Hive Queen by Sinclair, Grayson (ereader iphone .TXT) 📗

several gulps before setting it back on its saucer. Guess let's get this over with. I need some answers.

"Can we talk?"

He looked up from his papers to answer me. "Of course. I'm sure you have many questions."

"That I do."

Magnus picked at one of the biscuits on the plate, tearing it apart with his fingers and flicking the pieces into his mouth. "I'll answer what I can, but as I mentioned last night, there is still much I myself don't know."

"Yeah, I got that, but let's work through what you do know. Before we go off speculating, I'd like to have a good grasp of the situation. It was a lot to take in last night, and I want to fully understand the situation before we add to it."

"Go ahead."

I fumbled with the knife next to me, buttering a half of a biscuit I had no intention of eating. Let's start with the easiest thing for me to understand. "So the world used to be much bigger than it is now?"

"Correct."

"And up until three hundred years ago, everything was fine, until something happened. You don't know what, but it caused a massive crash."

"Indeed."

"So the system compensated for this by deleting shit, including people and even history itself?"

Magnus nodded. "A bit more eloquent than I'd have put it, but you have the basics."

“Why haven't we noticed any of this?"

"A few have, but the main reason is that everyone's memories get deleted."

"Wait, what?"

"Memories take up quite a lot of data, and with our limited hard drive space, it was the simplest option."

I paused to consider his words. I got the gist of it, but the technical aspects behind it boggled me. "How does that even work?"

Magnus sighed, rolling up his parchment and sliding into his pocket, giving me his undivided attention. "It's basically on a cycle. We have enough space for about a hundred years of everyone's memories. When the storage starts to exceed our allocated space, the A.I. resets the world."

"It deletes our memories and resets everyone back to square one?"

"Precisely. It hard resets everything back to the first backup, which was made when we reset the world the first time and erases the data."

I pointed a finger at him. "How do you know all this?"

"Perks of being the lead programmer. I've kept all of my memories since the very beginning."

I whistled. "That's a thousand years of memories."

Magnus took a sip of his tea. "It's certainly been a burden to bear. It's hard to make friends when they'll just forget you in the end." He smiled. "Though there are a few exceptions."

Aliria, of course, but there have to be others from the sound of it. I was about to ask when Magnolia returned with more tea.

The clink of china interrupted my chain of thought; Magnolia sat the full cup down on its saucer, and from the smell wafting past my nose, it was at least as strong as the first cup. I picked it up and took a tentative sip. It was more alcohol than tea. I took a big gulp, enjoying the burn of the booze as it went down.

It helped me get my thoughts in order, or at least sort them into manageable chunks for me to digest. Okay, let's not go off and ask every single question that's running through my head right now. We'll be here for hours if I pester him about pointless things. I need clear, concise, and understandable information.

"The void at the edge of the world—I'm assuming that's a threat?"

"Not by itself, no, but it's indicative of a much greater problem."

"Which is?" I hedged.

"Chaos, or for lack of a better term, instability. It means something is wrong and the system is compensating again."

"Can't you just use your admin access and find out what's going on?" I asked before drinking another sip of tea.

Magnus shook his head and sipped tea. "I could, if I still had it. I lost my contact with the A.I. and haven't been able to access any higher system functions."

"How'd that happen?"

Magnus paused, his eyes shifted away from me. "I don't know."

Liar. But I didn't press further. It would only anger him, and he was entitled to his secrets. There were much bigger things to worry about.

"Are we in danger?"

"Not at the moment, but something needs to be done, or it could turn into a serious problem."

I leaned back in my chair while I digested what he'd just told me. There were things Magnus was keeping from me, it was obvious, but what was also obvious, was that something was wrong. Okay, so something is going on here. Something big. It's not just Magnus's words, but whatever that's been taking over my voice. I'm being pushed into this, whether I want to or not. I can't afford to sit this one out, even if I had a choice in the matter.

Wonder what the Aspect thinks? I closed my eyes for a second, reaching down for its presence. It's been unusually quiet since meeting Aliria.

Hey, Aspect, talk to me.

It pulsed, keeping me alive, but it refused to answer my call. I pushed, and it sent a spike of frost through my heart. The pain was sharp and took my breath from me before fading and disappearing.

What the hell is going on with it? It was terrified, which in turn terrified me. The Aspect was strong, abomination or not, and it had saved my life more than once, so for it to be afraid meant serious news.

I ran my fingers over the cup of tea, trailing over the smooth porcelain under my fingers. It was a real, physical sensation that helped ground my fear and let me work through it.

As I was about to respond, there was an