Escape to Eden (9 page)

This was something I had also debated with my father for the last two years. “He didn’t feel the time was right.”

“You knew about Eden?” Anthony asks.

“I wanted to go there. I asked all the time, but my father always said it wasn’t safe yet. He never said why.” Because I don’t want to think about my father’s decisions, I quickly change the subject.

“When did you meet him?” I ask Anthony.

His gaze drifts above my shoulder as if he’s seeing through to another time. “Years ago his medicine gave my wife three more years to live.” He blinks and clears his throat. “I better wake up Jenna,” he says, and pauses. “Patch, don’t worry. We’ll get Max and get you to your father.”

“My name’s not Patch.”

He and Colt both look at me.

I lift my chin. “It’s Sage.”

G
et up now, Jenna,” Anthony says inside the darkened bedroom.

Colt and I sit on the couch. Colt is quiet, lost in his own thoughts, and I’m lost in mine. I’m thinking of how I can get back inside the Institute to get Max. My brain, no longer trapped in a fog, is working quickly, calculating different scenarios. None of them are promising.

“Why is it I never get any sleep when I work with you?” Jenna says. “Give me five minutes and I’ll get up.”

“You better or I’m coming in with a bucket of water.”

“Ugh. You’re so cliché.”

Anthony closes the door. “I don’t know why I put up with her.”

“So what’s the plan?” I ask.

“I’m going to meet Bram soon. When I get back we can discuss what to do.”

I stand and pace the floor. “I can’t just wait here. I have to do something.”

“The safest place for you is here. Just be patient.”

“How? Max is surrounded by strangers in a world he doesn’t understand. And who knows what they’re doing to him? I have to go.”

“Listen to me. You can’t help him if you get captured again. Just wait. We’ll come up with a plan. We’ll save him together, but we have to know all the facts.”

The door behind him opens.

“Save who?” Jenna yawns. She’s combing her tangled hair straight.

“Her brother, Max. He’s the boy that’s at the Institute,” Anthony says.

She removes some stray hairs from the comb and says, “You left your kid brother with Techheads? That’s cold.”

I cross the room in three steps and slap her hard, surprising everyone in the room, especially myself. “I am tired of your insults,” I say, my face only inches from hers. “You know nothing about me or what I’ve been through.”

“Boo-hoo,” she says, gritting her teeth. “You’ve had a hard life. We all have. At least you get to live long enough to see yourself get varicose veins. Sheesh. You’re so emotional,” she says, raising a hand to touch her cheek. “I don’t know how you’re going to survive this world.”

“Is that what I’m going to have to do? Become emotionally dead? If that’s what you are, then you’re already dead.” I turn around and catch Anthony with his mouth open. “When are you meeting Bram?” I ask.

“I have to call him first and let him know about your father. It complicates things.”

Jenna drops into a nearby chair, still touching her cheek where I slapped her. It’s bright red. “Her father? Why would Bram care?”

“Howard Edmonds is her father,” Anthony says and positions the earpiece behind his ear again.

“William Radkey,” I clarify, but no one notices.

Jenna slowly turns to Colt, her eyes big. “
The
Howard Edmonds?”

“Not now, Jenna,” Anthony says in a warning tone.

“But this is huge!”

“I said later.” His voice is firm and Jenna doesn’t argue. “I have to make that call.”

Anthony walks into the office and closes the door.

Jenna eyes Colt for several seconds like she’s itching to say something, but then she turns to me. “So apparently you’ve got your memory back. What’s that like?”

She doesn’t call me Patch or anything else, which is nice for a change, but her voice still reeks of sarcasm.

I think of all that I remember. Only one word comes to mind.

“Painful.”

My gaze meets Colt’s. This time it’s him who looks away.

“More emotions. You’re boring me.” Jenna stands and goes into the kitchen, muttering under her breath.

I don’t get upset. I have more important things to do, like trying to save Max. I sit in the chair Jenna’s just left, my knee bouncing. There must be something I can do. I imagine the layout of the Institute. I know it inside and out because my father had me memorize it every week for the last year. In case. He had me learn a lot of things. In case. His lessons were grueling, almost cruel, especially after my mother. Things would’ve been so different if she were still alive.

“Tell me about your childhood,” Colt says suddenly. His eyes are a softer blue, like the color of the sky on the edge of a cloud.

“Like I said, I lived near the coast. In Maine. It was an amazing place. For the first seven years of my life it was just me and my mom and dad, then she had Max. I loved having a brother, someone else I could confide in.” The motion of my leg slows to a steady rise and fall, like the swells of the ocean. “My parents were great teachers. They taught us everything. How wonderful this world is and how important the people living on it are. But then my mother died. I was twelve.” Colt doesn’t say anything so I continue.

“One day I came back from spending the night on the beach with Max, and she was just gone. My father had already buried her. He never talked about it. All he would say was it was a horrible accident.” Even Jenna has stopped chewing her cereal from the kitchen to listen. Colt shifts in his chair.

“My parents died when I was young too. And Jenna’s dad died.” The words bring pain to his face, and I wonder how many times he’s said them aloud.

Jenna swallows and adds, “Moving on from depressing stuff, did you ever leave your home? You know, get out a bit to see the world?”

It takes me a moment before I continue. “I knew about things in the world, but never experienced it firsthand. Only watched it
on television. I wished I could be a part of it, but I knew I’d never be accepted. I was obviously different, not special.”

I laugh a little, imagining all the times I’d paint my hair or try to lighten my skin with powder to hide my skin’s imperfections.

“That’s where you’re wrong. We’re not special.” Colt motions between Jenna and him. “We’re freaks of nature, a science experiment gone wrong.”

“Speak for yourself,” Jenna mutters.

