by Amy Cook
“Har-Harley?” Her voice was confused, weak, and it cracked like she had just woken from a long sleep. He smiled down at her, rubbing his thumb across her cheek.
“Hey, kid.” Her answering smile was blinding. Pell wandered out of the little room, stumbling slightly as he poked away at the laptop supported in one arm.
“This…wow…I mean these readings…just…wow!”
“So, Einstein? What is it? What’s the verdict?” Cajun asked tightly. Harley hoped the findings were important enough to constitute the risks.
“I’ve never seen something like this before. The tags…” He shook his head. “The technology on these things is mind blowing. Whoever created them is the real Einstein.” He looked at Amiel, glasses edging down his nose slightly. “How’s the memory?”
“I…I remember telling Harley I would be fine, and watching him walk to the safe room.”
“That’s all?” Pell asked, curious. Amiel thought for a moment, face scrunching up with her efforts.
“Nothing else. Just blackness,” she confessed tiredly, a tinge of anger hovering below the surface. Harley felt her frustration burning into and intermingling with his own, her emotions crystal clear to him now.
“Well, these readings are insane. Watch this.” He tapped in a few buttons, and video began playing across the screen. It was an internal diagram of Amiel’s body, her veins, bones, brain, muscles, all the inner workings.
“Now, this video is of her while she was doing the jumping jacks. Pretty normal, no big deal. But this, this is when the Rabids approached.” He hit fast forward. Suddenly bright colored lights began streaming up and down her body, originating at the neck. “You see that? Isn’t it astounding?” Pell exclaimed, gesturing animatedly at the screen.
“Those lines of color are the electrical impulses sent directly into Amiel’s nervous system from the tags. The impulses are sent shooting from the tags, upward along the chain, into the clasp where it rests directly overtop the spinal cord. The clasp then emits this electrical current into the spinal cord. Those electrical impulses shoot to her brain, telling it what it is to do, how to react.” He pointed to the colors shooting downward.
“These other impulses shoot to her limbs and organs, completely bypassing the brain’s need to command. The tags do it for the brain, commanding the body with their own directions. It sends jolts of electricity to the heart, kick starting it into a frenzy to keep up with demand. The adrenal glands release mass amounts of adrenaline that allows the body to move at higher speeds, swifter reaction times, to move and attack with more power. There’s no hesitation because it’s in complete and total attack mode and the cognitive thought process isn’t involved in the limb’s reactions at all. The brain is disconnected from it all. No regret, no doubts, no traumatic damage to the psyche, just action! That would also explain why she has no memory of her actions once the tags take over, by the way!” The glasses slid to the tip of his nose in his excited exclamation. He quickly pressed them back into place. “Now, look here. Look at her brain. Right there, see it? Tell me you see it, too?” he asked excitedly. Cajun stared at it dubiously.
“The way her brain kind of looks like an image of Elvis Presley at this angle?” Pell exhaled explosively at that statement, rolling his eyes.
“No, no! The actual chemical makeup of the brain has been changed. The actual physical formatting of it changed to look strikingly similar to-” Harley’s eyes widened.
“Ours.” That would explain the changes in her genetic makeup that his glasses kept picking up.
“Yes! Yes, exactly it!” Pell jumped up and down, pointing at Harley. Charleen’s brow furrowed.
“How is that possible?”
“I don’t know! But the beauty of it is breathtaking!” Pell shouted, nearly dropping the laptop in his excitement. His lips were stretched into such a huge smile Harley was shocked that they weren’t splitting. “Whoever did this holds the key to our future. If these tags could be mass produced, we could create an army of Cleans with the potential abilities to fight alongside you. An army with the same tactical instincts, but without the dangerous mixture of Rabid DNA that interferes with their humanity. There would be no more need for Hybrid birthing. Think of the implications!”
Harley stared at the image of Amiel’s brain. They would have an army of people just like Amiel. Their humanity intact but with the abilities to fight like Hybrids, senses activated to the heightened sensitivities, reaction times, and speeds. There would be no more Hybrids created, no more need to put them down when they broke.
