Damage (21 page)

I shiver. In eighth grade history, we did an entire unit on the holocaust; Hitler wanted a superior race of people, too, and he hadn’t been above experimenting on children to find out what separated the strong from the weak. The monstrous acts of torture performed by Nazi “scientists” make Dad and the other doctors who tested their medicine on us seem like okay people. But the fact that I have to compare my father to some of the most evil men in history in order to make his behavior less horrifying isn’t comforting.

“We thought we were giving you all a priceless gift,” Dad concludes.

Jesse snorts. “So what went wrong?”

“Nothing went wrong. At first,” Dad says. “For a few months we thought it was going to be a success. The sick kids were getting well and the well kids were getting bigger, stronger, healing more quickly.” He sighs, a tortured sound that I suspect has more to do with his failed wonder drug than any real remorse. “But then we started seeing elevated white blood cell counts in the daily blood work. The meds were causing the patients’ immune systems to become overactive. We were worried, but over the course of a few weeks the problem seemed to resolve itself. We started thinking we might have found a cure for autoimmune disease, arthritis, cancer … Then the psychotic episodes started. In every patient. Across the board. They were especially violent in those who were healthy at the start of the trial.”

Like Jesse. Is that the reason his dragon went in for the kill right away? Is that the reason his imaginary enemy is still so much bigger and stronger than mine?

“But we weren’t psychotic,” Jesse whispers.

His eyes are fixed on the road and his fingers grip the steering wheel so tight the veins stand out on the back of his hands. This has to be even harder for him to hear. At least I was sick to start with, and my father was the one who decided I should join the Dream Project. But Jesse was just … stolen.

I want to reach out to him, but I’m suddenly very conscious of my dad watching my every move from the back seat. I don’t want him to know about Jesse and me. He doesn’t deserve to know anything about my life. Not anymore.

“No,” Dad says. “It was a manifestation of an autoimmune disorder that we’d never seen before.”

“An autoimmune disorder caused by the medicine,” I say, needing Dad to take responsibility instead of blaming some disorder like he had nothing to do with it.

“Not exactly,” he says. “The Dream treatment actually altered the patients’ genetic material, creating an autoimmune disorder that caused their minds to manufacture imaginary … assassins.”

Jesse glowers at Dad in the rearview mirror. “That sounds like crazy to me. You’re still saying these things are all in our heads.”

“Well … ” Dad sniffs. “These beings
don’t
exist outside your imagination, but their actions do manifest in the real world. We’ve got hours of video of objects floating through the air with nothing there to hold them, wet animal footprints coming out of hospital bathrooms, elevated temperatures in rooms where the kids imagined—”

“So you
did
know that I wasn’t crazy,” I say, trying not to think too hard about what he’s just said. He’s all but admitted that he let people tape kids being attacked and didn’t even try to help, but I can’t think about that right now. I can’t imagine my father watching Rachel come for me with a hypodermic needle and leaving me to fight it out on my own without wanting to kick him out of the car. While it’s moving. “You knew that Rachel was your fault.”

“Dani, I was the first to say that I thought what was happening to you was a result of the medication. Don’t you remember that I—”

“I remember that you and Mom made me talk to that psychiatrist for months, even though you knew it wouldn’t help.” Another horrible thought rises in my mind. “Did Mom know? Did she know you were using me as—”

“I wasn’t using you,” Dad says, loud enough to make me press myself against the car door. “I was trying to save your life!”

“Did Mom know?” I demand again.

“Your mom didn’t know anything,” his says, voice softer, but just as bitter as it always is when we talk about Mom. “She didn’t care what happened as long as she didn’t have to make any grown-up decisions.”

His words sting more than they should. I know my mom isn’t a responsible grown-up. That’s the reason she lives in Philadelphia with a boyfriend half her age and hasn’t had a job in sixteen years. That’s why I’ve never spent more than a couple of weeks at a time at her place every summer instead of the six weeks mandated in my parents’ divorce decree. She can’t handle the responsibility. But she loves me. I can’t believe she would have been okay with Dad doing what he did—to me or the other kids in his “project.”

“And no, I
didn’t
know that psychiatric therapy wouldn’t help.” Dad leans between the seats, getting as close to looking me in the face as he can while I’m refusing to turn around. “We were dealing with an entirely new phenomenon, and the human brain is a mystery at the best of times. I hoped Dr. Messing would be able to help you gain control of your mind, and of Rachel.”

I hesitate, the angry words on my lips slipping back into my throat. I
have
started to gain control of Rachel, but only today, years and years after her initial appearance and with no help from a psychiatrist.

“So, why are they back?” I ask. “Why are they attacking Jesse and me again? Why are they so much stronger?”

“And why did someone run our bus off the road?” Jesse asks. “Why are terrorists trying to kill us?”

“I don’t think they’re trying to kill you.” Dad’s voice is thinner, weaker than it was when he was talking about the experiment. “I can’t be sure, but I imagine they considered the accident a calculated risk. It could have killed you, or it could have been the kind of traumatic event needed to reactivate your unique autoimmune disease.”

Reactivate? It sounds like we’re robots or something. “What about the medication? Wouldn’t we have to be taking the same drugs again?”

“Not necessarily,” Dad says. “When we finally managed to get all the kids into remission, there was some concern that the disease could be reactivated by events that trigger other autoimmune diseases—a serious infection, a broken bone, things of that nature. But after a few years it didn’t seem like that was happening. The only time any former patient had a relapse was after a car accident. The little girl suffered significant head trauma, and afterward, she … ”

He leans his head against his hand, and when he speaks again there is genuine sorrow in his voice. “She checked into another hospital after the crash and was killed in her bed two days later. She was strangled in her sleep by something the security monitors couldn’t see. The hospital staff assumed there must have been a camera malfunction and the police opened an investigation, but they never found her killer.”

