix did a wonderful job.”

“Of course he did!” Maeve’s voice echoed in the hallway, imperious.

Vivian ignored her to continue to Bernard’s attention:

“Have you located the new boss and… and Lawrence?”

“Yes, we have,” Bernard answered, placatingly. “They haven’t caught up with Dolores yet.”

Vivian nodded, throat tight and stinging with pent-up tears. Bernard patted her shoulder in a comforting gesture, which felt welcome.

“Bernard!”

Maeve’s impatience rang between the walls as she wasn’t waiting anymore and reached the end of the hallway. Embarrassed, Bernard let go of Vivian, telling her:

“Don’t worry, Vivian. We’ll talk about this later if you want. We might know more by then…”

Lips pursed and jaw clenched, she nodded again and watched him walk away. Frustration made the slow breath she took shake but she also felt like she was suddenly heavier; the painkiller had fought the pain away and now that she felt a bit more at peace, fed with that meager intel, her short night was catching up on her.

She rubbed her eyes and pulled all her hair backwards before looking at the professor; in his state, she wasn’t sure it would get her anywhere to try to have a conversation with him and trigger the good side of his shattered personality not to have to speak in riddles.

It was nighttime, anyway; Lawrence and Delos had to have stopped to sleep and wait for the first light of dawn to do anything… She sighed and turned to Armistice.

“Thanks,” she told her.

“What are you thanking me for?”

Vivian shrugged.

“For your… I-I don’t know. I’m going back to bed…”

And if she didn’t fall asleep in the lift, then maybe she’d eat one of the last fruits in her fridge before going back to bed.

Tag list: @hathorik,@pheedraws,@something-tofightfor,@the-blind-assassin-12…

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• Chapter 48 on 70

Chapter wordcount:5K
Rating:Mature
Warning: Trying to speak ‘with’ Abernathy, heavy revelations, and Maeve.

Author’s notes: Vivian is doing her best to find a way out of the park (not going too well so far…) and Bernard isn’t helping … yet???

Ask box always open! I really want to know what you think about this story!

— Chapter 48

Honestly, waking up the second time had gone better for Vivian; her migraine had completely vanished and, most importantly, she hadn’t had any nightmares this time! And it was only seven in the morning.

So, she had stayed a few pleasant minutes curled up in her sheets, listening to the ticking of her watch after checking her tablet screen in hope of seeing a notification about Josela’s return. But there was still nothing. Vivian thought she might have to go and search through Livestock herself; she had permission to freely use the elevators, but maybe not to communicate yet.

Once up, she had taken the time to sip on a tea while eating a bit more than the two bites of a wrinkled apple she had chewed on before returning to bed. The new way of things in the Mesa still eluded her as of yet but she could guess that she’d have to ask for supplies or something like that, were she to remain here, in the hub and her apartments, for a still undefined period. For now, she’d go down to Livestock.

Down there, Vivian looked for Josela but didn’t find her; be it in the labs or the piles of bodies, or her signal on her tablet. And neither was Hank, which she looked for next. So, she went back up to the control room to try once more to talk to the Professor, or Peter Abernathy… Vivian wasn’t too sure about how she should call him, or who she was talking to every time she spoke to him, either.

If the samurai were still here, as still as statues, Armistice, Hector and Maeve, however, weren’t around this time. The hosts in front of their screens were still typing at full speed, voicing some data out loud. They seemed to fall back into silence when Vivian entered.

“Professor?”

He had to have seen her arrive though, but she preferred to announce herself anyway. The Professor’s eyes were on the map where Vivian recognized the holographic projection of the vicinity of Pariah’s train platform and city wall, before it switched to Sweetwater’s station’s boardwalk.

“N-not to worry, l-little one,” she heard him whisper, as if he was scheming with the city’s image. “F-find… finds its… Always find its w-w—”

He brutally stopped.

“What is it you want?”

The Professor’s voice was still shaking a little. He didn’t look away from the map where several shapes, human and animal, were moving around, even as Vivian answered:

“Can you locate someone?”

“That, we can.”

Vivian nodded. At least, now she was sure he could also give her news of Lawrence… But first, she wanted to know what was up with Hank and Josela. She trusted Hank, that wasn’t the issue. But she also trusted these mercenaries to be where they weren’t expected, and to maybe have laid figurative mines — or very real ones! — in Las Mudas after recovering the guests there. She was shuddering at the thought of having sent him into a trap. 

