Strange New World

by Rachel Vincent

  I’m not processing a single word she’s saying.

  When Hennessy’s arm is similarly treated, he smiles and takes my hand, then frowns when my grip doesn’t relax in his. He looks into my eyes, and recognition dawns in his expression, swift and horrible. He leans in, as if he’ll kiss me, and instead whispers what must look like something very sweet in my ear. “Dahlia 16?”

  I nod, holding back tears with sheer will.

  He whispers angry words I’ve never heard before; then his hand tightens around mine again and he turns to both sets of parents. “Will you excuse us for a moment? My future bride and I would like to admire our ink in private.”

  “Of course.” His mother hardly glances up as she accepts another glass of champagne from Waverly’s mother.

  “Hurry back!” Lorna calls after us as the cameras part to let us pass.

  Trigger is not in the hallway, and I only have a second to hope he followed Waverly to her room before Audra gives a signal to one of the cameramen, who follows us into the foyer.

  “Sorry. Not for public consumption,” Hennessy tells him with a sly smile as he slides one arm around my waist.

  Audra pouts, but she and the cameraman settle for filming us as we head up the stairs.

  “I should have known. You’re not wearing your ring. Her ring,” Hennessy whispers as we disappear down the second floor hallway. “How did none of us notice that? What the hell happened?”

  “Audra thought I was Waverly. I didn’t know what to do.”

  “Anything,” he snaps. “For future reference, the answer is anything that will get you out of the room. Off camera.”

  “And go where?” I demand softly. “I’m not authorized to open the doors!”

  “Damn it,” Hennessy whispers. He holds his arm out, staring at the ink as we walk. “Waverly’s going to lose it when she sees this.”

  “She already saw. From the hall. I don’t think anyone other than Trigger noticed her, because they were all staring at us.”

  “There has to be some way to fix this.” We stop in front of Waverly’s room and he waves his hand, but the door doesn’t open. He makes the gesture again, and again nothing happens. “She revoked my access. Waverly!” he half whispers, knocking on the door. “Let us in before someone sees us!”

  The door slides open, and he tugs me into her room.

  My clone stands in the center of the thick white rug, alone, wearing a beautiful, lacy red blouse, her hands clenched into fists at her sides. “How could you?” she growls at me, fury and grief warring behind her accusing gaze.

  Hennessy swipes one hand at the door, and it closes behind us, though we’re hardly a foot inside the room. I’m afraid to go any farther. Waverly looks like she’d like to claw my eyeballs out and display them impaled on little toothpicks.

  “Audra thought I was you, and I didn’t know how to get out of that.” I hold out my sore arm. “I didn’t mean to take your ink. I don’t even really know what this means.”

  “It means that until we can get the Caruthers sisters to replicate work it took them eight months to do in the first place”—she growls at me through clenched teeth—“you are Waverly Whitmore.”

  “This can’t be happening,” I mumble as I pace across the plush rug between my bed and my bathroom door, waiting for my mother to arrive after my frantic message to her. “This can’t be happening.”

  Dahlia 16 stands near the door, her hands clasped tightly in front of her. “Where’s Trigger?”

  “It wasn’t Dahlia’s fault,” Hennessy says. “Audra pulled her into the library, thinking she was you.”

  “Why are you defending her?” I shout before it occurs to me that anyone walking by my room would know something is terribly wrong. “This is totally her fault. She and her soldier boyfriend locked me in my bathroom, stole my clothes, and impersonated me on camera, on my own show!”

  Hennessy turns on her. “You…?”

  “We were only trying to get out of the house.” Dahlia gives him a wide-eyed, innocent look, but I am not fooled. “Lorna locked us up all night, and we need to…” She bites off the rest of her excuse. “We don’t belong here.” Her gaze finds me. “We were trying to get out of the city, and the only way to do that safely was for me to pretend to be you. But then Audra saw me, and…” She shrugs, leaving me to fill in the rest with what I already know.

  “How did you know I was in the bathroom? And how the hell did you revoke my access to my own house?” I demand. But Dahlia 16 only shrugs. Not as if she doesn’t know the answers, but as if she’s not going to give them to me. This is no naive, innocent hydroponic gardener. No typical Lakeview servant. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”

  She can’t possibly, because she doesn’t know what the Administrator threatened to do to both of us if the world ever saw her.

  “It was an accident,” Hennessy says.

  “How could you let this happen?” I turn on him, more hurt than angry. “Could you really not tell you were pledging to spend the rest of your life with the wrong girl?”

  “Waverly, calm down.” He reaches for me, and when I back away, he looks crushed. “We’re in this together, no matter what. Remember?”

  “No, now you’re in this with her. It’s not like I can go on camera without that ink.” My gaze settles on Dahlia again. “I hope you liked pretending to be me, because you just scored a starring role in my life. Every on-screen moment and every public appearance, until we can get the Caruthers sisters to replicate that pattern.”

  Dahlia’s chin trembles while she stares at the design, which is already starting to puff up a little as her skin swells. I pull my tablet from my pocket, trying not to get my hopes up. “Maybe they haven’t destroyed the chips yet, and we can—”

  “They destroyed them on camera,” Hennessy says. “You told them to, remember? To emphasize the permanence of the moment. The uniqueness of the design.”

