******
Vincent’s eyes flashed open just in time to see the white stick being pressed up against his temple. His Lenses lit up with a searing heat, then exploded with white light. He was completely blind as a rough pair of hands jerked him from his bed. Blind, still, as a different set of hands closed over his mouth and half his nose.
“Your newsims indicate the presence of a virus,” said a voice above him. “You are being quarantined.”
Vincent tried to say something back, but the hand over his mouth held the words in his throat. He tried to lash out instead, but his limbs felt as if they had been detached from him, useless and completely immobile in the vice-like grips of his captors. Growing desperate, he was preparing to bite the hand over his mouth when the white light began to fade, and his vision began to clear. Above him, he could start to make out the men dragging him. They were little more than silhouettes in the dark, but he could see the color of their uniforms clearly nonetheless. He could see the gray.
Vincent doubled his struggle, which amounted to little more than a slight inconvenience to the men holding him. By the time they reached the main room, Vincent’s captors hadn’t broken stride once.
The door across the room slid open, and another huddle of men emerged with Jessica, whose eyes had only just begun to return from their embrace of the pure white. She seemed to be having equally little success in her attempts at escape.
“What are you doing?”
Vincent couldn’t see the owner of the voice; his captors were standing in the way.
“Those are my kids!”
Mr. Carlson had emerged from the master bedroom, still in his nightclothes. Before he could utter another word, two of the officers holding Jessica crossed over to him. Vincent’s view was blocked once again as his captors towed him closer to the door.
“No!” cried Mr. Carlson. “Don’t hurt them! Don’t–”
There was a muffled, thudding sound, and Mr. Carlson grew quiet.
The men continued to drag Vincent to the hall. The entire exchange was almost completely silent. What few sounds they did make seemed to be absorbed by the night, suppressed and forgotten.
They were almost to the door. They would go to the transport pods. They might even walk right out the front lobby. No one would stop them. It was the weekend – no one would wake up from their simulations.
The men carrying them pressed the button next to the main door and it slid open. They started out into the hall.
The silence of the room split down the middle with a shattering, earsplitting explosion.
Vincent struggled against his captors to look back, but they held fast. Some of them turned, raising their short white clubs, only to crumple where they stood. There was a chorus of more muffled thuds as the officers fell, one by one, and their grips went limp. It took Vincent a moment to realize he was no longer being held. He turned around. The glass ceiling now lay in dagger-shaped shards on the tile below, and at the feet of a half dozen gun-wielding men and women who seemed to have appeared out of thin air. Above the group, were two, militarily-dressed transports with their ramps already extended. A familiar Newsight employee stood at the helm of it all. He looked different outside of his small white desk: taller, broader-shouldered, and suspiciously like Brian.
“John,” whispered Jessica.
Before Vincent could inspect him further, John was blocked from view. A large, square-jawed man had rushed forward with a black club shaped exactly like the ones carried by the officers. Vincent recoiled, but the man was too fast. The tip of the club made contact with Vincent’s temple, and his vision went black. The same heat fired into his Lenses as before, searing his eyes. The room began to spin, and when his vision returned, he crumpled to the floor. Next to him, he heard Jessica do the same. Arms much gentler than the ones that had just carried him wrapped Vincent under his shoulders and lifted him to his feet. His eyelids drooped down over his eyes as the arms led him toward the transport. He felt his vision slipping into darkness once again.
“What’s wrong with them?” asked the man holding Vincent.
John crossed over to them. He pulled back one of Vincent’s eyelids. “The Privacy Officers must have done their disabling before we got here,” he said. “The Lenses are reacting against it. We need to get them to the tunnels.”
John took hold of Vincent’s free arm. Vincent didn’t resist as they walked him, supporting nearly all of his weight, to the transport. They had to lift him inside.
“The sim.” The words came out of Vincent as a whisper, though he hadn’t meant them to. He could manage only a few syllables at a time. “The sim…the…the…”
“You’re safe,” said John, “you don’t need any simulations to–”
“THE SIM.” Vincent had to push the words out of his mouth. “We have THE SIM.” He patted, weakly, at his front pocket.
“The sim…” John trailed off. Slowly, as if afraid something were going to bite him, he reached into Vincent’s pocket. He pulled out the disc. “Oh my god,” he said. “Oh my god!” He turned to the other transport. “They have THE SIM! Get us out of here! Go!” He waved his arm at the other transport, and they began to rise.
Vincent let his eyelids fall closed. The voices around him, then the shouts, grew soft and distant, and he was gone.
Part III – The Order