The Samantha Project

by Stephanie Karpinske

  “They waited a long time to turn on your switch. They wanted to make sure you would survive so they could finally see what these enhanced genes could do. And it sounds like you really impressed them at the lab.”

  “I didn’t have a choice!” I yelled at Jack.

  “No, I’m not blaming you, Sam. I’m saying that now they know the technology works. And they aren’t going to just let it go. They see you as an asset. A very expensive asset that they own. So they’ll do anything to get you back. That’s why we need to keep you safe, Sam. You can’t be seen in town. And you can’t go running off on your own. You need to stick with us.”

  “Great. So I’m a prisoner. My life is over.” I knew Jack was only trying to help. But I was mad. I was mad at GlobalLife. I was mad at Dave for not knowing or telling me more. I was mad at my parents for not going to a regular fertility clinic all those years ago. And I was mad at Jack for acting like I had no choice but to sit in that old farmhouse for the rest of my life.

  “Can we back up a minute here?” Erik finally spoke. “So if Sam has a twin, then wouldn’t I have one, too?”

  Jack scratched his beard. “I thought about that, Erik, and I don’t know. Those old research files didn’t mention any twins. And I never heard talk of a twin when you were in the lab, not that they would’ve told me. But it would make sense for them to have initiated the twin experiment when they moved the project here, to the U.S. After having so many failures in Europe, they could have seen the need for a twin, for all the reasons I mentioned. So the truth is, Erik, it’s entirely possible for you to have a twin brother.”

  We all waited in silence, each of us trying to wrap our minds around all that was said and what the future would hold if Jack’s theories were true.

  Erik broke the silence. “So my brother, if I have one, he’d be safe, right? I mean, if GlobalLife thinks I’m dead, they would just leave him alone.”

  “I don’t know, son,” Jack said. “They could have, well, taken care of him long ago. Cleaned up any evidence that the project ever existed. Or maybe they’ve kept an eye on him all these years.”

  “Wait,” I said, thinking it through. “So if Brittany is really my twin, how is it possible that she lives in the same town where you two live? Is it merely a coincidence that you ended up living right next to one of GlobalLife’s experiments?”

  Erik and I both looked at Jack as if he was hiding more information from us. “I really don’t know. As I said earlier, the only person I ever told about living here was Dave. And that was years ago. And I said I might consider this area. I didn’t say I would actually live here. And I never said a specific town. Plus, like you said, we don’t know for sure if she’s a twin. It’s all just a theory at this point.”

  Jack’s tone was sincere but it still seemed like too much of a coincidence. “Let’s assume that she is my twin. That would mean that GlobalLife has been watching her all these years. And since I’ve gone missing, what does that mean for her?”

  Jack’s theory hadn’t included all the possible consequences for Brittany. He was too focused on his son and me. Panic took over his face.

  “We’ve got to kidnap that girl.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Drive

  “What did you just say?” The word “kidnap” got both Erik’s and my attention. “Dad, don’t be ridiculous. We’re not kidnapping Brittany.”

  “It’s either us or them. Someone’s going to get her.” Jack sat down across from his son. “Sam’s right. If Brittany is her twin, GlobalLife has been monitoring her. Now that Sam is gone, they’ll move in and take Brittany.”

  “Why? What do they need her for?” Erik asked.

  “Any number of reasons. They can use her to lure Sam back. They can lock her away in a lab so they have her when they finally retrieve Sam. Or they can—get rid of her.”

  “And what if she’s not really Sam’s twin?” Erik asked.

  “I’ll run tests and find out. That way we’ll know for sure.”

  “You have equipment for that here?” I asked.

  “You wouldn’t believe all the equipment he has. Some of it he had to make himself.” Erik turned to Jack. “So you need a sample of her DNA. That’s easy enough.”

  “But we can’t wait.” Jack got up again. “We don’t have time. For all we know, they’ve already got her. If not, they’ll be coming soon. Erik, I need you to get the sample today.”

  “No problem. I’ll go over to the high school. They’ll be outside for lunch soon.”

