“Pax patient loose,” Harris explains. “Rudy says he wants a chimera on the case asap.”
Mi pales. “Um… he didn’t say that while Ben was in the room, did he?”
My stomach coils into a knot. Oh no... Ben had taken it upon himself to be that Chimera. Of course he had. Like mother, like son…
He didn’t know about the mob.
“We have to go get him!” Abi screams, but Mi and I are already ahead of her, strapping on every available weapon within reach. There's no discussion of whether or not I was going too, partial immunity be damned. I'm not standing by while that boy is at risk.
We head to the area Abi has pinpointed and split up from there, each taking a different section. I honestly didn’t think I’d be the one to find him; Abi and Mi have super-hearing to aid them, after all, although the chanting of the mob doesn’t help. I climb a roof to get a better view… not nearly as gracefully as you would have done.
That’s when I see them, standing on the roof next to me, the pax patient dangerously close to the edge.
“It’s OK,” Ben says to him. “Come down. Let me take you to the Infirmary. My brother works there. He can help you.”
“Stay… stay back! I… I don’t want to hurt you.”
I expect him to say something along the lines of he can’t be hurt, and that’s why he came, but instead he says, “Try it. Maybe then she’ll come back for me…”
I call out his name. He turns to me.
“Go away!” he yells. “You’re not supposed to be the one who comes running!”
He moves closer to the edge, and the pax patient slips off.
Barely taking a moment to judge the gap, I leap across the building and just –just– catch the ledge. I haul myself up and race to the other side. Ben is trying to tug the man up by his jacket, but strong as he is, the man is over twice his size and flailing. Not thinking, I offer him my hand and he latches onto me without another thought. We drag him up together and he rolls to the side, shaking.
I seize Ben by the arms. “What were you thinking?”
“She said she’d come for me!” he cries, pulling away from me. “She said she’d always come! Why do grown-ups always say things they don't mean?”
My chest aches. “You think Ashe was lying to you?”
“She was lying!”
“She thought she was telling the truth. When people say 'always', they mean if they can. They mean they want to. And there's nothing Ashe wanted more in the world than to keep you safe.”
Ben's eyes brim with tears, and he looks down at his feet, shaking silently. “I miss her.”
“I know, bud. I miss her, too. I'm actually kinda jealous of you, you know?”
“Jealous? Why?”
“Because you got her for a whole eight years. I didn't even get one.”
“I don't remember all of those years.”
“Well, why don't you tell me about one of the years you do remember? Or any memory you have of Ashe? I'll tell you one of mine.”
◆◆◆
I told him about the day we met, a story you apparently never relayed to him. I told him about how I could barely tear my eyes off you as you took on those guards. I almost forgot about the cargo altogether. I'd never seen anyone move like that. When we spoke for the first time, there was such fire in you... dangerous sure, but this great source of warmth, too. I wasn't sure if I wanted to bask in you or be ignited by you. I was struck dumb either way, and you danced around my thoughts all night. I couldn't get you out of my head. I didn't want to get you out of my head. I was certain we'd never meet again, and then the very next day, you dropped out of the sky in front of me, offering to help us again. And then you saved us, again. Then we saved you.
I carried you into the van. You probably guessed that, but I never told you. You were so light for someone so tough. Even then, I didn't want to let go. You looked quite sweet, like I was seeing inside of your shell. You were the strongest person I had ever met, but somehow I knew you had a softer side, which you showed me yourself, not too long after.
By the time I’d finished my story, Mi and Abi and found us and the mob had moved on. Mi went over to the victim and pulled him to his feet.
“Come on, buddy,” he said softly. “Let’s get you to the Infirmary.”
I could still feel the pressure of his hand gripping onto my arm, almost like a brand. I stared at the skin. There was nothing there, yet. Nothing at all. But there would be.
“Hang on, Mi,” I said. “I think I better come with you.”
I told you it was a terrible day.
Chapter 17
My lessons with Eva become a part of our daily routine, first thing every morning straight after breakfast. She is not the best teacher, and the nature of the skill makes it a hard thing to learn just by watching. When I learnt how to fight, I could watch how the instructors did something and mimic their movements. I can’t do that here.
How did Eva ever learn?
She’s a prodigy, Adam had told me. I guess she had to be, otherwise she’d be no more than a closed file and a body in a tank, like so many of my siblings and comrades. Her powers would have driven her insane.
“You’re doing it wrong again,” Eva remarks, as I attempt to hit a practise dummy with my watery fireballs. She’s lounging at the side of the room looking thoroughly bored. “Try to see it. Don’t overthink.”
I’m not sure how I’m supposed to visualise without overthinking, and my lacklustre results are chipping away at my energy. Anger, annoyance and self-pity all claw at me. I take a few deep breaths, take heed of her contradictory advice, I mentally summon the picture of a ball of fire. I spend precisely three seconds conjuring the image, and then hurl it away– both the image and the flames in my hand.
A fireball the size of an orange blrazes past the target and hits the wall behind.
