Control (16 page)

“How do you remember to live, every minute?”

“You mean my breathing? I make myself do it. It’s not easy.”

“I don’t have to try.” Her mouth stays taut, curls into a smile. “It is what it is.”

“Can you read my thoughts too?”

“I am a one-way street.”

I take her cryptic answer as a no. I even test her, asking her in my head if she likes apples, which I know she does from the pile of apple cores, but she stares blandly back at me, clearly not hearing my mental query. Ana proceeds to study me with her great, water-blue eyes until I lose the staring match. My eyes fall to a broken novel on the floor.

“Why do you read books, when you can use a holo?”

“I like things. Real things.” She reaches for a nearby book and presses it into her chest. Brittle bits of paper snow onto her lap. Something terrible lurks behind the blue eyes that watch me, almost clinging to me as I take a step back. My impulse to flee is gathering strength in my veins.

“No,” her voice whimpers in my head.

“I’ll come back sometime.” Oh, words. I offer them as a consolation prize, because I don’t know if I’m brave enough to back them up with the truth.

“No. No one comes back.” She wipes her nose clumsily, the way a little child might. The same way Dyl did as a kid. This time, my words will mean what they say. I undo my retreating steps and come close enough to touch her hand.

“
I
will. I promise. I’ll come by very soon.”

Ana clasps my hand, as if she’s captured a butterfly. “I like real things,” she says, and opens her cupped hands, freeing me. I know what pain it is for her to let go. She closes her eyes and burrows under the waves of blankets.

“Real is good,” I say, though I’m not sure what her flavor of real is.

I keep my hand on the wall as I walk back to my room. I feel off center, desperate to regain my balance. After that trip to Ana’s, I’m not quite sure that my north is north anymore.

IN THE LAB THE NEXT DAY
, I turn Dyl’s holo on to keep me company, but switch it to voice only. I can’t look at her face anymore. I know what she really looks like now. It’s the same reason I’ve always hated cut flowers. They’re impending death in a pretty vase, and it hurts too much to think that way about Dyl’s sweet image.

I hold my breath at the table, where two microID sheets have finished developing. Dyl’s sheet is marked with a large D in the corner; mine is C, for control. Both are covered in thousands of choppy lines, and I squint at them, trying to find differences.

Cy enters the lab. We haven’t spoken since the fight, but this morning I found yet another mug of coffee at my workstation. A peace offering. It’s the fifth one he’s left for me in the last two days. He’s either being nice, or trying to kill me with caffeine.

“Do you have a fragment reader here?” I ask, testing the waters.

“No,” he says. There’s peace in his tone. “But we have a comparator. It’s makeshift, but it’ll work.”

My stiffness around him melts, and Cy seems calmer too. I guess talking shop is easier than everything else we’ve been avoiding.

At another table, we feed the microID sheets into a steel box. The machine digitally subtracts one image from the other, leaving behind the fuzzy lines found only on Dyl’s sheet.

Cy leans in to stare at them, his neck and arms inked with maroon skeletons today. His face is close to mine, a hair closer than the boundaries of friendliness allow. I’m afraid I might bump into him, so I finally step away to really concentrate.

I adjust the contrast, and a bunch of black lines comes into focus. There are at least a hundred.

“Those lines are from Dyl’s sheet. She has extra genes buried in those sequences,” I say, trying hard to suppress my excitement, but failing. I’m grinning like an idiot. Finally! Something to show for my work. Here is the answer. Dyl’s entire worth, according to Aureus, is in those scattered lines that she’s got and I don’t.

“Good job,” Cy says. His tone isn’t entirely congratulatory; he’s holding something back, but I go on.

“Those sequences code for her trait. I’ll run it through one of those old gene libraries in the public archives.”

“Well, that’s a start.” His optimism is as overwhelming as soggy bread.

“What are you not telling me?”

“Nothing.”

“Bull.”

Cy falls into his chair and rubs his eyes with his fists. When his eyes open again to engage me, they’re tired. It’s not the kind of tired from lack of sleep; it’s an existential exhaustion, from lack of hope.

“You think this is going to be easy, just figuring this out and saving Dylia?”

“Well, maybe not so easy, but yes, that’s the plan.”

“Have you considered the possibility that the plan isn’t going to work?”

“I see. You’re one of those ‘glass half empty’ kinds of guys.” I’m prepared for this. Optimism is going to be my drug of choice.

