Synthetic: Dark Beginning (22 page)

“I don’t think that at all,” said Kora.  She wished her voice sounded stronger, but it cracked under the strain of the question.

Ruby’s hazy eyes hardened into slits. “You may have made him, my dear, but I know him far better than you ever will. He goes through women like cheap wine, and your pathetic transformation from a rotting corpse into a wallflower falls far short of what Vaughn requires in a mate.”

Kora rested her fingers on the gurney where Vaughn lay the night she switched his stomach with that of the synthetic. “I guess when this is all over, you’ll be the woman for him? Is that what you’re hinting at, mother?”

Ruby frowned when she noticed Kora standing beside the gurney. “What was that used for?”

Kora ran her hand over the pillow and pinched a dark wavy hair between her thumb and forefinger. Ruby stumbled toward it, her eyes struggling to focus on the thin strand. “That looks like Vaughn’s hair.”

“It is.”

“What was he doing on this surgical bed?”

“I operated on him last night. I had to in order to finish your new body. Even if I knew how to synthesize a blood-digesting stomach, there wasn’t time to grow one in two days so I took a shortcut.”

Ruby looked down at the pillow, then back up to the hair still gripped between Kora’s fingers. “Tell me you didn’t ruin him!”

Kora smiled. “He’s probably eating a big burger right now with extra pickles.”

Ruby lunged at Kora until her snarling face hovered mere inches away. “Change him back or I’ll tear you to pieces.”

Kora didn’t flinch. “Now mother, you and I both know he wasn’t meant to be a vampire.”

Ruby’s face relaxed and she tipped her goblet high into the air, emptying it before tossing it onto the floor. “You want to fuck with me? Fine. I’m always up for a fight. After the past few days, I’ve gotten used to having my plans demolished. First my reality show and now my vampire.” She strutted back toward her office. “You just killed your boyfriend.”

A lump swelled in Kora’s throat. “This is between you and I, mother. There’s no need to bring Vaughn into it.”

Ruby paused at the door. “I’m the director, here, and I’ve decided he no longer fits the part.” Ruby swept her hand dramatically through the air. “I have no use for a man who isn’t a monster and once my creations are no longer useful—”

“You throw them away.”

“No, I store them in my basement. You, of all people, should know that.”

“What do you mean?”

“The catacomb was your realm, Kora.  Everything else is fake.  You're a fake with your second rate body, big penthouse, and dreams of a white wedding.”  Ruby drifted back, her eyes alight with some mad plan.  “Go back after my surgery, and I'll let him live.” Kora opened her mouth to protest, but Ruby waved a finger at her. “Vaughn's not human, Kora.  I could kill him and no one would care.”

“
Back where? What are you talking about?
”

“
Hell.
Where you belong!
If you don't,
I'll just follow your suggestion and have Randall dismantle Vaughn at Mirafield along with Ivan and Caleb. It's time I cleaned house.”

“This is between you and me!”

Ruby faded into the darkness and Kora jumped at the sound of her office door slamming. She ran down the hall and yanked the door open, but the office was empty. Ruby had slipped away through a secret panel.

“I told you I don't know how!  If I do this surgery, you'll die,” she yelled into the emptiness.  Kora cursed herself for thinking she could manipulate the old witch. Was Vaughn safer with Ruby dead or alive?  When Kora failed during the operation and killed her, Randall was sure to carry out Ruby's orders and have Vaughn and the others dismantled.  Especially when he found out Kora had feelings for the former vampire.  Her only option was to disappear, never to be seen again.  With Mirafield's golden goose missing, Randall would have bigger concerns than destroying a handful of synthetics. But where should she go? She ran her thumb over the key to the Rolls in her pocket. She could drive anywhere... but Gus had failed to consider the prison force field. If she hit that, the car would probably blow up. Then she thought of Caleb, standing in the doorway, desperately spewing Mud's name and signing how he wanted her to be free. If Humphrey was right about all of Ruby's creatures getting buried in the catacomb, then she knew just where to find him.

Kora dashed back to her lab, grabbed a flashlight wrapped in a plastic bag from the back of a cupboard, and continued on to her cell. She stuffed extra clothes in the bag and the skull Humphrey had given her.  She sealed the bag and fastened it over her shoulder, then ran up the lava tube to the service entrance where she tugged on the door handle, but this time it didn’t budge. Next she tried the door to the stairs that led up to the living room but someone, probably Ivan, had locked the door behind him.

She backtracked down the hall to the secret panel Gus always opened with such ease, and stood glowering at it. “You better open or I’m taking this wall apart with my bare hands.” Kora hit the panel and it glided open. She snatched a torch down off the stand and stepped in, shivering with cold. Within seconds, the panel closed and Kora stumbled forward, holding her torch high as she navigated the twists and turns through the solid rock.

