Rebellion (33 page)

In the corner is a tiny square speaker. Mother's voice emits from it. “Foolish child. Did you really think I would just ‘go quietly into that good night'? You should have let the Enforcers kill me when you had the chance, Evelyn. I will not allow you to take my city from me.”

I shake my head and gesture for Gavin to turn around to leave. “Let's get the other subs.”

I jump when I hear a long, low beeping sound.

“What was that?” Mother demands and both Gavin and I turn around to try and find the source.

But then it cuts off and there's a
thump,
which sounds like it came from the speaker.

Gavin echoes, “What was that?”

But I don't answer, because while I don't know exactly what it was, I can see what it did. There, on Mother's pod, the glass dome is cracking. Spiderwebs of cracks grow larger every time I blink. I can hear it through the speaker.

She runs to the hatch, and her face presses against it. “Help me,” she says. “Please. Help me.”

Both Gavin and I are frozen. I can't do anything. I'm rooted to the spot. My feet refuse to budge even a centimeter.

Mother is staring at me. “Evelyn! Help me!” she says again. “You have to help me! I saved your life. Made you my own. Don't just
stand
there. Help me!” she yells, her voice screeching.

In horror, I watch as the cracks grow larger and longer. Even from here I can see water pouring in from a few of the larger ones.

Mother starts screaming louder. Shrieking about the pressure. Yelling at us to help her. But we can't. There isn't anything we can do. We're too deep and the cracks are too big. It'll all be over before we even reach the top of the stairs.

She's only meters from us and there's nothing we can do to help her.

Her screams turn to gurgles and red foam froths from her mouth. The sound is horrifying. Someone places their hands over my ears.

“Don't look, Evie,” Gavin says. “Just close your eyes.”

But I can't. Even with Gavin's hands over my ears, I can still hear her screaming. See her clawing at her throat as if she can't breathe. Then, just when I don't think I can take it anymore, the glass splinters one last time and the entire vessel implodes.

“Mother!” I yell, pushing past Gavin to run to the glass, even though I know it's too late. Had been too late from almost the beginning.

Just as I reach the glass, the shockwave hits it with a boom and rocks the entire room. I'm thrown into Gavin, who is directly behind me. My head smashes onto the concrete floor and stars explode in front of my head before darkness yanks me down.

 

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY
-
SEVEN

“She's planning a rebellion.”

“Yes.”

“Should I terminate?”

“No. It's just getting fun.”

—TRANSCRIPT, SIM 6,
S
UBJECT 121

“Subject 121 failed…” The somehow familiar yet unfamiliar voice, along with the sound of beeping, greets me as I slowly come to.

The air around me feels heavier than I remember; the smell of it staler. I think I might even smell a hint of chemicals. I must be in the Medical Sector. Father must have brought me and Gavin here after the explosion.

Gavin! The thought gives me a quick electrical zap in my nerves, but my limbs are still so heavy that the thought of moving my fingers—or even just my toes—is exhausting. My body wants me to succumb to blissful sleep, but I struggle through the fog in my head to tug myself into full consciousness. Even then I can't open my eyes. There's something keeping them shut.

Slowly—excruciatingly slowly—I force my fingers to move. But when I try moving my forearm, I make it only mere centimeters before I realize my arms are strapped to whatever I'm lying on. My legs are shackled with the same soft restraints at the ankle.

Tingles of panic slice through the fog in my brain, and I struggle against my restraints. The beeping next to me turns into screaming alarms.

I sense more than hear the movement at the bottom of my bed. I force myself to stop my fruitless floundering and to slow my rapid breathing. Of course, that doesn't stop the pounding of my heart, but there's nothing I can do about that.

The warmth of someone standing near me heats my left side and then suddenly, as if I've been hit with a hammer, pain pools like a wet heat at the nape of my neck. The tape is ripped from my eyes leaving me blinded not by darkness, but by a searing white light. I blink rapidly, trying to get my vision to focus, and stop the pain shooting from my eyes to my brain, but no matter how much I blink, everything remains a blur.