“No,” Cajun growled angrily. “That’s a dangerous idea, Pell. It is our Rabid DNA and lack of connection with our humanity that allows us to kill as we do. And you’ve seen the effects it has on our mental stability, despite our being created to withstand it. I don’t buy that it has no effect on her psyche, either. Look at her and tell me this whole thing doesn’t affect her!” Cajun glowered, the very ideas suggested by Pell infuriating him. “Besides, in the end it comes down to this fact. Heightened senses and abilities or not, without the Rabid DNA they are still Cleans. That means they are still susceptible to infection. Can you imagine these tags in the hands of an infected? They’d slaughter us. We’d be putting the keys of our complete destruction right in their hands.”
“Yes, I suppose that could be the case,” Pell admitted, downcast. “But perhaps, given time, we could find a solution to this problem.”
“I have a better solution, right now,” Cajun stated, walking toward Amiel. “We take them off and destroy them. Problem solved.” Amiel and Pell both shouted “No!” just as Cajun’s fingertips brushed across Amiel’s dog tags. Cajun yanked his hand back as if burned, an audible hissing sound emanating from the tags, a thin stream of steam rising from their surface. Amiel gasped, pulling the tags away from her skin, a red welt rising beneath it. Her knees buckled slightly beneath her and Harley quickly lent her his support once more.
“What the hell was that for!” Cajun shouted, nursing his reddened fingertips.
“I don’t know! I didn’t do it, I swear! They just…I don’t know! They’ve never done that before,” Amiel explained helplessly, tears in her eyes. “Please, just please don’t try to take them from me! I made a promise to my brother, I can’t ever take them off!” Cajun turned on her, Hybrid fully exposed in his eyes; exposed and thoroughly ticked off.
“He was sick, Amiel! He wasn’t even in the right mind to have asked you to make that promise!”
“Yes he was! He knew what he was asking me! I know my own brother!”
“Stop yellin’ at her!” Harley growled at Cajun, pulling Amiel closer. Cajun snarled, ignoring Harley.
“You honestly think your brother would be telling you to wear something so dangerous that you nearly get yourself killed every time you go outside if he was in his right mind?”
“I don’t care! A promise is a promise, and no one will ever make me go back on my word to him!” Amiel stood her ground, eyes crazed, practically aflame. Cajun took a menacing step toward them, and Harley shifted Amiel until she stood behind him, prepared to protect her.
“Cajun, stop it. Control yourself,” Charleen commanded sternly, though her voice shook with the effort to maintain her own control.
“They’re a threat to us, Char! They burned me just from touching them. What will they do if we leave them to her?” Cajun replied defensively.
“Don’t be such a baby! Amiel was burned, too, and hers already went away!” Harley growled. He didn’t trust his brother’s current irrational mood. He was reacting purely on instincts, the way any injured animal would react to a threat to his existence.
“Okay, okay! Let’s not get our pantaloons in a twist here, people,” Pell butted in, hands held high in the air. “No offense,” he amended to the girls in the room.
“None taken,” Amiel replied angrily, still leaning around Harley’s shoulder to stare Cajun down like a little hellcat. Charleen ignored him. Pell continued talking, tone
calm but commanding in his own way.
“The facts here are quite simple. Promise aside, danger aside, Amiel quite simply cannot take off these tags. “
“Why not!” Cajun snapped.
“Here’s the thing. Based on my readings, the way that her body reacted to the tags and vice versa, we’re looking at a symbiotic relationship here.”
“What’s that mean for Amiel?” Harley didn’t like the sounds of this.
“It means that the tags have bonded with Amiel’s body, her mind, her entire system, in a very potent way. The tags rely on her to kill Rabids, and in return they fuel her, give her enhanced strength, skills, and senses, almost akin to your own. She simply doesn’t know how to use them properly yet. However, in the natural order of things, they have become reliant on each other. It’s very possible that if she were ever to take those tags off, something in her psyche could snap. She could go brain dead, or worse. It is very likely at this point, after wearing them for so long, the tags sustain her, keep her healthy and strong. At the very least, taking the tags from her could turn her into a complete raging loony!” Pell threw his hands in the air as if to demonstrate an explosion. Everyone stared at him for a long moment, then at Amiel’s tags. Suddenly Amiel gasped, and Harley was rocked with the sheer wave of emotion pouring off of her.
