6 Digit Passcode

by Collins, Abigail

  There’s a twist in my gut that makes me feel nauseous; something about this sounds all too familiar.

  “But you’re basically immortal already, aren’t you?” I shift myself towards the front of the bed, as far away from Flynn as possible, but my father puts his hand on my wrist and keeps me still. “Your bodies are machines. You can be destroyed, sure, but you can’t die. Not really.”

  “Part of us can.”

  Then it all clicks, like another puzzle piece sliding into place. Only a few more and I’ll have all the answers I need.

  “Your brains,” I say slowly as I realize it. “Your brains are human.”

  “That’s right,” my father says from somewhere to my right. “But yours isn’t.”

  ***

  I am not human – at least, part of me isn’t. I’ve been growing an artificial brain inside of my body for sixteen years, and I didn’t even know it.

  Every part of a Digit’s body besides their brain is artificial. Since the Digital War, they have been conducting research on how to make their mechanical bodies last longer. They’ve learned how to synthesize life by replacing oxygen and blood with batteries and electricity, but their attempts at creating a brain that can think and reason like a human’s and survive indefinitely have been thus far unsuccessful. Until now.

  I sit, still and silent, as Flynn explains all of this to me. I try to keep my face expressionless, but my hunched shoulders and shaking hands give me away. My father tries to put his arm around me in comfort, but I lean away; he’s just as guilty of keeping secrets from me as they are.

  I debate trying to run away, but I’m stuck in the same situation I was in when I was at the camp; even if I made it out of the building without being caught, I have no idea where I am or what to do once I’m free. I don’t know how to get home from here. I don’t even know if I still have a home to go back to.

  Flynn escorts me back to my room, clearly trying to make me feel better by telling me about all of the advancements and cures my body will bring to the world. But when she talks all I can picture is Tetra slicing into my neck to get at my brain and the prickling scars his wounds have left on my body.

  Once I am brought back to my room, I am given a meal that look delicious but makes my stomach churn so badly I have to swallow down bile just to get near enough to cover it and throw it away.

  Rin visits me while I’m lying in my bed, fighting to sleep against the buzzing thoughts in my head. She sits on the edge of the mattress and pulls her legs up underneath her, but she doesn’t look at me.

  “I am sorry that you had to find out about your past this way,” she says quietly. “I truly did have the best intentions in bringing you here; I never meant to cause you any harm.”

  She takes a deep breath – even though I know that she has no lungs and no need for air – and she looks like she’s having trouble figuring out what to say.

  “I am not a young girl,” Rin explains after a moment. “I was once, a long time ago – or, at least, my brain was that of a child.” She stops to smooth out her dress and run a hand through her hair, even though neither is the least bit tousled. “You see, I was a failed result of the same experiment that you were a success in; I was born with an artificial brain, just the same as you. But when I was a young child, my body began to reject the cells inside of me that were not human. A Digit’s body was created for me, but my brain had already suffered too much damage – it lasted less than a year after I received my new body.”

  “So, then, your brain now – ”

  “Is human, yes,” she finishes, grimacing as though the thought is painful to her. “It came from the body of a 45-year-old widower with an incurable bone disease. My body was dying, and so was the girl’s brain, so we did what we believed was best.”

  “You killed her, you mean.”

  “She was already dead. It would have been a waste not to salvage what we could from her, and I was given a new life as a result.”

  “But she wouldn’t have been dying in the first place if you hadn’t been experimenting on her brain! She was just a child!”

  “So are you. So is your brother. Can you honestly say that you would give up the chance to live forever? For you – and everyone you love – to never have to suffer again? You can help make that happen, you know. If your mother had done her part, she would still be alive, and – ”

  “ – and being taken advantage of by you! That’s why she ran away, isn’t it? Because she didn’t really want to be a part of your experiments after all.”

  “No.” Rin finally looks at me, her eyes colder than I’ve ever seen them. “Her parents died when she was young, and she promised herself that she would never let her own children go through that same experience. She feared death almost as much as she craved immortality, and she knew that the only way that she could achieve it was if we were able to create a self-sustaining artificial brain – with human thoughts, emotions, and logic. Once we had one we could run tests on, we could determine a way to synthesize them in our labs. We wouldn’t even need to experiment on humans anymore.”

  “You mean you wouldn’t even need humans anymore. Your race would become immortal while ours died out.”

  “Yes, but the new race we create together will contain the best traits of each of ours. We will be capable of every emotion you are, because our brains will be like yours. And you still believe you’re human, don’t you?”

  “Of course I do!” I spit, then bite my tongue to stop myself before I can continue. I am in Rin’s territory right now, and it would be unwise of me to make her angry.

  “Your brain is a machine. Every emotion you have ever felt has been programmed inside of you since before you were born. Your mother allowed us to remove your human brain and replace it with a collection of artificial cells while you were still inside of her.”

  I clench my hands and press my fingernails into my palms hard enough to distract myself from my own racing heart. At least that part of me is real, isn’t it? My heart is beating, and my body still feels pain. My skin can still be cut, and I can still bleed. My body is human. I repeat those words a thousand times in my head, but my brain still doesn’t want to believe them.

