False Memory (7 page)

We don’t say more than a few words the entire way back.

I think we’re afraid of what we’ll find at home.

Home is not as we left it. I smell the smoke from a mile away. Not normal smoke, either. A chemical smell rides the surface. Peter signals us, and we pull off

the road, still a ways from the forest entrance.

“Is that what I think it is?” Noah says.

Peter sniffs the air. “Smells like H9. A lot of it.” 

“H9?” I say. My vision flashes—a white brick, melting before my eyes, bubbling and popping, glowing orange.

Spreading into an all-consuming fire.

Peter inhales again. “You remember?”

“Yeah. Like plastic explosives that...” I recall the image again, see another flash of orange. “It burns through anything.”

Peter nods. He seems happy I remember something, even something as awful as H9.

Noah climbs off his bike and interlaces his fingers behind his neck. “I don’t like this.”

Olive shakes her head. “You think any of us do?”

Noah kicks a rock into the tree line, but says nothing.

Peter starts his bike, twisting the throttle a few times. My blood quickens. This little pill of dread hit my stomach when I first smelled smoke; now I feel drugged. Like my life is about to turn upside down again.

“We still need more shots,” Olive says. “We have to go home no matter what.”

“That’s definitely H9,” Peter says. “Let’s get in and get out. If we find Tycast, great. Agreed?”

“Agreed,” Olive and I say together.

“Finally, a decent plan,” Noah says, swinging a leg over his bike.

Peter pulls away and we follow him, Noah hurrying to catch up.

We turn down our narrow green road. The smell thickens. I see the tension in Peter’s body; he’s scared, which makes
me
scared. We stop just outside the clearing and climb off and drop into crouches.

A fire burns where the garage used to be. Only it’s burning from
under
the ground, the flames licking up a few feet. Like the garage disappeared. We step closer and see melted metal and concrete in the hole.

“Tell me there’s another way out . . .” I say.

Peter breathes heavily. “There isn’t.” He pushes against his forehead with his hand. Noah bursts into the clearing alongside Olive. Peter and I follow, walking to the massive collapsed rectangle. The fire bakes my face until I have to step back.

Noah cups his hands around his mouth. “TYCAST!”

Peter lunges at him, but not before Noah screams “DOCTOR TYCAST!” again. Noah pushes him away and Peter’s feet slide in the dirt.

Olive grabs Peter’s arm to hold him back. “Let him yell, Pete. Everyone’s dead.” Her eyes shimmer with tears.

“What do you care?” Peter says.

“Peter,” I say. We can’t point fingers now. This changes everything.

He shakes his head. “I didn’t mean that.”

Olive says, “I know.”

Noah calls out again, this time for Phil. He takes a big breath and bellows “
SIFU
PHIL! PHILLIP!”

Olive is silent, head bowed. I can’t tell if she’s crying. I can’t tell if I’m supposed to be crying.

The family moment in the elevator is gone. Whatever training I have didn’t include the right way to handle this. Danger could still be near.

I can’t take my eyes off the flames. The hole looks like it leads straight to hell. “No one thinks this is strange timing?”

Noah turns around. “What is?”

I swallow and drag my fingers over my cheek, wiping away a cold tear. I’m crying after all. Feeling something besides emptiness and anger is new. “That this happens while we’re gone? I know I’m new to the group, but no one thinks that’s odd? We could’ve been inside.”

Peter looks at Olive. “Do we have weapons?”

Olive nods and slinks away to the trees.

I try to imagine a reason someone would do this, and can only think of one.

“Don’t you see?” I say, and now Peter is watching me intently. “What if Doctor Tycast decided not to go along with the voice in his office. He sounded upset, right?”

“He was crying,” Noah says.

“Were the men here loyal to Tycast?” I ask both of them.

“Everyone was,” they say together.

Peter scans the trees behind me. “We don’t know if anyone is dead. Maybe whoever did this burned the place and took off.”

I shake my head. “We talked to Tycast
this morning
. Why would they do that?”

“Let’s be clear on
they
,” Noah says.

“Whomever you heard Tycast talking to,” I say. “Obviously she’s not alone.”

“Nothing is obvious,” Noah says. “He could’ve done this on his own, or helped them.”

I want to fire back with something, but he’s right. We can’t be sure of anything.

