The little girl nodded. Her mom didn’t look up from her phone.
The hallway to the bathroom was plastered in flyers announcing the next poetry reading, the latest hypnotics class, the best essential oils to help with anxiety. Inside the women’s restroom, the walls were painted a calming taupe color, and the music played over the speakers in a muted volume. At the sink, I splashed my face with water.
I noticed the bags under my eyes in the mirror. The intense days and lack of sleep were catching up with me.
I slapped my cheeks, forcing some color into them. The gold bracelet glittered on my wrist with the movement, and the conversation with Jack last night came rushing back to me. He refused to talk. Would he ever open up, or was this how our relationship was destined to be, until the very end?
I sighed.
I wasn’t even sure why I had kept the bracelet on. For Jack? For Beckett? For myself?
Later. Deal with all of it later.
I stepped outside into the hallway again, and the song on the speakers switched. A solemn, melancholy tune, a single female voice with an acoustic guitar. I’d never heard the song before, but I liked it, in a depressing sort of way.
I’d taken just two steps from the bathroom door when I saw the man.
He peered in through the front glass window of the café, clearly searching for someone, his hands cupped over his eyes to block out the sunlight. I immediately dropped to the ground.
It was Sven.
From my crouched position, I watched him go to the front door and enter the café. He scanned the patrons at the tables and couches.
My heart pounded in my chest. Blood flooded to my head. Had he noticed my empty table? My waiting notepad and pencils?
Did he know I was here?
There was no exit from this hallway, only two bathroom stalls: one for men, one for women. I couldn’t allow myself to get trapped back here.
Sven entered the line to order, his body partially blocked by the half-wall separating the order line from the rest of the café. His demeanor remained calm, unsuspecting, just another normal coffee drinker getting his daily cup of joe.
I had to make my break now, while Sven ordered his drink. The only other way out had to be through the kitchen, and if I went that direction, who knows where I’d end up. I needed to get back to the hotel, and I needed a direct shot.
I waited until Sven stepped up to the counter and started talking to the barista. And then, on all fours, I scrambled across the wooden floor, all the way to my table, praying that any weird looks by people at their seats wouldn’t attract Sven’s attention.
Staying crouched below tabletop level, I swiped the napkin with Jack’s number from the table.
The young girl was staring at me, alone at her seat.
I pulled the notepad and pencils off my table.
“Here,” I whispered. “You can have these.” I set them in her lap.
I didn’t have time to see if she accepted my gift. Sven was already handing the barista his card.
I took off in a half-squat, half-crawl toward the front door.
As I dove out the door, I bumped into a young guy with a long beard. “Sorry!” I cried.
My feet hit the sidewalk as the mid-morning air hit my face. I didn’t want to look back to see if Sven spotted me. I took off at full sprint down the sidewalk toward the hotel, adrenaline pumping through my veins.
My body shook, my mind shrieked with a million different thoughts.
This was it. This was what I was talking about. Beckett betrayed us. They wanted to separate us, to get Jack and me apart, and Beckett used his brother’s loyalty to draw Jack away from me.
Sven was the enemy. He wasn’t really working with my dad but with Vasterias and Dr. Adamson. Or my dad was the enemy, working with Vasterias, too? Or maybe my dad wasn’t even alive, and Sven was a rogue who wanted to collect the money for himself?
Or … or, all of this was one giant conspiracy.
This idea scared me most of all. Jack left me alone on purpose, Beckett never showed up, Sven wants to trap me. No one was on my side, and I’m totally alone in the world. There’s no one left to trust.
The idea sounded ludicrous and believable all at once, bouncing around in my head. Just because I didn’t fully believe it didn’t stop the thought from terrifying me completely.
I needed to call Jack. Because I needed help from someone. I had to trust someone.
I sprinted up the hotel steps and shoved past the bellman. People stared as I ran across the marble foyer and slammed my hand on the elevator button over and over until it opened. Floor seven might have been floor one hundred for how long the elevator took to arrive.