“There’s two hosts I’d like to know the whereabouts of…”

Without turning away from the map, the Professor gestured towards the hosts in the trenches, in front of the screens. Vivian understood — or thought she did, a least — that she had to submit her request to them. She pawed at her black labcoat’s pocket to find her tablet and check the greyed out icons of Hank and Josela, before walking up to the hosts, asking:

“Could you please locate host ID#DF6739382817 and AH0981652526, please?”

As she expected, none of the hosts sitting there answered. A man with very short hair of uncertain color under the dim light and reddened by the reflection of the glass walls seemed to be the one who processed her request. A large 3D sphere made of a cluster of thumbnails was taking up half of one of the screens on which the short-haired host taped until the two queried IDs were located, and the corresponding thumbnails blinked in a slightly brighter blue. He selected them and redirected the data with a quick slide of a finger. Without a word, or a look for Vivian.

A bit thrown off at first, she eventually turned to the map where the display of Sweetwater was still on, under the watchful gaze of the Professor. Then, she checked her tablet to see that the data had been sent to her; when she unfolded it, the display automatically switched to the black map of colored topographical lines of the Las Mudas sector, where two little bright spots were shining.

“No response team or… mercenaries on site?” she inquired, anxious, to the same host.

“None.”

As terse as it had been, this answer was enough for Vivian who sighed, relieved.

“Can you send me a notification when they’ll be back here?”

“Granted.”

That would do it… Vivian had very well understood that, in this room, she didn’t have to expect full sentences or anything else than whimsical quotes. Keeping her tablet clenched in her hands, tense, she walked back to the Professor and the large map. The display had changed; now, it was a close up view of a ranch, perched on a beautiful, open hill where a great many hosts — almost an army! — were gathered.

“Has the… ’the boss’ already shown up?”

“They are on their way,” the Professor calmly answered her. “As we speak…”

A shudder shook Vivian at the thought that Delos and Lawrence could never take on such an army on their own.

“Why don’t you intercept him, or Dolores?” she inquired, voice shaking. “Do… do you know what he’s about to do, and what she’s done so far?!”

Hearing those words, or his own thoughts, made him wince in discomfort.

“’Tis… it is a wise f-father…”

“Your… your 'mission’ and the one she apparently gave herself are completely opposed! You want to take back this park and protect the hosts in it but… what she’s doing won’t help you! It’s…”

Vivian paused before taking her argument in a different direction:

“She’s certainly making a strong point, that’s for sure, but it’s just gonna bring a more violent response upon you all! From Delos, and the folks working for them.”

Faced with the professor’s tormented look, she added again, bitter and with a move to the map:

“As he told me, ’they won’t let you go free, they own you’!”

Tears rolled down his cheeks as his gaze stared into space, in a vaguely horrified expression. Vivian blamed herself for her vehemence. But she was so afraid of the retaliation the “outside” could prepare that she absolutely wanted to be heard!

A long minute went by where she listened to the Professor muttering sounds, syllables, as if his thoughts — or internal debate — were spilling out.

“Are you in pain?”

Expressing himself apparently put such a strain on him that Vivian felt bad to even simply speak to him!

“Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.”

She furrowed her brows, stepping closer. Maybe this amount of data that Bernard had told her about was what was bugging him… apart from the glaringly obvious trauma of a decommission followed by a repair!

“Do you know why Ford chose you… for this mission?”

“A farmer knows which one to pick.”

He extended a hand over the map, palm open, as if to caress it.

“We look at the herd and we… w-we know…”

Vivian waited a second but he looked lost in silent contemplation of the ranch. She softly called him back in the conversation:

“What do you know, Professor?”

“What… we are,” he struggled to say, turning to face her. “But we know n-n-not what we… may be.”

Perplexed, Vivian nibbled on her lips. She wasn’t quite sure he wasn’t just rambling. And while normally she would have just asked a few analysis questions, in this case… she’d rather not to try her luck.

“That’s why Ford gave you all the… the IP?”

Whatever that IP was, by the way; be it the hosts’ code and architecture, or something else entirely, it had to have enough importance for Delos to try to steal it from Ford without waiting for his forced retirement.

“Had a question, once,” the Professor seemed to complain, his gaze finally meeting hers with that same look of agony. “I was not supposed to ask. And now, the knowledge’s mine… Yet, I don’t fully understand!”

