He finally answers when we’re well beyond the men. “You called me One a moment ago.”
“It’s who you are. Would you rather I called you fearless leader?”
He chuckles. “Not necessary. You just hadn’t done that in private in a long time.”
Of course not. As soon as he says it, I remember.
“Like Cole Howard.” One bounces off the chair, pitches an imaginary baseball, then imitates an umpire doing the strikeout signal.
Across the floor, Nine rolls her eyes. She thinks baseball is boring, which is too bad because it’s one of the few things we’re allowed to watch unsupervised on TV in the evenings. I don’t mind so much, but watching sports is more boring than playing them would be. But we don’t have time to play much.
One and Five are very into baseball and spend lots of time debating who the best players are. Since they can both recite an endless stream of stats, it can get annoying quickly.
“What kind of name is Coal anyway?” Three says. “Coal is stuff you burn.”
“It’s also a name, stupid. C-O-L-E.” One’s voice cracks as he plops back on the seat. He and Three are the oldest of the boys and the first to have their voices change. Whenever it happens I have to stifle my laughter. “So fine. What would you want to be your name?”
Three debates this, running his fingers through the blond peach fuzz on his head. This morning was haircuts, and he’s been grumbling all day over the loss of his curls. We go through the same routine every couple months, and every haircut day Three’s vanity takes a beating.
“I’d go with Gabriel,” he says.
Although I’m the one who instigated this discussion about names, I’m only half paying attention because I need to finish an assignment. Twelve broke my wrist during our hand-to-hand training this morning, so I missed class while the doctor set it. “Why Gabriel?”
“He’s one of the most important archangels, and angels are bad-ass. They’re like holy hit men. That’s what I’m going to be. If you see me coming, you’re already dead.” Three shoots One a superior look, something Three is very good at. “That’s way cooler than a stupid baseball player.”
One flips him off. “Just remember who’s got the power to make you do extra laps tomorrow, angel boy.”
We go around the room, and everyone picks a name for themselves. Nine wants to be called Jordan because we watched a news conference this week, and a Jordanian princess was on it. She didn’t like the princess’s name, but she liked Jordan. Six chooses Summer after her favorite season. Eight picks Octavia, saying she prefers to keep things simple. So does Eleven, who goes with Lev, which is what most of us call him anyway.
They’re no fun.
We file these names away, one more secret we can’t share. Fitzpatrick would be furious and the punishments severe. We found that out two years ago when Four and Eight invented a private code for us to use. After Fitzpatrick discovered we were sending encoded messages to each other, we each spent a week in solitary. It didn’t matter that we were only sending silly messages. They told us we were being subversive and disrespectful.
What really mattered was that the adults couldn’t crack the code on their own. Even I could tell that.
They came down the harshest on One because he was supposed to be responsible. It wasn’t fair, but it’s true that he didn’t tell us to stop.
He’s not telling us now, either. I’m surprised. Sometimes One is just like the rest of us, but sometimes he remembers he’s been told to set an example. I can never tell which way he’ll act, and I’m pretty sure I spend too much time trying to guess.
I turn back to my computer. The script I’m writing is supposed to crack an encrypted file. Typing is a pain because my fingers don’t move as fast as my brain, and it’s even worse since I’m temporarily one-handed. I wish I could plug directly into the computer because it makes everything so much easier, but that’s not the point of the exercise.
Meanwhile the discussion about names goes on. It merely amuses me, but Nine and Three—Jordan and Gabe—seem to savor the taste of the syllables in their mouth each time they’re spoken. They’re always searching for small ways to rebel, and One is always warning them to stop before they bring down real trouble. Trouble not of the solitary kind, but of the Malone kind.
“What about you, Sev?” Gabe says. “You started it, and you haven’t picked yet.”
Done at last, I shut down the computer. “I want to be Sophia because the name’s root comes from knowledge.”