  “Why don’t I just do it?” I suggested. “I’ll go in the girls’ locker room. Get some clothing from her locker.”

  “No, it’s too risky. You look just like her. She sees you, she’ll freak out.” Erik got up to get his keys.

  “Well, how do you think you’re going to get her DNA?”

  Erik thought for a moment. “I’ll tell her I need to talk to her. Then I’ll flirt with her and ask her to get in the truck. She’ll start putting her hands all over me and I’ll be covered in her DNA.”

  The thought of Erik flirting with this girl made my blood boil, even though there was no logical reason for me to be jealous. The whole thing was for show. And he wasn’t my boyfriend. I just met the guy. I had to keep reminding myself that despite the strong feelings I had for him.

  “That plan is ridiculous. She’s not gonna just get into your truck.” I hoped my comment would make him change his plan.

  Jack sighed. “Trust us. It’ll work. The girls in this town love Erik. He’s a good-looking kid. That’s why I try to avoid taking him into town with me. We can’t go anywhere without girls coming up to him. When Brittany sees him paying attention to her, she’ll go wherever he says, even if it’s just to make her boyfriend jealous.”

  Erik cheeks turned red. “Okay, Dad. That’s a bit of an exaggeration. I’ll be back soon. Get your lab ready. See ya, Sam.”

  I didn’t answer, still angry that he was going to flirt with Brittany. Jack wasn’t exaggerating about his son. Any girl would be drawn to Erik. He was gorgeous and he didn’t even realize it—a rare quality.

  I had never been the type of girl who gets jealous over a guy, especially one I just met. But somehow I had turned into that girl after meeting Erik. If I reacted that way, it was easy to see that someone as boy crazy as Brittany would follow Erik wherever he told her to go. And she would definitely have her hands all over him.

  While Erik was gone, Jack hid himself downstairs in the room with all the computers and lab equipment. I took a shower, then changed into one of Erik’s t-shirts while I waited to put on my one and only outfit, which was still in the dryer.

  As I got ready, I wondered how I would feel if Brittany really was my sister. Part of me was excited to think that I might have family again—an actual sister. I wondered how Brittany would react to the news. I figured that she wouldn’t be too happy after finding out that I’d grown up in a safe, healthy home with two parents when she was stuck with a drunk mother and hardly anything to eat. I wished I had known about her years ago so I could have helped her.

  Within an hour, Erik was back. He took off his shirt and gave it to Jack.

  “Everything’s ready,” Jack said. “Sam, swab the inside of your cheek. That’s easier for me to analyze than the cells I have to use for Brittany.” I did as he said. Jack took the samples and disappeared into his lab.

  “Doesn’t it take weeks to do DNA analysis?” I asked Erik, who was sitting next to me on the sofa.

  “No, it’s actually quick. They just say it takes forever on the news and those court shows. I don’t know why. My dad will have an answer in an hour, I’m guessing. He’s studied my genetic code for years. He’s really good with that stuff. He built his own analysis software. That’s another reason the process is so fast.”

  “So how did your plan go?” I tried to act casual, but I was dying to know.

  “It went well. No problems. Easy, really.”

  I stared at him, annoyed by his
lack of details. “And? What happened?”

  “Well, when I got there, people were just starting to come out for lunch, so hardly anyone even saw me, which was good. I don’t think Brittany eats lunch. She was just sitting at one of the tables messing with her phone. I went up to her, said something about how I had noticed her, blah, blah, blah. And she got in the truck.”

  “What’s the blah, blah, blah mean?” Erik, like most guys, did not understand the importance of details.

  “I don’t remember what I said. Something about her being pretty. How I wanted to get to know her. Wanted to talk. I don’t know. Stuff like that.”

  “And what did she say?” I sounded like Allie, who used to fire questions at me before I could finish talking.

  “I don’t know. I can’t remember. Does it really matter? We have the sample.” He put his feet up on the table and leaned back, as if planning to take a nap.

  “What are you doing? You can’t sleep now. There’s too much going on.”

  “I’m tired. I got, like, two hours sleep last night.”

