by Lynette Noni
After a horrific day where Enzo knocked me unconscious in our sparring session and Vanik introduced me to one of his more … extreme experiments, I was curled up on my pallet, my body aching, my mind screaming, when the door to my cell slid open and Enzo hurried in. He held a finger to his lips as he approached my side, handing me a bag.
“It’ll get better, JD. You can survive this,” he whispered, glancing nervously back toward the door. “Every time you put these on, I want you to remember that, okay? Just don’t give up.”
I opened the bag to find the hot-pink gloves inside — the only hint of color I’d seen in weeks. A token of hope, perhaps, for a brighter future.
Apart from that one time, I’ve never seen Enzo outside of training. But his kind gesture made its mark, even if he had to take the gloves with him when he left that night so they wouldn’t be confiscated. Now he hands them over every day when we train, and his words are forever burned into my brain.
Don’t.
Give.
Up.
Those three words have helped me more times than I can count. They’ve helped me through the long hours of silence and isolation; they’ve helped me fight the memories and the nightmares; they’ve helped me survive the tests and the torture. No one could take them from me — not Vanik, not Manning … not even myself.
“You ready for this?” Enzo asks, pulling me back to the present.
I tighten the straps around my wrists, raise my hands and bounce on the balls of my feet.
Enzo grins at Ward. “I suggest you take some notes, Lando. You might think you can kick my ass, but it’s been a while since we last sparred. You’re about to see how wrong you are.”
Instead of listening for Ward’s comeback, I lunge forward and land a solid double punch to Enzo’s torso, then follow up with a roundhouse kick that has enough power to push him back a few steps.
I’m surprised by his lack of defense. Normally, he’s much more guarded. But he recovers quickly and begins his own attack in earnest.
Other than strength and endurance training — those being muscle-burning, high-intensity workouts — my physical sessions with Enzo cover all forms of martial arts, from Taekwondo to Aikido to Jiu-Jitsu, as well as boxing, wrestling and kickboxing techniques. I could train for a hundred thousand years and still have more to learn, but after the time I’ve spent with Enzo, I can hold my own against him — at least for a few minutes.
I’ve never fully understood why sparring is a part of my daily routine. When I first began training with Enzo, he started to explain about the importance of having control, before cutting himself off and instead sharing that physical health and mental health are interconnected. “Healthy body, healthy mind” is what he told me. I understood the implication. Lengard wants my body in peak condition so that my mind can handle whatever tests, whatever program, they’re running with me.
Regardless of the reasons, I’m never going to object to the physically demanding sessions. Not when they make me feel so much better than anything else at Lengard.
As we circle the room, striking out with dummy shots to test each other’s defenses, I catch the look in Enzo’s eyes. He’s enjoying this. Enjoying having Ward as a witness. I don’t know why. I don’t care why. All I know is that I have a point to make. I want Ward to know I’m not some delicate wallflower wearing form-fitting clothes. I’m more than that. More than he could ever imagine.
Aware of my own limitations, I’m surprised Enzo keeps allowing me to make contact. An uppercut here, a leg swipe there, a few well-timed punches in between. True, he lands his own hits as we continue circling, but I know — I know — I’m not as good as he’s letting me appear to be. A glance at Ward reveals his open wonder. But I don’t want to impress him simply because Enzo is holding back.
We’re a few minutes into our match, when I’ve had enough messing around.
Ducking under Enzo’s next strike, I throw a left-right-left combination into the belt of his stomach, directly underneath his rib cage. His tense abdominal muscles protect his internal organs, but there’s still enough power behind my blows for his body to contract in response. I don’t give him time to hit back at me. Instead, I use my swinging momentum to propel my right fist upward and clip him across the jaw — hard. Normally, we have an unspoken rule to avoid aiming above the neck, but right now I want this half-assed match to be over. I’m not above taking cheap shots, and if the approving smile I see on Enzo’s lips is any indication, he doesn’t seem to care.
