by Alice Reeds
And instead of taking us home, they brought us here, for reasons we were still trying to figure out.
But if these were Briola recordings, did that mean…?
“He’ll agree,” a woman said—Carla?—an hour after Anthony, according to the time stamps. She sat there lazily, slouched, like she was bored or just so sure of her spiel that she saw no reason to worry or doubt. “Anthony is an ambitious man, sure, but who in their right mind would say no to two million dollars?”
Carla sounded so cold, detached, all business. Nothing like the woman Fiona had described to me while we were stuck on the island. How could she do this to Fiona, pretend to be a loving mother if this was who she really was, nothing but an actress for Briola? How fucked up did you have to be to do something like this to your daughter?
“He might love her, but eventually he’ll give in,” Carla said. “Besides, there are ways to steer him in the right direction, remember?” She raised one eyebrow and then the video cut again, the image returning to the empty chair.
The sudden quiet felt too heavy, the room too empty, too little air for the two of us to share, the sound of Fiona’s wet little hiccups warped, unreal even though I literally felt them. I closed my eyes and wished, hoped, prayed that whatever this was would end now.
I should’ve known better.
“My name is Minsar Lyel,” a familiar voice said from all around us, the sound so vast and surrounding I couldn’t breathe, my heart immediately ceasing to beat. Lyel?
My name is Miles Echo. My father’s last name is Echo. Not Lyel. I am Miles Echo. I am—
“Living in Homestead, Florida,” he said, “though I don’t understand why you need this information. Why am I here? No one gave me a clear answer to that question yet.”
Forcing myself to look…there he was, a younger, happier version of my father, the one from before my mother’s accident. No gray hair, his face a little rounder, his eyes brighter, though his brows were pulled together with a frown, his expression impatient.
“Certainly not,” he continued, and chuckled to himself, a dismissive mannerism I’d seen on him more times than I could count. “Your offer may be generous, but I assure you, I make the same amount in less than two weeks, so I truly do not see a reason why I should even consider that little bit of extra cash in exchange for my son.”
Wait, what? For years, my father had acted as though he wished I didn’t exist. I’d assumed he’d jumped at the chance to get rid of me. But could it be there was a time when things weren’t like that? Impossible, and yet…
Was I misremembering my own life?
“Brandon is worth more money than you’d be able to give me, invaluable even.” Brandon? Leon. Wasn’t that the name he said earlier? “No matter what you say and how many times you repeat it, I will not change my mind. I won’t give you Brandon, and that is final.”
My heart sank. Of course, he wasn’t talking about me. Leon was the good brother, the oldest, the rightful heir to his fortune, the invaluable one. I was…a mistake.
“Do you now understand?” a distorted voice asked once the scene changed, as did the date at the bottom. It was still my father’s interview, but his clothes were different, and so was his appearance. His hair messy, eyes red and tired, the air of confidence from the previous video gone. What had they done for him to look this way? “All we want is Brandon, that’s it.”
The date. My father’s distraught exterior. The veiled threat. The realization of how it all fit together like a punch to my guts—they killed Mom to get to him.
“No, I will not give you Brandon, no matter what.” My father’s voice was weaker now, shaky, afraid of what consequences his continued refusal would have. His heir meant enough to him that even my mother’s death couldn’t change his mind, but did that mean Briola was involved somehow? Or was it just a coincidence in timing?
Suddenly he leaned forward, his eyes wide with panic or realization, an idea perhaps, I couldn’t tell. “What if I give you Oscar instead?”
Oscar. He meant me.
Fiona gasped while the room tilted, my heart falling, my lungs collapsing, my father’s words turning my bones to broken glass and my muscles to dust. His lips moved as he continued, but I couldn’t hear a thing, my body going into shock.
Part of me always knew that my father didn’t care about me, but this was the definitive proof, the faint hope I held on to for so long popping like a balloon. I was truly unwanted. I hated it, hated myself for being so foolish and naive, but even more than that, I hated Briola for everything they’d done. For the mere possibility that they could be the ones who not only took my brother from me, but also my mother, the only parent who ever loved me.
Fiona laid her hands against my cheeks and moved my head enough to force my eyes off my father to look at her instead. Her face was blurry as tears welled in my eyes and ran down my cheeks. Something within me broke like a fragile glass statue shattering into pieces not much bigger than grains of sand. I hated showing this much vulnerability in front of others, but with Fiona, it was different, safe somehow. So I allowed myself to cry.
Eventually the videos became nothing but static. The words lost all meaning, the voices indistinguishable, my body, mind, and emotions dead, unresponsive, gone as though a part of me detached itself from this reality to save me.
The door opened, and the screens went back to white, the sound gone, and in stepped Leon. His face was unreadable, unaffected by the mess the two of us were, tear-stained faces, red stinging eyes, broken hearts and spirits.
“Do you remember now?” he asked. “Do you understand now who you are, what really happened? The FBI never saved you. You’ve been Briola property for the better part of your lives.”
Silence, oppressive, strangling, all-consuming.
