Metawars: The Complete Series: Trance, Changeling, Tempest, Chimera (99 page)

Schillinger’s face went perfectly neutral, and I didn’t need Gage’s finely tuned senses to know we’d struck a nerve with the topic. “Dr. Arroway passed away several months ago. Heart attack.”

Teresa nodded. “Yes, I read that. I’m not interested in his death so much as his life’s work.”

“All of the work he did for us is confidential. We deal with very time-sensitive topics, and there are many competitors who would like to steal our research.”

“I promise I’m not looking to usurp your lead in genetic cloning.”

His jaw tightened, and his eyes narrowed just a bit. “What is your interest in Dr. Arroway’s work?”

“Purely professional. I’m sure you’ve heard about today’s attack at a New Jersey hospital.”

“Yes, some of your people, wasn’t it?”

Teresa didn’t even flinch. “That’s yet to be determined, but yes, the aggressors did exhibit Meta-like abilities. The problem is that it’s come to my attention that Metas aren’t the only people out there who possess unusual abilities.”

“Why has that information brought you to Springwell?”

“Unfortunately, I can’t reveal my sources, Mr. Schillinger.”

“Doctor Schillinger.”

“My apologies.”

“You’ll have to accept mine, as well. I cannot divulge any information about Dr. Arroway’s professional work here at Springwell. Everyone who is employed here signs a confidentiality agreement, and it doesn’t end postmortem.”

That put a whole new spin on taking secrets to the grave.

“So you deny that Arroway was part of any human cloning experiments?” Teresa asked.

Schillinger gave her a nasty look. “I deny nothing. I also confirm nothing. I’m sorry you three wasted a trip down here when a simple phone call could have answered these questions. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I think you know the way out.”

He turned and stalked back down a stark white corridor, before making a left and disappearing.

“Testy,” I said.

“Not a wasted trip, either,” Gage said. “Nice setup, Teresa. His pulse went through the roof both times you mentioned human cloning.”

She smiled. “You’re welcome.”

“So he’s definitely hiding something,” I said.

“Yes, he is, and it may be exactly what we suspect,” Teresa replied. “Unfortunately, we still don’t have any hard evidence.”

The revolving doors behind us began to pivot, pushing a soft breeze into the cavernous lobby. We turned around as a group. A young woman stepped out of the blue glass doors and stopped short when she saw us. She had short brown hair and brown eyes, a slightly rounded face, and she wore a very simple skirt and blouse combo. A bizarre kind of familiarity slapped me in the face.

Impossible.

“Wow, Rangers,” she said in a breathy, accent-heavy voice. Like she was trying too hard to sound local. Different. “I never dreamed I’d meet any of y’all in person.”

I knew her voice. I mentally aged her, adding a decade or two to the youthful appearance, and the picture in my head sent a jolt of cold terror down my spine. Gage gave me a sharp look, which got Teresa’s attention. I stared blankly at the woman, willing myself to be wrong and not to have conjured up what was now racing like a speeding bullet through my brain.

She looked and sounded just like my mother.

“Hey, you okay?” not-my-mother asked, and it took a second to realize she was asking me.

I tried to swallow, but all my spit was gone. “I, uh, have we met before?”

She smiled patiently, and I saw it. Saw the way my mother smiled at me when I asked too many annoying questions and she was about out of patience. “I don’t think so, I’m sure I’d remember you.”

“Uh-huh.”

Next to me, Gage and Teresa looked equal parts worried and confused.

“Well, you know what they say. Memory is as treacherous as black ice. Can I help y’all with something?”

“Maybe,” Teresa said. “Do you work here, miss?”

“Tricia Rice, and yes, I do work here. I’m just an intern, though, I don’t get to do anything real exciting.”

“Did you know Dr. Arroway?”

She started to say something, then her eyebrows shot up. “Oh my gosh, I can’t. I’m so sorry, I’m not allowed to talk about work stuff with anyone.”

“I understand.”

“I really should go, but it was nice meeting you three.”

Before any of us could respond, she strolled off in the same direction that Schillinger had gone. I shoved through the revolving glass doors, desperate for some fresh air before I totally lost my shit in front of my friends and anyone else spying from their security cameras. I stopped on the sidewalk and turned my face to the setting sun, breathing in large gulps of air. I was trembling head to toe and couldn’t stop.