Knowing for certain now that he’s not even trying, I decide to finish it. I lunge in close, hook my leg around the back of his knee and yank it out from under him, shoving his chest with my hands. I don’t bother jumping on him as he topples to the ground. It’s clear our match is over.
Enzo has the nerve to grin as he hauls himself back up to his feet. Slinging an arm around my shoulders in an uncharacteristic display of affection, he guides me over to where Ward is standing.
“How exactly do you think you can kick my ass if you’ve just had your own handed to you by GI Jane?” Ward asks Enzo, amusement lighting his eyes.
“Consider me a regular Mr. Miyagi,” Enzo responds. “I’ve taught this young grasshopper everything she knows. And hey, if GI JD can take me down, imagine what she can do to you, Lando.”
All right, enough’s enough.
I shove Enzo’s arm off and stalk away from them both, toward the treadmill. No one won this round — not me, not Enzo, not Ward. All I can hope is that I’ve made some kind of point: I can defend myself. I do have some dignity.
I run flat out for five miles before I gather the courage to slow down and glance around the room. Ward is nowhere in sight.
I step off the treadmill and approach Enzo.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he says, amusement threading his tone. “I didn’t plan that match. But you can thank me later.”
Thanking him is the last thing I want to do, and he knows it.
Annoyed, I blow out a breath and shake off my irritation. What I need is a proper workout to release my frustration. Fortunately, that’s exactly what Enzo has planned, and by the time my session is finished, I’m a panting, sweaty mess, buzzing with endorphins.
Too bad that only lasts for my shower and lunch break, because the moment I step into Vanik’s lab, I feel the usual crushing weight of gloom settle upon me.
“Sit down, Six-Eight-Four,” he says when my escorts depart. “We have much to cover today.”
I move woodenly toward the reclining vinyl chair. Dread wells up inside me when I lean back into the stiff material, but my face remains perfectly blank. I realized early on that Vanik gets a sick sense of enjoyment from seeing me squirm; I no longer give him the satisfaction.
He tugs my hair back and tapes monitoring wires to my skin, starting at my head and working his way down the rest of my body. As he does so, I consider the incongruity of his appearance. His white lab coat and polished shoes are immaculate, the picture of perfect hygiene and personal care. The same can’t be said for the rest of him. His face is covered with a perpetual sheen of oil, his sunken eyes have dark shadows underneath them and his hollow cheeks make him look more skeleton than human. But it’s his hair that repulses me the most, greasy as it is and permanently parted in an unflattering line down the middle of his flaky scalp. For someone who’s supposed to be a genius, I fail to understand why he can’t remember to buy some shampoo.
“We’re trying something different today, Six-Eight-Four,” Vanik tells me when he finishes hooking me up to the various machines positioned around the room. They used to scare me when I didn’t know what their purposes were. I’ve long since realized my fears were justified.
“It’s come to my attention that you may not be with us much longer, so I’ve decided to move up my schedule.”
Vanik doesn’t look pleased by the altered timeline.
“Over our last few sessions, I’ve been pushing the boundaries of what I believe to be acceptab
le risks, but today we’ll be going even further. I need you to remain as still as possible. We don’t want to cause any … irreversible damage. But don’t worry, Six-Eight-Four. It’ll all be over soon.”
He says this like it’s meant to offer me some kind of comfort.
Remaining motionless is nearly impossible as Vanik begins his tests, prodding and poking, shocking and jabbing me over and over. I’m screaming on the inside, screaming so loud yet knowing no one will hear me, no one will help me, because no sound escapes my lips. It hurts — God, it hurts — and not just physically. Vanik tears away every part of who I am — any dignity that I regained with Enzo is now but a passing memory. I am a whisper of the girl who was sparring just minutes ago. If Enzo or Ward could see me now … if anyone could see me now … all they would see is a shell of a human being waiting — praying — for the pain to stop.
But Vanik doesn’t stop, not until our time is up.