She sensed that the stairwell was somewhere in a southeast direction and continually shifted her path to the left. Her instincts paid off when the carved stair appeared around the last bend.  She wound her way up several floors and stepped off on what she hoped was the main floor of the house. She sped through a series of tunnels between the wooden walls and opened a panel decorated with a painting of a book.

The room smelled of dust and decaying paper. Tall shelves surrounded her on every side and a massive card catalogue sat in the center of the floor with several of the drawers hanging open. She edged past a long table littered with dirty coffee cups and plates of half-eaten sandwiches. Gus obviously spent a great deal of time here while Ivan didn’t.

A sliver of light glowed along the floor and Kora pushed open the grand doorway. She paused, scanning the massive room to make sure Ruby wasn’t wandering drunk through the couch maze, then hustled toward what she hoped was the main door to the castle. She skidded around a corner and smacked into the marble wall where the front door hung open, a flood of dead leaves and plants blowing over the checkerboard floor. Max had told the truth about how he got into the castle.

Kora launched herself down the stairs and within seconds, had skirted the entire building with nearly the same speed as the night Vaughn chased her. When she reached the beach, she stripped off her clothes and stuffed them into her plastic bag. The water felt warm after the hot day. She swam over to some rocks she’d noticed beside the mark Humphrey had made on the castle plans. Following a strange impulse, she dove straight down and spotted a massive pipe trailing along the sea floor directly below. She explored all sides until she found a hole gouged in the thick metal large enough for a man to swim through. Then an uncomfortable pressure gathered in her lungs that forced her back to the surface.

Already tired from treading water, Kora tried to concentrate on the moment she’d sent Caleb sailing across the lab. Her limbs hummed with power at the memory of it. Though she wasn't sure why, she'd wanted to do that for a long time. If she ran out of air halfway up the pipe, she felt certain some mysterious burst of strength would save her. With renewed confidence, Kora took several deep breaths and dove. She swam into the pipe and up the narrow channel like an eel, squeezing through tight openings where debris had washed down, over the years, forming dangerous obstacles. After a few minutes, she felt a heavy strain in her lungs and knew she wouldn’t last much longer. She prayed for strength, but instead grew weaker and more disoriented until she lost track of which direction was forward. Panic clouded her brain and she bashed against the pipe walls, hoping she could break free and find her way back to the surface. Her wild thrashing burnt up the last of her precious air, and soon she was bobbing helplessly against the top of the pipe like a trapped bottle.

Her last thought, before her mind folded into blackness, was of Vaughn lying in bright blue liquid with closed eyes, his face serene like that of a sleeping child. She reached out to touch him but everything went dim before her hand could reach his cheek.

Chapter 25

Vaughn walked into his bedroom completely worn out. He’d managed to haul Caleb up the stairs and tip him into bed where Ivan fussed over him like a frantic mother. He didn’t want to think about Kora, but the more he tried to block her out, the clearer he saw her face as she hurled Caleb down the hall.  It wasn't her strength that surprised him, he'd experienced that the first night they met, but her expression.  She looked triumphant, as if she'd always dreamed of tossing the giant with such ease. There was more going on between those two than any of them knew.

Gus stuck his head through the secret panel. “Kora isn’t here, is she?”

“No, why would she be here?”

“You and women, I was just hoping.”

“Isn’t she down in the lab?”

Gus shook his head and lowered his eyes. “I told her to go back to Mirafield where she belonged. Gave her the key to the Rolls but it’s still parked down in the garage.”

“
Did you forget that we live in a prison with a huge force field surrounding the property? Are you trying to kill her?
”
Vaughn tried to control his anger, but Gus had screwed up again and he was losing patience.

“I was angry and I wasn't thinking,” Gus said mournfully. “Where the hell could she have gone?”

Vaughn climbed off the bed and stared out the window.

“She said Caleb spoke to her,” continued Gus. “At the time I didn’t believe her, but why would she lie about something that weird?”

“What did Caleb say?”

“Something about this dead Mud guy. I can’t figure it out.  What it all means.”

Vaughn bounded onto the deck. “She went to find him on her own.”

“You don’t think she went looking for the catacomb?  I told her the vent only led to the garage.”

“Then she's taking the only route left.”

“The pipe? Let me come with you. This is all my fault.”

Vaughn put his hand on Gus's shoulder. He'd punished him long enough and could tell he was as concerned about Kora as he was. “Can you swim?”

Gus held his arms out like a pathetic gull. “I float like a beach ball, but swimming has never worked for me.”

“Stay here and do what you can to help.”