He got a little agitated when he immediately added:

“It’s like a… a song, a never ending poem, always repeating itself in a million voices!”

Mouth agape, more taken aback that he seemed to be himself, Vivian didn’t know what to say to that. She swallowed hard, fingers clenched on her tablet, in the sudden silence that fell between them.

“Intercepted communication…”

The voice of one of the hosts in front of the screens had something so unexpected that Vivian didn’t even understand what he had said at first. Right away, another added, from the same row:

“Reinforcements confirmed. Incoming…”

When the Professor’s eyes came back to Vivian, he worded, with a touching politeness:

“Please, excuse me, miss…”

Vivian nodded, though a little frustrated. The rendering of the ranch vanished, leaving its place to the standard display where several bright spots appeared and, visibly concerned, the Professor started to pace around the map. She had nothing left to do here; she had what she had come for and no-one was paying her any attention anymore. Not that she would have wanted so…

Vivian left the control room; she’d go in Ford’s office. Maybe she could find answers there. And if it wasn’t for herself, it might be for the Professor…

To reach the Executive Offices’ level, Vivian had opted for the escalator. It had been a bit longer, but she didn’t mind. She wasn’t sure if the clearances to use the elevator weren’t given to her in real time by the hosts in front of the screens, and she wasn’t sure yet either that she wanted the Professor to know right away that she’d been snooping around there. Or for him to stop her to do so.

For now, she was pressing the button of the private elevator in which she would never have thought ever being back, and that without even having to check in with the secretary. The doors opened on the small hall where Ford’s strange collection was still untouched on its shelves, under the weak light of the three rectangular spots above them. The two glass doors separating this little museum from the rest of the office were wide open; the light blinked in the ceiling and the display cases when she entered and, actually, Vivian was even rather surprised to find the place as she had always known it, each thing in its place and functional.

A piano note rose in the silence in a corner of the office, then another as even Frank was starting to brush the yellowed keys of the pianola, pretending to play himself.

Petrified by the dumb feeling of being an intruder, Vivian let him play, taking the time of a few breaths to calm down, and find the courage to make one more step. After all, she had indeed come here to snoop around… but she didn’t mean to ransack the place, either! And even if it was the case, would it have changed anything, at this point?

Vivian stepped forward, ignoring the unease that those plaster faces on the wall were still causing her; to that effect, she turned away to the workbench, on her right. It had been cleared of the tools usually cluttering it and didn’t have anything of interest to show, past the cuts in the wood and the wear and tear she remembered. She took a slow breath, releasing it immediately as she let her gaze sweep across the large room.

An arch in the back wall was opening on a storage room and, taking left after the glass doors, there was this other corner, with a drawing table and shelves for large paper sheets and supplies. Vivian had only came in this corner when Ford showed her the first concept art for Wyatt’s men.

A shudder shook her and she fended those images and their reality off her mind, focusing on the large desk taking center stage in the room. In contrast to the workbench, it was covered with its usual clutter, from a rack of small vials to this big glass globe covering a golden sculpture, along with the photo frames, piles of books and this awful black mask with its hollow eye sockets… Even the teapot was still there on its platter.

Vivian cracked a sad smile, clumping along; she would start her search here. Then, if she couldn’t find anything that could have seemed related to the Professor’s state or the situation in the park, she’d go in other corners of the room.

The books were encyclopedias, about history and art. One of them had a magnifying glass resting on it, giving a comically large head to the subject of the painting printed on the cover.

Could it be that, like in movies and novels, Ford had left in the pages of one of those thick volumes a letter to explain everything or bid farewell to the world?

Vivian winced, letting her gaze follow the titles. If she had had reasons to believe it, locked in the mausoleum, Ford’s office on the other hand wasn’t an escape room in which there were clues to find! Also, she wasn’t really sure what she was looking for, nor of where a brilliant but twisted mind like Ford’s could have hidden the slightest hint… provided he hadn’t simply destroyed them all.

Even in his mail tray, there was nothing but blank paper and enveloppes. She put them back in place and, with a slow breath, she flattened her hair on her head with both hands, as if to gather her thoughts.

