“That’s so messed up,” Rustin told Xaria. “I can’t believe your mom actually erases people’s brains.”
“Well, she’s not actually the one to do the erasing,” she said defensively. “She has coders for that. She just reviews the footage and decides what has to go.”
“Still,” Rustin said, “that’s glitched up.”
Xaria scoffed at this. They seemed to have forgotten about me. “Like your father’s job is any better.”
They went on like this for a while but I had stopped listening.
Something that Rio had said the night of our failed escape had slithered back into my consciousness during the conversation. He had mentioned something about my mother and “the last time.” But he’d halted himself before he could reveal more.
I had been so preoccupied with thoughts of Seraphina that I hadn’t even thought about that until now.
What had he meant?
Had I been wiped before?
Was last night not the first time I’d been in that chair? What had I seen in the past that had warranted a memory restoration?
It must have been bad. They didn’t wipe memories for C3 infractions. No. Memory restorations were specifically designed for C6s and higher.
“Xaria.” I interrupted their friendly debate, causing everyone to stare at me in bewilderment. It was the first word I’d uttered all day.
“Yes?” she answered warily, as though she were talking to an unstable alien.
“You said your mother has high clearance in the memory labs, right?”
She shrugged. “She’s Dr. Solara. She practically runs the memory labs.”
I nodded, my brain swirling. “Good. I need you to get me in there. Tonight. When no one else is around.”
She laughed at this. As did Rustin and Klo. “That’s a nice fantasy you’ve dreamed up there.”
“It’s not a fantasy. Do whatever you need to do, but get me into that lab. And I’ll need her access codes and fingerprints.”
“You’re spazzed.”
I glanced up, letting my eyes connect with hers. I reached out and took her hand, rubbing my thumb against her skin. “Please, Xaria.” I let my voice roll over her name, massaging the syllables. “I need this.”
I could tell my pleas were working. Her face softened at my touch. Her eyes danced under my pinning gaze. I knew it was wrong to use her feelings for me to get what I wanted, but I didn’t have a choice. Something was stored in those memory servers. Something that I wasn’t supposed to know about. And I needed to get to it.
“But why?” she asked quietly. “Why do you need access to the servers?”
Klo and Rustin glanced uneasily between us, unsure where this was going.
I released her hand but kept my eyes tightly locked on hers. “Because I’m fairly certain some of my memories are stored in there.”
16: Kissed
I went home with Xaria that afternoon and managed to lift her mother’s fingerprint off a coffee mug she’d left on the kitchen table. We waited until after midnight and her mom had returned home before sneaking into lab 4 and using my freshly imprinted NanoStrip to gain access.
I had never been on this side of the glass before. There were rows of cubicles set up, each with large Revisualization monitors, high-tech command centers built specifically for sorting through and recoding memories.
We sat down at one of the terminals, and Xaria inputted her mother’s access code at the login prompt. I glanced up in surprise. “You already knew it?”
She rolled her eyes. “It’s my birthday.”
“Well, isn’t that sweet,” I mumbled.
She didn’t appreciate the sarcasm. “Just because your mother is never around doesn’t mean you have to take it out on the rest of us.”
“You’re right,” I said, lowering my head. “Sorry.”
Once we were in the system, I typed Lyzender Luman into the search field and a pod promptly returned with my name on it. It was dated a little over a year ago.
A year ago?
That was long before I’d met Seraphina.
Before my father left.
There was only one file inside the pod.
One memory.
I dragged it into the Revisualization software. The monitor in front of me flickered on, and I hovered my finger above the Play button.
My breathing suddenly became very strained and I could feel Xaria’s presence behind me.
“You don’t have to stay,” I told her, hoping she’d take the hint. Whatever was stored in this pod, I wanted to see it alone.
She pulled up a second chair and lowered into it. “It’s okay. I don’t mind staying.”
She leaned forward until the dark skin of her cheek was only inches from mine.
I bit my lip in frustration. How was I going to do this without offending her?
“I’ll be fine,” I insisted.
She turned to me and smiled. “Lyzender.” My name sounded so foreign on her lips. So awkward. Especially after Sera had started calling me Zen. Hearing it was like accidently putting your foot into someone else’s worn shoe.
“You need to stop pushing people away,” she continued, stern but empathetic. “Watching anyone’s stolen memories can be really stressful. But watching your own could be downright disturbing. I want to help you. Let me be here for you. I’m your friend.” Her voice got very soft on the last word and she turned her head away from me. “And I can be more than just your friend if you want me to.”
I closed my eyes. There it was. The issue I’d been skating around for nearly half a year. Now she’d gone and said it aloud. Which meant I could no longer pretend not to notice it.
I cleared my throat. “Xaria … I.…”
And then her lips were on mine. Soft and tentative. Like she wasn’t sure how I’d react. She wasn’t sure if I would kiss her back.
And I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
All I could think about was Seraphina.
Her lips. Her hands. Her precious face.
