The World Forgot

by Martin Leicht

  “You’ve taken, like, six vials already,” I mutter. “I hope you’ve got a sugar cookie hidden away somewhere.”

  “We’ll make sure you’re replenished.”

  By “replenished” Marsden means more needles—the kind where stuff goes into your arm as opposed to being drawn out of it.

  “I bet people wouldn’t mind your taking over the world so much if you guys had sugar cookies.”

  Marsden chuckles and shakes his head. “I do so prefer you this way,” he says, a please-kick-me-in-the-teeth level of obnoxious smile on his face.

  “What, you mean lucid?”

  “I was going to say ‘chipper,’ but why split hairs?”

  “Quick question,” I say. “I mean, not that I’m not enjoying all this blood-taking and awesome bonding time with my baby’s kidnapper, because, whew boy, it’s been a hoot! But, uh, you mind sharing why you still haven’t cracked the secret to hybrid fertility, even after all this time? I thought you were supposed to be a mad genius.”

  Marsden doesn’t seem offended in the slightest. “Even mad geniuses must work through the science to reach their goals.”

  “So how come I get to have all the needle-pointy fun? Why do the others miss out?” This is my supersneaky way to try to figure out what Marsden has done with my friends.

  “Don’t worry. Mr. Archer has had his fair share of needle pokes.”

  So Cole’s still alive, and even if they’re poking and prodding him, that’s a good thing. But . . .

  “What about Ducky?”

  “Ducky?” Marsden asks. Like I just ordered something that wasn’t on the menu. I feel my stomach go icy.

  “Donald?” I say. “Floppy hair? Skinny arms? Probably barfed a few times by now?”

  “Ah, yes. Your human comrade. He’s here. But what use would I have for his DNA?”

  I settle down a bit. Ducky’s alive. “So Duck gets a free pass from all these good times just for being normal? That hardly seems fair—not that I’m suggesting you start poking him, too.”

  “I’m looking for an evolutionary breakthrough for a superior species. I don’t have time to muddle with apes. And to save you some more sleuthing, your redheaded hybrid friend is alive as well. Her samples are a helpful baseline to compare yours against. So no one’s been executed. Does that satisfy you?”

  “I suppose,” I say. “Unless you’re still considering my offer to have you surrender?” The snort from the doorway belongs to Chloe, who has been standing quietly at attention since she brought me here from my cell. I pretend to ignore her, even though what I’m saying is as much for her benefit as ­Marsden’s, if not more so. “You know the Jin’Kai leadership will never understand what you’re trying to do here. You could come with us.”

  “Come with you?” Marsden lets out a snort of his own. “To where? Another Almiri prison?”

  “I’m guessing it’d be better than getting sliced up by Devastators, or Kynigos, or whatever the hell you want to call them. Who knows? In time maybe you and the Almiri could work together to find a way to help both of you.”

  “You seem to miss the point of what I’m trying to do here, Elvie,” Marsden says. “The point is not to help everyone. It’s to help me. My people. I don’t care one wit about any of the rest of it, one way or the other. Hybrids, humans, Almiri, it makes no difference to me whether any of you live or die. I will be the savior of the Jin’Kai people. That’s all that matters.”

  “If that were what you really believed,” I say, wincing as he pulls the needle out of my arm and slaps a gel patch over the wound, “then you’d be looking for allies, instead of seeing enemies everywhere. You aren’t a messiah. Hell, you’re not even a patriot. You’re a genocidal, racist piece of—”

  I don’t get to finish the epithet, because that’s when Chloe clocks me across the jaw, sending me flying off the exam table onto the floor.

  “Shut your filthy mouth, mutt,” she hisses at me.

  “That’s quite enough,” Marsden snaps, his voice slicing through the room like a knife. Chloe freezes up and stands at attention.

  “Apologies, Doctor,” she says. “I only meant—”

  “Be quiet. Act out again and there will be punishment. Do I make myself crystal clear?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Chloe resumes her place by the door, her face sullen and red with shame, and Marsden lifts me up to my feet and guides me back to the table. He holds my head in his hand, examining my jaw.

