Unforgotten

by Jessica Brody

  I do.

  Those two little words feel like buoys drifting up from somewhere unknown to rest beneath my feet, to keep me afloat. Making me weightless.

  But which question was he answering? The one about seeing the sunrise? Or the snow? Or the one about me? About what he thinks when he looks at me?

  It has to be the first. Or the second. The sunrise. Or the snow.

  Except I know it’s not.

  I know like I know which way is up. Like I know that if I stop swimming I will drown.

  I know which question he was answering. Regardless of what he makes of the snow and sunrise and stars, he thinks I’m beautiful.

  And somehow that changes things.

  I don’t know how. I don’t know why. I don’t even know what is different, but I know that it is.

  We’ve managed to drift a few feet apart and I start to swim toward him. But my foot seems to be caught on something below. I attempt to yank it free but I’m unable to.

  And then suddenly I’m being pulled downward. With incredible force. My head drops below the surface of the water. Through the ripples of the current I hear Kaelen call out my name.

  I fight to pull myself up, managing to break through. But once again, I feel a tug on my leg, dragging me downward.

  Kaelen swims toward me, grasps my hand. But our fingers are wet and slippery, they slide right through.

  “Kaelen!” I yell, reaching for him. The hold around my ankle is firm and I’m suddenly back under.

  It’s just like my nightmare. Except everything is upside down. Everything is reversed.

  It’s not Kaelen attempting to hold me under. It’s him attempting to keep me afloat.

  The water floods into my open mouth, threatening to suffocate me. I try to cough it out but it just won’t expel. I kick and thrash in vain. My hand reaches up, grappling for something to hold on to.

  I feel the cold metal of my locket chain around his neck. I clench my fingers around it and pull. It snaps and plummets into the water with me. I clutch it tight, struggling with slick fingers to open the clasp.

  I manage to pry apart the tiny door just as the water streams into my lungs. Arctic and salty. Tasting of loss. Just like in my dream, I have no choice but to let it in as I’m dragged farther and farther into the unknown depths of the sea.

  I don’t resurface.

  51

  VIAL

  The next thing I know, I’m coughing up water on a cold concrete floor. The salt burns my throat and my lungs but I finally get it all out. I blink and look around me, shuddering from the cold wet clothes clinging to my body. I’m in the middle of a long, narrow room with a domed ceiling that appears to be made of glass. Above it is dark swirling water. Either it’s moving or we are.

  The locket lies by my hands. The chain is broken. Yet again. I scoop it up and place it in the pocket of my drenched pants.

  Next to me stands a man in a rubber suit with a mask. He has a metal tank strapped to his back. A thin cord winds around to a device in his mouth. I presume it’s some kind of contraption for breathing underwater.

  “You nearly drowned me!” I accuse him, my voice still raw from the coughing and the scratchy water.

  He pulls the device from his mouth and exhales. “Sorry about that. I had to get you away from your friend.”

  With effort I push myself to my feet and attempt to stand. I’m still wobbly and soaking wet. A puddle forms at my feet. “Why does everyone keep calling him that? He’s not my…” But I stop talking. It’s not even worth trying to explain what Kaelen is to me. Especially when I’m not quite sure myself.

  “Whatever he is,” the man goes on, “Dr. Maxxer gave me strict instructions to bring you alone.”

  “Maxxer,” I say softly, glancing at my surroundings with new eyes, feeling the same peculiar animosity course through me at the mention of her name. “She’s here, isn’t she?”

  He nods and pulls the mask from his face. I immediately recognize his small eyes, round nose, and pinched mouth. But I can’t think of where I might have met him before.

  He smiles. “I’ll take you to see her now.”

  He gestures toward the end of the narrow room and I start to walk but eventually drag to a halt. “But wait. What about my … what about him?” I point upward at the domed glass ceiling, into the swirling sea.