My hand quivered while I dug the gold key out of my jacket pocket and inserted it into the keyhole.
Inside, I slammed the door shut, put the dead bolt in place, and leaned against the door completely out of breath, my body trembling.
I thought I’d made it.
I thought I was safe for the moment.
I thought I’d get a chance to call Jack.
But instead, the hint of lemons hit my nostrils, and a voice greeted me from the chair at the breakfast table.
“Hello, Sage.”
86
SAGE
“Oh, I wouldn’t do that,” Dr. Adamson said, as my hand fumbled for the gun in my pocket. “We have guns, too.”
He calmly lifted his gun from the table, holding it up for me to see.
“You know we wouldn’t kill you, of course, but a gunshot wound in the right place can be very painful. Isn’t that right, Dr. Stanstopolis?”
I followed Dr. Adamson’s gaze across the room toward the bed, and there she was, Dr. Stanstopolis, standing amid a slew of medical devices. An IV stand with a bag of fluids hanging off the hook, a surgical tray filled with long tools, a monitor … some sort of ultrasound machine.
Dr. Adamson smiled at me, as if pleased at finally attaining some sort of goal.
“I’m so glad to see you here. All those people at Vasterias were getting suspicious of me, you see, thinking I might keep you all for myself. So they kept me out of the labs—my complete life’s work, all of it … they just cut me out.”
Dr. Adamson rested his hand on the gun. “That’s why I need you. Because the person with the leverage is always the person with the power. And your eggs will give me the leverage for a trade with Vasterias. They have something I’ve wanted for a long, long time. And I know, for your eggs, they’ll agree.”
My brain felt like it might explode trying to process Dr. Adamson’s words. My body remained frozen at the door—in shock, fear, confusion. I didn’t know why, but I could not move.
“So you see,” he continued. “I needed to get you out of the mansion without anyone suspecting me. As it turned out, I had such compliant enlistees.” Dr. Adamson paused, shaking his head like he still couldn’t believe it. “My sons have taken a real liking to you, haven’t they? So eager … too eager. They were signing up to save you before they even knew the rules of the game.”
He stood then, bringing his gun with him and taking a step toward me.
“Tell me, Sage, why do family bonds make it so easy for someone to act irrationally? It’s always been a weakness in my sons—the way the two of them are willing to sacrifice for each other. You said so yourself, back in the helicopter. They care too much—that’s their problem. All I needed was a man on a motorcycle to delay Beckett. I knew Jack would worry; I knew he’d leave you. And then, all that was left was for Sven to scare you back here to this hotel room.”
What?
It was Dr. Adamson? Everything that had happened … us getting out, Beckett getting delayed ….
But Sven was working with my father. So, was my dad in on the entire plan? Had he set up the boys? Gaining their trust, helping organize the master plan to get me out, all so he and Dr. Adamson could finish what they started together? So they could finally get full compensation from Vasterias?
The hurt—the pain in my heart at the idea of my father’s betrayal—it sliced deeper than any pain I’d felt since getting kidnapped from home. My dad abandoned me. Not once, as a baby; not twice, when he didn’t come to save Finn in time; but a third time.
The vision of the loving, good-hearted man from my dream shattered into pieces.
Dr. Adamson stepped closer to me, and I spun toward the door handle, trying to unlock the deadbolt, unlock the door handle, pull out my gun, everything all at once. I tried for too much. Dr. Adamson grabbed me, wrapped my shoulders, wrestled me to the ground from behind. I screamed, kicked, struggled against his weight, clawed at the carpet, pushed away from that all-consuming lemon smell wafting off his clothing.
I fought hard. Because this was my last hope of escape—I knew that somewhere deep inside of me.
If I didn’t get away, I had no idea what would come next.
“Get the gun,” he grunted, rolling me to my side, and I felt Dr. Stanstopolis reach into my jacket pocket and pull it out.