  My finger stills on the surface of my tablet. “So this is my fault?”

  “No.” He pulls me into a hug, and this time I let him hold me. “I’m just saying we need to work together. All three of us. What’s done is done, and we need to look forward. We need to figure out how to fix this.”

  “You’re right.” I sniffle and step out of his embrace, wiping away my tears, suddenly aware of the fact that my imposter’s makeup is perfectly done, but my face is still bare. And probably puffy from crying. “Okay.” I push past my anger and frustration and force myself to focus on finding a solution. “The real problem is that she has the ink”—I glance at Dahlia’s arm, at the gorgeous, exorbitantly expensive, unique pattern that was supposed to be mine—“and I need it.”

  “And you can’t get it because…?” Dahlia still looks confused.

  “When they destroyed the chips, they lost their ability to program this pattern into the ink sleeves,” Hennessy explains. “And we asked them not to keep a backup.”

  “That’s the whole point of our design,” I add through clenched teeth. “It was supposed to be as distinctive and unique as Hennessy and I are. As our relationship is. I didn’t want people to be able to hack into the Caruthers’ database and steal it after the show airs.” I reach for her arm, then snatch my hand back without touching her, because I can’t stand for this horrible moment to feel any more tangible than it already does. “It took eight months to draw. To get every line perfect. And it was all for nothing.”

  “What’s a show?” Dahlia asks. “Audra said they were recording an episode—”

  “What’s wrong?” my mother says as the door slides open to admit her into the room.

  “Show her!” I demand as my mom swipes the door closed.

  Dahlia holds up her arm, and my mother’s confused gaze travels from the ink to her face, then to mine. She still doesn’t get it, and after a second, I understand why.<
br />
  The gardener is wearing my makeup. And my clothes. She no longer looks like the demure, tech-deficient identical my mother’s only keeping around as my personal hormone bank.

  “Dahlia?” Shock echoes in her whisper.

  “She went on camera.” I give my mother a pointed look; she’s the only one other than me who will understand how very bad this is.

  “How did this happen?” my mother demands in the deceptively soft tone she reserves for employees who’ve really pissed her off. “How the hell did you get out of your room?”

  “Your household system seems a bit glitchy today,” Trigger 17 says as my door opens to admit him. Which should not have happened.

  “They did this.” I fold my arms over my chest as he moves near Dahlia in a blatantly protective stance. “I don’t know how, but they locked me in my bathroom and stole my clothes. Then she stole my tattoo. My show. She stole my life.”

  Dahlia looks terrified, cradling her arm as if her puffy new ink is sore, though she shouldn’t be able to feel it yet. “This wasn’t supposed to happen.” She turns to my mother. “I don’t want her life or her…show. We just wanted to leave.”

  “Well, that’s no longer a possibility.” My mother pulls her tablet from her pocket and I watch as she reinstates my access to the house system and revokes Trigger’s. “Has Waverly explained to you about the ink binding? About what this means?”

  Dahlia nods. “I don’t want to be her. I can’t be her. I don’t know—”

  “Hennessy.” My mom turns to my fiancé. “Your family is waiting downstairs to celebrate with you. Will you please go make apologies for Waverly? Tell everyone she’s not feeling well, but as soon as she is, we’ll all get together and celebrate the ink binding properly.”

  “Of course.” Hennessy pulls me close and drops a kiss on my forehead, his standard classy but affectionate public display of affection. The ratings people tell me that plays well on camera, but he’s been doing it since before I signed on for the show. It’s just part of who he is. One of my favorite parts.

  “And may I trust that you’ll keep all this between us?”

  Hennessy squeezes my hand in moral support. “Mrs. Whitmore, I know we haven’t said our vows yet, but I love Waverly, and we’re in this together, all the way.”

  My anger at him melts like ice in the sun.

  “Thank you, Hennessy,” my mother says as he heads into the hallway. When the door closes behind him, she turns on Trigger and Dahlia. “Are you not aware that the Administrator wants to have Dahlia executed?”

  “We’re very well aware,” Trigger says. “That’s why—”

  “Most people who are in danger of execution would know to keep a low profile, but you decided to go on camera instead! I can’t protect you if you’re trying to get yourself killed.”

  “You were trying to protect me?” Dahlia sounds skeptical, and with good reason. But I can’t scrounge up much sympathy for her since she locked me in my bathroom and stole my life.

  “Why else would I confine you to your room on a filming day?” my mother demands, and it’s a little creepy how easily the lies seem to roll off her tongue.

  Trigger does not look fooled. “Why didn’t you just tell us what was going on?”

  “Because it was after one in the morning and we were all exhausted.” My mother waves all three of us toward the cluster of white leather furniture in my sitting area, and the dismissive gesture makes it clear that she owes him no further explanation. She’s scrolling through a document as she sits in the chair nearest the window, and though I can’t read any of it, I recognize Trigger’s picture, even in reverse. “Special Forces,” my mother reads. “The Administrator was kind enough to send me Trigger’s file this morning.”

