by Kelly Oram
He had a point. My head felt like it weighed a million pounds, and my eyelids even more. It wasn’t normal. Sleep was pulling me under. I gasped. “You drugged me!”
Dr. Chen shook his head, giving me a reassuring pat on the back of my hand. “No. Fatigue is an effect of the serum. It’s pulling energy from your body to repair the damage. It’s an exhausting process, and we’ve just given you a rather large dose. You need rest. But you will be fine once you’ve slept it off. You have my word.”
Ha! His word. Like that meant anything to me. But, whether he was telling the truth or not, my eyes closed and I started to drift into a heavy sleep.
I didn’t dream. That disappointed me, and I worried that maybe the serum hadn’t worked, but maybe I’d just been too exhausted to dream. When I woke up, I was still very groggy, and my body felt stiff. It took me a few minutes to think straight. I was still in the hospital bed I’d passed out in, but from the stiffness in my body and the pressing bladder issues, I was sure I’d slept a long time.
Dr. Chen was gone, but Donovan sat in a padded chair beside my bed reading a nonfiction book written by someone with a name I couldn’t pronounce. I found it strangely comforting that he’d stayed with me while I slept, like a parent or a loved one would.
I cleared my throat to get his attention, and his face lit up with a bright smile. “Jamie!” He set his book down. “Good morning.” He glanced at his watch and smiled to himself. “For a few more minutes, anyway. I trust you slept well?”
I sat up slowly, my head swooning a little, but after blinking my eyes into focus, I finally became alert. I looked around for some confirmation that it was morning, but there was no clock and no windows. “What time is it? How long was I out?”
“It’s nearly noon. You’ve been out for about fifteen hours.”
“Fifteen hours!” The serum they gave me better have worked, because Major Wilks only gave me a day. He was probably already on his way. I needed to get as much information about it as I could before I ran out of time.
“That’s nearly half the recovery time my soldiers need after being administered the healing serum.” Donovan scanned me from head to toe and smiled. “You are truly a remarkable young woman, Miss Baker.”
I flushed at the praise, feeling both embarrassed and absurdly proud that he approved.
What the heck? I felt proud to be complimented by Donovan? That was insanity.
Instantly I flipped into Danger Mode and turned up my energy to the highest possible setting.
Donovan stepped back, eyes wide. “Miss Baker?” he asked warily as he watched my skin spark and my hair whip around my head. “Are you all right?”
“Fine,” I grumbled. “I’m just frying your stupid nanobots.”
When Donovan’s eyebrows flew up, I laughed. “The ACEs aren’t stupid, Mr. Donovan. They knew something wasn’t right with me after the way I acted at the hospital. We know I was being controlled. It turns out that your precious robots couldn’t handle my electricity. I can’t believe you’d try to inject me with more knowing that they don’t work on me.”
Donovan sighed. “We figured they hadn’t worked on you, but we didn’t realize you knew about them.” He gave me a sheepish shrug. “Can you blame me for trying again, Miss Baker?”
“No, I guess not.” I snorted and let my energy calm down. I mean, the guy was psycho, after all. You could always trust a psycho to act psycho.
Once my mind was clear again, I relaxed. He couldn’t control me. I had the upper hand here, not him. Reminding myself that the ACEs were coming soon, I focused on the plan and tried to get as much helpful information from Donovan as I could. I took a deep breath and, stretching my arms and legs, tried to sound casual as I probed for more information. “Do you use the serum a lot, then? You must have a ton of it.”
His eyes narrowed in suspicion, and he watched me for a few minutes with a calculating expression. I quickly turned my line of questioning to play to his ego. In all the superhero movies Teddy has shown me, egos were always the supervillains’ downfall. “Are you planning to market it to the public? Because, I mean, it’s basically a miracle serum. You would do so much good if you shared it with others.”