  “I’m fine,” I tell him.

  “I’ll be the judge of that,” he replies. He gestures toward Chloe. “You’ll have to forgive it.”

  “‘It’?” I say, pulling away from him. “That’s my daughter, asshole.”

  “No, I’m not,” Chloe shoots back.

  “Look.” I wrench my head around on my neck to face my daughter in the doorway. “They may have stolen you away, experimented on you, and filled your head with nonsense, but I gave birth to you, dammit. You literally shot out from my down below.”

  “And thank you so much for the imagery,” she sneers.

  “You really want to stay here? He just called you an ‘it.’”

  “I will play an important role in the future of the Jin’Kai people,” Chloe tells me, as if she’s reading from a pamphlet.

  “Oh, and what role is that? Is there a cheerleading team on this station? Because no daughter of mine is ending up a cheerleader.”

  When Chloe replies, there is more than a hint of pride in her voice. “I will host a new test subject, one with the engineered potential to save the Jin’Kai from extinction.”

  That’s it. I snap. Snap hard. I’m on top of Marsden, clawing at his face. “You’re going to make her a breeder, like you tried to do with me?” I screech. “She’s not livestock, you rotten son of a bitch. I’m not livestock. We’re people.”

  Marsden easily lifts me away from him, and it’s Chloe who roughly slams me facedown on the table and binds my hands behind my back.

  “Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong, Elvie,” Marsden informs me coolly. “You were always livestock. Up until now you’ve just been free-range.”

  “If you think for a second that I’ll allow you to violate my daughter like you did all those other poor girls—”

  “No one’s violating anyone,” Chloe says, spinning me around. “I will be paired with a suitable partner, and I will nourish his offspring.”

  “Jesus Christ,” I spit. “Chloe, don’t listen to another word this man tells you, please, I’m begging you.” Pain I can handle. Needles? Tests? Do whatever you want to me, Marsden. Just leave my poor daughter out of it. “You don’t have to be paired with anybody. You should get to be a normal kid. Go ask Bok Choy out for a Coke or something, if he’s the one you like, but don’t wait for this shit monster to pair you.”

  I can see from the way Chloe flinches that I’ve inadvertently hit a nerve. Meanwhile, Marsden’s too busy looking smug. “I had forgotten your charming nickname for our little friend from the Echidna,” he tells me. “But don’t fear, Chloe. That creature would never be your match. He’s far too rudimentary a subject to use for our purposes.” He’s jotting down notes on his lap-pad, about my samples, I’d wager. Hardly giving either of his “livestock” and our futures any mind. “I hadn’t yet analyzed your hybrid DNA when I first started growing that one,” he continues. “I hadn’t even solved the decay problem at that point.”

  “Decay?” I say the word, but I can see in Chloe’s confused face that the question is on her mind as well. “What do you mean? Bok Choy will . . .”

  “Yes, in that first generation of subjects the gene accelerator unfortunately causes their cellular structures to break down fairly rapidly. The life span is far too short to create desirable offspring. Hardly a trait I want contaminating the results of future testing.”

  When Chl
oe sees me looking at her, she turns quickly away and wipes at her face as stealthily as she can.

  “I’m sorry,” I say softly.

  “It’s all right,” Marsden replies. “I corrected the flaw in the second generation. There were some promising results with that round as well, as with the third and fourth. Soon enough I’ll have a match suitable for you.”

  “Me?” I ask, jolted out of my empathetic mother-daughter mind-meld.

  “Of course,” Marsden says. “You. This one. The redhead. I’ll need all the reusable hosts that I can get. Time is running out, after all.”

  • • •

  As Chloe leads me back to my cell, she walks with her head high, staring stonily ahead. But the wetness around her eyes doesn’t lie.

  Maybe I’ve found a crack in her armor.

  “I really am very sorry,” I tell her.

  “Shut it,” she snaps.

