Delaney remembered the "Candy-Man" tapes. They were the only things the children were allowed to watch on the bulky, wood-paneled television in the common room. It was a crude, animated series produced by the cult's "Media Ministry." The characters had oversized, weeping eyes and sang songs about "The Great Purge" in high, chirping voices that sounded like birds being strangled.
In one episode, a "Worldly Boy" tried to share a piece of gum with a "System Child." The gum turned into a snake in the boy's mouth, a jagged metaphor for the poison of the outside world. Delaney had watched it until the colors burned into her retinas—the neon greens of the "System's" lies, the pure, blinding white of the Prophet's "Truth." There were no commercials, only interludes where a woman in a floral dress—always smiling, never blinking—would look directly into the lens and ask:
Her parents hadn't been born into this. That was the part that Delaney couldn't forgive. They had walked into the cage willingly.
Her father had been a mid-level insurance adjuster in Ohio, a man who lived in a world of actuarial tables and beige carpets until he hit a "spiritual wall" in 1978. Her mother was a choir girl with a nervous habit of twisting her wedding ring. They were the perfect marks: bored, middle-class, and desperate for a "higher purpose" that didn't involve a mortgage.
They had met a "Fisher" at a rest stop—a woman with long, flowing hair and a guitar who spoke about a world without taxes, without war, without the "coldness of the System." She offered them a sandwich and a pamphlet called The Law of Love.
Within six months, they had sold the house. Within a year, they had handed over their life savings to Father David and moved into the Virginia compound.
Her father had stopped being an insurance adjuster and became a "Laborer for the Lord," which mostly meant digging trenches for the compound's irrigation while Father David watched from the shade. He didn't look like a man anymore; he looked like a tool.
By the time Delaney was seven, her parents were strangers who lived in the same barracks. They didn't tuck her in; they checked her "Spiritual Progress Reports." If she had been "rebellious"—which usually meant crying for a toy or asking why they couldn't go to the park—they would report her to the Elders themselves.
They hadn't joined a religion; they had joined a surveillance state. And Delaney, the bright-eyed girl with the "discerning spirit," had been the star pupil. She learned that to be loved by her parents, she had to be useful to the Prophet. She learned that "family" wasn't a bond of blood, but a network of informants.
Sitting now in her leather chair, Delaney realized why she hated the Fighter's bond with Elena so much. It was a luxury she'd never had. They had protected each other in the "dirt" of Detroit. They had kept secrets for each other, not on each other.
She looked at the "Submit" button on her screen. By clicking it, she wasn't just exposing a celebrity. She was proving that her parents were right—that there is no such thing as a pure secret. That everyone, eventually, must be corrected.
The article was gone. The "Truth" was live. And as the "Candy-Man" song from thirty years ago began to loop in the back of her mind, Delaney felt a cold, familiar peace settle over her. She was Father David's girl again. She was the "Recording Angel," and she had finally brought the "Freaks" to the altar.