MILA 2.0

by Debra Driza

  He exited the cell, and the door locked behind him. I sank against the wall and slid to the floor, burying my face in my hands. But I couldn’t block out the dark thoughts that swarmed over me. My breaths came faster and faster, until I was practically hyperventilating and then fighting to keep the gasps hidden from the camera.

  When Holland had said that was the Two he remembered . . . what did he mean? Had I tortured people in the past? Was that the future I had to look forward to, even if I did somehow manage to pass the tests? If so, maybe I should just give up.

  Maybe termination was for the best.

  I clenched my fists, pushed at the darkness until I could feel a glimmer of light. Of hope. I couldn’t allow myself to think like that. If they terminated me, Mom’s life was over. And what good would it do? They’d just make another MILA, another like Three, who would feel absolutely nothing as she picked up pliers and tortured a person until they begged for mercy. Yes, I’d let Holland scare me into hurting Lucas, but at least I’d stopped. I’d stopped before the point of no return, come to my senses before inflicting any permanent damage.

  It was small comfort, but it was better than nothing.

  Far too soon, Lucas was leading me down a new hallway. We hadn’t spoken since he’d arrived at my door, asking if I was ready, his cheek a colorful blend of purple and black. His strides seemed heavier, more off-kilter than normal, and every one of them was a painful reminder of what I’d done.

  Finally I couldn’t take it anymore. I blurted, “Lucas, I’m sor—”

  He cut me off. “Don’t. You’re trying to save Dr. Laur . . . your mom, I get it. Trust me, I’ve done things just as bad to help my family. Worse. Now, let’s just get to where we’re going, okay?”

  Despite his words, I thought our silent trek down the hallway meant he was angry with me. Only later would I realize it was guilt.

  Lucas led me down a network of dim corridors, through concrete doorways. We passed three unfamiliar soldiers, all of whom nodded at Lucas but gave me a wide berth. I kept my gaze averted. I was struggling enough without seeing condemnation of my attack reflected in their eyes.

  We stopped in front of an elevator. After supplying his DNA—DNA Scan verified: Lucas Webb. Please enter your pass code—and his code, the doors parted.

  He pushed B, and we sank farther into the concrete dungeon.

  Unlike before, Lucas didn’t attempt any small talk. He stared straight ahead. The quiet stretched out between us, filling the metal enclosure with a tension so tangible, I could swear I felt its frigid pressure boxing us in—android or not. Those doors would open, and then I’d have one last chance. For me, and for Mom.

  The elevator stopped. A breath I didn’t need froze in my chest as the doors slid open, exposing the unexpected glare of bright lights. Also unexpected was the massiveness of the space, and the high ceilings.

  Height, 30.25 ft.

  But as far as surprises went, the basement’s architecture rated low in comparison to its contents.

  Stretching out before us was a re-creation of an idyllic downtown square. Green and red awnings topped brick buildings, which lined wide, neat sidewalks. Nestled along the sidewalks were metallic-blue streetlamps, strips of grass, four potted trees, and even the graceful arch of a blue mailbox. Cheerful signs proclaimed each building’s purpose: Inn! Café! Bank!

  A tiny faux city, over thirty feet below the earth. Bizarre, but not especially terrifying.

  Images from the last test came flooding back—Lucas’s face when he was sure I would torture him, Holland, the pliers—to serve as a warning. Looks could be deceiving.

  Directly to our left was a huge concrete wall that featured a large window overhead. Beyond that was an oval-shaped room, one that extended all the way to the far wall. It was completely enclosed in silver metal.

  Nothing to see there, so I turned back to the cityscape. “What is it?”

  Beside me, Lucas shuffled his feet. “It is a modified version of Hogan’s Alley, the training area at Quantico that FBI agents and sometimes military forces use for urban combat training, to simulate maneuvers in populated areas. We sort of, uh, borrowed the concept. Obviously, those with special clearance for the MILA project are allowed to use it.”

  “Special clearance. Am I supposed to feel special?” I joked, if only to alleviate the steady pulse of anxiety awakening under my skin.

