Damage (28 page)

A real gun. Just like the one Dr. Connor almost killed me with.

“Get back!” she shouts, bracing the weapon with her other hand. She steps over the spilled drinks without taking her attention from the three people standing in the middle of the parking lot. I risk a glance over at the car, surprised to see the two men backing away. The redhead, however, turns her gun to the sky but holds her ground.

“We’re here on orders, Penny. We’re supposed to take Jesse and Dani with us.”

Penny sucks in a breath. “Gerard called you?”

“He just wants them to be safe. We all want them safe.”

Penny shakes her head. “No. You can’t take them, Mara. I won’t let you. You were there with me. You know what they’re doing to the others.”

The redhead—Mara—sighs. “I know. But what other choice do we have?”

“We have the choice to treat these kids with respect and compassion,” Penny says, her voice breaking. “They’ve already been through hell and—”

“And they can kill people. They’re deadly, Penny, and nothing you wrap around their neck is going to hold the things in their heads off for long,” Mara says.

I reach for the scarf at my throat and rub the perfectly normal-feeling yarn between my fingers. What is this thing? For a second I consider ripping it off, but I stop myself. Penny’s lied like everyone else, but at least she seems to be on our side.

“You’re risking your life,” Mara says, “and
their
lives if you don’t—”

“Don’t listen to her, Penny.” Dani has recovered from the shock of learning that her stepmom knows the bad guys by name a hell of a lot faster than I have. “We can control the manifestations. We won’t hurt you.”

Penny shoots Dani a lightning-quick look of gratitude. “Please, Mara,” she says, turning her attention back to the redhead, who has inched closer until she and Penny stand at opposite ends of Penny’s BMW. “Just let us go. I’ll find a place to hide and you can say we never saw each other tonight.”

Mara shifts her focus and I find myself staring into her eyes. She’s the one holding the Taser, but I can see how scared she is. She doesn’t want to force me and Dani into her van. She knows what we’re capable of.

“Two hours,” she whispers, tucking her stun gun back into her coat. A few feet behind her, the two men turn and walk back to the van. “I’ll give you two hours. Then I’ll call Gerard and tell him we saw you pulling through the border crossing into Canada. I suggest you head southwest.”

Penny’s gun arm shakes before falling to her side. “Thank you.” She waves to Dani and me with her other hand. “Get in the car, guys. Hurry.” I hesitate, but only for a second. I don’t trust Penny, but right now she’s all we’ve got.

Still, as I duck into the car behind Dani, I wonder if I’m making the right choice. Am I going to look back on this moment and wish I’d made another decision? Even if it seems like a stupid one right now?

“It’s going to be okay,” Dani whispers as Penny pulls out of the parking lot and down the ramp heading south on the freeway. “We’re together. We’ll figure this out. We’ll make sure Penny’s safe. It’ll be okay.”

She’s right. The only way I’ll ever be “okay” is with her. No matter where this ride ends, I’ll never regret staying with Dani.

But that doesn’t mean I have to go quietly.

I move so fast Penny barely has time to flinch before the gun fisted in her hand is in mine.

“What are—”

“Keep your hands on the wheel,” I say. I press the barrel to the base of her skull. “And start talking.”

“Jesse, put the gun down!” Dani pulls at my arm, but I hold my position.

“Don’t worry. I’m not going to shoot her … ” I pause, thumbing off the safety with a soft click. “As long as she tells the truth.”

I wouldn’t shoot her if she told me the sky was purple with green spots, but Penny can’t know that. Hopefully my scary voice can still work a little magic. If we don’t find out what’s really happening soon, I feel like I’m going to lose my mind.

“Jesse, I don’t—”

“I’ve been working for the FBI.” Penny interrupts before Dani can complete her protest. “Before he passed away, my father and I were working a surveillance mission, monitoring the scientists involved in the Dream Project. The experiment was originally funded by the government, but it isn’t supported anymore, and the FBI wanted to make sure the project stayed dead—that none of the people involved continued their work or told anyone what they’d been part of. So undercover surveillance teams were put on all five original members of the project. My marriage to Dani’s father was part of that surveillance.”

“What?” Dani falls back into her seat, looking less like she wants to grab the gun from my hand. “But … you’ve been together almost six years.”

“I know.” Penny flips the left turn signal and pulls out into the other lane, passing a long row of semi trucks. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t tell you the truth, but I really … I meant what I said in the parking lot. I care about you so much. I consider you family, and I’ll do whatever it takes to keep you safe.”

“Even from the FBI?” I ask, keeping the gun where it is.

“I think you saw that for yourself.” Penny sounds awfully reasonable for a woman with a gun pointed at her head. But then, if she’s telling the truth, she’s an FBI agent and probably trained not to freak out at times like this. “Mara and I work together … used to work together,” she says. “We were some of the last agents to learn that the Dream Project isn’t so dead after all. For several years now, the government has been rounding up the kids. We were debriefed a couple of weeks ago, and taken to visit the facility where the FBI is keeping them.” Penny’s hands tighten on the wheel. “That’s when I knew I had to find a way to stop the project. Dani wasn’t scheduled to be reactivated until she was seventeen, so I thought I had some time, but … ”

“But someone decided to step up the schedule.” Dani’s voice is high-pitched, wobbly, as if she can’t decide whether to laugh or cry.

“I’m not sure,” Penny whispers. “Vince is working for someone who wants Barrett’s research on the Dream Project. It could be a foreign government or a terrorist organization, but he said … ”

“He said what?” Dani demands.