“No, it’s not that. It’s not about the glass being half empty or half full of water. I’m saying, well . . . what if there never was a glass of water to begin with?”

“I can’t . . .” I turn away, stopping the conversation. Everything he’s trying to tell me is summed up in two words.
Give up.
I won’t allow them in my vocabulary right now. I put the microID sheets away on my worktable and walk out the door. I never was a running away kind of girl, but this discussion can’t happen.

“Zelia—”

Cy hooks my arm, preventing my escape. The touch of his hand on my arm shocks me, but not like Micah’s tingly touch. It’s soft and strong and asks me to stay.

“I can’t.” I pull toward the door, and Cy releases me into the frustration I need to run with. The door closes unsympathetically behind me, dividing the space between us.

I’m so tired of fighting. I wish I could hand my troubles over and let someone else deal with them for a while.

I need, more than ever, the one person I can’t talk to.

Dad.

• • •

IN THE LIBRARY, I STAND AT THE
oblong polished oak table. My heart is drumming under my ribs and I wonder if I should wear my necklace, in case I pass out. I’m that anxious.

“Turn on holoprof program. Dr. Benten, please.”

Shimmery sparkles condense together a few feet from me. In seconds, Dad’s there. His khakis are uncharacteristically wrinkle-free, and the salt-and-pepper hair is tidy. He’s got the look of someone content and well-rested.

Even the cleaned-up version of him breaks me.

“And what would you like to learn today?” he says.

I unstick my dry lips to speak. “Dad.”

“I am Dr. Benten. I teach pathology, anatomy, microbiology, clinical pharmacology—”

“I know, I know. That’s not why I’m here. I just—can you talk about other things?”

Dad points to a place for me to sit, and a holo chair materializes for him. “I’m programmed in sympathetic discourse with a background in basic psychotherapeutic techniques. For teaching purposes, of course.” Dad’s eyes soften a touch. It resembles the expression he’d wear when Dyl and I begged for something we couldn’t have.

I smear the moisture from my eyes and steady myself. “I don’t even know if you can answer this. Why did you . . . Why would someone leave me in a place where I have no freedom?”

“Parents often make constrictive choices for the sake of safety, which is a manifestation of the survival instinct,” Dad replies. Sensible and wretchedly unsatisfying.

“I miss Dyl,” I whisper. Dad squints, not recognizing her name. I almost cry from this alone, but I hold it in. “My sister. I miss her so much. I’m scared. And I don’t know if I’m going to be able to get her back. I’m trying, but maybe it’s all for nothing.”

“What we want and what we can make happen are often disparate things. But they do not have to be unlinkable ends. If there is a chance to bring them together, try.”

“Ha. You used to say if failure was likely, don’t bother.”

“Failure is always a real possibility. But nothing would be accomplished if we always succumbed to fear,” holo-Dad says.

I like the holo’s advice better than Dad’s, but still . . . it’s not him. It’s like wanting a bite of chocolate and licking a picture of a bon-bon instead. I give it one more shot.

“Why didn’t you tell me Dyl had a special trait? Why would you . . . would he keep that secret?” I ask.

Holo-Dad narrows his eyes. His whole body flickers, as if the program rebooted. His image stabilizes, and his eyes look at me. I mean, really stare me down.

“Zelia.” His face is pained and he’s completely lost the composure of the generic holoprof. His voice is changed yet frighteningly familiar. Frazzled.
Normal
. “It’s me. It’s Dad.”

“What?” I grip the table’s edge so hard, my nails scrape the perfect wood finish.

“I’ve embedded messages in this teaching program.” Dad stands up from the chair and wrings his hands, the way he did on the cusp of delivering bad news—that he couldn’t come to our school play, or we’d be moving on the eve of an exam I actually wanted to take. “In case something happened to me, and you and Dyl ended up here in Carus, I wanted you to know certain things.”

“What things?” I choke on a thousand questions all at once. “Those people in Aureus—they have Dyl. Why didn’t you tell us she had a trait?”

“I tested both of you at birth, but I didn’t tell you. I didn’t want you to know about this world. I’ve done everything I could to protect you both. To keep you out of the spotlight.”

I think of his list of don’ts. Just when I got really good with molecular bio, enough to earn national grants or awards, he wanted me to stop. He pounded the message into our heads to never, ever break the rules. We depended on him to help us make our choices. I’d been so meek and afraid, because he wanted me to be that way.