“All of this is bullshit,” Fiona finally said, her voice firm, sharp, harsh, her body so tense against mine. “None of this proves a thing. Video manipulation, easy as that. CGI allows people to appear in space even though they aren’t, deepfakes are quite convincing these days, and that’s all this is.”
Not a single muscle moved on Leon’s face, nothing to give away what he thought or felt. Instead he pulled out a small silver remote and pressed a button. The screens came alive once more, but this time they didn’t show those rooms with the chair.
Fiona’s best friend Melany appeared, her face at first frozen in a smile, her hair up in a ponytail. Whatever this was, it must’ve been recorded just after school, since she wore our school uniform. The video began with someone showing a picture of Fiona first to the camera and then to Melany. Her eyes moved across the picture, her forehead creasing, before she shook her head.
“I’ve never seen this girl before,” she said with a shrug, her eyes wandering to whoever was behind the camera.
Then they did the same with Alex. We’d been friends since he offered me a stick in kindergarten, claiming it was a wand. While our friendship was never like those in movies, open and honest and full of trust, since things like that just weren’t a thing in my world, he had still been my closest friend. But, just like Melany, he also shook his head, said he had no idea who the dude in the picture was, a notion shared by three more of my friends and then a few random students from our class and a grade below. None of them recognized us, not our pictures, not our names, nothing.
I was empty, hollow, my mind a blank canvas—confusion and sadness, despair and the feeling of being so utterly, unbelievably lost. There was a storm brewing at the edge of my mind, strong enough that I wasn’t sure what would happen if it crashed over me.
“Fiona Wolf and Miles Echo, the way you think you were them,” Leon said, “were never real. They and their lives are no more than figments of both of your imaginations. Everything you think you remember is fake. Your place is here at the Villa. You are nothing more than test subjects, purchased for that purpose alone. This is you
r life, Kellie Jackson and Oscar Lyel, properties of Briola BioTech.”
Chapter Six
The Villa
I blinked, trying to understand what Leon said, but he might’ve just as well said it in Russian or any other language I didn’t know. His tone and expression were detached, making it sound like all of this was normal, okay even.
Seventeen years of our lives, all these memories I had, hobbies, events, exams, friends, summers and winters, holidays and birthdays—fake. How was that even possible? This had to be some kind of cruel joke, a prank of inhumane proportions that’d probably go viral online.
Because how, how, how could it be true? How could our entire lives be nothing but a figment of our imagination if what I felt inside was so vivid, raw, like a wound slowly being ripped open further and further exposing everything that was beneath my skin. There was an iron fist around my heart, squeezing it more and more, my lungs shrinking further and further, my brain a gelatinous mess.
I’d never felt anything like this before, an explosion beginning somewhere deep within me and slowly expanding, leaving nothing but barren land and death in its wake. I was a shell, my senses dead, my eyes open but unseeing, my ears unhearing, words a foreign concept to my tongue.
If our entire lives were lies, what if the Leon I remembered wasn’t actually real, either? What if he’d always been like this, cold, detached, following whatever rules and assignments they made for him, business over family?
But that couldn’t be. I refused to believe it.
And yet.
Betrayal ran deep within the circles I’d navigated daily, my friends and acquaintances, everything a fragile balancing act. But this was more than just a knife in my back. More than my body crushed within an iron maiden. More than any torture device humanity ever thought of. It was a pain so complete I could barely comprehend it.
Was this how Fiona felt when she found out Carla wasn’t her mother, when she saw her name listed as that of the person who sold her, or when she saw Carla’s true face on that video? There was an entire person she didn’t know, her actual mother a stranger.
Regardless of which version of our lives was true, my father’s hatred of me stayed just the same. Every version of me was destined to be seen as the black sheep of the family, unworthy of love; alive or dead, who would even care?
And then, as realization hit me, it felt like someone set my heart on fire.
If my own family was so utterly willing to reject me, sell me, kill me, didn’t care about me, why would anyone else? If they couldn’t and didn’t love me, why would anyone else?
Maybe my father was right all along, all these years of ignorance or reminders of how useless I was, stupid, the sort of person no father wanted to call his son. I tried to believe he was the ignorant one, unwilling to even try to get to know me, but maybe I was wrong. This life, being a test subject, maybe it was all I deserved.
Miles Echo.
Oscar Lyel.
Test subject.
Only alive to serve a company in their quest for…what exactly?
“What is the purpose of all this?” I asked, each word like barbed wire being dragged up my throat and across my tongue. I wasn’t even sure anymore if I wanted to know the answer, while at the same time I needed to hear this. What purpose was worth buying us for a collective three and a half million dollars, to risk our lives, to make us believe we were going to Berlin for an internship, when in reality we were never meant to arrive, to fake two sets of lives and convince our minds that they were real?
What argument did they present our parents that justified this means for their end?
