Payback

by Gordon Korman

  She shakes her head. “The Osiris committee considered Glen. He refused to participate. No, Eli is cloned from me. There’s no other explanation. His gender must have been altered in the process—probably Felix’s ploy to keep me from learning the truth if I ever stumbled on the project.”

  “But I thought the whole idea was to clone criminals,” I remind her. “You’re not a criminal; you started a computer company.”

  Ms. Dunleavy looks away uncomfortably. “That’s where you’re wrong. Before I built VistaNet, I was a plain hacker—one of the worst, because I was one of the best.”

  “I’ve got kind of a knack for that too,” Frieden volunteers, embarrassed.

  “I thought I was smarter than everybody else,” she goes on. “I wanted to knock governments and big corporations down a peg. I designed viruses to black out power grids, air traffic control systems, vital communications. Plenty of people got hurt, maybe even died, because of the chaos I created. I’ve been trying to make up for it with charity work ever since.”

  Ha! What do you know? Turns out the great and celebrated Tamara Dunleavy has trashy DNA just like the rest of us. Suddenly, I don’t feel so bad about jacking her Bentley and taking it for a joyride all over the west.

  Amber speaks up. “So what happens now?”

  “I’m not going to pretend that I can undo what’s been done to you,” she tells us honestly. “But I can help you.”

  That rubs me the wrong way. “Listen, we blew the lid off Project Osiris and busted out of Happy Valley all by ourselves. And we’ve been making the Purples eat our dust ever since. We don’t want your help, lady. You’ve helped enough already.”

  “Malik,” Tori says gently, “she rescued us.”

  “If it wasn’t for her, we wouldn’t have needed rescuing,” I shoot back.

  “Maybe not,” Ms. Dunleavy admits. “But you need what I can offer you now.”

  “Fine,” Laska agrees. “Come with us to the police to back up our story about Project Osiris. Hammerstrom and our so-called ‘parents’—they have to pay for this!”

  The billionaire shakes her head sadly. “Felix knows about my hacker past. If I turn the authorities on him, he’ll turn them right back on me.”

  I bristle. “No offense, but that’s your problem. None of us hacked into anything—except maybe Frieden a couple of times. And that was only to save our butts.”

  She sighs. “I’m afraid my problem is your problem. Even if everyone associated with Osiris went to prison, your biggest obstacle would remain—the fact that you’re kids. You’re too young to get a job or rent an apartment or do any of the things that make up a normal life. That’s what I can do for you. Come and live with me, and I’ll take care of you until you’re old enough to take care of yourselves. But if I’m arrested too, that possibility disappears.”

  Man, that burns me up. She got us into this mess, and now we have to protect her secret because she’s the only one who can get us out of it. Still, there’s no arguing against her logic. Say what you want about the gangster lifestyle—nobody can claim those guys aren’t realistic when somebody else holds all the power. Back in Chicago, when Torque had something on me, I had to lick his boots. Now we’re all going to have to do that with Tamara Dunleavy’s ultra-white sneakers.

  I cast a glance over at Laska. If anybody is going to hate the idea of moving in with the cofounder of Project Osiris, it’ll be her. She doesn’t look happy, but she isn’t going ape either, ranting and raging about justice.

  “There are seven more of us, you know,” Eli points out. “We don’t know where they are, but they’re probably still with Hammerstrom and Project Osiris.”

  “I’ll make some inquiries,” Ms. Dunleavy promises. “I’ll hire private investigators if I have to. We might be able to find them.”

  “If you find Hector, leave him to rot,” I growl.

  Ms. Dunleavy spreads her arms in a questioning gesture. “So, do I tell the pilot to lay in a flight plan for Jackson Hole?”

  We look at each other. It’s not perfect, not even close. When you’re a victim of something like Project Osiris, hiding out on some billionaire’s estate doesn’t feel like the happy ending you’re yearning for. But it’s tough to ignore the advantages—a roof over our heads; three square meals a day; no looking over our shoulders for the cops, or worse, the Purple People Eaters.

  Tori makes the final decision for all of us. She takes a seat and fastens her belt. “It’s a deal.”

