Enders (23 page)

A look of surprise came over Michael’s face. “You shot me.”

Ender guards came and took me away, to another one of their rooms with a projection of a beach. A few chairs were placed around a plain, school-issue table. A moment later, they brought in Hyden and left us alone.

“What were you thinking?” I said.

He held out his arms. “I didn’t have a choice.”

“Making me shoot Michael? I can’t believe you did that.”

“They made me. They threatened to torture you if I didn’t cooperate.” His eyes pleaded. “They said the bullets were fake.”

“He could have been killed. People can die from blanks, from the impact if they’re too close.”

“We can’t all be shooting experts like you.”

He ran his hand through his hair. He looked awful, with bags under his eyes.

“Have they hurt you?” I asked.

“They’ve been treating me like a prince.”

I glanced around the room. I assumed cameras and listening devices spied on us everywhere.

“Who are these people?” I whispered.

He rubbed his forehead. “I’m not sure.” He kept his voice low. “They want the chip, my chip. They’ve figured out how to use it. So they’re competitors.”

He covered his mouth with both hands so a camera could not read his lips, and whispered, “The question is, are they my father’s men?”

I hadn’t even thought of that possibility. That would explain why they had mastered the transpositions.

I remembered what Hyden’s father said to me.
Trust no one but yourself, and then question that
.

Not long after our conversation, they finally brought in some food and water. It was just bread and a thin soup, but we were starving.

“Where’s Michael?” I asked the Ender guard who brought the food.

He ignored me.

“What could they be doing to him?” I asked Hyden.

“It could just be tactics. Keeping us separate. Who knows? Maybe he’s getting a cheeseburger and fries?”

He smiled a little, to try to cheer me up. It didn’t work. My mind went to the worst places, worrying about Michael. I didn’t know why they’d want to interrogate him. Of the three of us, Hyden had the most to reveal. Was it possible they didn’t know who he really was?

I looked at him.

“What?” he asked quietly.

“Nothing.” I didn’t want to risk even whispering it.

After we finished, the same Ender guard who had brought the food returned. “Hold on,” Hyden said. “Be strong.”

I gave him a half smile. He nodded.

The guard escorted me down the hall to a small, stark room with a table and two chairs. A female Ender entered, wearing a white turtleneck and pants. She nodded to dismiss the guard.

“Hello, Callie. Please sit down.”

She sat in the chair opposite me. She turned on her palm airscreen so it could transcribe our conversation. I could see the letters, backward, as she spoke.

“So, Callie, how long ago was your chip implanted?”

“Three months, two weeks, and five days.”

“Do you have any physical problems that you can attribute to it?”

“Headaches.”

“Is that all?”

I thought about not telling her. But I could see something else on the airscreen—a moving meter that looked like a graph. It was a lie sensor, and it now wavered just because I was thinking of a lie.

“I have memory episodes.”

She leaned in. “What are those?”

“Times when I relive a memory from my renter, when she was in my body. When I was unaware. They come back to me, out of the blue.”

“How does it manifest itself?” Her words flashed across the airscreen.

“It’s like watching a holo,” I said. “A short holo. It only lasts a minute.” I shrugged to try to make light of it. But she was far too interested to buy that.

“And you say it is a memory from your renter’s experience? How do you know that?”

“Because …”

I hesitated and the graph spiked.

“Just tell the truth,” she said.

“I knew who she was. I recognized the places in the memory, her room.”

“And is there some emotion that comes with this?” Her brows raised. She licked her lips and drew closer.

“Yes. It’s like I’m reliving her experience at that time. But I don’t know why. It’s not like it answers any questions. Or like I can explain why it comes on. There’s no revelation, just this stupid holo in my head, and then it’s over.”

I saw my words form on the screen. It was strange.

“So who is this surgeon you have here?” I asked.

She looked up at me. She didn’t deny his existence; she didn’t answer. She just kept on quizzing me.

“And what do you know about Hyden?” she asked.

My muscles tensed. I heard her device make a high-pitched sound like a bird.

“Relax, please,” she said.

“I think you should ask him that,” I said. I relaxed my muscles and the sound subsided.

“But I’m asking you.”

“And I’m saying you should ask him.”

Her machine went silent. So did she. She wrapped up her palm airscreen and stood. Without another word, she left the room.

Dawson entered. I hadn’t seen him face to face for a while. But having him in my head was a creepy experience. It felt almost embarrassing to see him in person again.

“You are a feisty little Starter,” he said.

I stared back at him. He pulled out a chair and sat.

“I would like to know more about Hyden,” he said.

“As I told the last Ender, I think you should ask him.”