  I’m surprised to hear myself ask the question. I shouldn’t be worried about Kaelen or where he is or whether or not he drowns out there. Without even trying, I somehow managed to accomplish my goal. I found Maxxer and at the same time was able to evade him. Plus, I have the locket. Which means everything is going to be okay. I can get the cure, transesse back to Zen, and, hopefully, this will all be over in a matter of hours.

  But then why do I feel so awful?

  Why do I feel so hollow?

  I can’t possibly want him to be here. He would only cause complications. He would only get in my way. He was sent here to get the cure for Alixter—my enemy. And then most likely, he was planning to bring me back with him.

  So why on earth would I care that he’s not here?

  I don’t.

  I won’t.

  “Maxxer only trusts you,” the vaguely familiar man explains. “She won’t allow anyone else admittance on this vessel.”

  I try to respond. But even a simple word like okay has trouble making it past my lips. It gets lodged somewhere in the middle, choking me.

  I cough, expelling another few drops of seawater.

  “Right this way,” the man says. He opens a door at the end of the domed-top room and we walk through it, down a dark corridor. When he leads me through the second doorway, at the end, I have to stop. A small gasp escapes my lips as I gaze upon the miraculous giant chamber that lies before me.

  It’s two stories high with floor-to-ceiling windows that look out upon miles and miles of black ocean. An artificial fire roars in a clear cube-shaped fireplace in the center of the room. A curved sateen sofa sits atop plush white carpet, forming an S shape around a glass coffee table with a single white flower in a vase in the center. A winding spiral staircase coils up to a second-floor loft that overlooks the entire room.

  On either side of the staircase stands a very large, very burly man. They are dressed in matching white uniforms from head to toe. I find their imposing placement odd, but I refrain from remarking on it.

  “I can’t believe we’re underwater,” I say instead. To no one in particular.

  But it’s a familiar woman’s voice that answers me. “Pretty spectacular, isn’t it?”

  I look up in the direction of the sound. Dr. Rylan Maxxer stands on the balcony of the loft gazing down at me. She looks exactly the same as I remember her. Silvery-gray hair cut bluntly across her forehead and along her shoulders. Black-rimmed glasses hugging her slender face. A short frame so slender it makes her look slightly emaciated.

  I’m not sure why, but somehow I knew I would someday see her again. That the day we said goodbye was not the end.

  But what I didn’t expect was the way I would feel when I did.

  That unusual hotness starts to gurgle in my stomach. It bubbles up, stinging my chest. I suddenly feel furious. Outraged. Which is ridiculous because I clearly have no reason to be angry. Maxxer has only proved to be an asset.

  She helped me when I needed it.

  She answered all my questions about Diotech and transession and my past.

  In fact, she brought me back to Zen.

  And now she’s led me here.

  Maxxer is an escapee. Just like me. She fled Diotech after she discovered how corrupt they had become. How immoral Alixter really was. We are the same in that way.

  But that doesn’t stop me from feeling this strange, unfounded rage when I look upon her. It’s not powerful. Almost subtle. Like it’s brewing below the surface, heating behind my eyeballs, simmering in my chest.

  I attempt to push the feeling away.

  Maxxer descends the stairs, looking somewhat ele
gant despite her plain black pants and red sweater.

  When she reaches the bottom, she walks toward me and takes my hands. “Sera,” she says with a bright, beaming smile. “Welcome to my command center. So nice of you to come.”

  I have to laugh. “You didn’t give me much of a choice.”

  She chuckles at my comment. “Sorry about all the theatrics. You see, I simply had to do it that way. I couldn’t risk you getting caught and your memories being scanned. This was the only way I knew how to get you safely to me. And to protect my location.”

  “Actually,” I begin, “about that…”

  She tilts her head and gives me a skeptical look. “What is it?”

  “Diotech did scan my brain. And somehow they knew that you left me those memories.”

  She nods. “I was afraid of that. They must have seen the imprint.”

  “Imprint?”

  “There are only a handful of computers capable of creating time-delayed recalls and I have one of them. Each one imprints the memory with a special code, like a brand, signifying which computer created it. That’s how they would have immediately known it was me who implanted them. But as long as they weren’t able to access them, we should be safe.”