Finally, after several long moments, I'm able to make out a nurse standing beside me, making notes on a Slate and mumbling numbers to herself.

“Wh—what?” I start, but my voice is rusty. My throat is sore and my tongue is thick and dry, sticking to the roof of my mouth.

The woman barely spares me a glance. “Don't talk. You've been under awhile.” Her tone is gruff. Almost mean.

Once again, I try to move, only to have the nurse glance at me and roll her eyes, before returning her attention to the Slate.

The sound of a door opening and the familiar click of heels against tile has me freezing and the nurse turning away from me. Confusion and terror war in my mind.

Is that … No. It can't be.

I struggle against my bindings again, trying to peer around the nurse, but she's a perfect door when all I want is a window.

“I'm just finishing taking my vitals for her report, ma'am,” the nurse says.

“I saw what happened. I don't need a report. Or her vitals,” Mother's voice says clearly, making my veins run cold and leaving no room for doubt that it's her.

How could that be? I just saw her die!

The nurse rushes out the door and Mother strolls to stand beside me. “Relax, Evelyn.” She presses a button on the beeping machine and cold replaces the heat on my neck.

My eyes clear and I scour the room for a clue as to what's happening. I'm not in the Medical Sector. I have no idea where I am. And I'm alone aside from Mother. Where's Gavin? I glance up at the ceiling and my mouth falls open. A naked girl stares back at me from a mirror angled above the bed. She has my same blue eyes, even if they're a bit sunken. The same blond hair, even if it's lost some of its luster. And the same star-shaped scar I've come to accept as mine on her left shoulder.

But the rest of what is obviously a much grimmer version of the me I remember is covered in wires and electrodes. There are four electrodes on my upper chest, four on my abdomen. Two on my thighs and biceps and another two on my lower legs and forearms. And my head has so many of them, that I might as well be wearing a hat made of wire. There's a tube going into my nose and one resting just under it with two prongs blowing oxygen into my nostrils. There's what appears to be IV lines in my neck and another one in each arm.

“Where am I? What's going on?”

Mother peers down at me with pursed lips. “How do you feel, Evelyn?”

“Where am I? How are you alive? Where's Gavin?” I know I'm in no place to make demands, but I have to know.

The door behind her opens again with a swoosh and she glances over her shoulder. Without a word, she leaves me to join the new visitor in the corner of the room. My heart lurches when I see it's Dr. Friar. Did no one I killed actually die?

They're whispering, and my head is swimming with confusion. Reality and fantasy war in my memories. Memories, or echoes of memories, flood into my brain in a tidal wave of jumbled thoughts and pictures, filling in the gaps, and pushing away the memories I'd had just moments ago to make room for others, duplicate and triplicates of things that couldn't possibly have happened. I don't know what's real and what's not.

“She remembers,” Mother hisses. “She's not supposed to remember anything that happens in the sims.”

Sims!

More half-memories flood in. Mother captured me. Knocked me out with … something, and I woke up in here. She'd been planning this all along. It had all been just one giant test and this was to be my final exam. To make sure that when the time came, I would rule Elysium as she did. With an iron fist and an empty heart. And I'd walked right into the trap. But … someone—who? A friend? Yes! Someone in the Underground—came to my rescue. They had a plan. I could use the Sim to find Mother's weaknesses.

But I've been doing this for too long. None of this is going to plan.

“It was traumatizing. Her brain recorded it like it would a nightmare.” Dr. Friar shrugs. “It's nothing. In time it will fade.”

“If we ran it again, would she remember?”

Again? That's right. I failed again. Both the Underground and Mother. They had to run the sim again so I can try … wait … no. I
didn't
fail this time. I bite back a grin as more memories slide in. I'd done exactly what I was supposed to do this time. Find a way to take Mother down in the sim for the Underground to use in real life. But there's more I'm supposed to do.