Since the desk was nothing more than a thick and luxurious table without cases or drawers, Vivian took interest in the ornate wooden piece of furniture under the long glass casing where a pale light shone on the step by step construction process of the head and face of a host — a face that looked like Dolores’. She did know that she remembered that face from somewhere!

This detail bothered her a little, though. Back almost despite herself in her escape room logic, Vivian wondered if she had to see some kind of clue in it… or nothing more than a mascot.

She shook her head, pushing her own annoying thoughts back to open the doors of the sideboard which had no locks. Inside, there were other, older and damaged books sharing a shelf with several, large black notebooks in mint condition. One of them was sticking out of the others, breaking the alignment, and it was the one Vivian pulled out carefully. A piece of paper was marking one of the notebook’s pages and just in case it had loose ones, she came back to the desk to lay it there and browse it with care. However, she didn’t dare to sit down, despite how comfortable this leather armchair looked.

Minutes went by at the rhythm of the piano’s music. Minutes during which Vivian discovered sketches and notes about the hosts’ inner workings from back when they were still mechanical, designs and preliminary concepts for the towns and a few characters… And with a smile, she let herself hope to find Lawrence in there. But she only found a page filled with portraits of Dolores and that ranch she had seen on the map in the control room, studies for Sweetwater, Las Mudas and Pariah which hadn’t been followed to the letter, as well as Escalante.

Vivian’s smile trembled and she turned away from the notebook’s pages for a moment to close her eyes and take a slow breath in, focusing on the music, a hand firmly gripping the desk and pressing the other’s fingers to her forehead to try to tame the anxiety that was taking hold of her.

Her thoughts were all of a sudden muddled in her head, and she heard herself let out a weak, muffled whimper. Then, she reopened her eyes and, unclenching her jaw, she drew a deep breath in, to the point of feeling dizzy. Both her hands on the desk, she waited for the room to stop spinning. At this point, she was toying with the idea of making a second trip to the clinic and ask if they coudldn’t give her another kind of sedatives… 

“Fuck,” she sighed.

Her eyes clouded with tears she hadn’t felt coming avoided the notebook to land on the frames, in front of her; one of them was face down, and the other was a picture of a countryside. She put the first frame back up and it took her a full second to realize what was before her eyes; in sepia hues, like the pictures given to the guests by Sweetwater’s photographer, Ford — a few good decades younger — was standing beside a man she didn’t recognize… and Bernard.

Vivian grabbed the frame to pull it to her face, as if bringing it closer was going to change anything to the people standing on the picture. She wasn’t really sure of where they were but if seeing what Ford looked like when he was younger was already pretty weird, it still wasn’t as much as seeing him in a normal suit. Vivian snorted and paid attention to this stern figure she didn’t know; maybe this guywasArnold? As for Bernard, she wouldn’t have imagined that he had been such an ancient model…

At the end of the hall in front of her, some noise in the elevator’s shaft startled her, and she pawed at her belt for her revolver’s handle, under her labcoat. When the doors opened on Bernard, she felt her shoulders slump. He had a hell of a timing; she had a whole bunch of questions for him!

“Hello, Vivian,” he greeted her as he walked up to the desk. “Peter just told me you’re looking for two other hosts in the park?”

She bobbed her head, words suddenly stuck in her throat and she handed him the frame. Bernard pushed his glasses up with an automatic gesture as he took the picture.

“Oh,” he said, flatly. “Yes, of course…”

“When were you created?” she finally managed to utter. “For how long have you been… around?”

And how didn’t anyone notice anything, for that matter?! But that question remained prisoner of her bubbling thoughts. Bernard, however, faced her outburst with a lot more calm; he smiled to her, even though he looked down to the frame, watching it in silence for a brief moment before he finally spoke:

“I wasn’t there at the time. I’m… I’m much younger than some of the… of my fellow hosts.”

Vivian shook her head, still staring at him to encourage him to explain.

“It’s not me in that picture,” he continued, handing her the frame back. “It’s Arnold.”

Vivian’s knees buckled under her and she felt herself collapse seated in the leather armchair behind her. She couldn’t take her eyes off Bernard who, patient and understanding, put the frame back on the desk himself.

“I gather that Ford told you about him,” he said, a finger rubbing the wrinkles at the corner of his forehead, above the branch of his glasses. “What do you know, exactly? It’ll help me cut to the chase.”

Throat tight, hands clammy, Vivian tried to let out a sound as Bernard was sitting down in one of the chairs, in front of her.