“It’s okay, darling,” Dr. Adamson said in my ear as he struggled to contain me. “We really aren’t going to hurt you. We just need something from you, and we’ll be on our way. What happens to you after that—wherever you disappear to—I don’t care.”
Dr. Stanstopolis contained my kicking legs. Dr. Adamson jerked my body up until he leaned with his back against the wall, still hugging me from behind. Dr. Stanstopolis sat her wide hips down on my shins, a feat for a woman wearing a tight white skirt and high heels.
Dr. Adamson gripped my right forearm, digging his fingers into my skin and pulling my wrist closer to his face, inspecting it.
“What do we have here? I believe you’re wearing something that doesn’t belong to you.”
“It was a gift,” I said. I didn’t have enough air to speak more words because Dr. Adamson gripped my rib cage so hard, I could scarcely breathe.
“Get it off her,” he ordered Dr. Stanstopolis.
She frowned at him but reached over and unclasped the bracelet.
In my ear, he whispered, “That is my wife’s. No one else’s. Ever.”
His hand lifted a cloth to my mouth and nose.
My head drooped forward into blackness.
87
SAGE
“There you are.” Dr. Adamson looked down at me.
I laid on the hotel bed, my mouth gagged. My arms were tied to my sides, a rope around my waist. My lower legs were held down by Dr. Stanstopolis. I had an IV in my right arm, just above the bend at my elbow, and the tube led to the IV stand at the side of the bed. Three bags of fluid hung from the IV stand: a giant bag of saline, a medium bag of something else clear, and a small bag of neon yellow liquid.
“This will be quite painless,” Dr. Adamson said. “I will administer anesthesia momentarily, and you won’t feel a thing. You’ll be completely under.”
Dr. Adamson palpated the skin around my IV insertion, inspecting it. “Yesterday morning, Dr. Stanstopolis was able to determine the state of your follicles. You’re close. Very close. But they need to be nice and ripe, so I brought something to help that along.” He lifted the bag of yellow liquid.
I recognized it, then, from the island. Dr. Tappit had held the same color fluid in a syringe just above my arm while we waited to see if my father would call and save me.
“I can tell by the look in your eyes that you recognize this,” Dr. Adamson said.
“You see,” he continued, “during the short mutation time when modwrogs change, large shifts take place inside their bodies. Everything speeds up, sending them through puberty, not over a matter of years, but in a matter of minutes. It’s why their bones, their facial structure, their skin, and their muscles all stretch as they do—the body grows within minutes in a way that would normally take much longer. Their system is moving so fast, it doesn’t know when to stop. The degenerative process sets into motion, and within a few months, they die.”
Dr. Adamson released a clamp on both the clear packets of fluid and pushed a button on the IV machine. Within seconds, I felt the coolness of the saline and the anesthesia enter my arm.
“But we’re not going to give you the whole serum packet. You don’t need it. With just a little bit of the serum—a drop, maybe two—we’re going to plump up your follicles. Make them nice and extractable.”
No. No. No.
I struggled against the ropes, fought as hard as I could against Dr. Stanstopolis’s body weight holding down my legs.
Fight. Do not give up. Fight this, Sage.
The IV needle poked at my arm.
How far away were Jack and Beckett? If I could hold the doctors off a little longer, hold off the procedure, buy myself some time ….
“No, no. Don’t fight us,” Dr. Adamson said.
The tube to the yellow liquid had a separate button from the main box, attached lower on the tube itself. Dr. Adamson pressed it only once. A single yellow drop slipped down into the tube toward my arm. “Just a few minutes, and you’ll be ready.”
Dr. Adamson slid behind Dr. Stanstopolis and sat in a chair positioned at the foot of the bed.
“Honestly, the first time I met you, I was sure you’d die on the island.” He wheeled the surgical table closer to his chair and pulled on two latex gloves, the plastic snapping against his wrists when he released them.
“Of course, that was before I knew what you are. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised at us meeting again.”