Cole gives me a thoughtful look. “That fits since you’re the smartest.”
“Yeah, right.” I laugh, but secretly I’m pleased Cole thinks I’m smart. He’s the smartest of all of us, in truth. He’s not the fastest or the strongest, though he comes close at both, but he is the best strategist. And in the end, that’s what matters most. You don’t need speed or strength if you have brains and plans.
That’s why our brains are special, so we’re told. Our implants make them superior to normal brains. But it’s hard to feel special when we have to name ourselves in secret.
“Cole after Cole Howard,” I say. I don’t think he’s watched baseball in over a year. Our schedules have gotten more intense. The TV we watch is assigned for specific purposes.
Cole-One, I’m not sure how to think of him anymore, opens a door to one of the buildings. “It’s coming back. What did I tell you?”
Coming back for sure. I step inside and am assaulted by a thousand disconnected memory fragments. All those times I entered this place—tired, jubilant, hungry, bloody, broken, proud and anxious—they’re all here. Useless in their current form, but here and accounted for.
The anxiety is the strongest. That memory the most recent. It’s the night before I left when I stood outside the girls’ quarters with Cole. The first time I dared acknowledge there might be more between us than just sibling-like affection.
I bite my lip, overcome with those daring feelings until a voice in my head whispers Kyle’s name. Shaking the memories off, I take a good look around. Nothing has changed since the night we chose our names. Our little communal area is comfortingly familiar.
Cole squeezes my arm. “You should go to bed. Fitzpatrick’s going to grill you tomorrow.”
Fitzpatrick. Bitchpatrick. She’s the voice I sometimes hear. The one I heard back in South Station. She won’t be happy with my failure, but neither am I.
“Yeah, I’m sure.” I rub my eyes, feeling my stomach twist in frustration. “That night before I left. I was so worried I’d fail, and I have. I’m missing something important. I know it. I need to get these memories back.”
“You will. I believed in you then, and I still do. You didn’t fail. Not every mission goes perfectly.”
“But that’s what we’re here for, isn’t? To be perfect?”
“Yeah, but…” He leans in close, and his breath tickles my ear. “Even when we make a mistake, we’re a hell of a lot closer to perfect than anyone else around this place. Never forget that.”
His lips brush my ear, purposely I think, and I don’t move. I’m frozen with confusion as tingles spread down the side of my head. Then Cole steps away like nothing happened, although the intensity in his expression screams otherwise. “Night, Sev.”
“Night.”
He opens a door directly across from us and disappears. For a second I’m lost. Then I take a deep breath and my feet spring into action. My body knows where to go and what to do when my brain doesn’t. I open another door and pass through a short corridor. On the left is a new door, but not the one I need. That one is at the end of the hall, and voices seep through it.
My unit. Or half of it.
As I reach for the handle, the door swings open. A dark-skinned girl in a gray tank top gapes at me for a moment then screams.
“You’re back!” She pulls me into a hug, half draggin
g me into the room behind her as she does. “Look, Seven’s back.”
Relying on my few memories, I assign a name to her face. “I missed you too.”
Nine-Jordan releases me, and I’m enveloped in more hugs. The five girls circle around me, a hundred unasked questions hanging in the air. I take the moment to assign names to the rest of them.
Six-Summer is blonde and blue-eyed. Besides Jordan, she’s the only one whose name comes easily. My memory of her at my pre-mission party is so vivid.
Next to her stands Twelve-Eva, her reddish-brown hair cascading over her shoulders in waves I’d kill for. Then comes Eight-Octavia, whose hair is as black and dead straight as my own. And finally, there’s Two-Sky, also black-haired but with Eva’s waves and killer lashes.
Our skin-deep diversity is no accident. Every bit of our lives has been planned right down to our genes. With the appropriate clothing and hairstyle, one of us could be dropped off in almost any part of the world and we’d blend in. Maybe the only thing our creators couldn’t account for was our birth order.