Bingo. Donovan’s face smoothed out. Suspicion gone. Replaced with pride. And bonus, he answered my question. Chalk up a point for me. “Unfortunately, no,” he said. “The serum is definitely miraculous and has been perfected for the most part, but the magical secret ingredient that makes it work is in very short supply. I can only make small amounts of the serum and not very often. In fact, Chen gave you nearly the last of our supply last night. I only have one last dose that we save for emergencies.”
“Only one more?” That was disheartening. I wondered if the last dose would be enough to fix me after the ACEs came in and shut this place down. No way were they going to make more if this magical secret ingredient came from Natalia, as I suspected it did. I wanted my memories desperately, but I couldn’t possibly ask for them at the expense of another human being.
“Yes, Jamie—may I call you Jamie?” I nodded absently, and he smiled as if pleased, before continuing. “We used nearly all of the remaining serum on you—as much as was safe for you.”
Suspicion crept into my mind. “Why would you do that? You said yourself that you knew I’d turn on you if you gave me all of my memories back.”
Donovan sighed. “Because we want you to trust us. We want you to be happy here, and to see that we really do want to help you. It’s true we couldn’t fix you completely, but as a show of our faith in you, you should have almost all of your memories back now.”
My heart fluttered. Did I really have my memory? I tried to retrieve a memory, but nothing came. Maybe it was because I didn’t know what memory to recall. Thinking back on all the stories Ryan told me of my life before the explosion, there was one in particular I wanted to remember firsthand. I tried to imagine a warm, cozy cabin, snowstorm howling outside the windows and the fire crackling inside. Just Ryan and me…
When that didn’t work, I tried to remember our last night together, at the Grand Canyon. He’d told me that’s where he’d proposed to me and gave me enough details that I should remember the conversation. Again, nothing seemed to come to mind other than the conversation I had with Ryan a couple nights ago. My heart rate picked up as anxiety blossomed inside me. “It’s not working. I don’t feel any different. When I try to think about my past, it still comes up blank.” I started to panic. “What if it didn’t work?”
Donovan covered my hand and gave it a gentle, reassuring squeeze. “I’m sure it worked,” he promised. “We scanned your brain again just a little while ago and can already see the results. You likely just need something to jog your memory since you’ve been disconnected from it for so long, and I believe I know just the thing to do that. Do you feel well enough to go for a walk with me?”
I glanced down at Donovan’s hand covering mine. There was something soothing about the contact, something comforting, almost fatherly.
“Yeah, I’m okay. Still a little sluggish, though. I’m having a hard time getting my brain kicked into gear.” Obviously. If I’m feeling cordial toward Donovan. “I don’t suppose you have any coffee or Mountain Dew or something around here? A bathroom wouldn’t hurt, either.”
Donovan laughed. “Of course.” He waved toward a door on the other side of the room. “The bathroom is right there. Feel free to shower or freshen up however you’d like. I believe you’ll find a bag of your things in there.”
My things? When and how did he get a bag of my things? Seeing my surprise, Donovan explained. “I had a couple of my soldiers visit your parents’ home last night while you slept.” He held up a hand to warn me off before I could accuse him of anything evil. “Don’t worry; we know your parents are with Major Wilks at the moment, and we didn’t harm anything. I simply figured you would appreciate a few changes of your own clothes other than the scrubs or uniform jumpsuits I could provide you with here.”
“Of course. We have no need to disrupt your parents’ lives. However, someday if you’d ever like them to join you here, we could make those arrangements. Or perhaps set up visits with them.”
My mouth fell open. “Seriously? You would let me visit them?”
Donovan smiled at my shock. “Jamie, as you said on the phone yesterday, you are a guest here, not a prisoner. We hope to work with you. Not just a subject to experiment on. Of course, we’ll need to do the occasional test to try and figure out the mystery of you, but we hope to have you join us, be part of the team. Once you can be trusted not to bring Major Wilks and his ACEs to our doorstep, then you will be free to come and go as you please.”
I stood there, completely incapable of moving. He’d stunned me with that revelation. The offer he presented me with wasn’t anything like the cage I’d expected to be put in. Maybe Donovan wasn’t the monster I’d always made him out to be. Still, I was wary of what he wanted from me. “What would you have me doing? What do you want from me?”