I don’t say anything. I don’t know what to say. Maybe it wasn’t his intention, but Dad just confirmed that some of the kids like us have lost their battle. We could lose, too.
Jesse
could lose.

“I think the people who are after you came into possession of that information,” Dad says, “And they decided if it worked once, it might work again.”

“Okay, so maybe that’s why they wrecked the bus,” Jesse says. “But what about the guns? I’ve got a bullet in my shoulder. That has nothing to do with head trauma.”

Dad sighs again. “I don’t know. Maybe they’ve guessed that you’ve been reactivated and you’re stronger and faster and capable of healing just about any damage done to your body. In our original trials, the teenagers we treated displayed amazing athletic and healing powers. These men could think that a gunshot wound is the only way to slow you down long enough to catch you.”

“And maybe they don’t care if they take us alive,” I say. Agent Bullock had been trying to kill us. I’d seen the look in his eyes.

“I think they want you alive,” Dad says. “At least some of you. They obviously want to see if reactivating the treatment in older adolescents is successful. They can’t do that if you’re all dead.”

The matter-of-fact way he discusses my life or death makes me shiver. Who is this man? And how did I ever believe he loved me, even in his own peculiar way?

“Initially, the teenagers in the original trials were our brightest hope,” Dad continues, his voice tired. “They were so strong and had a superhuman ability to heal. But most of them had to be taken off their meds in the first few weeks. There were … deadly elevations in body temperature. They started rejecting the gene modification and we couldn’t bring the fevers down in time.”

“So are you saying … ” I stare dumbly out the window, watching the city turn into countryside while my pulse thuds ominously in my temple. I can’t even finish the sentence. Have Jesse and I made it through everything we’ve been through today only to learn we’re going to die of a fever?

“I don’t know.” Dad puts a hand on my shoulder. I cringe closer to the door. He pulls away and doesn’t try to touch me again. “But I’m going to do everything I can do to make sure you’re okay. And there’s a chance that reactivating the altered DNA of teenagers or adults who received the treatment as children might not cause the same side effects. We’ll have to monitor you both closely over the next few weeks.”

“I’m not a scientist. Obviously.” Jesse’s voice is strung tight. He steps on the gas, pulling in front of a station wagon full of happy-looking kids. “But I paid enough attention in Bio last year to know that gene modification and altered DNA aren’t things that happen when you’re trying to treat an illness. Let alone super powers and super healing and all the other stuff. What kind of
medicine
were you giving us?”

Dad clears his throat. “We weren’t trying to treat an illness, we were trying to eliminate the possibility of illness. We were trying to make you … invulnerable.”

I pull my knees to my chest, hugging them tight. My mind races faster than the wheels speeding down the interstate beneath us. Invulnerable. Strong. Altered DNA. Experiments. Psychic Phenomenon. Terrorists. The pieces of the puzzle swirl around and around until they begin to form a chilling picture. I can only think of one reason terrorists would want genetically altered, super-strong, hard-to-damage teenagers capable of doing impossible things with their minds.

“They want to use us as some kind of weapon. Right?” I ask, letting my gaze slide over to watch Jesse’s reaction. His eyes meet mine just long enough for me to see that he’s already worked through the logic and come to the same conclusion.

“I wouldn’t imagine they want to use you or Jesse specifically. But if teenagers modified when they were children and reactivated after puberty can deal with the side effects of the Dream treatment, and still retain the same positive traits as the first test subjects … ” Dad trails off as he falls back into his seat. “But you said you’ve already been attacked by your psychic manifestations. Are these the same ones from when you were children? Have you seen them once or—”

“A few times. But we’re starting to get control over them. Like you said.” I silently pray that I’m telling the truth, and that Jesse will be able to handle his dragon when it shows up again.

“If that’s the case, then … ”

“Then the people who are after us will want to grow their own crop,” Jesse says, speaking the words my dad is unwilling to utter. “That’s why they want all your research, right? So they can make their own superhuman terrorists in a few years?”

“I’m sure they’ll find a lot of people willing to sign their children up for the treatment,” Dad says. “Especially parents who know their children will die without it. That’s why I did this, Danielle. I wanted you to have a chance to grow up. Even if that meant you’d grow up to hate me.”

I look out the window and pretend I didn’t hear him. Do I hate him? I don’t know. A part of me can understand why he made the choice he did for me, but I can’t forgive him for Jesse. Jesse didn’t have a choice, and he would have had a better chance at a happy life if they’d left him alone.

They
. Who are
they
? How many adults are in on this?

“Does everyone at North Corp know about the experiments?” I ask. “Or is it just you and your research team? And what about the people at the hospital? At least some of the doctors and nurses must have—”

“I can’t discuss any of that, Dani. The identities of the people involved in the project are classified.”

“Like, national-security classified?” Jesse asks. “Is this some kind of government thing?”

Dad’s steady stream of word-vomit ceases for the first time since we got in the car. I finally turn to look at him again, but his eyes are on the hands clenched in his lap.

“Is that how you met Penny?” I ask. Dad told me that he and Penny met at a North Corp banquet. Penny’s dad was a big North Corp supporter before he died a few years ago. They even have a building named after him. “Is she part of this?”

“Penny … ” Dad sniffs, but it isn’t until he lifts his face that I realize he’s crying. “I think Penny’s going to leave me.” I’m too shocked by the tears streaming down Dad’s cheeks to know what to say. I’ve never seen him cry, not even when he thought I was going to die.

“She didn’t know about any of this, but I had to tell her today. To keep her safe.” Dad swipes the back of his hand across his face. “She was so angry and disappointed. I think she’s going to ask for a divorce.”