Page 77 of Sloth
“I feel fine. Ready to find Max. We got things to do.”
“You look like you’ve snorted a rail of coke through the nose, Sloan.” Tony arched an eyebrow at her. When he took in her confusion, he added, “You look wired.”
She shrugged. “Sure, I feel a little more energized. Maybe my adrenaline’s still kicking. Wait. Are you saying that I’ve got too much of the opposite of my sin, whatever it is?”
Parker’s voice lowered as he checked Barry and Beatrix over his shoulder. “You flipped, Sloan. Flipped the switch.”
“I’m still confused.”
With the help of Flint, Barry got to his feet. He held his daughter’s hand and stepped bravely toward Sloan. “I think I can explain.”
All eyes rounded on the man.
“Let me preface this by saying I had no idea about your mate being taken—that’s what he was, right? Your mate?”
Sloan nodded, eyes narrowing. “We didn’t think you all knew about the mating bond.”
“We only recently found out.” He nodded toward the upturned chair. “Do you mind if I—?”
No one moved.
With a jolt, Sloan realized they waited for her permission. Everyone in the room was walking on eggshells—because of her.
Her mind whirled at the shift in dynamic. What was happening?
She gave a curt nod, and the man picked up the chair. Flint found another for Beatrix to sit on. Seeing her clutch her father’s arm did something to Sloan’s heart, especially since the girl had worked so hard to help Sloan on the drive over.
Sloan blurted, “I’m sorry. I wasn’t in control of myself. You have to believe I would never willingly hurt either of you. It’s just… in my head at the time, something snapped. I felt your sin, Barry. It’s still there… I thought it would be gone after we stopped you from unleashing those beasts on the city.”
“It’s okay, love,” Barry fixed the spectacles on his nose. “I don’t blame you. What you went through is something called theGodiver Reflex.”
Gloria Godiver was the geneticist who created them, and their biological mother. Unease spread through Sloan’s gut.
“What’s that?” Parker folded his arms.
“Initially, Gloria was instructed to modify your genome sequence to boost the sense of deadly sin in such a way that had you instinctually motivated to end the sin. A search and destroy urge, if you will. Gloria did this because she was manipulated into believing she was making the world a utopia, however, as you all know, this was not the case. Julius Alcott wanted—sorry, still wants—to unleash you seven upon the world in order to eliminate all sinners indiscriminately. The Godiver Reflex occurs when the body registers too much sin, or too much of its opposing virtue. You become out of balance and will snap. Lucky for you, when Gloria discovered Julius’s true intentions, she secretly changed your DNA with a solution to the reflex by programming a balancing mate. Unlucky, I guess, that the Syndicate have now discovered that if they remove your mate, then this reflex is triggered again.”
“How do you know this?” Parker asked, then shifted to Flint for confirmation. “I thought you said he wasn’t in the main lab with Gloria.”
“He wasn’t.” Mary’s eyes narrowed on the man. “How do you know so much, Barry?”
The scientist sighed, looking much older than his late fifties. “Obviously, you’ve discovered by now that Despair survived the fire. Gloria may have died, but some of her research was also saved. The rest, we surmised from reverse engineering Despair’s modified genetics, and… well, from the recent samples we’ve gathered from your family.”
“Daisy. We call her Daisy here,” Sloan insisted. “Why didn’t my power work on her?”
Barry scratched his head. “I’m not sure what you mean?”
“My new ability just allowed me to send almost everyone in here to sleep. I tried to do that on her, but it didn’t work.”
“Without running some tests, I couldn’t—”
“Just take a guess.”
Parker jumped in. “I think it’s related to mirror neurons and theta waves.”
“Okay. Right, then. My guess is your power seems related to feelings and emotions. Being linked to mirror neurons would mean that you can make someone believe they’re experiencing the sensations for real. Since this power is stemmed in some sort of empathetic connection, I’m afraid to say that your sister probably has none left.”
A cloud of dread descended in the room, making it seem like an ice box.