  A ghost of a smile lit his plain face, but it vanished much too quickly, like a cloud blotting out the sun and dousing the warm air with an unexpected chill. He shoved his hands into his pockets and refused to look at me.

  “All I’m authorized to discuss is this last test,” he said, each word clipped.

  I nodded, ignoring the sudden tightness that clutched my throat.

  “Beyond the city is what the men around here call the Run.”

  I followed the trajectory of his pointing finger, past where the makeshift city changed, where the buildings turned from quaint and elegant to piles of deserted boards and dirt that pretty much screamed “war zone.” I followed it to where the sidewalks dead-ended into the imposing concrete wall that formed the room’s far boundary, to where the street met a dark, horseshoe-shaped opening. A tunnel.

  “The Run?”

  Lucas toyed with his shirt collar. “An obstacle course General Holland uses to make sure the soldiers here are . . . prepared for any eventuality.”

  I stared at the entrance, trying to ignore the dread curling around me like a dark, cold tentacle.

  “In this test, your one and only task is to get through the Run with the highest score possible. You’ll be competing against Three. Since she’s performed the course before, I’ve been authorized to give you a brief breakdown of what to expect.”

  Three? The dread squeezed tighter.

  “You’ll be expected to navigate a series of obstacles, first in Hogan’s Alley, then in the Run. The obstacles include barbed wire, vertical climbs, rope work, tunnels, and land mines—simulated, of course,” he added, at my startled gasp.

  “Along the course, you will encounter soldiers who are simulating enemy forces. They should be treated as real threats. They might have simulated weapons, and if they hit you, points will be deducted from your overall score.”

  It could be worse, I comforted myself, trying to relax the growing knot in my stomach. Way worse, given the horrors Holland could have invented.

  “Whenever you trip up over an obstacle that could do real damage, points will be deducted. There will also be simulated civilians on the course,” he said. “If you hurt a civilian—”

  “Let me guess—points will be deducted.”

  Lucas spun to face me, fists clenched. “This isn’t a joke, Mila! You need to focus.” No smile, and his harsh words served as a wake-up call. As Lucas stared directly at me for the first time since we’d left my cell, his eyebrows lowered in an uncharacteristically fierce expression, I realized something was wrong, very wrong. The knot in my stomach twisted.

  “Now, please turn your head to the right—I have to insert the blocking mechanism.”

  He positioned himself at an awkward angle, almost as if blocking my head from view. His fingers were gentle as they bent my earlobe. Cool metal slid into my skin, followed by a quick buzz of electricity.

  Security Chi—

  My internal voice cut out and then . . . nothing. When he stepped back, my hand immediately flew up to trace the thin line that marked the presence of a computer chip.

  “Some of your android functions will only work for the first minute, to simulate a short.”

  Wait, which functions? But before I could ask for specifics, a light flickered on to our left. High on the wall, the spectator window illuminated, revealing a room set up like a theater. Three rows of chairs lined up across the space, and in front of them—an oversized TV screen. I saw four heads pop into view, but none of them had Holland’s salt-and-pepper hair. No Three, either.

  As if on cue, the elevator door beeped and slid
open behind us.

  When Lucas glanced over his shoulder, the tense set of his jaw relaxed ever so slightly. “Where’s General Holland? Did he change his mind?”

  I turned and watched Three glide across the concrete floor in our direction, decked out in camos identical to mine. Without my consciously summoning them, my hands ended up sifting through my hair, rubbing the short jagged edges as proof that we weren’t one and the same.

  “No, he’s just setting up Two’s”—Three’s familiar green eyes, my eyes, shifted to me—“special challenge.” She smiled that same serene smile, but the way she scrutinized me with more curiosity than usual didn’t bode well.

  Enough.

  “What special challenge?” I demanded. I crossed my arms and faced him—just in time to watch Lucas’s hands rake through his own hair. He closed his eyes and inhaled an unsteady wheeze of a breath.

  Three had turned to watch him as well. “Peculiar” was all she said.

