Sugar Coated (26 page)

Chapter 27: Eris

Brynn didn’t bother trying to get back to the home screen to cover her tracks. Instead, she stepped into the elevator and pushed the button for the first room where they had entered A1. As the metal door slid closed and the grate below her feet began to move, she sifted through the information she had just received. There was almost too much of it for her to comprehend and she wondered if she’d ever understand exactly what was happening on Halcyon.

This much she understood: the only reason she was alive was to be tested. She had no idea what they were testing for, her continent was about to be terminated, and there were whole continents filled with people that no one else, but the Angels—and now she—knew about.

She tapped her foot impatiently on the floor of the elevator, wishing she could somehow will it to go faster. Ty and Jonah hadn’t made an appearance since they each got into their own tubes and she wondered if they had already been caught. Would they kill them or simply keep them at the facility for testing? Should she stay in A1 and try to find her friends, or escape and try to get others to help her? Even if she could escape, who would believe that their entire planet was actually one of three continents used for testing?

Brynn sighed deeply at the hopelessness of her situation. She had no idea what she should do, but she did know she was running out of time to make a decision. The longer Jonah and Ty were in the facility, the more likely it was that they would be caught. Squeezing her eyes shut and willing herself to make a choice, Brynn let out an agitated growl, knowing that she needed to stay and help her friends even though she had no idea where to start looking for them in the maze of a base.

As the elevator came to a stop and the door slid open, Brynn was met, not with the entry room they had first encountered, but with a white room much like the one from her dreams. She pushed the button on the elevator once more, not wanting to explore that particular room and assuming she must have pushed the wrong
floor to begin with.

The eleva
tor didn’t respond. It sat stationary, not making any attempt to take her to her desired destination. She pushed the button again, but the machine was just as unresponsive as before.

Beginning to panic
at finding herself stuck in the room from her nightmares, she pushed any button, hoping that at least one of them would work and take her away from this place. No matter what she did, the room stayed right where it was, refusing to let her go. Knowing that she couldn’t stay in the elevator forever, she stepped out into the white room with its soft floors and hospital bed in the corner. She touched the padded walls and looked around, glad that she was unable to locate the see-through tube where the Angel had detained her and tried to drown her.

Without warning, the elevator door slid shut behind her and she could hear the distinct hum of the grate moving away. She ran back, pressing her hands firmly against the metal door and trying to pry it open with her bare fingers. When that didn’t work, she resorted to banging her fists against the door in anger and sheer panic. She ignored the pain in her hands, only caring about leaving the room that evoked so many horrible memories for her. The sterile smell that seemed to emanate from the walls and the almost blindingly white surroundings were enough to make her sick to her stomach as she imagined the Angel telling her about all of the people she had killed without a second thought.

More desperate than ever, Brynn tried to work her fingers into the small space where the door met the elevator wall, pulling with all of her might to open it. Much to her surprise, the door actually began to move. It slid slowly open, almost of its own accord, to reveal the one person Brynn hoped to never encounter.

Her Angel.

She stood there, fully formed and in person, not just a figment of Brynn’s imagination or part of a nightmare. Brynn took an involuntary step back, a small gasp escaping her lips at the beauty of the woman who seemed to tower over her, making Brynn feel like a toddler.

At first the Angel didn’t s
ay anything, but instead looked wordlessly at Brynn with that same cruel half-smile on her face that she always wore in Brynn’s dreams. After a moment, however, she seemed to remember herself and entered the room, letting the elevator door slide shut behind her with a note of finality. The Angel wore her usual white ensemble, her short white hair framing her face in its asymmetrical bob.

“It took you long enough, Brynn,” she said, causing Brynn to jump slightly at the sound of her own name. “Could I really have made it any easier for you to break into the facility?” The woman looked over at her with a raised eyebrow, her lip curling up as if she were looking at something filthy she had just stepped in.

“What?” was all Brynn managed to say.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I forgot you’re not Rachel. Maybe I need to talk a bit slower for this to get through that thick skull of yours,” she said slowly, her violet eyes flashing like she was playing her favorite game. Brynn couldn’t help but feel that this whole situation made the Angel very happy. “I
let
you break in. Do you really think we’d have no security in this facility?” she asked. “Didn’t you think it was a little peculiar that the lock on the back of the train was so easy to pick?”

“No, we
worked hard to get here,” Brynn insisted before realizing she had just given her friends away with that one simple phrase.

“Ah yes. We,” the Angel repeated, her lips curing up in the corners. “Sorry about your friend, by the way. Don’t worry. I’m sure it wasn’t too painful.”

Brynn felt the color drain from her face, but held onto one hope—the Angel had said
friend
, not
friends
. That meant they only knew about one of the boys. But whom had they caught? Ty wasn’t very sneaky, but Jonah was wearing all black in the stark white base.

“How cute,” the Angel said after a moment of silence. “You’re thinking things through. That would have served Rachel well. But I have to stop comparing you two, don’t I?” she asked, stepping closer to Brynn as she spoke.

She brought her paper white hand up to Brynn’s face, grabbing her chin and turning her face from side to side as her violet eyes scanned her features. Brynn shuddered under her cold and powerful grip. Her hand felt strong enough to crack Brynn’s cheekbones with one squeeze.

“Though I must admit, the resemblance is quite shocking. It’s like I’ve gotten a brand new toy to replace the old one I broke,” she said with a cold laugh before releasing Brynn.

“You want something from me,” Brynn stated, not sure where she had gotten her courage from and hoping that her dreams were correct. “Information.”

The Angel’s face fell for a moment, obviously not expecting Brynn to know as much as she did. It gave Brynn a brief surge of pleasure to know that she had unbalanced the terrifying creature.