  14

  ELI FRIEDEN

  The Bentley is back. We took it all the way to New Mexico, but Ms. Dunleavy got it returned somehow. Billionaires make stuff happen.

  “It’s good to see you, buddy,” Malik tells the car every time he lays eyes on it. He also pats the hood. I think that Bentley might be his favorite thing in the whole world. He definitely likes it more than he likes us.

  Vachon, the chauffeur, isn’t a big fan of ours, which is pretty understandable. He was in charge of the Bentley when we stole it. We left him unconscious in a park. He has no choice but to accept us, though. Ms. Dunleavy told all her staff that we’re underprivileged orphans she’s taking in as part of her charity work. Vachon knows there has to be more to it than that, but not the truth about who we really are. Nobody has that information except Ms. Dunleavy herself. And, out there somewhere, Project Osiris.

  The one word that best describes how our lives have changed is safe. Here on Ms. Dunleavy’s sprawling property in the mountains near Jackson Hole, we don’t have to agonize about the Purple People Eaters coming to scoop us up. We don’t have to worry that some police officer is going to question why a bunch of kids are living on their own. We don’t have to think about food in our stomachs or shelter. I never realized how much that fear had become part of me ever since we escaped Serenity. I still wake up with that gnawing in my gut, and I have to assure myself I’ve got nothing to be afraid of. It’s a pretty wonderful thing.

  In Serenity, the houses we grew up in were super-nice, but that doesn’t begin to compare with how a billionaire gets to live. Even Malik and Amber, who stayed in Gus Alabaster’s mansion, say it was nothing like this. The Dunleavy home is ultra-modern, with gigantic windows that bring the spectacular scenery indoors. It has its own movie theater, an indoor pool, tennis and basketball courts, and a fully equipped gym. There are two kitchens—one just for snacks, the other for the professional cook and his staff. The place is so big that it’s a workout just to walk from one side to the other.

  Speaking of workouts, Amber is in heaven. She’s making up for all the exercise she didn’t get during our life on the run. Every time I see her, she’s either soaking wet from the pool, sweat-covered from the gym, or heading out for a jog through the miles of alpine trails on the property. One of the security guys has to go with her when she leaves the house—a rule that applies to the four of us. Project Osiris is still out there, and Ms. Dunleavy isn’t taking any chances.

  Malik loves it here too, but he’s the opposite of Amber. As active as she is, he seems determined to move as little as possible.

  “I moved already,” he explains righteously, as if he was the only one who escaped Serenity and the Purples. “In the last few weeks, I moved enough for five lifetimes. And now I’m exercising my constitutional right to sit on my butt.”

  The mountainous terrain of Jackson Hole makes this the perfect place for Tori to get back to her artwork.

  Every afternoon she returns to the house with a new canvas to show us. “This is the most beautiful scenery I’ve ever seen. But what I’m really looking forward to is winter. I’m dying to see this gorgeous landscape covered in snow.”

  “Wait till you’re out there painting with your hand frozen to the brush,” Malik comments.

  “Wait until your rear end fuses to a chair,” Amber tells him.

  I’ve been getting to know Ms. Dunleavy. Malik calls me a traitor, and even the girls have a hard time seeing past her role in the early days of Project Osiris. Sur
e, she did that, but she’s also the one shielding us from the questions that might come from police and other authorities about who we are and where we came from. Her goal is to protect us from all that until we’re old enough to start college—when it won’t make so much difference that our origins aren’t the same as everyone else’s.

  It’s the first time anyone has come up with a plan that ends with us having real lives.

  Ms. Dunleavy also hired a firm of private investigators to search for what’s left of Project Osiris. So far, they’ve come up empty. The town of Serenity is just as deserted as it was when we last saw it, and the inhabitants seem to have disappeared off the face of the earth. None of the people we mention—Osiris researchers or their kids—register hits in internet searches. We can’t follow up on the Purple People Eaters because we don’t know their real names, except for Bryan Delaney, who was married to our water polo coach. And the only thing the detectives turn up on him is that his wife left him. Good for you, Mrs. Delaney.

