Erasmus stood in the center of the kitchen, flour dusting his bare chest and golden hair. Vogelbaum had given up on getting him to sit for a normal breakfast today.
The rest of the kitchen staff hovered in the background, their eyes filled with a soft, protective devotion. They watched as their beloved young master, the boy they believed they had seen grow from a toddle, returned once again to try and master the simple art of pizza dough.
Across the counter stood Oliver and the estate's chef, Marco, a round man with flour-stained hands. "No, no, Master Erasmus! You have to use the wrists, not the whole arm!" Marco said, laughing as another lump of dough hit the floor.
Marco had handled Vogelbaum's complex palate for fifteen years. He knew exactly how the old man liked his steak, which wine paired with which mood, and precisely how much salt would trigger a complaint. A true chef knows the habits of his subjects. But lately, Marco felt a strange, nagging itch in the back of his mind.
He couldn't remember Master Erasmus's palate at all.
He knew the boy had lived here his whole life, yet he couldn't recall a single favorite meal before last week. It was as if his memories of the boy's childhood were a series of blank, white pages. He watched Erasmus pick up another piece of dough, his blue eyes unblinking and serene.
Did he really eat anything I made for him before? Marco wondered, his spatula pausing mid-air. How can I know a man's father for fifteen years but feel like I'm cooking for a stranger I met two days ago?
"What's wrong, Marco? You're not looking. Am I doing it right?" Erasmus asked. He saw through the old chef's confusion instantly.
"It's nothing, Master Erasmus. It's just... the funniest thing. It's like I completely forgot your preferred palates."
At those words, the entire kitchen staff began blinking in confusion. The confusion spread like a virus. It wasn't just Marco; the prep cooks and the scullery maids all paused, as a collective vacuum opened in their minds.
They realized, all at once, that they couldn't remember a single habit of their young master.
Did he have friends? Did he have a favorite book? Did he prefer to be bathed or shower alone? A thousand questions popped into their heads, and not a single one had an answer.
"Don't worry about it, Marco," Erasmus said, his voice smooth and resonant. "I've changed a lot recently. Maybe I'm just developing a new taste for things."
Aldrich offered a small, charming smile. but internally, his mind was already at work. He realized then that casual, blanket memories weren't going to hold forever. He couldn't just tell them he existed; he had to prove it.
He would have to go to work on each and every one of them.
"I think I'm just hungry for everything today," Aldrich added.
In Vought Tower, Stan Edgar was hunched over his desk, gripped by a rare and immense confusion. His mind felt like a ledger with several pages missing.
He remembered the terrorist and the Leviathan breaking into the hospital to steal the Compound V. Then, he remembered asking for his car to be prepared.
He looked at the security logs on his monitor. He had specifically ordered his private limousine to be rigged with high-frequency speakers and Halothane gas. He had prepared for a kill-box. But for who?
Worst of all, the logs showed he had ordered Godolkin University security to sedate and deliver a student named Rufus McCurdy. Now, Edgar was back in his office, and Rufus had vanished.
Edgar rubbed his temples, his eyes cold. He didn't believe in accidents. If there was a hole in his memory and a missing psychic student, it could only mean one thing: Rufus McCurdy had done something to him. He had been compromised by a telepath.
But what was even more confusing was the suspicion sitting in the center of his mind like a cancer: he suspected Jonah Vogelbaum of going rogue?.
Think, Stan. Think.
His mind had been compromised by a telepath. That was a fact. But why?
Would a telepath like Rufus implant the idea of a trusted friend going rogue just to distract him from something bigger? Or had Vogelbaum truly turned traitor, and Edgar had been investigating him when a trap snapped shut?
Could they be working together? Perhaps Edgar had caught Vogelbaum red-handed, and the old man had ordered the boy to wipe his memories, banking on their long friendship to lure him into a trap.
Edgar stared at the blank screen of his monitor. The "math" didn't add up, and in his world, that usually meant someone was hiding a skeleton. He didn't know which thought was a lie and which was the truth, but one thing was certain: he couldn't trust Jonah Vogelbaum anymore.