“If I took them off- it could kill me?”
“Well, yes, it certainly could. Especially if your body was put into any sort of shock from the removal of them, or if it was already in a weakened state. Your organs or limbs could stop working, you could suffer an aneurysm, any number of things could happen that would ultimately result in your death.”
“Oh no. No, no, no, please no!” she whispered. Her eyes bulged wide, sheer terror reflected in their haunted depths as she bent over at the waist, arms hugging her stomach as though she were about to be sick. “I killed him.” The desperate words were so quiet Harley almost missed them.
“What are ya talkin’ about, Thumbelina? Killed who?” Harley tried to grab her arm, but she kept scuttling backward, bent over in that pained way, clutching the tags to her heart. Little alarms on Pell’s computer started going off, and he pecked at the keyboard, gnawing on his lip.
“Her levels are flying off the charts here, guys.”
“He was still alive, he was surviving, he was surviving so much longer than anyone else had,” she mumbled to herself. “And then I took them, and he died! Oh, heaven forgive me!” Harley grabbed her arm forcing her to stop retreating, her crazy talk and the alarms on her vitals starting to worry him a whole heck of a lot. Her frantic eyes shifted to Harley, pupils dilated in that strangely entrancing way, grabbing him with nearly physical force. She gripped at his arm with enough strength it actually hurt. “I killed my brother!” The alarms on Pell’s laptop hit a new high, and then she collapsed in his arms, unconscious. Harley looked up, helpless.
“What just happened?”
“She put the pieces together,” Pell muttered. “If what I understand here is correct, her brother held the same sort of symbiotic relationship with these tags. When he gave them to her, he severed that connection. The tags were the only thing keeping him alive, combating the poison in his system. Without them, well…” He shrugged, not needing to say another word. They got it. Harley looked down at his poor fragile charge. What would this new knowledge do to her?
“So it’s decided. We have to teach her how to handle the tags, and we keep the truth of the them from Foundation,” Harley stated resolutely. Cajun and Pell started arguing with him immediately, though Charleen stayed silent, contemplative.
“No, we’re done here!” Harley growled, lifting Amiel in his arms. He leaned aggressively into Pell’s face. “And I swear, Pell, if y’all so much as whisper a word of this in your sleep to anyone, I will rip your intestines out through your nose holes.” Pell gulped, finally feeling nervous. The nerd nodded slowly.
“Understood.” Harley turned and walked away. “But wait, I need blood samples!” Pell called frantically after Harley’s retreating form.
“No freakin’ way, Frankenstein. This experimentin’ on her, this entire thing, is over. Y’all understand? No more! I never want her to hear from either one of you on this matter again.”
“Where are you going?” Charleen asked.
“She can’t wake up here. She needs to be somewhere- somewhere else,” he grumbled, Hybrid temporarily distancing him from everything but the need to take care of his charge. Charleen appeared at his side, and his lips lifted into a snarl, sure she would argue with him. She gave him a look. The one that lifted her left brow and let him know she wasn’t impressed.
“Stop it. Let me help. Besides, how are you going to get out of here without your bike?” Her authoritative tone took most of the bluster from his Hybrid, just enough to allow him to think clearer.
“Fine,” Harley mumbled, heading outside.
“Charleen!” Cajun called after them. She turned and gave him the same stern glare.
“You need to evaluate yourself,” was all she said to him before they exited the building. Harley climbed into the passenger seat, Amiel nestled snuggly in his lap. Charleen started the car, driving away from the warehouse.
Chapter 28
Cajun
He’d screwed up. He’d screwed up bad. His jaw clenched as he heard the wheels of his SUV peeling out in the gravel, leaving him in the dust. Even Char was pissed at him. He thought back to the feeling of a freshly gained sort of respect that his fiancé felt for Amiel, when he and the girl had been arguing. That was likely a portion of what had sent him over the edge. The girl had gained Char’s respect so easily, when Charleen’s regard was never easy to gain. Char was pretty much anti-everyone. It had taken Cajun a long time to get his beauty to warm up to him. And even longer for her to warm up to Harley. And even now there were days she wanted to behead the both of them. His Hybrid had felt a ridiculous sort of dent to its pride, jealousy even, knowing his mate had so easily found that respect for this girl. And not just any girl, but the girl who could very easily sign their death warrants, simply by existing. That had been the last straw.
