by Patra, CS
It turned out that they had a long list of success stories on their website. None of their names were on it, but other people were happy to give reviews and compliments. For many of these families, their lives had been saved. They all had the families that they wanted. No one mentioned anything about the experiments or what they had gone through to get their babies. Ren looked over at where the search bar was and pointed to it.
“Put one of the serial numbers in there and see what comes up.”
Nikhil did that but it led to many articles. None of them were about the Bradley Institute or who the serial number belonged to. “Well, that was a bust.”
“If they are dead, chances are, you aren’t going to find much on them,” Marie said. “You might find an obituary but that’s it. It won’t be enough to help you.”
“I know but maybe we could trace their families,” Ren thought. “Surely, their relatives must be alive.”
“It depends on how close they are to their relatives. It also depends on how much the family really knows. I’m willing to bet your parents have no idea that a wire was placed in you.”
“Great,” Ren sighed, heading to the kitchen. “I’m going to make myself a snack. Does anyone want anything? I’ve got garlic bread, some jalapeno poppers, and pizza rolls. The pizza rolls do have pepperoni in them so you may not want those, Nik.”
“Just make some the garlic bread and poppers, Ren.” Nikhil told him. “Can I have a glass of water too while you’re up?”
“I’ll take one as well.” Jackie added.
“Got it! Does anyone want soda, coffee, tea, or anything of that sort?” There was a little bit of a pause as Ren pulled out the frozen foods and popped them in the toaster oven. “I can brew a pot if anyone likes.”
“Water should be good enough to cover all of us,” Doug said. “Thanks, Ren.”
He went back into the living room with all the water. “Our snacks should be ready shortly. I made them a few days ago and froze them in case company came over.” He looked around the room and saw that Marie was gone. “Hey, where did Marie go?”
“She said she had some business to take care of,” Crystal said. “I told her to wait a little bit but I guess she couldn’t stay. She told me to give you her regards.”
“Weird. I didn’t hear the door open.”
“Trust me. She left.” Pam nodded. “We tried our hardest to keep her around, at least to say goodbye. It’s funny though. I looked out the window to see her leave...and I didn’t see anything. I didn’t see her walk away or drive off or anything.”
“Yeah, I checked out the window as well. We all did,” Doug said. “I looked down both ends of your street. Not a sign of her anywhere. She just appears and leaves out of nowhere. I keep thinking she’s a ghost.”
“How can she be a ghost if we can all see her?” Ash asked. “Still, she is a strange case. I wonder how she knew about us. How did she know where to find us? What is her deal?”
“Who knows?” Ren sat down with the rest of them. “I don’t know how much she could help us with this problem. I doubt she knows where all our wires are.”
“You’ve had a lot of operations, haven’t you?” Nikhil asked.
“Well, yeah, I’ve had to have a lot of them,” Ren shrugged. “Why?”
“Didn’t your doctors ever notice anything funny? Do you think they would have pulled out a wire from you?”
“I’ve been wondering about that and I can’t recall a time when they did,” he murmured. “Even when I was a kid, I had my appendix taken out. All they gave me was my appendix in a jar. Not the nicest gift in the world but that was no wire either.”
“Do you think it might have been in your appendix?” Pam asked.
“I’m not sure. Maybe they’re still tracking me, maybe they’re not,” he shrugged. “I just find this so weird. It’s like all my privacy is now violated. They know things that my parents didn’t even know. They must have known that I’ve wanted to be a man all my life. They must have known how I tried to be true to myself.”
“Well, we’re going to find a way to get rid of them,” Ash decided. “They’re trying to hit us so we have to hit them back. I’m still pissed off about what they tried to do.”
“Try to think clearly now,” Doug suggested. “I’ve told you so many times. You don’t want to rush into this blindly. Imagine what would happen if Crystal hadn’t been there to save you. They would have hurt you and your asthma would have been hard to control.”