“Doubtful. But, she's much too weak…”

Mother waves her hand. “She's the strongest subject we've had. I handpicked her myself. Despite her unfortunate decision this last time to start a rebellion against me, she showed true leadership potential. I'm not wasting all the time I've spent grooming her over such a small issue.”

How many times have I done this? When was I put here? Too many conflicting memories float around in my mind to snatch the real answers.

“I must insist…”

“I can't risk her remembering these … revelations. Erase her and run it again.”

“Her brain may not be able to take it…”

“I can do it,” I gasp out, desperate to prove myself one last time. I'm not finished. I've only completed half the task. Dr. Friar
has
to let me go again. And Mother
has
to believe that I'm doing this for her. That I
want
to pass her test so I can be her heir. Because as long as she's focused on me, she
isn't
focused on the Underground.

Mother glances over her shoulder, a smug grin resting on her face before she turns back toward Dr. Friar.

“Dr. Friar. You are my most trusted advisor.” Her voice is sugar sweet when she says it, but her voice hardens to cold steel and the smile goes dark when she adds, “Don't make me find a new one.”

I can see his Adam's apple bob, but he hesitates again, so I plead, “Please let me try again. I won't disappoint you again, Mother.”

“Get the tech. Run it again.” She turns and walks to me.

“As you wish, Mother,” he finally says.

Dr. Friar rushes from the room, but Mother stays standing over me.

She touches a hand to my head, pushing my hair farther from my eyes. It takes everything in my power not to flinch away from her.

“You'll do this city no good if you're brain damaged, Evelyn,” she says as if she were the one questioning my ability instead of Dr. Friar, but she smiles down at me. “You'll have one more chance to choose the
right
side in the sim to become my heir, Evelyn. And just to make it clear, starting a rebellion isn't it. Otherwise, I'll have no choice but to terminate you and choose another.”

“Where's Gavin?” I have to ask. I have to know he's okay.

She narrows her eyes, and she nods to herself as if she's just realized something important. “He's dead, Evelyn. You killed him yourself.”

Despair pools in my stomach like molten lead. “No. I love him. I would never hurt him.” I know I wouldn't. But that doesn't mean that Mother didn't kill him and blame it on me. She's done worse.

She only shrugs, that same horrible smile on her face. I just want to rip it off when she says, “But you did, dear.” She pats my shoulder. “But don't worry. In a few moments, you'll never know he lived at all.”

I close my eyes, letting Mother think that she's upset me. My eyes sting, but it's more from frustration than pain. Frustration that I can't sort the reality from the fiction even after all this time.
That's why I'm here
. That's why we chose
this
plan. Because I was the only one able to fight my Conditioning. I
have
to remember.

Another familiar female voice vibrates into my ear. “You sent for me, ma'am?”

“Prep her for another run.” She leaves the room with a clicking of her heels as her only sound. The door whooshes closed behind her as the tears I've been fighting since Mother appeared leak from the corners of my eyes to slide down into my ears.

I fight for control over my emotions as the newcomer walks closer. She stands next to me for so long I get the sense she's watching me and I open my eyes to glare at her. It's the only emotion other than despair I can muster.

But the minute I see her, I gasp. It's an Enforcer. In fact, it's
the
Enforcer. The one I was sure had killed Myra's family in the last sim. And she's holding none other than Dr. Friar's device. The one that disrupts my nanos and can turn me into nothing but a quivering mess of dead tissue with a push of a button.

But … no … Mother called her a tech.

More fog clears from my brain as I force myself to remember. The device doesn't disrupt my nanos. It's what starts the program. And the tech
isn't
an Enforcer. She's part of the Underground. My only contact with them. My only way to know for sure if Gavin is dead or not.

I open my mouth, but she shakes her head. Just once, but firmly. Her eyes lock onto mine. “Looks like you have a loose wire here.” She bends next to me, her attention and fingers on one of the electrodes behind my ear. “Gavin's not dead,” she whispers and the way she says it makes me think that even though I can't remember it, this isn't the first time we've had this conversation.