I pulled away, cringing at Xaria’s injured reaction. She wasn’t doing anything to hide it. Her face reflected the pain and rejection as clearly as DigiSlate glass.
She nodded, like she knew everything. Like I didn’t even need to say the words.
But I did.
“Xaria, I’m sorry. I…” I faltered, fidgeting with the hem of my shirt. “I just don’t feel that way about you.”
She pressed her lips together so hard, I saw faint traces of white in them. “You don’t know how you feel,” she accused. “You are so afraid of feeling anything that you shut it all off.”
I opened my mouth to disagree but quickly decided against it. There was no use arguing with her. She was right. And wrong at the same time. That was exactly who I used to be. Someone who was afraid of his own emotions, like a coward afraid of his own shadow. Someone who fought so hard to hide from anything that felt real.
But I wasn’t that person anymore.
I had found something to fight for. I had found something to feel for.
I had found Seraphina.
But obviously Xaria didn’t know about that. Couldn’t know about that. The only thing she saw was Lyzender Luman, the boy who had closed himself off to the world. Who found cheap thrills breaking into labs and stealing genetically altered bunny rabbits.
She didn’t know the person I had become. The person Seraphina had brought out of me, my layers slowly peeling away until she found something worth loving.
She didn’t know Zen.
And as much as I longed to explain it to her, I knew I never would be able to. I knew I had to let her go on thinking that she was right about me.
“I’m sorry,” I offered one last time.
She nodded again and pushed the chair back, standing up. “Me too. I’m sorry I ever felt sorry for you. I’m sorry I ever tried to help you.” She stormed toward the door of the lab. “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”
I sat alo
ne in the darkness, the room illuminated only by the monitor that sat before me and the memory cued up on the screen, ready to show me what they stole.
Ready to show me what was worth stealing.
I let Xaria’s pain and heartbreak flow through me, cringing at the bitterness it left in my chest. It’s the way it has to be, I told myself. If I had any hope of fulfilling my promise to protect Seraphina, there was no other way it could be.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, allowing the guilt to sink into me, knowing I would always carry it around wherever I went. But also knowing, with sadness, that it was a price I was all too willing to pay.
Then I opened my eyes and pressed Play.
17: Protocol
The images that filled the screen were disturbingly surreal. Everything was shown through my own eyes, and yet I was so removed from it, sitting in this cubical, watching it on a screen. It was like playing a virtual simulation game, except I had no control over my avatar. I could only sit back and let it happen.
Unlike real memories, the Revisualization was crisp and vivid, without the hazy filter of time. It played out before me like a movie I’d starred in. In another life. Another world. A forgotten dimension.
* * *
I swiped my fingertip across the sensor. It flashed green and the door to the lab clicked open. I glanced around the huge space filled with screens and processors and complicated equipment I didn’t recognize.
The far walls were lined with cages, each one housing a small white mouse. Several were dead.
I started to move toward the helpless animals, gaining speed and intensity with each step.
On the wall next to each cage, a monitor indicated the status of some kind of experiment. I chose the closest one and studied the lines of text.
Project White Flower.
Subject: 341
Latest update: Failed to transesse two minutes forward. Gene malfunctioning. Expected termination within four hours.
I turned my attention to the poor, helpless mouse. “Sorry, little guy,” I said aloud to the empty lab. “You don’t have much time left.”
His nose wiggled in response, as if he understood.
I glanced at some of the other screens. All of them had similar status reports. “Failed to transesse two minutes forward.”
* * *
I hit Pause on the monitor.
Failed to transesse.
What did that mean?
Transesse wasn’t a word I was familiar with.
And Project White Flower? I’d never even heard of that. Which meant it was at least a C7, possibly higher.
I pressed Play.
* * *
A sound echoed in the empty lab and I spun around.
A custodial droid glided into the room, her creepy human top and wheeled-machine bottom made me shudder.
She spotted me. Her head tilted curiously to the side, processing. I shut my eyes tight, knowing she would be attempting to scan them. I turned around and slid a NanoStrip onto my eyeball, blinking it into place.
When I spun back toward the droid, she continued to stare at me, her creepy dead eyes unblinking. After a moment, she seemed satisfied that I was supposed to be there and went about her work, tidying up the lab. A sweeper protruded from the back of her wheeled base, brushing up dust and debris as she went.
I waited until she had disappeared out the door before popping out the retina strip, tears blurring my vision. I blinked rapidly then turned back to the mouse. The one who had less than four hours to live. I carefully eased open his cage, captured him in my hand, and lowered him into the pocket of my sweatshirt.
I inched to the left and began to open the next cage, but a voice stopped me.
I ducked behind a tower of machines and waited, listening.
Two scientists in white lab coats had entered the room—a woman and a man. They were sipping coffee out of SynthoPlastic cups from the commissary. It was obvious from their relaxed body language and easy speech that they hadn’t seen me.
“I’m telling you, the woman is nuts,” the female scientist asserted.