  “Yes, but,” I continue, a dull pain starting in my chest, “they sent someone to follow me here. An agent. Except he’s different from all the others. He’s … like me.”

  “Only better.”

  I leave this part out.

  She inhales sharply, clearly not expecting this. “And where is he now?”

  The dull pain starts to stab as I nod toward the windows. “Out there somewhere. I don’t know. I was pulled under and he was left behind.”

  Maxxer flashes a satisfied smile in the direction of the man who led me here. “Well done, Trestin.”

  He nods tightly in response.

  “Don’t worry,” Maxxer replies gently. “He’s long gone now. We’re a good three miles from the coordinates I directed you to. Another precaution I took. Trestin was instructed to transesse there and back with you. So it seems as though we’ve outsmarted them.” She beams again.

  I smile, too. Because it feels appropriate. A minor triumph over Diotech. But the subtle celebration distresses me. Makes my stomach flip. It feels so … so …

  Wrong.

  I don’t speak, however. I reassure myself that Kaelen can’t drown. He’s a strong swimmer. Like me. Plus, he can transesse out of the water whenever he wants. He won’t stay there.

  This eases my discomfort.

  He can’t find us. But he won’t perish either.

  For just a moment, I allow myself to hold his face in my mind, focusing on his bright aquamarine eyes and creamy white skin. I wish him a silent goodbye. I’ve won. And that means I won’t be seeing Kaelen ever again.

  Exactly as it should be.

  And yet, somehow, I always thought victory would feel … I don’t know …

  Better.

  Dr. Maxxer strolls over to a counter indented in the far wall. It is backlit with a soft blue light and stocked with numerous bottles of liquid. “Would you like something to drink?” she asks. “We have a fully stocked bar.”

  I shrug. “Sure.”

  I watch as she removes two glasses from a shelf, drops a few ice cubes into each, and pours a fluorescent green liquid over them.

  “Trestin,” she says sweetly to the man who brought me in here, “give us a few minutes to catch up, would you?”

  The man eyes me and I swear I see doubt flash over his face. “You’ll be okay?”

  She smiles and gestures toward the two men in white still standing motionless on either side of the staircase. “I’ll be fine.”

  “Of course, Doctor,” Trestin replies, and then disappears through the door, closing it behind him.

  Dr. Maxxer invites me to sit on the S-shaped couch and I oblige. She takes a seat next to me and hands me one of the glasses. I stare down at the strange green drink with trepidation.

  “It’s an energy drink,” she tells me with pride. “My own creation. I modified the molecular structure of caffeine to make it ten times more potent without the jitters or the crash.”

  I’m not sure what most of those words mean but I smile politely regardless.

  “Who are they?” I ask, glancing at the men in white.

  “Bodyguards,” she says bluntly.

  “To protect you against me?”

  She laughs and takes a sip of her drink. “Heavens, no.” But I notice that her voice rises a few octaves when she says it and she doesn’t make eye contact with me. Instead she hides her face behind her glass. She swallows and presses the bottom of it into her palm. “To protect me against the unknown. It’s a crazy world we live in.” She gestures to me and herself. “Full of so many surprises. Don’t you agree?”

  “Yes.” I sniff the drink. It smells rancid and bitter. I place it down on the table.

  “But don’t worry,” Maxxer assures me, “we can speak freely in front of them.” She leans in close and whispers, “I adjust their memories at the end of each day.”

  I shoot a wary look toward the men in white, feeling sorry for them. Then I eye the door through which the man who brought me here just disappeared. “Why did he look so familiar to me?” I ask.

  Maxxer’s gaze shifts uneasily toward the door. “Trestin?” She swats her hand in the air. “Oh, he has one of those faces.”

  “One of those faces?”

  “Meaning he looks familiar to everyone regardless of whether you’ve met him or not.” Her knee starts to bounce.

  Why does she seem so nervous?

  “But I have met him,” I argue. “I’m almost certain of it.”