Vaughn jumped over the railing and Gus called after him: “I just remembered—you can’t swim either.”

Vaughn ignored his words but when he reached the shore, he paced back and forth on the sand like an anxious lion. Kora's fresh footprints disappeared into the water.  He was right. She was out to find the catacomb on her own.  He rushed into the water and the waves crashed over his head.  He struggled hard to swim, but sank like a stone through the murky depths.
He thrashed toward the surface, but his efforts proved about as effective as trying to flap his arms to fly on land. Then Vaughn realized he’d been underwater for over five minutes. He felt his chest, amazed to find that his heart had stopped beating and he had no desire to breathe. This was a surprise.  Vaughn had always been so alarmed by his lack of buoyancy that he avoided water, but it wasn't so bad stumbling along the ocean floor. Even sort of fun. After half an hour of wandering, he smacked into a curved wall half buried in rocks and realized he’d found the pipe Gus mentioned. He followed it another twenty yards out to sea and discovered a large opening. Kora had passed into that dark chamber not long before.  He could feel it.

The inside of the pipe was large but full of so much sand and junk that he had to dig a larger opening in order to climb through. His journey was slow and when he was over halfway through, he sensed something ahead and reached into the pitch black where he grasped a small, limp hand. He pulled Kora into his arms and wished for even the smallest stream of light so he could see her face. She felt dead in his arms as he trudged the rest of the way up the pipe, bent over like an old man.

When he surfaced everything was still dark, but he could tell he was in a large cavern from the way the sound of the water echoed off the walls. The air was rank with the smell of rotting trash and seaweed, so he ran his hand over the flat surface beside the pool to clear a spot where he could lay Kora down. She was breathing again but her eyes were closed, and he decided the best thing he could do was find somewhere warm where she could dry off.

Accustomed to the motion-activated torches in the castle, Vaughn waved his arms but nothing happened. Then he remembered the plastic bag wrapped around Kora’s shoulders and opened the sack. He rifled through her clothes until he found a flashlight, switched it on and hoisted Kora over his shoulder. He entered a wide tunnel and trailed the flashlight over the walls that were cut with deep, earthen shelves covered in dark shapes.  When he looked closer, he saw the shapes were dried corpses curled up on their stone beds, mouths twisted open in silent, eternal screams. After that, he kept the flashlight pointed straight ahead.

The winding cavern often lead to dead ends heaped with bodies, their limbs tangled through each other like a gruesome puzzle.
Vaughn nearly gave up on finding a dwelling fit for the living when his flashlight reflected a glint of metal and a steel door appeared on his right. He fumbled with the knob until it opened into a small, dingy apartment. He shined the light through the eerily quiet room in search of gas torches until he noticed a light switch. Amazed at the novelty, he flicked the small button and a bare, incandescent bulb hanging from the ceiling drenched the room with electric light. He set Kora down on a dusty cot and searched through the cupboards where he found a wide variety of tea boxes, an electric kettle, blankets and a space heater. He plugged the heater into a nearby socket and fiddled with the levers until it gave out a dull heat, then rolled it as close to Kora as the cord allowed.  Her clothes were soaked so he carefully removed her pants and shirt, doing his best not to look, and laid them over the heater to dry.

“Where am I?” she asked in a hoarse voice.

Vaughn sat down beside her. “I thought I’d lost you.”

“What are you doing here?” She looked fearfully around the cramped room and sat up so the blanket fell away exposing her wet bra.

He handed her a cup of black tea and pulled her blanket back up. “We’re in the catacomb. I found you about three quarters of the way up the pipe. Do you remember anything?”

Kora gazed at him blankly until memory stirred back into her eyes. “I couldn’t make it. I thought my strength would kick in, but it never did.”

“You mean the strength you used to toss Caleb like a frisbee?”

“I didn’t meant to throw him so hard,” said Kora. “I swear.”

“I believe you.  I've experienced it myself, remember?”

She searched his face. “You're not angry with me like the others?”

Vaughn resisted the urge to push her wet hair off of her cheek.  “I think you and Caleb have a complicated past. I’ve decided to be patient and not jump to conclusions.”

Kora smiled with her mouth, but not her eyes. “I wish Gus felt the same way. He'll never forgive me.”

“He’s the one who sent me to rescue you.”

“Really?” Kora looked relieved.  “It broke my heart when he told me to go back to Mirafield.”

Vaughn tried not to get too excited, in case he misunderstood. “You don't want to go back anymore?”

Kora looked down at the blanket covering her. “I don't belong at Mirafield, and I don't want to marry Randall.”

A wave of joy crashed over him, but it was short lived.  Vaughn liked Kora, more than he should because no matter what he did, she would always look down on him. He was near the bottom of that damn ladder, so any relationship with her was pointless.  “You almost ended up in that pipe for an eternity, though I’m sure you would have washed out eventually.”