Her simple existence meant that all he held dear could be snuffed out, without a single second of guilt on Foundation’s conscience. His Hybrid had bridled at the knowledge that all this time he’d been encouraging his brother to schmooze with the enemy. They had been blindly protecting the key to their annihilation. His instincts had flared, his fury right along with it. Temper was a big problem for him. The brain cancer, and the surgery that ended up cutting out a large chunk of it, had screwed up his brain in the first place. And when the Hybrid DNA was introduced, things got a whole lot more interesting. His moods were everywhere, and he couldn’t always make the connection that meant putting those moods in their place; connections that a normal brain like Harley’s could easily make. Which was why his brother had a firmer grip on his Hybrid nature, and Cajun’s Hybrid got the better of him far too often. It was a hard wiring problem out of his control, but it was a dangerous one that the three of them had been working hard to keep from Foundation’s knowledge. He put on a good show of calm and humor, but if they knew how close he was to flipping his switch most of the time, they would have put him down long ago.
When Pell had laid it out for them, all Cajun could think about was his need to secure their survival. He’d zoned in on those tags, the weapons just waiting for the user manual to be cracked open. When the girl had refused to turn them over, when the tags themselves had zapped him, his instincts saw it as an outright cry of war. He’d gone on the rampage shouting at the poor little bird like a maniac. Then, it had seemed like the right thing to do. Now with the lack of blood pounding in his ears, he felt like a Grade A Bounce. Bullying a little girl. Cajun shook his head. Charleen had been right. This was an entirely new low for him. He’d pushed Harley to find a friend, someone he could talk to, because he was worried about his brother, yes. But also because he was worried that he wouldn’t be around
much longer himself. And when Cajun was gone, Harley would need someone new to play the loyal bodyguard for. It was in the guy’s blood, and he’d be lost with no one to look after.
“You really lost it back there, Aussie,” Pell muttered, pushing the glasses up to sit in his spiky hair. Pell. Cajun watched his secret confidant as he began packing up his supplies. They had a strange sort of friendship. Cajun had secretly gone to Pell as a last resort, when he’d first realized his brain was still short circuiting despite the change. He’d been desperate. It had begun with threats and contraband being exchanged in return for the guy’s unprecedented brain power. Cajun threatened him, gave him tidbits of insider information and stories of his missions, parts or instruments he needed for curiosities and experiments that Foundation wouldn’t fund, all to ensure his silence. Pell also flourished in the knowledge that he was only person in on this secret task, brought to him by the second highest ranking Hybrid. And in return, Pell put his efforts into helping Cajun find ways to control his inner demons.
Pell was truly a genius. No one gave him credit for much, seeing him for only the geeky and meek demeanor he wore. Foundation knew his potential, of course, which was why he was even working for them. But they saw him as a pawn and little more. Pell was known to be a bit scatterbrained, and definitely hyperactive. Foundation kept him on lower level work where they felt he could do more good than damage. In the beginning Cajun had seen him the same way. But then their alliance had morphed into an odd sort of friendship.
Pell may be scatterbrained and goofy, but he was also a nice kid with a yearning for adventure and friendship. And surprisingly enough, if you gave him compassion and good stories, the guy became a decent and loyal friend to have at your back. He was also a bit of an unabashed Hybrid fan boy, making him one of their biggest supporters. Cajun trusted him almost as much as he trusted Harley and Charleen. That is why he’d brought him in on this little mission of his. He had told Pell about Amiel back when Tandy had first talked with them. He thought the inner geek in Pell would scream like a little girl over the idea of dog tags turning a chick into a Rabid-killing ninja. He hadn’t really believed the story then, and felt it was just a harmless story to share. But when Harley had told him about seeing the girl kill the three Rabids with his own eyes, Cajun had begun to wonder if his dad hadn’t been spinning a story just to put Harley in a position to fall for the girl. Pell had been throwing out millions of ideas since then, jabbering excitedly over it nonstop. Pell had been out of his mind with excitement when Cajun sent Char to collect him that morning. He’d been overjoyed to know he was getting yet another secret mission and adventure to work on.