And my memory loss.
“No one told us you were back,” Summer says. “Spill everything.”
I wander over to my bed, unsure how I know it’s mine other than by the fact that it’s the only one that appears lonely and unused. “No one told you? I’ve been here for a few hours, and with Cole the past couple.”
“We thought something might be up when Malone called Cole out of dinner.” Sky sits across from me. “But no one would say.”
Jordan clears her throat. “So get on with it. What happened?”
“Or aren’t you allowed to tell us?” Octavia says. “Cole’s the only one who was briefed on the purpose of your mission.”
Jordan waves off these details. “Screw the mission. She can at least tell us about Boston. We know you went there.”
I rest my head in my hands as Octavia and Eva question whether I should talk about anything since my mission was classified. If only I had that dilemma. “I haven’t been officially debriefed yet. I don’t know what I can share, and honestly, it’s not an issue anyway.”
“What’s wrong?” Jordan rests a hand on my back. “Didn’t it go well?”
Five pairs of eyes watch me, but it’s the disappointment in Cole’s hazel ones and suspicion in Kyle’s black ones that I see in my mind. I want to curl into a ball and make it all go away.
“Something happened.” I can’t bring myself to look at them, so I play with the fabric on my pants. “I don’t know what, but I got hurt. That’s why I’m back. That’s why I haven’t had an official debriefing yet. I don’t have anything to tell.”
“Nothing?” Summer says.
I shake my head. “I lost my memories. Things are starting to come back but…” I shrug. What’s there to say?
Apparently a lot. The others speculate about what could have happened to cause this, who could have known how to do it, and why someone might have tried. Since I’m not cleared to tell them why I was at RTC, I can’t explain how unlikely some of their guesses are. A listless mess of depression and nerves, I head to the bathroom.
Jordan follows. “You all right?”
I nod and grab a toothbrush. “This is mine, right?”
“Yup. So you haven’t lost all your memories, I see.” She takes her own.
“Not all.”
Kyle. Audrey. My mission. Kyle.
“Tell me?” Jordan bats her eyes at me.
“Tell you what?”
“Why you got this wistful look on your face.”
I looked wistful? I glance in the mirror above the sink. My cheeks turned pink. Oh.
I spit out toothpaste, debating how much I should confide. At this point, nothing is the safest way to go. And yet, I’m tempted to share it all. I need a confidante, and Jordan is the person I always turned to. I know that too.
Before I can decide how to respond, however, Sky and Octavia enter the bathroom. I take that as a sign to keep my silence. For now anyway.
I’ll sleep on it.
Chapter Fourteen
Sunday Morning: Present
I don’t sleep. All the slimy, confused anxiety keeps me up all night. I toss and turn, alternately worried for and about Kyle, sick with feelings of failure over my mission, scared that my inadequacy is resulting in an innocent person’s death, and depressed knowing that I’m disappointing everyone. And when my brain overloads with these heavy concerns, I worry about the little things. Like what’s Audrey’s going to do without me to tutor her in physics?
At last five a.m. comes around and the overhead lights blink on. Years of habit blink with them. With no conscious effort, I’m out of bed, grabbing clothes out of my trunk. Jordan and Summer flash me smiles as we get dressed, and I take this automatic response as a good sign.
In our jogging pants, sweatshirts and sneakers we march into the bathroom, brush our teeth and pull back our hair. Then we march some more into the communal area where we meet up with the guys.
Cole must have told the others about my return because their greetings lack surprise. Gabe gives me a brief hug, but everyone’s subdued at this hour. I can’t believe I’m as awake as I am, and I write it off to adrenaline. Every nerve in my body is on edge.
Cole takes the lead, and we head into the frigid morning air for our run. I fall into step with the others for the first half mile, but eventually my lack of regular training while at RTC catches up to me. The no-sleep thing probably doesn’t help, either. Never the fastest, I lag more behind than usual. It takes all my energy to focus on the white puffs of breath coming out of my mouth. My legs move on their own, but my brain would be miles behind if I didn’t focus.