The fire is lower now, just an orange glow reflecting off the dirt walls. The ground beneath my feet is warm through my boots. I crouch down and press my palm on the grass.

When I look up, Peter stands over me. “Take off your boot,” he says. His eyes are blurry with tears, but maybe it’s from the billowing smoke.

“Why?”

He kneels. Grabs my laces and tugs.

“What’s wrong?” I say.

“You’re right about what happened here,” he says. “We’re not safe. And we won’t be until no one can track us.”

Noah is next to him. “What are you doing?”

“Removing her tracker.”

“What tracker?”

Peter takes my sock off and finds the seam in my armor with his thumb. He splits it along the top of my foot and rolls it halfway up my shin, holding my foot in his dry hand. My toes are painted a burnt red color, kind of like my hair. I don’t remember painting them; it doesn’t seem like something I would care to do. My bare foot in his hand makes me feel a little exposed, and I don’t know why.

Then Peter pulls out a knife.

I see something in his eyes. Pain. But not for our burning home. Because he’s about to hurt me?

I bite my lip.

“This won’t feel good,” he says.

Noah reaches down and grabs the wrist holding the knife, but Peter elbows him in the chest. “Back off,” he says. “I’m saving our lives.” To me, he says, “This is where I put the tracker. I thought I was only one who could use it, but I don’t know if that’s true now.”

I nod. The knife goes in just behind my ankle. I bite my lip harder to keep from screaming. He twists the blade and a little red pill shoots out and falls into the grass. I taste blood and blink my vision clear.

“You should be able to stand,” Peter says.

Olive comes back carrying four long sticks in her arms. Slim combat staffs. I smell a gym mat, hear the thwack of a staff hitting bare skin. Another phantom, this time without images. I shake my head to clear the sensations.

“No guns?” Noah says. Peter disposed of the two Walthers in a storm drain before leaving Indiana. He didn’t want to risk getting pulled over with them. After some grumbling, Noah and Olive did the same.

Olive shakes her head. She’s smeared dirt across her cheeks and brow. With her dark hair and black suit, she blends in with the shadowed tree trunks perfectly. I feel like a road flare in comparison, with my red hair and pale skin.

Peter wipes the knife on his shirt, smearing my blood. “Who’s next?” he says. He rolls the armor down my leg and pushes the seam together. The pain fades a moment later as the armor acts like a bandage over the wound.

I put my sock and boot on while Peter removes trackers from Noah and Olive. Noah calls him an asshole for keeping tabs without his knowledge, but Olive just shrugs like it all makes sense. I get why he did it—we wouldn’t be here together if he hadn’t—but I’m not sure I like that he didn’t ask. Still, from what little I know about him, it seems like the idea was for the right reasons, not to spy on us. Our situation kind of proves that.

I practice walking around. My ankle is tender but feels like it’s already healing, if that’s possible. The fire from the H9 has died down even more. It’s just a smoking pit in the middle of the clearing, and none of us look at it. We know we shouldn’t stick around, but I think we’re afraid to leave the hole behind. It’s our home. Not remembering doesn’t change that fact.

Olive gives me a staff, and I give it a few experimental twirls. It rolls over the back of my hand like I’ve been twirling staves my whole life, which I probably have.

When she turns away, I tap Olive on the shoulder with the staff. “How good was I with one of these?”

“Almost as good as me.”

Her eyes are red-rimmed and wet, just like Peter’s and Noah’s. I try to drag up some memory of my home, some phantom, but there’s nothing. I can’t remember anything I’ve lost the way they can. That’s almost enough to make the tears return. I find myself glaring at Noah again, and he notices.

He opens his mouth to say something, but then we hear the helicopter.

We all freeze, but only for a second. We break as one, sprinting for the trees with our staves. Peter is in the lead, followed by Olive then Noah then me. I look over my shoulder every few seconds at the thin column of smoke curling above the trees. The leaves rustle as the helicopter passes over our heads. We keep running. The trees thicken till we come to a narrow path of moist dirt and roots.

I skid to a stop. The others keep running silently, growing smaller. Noah realizes I’m missing first and shouts, “Hold up!”

Peter and Olive stop farther down the path. They run back to me, but I’m not looking at them.