  He doesn’t look surprised.

  Dahlia’s frown looks more scared than angry. “You spoke to the Administrator?”

  “At length.” My mother scrolls through the file, then looks at me. “This explains how they got access to our system.” She sets her tablet in her lap and leans back in her chair to study Dahlia and her boyfriend. “But what’s done is done, and controlling the damage will mean changing our plans.”

  “What plans?” Dahlia’s voice wavers, and Trigger takes her hand. The gesture looks so much like what Hennessy would do for me that for a moment, I’m transfixed, my gaze caught on their intertwined fingers.

  “I’m sending Trigger back to Lakeview this afternoon, under armed escort.”

  “Just him?” Dahlia frowns.

  “No.” His hand visibly tightens around hers. “We stay together.”

  “Even if that means sending her to her death?” my mother asks, though I know she has no intention of sending Dahlia anywhere. This is why she’s so much better in board meetings than my father is. He’s good at manipulating ideas and technology. She’s good at manipulating people.

  Trigger hesitates, and I frown at the soldier. Why would he drag Dahlia back if—

  He wouldn’t. And suddenly I understand. “You think you can escape again,” I say. “Together.”

  Trigger doesn’t reply, but my mother gives me an approving smile, pleased that I’ve come to the same conclusion she has. Then she turns back to the soldier and the gardener, standing tall in front of us, facing their fate as one. “That is one of your options—I can send you both back to Lakeview, where Dahlia will face execution. But the Administrator knows what you’re capable of now and she’ll never give you another chance to escape. Or you can accept the offer I’m about to make.”

  My mother shoots me a look, silently ordering me to go along with whatever she says. “Dahlia, before the ink bonding, my daughter and I had planned to ask you to stay with us for a while. One of the ‘anomalies’ they found in your genetic code is the production of some hormones that her body can’t make. A biological donation from you could literally change her life. And since you’ve managed to get yourself marked with her wedding date…well, we need your help now more than ever.”

  “By pretending to be her for this…show?” Though it’s clear she doesn’t really know what that means.

  “And for a few other live appearances.”

  A few? I do several a week, when school’s out. There’s no way she’s ready for that.

  Dahlia exhales slowly. Then she looks right at me. “I wish I could help you. But Trigger and I…we need to go. Now.” The waver in her voice says she’s not used to making demands, but her gaze shows no hesitance. “It’s not safe for us here.”

  “It’s safer for you here than anywhere else,” I tell her. “Here, people think you’re me.”

  She and Trigger look skeptical.

  “The Administrator knows we need your help with the medical issue,” my mother says. “She’s already agreed to let you stay, if we send Trigger back.”

  He tenses, ready to stand his ground. “No—”

  “Do you love her?” my mother demands.

  Trigger frowns, as if he’s not sure he understands the question. Which makes sense, considering that clones aren’t even supposed to have a sex drive, much less the capacity for romantic feelings. But then he looks at Dahlia, and I can see it in his eyes.

  “I think you do,” my mother says. “You two risked a lot for each other, and I don’t think you’re the kind of guy who would drag her into danger just to keep you company, when she could be safe and happy here without you.”

  “That’s not what I’m…” The conflict raging behind his features is almost painful to watch. “Dahlia, they’re right.” He takes both of her hands. “I’m not going to put you back in the Administrator’s grip.”

  “You wouldn’t be,” she insists, clearly still convinced that they could escape again. “And anyway, that’s not up to you.” Dahlia fixes a surprisingly strong gaze on my mother. “Send us both back, or let us go. Either way, we
’re leaving.”

  Panic burns like fire in my veins. Locking Dahlia up is no longer an option, not that I was ever really on board with that. She’ll have to be an active and willing participant to take my place on camera. And if she leaves or refuses to play along, I’m so screwed.

  “Before you decide to do something stupid…” My mother picks up her tablet and taps rapidly through a series of screens, then opens an attachment in an email I can’t see well enough to read. A video feed opens on her tablet. My mom stands and makes a swiping gesture from her tablet toward my e-glass screen.

  The feed appears on my wall, nine feet tall. Larger than life.

  For the half second it takes to come into focus on the bigger screen, Dahlia, Trigger, and I stare, puzzled. Then the image sharpens, and Dahlia gasps.

  “If you won’t do it to help Waverly—or to help yourself—then do it for them,” my mother says.

  On-screen, in an empty concrete room, sit dozens of girls wearing my face.

  I stare at the wall, my hands steepled over my nose and mouth, stunned beyond speech. This can’t be real. They can’t be…“Is this real?”

  “Very real. It’s a live feed,” Lorna says. “From one of the Administrator’s ‘acclimation facilities’ in Valleybrook.”

  “How are they still alive? Are there more? Or is it just these few?” I’m looking at three dozen of my sisters, at most, and while that feels miraculous, assuming Lorna isn’t lying, it leaves thousands unaccounted for.

  “All 4,999 of your identicals are alive and well in the facility,” she says. “They were scheduled to begin ‘acclimation’ for their lives outside of Lakeview until you escaped the compound, at which point the Administrator put the entire process on hold.”