“How about we discuss that after we get your needs taken care of? You must be hungry.”
Now that he mentioned it, I was starving. Temper calmed, I hopped off the bed and made my way to the bathroom. Then I laughed at his expression when I came out showered, changed, and ready to go only seconds later. “Superspeed’s pretty handy.”
After blinking a couple more times, Donovan laughed softly and held out his arm to me. “You are truly a wonder. I’m so glad you’ve come to us. Shall we, my dear?”
I almost accepted his offered arm. I reached out, but at the last second, I realized what I was about to do and quickly pulled back. Donovan looked neither shocked nor disappointed. He simply accepted my rejection and waved his arm toward the door. “This way.”
Donovan gave me a tour as he took me wherever we were going. “We have several buildings on the compound. This is the medical facility. Then we also have the labs and the living quarters.” We exited a set of double doors into the lodge I’d warmed up in the previous night. “This is our main reception area. It’s the only way in and out of the complex.”
He led me through the toasty warm area past the fireplace that was once again burning strong, and used a key card to open a set of elevator doors. “Reception area for who?” I finally asked. “You can’t possibly have a lot of visitors to your secret facility in the middle of the North freaking Pole.”
Donovan laughed as he pushed a button that appeared to be one floor down. “True, but my soldiers come and go, and often they are as chilled through as you were when you arrived last night. It’s good to have a place for them to warm up that is near the medical facility.”
We stepped out of the elevator into a long hallway. I was once again staring down a hall with no windows; dim, fluorescent lighting; and plain, boring off-white walls. Donovan and the U.S. government must have hired the same contractor.
“Each of our buildings is connected by underground tunnels.”
“Convenient, considering the weather outside.”
Donovan slid me a rueful glance. “I’m not much a fan of the cold myself, but I had an accident with my desert facility not that long ago.”
I smirked. “Yeah, not going to say sorry about that.”
Donovan pursed his lips, but said nothing in response.
At the end of the hall we took an elevator up one floor into one of the other buildings. I recognized at once that we were in the residential building because I could hear chattering and laughter along with various sounds of dishes clanking, showers running, televisions playing, and other random sounds. We didn’t head toward the noise, though. We turned down a quieter hall heading the opposite direction and came to a door marked Subject Residence Hall. “Subjects?”
I raised a brow at Donovan. He wasn’t the least bit sympathetic. “It’s simply the way of things, Jamie. They are here for research purposes. They are not caged up and treated like animals, though. They are not lab rats, as you said.”
I wasn’t so sure, but I kept my mouth shut. There was no point in arguing with a narcissistic egomaniac like Donovan.
I followed him through the door, down a short hall past several small sleeping rooms, and around a corner into a living room/lounge area. It was fairly large, and as lavish as the sitting room I’d just been in. Again, no windows—not that there would be anything to see besides an endless blanket of snow—but it wasn’t bad. Nicer than The Lair by far. And it wasn’t empty.
My heart stuttered at the sight of the elderly woman reading a bodice-ripper romance novel in a rocking chair, and the young girl with hair and skin as pale as the moon sitting at a table, humming softly as she drew a picture. I’d never seen their photos, but I knew who they were. Tyson had told me all about Betty and Natalia. Donovan waved a hand toward them and said, “Do they seem tortured or mistreated to you?”
They really didn’t. They seemed content. But then, looks could be deceiving. And though there were no bars, a cage was still a cage.
Both the woman and girl looked up when he spoke. Or, I should say, Betty looked up. Natalia nearly jumped out of her skin, and grew impossibly paler at the sound of Donovan’s voice. Her fear of him nearly threw me into a rage, but when she saw me she gasped and leapt from her seat, shooting across the room to wrap her skinny little arms around me. “You came,” she whispered. “He said you’d come.”
Startled, I hugged the tiny girl back, careful to be as gentle as possible because she looked as if a feather could break her. This was my first experience with a child, and she was so sweet that I was a goner for her instantly. “Hi, there.”