“I know but I can’t help it. I want to go back. I need the perfect opportunity.”
Ren shook his head. “Don’t look at me. We’re not catering anything for the next two weeks. Even still, I don’t think the Bradley Institute cares too much about someone’s Bar Mitzvah. No, I don’t know why they asked to cater for them either. I’ve learned long ago not to ask questions in this business.”
“You know where I want to go?” Crystal asked. “Down to the arena. I want to go to where that man killed himself. I bet there is something there.”
“I have feeling it’s still not open for the public,” Doug said.
“Does it really matter? We can always get in,” Ash said. “It’s only covered by yellow tape. Just lift the tape up and go under. If anyone interrupts us, I’ve got my smoke bomb spy-ders to take care of them.” He held one up. “I gave one to Crystal when those creeps were chasing us.”
“Now you’re making weapons?” Jackie asked.
“Hey, we need to fight back somehow. Besides, these aren’t going to harm anyone. It will just blind them and set them back a little bit. It’s enough for us to make our escape.” He looked down at it in his hand. “I don’t have too many of them at the moment but I’m building them as fast as I can.”
“You know, as much as I don’t like the idea of using weapons, he’s got a point,” Nikhil said. “We have to be able to protect ourselves. We don’t want to kill anyone. We just need to hold them off long enough so we can get out alive.”
“Precisely,” Ash nodded. “I’m not trying to hurt anyone. Not unless they hurt us first. If it comes down to that…” He looked over at Crystal. “I think we may have to take things to the next level.”
Crystal didn’t seem too certain about this, but she knew he was right. “Yeah, we might have to. For now, let’s hold off on it. Let’s see what we really are first.”
It was such an easy thing to say. Unfortunately, it wasn’t going to be an easy thing to find out.
Chapter 11 – Jackie
Jackie went to work feeling more nervous than usual. She did her best to hide it because she had to deal with customers. They needed to know about the prescription medications and she had to stay professional. She could not give anyone the wrong dosage or it could prove to be disastrous. She was grateful that Miguel and a few of the pharmacy techs were around to help her. She was in such a daze that she didn’t remember what she was doing.
“Are you okay, Jackie?” Miguel asked. “You look exhausted.”
“I’m a little tired.” She admitted. It was hard not to tell anyone what she was really going through. “I had a long night. I’m sorry I’m giving you more work than usual.”
“Don’t worry about it. We just need to make sure that we give the right prescriptions to the right people. You almost gave someone Lexapro when they are on Zoloft.”
“I know! I know!” Jackie sighed, rubbing her head. “I can’t believe I made such a simple mistake! They’ve been coming to us for how long now? You think I’d have this memorized by now!”
“Hey, it’s okay.” Miguel tried to calm her down. “You can take a break if you need. I’ll handle everything up front.”
It was kind of Miguel to do this but she declined to take a break now. She just needed to concentrate on something other than Project 99. A part of her wanted to go back to the arena as well. She didn’t know why she was drawn to it in the beginning. She wanted to ignore Marie’s invitation and just stay at home. Yet something inside of her
convinced her that she needed to come here. She didn’t have any interest in robots fighting each other. Minutes before anything started, she was thinking about escaping. She didn’t want to hang around to see what went down. Then that man burned himself in front of her and she was shaken by the whole thing. People began screaming and running around everywhere. Somehow, she got out of that crowd and was led straight to Nikhil’s front door.
Even now, after all that happened, she still felt confused. She believed all the stories but she didn’t want to accept them as the truth. She was scared about what could happen later. Pam’s daughter was run over by someone. Ash was attacked outside of the Bradley Institute. Who knew what else they were capable of doing? It was clear they didn’t care who they hurt.
Shortly after she found out the truth, she did reach out to her parents. She just wanted some confirmation that this could be real. Her mother did admit they had problems with getting pregnant. It seemed like she wanted to tell Jackie that she had used help from a medical facility. However, she was so nonchalant about it that Jackie couldn’t press on. Maybe it wasn’t such a big deal to her family. After all, she was alive and she had a good job. She had gotten a great education and got along with everyone she met. What was there to worry about?