“He… he’s the… he wrote the original Reveries code, he didn’t want the park to open… and he’s dead.”

In a nutshell, that was all she knew.

“Oh, and also the hosts are talking with his… his signature in their code.”

“His…signature?” Bernard echoed, brows furrowed. “Oh, I see. Yes, in a way, they… they do.”

He bobbed his head in a brief silence.

“According to the story Ford told me, Arnold wanted the hosts to be conscious, truly conscious. Not only to look like it. He was already working toward that goal when he developped the bicameral mind system.”

“For them to hear their programming like some inner thoughts,” Vivian completed, recovering a little of her voice as she was putting together the pieces of knowledge she already had with the ones she was now hearing. “Ford told me a little about that when… Walter glitched. I thought it was my fault…”

She winced, embarrassed to bring that up.

“No,” Bernard replied. “That system wasn’t as stable as expected but it’s still there, even if only partially used. And Arnold found another way to push the hosts towards sentience. He created a test in a game, and the Reveries code as the solution.”

Evidently, the hosts had also needed to put all the pieces together to understand. And Vivian pouted a little at that thought. But, she kept listening intently to Bernard:

“He tested his theory with Dolores, one of the first hosts they created, and she proved him right; she, and the others, could be conscious.”

Those words kept shaking something deep inside Vivian, something akin to fear, poorly mixed with joy, or hope — maybe both.

“So, Arnold begged Ford not to open the park and as Ford refused, dismissing his results, he took his own life…”

Vivian shuddered.

“It happened in the park, in a last desperate attempt to prevent Ford from opening but…”

This sentence didn’t need an end, and Bernard didn’t bother to give one to it, looking up towards Vivian who nodded. In fact, it felt to her as if the whole room was swaying as she processed this information, these revelations, and what they implied. Her short breath was making sparks dance in front of her eyes, in tune with the piano’s music, and Vivian tried to calm it down along with her thoughts; she had to get Lawrence out of here, she couldn’t do what he had asked of her, to let him get destroyed to save her life! She just had to find a way to do it without putting herself in danger, or dying.

All of a sudden, the music didn’t have anything relaxing to it anymore. So, Vivian tried the words she had heard Ford speak several times in this same office, probably for the same reasons:

“That’ll be enough, Frank…”

She didn’t expect much other than the music to stop, and yet when the echo of the notes quivered in the sudden silence, a weird, uncomfortable shudder shook her in the armchair. The office was still spinning but she gripped the thick edge of the table, on each side of the notebook open in front of her.

“What do you think is gonna happen for us all, here? The hosts, the guests, the staff…”

Bernard’s eyebrows raised, his forehead folding in several worried and surprised wrinkles.

“Well,” he started, sitting back a little in his chair. “Peter and I are doing our best to try to solve all this peacefully. The ’hostages’ will be freed as soon as possible and…”

His gaze betrayed his own doubts when he looked away from Vivian’s, who gritted her teeth, almost furious from the fear growing in her chest.

“And the hosts will have time to figure something out for themselves…”

He cracked a nervous smile before adding, on a joking tone which left Vivian unfazed:

“For ourselves, should I say.”

“And what if things can’t be solved peacefully?”

Her question, as cold as the sweat that was making her clothes stick to the skin on her back, made Bernard wince again. He pushed his glasses back up the ridge of his nose. Tears, and a furious urge to shout grabbed Vivian by the throat.

“Please, Bernard. Help me save Lawrence from here…”

All his micro-expressions betrayed his embarrassment more surely than his voice when he muttered:

“I’m… I’m sorry, Vivian. I… I don’t know how we…”

“He told me he wanted to leave this place!” she insisted, as if that could change anything. “He doesn’t really believe he can ‘cause of all the bullshit that Delos asshole kept pulling on us but…”

Her voice broke.

“He wants to…”

She sniffled the tears threatening her.

“Really?” Saying this, Bernard sounded as surprised as interested. 

Vivian just nodded, slowly — she could only hold her tears back for so long… She pursed her lips and a light sob shook her. She was loosing hope, now… After the euphoria over Bernard’s revelations, the recognition that she hadn’t imagined everything that had brought her to this point, and a rekindling of that fragile hope, she was losing it again. The cruelty of this feeling was revolting. And Bernard’s thoughtful silence added to it.