“Hurrah!” Eva leaps up and makes some bizarre movement between a clap and an air punch. “You did it! Now, let’s try actually hitting something…”
Hitting something, I’m sure it’s no surprise, is actually one of my specialities. As soon as I master creating a fireball, learning to aim them is easy. It’s only ever complicated when I have flashes of watching Nick play darts, the last night we were together. He told me he was a good shot, but I rarely got to see him in action.
Maybe, when you escape, you could practise target-shooting with him. That’s something you could do on equal footing.
Nick had always wanted to train with me, to learn my fighting style so that he could assist me if we were ever partnered up again in future. We never had the chance.
Please… let us have that chance.
It’s difficult to focus with that thought swimming around. I have to scoop it up and shove it some far recess at the back of my mind, reminding myself that what I am doing now will help me in the future. I need this power, and the trust they’re showing by letting me learn it, to help me escape. I can’t wait for thirteen years like I did last time.
One morning, Eva doesn’t show. I’m informed by one of the scientists that she’s undergoing some routine tests, but behind him in the observation deck, I see a tall shadow lurking. The Director. Whether or not he wants me to know he’s there, I don’t know, but it’s clear that today more than ever, I am being tested.
A trio of rubber dummies are already lined up for me to practise on. I summon a fireball and hurl three in quick succession, all body shots. Then I create two at once and send them soaring, one after the other. I hit the same spot both times, barely an inch out. I repeat the process five, ten, a dozen times, increasing the heat with each shot until the rubber starts to melt.
The Director steps forward. I hear clapping over the microphone. “Excellent progress, Eve.”
I pause, panting, trying to steady my breathing and summon my words. Be Eve again. “I thank you, sir, but I’m far from mastering it.”
“I am sure you are giving it your every effort.”
“I alw
ays give my every effort.” Into escaping from here.
“Good to hear. I’ll see if Beta-6 has finished with her routine tests and can come back and offer you more instruction. How are you finding her as a teacher?”
“Honestly, sir? I don’t always understand her instructions. She’s a little… juvenile.”
“Well, she is very young.”
“I am sure she is a fine soldier.”
“On that front she still has much to learn. Perhaps you can train each other.”
“If that is what you wish, I shall do my best.”
The Director nods. “How do you find her outside of her capacities as a teacher?”
I frown, pondering the meaning of this question. Did I not answer it by praising her abilities as a soldier? What more could I say? Truth be told, I neither liked or disliked her, although I still found her resemblance to me unnerving.
“Like I said sir, she is young, but skillful.”
His face falls, just a fraction. I have disappointed him again.
“Indeed,” he continues. “Well, it is early days yet. See if you can’t learn from each other. Good day, Eve.”
◆◆◆
Eva comes back in, but I’m in no mood to play games with her. Something about the exchange with the Director has unsettled me, squirmed under my skin. She tries to teach me how to make my flames hotter, but her instruction is useless and the only thing that heats up is my temper. Eventually, I get so frustrated that I let out a huge scream and hurl a fireball at one of the dummies that’s the size of a small boulder. It takes its head clean off.
“I said hotter, not bigger!” Eva stamps her foot.
“Oh really, I must have misheard!”
“You’re angry.”
“Astute powers of observation there, Beta-6. Adam must be thrilled.”
“Eva,” she says quietly, “my name is Eva.”
Her soft voice is so like Ben’s that I can feel the my anger trickling away, replaced instead by a palpable guilt.
“I’m sorry,” I say, trying to sound as gentle as she does, observation be damned. “I know that’s your name. I didn’t mean to yell.”
“That’s OK. I can handle yelling. But my name is Eva.”
“I know.”
“Adam named me after you.”
“He told me.”
“He said you were the best of the best, and if I trained really hard, one day I could be the best of the best too.”
“You are very good.”
“But not the best. I need you to master your flames first. Then when I beat you, I really will be the best.”
There is a twisted logic there, and all her sweetness melts away with the confession. That glint in her fire-blue eyes is back, the one that loves chaos. Her eyes, I realise, are almost the same colour as her flames. Like Adam’s. Maybe that’s why she was assigned to him. Ben looked enough like me that I sometimes wondered if he might be my little brother. Perhaps she was like Adam’s little sister… although why would they make her look like me? We were never friends. Why would they think he would bond with someone with my face?
Only, of course, he had. Never bonded with the rest of his unit, or so he said, but he bonded with her. He let me see that he’d bonded with her.
What does that mean?
“I think I’ve got a lot of training to do until I reach your level,” I tell her, and then remember the Director’s request. “But how about I help you with something today? I’m all burnt out.”
She grins at this, and kicks the dummy’s severed head in celebration.
Chapter 18
For weeks, I focus on honing my skills and training Eva. I am glad of the goal, but frustrated by the slow progress. Nothing I have ever done has taken this long to master before. Gabe finds it amusing.
“But you are getting better, so–”
“Not fast enough!”
“What’s the rush?”