  “I’m sure you have many questions,” Maxxer says dismissively, “but first I believe we have some business to settle.”

  I raise my eyebrows. “We do?”

  She takes another sip of her drink. “Of course. It’s the reason you came, isn’t it?”

  “The cure,” I say automatically.

  She exhales, seemingly in relief. “Yes. I imagine Zen is very sick.” She sighs apologetically. “An unexpected side effect of DZ227, I’m afraid.”

  “DZ227?”

  “Sorry. It’s the official nomenclature of the transession gene. It would seem the way it was designed was simply too powerful for the human body to take in. It causes the natural immune system to attack itself, thinking it’s being infested by a virus. Anyone who has had the transplant, depending on their own chemical makeup and how often they transesse, would be dead within a year.”

  “Including Alixter,” I verify, eager to finally have the confirmation that Kaelen would never give me.

  Maxxer smiles. “Yes. I imagine that’s why he sent the agent to follow you. And why I had to take such precautions when I brought you here. He’s probably fairly ill. And fairly desperate. Which, of course, only makes you that much more valuable.”

  “Me?” I repeat skeptically.

  She cocks her head. “You have noticed that you are not affected by the gene?”

  I quickly make a move for my pocket. Out of the corner of my eye, I swear I see Maxxer flinch at my sudden motion. I withdraw the locket on the broken chain. “That’s because Rio made me this. It activates my gene when it’s open. He was worried about what the gene would do if I couldn’t turn it off.”

  “Wise man,” Maxxer commends. “But in reality, he had nothing to worry about. You’re not like the rest of us, Sera. I’m sure you’ve figured that out by now.”

  I look away. I think about the horrified look on the old Chinese man’s face when he held my wrists and declared my blood to be too strong. I think about Blackthorn, the horse on the Pattinsons’ farm, and the distrust I saw in his eyes every time I entered his stall. I think about the screams of rage directed at me as I was led through the streets of London. I think about my legs and how the fire ripped through them, shredded my skin, and gnawed at my muscle, and yet there’s not a single scar of evidence.<
br />
  So yes, I’ve figured it out. But I’ve spent the last six months wishing it wasn’t true. Wishing I was like the rest of them.

  “Your body, your mind, your genes, everything about you was perfected by science. I could transplant this gene into you a thousand times and it wouldn’t affect you.”

  She may as well just say it. She may as well just tell me what I am. Or rather, what I’m not.

  I’m not human.

  “Which is probably why Alixter had to create another synthetic being,” she adds. “Because neither he nor his other goons can transesse anymore. Without that new agent he created, they’d have no hope of ever finding me. Or you.”

  Once again, Kaelen’s face flits into my mind and my stomach wrenches with guilt.

  That’s why he wasn’t sick.

  Because he’s like me. He might very well be the only one ever to be like me. And yet I left him. I abandoned him.

  “But Zen,” Maxxer goes on, oblivious to the torment in my mind, “Zen’s body didn’t stand a chance. It was too fragile. Like the rest of us.”

  Fragile. It’s the exact right word to describe the way he looked when I left. Ready to crumble. Ready to shatter into a million pieces. On the brink of death.

  He never deserved it.

  He never deserved this atrocity.

  He never deserved me.

  Maxxer places her glass on the table with a clink and rises to her feet. “Which brings us to the reason you’re here.”

  As I watch her walk across the room, I can feel my heartbeat accelerate. And that mysterious anger begins to resurface at the thought of what will happen next. My palms feel greasy and wet. I rub them anxiously against my wet pants and stand up, following her with my eyes. She ascends the stairs gracefully, disappearing into the loft only to reappear a moment later holding a small, clear vial filled with an electric-blue liquid. She pauses at the top of the stairs, seeming to study my expression.

  “This,” she begins, “is a repressor for gene DZ227. When injected directly into the bloodstream it will permanently disable the transession gene. The immune system will cease its attacks against the body and the recipient will experience a full recovery, essentially reversing all negative effects of the gene transplant.”