“During the next ice age.”

Vaughn wished he could kiss her, but it would probably just freak her out.

“This isn’t how I pictured the catacomb,” continued Kora. “Seems more like a prison break room.”

“I think someone lived here who definitely liked a good cup of tea from the old country. The cupboard is full of PG Tips.”

“Mud.” Kora sat up straight and looked around. “I bet this is where he lived.”

“Are you beginning to remember things?”

“Slowly…and painfully.”

She stood up with the blanket from the bed wrapped around her and Vaughn saw flashes of her stomach and legs as she moved across the floor. He turned his back to refill the teapot in the sink. “It’s strange because everything here is electric,” he said, straining to listen as she dressed herself in a dry pair of pants from her plastic bag. He was so used to girls in nothing but string bikinis and psychedelic body paint that the idea of her in plain white underwear drove him wild.

Kora finished her tea and brought him her cup. “Obviously Ruby never came down here much. Everything with her has to involve fire.”

“We came through a frightening maze that looks more like how you’d picture a catacomb. That part definitely fits her taste.” He brushed his fingers over hers as she handed him the cup.

“I want to look around but you’re soaked. Aren’t you cold?” she asked.

“I’m fine. Unfortunately there isn’t any sugar.”

“I never use sugar.” Kora pointed at the broken table against the wall. “Doesn’t that sort of look like a larger version of the one in Caleb’s tea party.”

Vaughn studied the table.  “Looks just like it.”

She shivered and moved closer to the heater. “How did you managed to get me out of that pipe anyway? Gus mentioned that you don’t swim and hate the ocean.”

He paused as he tried to find the right words to explain the strange experience. “I didn’t swim. I walked.”

“You walked?”

“That’s the only way to describe it.”

Kora laughed. “Are you trying to tell me you just strolled up the pipe and saved me?”

“Yep.”

“That’s insane. You’d have to hold your breath for at least half an hour, probably more.”

“I didn’t hold my breath.”

Her eyes opened wide. “You didn’t breathe?”

“Not at all. It seemed so natural, it took me a while to notice.”

“I could never have made you that way…could I?”

“Do you want me to prove it?”

“I believe you, but it’s terrifying how brilliant I used to be. I think I forgot a lot more than just my sordid past.”

“Should I take that as a compliment?”

She drifted up to him and though he knew she was examining him like a curious specimen, he still basked in her attention. A shiver went through him when she pressed her head against his chest to listen to his heart. Several times he reached up to stroke her soft, electric hair, but he always stopped himself.

“I wish I’d poked around a bit more when I had you asleep on that gurney the night I fixed your stomach,” she said.  “I've got a lot to learn from my old self.”

“I’ll have to keep an eye on you from now on.”

She winked at him, grabbed the flashlight, and walked out into the grim tunnel. At that moment, Vaughn would have followed her off the castle roof but once out in the tunnel, he looked around uneasily. The first body he saw outside the door had teeth growing out of its nose. “I like it better in Mud’s pad.”

Kora bent down to study a corpse that looked half coyote, half man. “This room has many from the early period when she was combining humans with animals.”

“Like Humphrey?”

“He’s probably the only one that survived.”

“So you never made any pig men or horned devils with twenty rows of teeth like a shark?”

Kora shot him a withering look and he decided to keep quiet as he trailed along behind her. He watched in horror as she smoothed her hands over tortured faces and grasped shriveled hands that seemed to reach for her.

She called him over, at one point, to help her turn a body over so she could look at its back. “Many of these creatures have been stabbed right through the heart with some kind of long, jagged blade.”

“Must be how rejects got
disassembled
down here. I imagine you used something more sophisticated?”

Kora stared at the gash in the corpse's chest for a long time.  “We use a special gun.” She turned her face up to him, her eyes searching his. “I know you must think I'm cruel, but I don't think I always was.”

He put a hand on her shoulder.  “I'm sorry. That was a low blow.”

“I deserved it,” she said, gazing at the line of bodies that seemed to go on forever.
“But whatever you think of me, I never harmed these creatures.”

They stood in silence while Vaughn struggled to come up with a new subject. “So what's up with the old skull in your bag?”

Kora gasped and ran back to the apartment with the flashlight, leaving Vaughn alone in the dark. He could hear a squeaking, scraping sound on the floor along the wall and imagined a team of rats scrabbling up his pants. It seemed a long time before he saw the light in the tunnel once again.

“Thanks for reminding me. I almost forgot.” Kora set the skull down on a shelf and stood appraising it as if it was a vase of flowers. “I wish I could place it with the rest of its body.”