Her eyes lit up with excitement, but it couldn’t cover their lack of luster. They were a crystal blue, but so pale they were practically the color of water. They were also sunken in and rimmed with dark circles. She wore a white cap-sleeve nightgown that showed off big, ugly bruises ranging from dark purple to green to yellow dotting her arms. She looked frail, breakable, and sick, but when she grinned at me her face lit up. She looked much sicker than the last time I saw her.
When that thought registered, I gasped. “I remember you!”
Her pale little cheeks produced two tiny little pink spots as she nodded. “I’m Natalia.”
I shook my head in utter disbelief. “I know. I found you in the Visticorp lab. I got you out. The four of you. I sent you up a maintenance tunnel in the air filtration system, and then went to find Carter.” I found Donovan’s gaze. “I remember!”
He grinned. “I thought seeing a familiar face might do the trick.”
It did. The more I thought back to the last time I’d seen Natalia, the more I remembered. I hadn’t remembered Natalia until I saw her, but then my short trip to the Visticorp lab had come flooding back to me, and from there I was able to sort of work my way backward. I couldn’t remember everything. There were obvious gaps in my memory, but maybe those would come with time.
Natalia broke me from my reverie. “Are you here to rescue us?”
Instant mood crusher. The lights in the room flickered. Swallowing back a lump of emotion, I crouched down to her level and gave her a soft smile, hoping she wouldn’t sense how much her question had just broken my heart. “Do you need to be rescued?”
She opened her mouth to answer, but quickly shut it again. Her eyes flicked over my shoulder at Donovan before she stared at her lap and bit her lip.
Yes. I jumped when the fierce voice spoke in my head. The sensation was startling, but not shocking and not wholly unexpected since I knew that Betty was telepathic. She, more than any of us, needs to be rescued.
When I shot Donovan a suspicious glare, he hunched down beside me and smiled at Natalia. “Sweetheart.” He spoke softly, kindly, but his sincerity rang false like it had with me earlier. It didn’t help that Natalia flinched when he cam
e close. If he touched her at all, I might just fry him to a crisp, my memory be damned. “Are things not better here than they were before?” he asked her. “Don’t you have your own lovely house now? And don’t you get to stay with your family all the time?”
He waved a hand toward Betty, as if she were her family. I wasn’t sure when Natalia had been captured, but maybe the other subjects were the only family she knew.
“Isn’t that much nicer?” he continued. “Haven’t I apologized for not understanding your feelings before? Don’t I take good care of you now?”
Still gnawing on her bottom lip, Natalia slowly lifted her eyes to Donovan. She was wary and confused, but when she finally nodded to him, there was truth in it.
He flashed her a wide, toothy smile, pleased with her answer because he saw as much as I did that he was breaking her down and earning her trust, however slowly. His manipulation of such a young, vulnerable child was disgusting. It made me want to punch him in the face.
She can’t stay here. He is slowly killing her.
I glanced at Betty again, wondering if she could read my thoughts or just speak to me. If I tried to talk back to her, would she hear me? Because that would be super handy.
I can hear you. It’s easier if you try to focus. Send me a direct message instead of just letting me pick through scattered thoughts.
Like this?
Betty gave me a subtle nod.
We have friends coming for us.
She was obviously a smart woman, because she didn’t react to my statement at all.
Donovan jolted us out of our conversation when he rose to his feet and clapped his hands together. “Well, Jamie, I have some things to attend to, but I will be back shortly with Dr. Chen. I’m sure he’ll have questions for you concerning your memory, and then we can discuss your place here and your duties. In the meantime, the kitchen is stocked and I’m sure you’d like time to rest and get to know Betty and Natalia, and maybe catch up with Teodoro.”
Both my heart and my stomach leapt at once as relief and anger warred inside me. “Teddy’s here?” Somehow I’d thought he would be in the other residence quarters, with the soldiers and the evil scientists, as opposed to being one of the captives.