  “My mother loved me. She would never do something like that to me.”

  Rin sighs and her voice softens. “You’re right; she really did love you. She loved you enough to want you to have the opportunity to live forever – to never have to feel the pain she felt all her life. She may have become pregnant with you for the sake of an experiment, but that doesn’t mean she didn’t grow to love you.”

  “My mother… wanted this for me?”

  Rin’s entire demeanor changes, her expression more sympathetic and weary. The way she’s holding herself right now, I have no trouble believing that she was once a middle-aged woman, and I wonder how it must have felt for her to take the body of a young girl and use it as a mask for so many years. Seeing it from her perspective, I can almost understand why she did it, and the empathy I feel for her frightens me.

  “Your mother let herself die to keep you safe. She only ever had your best interests at heart.” She smiles at me, but there’s a hint of sadness behind her eyes. “You are very important, Everly. You could even change the world, if you wanted to.”

  Yes, I think, but I could also destroy it. And I’m not sure which path I’m on right now.

  Chapter thirty

  The next three days are filled with tests and scans, each pinpointing specific pieces of my brain to make sure they’re working like they should. I am pinned down while a machine buzzes around my head, sending volts of electricity through my skin that sting for hours after it’s over. I am put in another simulation chamber and my brain is monitored as I am faced with visions of the most basic human emotions – fear, love, hatred, desire, joy, and sadness; my brother dies, my mother is alive again, Tesla is screaming insults in one ear while Roma whispers encouragements into the other. A computer measures how my brain reacts to each of t
hese things, and compares them to the results of several subjects in the building with human brains.

  They run every test on me that they can, except for one. I know what is coming, and I know that Rin is putting it off until I’ve made up my mind. But how can I, when I know that the result of choosing the side of Division 4 will be my own death?

  Rin tells me that I won’t really die, so much as lose consciousness for a few hours and wake up inside of a body that is not my own. To properly examine my brain, she says, it has to be removed from my body. Everything inside of me that is human will die without it, and I will have no choice but to become one of them – a Digit, just like Dori. Just like the monsters that killed my mother and threatened my little brother.

  But who also saved my father, and promised to keep the rest of my family alive and bring them to me as soon as they can. Rin let Holden die for the sake of saving me, but she also let my father live as a human even though she had no reason to.

  I don’t think I’ve ever been more confused in my life.

  But there’s one thing that I do know, and that is that I do not want to become a Digit. My mother warned me in her letter about them, and did everything she could to prevent them from recruiting me. And for some reason, she ran away from Division 4, and because of that I still can’t find it in me to trust them.

  “Have you made your decision?”

  I am not allowed outside of this building. Rin tells me that it’s for my own safety, but I know it’s because they think I’ll run away the second I get the opportunity to. And it’s not wrong.

  “Do you want me to… be honest?” I ask, panting to catch my breath and wiping moisture from my cheeks; today’s simulation showed me the loss of my best friend and her parents, and gauged my reaction to it. “Or would you rather… I tell you what I know you want to hear?”

  My father shakes his head slowly and helps me out of the sim chamber, pulling one of my arms over his shoulders to support me on my trembling legs.

  “I want you to tell me what you’re thinking. Your mother never did, and her betrayal still hurts me.”

  I try to ignore the bitterness in his words, but it sticks inside of my head and echoes. He stops and holds the door open for me, and I have to hold the frame to pull myself outside. I’ve been noticing more and more lately how much the simulations affect my mood and my body; yesterday I was reunited with all of my lost family members and friends, and my skin tingled with so much joy that I had no problem making my way out of the room and down the two flights of stairs to my bedroom. But today, I am achy and tired, and filled with so much sadness that I can’t even conjure a happy memory to distract myself.

  “My mother… She did what she thought was best.” I push past the door and stumble out into the hallway; my father catches me just before I fall and helps me steady myself against his shoulder. “And I know that Rin thinks it’s best for everyone if I just let them… dissect me or probe my brain or whatever it is they plan on doing, but I don’t… I just don’t think it’s a good idea. I don’t want to do it.”

  He hums and opens another door for me, helping me across and holding the handrail as we make our way slowly down the stairs.

  “But think of all the people you’ll be helping,” he says.

  “All the Digits, you mean. Because if Rin and the others find out exactly… exactly why my brain is working the way it is, they’re going to clone it a thousand times over. If that happens, the human race will eventually… cease to exist, and the Digits will live forever.”

  “You say that like it’s a terrible thing, but think about what it really means.” I cough, and we stop in the middle of the flight of stairs so that I can catch my breath. “They’re going to be just like humans – they’ll be able to think and feel the same way you can. But they will live infinitely longer, so they won’t have to watch their loved ones suffer or… or die.”

  I barely catch his fumble, but his grip on my arm changes, and I know he’s thinking about my mother. I wonder if he still loves her, even after finding out what she was hiding from him. I wonder if he ever really loved her, the way he talks about her betrayal like she’s his enemy.

