The doctor currently on duty was sitting behind a desk in the corner, and looked up as the Director entered.

“There have been no developments, sir,” she said. “I would have alerted you immediately.”

“So the prognosis hasn’t changed?” he asked.

“No, sir,” said the doctor. “She’s stable, but she lost a huge amount of blood and she’s extremely weak. We’ve harvested vampire plasma from the first round of PROMETHEUS Operators so we’ll turn her as soon as she’s strong enough, and hope for the best.”

“You can’t do it now?” asked Turner.

“I could,” said the doctor. “But I won’t. I don’t believe she’d survive the process, sir.”

Turner grimaced. “Fine,” he said. “Give me a minute, please.”

The doctor got up and left the room. When the door had closed behind her, Turner walked over and looked down at the bed.

Kate Randall was lying on her back, her eyes closed, her skin ghostly pale. Wires ran from pads on her arms and chest to machines standing beside the bed, and a huge wad of bandages covered the left side of her neck, where Greg Browning’s bullet had sliced through it. Her pulse showed on a monitor, slow, rhythmic spikes of glowing green accompanied by low beeps.

She’s alive, he told himself. It could have been worse. At least she’s alive.

Rage burst through him like wildfire, burning everything in its path. He was suddenly full of the desperate, fervent desire to go back to the detention level, open the door of Cell D, draw his Glock, and put a bullet through Greg Browning’s stupid, hateful head. It would be nothing less than he deserved, unlike the girl he had almost killed; Kate had done nothing to warrant lying unconscious on a hospital bed, her body too weak to wake up, her mind adrift in the darkness.

Calm. Stay calm. STAY CALM.

But he couldn’t.

The sight of Kate collapsing to the ground with blood spurting from her neck had been the second worst thing he had ever seen, outdone only by the sight of the lifeless body of his son lying on the landing area outside the hangar. Greg Browning had raised his MP5 towards his own head as Kate fell, and Turner was grateful that his soldier’s instinct had taken over as the human part of him reeled in horror; he had shot Matt’s father twice in the leg, dropping him screaming to the ground, and had run to Kate as the Security Operators had gone to secure Browning. The rest had been a blur of blood and screams and stretchers and desperate, repeated demands for the teenage girl not to die, to not even dare think about dying.

He stared down at her.

Wake up! he shouted, silently. Wake up, Goddamnit!

He squeezed his eyes shut for several seconds, then opened them.

Nothing.

I’m going to have to tell Jamie, he realised. And Matt and Larissa. And her father, her poor father. I don’t know if I can do it. This might be the end of him.

Pull yourself together, ordered a voice in the back of his head; it was cold, and hard, the voice that had kept him alive for so many years. You’ll do what needs to be done. That’s all you can do.

Turner nodded to himself, and looked down at the teenage girl in the bed.

“Wake up,” he whispered. “Just wake up, OK? Do you hear me, Kate? You do not have permission to die.”

He stared at her for a long moment, then headed back towards the door, pulling his radio from his belt as he walked.

Matt walked slowly towards the canteen on Level G, his heart pounding with misery so great it was threatening to drag him under.

He had made it out of the cellblock on the level below before the tears had come, great sobs that shook his body and hurt his chest. He had crouched beside the lift for a long time, his arms wrapped round his stomach, his head lowered, unable to do anything but cry: for Kate, for both their fathers, for himself. He could not even begin to process what his dad had done; it was so monstrous, so evil, that he simply could not reconcile it with the man who had raised him. Matt had always been scared of his dad, but he had never really, truly believed that he was a bad person. Unkind? Regularly. Cruel? At times.

But not bad.

What had eventually broken the paralysis of his grief had been the beeping of his console. He had fumbled it from his belt, woken up its screen, and read the message that had arrived on it.

FROM: Carpenter, Lieutenant Jamie (NS303, 67-J)

TO: Browning, Lieutenant Matthew (NS303, 83-C)

Just heard about Kate. Breakfast in the canteen. Ten minutes. No excuses.

Matt pushed open the canteen door and scanned the wide, bustling space for his friend, if that was even what Jamie still was. In the far corner of the room, a black-clad arm shot up into the air and waved at him; he acknowledged it with a nod of his head, then crossed to the food counters and filled a plate with two huge bacon rolls and a scoop of hash browns. He put the plate on a tray along with two large mugs of steaming coffee, and pushed his way through a crowd of Operators gathered round one of the large screens on the walls. Jamie was looking up at him from a table in the corner, a measured expression on his face.

“Morning,” said Jamie. “You got my message?”

Matt narrowed his eyes and sat down. “No,” he said. “Me being here at this particular moment is a complete coincidence.”

Jamie blinked. “OK, I deserved that.”

Matt sighed. “No,” he said. “You didn’t. I’m sorry.”

For long moments, the two teenagers looked silently at each other.

I don’t know, thought Matt. I don’t know if we can fix this. He stared at Jamie, grief and pain coursing through him, and came to a realisation.

We have to try, though. Because otherwise what’s the point of any of this?

“I betrayed you,” he said, his voice low. “I let you down, and I’m sorry.”

Jamie grimaced. “Don’t, Matt,” he said. “It’s all right. You did what you had to do.”

“That’s right,” he said. “But I could have told you why I was doing it. I should have told you.”

“Maybe,” said Jamie. “Or maybe there are things going on right now that are more important than keeping secrets from your friends. I overreacted, in the briefing. I was hurt, and I felt like you used me, and I overreacted.”

“So did I,” said Matt. “I felt like everyone was blaming me for a decision that the Director made. PROMETHEUS was a direct order, and I did protest when Major Turner gave it to me, whether you believe that or not. But I’m the only member of Lazarus who is also technically an Operator, so it was given to me.”

“It’s the right thing to do,” said Jamie. “It really is. I don’t like it, because I know what the people in the infirmary are going through, but it makes sense. And if we beat Dracula because we turned our Operators then cured them afterwards, nobody’s going to remember that PROMETHEUS was controversial. Nobody’s going to care.”

“As long as we beat him,” said Matt, his voice low.

Jamie nodded.

“Beat who?” asked a familiar voice.

Matt looked round, and saw Larissa standing beside the table; she was watching them with a curious expression on her face.

“Hey,” said Jamie. “I’m glad you came.”

“Your message said no excuses,” said Larissa, and smiled. “What choice did I have? Morning, Matt.”

“Morning,” he replied. “It’s good to see you. I’m sorry about yesterday.”

Larissa’s smile faded. “It’s all right,” she said. “It was a bad moment.”

Jamie frowned. “What happened yesterday?”

“We found out that someone we knew had died,” said Larissa. “Danny Lawrence. He was NS9. I don’t think you knew him.”

“I didn’t,” said Jamie. “Shit. I’m sorry to hear that.”