Teresa appeared in my peripheral vision. She gently cupped my cheeks and tilted my head back down, so I was looking her in the eye. I focused on the warmth of her hands, the intense lavender blaze of her eyes. The strength she was trying to feed into me. “Talk to me,” she said.

I didn’t want to talk to her. I wanted to talk to Aaron, but he wasn’t here, and I had to say this. Had to add one more layer of crazy to this slowly building shit storm circling around us. “My mother,” I said in a toneless voice. “Tricia Rice looks just like my mother.”

Twenty

Identity

T
he ride home was spent hovering over the jet’s computer terminal, conferencing with the War Room. Marco was busy on his end pulling up Corps photos, searching for any pictures of my mother in her early twenties. I sat like a lump in my chair, opposite Gage, finally able to empathize with his shock and fury over this violation of our lives and the memories of our loved ones.

My last memories of my mother were of a bloated, dying woman who had lived a full life, and then left me alone with a terrible secret. I had some residual anger, but I still loved her. I didn’t want someone else running around with her face—quite possibly with her DNA, too.

We’d made a few calls before leaving Oklahoma. Dr. Arroway’s home in Nichols Hill had been sold at auction last month, along with the contents. He had no immediate family and no friends outside work willing to talk to us. The money from his possessions had gone to various charities in Oklahoma City. And even though Dr. Schillinger said our trip was a waste of time, it had proved to be anything but.

“I believe I found a suitable photograph,” Marco said. “One moment.”

I launched out of my chair and stood behind Teresa, who hadn’t moved from the terminal since takeoff. The screen flickered, then switched over to an image of three young Rangers in uniform, posing as if for a publicity shot. The caption at the bottom read “Sledgehammer, Fathom, Anvil: Denver’s Newest Heroes.”

Sledgehammer was Anthony Hill, our late friend William’s father. He and Anvil had been partners for many years as young Rangers, because their powers complemented each other’s. Anvil’s skin could turn hard as iron, while Sledgehammer could, well, hit things really, really hard. And standing between the two men was my mother, Patricia Swift. The image closed in on her face.

Patricia Swift. Tricia Rice. Identical.

A whole lot of cuss words tumbled out of my mouth, one after another.

“Lo me siento, hermano.”
The photo went away, and then Marco was back, his own face a mask of bitter fury. “They had no right.”

“This is insane,” I said. It didn’t make sense, not even a little bit. How could someone clone my mother? The fact that I was talking to her less than an hour ago made the entire thing too surreal to comprehend. Like it had happened to someone else.

“What the woman said to you about black ice was no accident,” Marco continued. “I believe it was a clue.”

“Why?”

“Black Ice was the code name for Janice Murphy, Janel’s mother.”

Janel Murphy had been one of our fellow Central Park survivors, one of the few to make it to HQ alive after our powers returned in January. She didn’t stay alive long, though. Specter possessed her, used her to torture Marco, and forced Teresa to kill Janel to save the rest of us (although I still got a ceiling dropped on me for my trouble). Considering her mother’s code name, Janel’s ice-manipulating abilities had apparently been inherited directly. Much like William had inherited his father’s incredible strength.

“You think Black Ice was cloned, too?” Teresa asked.

“Perhaps,” Marco replied.

“But why give us such an obvious clue?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” Teresa said. “Maybe whoever’s in charge is leading us somewhere. Letting us see the Jasper clone’s face at the hospital doesn’t feel like an accident, and neither does running into Tricia Rice in Oklahoma.”

“They want us to figure out who they are?”

“It’s possible. Marco, when did Black Ice die?”

“Eighteen years ago,” Marco replied. “She was killed during a battle in Salt Lake City.”

“Two years before Fathom and Jasper died.”

“So the DNA was obtained by someone who worked at HQ or for MHC during the War,” Gage said. “We need to know who those people are.”

“That search is in progress,” Marco said. “I am also searching for more detailed personal information for Tricia Rice. She has a birth certificate and Social Security number, as well as a Bachelor of Science from Oklahoma State. However, documents can be forged.”

“Keep on it,” Teresa said.

“Por supuesto.”

“See you in about an hour.”

Switching off the terminal seemed to lessen the impact of our latest round of information. Out of sight, out of mind, I guess. I returned to my seat, less weirded out now that my mother’s photograph was no longer in plain sight. In the back of my mind, I knew untold horrors were still waiting to be uncovered. Horrors developed and bred at Springwell Lab and overseen by the late Dr. Arroway.