  The railing digs into my ribs, and I lean against it to take some of my weight off of my unsteady legs. “Papa,” I say, the word still tasting foreign on my tongue after all this time. “My friend, Dori… They turned him into one of them. They controlled him, made him murder someone he used to love… If the rest of the world is going to become like that, I don’t want it to be because of me. Please, you have to understand that.”

  “I do. Believe me, I know exactly what you’re going through. But you need to try and think beyond yourself for this. Imagine a world without pain, or hatred, or suffering–”

  “ – or love, compassion, empathy,” I cut him off, feeling suddenly defensive of my beliefs against my own father. “Their senses are all artificial. They don’t know what it feels like to hold someone’s hand, to feel protective of someone else… When Mama died… it hurt. And that’s how I knew how much she meant to me. But when Dori killed Holden, I could see it in his eyes – he didn’t feel anything.”

  We turn down a short hallway and the start of a second flight of stairs.

  “That’s just Division 6, Everly. They’re training those people to be mindless soldiers, and that’s why your friend acted the way he did. But Division 4 is different. They don’t want to control anyone, they just want to help.”

  “And what about the other Divisions? What do they think about Rin’s idea?”

  My father shakes his head slowly; I don’t look up at him, but I can feel the movement against my shoulder. The other Divisions don’t know about this plan; they don’t know about me. Even if Rin could somehow convince just half of them that it’s a good idea, there are still going to be more than enough – people and Digits combined – left to oppose her. And Division 6 is going to be one of them.

  “There’s going to be a war, Papa. You know that. The humans aren’t going to be very complacent being told their species is going extinct, and I know there are more than a few Digits out there who won’t like the idea of free will for everyone.”

  “War is inevitable regardless. You know that.”

  “No,” I say, trying to hold back my anger. “Not if we try hard enough to stop it. Division 6 wants to attack because they know that my mother ran away from Division 4, and they want me back so they can figure out why. If I just talk to them, explain what’s going on and tell them that a war isn’t necessary – ”

  “ – you’ll be killed on the spot, and our technology will be used against us,” he cuts me off bitterly. “You can’t just talk your way out of a war. Your mother tried, and look where it got her.”

  My heart is beating so quickly it’s making me feel dizzy again. I press my weight against the railing, letting the pain in my side distract me from the anger building in my chest. He’s not making any sense; these aren’t things that my father would say. It almost sounds like…

  I suck in a breath that rattles in my lungs and ask, “Did you ever really love my mother?”

  The look on his face is enough of an answer, but he says it anyway.

  “I did, before I found out who she really was. Through our whole life together, she never told me that her real name wasn’t Teresa, or that she wasn’t born in Division 6. I didn’t know that she was a criminal. If I had known the experiments she was involved in, and what she made you into…”

  “But she regretted it, didn’t she? That’s why she left. I think she knew that what they were planning on doing to me wasn’t right. I think she was trying to save me from the kind of life she had.”

  He pauses a couple of steps up from the doorway. “She shouldn’t have,” he says, and I shiver at his tone. “I never understood why she resented the Digits the way she did. Especially now that I’ve come to Division 4 and learned that they aren’t all as bad as they seem. In 6, they’re brutal and emotionless, but not all of them are that
way. Here, all they want is peace and freedom. They saved you from the people who were going to turn you into a war machine, or dissect you for information on Division 4. You owe them your loyalty.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say softly as we continue walking, down the remaining stairs and out the door into the hallway that leads to my bedroom. “I can’t give them that. I would rather live a short, human life than an immortal one as somebody’s puppet. Until Rin can tell me for certain the reason my mother left this place, I can’t trust her not to betray me.”

  We walk in silence for a moment, my father’s arm wound tightly around my back even though I’m feeling stable enough to walk on my own now. I think I see his lips twitch into a smile at their corners for a moment, but he won’t look at me. I wish I knew what he was thinking. After all of those years of him being such a wonderful, doting father, I am not used to seeing him acting so guarded around me.

  It doesn’t fully hit me until that moment that he isn’t really my father. We aren’t related – we never were. He may have raised me, but I was conceived in Division 4 by my mother and a man whose identity I may never know. He has no reason to treat me like his daughter now that he knows the truth, but he’s still holding me up, and he feels as warm and comforting as I remember.

  I wish the Digits had never intruded on our lives. Whoever killed my mother also destroyed my family; my brother is miles away and maybe – hopefully – still alive, and my father is resentful towards the only woman he’s ever loved.

  Maybe if I was a Digit, I wouldn’t be able to feel this kind of pain. But would I really trade that for the happy memories I use to keep my nightmares at bay? Feeling my father’s arm around me, his warmth radiating along my spine, makes me realize exactly how much I would be missing.

  “I can’t do it,” I whisper, more to myself than to him. “I can’t do what Rin wants me to. I’m so sorry, but I can’t. I don’t want anything else to change because of me. I don’t want anyone else getting hurt.”