I blinked once, my eyelids felt heavy. My brain grew foggy. But I still fought, pressing against the weight of the drug, the weight of Dr. Stanstopolis.
Dr. Adamson smiled at me. “You have a good rest now, okay?”
88
SAGE
Wake up, Sage. You have to wake up.
I pulled myself from the fog, forced myself out of it, like bringing myself from a dream. I couldn’t feel anything. My body had detached from my will; my muscles disconnected from my brain’s control. The anesthesia, or some stronger drug, rendered me useless to command my own movements. Complete silence pervaded the room, save for the periodic beep of the IV stand displaying my vital signs.
Both Dr. Adamson and Dr. Stanstopolis focused on the screen by the foot of my bed.
“These follicles look perfect. The two drops of serum helped.” Dr. Adamson spoke quietly, anticipation in his voice.
Dr. Stanstopolis leaned in toward the screen. “The needle is almost there. Just a little farther.” It took my mind a moment to register their words, and then, with complete terror, I realized my worst fear was seconds away from coming true. They were about to have a part of me.
I couldn’t let that happen. It could not happen.
To my right, the bag of serum hung from the IV stand next to the saline. The button dangled within reach. If I pressed that and held it down, I would release the entire bag of neon yellow liquid into my IV, and Dr. Adamson wouldn’t get anything from me—not once my body morphed into something non-human.
I wondered, vaguely, if this extraction, if that needle inside me, should be causing me pain. I wondered, too, if pain would surge if I moved.
I contemplated my choice.
But I already knew my answer.
I saw what the serum did to Finn. And because the code no longer effectively worked in my body, because I had no heightened capabilities, I knew if the serum flowed into my veins, it would render me completely useless to Vasterias.
I would be … unrecognizable.
A modwrog.
It’s time. Finish what you started when you left the island, what Beckett stopped you from doing at the gala. This won’t end until it’s over. And it’s not over while you’re alive.
I’d never thought of myself as important. Maybe in relation to helping my mom, or supporting Finn, or making sure we took care of the farm, but never in a “big picture” kind of way. But now, I pondered this. Dr. Evans talked about us all being “part of the tapestry.” It didn’t sound so crazy in this moment.
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I think I knew my job within the tapestry. I just had to be brave enough to fill my role.
Jack’s sperm meant nothing to Vasterias without my eggs.
Only one of us needed to die.
In the instant after I chose the path, the decision rooted deep within me and took hold. I felt nothing but steeled determination, gathering strength from my bitterness toward the people who’d put me here in this place, in this moment in time. Decisions others had made decades ago were now impacting my life, changing the very trajectory of my world, all without my consent.
I’d simply been born into this.
My decision felt different than in the bathroom at the mansion. In the bathroom, with that knife, I’d had so many doubts, so many fears, so much grief because of Finn and the boys, because of the people I’d leave behind, and the fear of the pain and the unknown beyond this world.
That was all gone now. I would apologize to no one for this decision.
I would choose a different path than the one other people had for me. Dr. Adamson would not do with me what he wanted. I would choose my own destiny.
And this would stop. Right now.
If only I could get my arm to move, if only I could pull myself out of this strap ….
“Carefully …” Dr. Stanstopolis said. “Yes. That’s it. Yes.”
If there was ever a time when I needed super-human strength, it was now.
Do it, Sage. Move your arm.
I fought against the anesthesia.
I’d always been resilient to drugs—they didn’t have an effect on me the same way they did for others, but now, it seemed, I’d lost the ability, like I’d lost my numbers and my heightened hearing.
I’d have to pull deeper. I needed to dig further into myself than I’d ever gone before. I needed an act of God, or spirit, or something. I needed help. Help me, please.
Please. Help. Me.
My mind zeroed in on my arm. My entire energy and focus and being willed my arm to lift. It felt like trying to lift a cement truck. It felt impossible, and yet, somehow, totally possible, all at once.
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