“I don’t know,” the man admitted. “I mean, if it works, it’ll be pretty amazing.”
The woman rolled her eyes. “Don’t tell me Dr. Maxxer has gotten to you, too. This whole place has gone spastic. I mean, time travel? Seriously? What does she think this is? An H.G. Wells novel?”
* * *
I hit Pause, my breathing starting to quicken.
Time travel?
Project White Flower is about traveling through time?
Is that what the status updates were referring to when they said Failed to transesse two minutes forward?
Curious and slightly nauseated, I pressed Play.
“I’m willing to buy in to Dr. Maxxer’s theory that it’s possible,” the man said.
The woman set her coffee down on a table and swiped her fingertip across one of the nearby screens. It glowed to life. “Well, it’s not like she would ever tell us if she was right. Dr. Alixter would be the first to know. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if we’re sent to the Memory Coders the second this project is finished.”
Just then my attention was snagged by a white blur. I looked down and noticed that the mouse had climbed loose from my sweatshirt pocket and was scurrying toward the scientists. I dove forward to catch him, my hands closing around his small body. I scrambled to push myself back up but slipped, knocking my chin on the ground.
Stars danced in my vision.
When I looked up, both of the scientists were standing over me. An alarm started to blare through the room. I jostled to my feet, returning the mouse to my pocket, and made a dash for the exit. They didn’t bother to follow me.
They knew it wasn’t their job.
They also knew Director Raze and his security team would be here any second.
And they were right.
I’d barely made it into the desert air when I was surrounded. Agents closed in from all sides.
I pulled the mouse from my pocket and crouched down to set him on the ground. If I was going to be captured, at least he could be free.
He took two steps before stiffening and collapsing onto his side.
Dead.
Tears instantly welled in my eyes as the agents approached. A Modifier flashed in my vision, and then the world faded to black.
* * *
I was about to hit Stop when suddenly I heard voices.
I swiveled around in my chair, searching for the source, convinced I was about to experience a strange déjà vu from my stolen memory. But then I realized the voices were coming from the Revisualization monitor.
Through the blackness of my semiconsciousness.
That’s when I noticed the time code on the file. There were still three minutes left.
I tilted my head toward the darkened screen, listening.
Two people were arguing. The clarity of their words was compromised by my nearly comatose state, but I recognized the first voice as my mother. The second voice took a moment longer. Because I hadn’t actually heard it in over a year.
A chill settled into my spine when I finally realized who was speaking.
It was my father.
* * *
“There’s nothing I can do!” my mom insisted. “The protocols are in place for a reason. I can’t just rewrite Diotech laws.”
“He’s only a kid,” my dad whispered back, anger souring his words.
“Who broke into a C9 laboratory.”
“I’ve heard what these memory wipes can do to the brain.”
“They’re perfectly safe,” my mom argued.
My dad grunted. “You can stop this. You choose not to.”
“That’s not true! I have no power here.”
“Talk to Alixter. Reason with him. Or ask Havin to step in and make an exception. He’s just as much in control around here as Alixter. Besides, you two have gotten awfully chummy lately.”
My mom’s breathing was sudd
enly labored. She was trying to control her temper. “Don’t start with that again. My relationship with Dr. Rio is completely professional.”
My dad ignored this. “If you let this happen, you’re siding with them over me. You’re choosing this place over your family.”
“I’m sorry you see it that way.” My mom’s voice was tight. She didn’t sound sorry in the slightest.
There was a long, angry silence. “If you won’t do this for our son, then I’m leaving. For good this time.”
“Don’t give me ultimatums!” my mom screamed. “I told you, I don’t have a choice! I can’t stop this.”
“You can,” my dad insisted with audible sadness. “You just won’t.”
My mom sighed. I heard heavy footsteps echoing down a hallway, getting farther and farther away.
“Initiate protocol,” my mother called to someone.
Then everything went deathly silent.
18: Enough
I didn’t expect to find anything under the bench the next afternoon. After our failed escape a few days ago, I was pretty convinced they would be wiping her memories nightly. Which was why the small tangle of twigs that had been fashioned into an eternal knot, half buried in the dirt made my heart swell with relief and joy.
But the emotions were quickly hijacked by a flash of suspicion and distrust. Why had they kept her memories intact? Why hadn’t they wiped them? What were they planning now?
I picked up the small wooden symbol and turned to find Seraphina gazing at me from the front porch of the house.
She smiled and walked tentatively in my direction.
I held up the knot. “I didn’t tell you about this symbol the last time.”
“I found it,” she proclaimed. “I found it drawn on the wall next to my bed. I believe I drew it there. As a reminder. I made the assumption that the symbol was a reference to you.”
I smiled. “It was.”
She nodded. “What does it mean?”
I took a deep breath and walked toward her. “I means eternity. It means forever.”
“Forever,” she repeated quietly, playing with the word on her perfect lips. She reached out and touched the knot of twigs. “I like the symbol.”