Around seven that morning, she had gotten a call from an unknown number. Against her own good judgment, she picked it up. “Hello.”
“Hi, Jacqueline. This is Dr. Rosemarie Chang. You remember me?”
Jackie acted like she didn’t. “No. Should I?”
“You can drop the act, Jackie. I’m not trying to hurt you. I just wanted to call and see if you were free this afternoon. I just want to talk to you in person for about ten or fifteen minutes. Is that okay?”
Jackie gulped. “I...I have work today. I don’t get any time off until Saturday.”
“It’s fine. I can come during your break or lunch. What time do you normally take lunch?”
“Around 12:30. What is all this about? How did you get my number?”
“None of that is important, Jackie. I just want to see you. I’ll come around 12: 30 then. I promise I won’t take too much of your time. I know you have questions and I have the answers. You just have to be patient. Now I will see you at your pharmacy at 12:30. Be there and don’t tell anyone else about our meeting.”
“Wait, you don’t even know where I work!” Jackie exclaimed but to no avail. Dr. Chang had hung up on her. This made her feel uncomfortable. How could Dr. Chang meet up with her if she didn’t know where it was? Then she remembered the damn wire in her mouth. Of course. Everyone back at the Bradley Institute was keeping tabs on them. They would know exactly where she lived and worked. She wasn’t safe anywhere.
I need to get that wire out of me. She thought, feeling a bit envious of Ash. In a way, it was a good thing he lost that tooth. They would never have known about the serial numbers or wires implanted in them. Now he was free, but she was stuck being watched. She went into the bathroom and looked at herself. On the outside, she was pretty. She wouldn’t call herself perfect, but she wasn’t half-bad either. Her hair was dark brown and her skin was the color of mocha. She had those almond-shaped eyes that people were envious of. Her figure wasn’t too bad. The only horrible thing about her was that she looked she didn’t get much sleep. In truth, she was having trouble with that. Since the truth came out, she couldn’t sleep comfortably. Nightmares plagued her. She couldn’t help but feel like something was going to happen and it would affect her negatively.
She poked her gums to see if she could feel a wire. Ren had a point about one thing; how did their doctors and dentists never find the wires? How deep were these things buried in them? She didn’t have any loose teeth at the moment so she couldn’t pull them out. She felt hopeless. She was being watched and she couldn’t stop this.
Nonetheless, she tried to go about her day like normal. She took her shower, got dressed, and headed to work. After she clocked in and put on her coat, she went over to where Miguel was looking over the prescriptions.
“How are you now, Jackie?” He asked her, handing her some of the prescriptions. “We’ve got some refills today.”
“Great. I could use a distraction,” Jackie murmured. “It’s true when I say I didn’t sleep a wink last night.”
“Are you feeling a little better at least?”
“Yeah, I haven’t thrown up in a while so that’s good. I’m just stressed out for other reasons,” Jackie murmured. She began to wonder if it was time to tell someone else about this. She would ease into it though. “Miguel, how many of our customers are pregnant women?”
“A lot of them,” Miguel replied. “There are also a lot of women who were prescribed birth control. Why?”
“I’m just wondering about my own birth,” Jackie said. “I’m beginning to feel like my mother hid something from me. I tried to talk to her about it but I didn’t get very far. She didn’t make it sound like a big deal.”
“It probably isn’t a big deal. What did you want to know?”
“Oh, I wanted some specific details on that day,” she said. “I know there are a million people who were born on the same day I was. It’s no different from any other day. Still, it feels special to me.”
Jackie felt a little nervous when Dr. Chang came to visit her at the pharmacy. As promised, she arrived at 12:30 in the afternoon. She was in line with everyone else, but she obviously wasn’t here to pick anything up. She stepped away and allowed Miguel to take over for a few minutes. She tried to keep her composure because she didn’t want him to know what was going on.
