Nikki's mind was deafeningly loud.
Roxy's parting words echoed relentlessly against the inside of her skull.
Stop letting the fear paralyze you, and start using your brain. If he adapts to you, then guide him.
Nikki leaned her forehead against the cool, tinted glass of the window, watching Sector 1 flash by. Roxy was right. She had been letting the System's punitive simulation—the horrific vision of the Penalty Zone—dictate her reality. She had been shrinking away from the very entity she was supposed to be anchoring to humanity. If Adonis's core processor was truly learning empathy by studying her reactions, then shutting him out and treating him like a ticking time bomb was the exact sequence of events that would eventually turn him into the monster she feared.
If she wanted to save the world, she couldn't do it by cowering in the corner. She had to step into the fire. She had to guide him.