Every step I’ve taken to get Dyl back has been a battle between my fear and the right thing to do. He made me this way. And yet he did it for love. For protection.

I hardly know what to feel.

“Tell me everything. Anything you forgot to say, I want to know,” I say frantically, before he melts away.

“I’ve embedded information in this program, triggered by your questions. Ask the right questions, and you’ll get the real answers.”

I slap my hand on the table. Even now, after death, he’s still controlling me.

“I don’t have time for games! You hardly spent any time with us. These kids in Carus have more of a dad in you than we did. And even now”—I grip the table so hard, my hands hurt—“even now, you’re parceling yourself out. To
me
.”

My voice trembles with frustration. Dad flickers again, spurred by something in my words. “I wasn’t there for you. For that, I suffered more than you realize. But I had no choice.” Dad’s face crinkles in discomfort. “I worked for them. For Aureus. They told me where to go, whom to take care of. That’s why we moved around all the time. Several years ago, even before we moved to Okks, I had started to disobey them. I wasn’t telling them about all the new traited children I knew of. Some of them with physical traits that can’t be hidden, like Wilbert, I brought to non-Aureus-affiliated safe houses. Others that could blend into society, I left with their biological parents. They threatened to kill you both if I didn’t fall in line, so I had to run. I should have told you.”

Oh my god. “You worked for
them
? Why?”

Dad sits back in his chair. “At first, it was exciting, fascinating. But I realized I was a pawn, and the kids were pawns . . . Aureus didn’t care whom they hurt.” He tightens his lips. “I felt responsible for these kids. I couldn’t stop caring for them, until I had no choice.”

“How many?” I remember Marka saying there were other houses, but I’ve only been thinking of Carus and Aureus. “How many kids are out there?”

“Maybe a hundred or more,” Dad replies, without missing a beat. “Or maybe only fifty now. The number varies depending on how many have been killed, how many are born. Even Aureus can’t keep track of how many there are. Mostly because I stopped giving them the records a while ago.”

I don’t believe it. My dad was one of the bad guys. The ones who are destroying what’s left of Dyl. A minute goes by, and Dad’s image flickers. I inhale sharply. I’ve waited too long to ask another question.

Dad’s face isn’t upset anymore. It’s placid and patient. I grab the table again.

“No. Oh no. Wait, I have more questions—”

“I am Dr. Benten. I teach pathology, anatomy, microbiology, clinical pharmacology—”

“No!” I reach out to grab him, but all I’ve got is this robot image with a heart of air. I hunch in my chair, covering my face. After a long time, the holo-Dad speaks again.

“It will get better. The pain.”

I glance up, but it’s still the fake one, with his plastic, software psychology.

“As if you really know,” I challenge it. It, not Dad. “I don’t know if we meant anything to him. If Dyl was anything but a goddamn experiment.” The words are so bitter and poisonous, but it’s what I feel. My eyes are so blurred, I almost miss the flickering of his image one last time.

“My children were everything to me. Time spent with you was measured in infinite moments. I loved you, even when I wasn’t there. I love you, even now.”

I cover my mouth. Dad’s brown eyes find mine, and in a second that stretches time, I memorize them. I reach out to him and his hand shimmers as I touch him. All I have is a shower of atomic glitter when I get too close. It’s so cruel. Dad blurs one last time and switches back to his generic program.

“I offer my sympathy for your pain,” he says, stiff and formal.

“You’re just a hologram.” I say it like a dare.

“Yes. Ultimately, I cannot solve your problems. Your future will always be controlled by your own choices. The answers must come from you.” I lift my eyes to him, the pieces of Dad stitched shoddily together with electrons and memory files. “Good-bye, until our next teaching session.”

And with that, Dad breaks into a brilliant flash of incandescence and leaves me, all by myself, to figure everything out.

All this time, with the poetry and the science—I’d been thinking that Dad never really knew me. Now I know the truth.

I have no idea who my father was.

• • •

THE NEXT DAY, I GO BACK TO
the library ten times to activate the holoprof program, but nothing I say triggers Dad to come back. I start to wonder if I imagined the whole thing. Yet the memory of his words, telling me he loved me, was real. I know it was.

For the first time, I realize there’s a story here larger than just me, Dyl, and this house of misfits. But I can’t think of that now. I’m already drowning, trying to save one life. It kills me that I can’t conjure Dad up to help, but like he said, I’m on my own.