My guards flank him on either side. If he so much as moves a finger wrong, they’ll load his body with bullets.

I settle myself on the couch opposite him and prop one of my ankles over my knee. A butler comes in with two glasses of aged Scotch. He dips down, and I take one from the tray. My butler then turns to Kline, who’s watching this all unfold with wary eyes.

I gesture to the drink. “Go on. I’m not trying to poison you. I have far more efficient ways of getting rid of people than that.”

Reluctantly he takes the tumbler off the tray, his cuffs clinking together as he does so. It’s an awkward maneuver, drinking while shackled, but the former general manages it with ease. He takes a swallow and exhales, his eyes closing for the briefest of seconds.

“That’s good stuff,” he says.

“It’s near the best,” I say.

“Why are you sharing your best Scotch with one of your prisoners?” he asks.

Blunt and to the point, just like my wife. I wonder if this is where Serenity picked up some of her personality traits, or if this is just a feature of all North American citizens.

“I’m hoping by the end of this conversation you won’t be my prisoner.”

The man squints his eyes and leans back. “I reckon that’s not going to happen,” he says. “I don’t like you very much. See, you killed my son, destroyed my country, and married the closest thing I had to a daughter, and now she’s dead too.”

I swirl my Scotch. “I’m not here to apologize or discuss the past. It’s your resume that interests me. How long had you been the general of the WUN?”

“Six years.”

“And before that?”

“I was the Secretary of Defense for two years.”

I nod. “And you remain loyal to your homeland even now?”

Kline leans forward, resting his forearms on his thighs, his drink still clutched in one of his hands. “From where I sit, you’ve got me by the balls. Do you really think I’m going to answer that honestly? Add treason to the growing list of charges against me?”

I set my glass of Scotch down carefully on a side table, then I, too, lean forward. “This isn’t your old world. I can kill you now just because I feel like it—if I were so inclined. I’m not. I know you’re now heading up the Resistance, I know you love my wife, and I know you still want to help your people.”

South America has fallen into my enemies’ hands, and North America is set to follow. Serenity’s beloved homeland is far worse off now than it was two years ago when they surrendered to me.

For the first time ever, someone’s taken land from me. I intend to get it back.

“‘Love’?” Kline’s still stuck on my comment about Serenity.

“Come,” I say, standing. “I want to show you something.”

He doesn’t get a choice. His drink’s taken from him; my guards yank him up to his feet and force him to follow me.

I head down to some of the lowest levels of the palace. Here, the drone of many different machines fills the air. It doesn’t take long to find Serenity’s. I open the outer shell. Inside it is another glass case—a sort of incubator. And inside of that, the woman that holds my heart.

I haven’t laid eyes on her in nearly a year, and I have to lock my knees to keep myself upright. But for my purposes, Serenity’s old general needs to see this.

“Holy fuck!” Kline reels back soon as he catches a glimpse of her. “She’s alive?” There’s a strange note in his voice.

“She never died to begin with. But she will if I take her out of this machine.”

Kline regains his composure and creeps closer. I can still read the horror on his features, however.

“Why keep her like this?” he asks. “Why not just let her die?”

My eyes are transfixed on that scarred, beautiful face. “Because I love her.”

He’s shaking his head like he thinks I’m crazy, that what I feel for my wife is something less pure than love. But what does he know? He gave away this very woman to a man he considered his worst enemy.

I’d level the earth before I’d let that same fate befall Serenity.

“I’m working on curing cancer—and repairing radiation-damaged tissue,” I say instead. “I’m going to save her life. Once I do, I will have the ability to heal the sick. And I will heal them.

“You are a good man, Kline. I believe you have an honest heart. I need men like that. Will you help me repair what I’ve broken?”

It’s been a long time since I’ve done something that’s felt right. Like power, this feeling is addicting. Maybe I’ll rewrite my own history along with Serenity’s. Maybe one day people won’t see me as a man who ruined the world, but the one who saved it.

That won’t happen anytime soon, but time is something I have plenty of.

“I worked for you once,” Kline says. “I never will again.”

Before the sight of Serenity can break me, I close the lid. I turn to Kline, a man who was once my enemy, then my ally, then my enemy again, in hopes that he will be my ally once more.

Serenity trusted this man. I will too.

“I’m not asking you to work for me. I’m asking you, and the Resistance, to work with me.”

7 years later

MY TRAITOROUS FORMER advisors have stolen my technology. For the first time ever I feel the anger that comes with trying to kill something that just won’t die. That’s how I find out they’re utilizing the Sleeper.