UnDivided (Unwind Dystology 4)
Page 36
Any child seeking euthanasia under the law must understand what is meant by euthanasia and the decision must be agreed by their parents.
Their illness must also be terminal.
Belgium recorded over 1,400 cases of euthanasia in 2012. . . .
The full article can be found at: http://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/health/belgium-country-euthanasia-children-article-1.1547809#ixzz2qur84gzr
18 • Cam
Meals with Roberta on the veranda. Always so formal. Always so genteel. Always a reminder to Cam that he is forever beneath her thumb. Even when he’s miles away at West Point, he knows he will still feel her manipulations. Her puppeteer’s strings are woven through his mind just as effectively as the “worm” that makes him forget that which is truly important.
During breakfast, a few days before he’s scheduled to leave, he asks her the question point-blank. The question that sits between them at every meal like a glass of poison that neither is willing to touch.
“What was her name?”
He doesn’t expect an answer. He knows Roberta will evade.
“You’re leaving for a grand new life soon. What’s the point?”
“There’s no point—I just want to hear you say it.”
Roberta takes a small bite of her eggs Benedict and puts down the fork. “Even if I tell you, the nanites will break the synapses and rob the memory within seconds.”
“Tell me anyway.”
Roberta sighs, crosses her arms, and to Cam’s amazement, says, “Her name was Risa Ward.”
. . . but the moment the words are spoken, they’re gone from his mind, leaving him to wonder if she had told him at all.
“What was her name?” he asks again.
“Risa Ward.”
“What was her name?”
“Risa Ward.”
“WHAT WAS HER NAME?!”
Roberta shakes her head in a belittling show of pity. “You see, it’s no use. Best to spend your time thinking of your future, Cam, not the past.”
He looks at his plate feeling anything but hungry. From deep within him comes a desperate whisper of a question. He can’t even remember why he’s asking it, but it must have some significance, mustn’t it?
“What . . . was . . . her . . . name?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Roberta says. “Now finish up—we have a lot to do before you leave.”
19 • Risa
The girl who Cam can’t remember is running for her life.
It was a bad idea—actually, a whole series of them—that brought her to this circumstance. Only now does Risa comprehend how monumentally bad those ideas were, as she races from armed security guards in a massive research hospital complex. There are windows, but they only look out on other wings of the complex, so there’s no way to get one’s bearings. Risa is convinced they’re running in circles, spiraling toward inevitable doom.
• • •
There was little choice but to go on this fool’s mission.
If the organ printer arrived as stillborn technology when they made their grand play, then all their efforts will have been for naught. It was crucial that they find a way to test it, for only by demonstrating what it could do, would the world sit up and take notice.