Weatherfield and Springwell hadn’t been the only labs developing Recombinants over the last three decades. They were just the only two we knew about. Weatherfield was supposedly developing the hybrid-Changelings as possible replacements for Metas. Had Springwell taken it a step further and decided simply to bring Metas back from the dead?

And why?

I didn’t really want to know the answer to that question, but Springwell had violated my mother’s memory by cloning her. I’d see that damned place torn to the ground inch by inch, even if I had to create a tornado to destroy it.

•   •   •

The best thing about the empty pool in our backyard was that it made a nice, deep hole in which to hide out and create whirlwinds. The old painted tiles were cracked and worn, and a few were pulled into the air I moved in a tight circle. I’d retreated there about an hour ago, needing some space and some time to work out my excess frustration. Sitting in the middle of the deep end, legs crossed and hands in my lap, I watched the dirty, tile-dotted air spin and roar in the small cyclone in front of me.

Unsurprisingly, Marco had found out that Tricia Rice’s identity was stolen. He’d been able to track down a death certificate for her Social Security number, purged from the system seven years ago. The age of the real Tricia Rice would put her at twenty-one, which matched the woman’s appearance. Using that as a lead, Marco had plunged into searching for other purged death certificates from the same time frame. Just in case the other clones had personal lives and day jobs, too.

I hadn’t been able to stay in the house. Too many concerned and sympathetic looks, especially from Dahlia, who’d tried to talk to me about McTaggert. I don’t know who told her, but I’d put my money on Renee. And as much as I’d wanted to talk to Aaron back in Oklahoma, now that I was home and able to, I just wanted to be alone.

So I was sitting at the bottom of a pool making a baby tornado, amusing myself with notions of dropping a few right on top of Springwell. Maybe even on Weatherfield, while I was at it, since they were still in business here in L.A. and just a few miles away in Studio City.

I kept up the whirlwind until exhaustion forced me to drop it. Dust and tile chips settled to the ground in a gray and white circle, and the sudden silence seemed incredibly loud.

“I was wondering how long you’d keep that up.”

Aaron’s voice next to me startled me into yelping. I scrambled to my feet and turned, heart pounding. He sat on the edge of the pool near the five-foot mark, legs dangling over the side.

“How long have you been watching me?” I asked.

“Dunno, a while. You looked like you needed to get that out of your system.”

I shrugged. “Some people run, some people punch heavy bags.”

“You make cyclones.”

“What do you want, Aaron?”

His eyebrows jumped. “Do you want me to leave?”

Yes. No.
“Whatever.” I wandered to the opposite side of the pool and sat down with my back to the wall.

Not deterred by my bad attitude, Aaron jumped into the pool and came down the slope into the deep end. He sat next to me, close enough for me to feel his heat without our actually touching. “I won’t ask how you are, because you’re obviously not okay,” he said.

Sarcasm eluded me—I was so damned tired of my defensive walls, and Aaron didn’t deserve to slam into them—so I settled on honesty. “I feel like I’m going crazy.”

“Because you saw your mother today?”

“She wasn’t my mother.” I exhaled a hard, shaky breath. “But she looked just like her, probably has her DNA. Someone made her in a test tube, for fuck’s sake. She isn’t real.”

Aaron’s entire body flinched. Shit. I’d put my whole foot in my mouth with that one. “You’re mad, and I get that,” he said. “Springwell had no right to do what they did, to clone your loved ones. But they’re still real people, maybe with no idea where their DNA came from.”

“Is that some sort of ‘love the sinner, hate the sin’ speech?”

“Something like that.”

“They kidnapped my father and brother.”

“I know. And I know how that feels, that need to find them and punish the people who took them.” He did know. He’d gone through something very similar with Jimmy and Dr. Kinsey. “The big question, though, is why. Why did Springwell create the clones? And why did they take Freddy and Andrew?”

“They probably made the clones for the same reason they made the Changelings. Controllable soldiers with Meta-like powers. Only they don’t seem to be doing a great job controlling them.”

Aaron frowned. “The clones who attacked in New Jersey were probably following someone’s orders.”

I angled my head sideways and offered a tentative smile. “I meant you. You and your brothers busted out of Weatherfield.”