I’m looking at Dr. Tycast propped against a tree.

The front of his white coat is bloody and torn. The lenses in his glasses are cracked. His lips and nose are smeared with dried blood.

“Miranda . . .” he says. I crouch next to him and touch the side of his face lightly, afraid to cause him any more pain. He manages a weak, shaky smile, showing blood on his teeth.

“What happened?” I say.

“You have to go. Beta team, they’re still here. They...aren’t your friends.” His voice is so quiet and wet. I hear the others standing behind me. Peter crouches down and balances himself with a hand on my shoulder.

Peter says, “We have to move him. We can carry him. Doctor, did anyone escape with you?”

Tycast shakes his head. “I was in the garage when they dropped the H9. It collapsed, and I barely got out.” He looks up at Noah, standing behind me and Peter. “You were right to flee. You were right.” His face crumples and he coughs for a few seconds. “How did you know?”

Noah’s voice is soft. “I was in your office. You received a call from a woman. You—she talked about buyers and tests.”

“I expect that left you . . . a little confused.”

“Yes, sir,” Noah says.

“Who is she?” I ask.

“Part of the people behind all of this. Everything. The creators of this project.” Tycast’s eyes roam over us and he smiles again, warmer this time. That missing piece inside me is filled, maybe temporarily, but enough to make my eyes ache.

Another helicopter—or is it the same one?—zips overhead. The branches sway and green leaves spin to the forest floor.

Tycast takes a deep breath. “You belong to one another now. But they will hunt you. You have to...be ready. You have to . . . stay together. They raised you for a purpose. All of you.”

Tycast begins to slip off the tree trunk. Peter reaches out to hold him in place.

“What purpose?” Peter says.

“You are all aware of your power,” Tycast says. “There are people in this world . . . who would do anything to own you. To control you. The people who made you the way you are, they want to, to...”

“To what?” Noah says.

“To test you. In the city. A dry run to prove your worth. They will use you to terrify the city until it can’t function, until people flee and nothing is left but empty buildings and streets.”

“And those who die trying to get out of the way,” I say.

Tycast nods. “I’m sorry. I am. I thought I could change their minds. Even if you evade capture, they’ll still use the other Roses.”

Peter says, “You knew we’d be sold all along...you
knew
.” His jaw is clenched. It’s like he’s fighting the urge to feel betrayed. We all are. But there’s love in Tycast’s face, even if I can’t remember it.

He fights the pain with clear eyes. “I did. Yes. But I was unwilling to let you go. And now it’s happening without me. . . .”

Noah says, “That’s what I heard. That’s why we left.”

Tycast says, “I should’ve sent you away. Sooner. I was a coward. Didn’t stop it.”

“Until now,” Olive says behind me.

“Too late, my dear,” Tycast says. “I said I would have no part in it, so they destroyed all my work . . . our home. They must’ve known you four were out. They still want to use you. You are worth so much.”

Peter shakes his head. “Even if they capture us, they can’t make us cooperate. They can’t break us.”

Tycast’s white eyebrows go up. “All they have to do is deny you your memory shots. Then you won’t know what side you’re fighting for. And there are other ways, too.”

A freezing hand reaches inside me and grips my stomach. Olive gasps. I guess the thought of future shots wasn’t on anyone’s mind, including my own.

Noah is huddled next to Peter and me now. “Where can we get more shots, Doctor?”

“There is a place,” Tycast says. “I made a secret cache for emergencies. I sunk it, in the lake. Off the third pier downtown. Red paint. Third pier. I’m sorry. I failed you. There’s enough to last. Get it, and hide. Don’t fight them. Don’t...”

He’s fading. I squeeze his shoulder, trying to keep his attention. Maybe he can hold on. But even as I think it, I know these are his last moments.

“This Beta team,” I say. “Who are they?”

Tycast grimaces, but it’s not from the pain. Disgust or shame, it seems. “They are just like you,” he says.

Just like us.

Noah asks him another question.

“Rhys,” he says. “The rogue. Who is he? Will he help us?”

Noah asks something else but I don’t hear it. I’m too busy watching the light fade from Dr. Tycast’s eyes. They shut halfway but stay cracked, like he’s slowly waking from a nap and adjusting to the light.