  “I didn’t get any sleep either and I’m not napping.”

  Erik sat up and put his feet back down on the floor, turning toward me. “Are you kidding? You slept on me on that swing for like three hours. I couldn’t move.” I could tell that it was not as big an imposition as he made it sound—that he actually liked it.

  “Oh, I didn’t realize. Sorry about that. How did I get downstairs?”

  “When I was finally able to move my legs again, I carried you down here. So I know that you got at least three hours of sleep.”

  “I guess I was really tired. I don’t remember any of that. Well, you could have woke me up.”

  “It’s okay. I didn’t wanna wake you. You’re cute when you sleep.” He smiled, knowing I was embarrassed.

  “So finish the story.” I was desperate to change the subject. “Brittany got in the truck and then what?”

  “That was it. She did just what I said she’d do. She got all flirty, and then she was all over me.”

  “All over you? What does that mean?”

  “Why are you so interested in this? Wait a minute!” He laughed. “Are you jealous?”

  “Of course not.” I moved away slightly and folded my arms.

  “Because you have a boyfriend, right?”

  “Yes, I do. I only asked about Brittany because if she’s my sister, I need to know what she’s like. That’s it.”

  He smiled again. “Okay. Then yes, she was a little more aggressive than I had anticipated. I told her I had to go and then asked for her phone number.”

  I decided not to ask what “more aggressive” meant. I had already made an idiot of myself with the 20 questions.

  “So what do you think about all that stuff your dad said?” I asked.

  “About those other kids? I don’t know. I mean, I already knew about how and why my dad got me out of that lab, but I wish he would have told me that there had been others, you know? I’ve felt like some kind of freak my whole life, thinking I was the only one.”

  I felt sorry for Erik. I’d only known about my abilities for a few weeks and felt completely alone and unsure of how I fit in the world. But Erik had lived with that for almost 15 years.

  “I guess it wouldn’t have mattered,” he said. “None of those kids survived. Well, except you.” He grabbed my hand and I could feel our strong connection again. “I guess we’ll always have to be friends because nobody else will understand us.”

  We both knew that we could easily be more than friends, but neither one of us would admit it.

  “So do you think you have a twin?” I said, not letting go of his hand.

  “No, probably not. If I did, I’m sure it would have been in those files Dad talked about. What about you? How do you feel about having a sister?”

  “I don’t know. I guess if she really is my sister, I’ll be excited. I don’t have any family left now that my parents are gone. So it might be nice to have a sister.”

  “You know your family doesn’t have to be blood relatives, Sam. Jack is totally my dad even though we’re not related.”

  “I know. Dave was like family to me. Now I don’t even have him.”

  Erik could sense the loss I felt. He let go of my hand and put his arm around me.

  Jack burst through the door of his lab and I quickly moved away from Erik. Jack didn’t even notice. He was too focused on a printout of the results. “It’s a match. She’s your sister, Sam. And yes, she is an identical twin, just as I suspected.”

  Both of them looked at me but I didn’t know what to say. I wasn’t sure how I felt. The excitement I thought I would feel wasn’t there.

  “Sam?” Erik said.

  “Okay, so she’s my sister. We pretty much knew that would be the case. So now what?”

  They stared at me again, expecting more of a reaction. When I didn’t respond, Jack gave up and moved on. “Well, we’re going to have to go get her and bring her here. She’s not safe at home or at school.”

  “She’s home now,” Erik said. “She said it was early out day at school. She asked me to come over. I have her address here.” He pulled a piece of paper from his jeans pocket.

  “Oh, now you remember this? That she invited you over?” I said under my breath, annoyed again at his lack of story-telling details.

  “Then you two go get her. It won’t matter if she sees Sam now. They’ll meet soon enough anyway. I’ll get the serum to put her to sleep.” Jack walked back into the lab and came out with a syringe.

  “You’ve got to be very careful when you get there, Erik. The place could have hidden surveillance. Leave Sam in the truck, just in case. We can’t risk her being seen. Sam, you’re only going in case something happens to Erik, got it? Let him take the lead on this.”