“Wouldn’t you rather we not do it that way?” He squinted, as if contemplating some unsavory task.

“I don’t know much about him.”

“Is it true he invented the chip that you have in your head?”

“He would have to be pretty smart at his age, to do that.”

“He is pretty smart.” He leaned forward on the table and grabbed my wrist. “You, Callie Woodland, were the one we wanted. You’re the only one with an altered chip that allows you to kill. You’re the only one who is an M.A.D.”

I tried to pull away, but he held on.

“Multiple Access Donor. You’re the only one who can have someone in your head without totally transposing you. You are still aware. You can hear them. And that means that you can also have another person inside. This is something no one has been able to re-create in any other Metal.”

His nails were digging into my skin. “You’re hurting me. Do you really want to hurt the only M.A.D. Metal?”

He looked down at my wrist and let go. I put it behind my back. I didn’t want him to see me rubbing it.

I remembered what Hyden had said. So these guys were his father’s competition? Maybe they were going to sell the chip off to some terrorist group or enemy country. Or maybe they were a terrorist group themselves.

“So you’ve been doing all this research about chip technology …”

“Yes,” Dawson said. “We have.”

“With these experts …”

“We have some of the best.”

“But you can’t re-create the chip yourselves.”

“It is the keystone, and it eludes us.”

“We don’t want these chips in our heads anymore,” I said. “You can have them. I believe you have an expert here who can remove them.”

“You know it is very difficult. Very precise work. The skill required is a cross between a demolitions expert and a brain surgeon.”

“Yes. But you have the person to do it, don’t you?”

He stared at me with piercing eyes. I could tell he was considering it, as if it could be the answer to all his problems.

“Remember, you asked for this,” he said.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Dawson gathered all of us in the large room where we’d first entered. Hyden, Emma, me, and Michael. The projection now was of the snowy Himalayas.

I rushed over to Michael, wanting to know how he was, what they’d done to him, but Dawson stopped me. He’d brought in an Ender he referred to only as “the Doctor” to talk to us. He had an accent, Swedish or Norwegian.

“Removal of the chip is a risky process,” the Doctor said. “We know from the scans that it is attached with a weblike pattern.”

“It’s quite ingenious. The chip itself creates the web,” Dawson said.

“Due to variations from human to human, it makes it trickier to determine how to unhook it,” the Doctor said. He motioned with his fingers, curling them like hooks. “But finally we have the inventor of the chip here with us to ask.”

Hyden glared at him. “You need to ask my father. I had
the concept and the initial designs. He created the physical chip and figured out how it would be implanted.”

The Doctor’s smile melted.

Dawson pulled out a chair and sat. “Have you ever watched an implantation surgery?”

“Lots of times,” Hyden said. “But never a removal.”

“But it can be done?” Dawson asked.

“Theoretically. But practically, I wouldn’t touch it.” Hyden folded his arms. “And neither should you.”

“Why is that?” the Doctor asked.

“Because it’s a big risk.”

“Any surgery is a risk,” the Doctor said. “But we do them.”

People started talking at once, arguing the pros and cons of chip surgery until no one could be heard.

Emma stepped forward. “I want mine out.”

Everyone stopped talking and turned toward her.

“Take it out,” she said. “You can have it.”

With a surprised expression, the Doctor turned to Dawson. “We have a volunteer.”

She held up her hand. “Yes. Use me.”

“Emma, are you sure?” I asked.

“Why, you want to go ahead of me?” she said. “You can’t. I asked first.”

“Do you know the risk you’re taking?” Hyden asked her, shaking his head almost imperceptibly.

“Don’t you try to talk me out of this. I hate this thing in my head. Worst decision ever,” she said. “I don’t want men tracking me, chasing, hunting me down.” She pointed at me. “You know, you all do, that this is what it’s going to be like for the rest of our lives. We will always be hunted for what we
can do, for the chip itself. Let’s just get it over with now and go back to living our lives. I want to go back to my grandma. Finish school. Go to parties again. The war is over, but I’m still living it, every day. I’m so sick of it. Take the stupid thing out of my head. Please.”

An icy silence fell. Dawson cleared his throat.

“All right,” he said. “Let’s do it.”

Emma smiled. I went over and took her arm.

“We know chips can explode,” I said. “I saw it happen, at the mall. Someone set it off.”

“That’s different.” She pulled her arm away. “No one’s going to be setting mine off. They’re going to remove it.”

She had a point.

Hyden came over. “It’s proof there’s an explosive component in there.” He gestured to her head. “The webbing of my design is entwined with the explosive.”

“So you do know something about removing the chip after all,” Dawson said.