“If it were up to me,” Colt continues, “I’d completely wipe us all out, leaving only people like you, Originals, to start over and make this world a better place.”

Jenna laughs. “Then it’s a good thing no one cares what you think.”

A shadow passes over Colt’s face. “One of these days, Jenna—”

“What?” she asks. “What are you going to do? Turn me over to the Institute?”

Colt stands suddenly. “I’m warning you!”

Jenna sets her bowl onto the counter and walks over to him, smiling. The action’s not friendly. “Don’t threaten me. We wouldn’t be in this mess if it wasn’t for you.”

“What is she talking about?” I ask.

Colt doesn’t answer, but his face is pale again.

“Yeah, Colt,” Jenna says. “What am I talking about?”

“This isn’t the time—” he starts to say, but Jenna cuts him off.

“No. I’m not letting this go. The piper has come and now it’s time to pay.” She turns to me and opens her mouth.

“Jenna, don’t!” Colt says.

She doesn’t stop. “Colt is the reason the Institute has your brother.”

“I don’t understand,” I say.

Colt leans back into the sofa, his expression stone.

Jenna crosses her arms, looking pleased with herself. “Almost a year ago, Colt turned your father into the Institute in exchange for money. They had your dad for several days until he escaped, but in the process a Canine bit him. That Canine eventually tracked him back to your house in Maine where you were captured.” She is watching Colt as she speaks. “This is all Colt’s
fault. And with that”—she curtsies to Colt—“I leave the room.” She walks into the office where Anthony is on the phone and closes the door.

I stare after her, trying to absorb everything she just said. My father had been captured. He escaped, but a Canine had bit him. I know what a Canine is: a Prime with an unusual taste for blood. Once they’ve tasted the blood of their prey, they can track it anywhere. No wonder my father never stayed home much, especially this last year. But in the end it still wasn’t enough.

Turning to Colt, I ask, “How much?”

His eyes meet mine. “What?”

“How much did they give you in exchange for my father?”

He hesitates like he doesn’t want to answer, but he does. “A grand.”

I fight back the urge to cry. “So you traded the life of a human for a thousand dollars?”

Colt’s mouth tightens and his features sharpen. “Looks that way, doesn’t it?”

I don’t know how to respond. What world did I step into where a person would trade the life of another for money? I turn away from Colt, unable to look at him.

“Time to go,” Anthony says as he walks out of the office. He seems to sense the tension in the air. “What’s going on?”

Neither Colt nor I answer. Jenna walks out of the office to stand next to Anthony. “I can tell you.”

“What about my brother?” I ask quickly.

“Max is still at the Institute, but they’re moving him for the event in two days.”

“What event?” I ask.

“It’s a yearly fundraiser where wealthy Primes raise money for those who are close to dying. They even donate a vial of their own precious oDNA for a week.”

I remember the conversation I’d heard on the Wall Television at the Institute. “But why would they take Max there?”

Anthony doesn’t say anything and doesn’t look at me either. It’s Jenna who answers. “He’s on display. Buyers like to meet their future donor, like one would when picking out a prized pig. And
believe me, your brother is going to make them a lot of money when everyone finds out who his father is.”

Although I don’t say it out loud, I wonder if that’s true. Ebony thought Max was broken and so might other Primes. Max
was
different from everyone in this world, but he was hardly broken.

“How long can an Original live while their DNA is being sucked out of them?” I ask.

Anthony says, “It’s not them taking DNA that’s harmful, that’s the easy part. It’s all the testing and experiments they put Originals through. The Techheads deny the experiments for the public’s sake, but we have strong evidence to the contrary.”

“So how long does my brother have?”

The room is silent. It’s Colt who eventually decides to be the bad guy.

“No one knows for sure, since we don’t know what they do with the bodies, but we’ve heard the average life span is six months, probably less for a kid.”

I sink into the chair, feeling the blood drain from my face. Why didn’t I know any of this? My father sure didn’t skimp on any of my other lessons.

“We’ll get him back,” Colt says, his voice hard. “I promise.” He looks at me for the first time since our argument, but I have to look away. What little I know of him makes me want to keep my distance.

Anthony clears his throat. “Bram’s going to help a little. Not as much as I would’ve liked, but he’s giving me some things that will help us go unnoticed once we’re inside the pavilion.”

“But how do we get inside?” Jenna asks. “The place is going to be crawling with mutants.”

Anthony shakes his head. “That’s going to be the hard part.”

“Where did you say it was?” I ask.

“The Oscar Johnson Pavilion. It’s a big building on the edge of town. Real fancy place.”

“I know it,” I say.

Jenna scoffs. “How could you know it? You never left your cottage in the woods, remember?”

“My father taught me the layout of every Institute building he
knew of, including the OJP. For example, I know their security is tight. They change their passcodes twice a day and only three people know them. I know the guest list to get into their events will be digital using those same passcodes. We’re not getting into that party. At least not through the front doors.”

No one says anything for several seconds, and I look down, embarrassed. It probably does seem strange that I know all of this random information. At the time my father taught it to me, I thought it was odd too. Not so much anymore.

“Then how?” Colt asks.

I look up. “In the basement. Security is minimal. There’s a water drain. If we go through the tunnels—”

Jenna waves her arms. “Stop right there. We are not going through the tunnels. No way, no how.”

“She’s right,” Anthony says. “We won’t get past the Junks.”

“Not to mention the dreaded mutated alligators,” she adds.

Anthony snorts. “That’s a myth. We only have to worry about Junks, which is plenty.”

The term stirs a memory within me. Junks are human addicts who injected all kinds of pDNA, both human and animal. The result was disastrous and over time they mutated into smaller creatures devoid of human reasoning. The Institute tried to eradicate them, but they escaped into the tunnels beneath the city, making it near impossible for the Institute to find them all.