  Mindful of the video cameras, I forced myself to relax by smoothing my suddenly clammy palms down my pants, once, twice, three times. “Can someone please explain what’s going on?” I asked. “Why are we just standing here? When are we going to start?”

  A loud whir answered for him. All three of us turned to the left, where the oval-shaped metal wall I’d noticed earlier was lifting, revealing the gleam of glass beneath it. At first, when the metal slowly groaned its way upward, I thought the room was empty. Until my gaze slid right, near the far wall. A pair of women’s tennis shoes was revealed. White tennis shoes with blue laces.

  A sickening mixture of hope and fear twined up my throat, making it impossible for me to swallow. For a moment, I forgot everything—the Run, Three, Lucas, this room—while I waited as her legs, her torso, her neck, her chin were exposed, my non-heart beating with quick, urgent thuds. And then finally, her face; the first time I’d seen her in person since we’d been separated at the airport.

  Urgency flooded my limbs, and I took a jerky step forward. “Mom?”

  “No!”

  Lucas’s harsh command made me falter. “You should know that even your pretesting performance will count in your overall score,” Lucas continued.

  For one brief, desperate instant, I considered ignoring him, but reality froze me in my tracks. If my overall score dropped too low . . .

  Trapped, I focused on Mom’s still form, taking in the dilated pupils that almost obliterated any trace of blue from her eyes, her sluggish movements, the way her arms were taped to the chair behind her. Her head turned, and her lips pressed together. “Mila,” she mouthed, but no sound came out. One of her hands fluttered against the tape before she sagged into the chair, her head lolling forward like a doll’s.

  And here I was—as helpless as the doll she resembled.

  A distinctive gray-haired figure emerged from the far side of Mom’s room—Holland. His left hand was clenched around something I couldn’t see, and he walked with more precise steps than usual, his shoulders rounded out of their typical erect posture. I noticed he winced a tiny bit with each inhaled breath.

  My gaze shifted to his left side. The spot where I’d bashed him with the pliers.

  Force of impact, 720 lbs. per square inch. Fracture to ribs 5 and 6 highly probable.

  I had trouble mustering even an ounce of shame.

  “What’s he doing in there?”

  “Part of the test,” Lucas said in a strange, flat tone.

  With those words thundering like an approaching train in my head, Holland turned to face us through the glass. His drawl echoed around us through hidden speakers. “So I know Lucas there gave you the basics, but I thought we’d add a little something extra, spice things up. There’s no satisfaction in winning if the game’s too easy, right?”

  Wrong, I wanted to scream, and Holland’s eyes narrowed on me. The corners of his mouth twitched, like he knew what I was thinking and dared me to say it anyway.

  I clenched my jaw against the temptation.

  “I thought you and Three needed more of a real competition. While you’re doing the Run, your job is to locate and retrieve a simulated explosive device. Now, you want to make sure you find it, because there’s only one, and whoever brings it back to the finish line will receive a hefty bonus. I’m feeling generous, so I’ll even tell you where to look—it’ll be buried under a pile of worthless junk once you pass the tunnels. How’s that for helpful?”

  He paused to glance at the mystery object in his hand before continuing.

  “Now, in real life, a bomb goes off and that’s it, game over. Lucas there wanted to make dropping the simulator a point penalty, but me? Hell, I figured it should be the penalty.” A hint of a smile crept over Holland’s weathered face. “Lucas, why don’t you do the honors and explain the rest?”

  Lucas wouldn’t meet my eyes. “If you drop the simulator, it’s an automatic loss.”

  Everything inside me plummeted toward the floor. Absolutely, positively, no dropping the simulator. “What does any of this have to do with Mom?”

  “You will have exactly fifteen minutes to enter the Run, find the phony bomb, and complete the course with it in your possession. Three will be completing the course alongside you, and part of your score will be determined based on the discrepancies in your performances.”

  We’d covered this already, but he had yet to answer my question.