  “Marsden’s a monster,” I tell her. “You can see that, can’t you? He’s brainwashed you, Chloe. You’re a whole person, not some sort of breeding sow to be used up and discarded. You’re not even Chloe. You know that, right? Your name’s Olivia.” She squeezes painfully on my arm, but still I keep talking. “We could find a way out of here,” I say, my voice low. “There’s a way, I’m sure of it. My mother escaped. We can too. Get home somehow.”

  “I said, silence,” she tells me, wrenching my arm again.

  “If he’s so blasé about Bok Choy’s life,” I gasp through the pain, “what do you think he’ll do with you once you’re not useful to his research anymore? Or your baby?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she says. “So long as it’s in the service of the Jin’Kai empire.”

  “You cannot be this stupid,” I groan. “Not with half my genes.”

  She stops dead in her tracks and shoves me against the wall.

  “Listen, mutt. The doctor said not to hurt you again, but there’s all kinds of things that I could do to you that he’d never notice. Understand me?”

  She’s trying to sound tough, but her voice is trembling. I can feel the hurt coursing through her. My poor baby, I think. I’m so sorry I couldn’t stop them from doing this to you.

  “Look, you’re confused, I understand, but I’m your mother. I can help you. Maybe if we could get out of here, we could even help—”

  “What’s going on here?”

  We both turn to see Bok Choy standing in front of us, his arms crossed over his chest.

  “Nothing,” Chloe says, straightening up. “Just returning the prisoner to her cell.”

  “It doesn’t look like nothing,” he says. He approaches us and notices the swelling on the side of my face where Chloe hit me. He gives Chloe a harsh glance.

  “Chloe . . .”

  “Just . . . get out of my way!” she blurts out. Pulling me along, she brushes past Bok Choy.

  I don’t say anything the rest of the way. In her current state she wouldn’t even hear me if I tried.

  But I’m not done trying yet, Olivia.

  • • •

  “Think, Elvie,” I mutter to myself as I pace the room. “Think, think, think.”

  The door lock clicks open and distracts me from what I’m sure was about to be an absolutely brilliant escape plan. I back up against the far wall in a defensive position. What could they possibly want with me again so soon? They just extracted who-knows-how-much genetic-material-slash-unsavory-inside-fluids.­ I doubt there’s anything useful left in me at this point.

  The door slides open, and Bok Choy steps into the room. A duffel bag is slung over one shoulder.

  “You going somewhere?” I ask him. “Do evil alien commandos get sleepovers?” I look past him into the hallway, but Bok Choy is alone this time. I rub the sore spot on my upper arm. “What do they want now? Don’t tell me Marsden’s discovered a way to save his species with my spit.”

  Bok Choy motions toward the door silently.

  “What? Come on, speak. I know you can. You’ve learned quite a bit of English since I saved your life on the Echidna.”

  Again he motions me toward the door without saying a word.

  “I’m sorry, sweetie,” I say, folding my arms across my chest, “but stubborn crankiness is about all I have left at the moment, so I’m going to have to insist that you convey your evil alien demands to me out loud. I’m in no mood for pantomime.”

  Bok Choy leans his head back out into the hallway, looking side to side. I notice for the first time that he isn’t holding his weapon—it’s holstered at his hip with the clip fastened tightly.

  “What’s going on?” I ask. There’s a feeling of anticipation rising in my gut, and I can’t tell if it’s hope or fear. Either way, it’s a good thing they don’t feed me much in here, or I’d be ready to yak all over the place. Bok Choy moves to me quickly, a nervousness in his step. He leans in, and for a split second I think he’s going to kiss me, which would be all kinds of weird, since it wasn’t that long ago that I saw his six-year-old didjeridoo.

  “I’m here to rescue you,” he whispers into my ear.

  I jerk my head back and stare at him. His face is just as terrified as his voice, and his eyes are bulging wide. His chest moves up and down rapidly. It’s the first time I’ve seen one of these superaliens even close to hyperventilating.

  “You’re here to res—” I start, before Bok Choy clamps a hand over my mouth.

  “Shh!” he shout-whispers. “We don’t have much time. There’s about to be a guard shift in five minutes, and I think we might have a chance of getting you all out of here.”