“To be fair, we were about to be terminated. Otherwise, we might never have left that lab. Or we may have left when they sent us to rob a bank, or kidnap a Meta and his son.”

“I’m glad that didn’t happen.”

He leaned closer until our shoulders and arms touched, and my skin prickled with awareness. I didn’t understand why I reacted like that to something as simple as physical contact, but I liked it. It made me feel less alone and even more grateful that Aaron and I hadn’t ended up as enemies. That maybe we could be more than friends.

“A lot’s changed in twenty-four hours,” he said.

“Story of my life.”

“I’d like to hear more about that sometime.”

“You know the important broad strokes.”

“Yeah, but it’s the details that make the person.”

“I hate strawberry ice cream.”

He laughed. “Okay, I will keep that in mind if you ever have your tonsils out.”

“Do you ever think about your mother?” I asked, the question popping out of my mouth before I realized it was even in my head.

Aaron sobered up quickly. “Which mother?”

“Not Mrs. Scott, not Aaron’s mother. King’s mother.”

Back during the initial Changeling experiments, Dr. Kinsey had donated his semen to the project, which made him (kind of) genetically related to Noah and Aaron. The egg donor had been anonymous for a long time, until we discovered it was actually the late Detective Liza Forney. She’d needed the money. Years later, she was killed by one of her own daughters.

“Honestly?” Aaron said. “No. She’s a name on paper to me. While I do recall the mothers of some of the lives who are a part of me, the mother I most remember is Trudy Scott. She was a great mom. And I don’t think we ever stop missing our parents.”

“I just wish I could go back to before I saw Tricia Rice.”

“We can’t change the past, Ethan.”

“I know that!” I blew hard through clenched teeth, desperate to control my anger. He didn’t deserve it; though he seemed to weather it well. “I keep wondering who else did they clone, you know? Gage’s brother, my mother, possibly even Janel’s mother. Who else is out there?”

“Something tells me we won’t have to wonder for long.”

“That’s what scares me the most.”

“What’s that?”

“Going up against people who look like our loved ones and not being able to do what’s right.”

“Fight them, you mean.”

“Yeah.”

Aaron shifted around to face me and took my hands. Squeezed them hard. I looked him in the eye, nervous about what I’d see, and saw only determination and confidence. And something else behind that, warmer and intense. “You were trained to be a Ranger, Ethan. To put the needs of others first. You’ll do what needs to be done.”

I wasn’t so sure, but I liked knowing someone believed in me. That Aaron believed in me. Despite the fact that anyone taking a late-night stroll through the backyard could see us, I took a chance and kissed him. He didn’t hesitate to kiss me back. There was no uncertainty between us now. Not at the bottom of the pool, or a few minutes later, when we tumbled into my bedroom. Not when the first cracks of sunrise woke us up, tangled together naked in my bed, exhausted but also somehow newly energized. Not when I nearly got us both going again because I just didn’t want to stop kissing him.

Aaron slipped out of bed and got dressed so he could return to his room before the rest of the house stirred. I didn’t ask him, and I liked that I didn’t have to. If this thing between us was real, we wouldn’t be able to hide it much longer. And I wasn’t sure I wanted to hide it at all. I just didn’t know how to say it to him—or to my friends.

I waited a few minutes, content to remember the details of our first real night together, until my bladder told me to haul ass out of bed. I put on my robe and padded down the hall to the community bathroom. I pushed the door open and jumped back, startled to see Renee there so early in the morning.

She stood at the row of sinks wearing a gray sports bra and boy shorts. She was staring at herself in the mirror. The scars on her arms and chest stood out like bleach stains on a blue shirt. She lifted both arms straight out from her sides. Her left arm extended at the wrist as she used her Flex powers, stretching out to nearly four feet. Her right arm, which was covered in burn scars from shoulder to palm, did nothing. She retracted her left hand with a frustrated grunt.

“Couldn’t sleep, either?” she asked.

“Something like that,” I said and came fully inside the bathroom. The door swung shut with a whoosh of air that tickled the backs of my legs.

“Fucking burns.”

“They don’t still hurt, do they?” I stood next to her in front of the sink and met her eyes in the mirror. They were wet, shiny, ready to drop tears at any moment.

“Only when I try to be effective and use my powers.” She held up her right hand. “Can’t do anything with this one anymore. I can feel it, though, you know? The bone wanting to stretch and bend, but my skin won’t fucking let it.”