For a few moments, none of us moves or speaks. I can’t read their minds, but I’m guessing we all ponder the same question— did Tycast betray us? He knew what was coming, but that doesn’t mean he was powerless to stop it. I want to believe he meant what he said—he wouldn’t leave us, or use us. I know the others do, too. But as usual, I don’t know what to think.

Eventually, Peter stands up and walks away from us, gripping his forehead with his palm. The rest of us watch him, waiting for orders I guess. We should be moving. Standing here makes the bottom of my feet itch. Or maybe that’s the blood still leaking from my ankle, pooling under my foot.

Noah puts his hands on his hips. Sweat glistens in his short brown hair. “We need to get that cache of shots,” he says to Peter.

Peter doesn’t face us. “Don’t you think I know that?” “Then what are we standing around for?” Olive says. She’s so quiet, but her presence is still reassuring, maybe because she isn’t loud about it. She’s like Noah’s opposite. Especially now with the dirt on her face, and the way she seems to hang a few steps back, watching us rather than taking part. There’s something feral about Olive. A strange light in her eyes that seems more than human.

I want to know more about her. I wonder what I’ve forgotten.

Peter finally turns to us. Behind him a squirrel skitters over the dirt path and up a tree. The helicopters still drone in the background, far away.

“We need to stop this dry run,” Peter says. “If what he said is true...”

We all know it’s true. I spin my staff around and hold it behind my back.

“That’s not our priority right now,” Noah says. He looks at me and Olive to make sure we’re listening. “Our priority is making sure we don’t lose our memories.”

“Like I did?” I blurt.

It hangs in the air between us, my stupid reminder that I’m still the wild card.

“Miranda—” Noah begins.

I shake my head. “The dry run needs to be just as important. You know what we can do, so imagine it happening in a city. You weren’t there in the mall with me. When people couldn’t get out of the way fast enough.” I swallow thickly, wishing the scene was part of my forgotten memories. “We’ll get those shots, but we have to stop
them.
”

Them. Wish I was a little more clear on who the enemy is. It’s hard to fight what you don’t know.

I bite the inside of my cheek again, feeling the raw flesh against my tongue. More leaves tumble down as one of the helicopters passes overhead. I focus on the taste of blood, if only to focus on something.

Peter rubs the bruise on his forehead. “Tycast once told me we can only create the fear waves during our teen years. After a while the density of our brains will decrease until they resemble a normal person’s. That’s why we’ve been training since we were kids.”

Olive says, “He told me that too. So they need to use us soon, or not at all.”

Peter nods. “Precisely.”

“Will we still need our memory shots?” I say. “After the powers fade?”

Peter shrugs. “I don’t think so, but I can’t be sure. There was only so much Tycast shared with me.”

Noah holds up his hands and steps between me and Peter. “Planning for the future is fine, but we need to deal with the
now
. Let’s get to that cache before it’s too late.”

Noah is about to say more, but he’s staring at Peter funny. Then I see it—something is sticking out of Peter’s neck. Peter reaches up to touch it, then his eyes roll back in his head and he collapses onto his back. His head thumps against the dirt.

“Cover!” Noah says.

I react instantly, backpedaling and curling around a tree, crouching low, holding my staff at my side. Noah and Olive have disappeared. I breathe slowly through my nose and let my eyes scan the trees for any threat. They keep straying to Dr. Tycast’s body, which still leans against the tree trunk a few feet away.

And Peter—oh God. The initial reflex has faded and now I see him with the dart in his neck. It could be poison; he could be dead. I fight to keep my breath even. I can’t lose it now, not out here, with all of us under attack. My scan of the trees just shows leaves and more leaves.

Noah grunts. Then I hear the sharp crack of wood against wood. I burst from my hiding spot and step onto the dirt path with my staff held close. Noah stands ten feet away. In front of him, between us, is someone wearing a black bodysuit identical to ours, down to the little scales. A cowl covers her head. I can only tell it’s a girl from the shape of her body.

Behind Noah is an exact clone of the first black suit, a male; since he’s facing me, I see his scaled face is featureless except for two smoked lenses over the eyes. Both suits hold staves like Noah, only theirs have knives on the end. Why do we have the low-end model?

