Extracted

Tyler

The entire left side of Lily's face is swollen, blue beneath her eyes and yellowing as the bruising moves down her cheeks. She can't open her eye. It's painful to see. Everyone is quiet at breakfast, but Jeremy—he is Jeremy—keeps giving me furtive glances like when he has something important on his mind he's building the courage to ask me about it.

I keep my hands under the table, stilling the urge to reach behind Lawrence and cuff Gideon on the back of his neck. Alright, kiddo, what's so important?

I'm not hungry. No one seems to be this morning. Lily's having a hard time getting food around her swollen mouth and chewing. She should probably still be in the infirmary. I have the feeling she isn't because of me. The director wants me to stare across the table at the brutality of this place. Maybe she'd have received better treatment if I hadn't interfered. Lily must realize that too because she won't look at me. She hasn't said a word.

I watch as she takes her tray to the bins and walks out of the cafeteria.

"You bring nothing but trouble," Cecelia snips before, she too, leaves.

I'm left alone at the table with Jeremy. He looks at me with large brown eyes and for a second I see soft blue looking to me for guidance, then he blinks and it's gone, as is he, sliding from the bench and disappearing among the taller students like a whisper.

I stare at the floor as I walk through the hallway to class and am jolted out of my thoughts when Mitchell is suddenly walking at my side.

"You were right," he says.

"You looked?"

"Yeah. Anything to do with the graduates is behind a gazillion firewalls and then encrypted over ten times ten. There's not much, but you're right. Anyone who's graduated to the outside has been the most aggressive, and..." His eyes go hard and blank. "It's bad. What they're doing."

"What are they doing?"

He gives a quick shake of his head and tightens his lips. He's not going to tell me, at least not here in the corridor surrounded by other students.

"I'll help you, Katherine. We're getting out of here." And then his longer strides carry him away.

~~~

I sleep well, calm for the first time since I've been here. We can do this. With Mitchell's hacking skills, we can figure out who Tyler for sure is and get him and Jeremy out of this horrible place. I will not leave my brother here.

I'm awakened by two guards dragging me out of bed. Disoriented, I kick out, getting one in the kneecap. He falls to a knee, releasing my arm. I make good use by going after the other guard's ear, tearing, but the other is up, the glass of a syringe flashes in the subdued light from the hall. Hot liquid burns into my arm.

On her bed, pressed back against the wall, Cecelia accuses, "What have you done?"

Then she and our room are spinning and my muscles go slack. There's no fight in me. I'm aware, but immobile. A scream claws up through my throat and gets stuck there.

I'm folded at the waist and lifted across a shoulder. His uniform catches across my thin sleepwear and we're moving fast through the hallways, my arms dangling limply, swaying with the guard's steps.

I wonder if Mitchell is awake and monitoring the hallways. Does he know I'm being taken? What are they going to do to me? Do they know what I've planned? Do they know I remember being AnnaLee?

My stomach clenches against the man's shoulder. They're going to erase my memories. They're going to take Jeremy away from me.

We go into the elevator. Going down to where the lab is. My heart wrenches in my chest.

I picture Jeremy, just before the accident, eyes solemn. He knows I'm breaking up with Tyler because of him. I wish I hadn't let him tag along—but before Tyler had smacked him at the quarry we'd been hanging out in, Jeremy had been so happy to be included in our fun. I grasp onto that, holding the image tight in my head, so tight they'll never be able to tear it free. They can't. I won't let them. Tears leak out of my eyes, sliding down my forehead in my upside down position.

Suddenly I'm twisted in the air and tossed down into the examination chair. The guards make quick work of strapping me down though there's little point. My limbs are floppy, my body limp.

My breathing is loud, my chest rises up and down in a harsh rhythm.

The guards move away and the director moves into my square of vision, his face lined with sympathy.

He runs a cold thumb beneath my eyes, smearing away my tears, but more come, clouding everything behind a watery sheen.

"I can tap into the hypothalamus, make her more aggressive," someone says from the side. I can't see who. I couldn't turn my head even if it wasn't strapped down.

My chest heaves up and down harder against the strap. It's so hard to breath. My tongue is thick on the roof of my mouth.

The director stares down at me like I'm a fascinating riddle. "Let's hold off on that for now."

I state at him, pleading with my eyes. Please don't hurt me. Because that's all I can do. Everything I am is in his hands.

A sting jabs the inside of my elbow, flowing white hot into my veins, up my arm and my already hazy vision grays. The director's face wavers.

"Shall we proceed with the memory cleansing?" the other man asks, a hollow disembodied voice ringing at the left of my head. I scream, at least I try, but all that comes out are croaking raspy sounds. I'm fading away. I can't drift off. I fight it. If I go now, when I awake, if I awake, I won't be me.

They're taking everything. Jeremy. Jeremy. I clutch onto his name. How can I save him if I don't know him? Jeremy.

The director's head tilts. "No. She provides a unique case study, introduced among the other subjects."

My heart jolts. Does that mean...?

His cold hand rests across my forehead, pushing back sweaty bangs. He leans in close, his head sliding to the side to whisper in my ear. His breath is warm and smells of orange juice. I tense, afraid of whatever threat he's going to spew between his lips, but he hovers there for a small moment, and then moves away without a word.

Then the fun really begins.

It isn't electro-shock therapy this time, but something much worse.

The raving mad scientists shoot something into my veins that burns like frost bite—intense searing frost bite breaking apart inside every nerve ending.

There isn't even an apparent purpose for the torment. No one asks any questions or threatens me with worse if I don't behave. I'm pretty much left alone to endure this for hours. Maybe that's the lesson.

We can do whatever we want to you.

If so, I'm learning it well. Or maybe it's simply another test to see how far they can fill one of their new and improved test bodies with antifreeze before it explodes.

It goes on and on, the only relief comes when I finally pass out, yet even then I dream of cold.