No one talks. It’s dark out, though it’s clear others are stirring. Steam rises from the mess chimney, and I hear engines in the distance. The HY2s are up as well, but they’re not as fast as us, and we leave them behind.
Cole usually sets the pace, but today he keeps glancing back at me. “Five, take over.”
I push my legs harder. How many ways can I fail?
As Five—whose chosen name I can’t recall—takes the lead, Cole slows down until we meet. “Anything new this morning?”
“No.”
“You look tired.”
“Didn’t sleep much.”
We finish our three miles in silence, but Cole stays at my side for the rest of it.
With every step, I hope more memories will be triggered. My body goes through all the right motions. I shower, change into the proper uniform pieces and am ready for breakfast with the others. But that’s merely muscle memory. It’s nothing helpful.
My stomach knots as we enter the mess, and the combined smells make me want to retch even though I’m hungry. Unlike at RTC, I have no choice about what to eat. Someone hands me a tray, and I take it to my unit’s table.
Warily, I stick a spoon in the bowl of oatmeal. Did I used to eat this? It looks like vomit. When I let go of the spoon, it stands straight up. I decide to eat my eggs instead.
Gabe smirks at me. “You used to like oatmeal.”
“Are you screwing with me? Did One tell you about my memory issues?” I almost slip up and call him Cole. Must get it together. I can’t do that in public.
“Doesn’t matter,” Jordan says. “Every calorie and nutrient is accounted for. Eat up, or Fitzpatrick will be annoyed.”
Gabe pretends to fling oatmeal her way. “I swear, I’m going to start bribing those geeks in the labs to develop a pill so we can be done with this eating business. One pill, three times a day. That would be so much easier.”
“Taste better too,” Summer mutters.
Lev reaches across Gabe for the salt. “What are you going to bribe them with, huh?”
“I have my ways,” Gabe says. “So, Sev, what do you remember?”
Cole sits down next to me
. “Nothing she can discuss with you.”
“Oh, come on. I don’t care about the mission.” Gabe dumps milk into his oatmeal. “I just want to hear about life on the outside. None of us have lived out there for so long before.”
Gabe’s not the only one interested. The whole table watches me. Pressured to say something, I offer up the most relevant thing I can think of. “I remember the food was better.”
That seems safe enough, but even it leads to more questions as people make jokes. Before I can respond, someone kicks me under the table.
A tall woman with obviously bleached blonde hair, an overly tanned face and squinty gray eyes glares down at us like a god fuming over the arrangement of his chess pieces. She crosses her arms, and her icy disapproval searches me out. Peon chess piece that I am, I go cold.
“Seven.” Her voice is deeper and scratchier than I remember. “With me. Now.”
Of all the reasons to be a mess of nerves, Bitchpatrick’s fury hadn’t ranked high on my list. I guess it should have.
Memories of her charming personality overtake my mind as I get up.
Through the dark, murky water, I see Three raise his head into the air. Fear courses through me. He’s going to do it. I want to scream at him to stop, but my teeth chatter too hard.
I’m not cold. I’m not cold. I’m not cold.
I can—and have—turned off my awareness of the pain, but my muscles are almost useless. Hypothermia has set in. My body’s probably beyond the stage where it feels the cold, but I’m not about to let myself find out. I haven’t eaten or slept in three days. And now this.
They won’t let me die. I’m too valuable. Too special.
But with every passing second in the frigid lake, it becomes harder to believe that.
Willpower, One would tell me. We have to have willpower. The body is a machine. The brain can control it.
Whatever.
It takes major effort seeing as my limbs don’t want to obey my brain’s commands, but I raise my face to skim the water’s surface.
“Three,” Fitzpatrick yells. “Head back under or you will do this again and again until we freeze the weakness out of you.”
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