“Oh, I’ll get the information out of you. I have no doubt about that,” the woman answered.

“Like you got
it out of Rachel?” Brynn countered, trying to keep her voice from shaking the way her knees were. She wanted desperately to reach out and grab the table beside the hospital bed for support, but she knew it would make her seem weak.

“It doesn’t matter that Rachel didn’t last long enough to tell me what I needed to know. We obviously figured out her little trick with the tissue sample when you came along,” the Angel said. “It wasn’t very clever of her to die for something that would so obviously present itself to us in a matter of time.”

“So I’m a clone of Rachel?” Brynn asked, unable to worry about the little power struggle they were currently in when so many answers were within her grasp.

“Oh, so now I’m the one with the answers, am I?” the Angel asked, smiling once more.

“But you don’t have all the answers,” Brynn said, going out on a limb and hoping she was right. She could tell by the flash of anger in her Angel’s eyes that she had guessed correctly. “I still have some of them,” she lied, tapping her head for effect.

“So what do you want? To live?” the Angel said, sounding disgusted with such a trivial request.

“I want to exchange information with you,” Brynn answered simply, trying to sound uninterested. “You’re Eris, aren’t you?” she asked, remembering the name she had read on the computer screen in the records room.

“I sincerely hope that wasn’t your first question, because I should think that answer is obvious,” she responded, her violet eyes narrowing as she smiled viciously.

“It was a statement,” Brynn lied. “My first question is this: am I a clone of Rachel?”

“Well, if you’re the one with all of the knowledge, shouldn’t you already know that?” Eris asked her, raising a skeptical eyebrow at the inexperienced young girl standing before her, shaking like a leaf.
“I don’t know how any of you managed to function on this pathetic continent with such limited brain usage. Honestly it escapes me why we bothered to populate your history books with such a convincingly fabricated history if none of you ever bothered to crack open a book every once in a while.”

“Answer the question,” Brynn demanded flatly. “That’s what the deal was.”

Eris narrowed her eyes for a moment, unhappy with being spoken to so forcefully, but she answered her, knowing the potential to gain the answers she so desired was greater than her pride.

“You’re not a clone, per se. You were made from a tissue sample she smuggled into the creation bay once she figured out that she didn’t have much longer here. There weren’t supposed to be any
real
human tissue samples in there. Though the fact that you seem to retain some of her memories is a bit shocking,” she said nonchalantly. “We hadn’t anticipated that you’d dream in Rachel’s memories.”

Brynn tried to suppress a shudder at the fact that the Angel somehow knew what she was dreaming about. Did they have the ability to monitor her dreams? If that was true, then she’d already know that Brynn didn’t know what Rachel’s last secret was.

“Your turn,” Eris said darkly, letting Brynn know that the secret had better be worth her time.

She thought desperately of a convincing lie, trying to remember the things she had read on the computer.

“Rachel didn’t just send me to Halcyon. She sent something to Panurgic as well,” Brynn said hurriedly, glad that she had remembered the name of one of the other tests, since the third continent was a complete blank to her.

“We already know about the transmission,” Eris said with a wave of her hand, irritated that this was the big reveal. “What else did she do? We know there was something.”

Brynn thought about the orphanages, the fabricated humans, and the test continents, but she couldn’t think of any more fake information for the Angel, so instead she tried to get the upper hand.

“That was my first bit of information to offer. It’s not my fault you already knew it. That means it’s my turn to ask a question,” Brynn said petulantly, taking a step back when the Angel walked toward her angrily.

She now had her back against the soft white wall and held her breath, hoping the Angel wouldn’t come any closer. Luckily Eris had regained herself and seemed to be stable once more, standing stationary a few steps away.

“Fine,” was all she said in the smooth, deep voice that had haunted Brynn’s dreams for years.

“What are you testing for?” Brynn asked, causing the Angel to laugh loudly.

“That’s your question?” she asked in disbelief. “How is it that you know so much, but you aren’t aware of the most basic concept of why we’re here?” she said, still laughing.

It was a deep, rich sound that would have been comforting if it wasn’t so terrifying. Brynn didn’t respond to the Angel’s question, but simply continued to stare at her, waiting for an answer.

“We’re testing for the perfect society,” she finally answered. “What
you
call Utopia.”

This took Brynn aback. She hadn’t expected that answer and was shocked that someone like Eris would even care what society worked best. She couldn’t imagine this woman dedicating her life to such a discovery. There had to be something more to it.

“Now,” Eris said in a serious tone, lowering her chin and staring at Brynn intently. “Tell me what else Rachel did.”

Brynn floundered for a moment, trying to come up with a convincing lie. The Angel watched her face, quickly becoming frustrated with the lack of an answer.

“You don’t know,” she said, realization dawning on her. “No. You do know…it’s just buried somewhere in Rachel’s memories,” she worked out slowly, her eyes never leaving Brynn’s face. “We just have to come up with some way to extract it from you like we did with Rachel.”

In the blink of an eye, Eris had slammed Brynn up against the padded wall, holding each of her arms above her head so that she was pinned. Brynn glimpsed something shiny in her right hand and noted with distress that it was a syringe. She had never seen someone move so quickly in her life, and she was beginning to think that Eris wasn’t entirely human.

Her face was so close to Brynn’s that it was difficult to focus on her purple eyes as she whispered to her.

“I hope you’re stronger than Rachel, because we need you to last long enough to give us that information,” Eris said darkly, her voice threatening. “You’ve seen Rachel’s memories haven’t you
, Brynn? You know how creative I am.” The Angel smiled at her; a twisted expression that showed just how sick the woman really was. That she enjoyed every ounce of pain she extracted from people.