Leon’s eyes scanned us up and down, as though assessing the damage the videos had done, deciding which words to use, which would hurt us most, deliver the death blow. They’d already hurt us in ways I couldn’t have even fathomed until today. He straightened his shoulders, folded his hands behind his back, his body language open like he had nothing to hide, the wolf leaving behind the sheep’s clothing for good.
“The implants you decided to extract from your necks on your own,” he began, “which, by the way, you really didn’t need do—and I advise you not to do again this time—were the purpose of your trial. These implants, although small and plain looking, are being developed for future use by the military.”
“Wait, wait,” I said, frowning. “How exactly would some implant that gives you hallucinations be helpful for the military? I doubt confusing your own soldiers is a very useful tactic.”
“You’re thinking much too simply, Oscar, on too small of a scale.” I tilted my head at his words and narrowed my eyes at him. “Essentially, one day soldiers will be able to learn skills far quicker by using these implants, especially when used to bridge the time when they’re wounded to the time they’re put into a medically induced coma, or fallen into one naturally. Time will never be wasted again, instead their minds will train and learn, think that life is continuing, possibly weeks going by while in reality it was just a day or a few hours.”
“Because they’d somehow forget that they were in combat just a minute ago?” Fiona challenged. “Come on, as if any of this would be possible.”
“You saw a bear on the island,” Leon pointed out, “and you thought it was real, didn’t you? Only to later discover, it wasn’t ever really there. It had all been in your mind. But during the time you thought it was real…were you focused on anything but survival? And in order to survive, you had to develop new skills. Trial by fire—you either learn or burn.”
It disgusted me how much sense that made.
Fiona must have thought the same, because instead of arguing further she just crossed her arms.
Everything Leon said made me sick. The military and FBI messing with people’s minds just to not waste time while their soldiers were injured? There had to be at least seventeen different laws against that.
Although, when did the government ever care if they broke the law?
Anger coiled in my stomach, flooded my veins, tainted my thoughts like drops of ink into water. All of this was impossible, so inhumane, yet didn’t unbelievable things happen all day, every day around the world? Was this really so farfetched?
“For all I know,” Fiona said, “you could be just another simulation, make-believe.”
“Kellie—”
Fiona took a step toward him. “That’s not my name!”
“You should be careful what you say and think and how you behave.”
“Or what?” I snapped.
Leon sighed, his eyes briefly rolling toward a corner of the ceiling, as though he was so over this entire conversation.
How can you do this to me? Do you really not care? Not one bit?
“If you fail your trial again,” he said, his voice chilling, “you will be sold to anonymous buyers on the dark web. Individually and irrevocably. You think we’re the bad ones?” He shook his head. “You don’t even want to know what someone else would do.”
As he ushered us out, I glanced back at the camera recording our every move, giving a silent fuck you to whoever was watching. But when I looked ahead and moved toward the door, something clicked in my mind as if it were important, though I couldn’t fathom how.
The camera in this room was mounted in the exact location Leon had looked up to when he sighed.
Chapter Seven
The Villa
“I think they killed my mother,” I said once we were back in our room. The space felt even more foreign and wrong than it had before, a sort of cold bordering on abominable. Objectively nothing about it had changed, but it made my skin crawl.
“What?” Fiona asked. “Why would you think that?”
“Looking at the video, at my father…” Just mentioning him left a bitter taste on my tongue as though the word was toxic. “The time stamps.”
“I didn’t even notice them.
But still, what does any of it have to do with your mother? She was never mentioned.”
Looking away for a moment, I shook my head in an attempt to push down the growing anger sitting in the pit of my stomach, control it no matter how difficult it was. So many years had passed since she died. I thought I’d accepted it, moved on as much as that was even possible, but it was clear I hadn’t. The pain flared up again like I’d lost her only yesterday.
“You saw the way he changed,” I said. “The distraught look, the panic, red eyes and everything.” Part of me felt sorry for my father, the pain on his face so familiar to my own, but another part could feel only hate. It was his fault, even if he wasn’t the one who carried it out. “The dates matched; the first ones before, the last after. They hadn’t mentioned her, but it was there between the lines. They killed her to put pressure on him. And yet she died for nothing. Leon still ended up here, even if he isn’t a test subject.”
“Bastards,” Fiona spat. She pulled me into a hug, close yet never close enough, her warmth against me, her arms holding on to me. I was grateful for the silence, for the lack of throwaway lines others would use in moments like this. None of it was our fault. None of it was something we could change or influence. The past was long gone, and while my mother’s body was buried six feet under, my father sat on a mountain of money, satisfied to finally be rid of me and Leon and everything that could remind him of his guilt.
Did he even feel any? Was he capable of that, of emotions other than disliking me, blaming me for a mistake he made, for something I never wanted any part in?
“You’re shaking,” Fiona said. I hadn’t even noticed. “I wish I knew something wise to say, but at this point, fuck these bastards is the only thing coming to my mind.”
An unsteady little chuckle escaped me. “That is very wise, you know, and very true.”
“You don’t deserve this, and neither did your mother, or even Leon. Though I won’t lie and say I didn’t feel like punching him in the face back there.”