“That’s enough for today,” he finally says, releasing me from the manacles he used to strap me down when my body began jerking uncontrollably. “We’ll pick up from here tomorrow.”
I want to scream at him, but before I can decide whether it’d be worth opening my mouth, a pair of guards walk through the door. They won’t hesitate to punish me if they see me as a threat, and I can’t take any more today. I demurely place my trembling hands behind my back and wait while they bind my wrists. I can’t hide a wince when the cold, unyielding metal presses against my tender flesh.
It takes all my energy to keep upright as my escorts lead me to my session with Ward. My skin feels tight and clammy, and while my nerves are on fire, my teeth are chattering with cold. My head is splitting with an ache so deep that it makes me wonder if Vanik performed intrusive neurosurgery without me realizing. But I don’t think he’s that desperate — not yet.
When my guards bring me to a halt outside the library room, they undo my handcuffs and wait for me to step through the doorway. It took only two days for Ward to make it clear that my escorts are not welcome inside his evaluation area. All the guards have strict orders to release me outside and send me in alone. Only, today is the first time I could actually use their support. Because when they walk away and I take a step forward, I stumble — literally stumble — into the room, and I don’t have the strength to catch myself before my body falls like a sack of grain onto the carpet.
Ward calls out to me in alarm, but I’m unable to respond. He’s saying my name, I think, repeating it with increasing volume as he approaches my unmoving body. Questions pour from his mouth, and he turns me onto my back, brushing hair off my skin and moving it behind my ears. My eyes are closed, but I find the will to open them, and I discover his concerned face hovering just inches above my own.
“Talk to me, Chip.”
He rests his hand against my cheek and sucks in a breath. “You’re freezing. What the hell happened to you?”
I can’t do anything but look up at him, shaking violently. Then my eyes roll to the back of my head as I’m overcome by the sweet silence of oblivion.
CHAPTER FIVE
I’m not sure how long I’m unconscious, but when I eventually wake up, I’m not in my cell. I’m also not in Lengard’s medical facility, a place I’ve visited a handful of times. The sterile hospital smell doesn’t linger in the air here, nor do the bleached walls assail my vision. That in itself causes me alarm, since during my time at Lengard I’ve never seen any other kind of walls. The ones around me, however, are dark gray, and I bolt upright in my comfortable bed to peer around the rest of the room.
Shades of gray and white meet my eyes, coloring everything from the blankets to the bedside table to the abstract painting mounted on the wall. I have absolutely no idea where I am. But I can guess. And that guess makes my mouth turn dry and my heart start to race.
I draw back the covers and drag my legs out until I’m seated on the edge of the bed, where I look down at my body in confusion. Magical elves must have changed me — or so I try to convince myself — because my pillowcase uniform is gone and I’m wearing an oversized, fleece-lined hoodie with an equally warm pair of track pants. Woolen socks cover my feet — a luxury that I haven’t experienced in what feels like forever — and I wiggle my toes in awe. I feel warm all over for the first time in years, and I try to appreciate this fact rather than fear it. But when the door opens, I know I can no longer maintain any illusions.
“Good, you’re awake.”
Ward steps into the room, and I rise to my feet. I wobble unsteadily, and he rushes forward to keep me from collapsing.
“Hold up there, Chip. I don’t think you should be standing just yet.”
His grip on my arm is gentle but firm as he moves me into a seated position again and kneels in front of me.
“How are you feeling? Any better?”
I don’t understand his concern. He shouldn’t care about me — he’s my evaluator. I have no idea what, exactly, he’s been evaluating during our library sessions, but I do know he has a job to do. To him, I’m supposed to only be a test subject. Six-Eight-Four. Jane Doe. Not —
“Chip?”
No.
I’m not supposed to be “Chip” to him. I’m not supposed to be anything to him. And I don’t understand how he can kneel in front of me thinking otherwise, while his gentle — too gentle — fingers cup my chin, and his green — too green — eyes probe mine for answers. I want to pull my hair in frustration, because even after two weeks, I still have no idea why I have sessions with him, let alone for so many hours each day.