  “Why are you doing this?” I ask. If I sound suspicious, it’s because I totally am. (Although, to be honest, I cannot fathom what could be in it for Marsden to attempt to trick us like this. He might be a megalomaniacal madman, but mind-dickery just for the sake of it doesn’t seem like his style.)

  “I don’t know a lot,” Bok Choy says. “I mean, I’m learning things, but it’s all very fast and confusing. I know I haven’t . . . been here very long. I know there are things I can’t understand yet . . . but there are things I just know. No, that’s not the right word. Things I . . . feel.”

  Bok Choy takes the bag from his shoulder and hands it to me. I open it and find a spiffy zip-front sheath jacket. I slip the jacket on right away, immediately appreciating the warmth of the fabric. I hadn’t realized how cold I’d been in here.

  “It fits perfectly,” I marvel, stretching out my arms. “How did you—”

  “I’ve got an eye for sizes,” Bok Choy replies with a shrug.

  “But”—I switch over to a slightly more important topic of conversation—“aren’t you going to get in a lot of trouble for this? Like, the kind of trouble that gets you dead?”

  Bok Choy examines the floor as he speaks. “The doctor . . . ,” he begins. “He tells us things. How he says things are. I’ve listened to him, and I’ve believed him, because, I don’t know, I just have? Like there was no reason not to. I had no choice. But the things he’s done here, the things he’s doing. The things I’ve helped him with. None of it seems right. But you . . .” And that’s when he looks up at me. “You sang to me. You’re the only one who’s ever done that. You sang to me when I was scared, and showed me kindness. Yours is the only kindness I have ever known.”

  Who says show tunes can’t unite warring nations?

  Without really thinking what I’m doing, I reach out and touch Bok Choy’s cheek. It’s a very motherly gesture, I realize.

  Hard to believe you don’t have much time left, I think, remembering what Marsden told me about Bok Choy’s “viability.” But I say nothing. I have a strong suspicion that the poor kid doesn’t know.

  “I think I figured out what my daughter sees in you,” I tell him instead.

  Bok Choy cocks his head to the side like a confused puppy. “Huh?”

/>   “Nothing. We should go. Get the others.”

  Bok Choy nods. “Here.” He hands me a pair of nifty Jin’Kai manacles. “This way.”

  We come out into the hall and make our way quickly down the corridor. I keep my hands crossed in front of me, the cuffs loosely placed around my wrists so that to a passing baddie it’ll look like I’m a prisoner being transported. Bok Choy keeps a grip on my arm. When we turn a corner, we both freeze for a split second, hearing footsteps. But whoever the footsteps belong to is traveling away from us, so we continue on.

  There are five cells lining the left wall, three of them with a solid red light above the doorway. Doors I’ve passed at least a dozen times now, wondering if any of my friends might be trapped inside. Sure enough, Bok Choy taps the wall console, and all three cell doors hiss and slide open, their red lights flashing blue. Marnie pops out of the first cell, and if she’s surprised to see us, she does a good job of hiding it. I guess in her world there’s rarely any time for explanations during life-and-death situations.

  “What’s going on? How did you get out?” Cole says as he sticks his head out of the far cell and sees us.

  The center cell is quiet. No movement. I feel a growing lump of ice form in the pit of my stomach.

  “Ducky?” I call. No answer.

  I rush past Marnie and ignore Cole as he steps into the hallway, still confused by his sudden emancipation. I clamor down the two steps into the middle cell, expecting the worst. Or worse.

  I find Ducky lying stretched out on his side on the hard metal bed slab jutting out of the far wall. He’s resting his head in one hand, with the other draped over his hip. He’s looking right at me, and the smirk on his face is tight and twitchy, like he’s trying with all his might not to burst into a great big moony smile.

  “Aren’t you a little short for a storm trooper?” he asks, his voice one step away from a giggle.

  I could pop him in the mouth, but he’s just so happy at the moment that I don’t have the heart.

  “Ye wretched scamp!” Marnie chastises as she brushes past me into the cell. Ducky rises slowly from the bed, and I can tell he’s in pain. They must have done a number on him at some point—doing what, I’d rather not know.