Noah parries a front attack from the girl, then takes an unblockable hit in his back from the male. He groans, stumbling forward. Olive bursts from the tree line, her staff a spinning blur. I’m on the black-suited girl, who’s had her back to me all along. My staff comes down on top of her head and she screams behind her mask.

The cheap shot doesn’t slow her, apparently, because she spins toward me, sweeping her staff low over the ground to take out my legs. I jump as it passes under me, and since I’m already in the air I plant a semi-solid kick on her chest. She staggers back, knocking into Noah, who engages the other black suit with Olive. The continual crack and slap of wood rings outs like a drumroll. The girl trips over Noah’s leg and falls into an awkward somersault.

If this is the Beta team, why are there only two? I watch Olive thrust the end of her staff into the male’s chest; he goes down with a violent grunt. The girl takes a whole second to stand after her tumble. Against the three of us working together, she has no chance.

I want to laugh, but something isn’t right. It shouldn’t be this easy. I glance over my shoulder to check on Peter, and see it isn’t.

Two other black suits stand over him, another guy and girl. I catch a glimpse of eyes before the guy’s lenses darken. I remember those eyes. Pale blue, too blue—almost fake. Before I can remember anything further, both of them are on me. I snap my staff from side to side, picking off their thrusts and blunt slashes, but they’re as fast as I am. One of them reaches out, holding a dart identical to the one in Peter’s neck. I jerk my head back before it can prick me, but the movement unbalances me. A blade cuts through my jeans, scrapes the side of my knee.

I’m falling.

Noah catches me. He doesn’t hold me for long, just enough to break my fall. Then he slashes back and forth again, driving the black suits away. Olive sneaks in behind them and heaves Peter up. She wrestles him over her shoulder and slips into the forest. Behind me, the first two black suits stagger upright, dazed. The girl clutches her head.

“Noah, come on!” I don’t wait, just sprint into the trees and run and run and run. Noah’s feet pound the dirt behind me. Our only chance is to lose them. A dart pierces a tree trunk five feet ahead of me. I flow around the trunk without losing speed. The forest is a green blur, and the only sound is our feet landing lightly on dead leaves and dirt. I zig and zag and Noah keeps pace and I know we have to escape together. I think we’re losing them. A few more twists. Whatever I am and whatever we’re supposed to do, it doesn’t end in this forest. It can’t.

The river roars up ahead, and I coax a little more power from my muscles. I’m not even breathing heavily. Part of me feels alien because I don’t know what I’m fully capable of. My body seems to have its own memory, one still intact.

The speed burst carries me through a tangle of branches to open ground that ends at a gray-brown river flowing right to left. With the next step, I leap from the bank and soar over the river, straightening my body into a dive, thrusting my hands out in case the murky water is shallow. I cut into the rushing water and submerge. I’m lucky—no bottom found. The current tries to push me to the surface, but I pump my arms and legs, fighting to stay under. The cold water stings my eyes and nose; I can’t see anything but brown.

A hand closes over my wrist. I jerk away. See a T-shirt through the murk.

Noah.

I blow out my air so I don’t bob back to the surface and reveal our location to the suits. Noah keeps his hand tight around my wrist. Bubbles surge around me. My chest grows tight. It’s so much harder to hold your breath when there’s no breath to hold.

Noah orients himself over me, and we scrape along the bottom. I open my eyes and see him through the haze of dirty water.

I have to go up.

I
have
to break the surface and fill my lungs.

But I don’t know how far we’ve traveled. Maybe not far at all. If we surface now, they might see that we didn’t cross the river. I should have kept running.

I jerk in Noah’s arms. I’m drowning, I know it. Can’t hold my breath any longer. I pull free, fighting and clawing at him, anything to make him let me go. I have to reach the surface. But his hands hold me tight, and for one sick moment I think he’s trying to kill me. A rock on the bottom scrapes my neck hard, and as my lips part to gasp, Noah puts his mouth on mine. He blows his hot breath into my mouth just as I inhale. Just in time. My lungs still burn, but not as badly, and I can take it. Here, scraping along the bottom of a river, lips on my once-boyfriend who gives me his air, I realize I’m not going to drown, not yet. He keeps his lips on mine, allowing me to give a little back. Then his mouth isn’t just on mine, it’s moving. He’s kissing me. And I’m kissing him. We forget about breathing. A phantom memory hits me—