It.
Doesn’t.
Make.
Sense.
All my other evaluators have clear purposes: Enzo disciplines my body, Vanik pokes at my brain and Manning assesses my psyche — or attempts to — while everyone else tries to break me and put me back together again. That’s their script, and they act out their roles, even if I may never know why.
I’ve managed to shut them all out for so long. To just let them do their jobs and be done with it. I haven’t cooperated, but I haven’t resisted. Like the gruel I eat every morning for breakfast, I do what I’m supposed to do but nothing more. I’m functional but bland. I survive, but I don’t thrive. That’s the life I’ve chosen to live. It’s how I stay safe — and how I keep others safe from me.
Or at least, it was, until Ward came along with his prophetic nickname. Without me being able to stop it, I’ve been thawing. Two weeks is all it took for him to chip away at me, just as he said he would.
“Give me something here, Chip.”
Ward reaches for my cheek, his fingers skimming my skin. My eyelids flutter at his touch, and I don’t pull away despite everything inside me warning that I should.
“At least tell me you’re okay.”
I inhale deeply and meet his gaze, offering a barely there nod that says everything I can’t: Yes, I’m okay. No, I won’t tell you what happened. Please don’t ask, because I won’t answer.
He releases a sigh of relief, and I wonder if his performance is even real. As an evaluator, he would know better than to form any meaningful attachment. He must be aware of the clock ticking down to my last day. He is the noose tied around my neck, after all, just as much as Falon is the hangman.
“You’ve been out of it for almost nine hours,” he tells me. “It’s nearly midnight.”
That causes my eyes to widen. I’ve never been away from my cell so late.
“We’re in my personal quarters right now,” Ward continues, rising to his feet again. “I didn’t know what to do with you, just that you needed to get warm, so I brought you here.”
He clasps his hands behind his back, and I fight to keep my eyes on his face when his T-shirt tightens.
“My aunt is Lengard’s head medic, and I convinced her to come and check you over — off the record. She said that as far as she could tell, you were mostly suffering from shock.”
His eyes sweep down my body and back up again.
�
�In case you’re wondering, she’s the one who changed you into my clothes.”
Not as good as magical elves, but better than the alternative.
“You must be hungry. I’ll get you something to eat, but then you’re going back to sleep. Esther — my aunt — says that’s the best thing for you right now. You’re normally pale, but this is ridiculous.”
He almost sounds angry, and for the second time in twenty-four hours, I wish I could see my reflection.
As if bracing for a battle, Ward says, “You’re staying here for the rest of the night, no objections. You wouldn’t be able to walk back to your …” He trails off, seemingly unable to find the word he’s after, then he clenches his jaw and continues, “… accommodations on your own anyway, and I’m not carrying you around again, when you can sleep in a perfectly good bed here.”
I can’t think about anything — not the emotion I see in his eyes at the memory of my cell, not the idea of him carrying me anywhere. All I can focus on is one thing: I don’t want to sleep in his room — again. No way. It’s much too personal, crossing too many boundaries even without him in here with me. He is my evaluator. And he can never — will never — be anything else.
“Don’t try to fight me on this, Chip. You won’t win. So don’t waste the energy.”
With those words, he turns and walks from the room.
I’m thrown by his abrupt exit, my thoughts reeling. I want to object, to escape his company and the unbalanced feeling he ignites in me. But he’s right — I’m light-headed just sitting here. Regardless, I try to take advantage of his absence by standing again. Or attempting to. But once more my legs give out, and I collapse onto the bed just seconds before Ward strides back into the room.
“Here,” he says.
He hands me a steaming bowl filled with some kind of aromatic soup. Despite my churning stomach, my mouth waters. I can’t remember the last time I ate anything other than bland, regulated meals. The offering before me is like something from a dream.
“Go on. You need to get your strength back.”