“I won’t take long,” she promised. “Once I get back, you can go to lunch.”
“It’s okay, Jackie. I’ve got your back here.”
Jackie turned to Dr. Chang and stepped outside. She walked a few feet away before speaking up. “I’m a little surprised to see you here. Did I do something wrong?”
“No.” Dr. Chang shook her head. “On the contrary, I don’t blame your curiosity. You want to know the truth. I promise that you’re not in danger though.”
“Why do I feel like I am?”
“You’re just making this out to be worse than it is. There’s nothing wrong with any of you. I feel like you should know this already. The only thing is that you weren’t born like any other person. That doesn’t mean you aren’t real,” Dr. Chang explained. “No one is trying to hurt you. No one wants to kill you. You let this go and you will live a happy life. What other questions do you have for me?”
Jackie touched her face for a second and wondered about the piece of wire that could be in her. Ash’s was in his gum. What about hers? Where had they implanted the serial number in her?
“Is it true?” She asked. “Do you monitor us?”
“We have to,” Dr. Chang said. “It’s not that we don’t value your privacy or anything of that sort. No, we leave you alone when you need to be alone. This is to make sure that you aren’t putting yourself in any danger. We do this because we care about you.”
“That sounds like you’re stalking us.”
“No, dear. You’re being monitored for the same reason as everyone else; we want to see if you make any progress. You all have relatively normal lives yet some of you go through changes faster than others. We just want to know when you go through your change.”
“What is that change going to be?”
“You’ll see. You will start to feel different. Your body will go through various changes as well. You might be getting your menstrual period sooner or later than expected. You might go through menopause earlier than most women. Your immune system might get stronger but you will feel weak at first. There might be some emotional changes as well. It’s nothing to be alarmed with. You’re just changing and learning to adapt to your surroundings.”
Jackie shuddered. “Do you know when that will happen to me?”
“It’s hard to say. It changes for every experiment. You will know when you’re going through everything,” Dr. Ch
ang assured her. “Try not to think about it, all right? It’s confusing and you feel like you have no freedom. That’s not true though. We allowed you to grow up and be what you wanted to be. We have no problem with the fact that you work in a pharmacy or that you are a lesbian. We don’t care about what you have interests in. We just care about you.”
“You have a funny way of showing it.”
“It may feel that way, but this is all done for your own good,” Dr. Chang promised. “You are a very special person, Jackie. All of your siblings are special to us. You were designed to be everything that people want in a person. You may not feel that way right now but you are perfect. You’ll see it one day.”
Jackie sighed. “How do you determine what makes a person perfect?”
“There are a lot of factors that go into this. The end result is always spectacular. Now here’s my advice to you and your siblings,” Dr. Chang got serious. “Don’t dig any deeper than you have. You won’t find much. Do it for your own health. Do it for your family. Don’t question anything anymore.”
“Is that a threat?”
“No, that’s me telling you that you have nothing to worry about. Don’t go looking for something that isn’t there.” Dr. Chang stepped away. “I’ll let you get back to work now. Remember my words.”
With that, she turned on her heels and walked away. It was so easy for her to say, yet something was off about the whole thing. Jackie went into the bathroom and felt around the inside of her mouth. If she was lucky, her wire was probably located in her mouth as well. She just didn’t know how she was going to cut it out. None of her teeth were loose enough to remove yet. She had one wisdom tooth that was buried into her gum but it wasn’t bothering her. She didn’t need to have it taken out. It was just annoying to know that they were watching her every move. She wanted to know what her serial number was and how she could remove it.
She poked again at her gums to see if she could feel it. If she could pinpoint where it was, maybe there was a prayer in getting it out. She didn’t want to be their lab rat anymore. She wanted her freedom. The sooner she could find this wire, the sooner she would be out of Project 99’s grasp.