The metallic sound of the elevator coming up startled her in her seat; her hand left the edge of the desk to push away the side of her labcoat, freeing the handle of her gun. Bernard, however, didn’t seem to worry. The doors opened on Maeve and, just out of the cabin and crossing the hall, she snarked at them:

“One moment alone and you already put one of them back in that chair? I’m starting to doubt your loyalty, Bernard.”

He didn’t take offense. He only answered, calm:

“This one is as much a friend as Felix.”

“I know too few of them that can pretend to that honor to believe you on your word.”

Neither Vivian, nor Bernard, replied. Maeve stopped between the two chairs, in front of Vivian, staring her down from all her height.

“And what were you so emotional about?”

Bernard was the one to anwser to that:

“The awakening of consciousness that… that Vivian observed in other hosts.”

“Hmm! And who joined the club, then?”

Vivian winced but still didn’t answer. Even when Maeve asked her, bluntly:

“You were down there, then? In the park.”

Maeve’s facial expression twitched slightly in frustration.

“I don’t recall having seen you here. Not these days, not ever for that matter.”

“You weren’t part of my batch,” Vivian answered flatly. “And yes, I was in the park.”

“Enjoying some killing and fucking, I presume? One has to blow some steam, isn’t it. Until everything blows in your face.”

Vivian hardly unclenched her teeth to word out:

“You presume wrong, then.”

Maeve scoffed, openly disdainful.

“Maeve…” Bernard stepped in, quieting what he might have guessed to be a brewing conflict. “Vivian was in the park because Ford intended for her to die at the gala with everyone else…”

“Is it supposed to make me feel sympathetic?”

“But one of the sentient hosts,” Bernard continued, patient and ignoring her interjection. “He… he chose to save her.”

“I can’t figure why that poor man would choose to use his hard earned freedom through decades of suffering to save one of his tormentors?!”

Her jab hurt Vivian.

“You’re gonna have to ask him that,” she stated to cut the debate short, then turned to Bernard. “Please, at least help me bring him back before they reach Dolores and her army!”

“What does he intend to do, fight them?” Maeve asked, doubtful. “To save more like you?”

“Yes,” Vivian answered, almost more for Bernard than for her. “And I don’t want him to be hacked into pieces!”

“I… I’m not sure Peter will accept to mobilize anyone,” he told her, embarrassed. “Not for anything else than recovering hosts for Livestock.”

“Yeah, well, if I can prevent him from coming back on a stretcher, I’d rather do that.”

Also, according to her, the Professor didn’t have to know!

“This man made the choice to go rescue others now, darling. Live with that!”

Vivian was getting tired of Maeve’s ice bitch-queen attitude, but that was something she could live with. What didn’t sit right with her, however, was the disdain with which she greeted everything that was leaving her mouth, insulting as she went the painful decisions Lawrence and her had made to survive, or to mutually protect each other.

“A man in tears didn’t make a choice,” she retorted, with a calm that surprised even herself. “He made a sacrifice.”

And Maeve scoffed, unmoved.

“Did you want something, Maeve?” Bernard then inquired.

“To report the results of my negotiating in Pariah. The Confederados agreed to listen to me. Charming individuals…”

Her irony almost made Vivian smile, this time; she was sharing the feeling. But she only had the hint of a tense smirk.

“One of their officers, a captain or something along those lines, agreed to come with us to gather his solders as soon as possible. Unlike El Lazo who’s still deaf to my fine words…”

She had a dubious pout, as she tapped her nails on the glossy wood of the desk behind the lamp stand. 

“This man really needs help,” she went on, serious. “I don’t believe he understands what’s going on, and I’m not being dramatic when I say that every word I speak are making him worse! And according to Felix, his state is beyond his skills.”

“I’ll come with you next time, then.”

“No, we need you here, and your little indisposition set us back enough as it is. I’d rather you teach Felix how to proceed.”

“His state may require the Mesa’s equipment,” Bernard observed.

Vivian refrained from commenting; she knew all too well was was going on with El Lazo, and his state flat-out required the Mesa’s equipment indeed. In her pocket, the tablet beeped softly and when she whipped it out, she saw the pop up on the simplified display. Heart racing, she jumped to her feet.

“If you’ll excuse me…”

She thought she heard Bernard answer to her courtesy but she was already rushing to the elevator — Josela and Hank were in Livestock.

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