“He said it was one of our dad’s old friends from the FBI who hired him to get you on the bus to New York City. I told him he was a liar. That’s when he hit me,” she says. “But a few minutes after you and Jesse left the house, I got a call from my supervisor. He said a team had already collected four of the kids they were hoping to reactivate from the wreck, but that I should watch for you two and bring you in. I didn’t know Jesse was part of this until that phone call, and … I … I don’t know how the FBI could have known about the wreck in time to pick up the other kids unless … ”

“Unless the FBI planned it,” Dani says.

“Right.” Penny pulls back into the right lane, but has to slide into the left again almost immediately. The line of semi trucks seems to stretch on forever. “They also knew that you and Jesse were experiencing the psychic manifestations again. That’s why they gave me the scarves,” she says. “They’re threaded with copper wire and charged with a mild electrical current. The scientists working on the Vision Project say they help prevent the manifestations.”

“The Vision Project,” Dani echoes.

“That’s what the FBI is calling the experiment this time around.”

We’re quiet for a few minutes. I catch Dani tugging her scarf off and fight the urge to pull mine off, too. But if it’s really helping to keep the Thing away, I can’t risk removing it no matter how trapped it’s making me feel.

“I saw some of what they’re doing when I visited the facility,” Penny continues. “The kids who cooperate in the experiments are isolated in their rooms. The ones who don’t cooperate are drugged. And that’s not even the worst of it.”

“What’s the worst of it?” I remind her there’s a gun to her head with a nudge of my wrist.

“Electroshock therapy, experiments with different versions of the original formula, infecting healthy kids with diseases to see what they’re capable of fighting off.” The horror in Penny’s voice makes me feel stupid. And cruel. I ease the gun away, but she keeps talking. “I think they’re performing surgeries, too. I wasn’t allowed into that part of the facility, but my tour leader mentioned something about the doctors having success with an implant.” She shakes her head. “And they’re doing all of this without the permission of the kids or their parents.”

She pauses, wipes at her cheek. I realize that she’s crying and feel even worse. “Most of the parents think their children are missing. Or dead. The people on the project justify what they’re doing by saying they have no choice. They say the kids who were part of this experiment are too dangerous to be allowed basic human rights.” She accelerates, pulling past an oversized U-Haul. One of the semis pulls out of line to ride our ass, its headlights glaring in the rearview mirror. “I can’t imagine why they let me in the door to that place. They had to know I’d never support something like this.”

“I’m sorry, Penny,” Dani says. “Thank you for … I mean … I don’t know what to say. This has been your whole life.”

“Not my whole life. Just seven years.” She smiles, a sad smile that makes her look older. “It was worth it to me. I was part of a different North Corp trial years ago, when I was a teenager. The drug was supposed to treat insomnia, but we found out later that it was one of the experimental meds. It’s the reason I can’t have children.”

“I’m so sorry,” Dani says.

Penny glances over her shoulder. “Don’t be. It could be worse, right?” The words are barely out of her mouth when the semi roaring behind us rams into the back of the car, sending Dani and me slamming into the seats.

“Buckle up and hold on!” Penny stomps the accelerator to the floor. The BMW leaps forward as Dani and I pull on our seat belts.

After the initial burst of speed, the zip from sixty to one hundred is smooth, flawless. We hit the next uphill stretch going one hundred and ten and soon we’re leaving the semi in the dust as it begins to labor up the hill. No matter what kind of engine the bad guys have in that thing, it’s not going to be able to catch us now.

But if there are already people tailing us, then Penny’s old work buddy must have broken her promise. Mara must have told her boss which direction we’re
really
heading. We have to get off the highway.

I lean forward, but there’s no time to tell Penny what I think we should do. The white car comes out of nowhere, sliding from between two semis and into our lane less than a hundred feet ahead of the speeding BMW. Penny is going way too fast to stop in time. I know we’re fucked even before the white car’s brake lights blaze and I realize the person driving is one of them.

Penny slams on the brakes, but it’s too late. We’re already on top of those cherry red lights that glow just like my dragon’s eyes. I reach for Dani, but before I can touch her, the cars collide. Metal screams and my seat belt bites at my shoulder, trying to cut me in half. My chin snaps to my chest, my spine screams, and then there is glass and heat and pain. The rear end of the car lifts into the air while the front is eaten alive by the impact.

I’m conscious long enough to watch Penny be crushed between the steering wheel and her seat and then the night goes black and I am gone.

Dani, Six months later

A cool wind rushes in from the ocean and whispers across our sun-warmed skin, swirling the scent of coconut oil and sunscreen into the air. A few feet away, a swimming pool of still blue water beckons, and all around our private patio tropical plants explode into bloom, bending and bobbing with the weight of their heavy fruit. Sometimes we eat the mangoes and bananas right off the trees. Sometimes, like now, we lie quietly and wait for the tiny monkeys who live nearby to creep in and steal a treat.

During our first weeks on the island, we were too frightened to appreciate our neighbors; by our third month, we took pictures of the mamas with their babies clinging to their fur, and now Jesse and I just sit and watch the monkeys jump from branch to branch. We stare into their strangely human eyes and count the number of rings on their tails and laugh at the perfect, tiny fingers on their hands. We’re finally starting to feel safe, finally daring to believe that this new life is more than an intermission before another horror-filled act begins.

There was a time when I wouldn’t have appreciated a miracle like this new beginning, but I do now.