  My gaze flicked back to Holland to find his steely eyes focused on me. As soon as he saw me looking, he deliberately uncurled his hand, revealing a bright-yellow rectangular object.

  A lighter.

  I glanced at his hand, then across the room to where Mom was drugged and restrained. A horrible thought whispered through my head. No, there was no way.

  “This test is meant to challenge your focus on the task at hand, under extreme emotional duress,” Lucas continued. “You cannot, for any reason, veer off the objective. Any. Reason.”

  Now Holland was rolling his beefy thumb against the rounded edge of the lighter. The lighter burst into flame.

  My scalp prickled with tiny pinpoints of fear.

  “In order to assess your resilience to such pressure, General Holland added an extra facet to this test,” Lucas said, each word sounding like he had to force it out through gritted teeth. He fumbled with something in his pocket, and for a moment I was distracted when the oversized digital red numbers glowed to life on the screen that sat atop the faux post office.

  “Timer set for fifteen minutes,” a detached, digitized male voice announced overhead.

  Lucas withdrew his hand from his pocket. I thought I saw it tremble. Then his hand fisted—so tightly, his knuckles looked ready to pierce his pale skin.

  “Fifteen minutes is the maximum time you’re allowed. If you don’t . . .”

  “If I don’t, what?” In the glass room, Holland bent his head as he searched for something on the floor. The lighter glowed.

  No. This couldn’t be happening. He was messing with me, as part of the test. That had to be it.

  “General Holland has been testing out a new . . . information-gathering device. It uses a computerized set of fans and fuel to control the timing of the fire. It’s currently set at fifteen minutes. After that . . .” Lucas trailed off. Unable or unwilling to finish.

  Holland squatted, touched the lighter to the floor. A tiny red spark ignited. As Holland backed out of the room through an interior door I couldn’t see, the spark burst into a wall of full-fledged fire, one that quickly soared to chest level, then higher. The flames swayed back and forth like red-orange dancers.

  Flames—just like the ones I’d been told ended my fake father’s life.

  With my entire world shattering around me, I completed Lucas’s sentence in my head.

  After that, your mom will burn to death.

  “Twenty seconds to start,” the dispassionate digital voice announced.

  It felt like everything inside me had turned to stone. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t breathe. Choi
ces flickered through my head in fragments, as if mimicking the dancing flames.

  Shatter glass wall, yank Mom from chair. Fail test three, lose everything.

  Focus. Complete the test. Don’t go over time.

  Everything in me strained to lunge, to break through the glass. To pick choice one and grab Mom. But that would mean game over. Holland would win, and Mom and I would lose.

  Only the second choice gave us a fighting chance.

  I had to compete in the Run, and I had to win.

  “Step to the starting line, please,” Lucas said. Still reeling, I followed Three in a daze to the bright-yellow line that bisected the floor. I felt the weight of Lucas’s eyes on me, but I didn’t look at him. I didn’t look at Holland or Mom.

  My control over my emotions was slipping with every breath. Unacceptable.

  “Ten seconds to start.”

  Beside me, Three stretched her arms over her head, no more concerned than a runner at a track meet. “I hope you’re ready,” she said.

  I ignored her. Ahead of us sprawled the town scene and, beyond that, the tunnel that led to the Run. That was where my chance—Mom’s chance—at survival resided. My body tensed, and I leaned forward in preparation.

  “Test starts in three . . . two . . . one . . . go!”

  I was off and running before the “go” finished ringing in the air.

  Thirty

  I raced into the intersection, my gaze sliding along the storefronts, the windows, anywhere that might reveal a sign of movement. At first I didn’t see a single person out here, which sent my internal jitters into an uproar. Besides Three keeping abreast of me to the left, nothing stirred. It was like a ghost town we’d read about in history class.

  My feet had just struck the concrete sidewalk when I saw the words, heard the digital voice:

  Motion detected.

  A man in a red Windbreaker emerged from the pseudo post office, head down, hands bunched in his pockets. Without breaking stride, I perused his clothing. A gun, did he have a gun, or a weapon of any kind?

  No weapons detected.