  The one name that generates a blizzard of activity is C. J. Rackoff, who broke out of prison in Texas. This is hardly news to us; we were the ones who sprung him. Still, an escaped convict is a pretty big deal. A massive manhunt has yet to turn up any sign of him. It only underscores the feeling that everything from our past has vanished.

  Tamara Dunleavy never married or had kids. So as her clone, I’m the closest thing to a son she’s got. We get along pretty well, which makes sense, considering we have the same DNA. It’s weird to think that I’m identical to someone who’s so much older than me, and a girl. When I look at her—gray hair, crow’s feet, female—it’s impossible to see myself.

  But it’s true. She had samples of our DNA tested. She shows me the report: except for the chromosomes that determine gender, we’re a perfect match.

  “I never really doubted it,” she admits. “Felix may have been extreme, but his science was always top-notch.”

  I wince. For 99 percent of my life, I called that guy Dad. It’s so recent that I was living in his house, dusting the framed photo of my poor dead mother, who never existed.

  “I still think about him all the time,” I confess. “Even a lousy parent is better than no parent at all. And believe me, he was a lousy parent, even without the Osiris part of it.”

  Ms. Dunleavy looks away. “I have to live with the role I played in what Felix did. But I can’t help thinking that if there had been no Project Osiris, there would be no you, Eli.”

  “Could be you just like hanging out with yourself,” I suggest, only half joking.

  She laughs. “You’re not me.”

  Maybe not, but when she watches me on a computer, it has to feel as if she’s looking in a mirror. She gives me the odd pointer, but mostly, I can find my own way. I started out on Serenity’s fake internet, and during our months on the run, I had to be satisfied with a few minutes online here and there. So when I get to Ms. Dunleavy’s house, which is equipped with state-of-the-art technology and the fastest, highest-quality internet anywhere, I’m like a kid in a candy store. After more than thirteen years in a bubble, with Project Osiris deciding what I’m allowed to know, suddenly I’ve got the entire world at my fingertips. I read newspapers, watch videos, immerse myself in virtual reality simulations, explore, explore, explore.

  With Ms. Dunleavy’s help, I’ve designed an internet bot to scour every media outlet on the planet for the appearance together of two keywords: criminal and DNA. One morning, the program spits out a small article from page 19 of the Manchester Guardian:

  DNA REVEALS AMERICAN CRIMINAL IN RESORT ROBBERY

  WEST CAY, BAHAMAS: An investigation into a string of hotel room robberies on this idyllic island has led to a baffling mystery. Police arrested a maintenance employee on suspicion of a series of break-ins at the vast Poseidon Resort and Water Park here. Although no fingerprints were found at any of the crime scenes, police were able to extract a DNA sample from the root of a hair follicle in one of the rooms. The suspect confessed to the robberies before it was determined that his DNA did not match the specimen on the follicle.

  Since the police had their man, they concluded that the hair must have come from a guest staying in the room.

  Case closed—until the test result came back from the DNA lab. The specimen was a perfect match for Farouk al Fayed, a citizen of the United States. However, al Fayed, 61, could not possibly have visited Poseidon. He is currently serving twelve consecutive life sentences in a Minnesota prison for a series of kidnappings. He has not been a free man since 1994.

  Scientists assert that it is impossible for even close relatives to present a genetic match of this exactitude. “Only identical twins can have identical DNA,” a lab representative confirmed.

  Yet Farouk al Fayed has no twin. In fact, he has no siblings at all.

  The question remains: How did a hair follicle from a convicted felon who’s been jailed since 1994 make it to an oceanfront mega-resort that was constructed in 2009? . . .

  It’s like the temperature drops thirty degrees and I’m freezing and sweating at the same time. Farouk al Fayed—I’ve seen that name before. It was on a list with Gus Alabaster, Mickey Seven, Yvonne-Marie Delacroix, C. J. Rackoff, and the other criminal masterminds chosen to participate in Project Osiris.

  And that means he wouldn’t need an identical twin to get his DNA to a hotel room in the Bahamas. There’s another way—a way that cops on some vacation island wouldn’t think of in a million years.