  “Yeah, got it,” I said, not sold on the plan but willing to go along with it.

  “Sam, when you get back I need to talk to you. I found some things in your genetic code. I’m not sure what to make of it just yet. It has some similarities to Erik’s, but yours is much more sophisticated. They put markers on the enhanced sections, so it’s much easier to see what they’ve done. Well, easier than Erik’s. It’s taken me years to figure out his sequencing and I’m still not done.”

  “Okay,” I said, not wanting to think about what he meant. I could only handle one crisis at a time. Rescuing Brittany was already more than I wanted to deal with.

  On the drive over to Brittany’s house, Erik went over his plan. He was mainly talking to himself. I was still trying to comprehend Jack’s story about Brittany being made to act as a human donor. The way that GlobalLife treated people was beyond inhumane. People were simply puppets to them. Lab experiments meant to get GlobalLife more power and more money, all while telling the world that their goal was to save lives and help the sick and the poor. The thought of it made me sick.

  “Sam, are you listening? This is important.” Erik tapped my arm, startling me. “When I carry her out, you take off, got it? You do drive, right?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Okay, so just get us out of there and then you can pull over and I’ll drive. Because I’m guessing that you aren’t sure how to get back.” Erik had taken several turns down dirt roads, leaving me completely lost.

  “We’re here,” he said, pulling up to a rusted-out double-wide trailer. It looked like it had been abandoned years ago. Tall, thick weeds surrounded all sides of it. The roof was badly dented, as if a tree had landed on it years before. The trailer was in the middle of nowhere on a dirt road, with fields of tall grass and half-dead trees on each side.

  “They actually live here?”

  Erik didn’t hear me. He was too busy hiding the syringe. “Move over here, in the driver’s seat. Keys are in the ignition. And get ready. This shouldn’t take long.”

  Erik went to the door. Brittany answered. I ducked down so she couldn’t see me. She leaned against the door as Erik talked. Her cheerleade
r uniform had been replaced with a short, tight denim skirt and a bright pink tank top that barely covered the cleavage she had created with a padded push-up bra.

  Brittany put her arms around Erik and pulled him inside. I felt sick at the thought of her touching him. Even if she was my sister, I hated having her anywhere near Erik. As the minutes rolled by, I got more and more anxious. What was taking so long? More minutes went by. She didn’t invite him over here to talk, I thought, so what were they doing in there? I tried not to think about it, but I couldn’t help imagining Brittany all over Erik.

  Suddenly the door of the trailer swung open and I saw Erik, “Open the door. Hurry.” He had Brittany in his arms and was racing back to the truck. He got in, still holding Brittany, who was completely knocked out.

  I took off, driving fast along the dirt road, then turned onto the main gravel road. There were miles of open fields and no cars. Everything looked the same in all directions. “Okay, I don’t remember where to go from here. Should I pull over now?”

  “Yeah, okay.” He put Brittany down between us. I checked the rear view mirror as I slowed down to pull over. I saw a glimmer of something in the mirror. I looked closer and saw something in the distance.

  “What are you doing? Pull over.” Erik had his hand on the door, ready to jump out.

  “There’s something back there. In the distance.” As it got closer, I could see it was a vehicle. A large one.

  Erik opened his window and poked his head out to get a look. “It’s a black SUV. Shit! You never see cars on this road, especially ones like that. Drive, Sam. Drive fast!”

  I slammed on the accelerator, keeping my eyes on the SUV.

  “Sam, watch out!” Erik yelled. I looked up to find the truck veering off the road and heading for a large tree. I slammed on the brakes and the truck jerked to a stop. Brittany’s head dropped forward, hitting the dashboard. Erik grabbed her and held her floppy body tightly against his chest.

  I drove back up on the road and then took off fast down the gravel path. Erik looked back again. “I’d say they’re at least a half mile away, but don’t slow down.” Like me, Erik had superior vision. He could see the SUV clearly from far off in the distance. “The windows are dark. I can’t see who’s driving it.”