I glare at him, and don’t need to answer. I think of all the pain I felt living without him, and cannot bear to think of putting our family through that for a minute longer than necessary. And then there’s Nick, being similarly tortured. Only he might not wait forever.
Gabe frowns at me, not quite understanding where the last emotion has come from, but says nothing.
Eva progresses much faster under my tutelage than I do under hers. From the youngest age, her default in a fight has been to use her powers, and she struggles gaining the upper hand in a situation without resorting to them. I wonder why they didn’t shackle her like they did me. They slapped them on almost as soon as I arrived; they must have already had them. Why didn’t they force her to fight like the others?
Perhaps I’ll ask Adam… the thought bubbles up inside me, but I quickly squash it. I don’t want to ask Adam. I don’t want to ever talk to him.
“Again,” I bark, making Eva repeat the formation. She executes it perfectly, in record time. It’s a simple enough exercise –and doesn’t involve any human obstacles– but it’s still a great result. I offer her a smile. “Good job.”
Eva’s face breaks into a wide grin, and I have the strangest urge to offer her a treat. Only, of course, I have nothing to give her. “Take five,” I say instead. “Refresh yourself.”
I have no need for refreshment, so I practise the movements myself, ending each lunge and punch with a short ball of fire. Adding them onto the end of formations feels perfectly natural, like the flames are just an extension of my moves. Is this how she learnt? I’m starting to see what she means, about just doing it. Trusting my instincts is leading to better results.
The door clicks open, and a scientist comes to collect her. She looks wary of them –a look I know too well– but follows obediently. I am left alone apart from the guards.
This has been happening more often of late. They are giving me time to practise alone, to work it out for myself.
Not wasting any time, I gather fistfuls of flame and pass them between my hands, almost juggling. I pull them down, flatten it like a ribbon. I’d seen Eva do something similar when she was bored, twirling the flames around her fingers like Abi would her hair.
Abi.
Somehow, Eva always managed to remind me a little of my family. It was a reminiscence quickly quelled whenever she did something odd or frightening, but it bubbled up from time to time. She mostly reminded me of Ben in her childish delight for things, but occasionally she’d get this glazed, serious expression like Abi would wear, or fiddle with something like she would. She even reminded me of Mi the other day when she leapt up with a damp cloth to soothe my arm after I burned it.
She could be kind. Sometimes.
The door opens again, and in walks Adam. I try not to look too annoyed –the guards are still watching after all– but barely conceal my sneer when he grins at me.
“Your firepower is coming on nicely, so I see. Your tutor must be doing a good job.”
I shrug. “She’s doing her best. Although she’s made it quite clear it’s only so that when she beats me, she knows she’s truly the best.”
“Yeah, she gets that drive from me…” There’s something in the way he says that that I can’t quite put my finger on. I try to shelve it, and concentrate on trying to hit the dummies from a distance.
“Tell me honestly,” Adam says, creeping closer, “what do you think of her?”
“Why would I be honest with you about anything?”
Adam’s voice is much softer when he speaks again, softer than I have ever heard it. “Please,” is all he says.
I don’t like this, this side of him. I don’t like the way he looks at Eva, the way he talks about her. It reminds me of my relationship with Ben, but also… also of something else, a little different. Has she only gained his drive because he raised her? Or… or has she always had it, in the same way she has his eyes?
And my face.
“Who… who is she?” I ask him. My voice wavers; I cannot hide it. I have a terrible feeling I already know.
Chapter 19
“No,” I say dumbly, “That’s not possible. You’re lying.”
Adam’s grin widens. “I am many things, Eve, but a liar? Have you ever known me to lie?”
It’s not true. It’s not possible. When I was eleven or twelve, they’d done something to me, something that made it impossible for me to ever have children–
Eleven or twelve. Six years ago. They hadn’t just done something to me, they’d taken something. My ovaries. My eggs.
“You’re… you’re telling the truth.”
“Indeed. She is your genetic daughter. And mine, in case you hadn’t made the connection there.”
My head is spinning. I feel like I want to be sick. I have a biological child, a biological child that I share with Adam. This is a new violation, a new low even for them.
“What’s wrong, Eve? Is the news really so shocking?”
“Why… why would they do that?”
“Blend their two best soldiers together? Makes sense to me.”
“Does… does she know?”
“She knows there’s a connection between the two of you, but she doesn’t exactly understand terms like mother and father. I imagine she thinks she’s another version of you.”
“This… this is wrong…”
“No, Eve, this is right, don’t you see? You and I… we were always supposed to be together.”
“Be together?” I cringe. “As in… lovers?”
Adam shudders, as if the very idea repulses him. “Nothing quite so simple. We were meant to lead together, to create an army as powerful as Eva will be.”
“But… but you don't love me.”
“Love isn't part of the equation. It's strange that you should bring it up. You've been outside too long. You've acquired defects.”
“I loved before I left here, I just didn't know the word for it.”
“You did?”
“You don't? Not even... her? You gave her a name.”
Resurrection Page 6