  I dash out the door and down the hall, into the nearest bathroom. I’m doubled over the sink, splashing cold water on my face when Malik bursts in.

  “Whoa! What gives, Frieden? You look like you’re about to keel over.”

  I have to blink to get the two images of him to come together. “Malik—” I croak, almost as if speaking my incredible discovery aloud will make it untrue, “I think I’ve found Project Osiris.”

  15

  TORI PRITEL

  Ms. Dunleavy squints at the article on the laptop in front of her. “Farouk al Fayed. Yes, he was one of them. Terrible man—the brains of an international kidnapping ring. I never met him. It was Felix who went to recruit him.”

  We’re gathered around the tech billionaire in her luxurious office. Eli—brilliant Eli! Only he could see evidence of Project Osiris in that innocent headline in the Manchester Guardian. He didn’t have much trouble convincing us of the importance of his discovery. But would Ms. Dunleavy believe it?

  “Well, he can’t be in the Bahamas because he’s been in jail for more than twenty years,” Eli points out. “There’s only one other person with exactly that DNA—the Serenity Kid who was cloned from him—Freddie Cinta.”

  Ms. Dunleavy looks skeptical. “Do you honestly expect me to believe that with his life’s work crumbling around him, Felix decided to take Project Osiris on a vacation?”

  “Not a vacation,” I insist. “Don’t you see? They’re hiding out there!”

  “At a water park resort?”

  “It’s the perfect place,” I reason. “It’s one of the biggest resorts in the world. And what do the guests look like? Parents and their kids. All they have to do to blend in is go to the beach, ride the waterslides, play with the dolphins, and have a great time.”

  “Figures,” Malik puts in bitterly. “Thirteen years in Happy Valley and I never got past the third tumbleweed on the left. But the minute I’m gone, they take the whole place to an island paradise.”

  I know what he means. I used to beg my parents to take me on a trip to visit the great art museums of Europe. The answer was always no. Even though the real reason was obviously the Osiris experiment, the thought of the whole lot of them at some amazing resort bothers me.

  Ms. Dunleavy makes a face. “It doesn’t sound like the Felix Hammerstrom I remember.”

  “It’s exactly him,” Eli says grimly. “All smiles on the surface, but cold and calculating underneath it.”

  “What’s so calculating about a vacation re
sort?” she asks, still bewildered.

  “He set up shop in the middle of nowhere, surrounded on all sides by eighty miles of desert,” Amber supplies. “This is his Plan B—an island, surrounded by ocean, so no one can get away like we did.”

  “And,” I add, hoping I’m not thinking too much like Yvonne-Marie Delacroix, “if the FBI tries to arrest him for human cloning, they can’t touch him because he’s in a foreign country.”

  “It adds up,” Eli concludes. “Serenity’s a ghost town. After chasing us all over the country, no one’s come after us since Texas. It’s Hammerstrom’s new strategy. He got worried that somebody might believe our clone story and took Osiris underground.”

  Ms. Dunleavy doesn’t sound convinced. “The island police must be mistaken about the DNA. They’re in a tiny jurisdiction without the kind of lab resources we have here in the US.”

  “DNA doesn’t lie,” Eli counters. “We’re living proof of that.”

  Our billionaire hostess thinks about it for what seems like an eternity. Finally, she comes to a decision. “I’ll send a pair of private investigators down to West Cay to look around. Let’s test this theory of yours.”

  “And if we’re right?” Amber demands eagerly.

  Ms. Dunleavy sits back, arms folded. “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

  The waiting isn’t easy. When you’re running for your life, you don’t worry about the past. Your focus is the present—surviving the next few hours, the next few minutes, sometimes the next few seconds. Of all the comforts that go along with living on a billionaire’s estate, this is the one we least expect: the weird luxury of stressing over who might or might not be hiding on that island in the Bahamas.

  They’re more than just the personnel of Project Osiris. They’re the parents who raised us, who loved us in their way; the Purples who kept us in line, and always just a little off balance; the kids we grew up with, including other clones who are still completely in the dark about who and what they really are.