Broken Promises (11 page)

“Huh?” He moved to crane his neck around the wall that had stopped in his path, but Jasper wasn’t moving. “Lord…Carlisle, isn’t it? And of course, Lady Carlisle.” He noticed Patrick then too, who stuffed a last bite of cake into his mouth and nodded. The doctor’s gaze lingered until the young man paled visibly and swallowed hard.

“The general has sent you to assist in my research? Are you ready, then? We can get the testing started immediately.”

“Testing?”

His eyebrows lifted. “I will need to take some blood samples, and—”

Callie closed her eyes, overwhelmed by images of this man looming over her with a needle. If she’d been standing she would have keeled right over.

“Your continuing research isn’t the primary purpose for our visit. In fact, we’re here to ask you some questions about a Captain Dunsmoor.”

Jasper’s voice soaked beneath her skin and calmed her enough that she opened her eyes.

The doctor had moved subtly to the left and once again had her in his sights. “Captain Dunsmoor? Oh, oh yes. He was the heart transplant and facial rebuild.” The doctor’s face lit up and she wanted to take him by the throat and force him to acknowledge Dunsmoor as more than a procedure. He was a human being whose life had been destroyed, who had feelings and deserved respect.

But she didn’t. If she spoke she’d start screaming, and they would all be convinced she must be suffering from degeneration. Then how long before she found herself strapped down to a bed behind a curtain in the laboratory on the other side of the glass there? How long before there were more needles digging into her skin? What would be taken from her then? Which of her remaining limbs? How much more of herself could she afford to lose before she really did become a monster? Before she lost everything, even her life?

“Can you tell us what happened to the captain?” Jasper asked.

“His surgery and subsequent recovery? Or his attack on my life?”

“Start at the beginning. I’d like to know if he suffered from any complications as a result of the surgery or during his recovery and rehabilitation that might have contributed to his later actions.”

The doctor looked between her and Patrick. “I would like for you and the boy to submit to an examination before you’re done here.”

“Let’s stay on track please, Doctor.” Jasper’s tone was like a sharp sliver of ice.

Dr. Helmholtz harrumphed but continued. “The man was near death. I was required to open up his chest. The heart was riddled with shrapnel from an explosion. I had been working on a prototype for an artificial organ…it was the perfect opportunity to test it.”

The perfect opportunity.
She didn’t doubt that he might have conspired to create the situation if he could have.

“Of course the operation was a success.”

“What about the work that was done to his face?” she asked.

A frown replaced his smug look of self-assurance. “My artificial dermis was still in its experimental stages when the War Office came to me with their request. There were some things I had not considered…”

“It isn’t very stable, is it?” she interrupted. “His face…
changes.
I’ve seen it.”

“The artificial dermis I created and grafted was absolutely perfect. However, admittedly, due to the vagaries of nature which are beyond my control…including exposure to heat and cold, damage caused by chemicals and detergents, and various other environmental contaminants, it began to degrade just like natural skin, if slightly more quickly. This seemed to cause the nanites to work overtime to repair the damage. And if the captain experienced a trauma to the face—”

“Like being punched, for instance?”

He nodded at her. “An apt example, thank you. Yes, if he were punched in the face, this nanite activity occurring just beneath the skin layer might actually look as if the very features of his face were shifting. I continue to try and perfect the design, but the science is more complicated than I expected. It continues to be a work in progress, and I haven’t used the artificial dermis on a patient since.”

Her gloved hand clenched in a tight fist. There was more happening to Captain Dunsmoor than a slight “shift” of his features as the nanites tried to repair surface damage. The man had worn two completely different faces within the space of a day. Perhaps the doctor wasn’t even aware of this development.

“Despite this one complication, the captain recovered remarkably well and was back on his feet within a relatively short period of time.” The matter-of-fact pride in his voice made her want to vomit, but she was either a very good actress, or more likely the doctor was blind to everything but his own recollections of brilliance.

“What about the nanites in his bloodstream? And in mine?” she interjected. “Is it true these are now degenerating and causing problems?”

His gaze narrowed. “Have you experienced any such symptoms?”

“She’s been just fine.” Jasper insisted, stepping closer.

She paused. “What sort of symptoms would I be looking for?”

“Callie.”

Shoulders tight, she braced herself but couldn’t look at him.

“The degeneration would start in the artificial limbs,” the doctor began. “You might notice a lag of movement between thought and reaction, or you might experience spontaneous movement of the limb or limbs. But as the condition progressed, you would also start to see changes in your biological functions.”

“Like what? How is it possible for them to have such an effect on my natural systems?” She was almost positive now that what she’d been feeling was the beginning of degeneration, and held her breath waiting to hear what else she could expect to encounter as the biomechanical organisms coursing through every part of her started to wreak more havoc.

The doctor looked down the bridge of his nose and sighed very loudly.

“I realize you find it tedious to have to explain your work to lower-functioning individuals such as we are,” she snapped, heat rising in her cheeks. “But I’ll ask you to remember that this is about more than just a footnote for your research. People’s lives are on the line. How many others besides Captain Dunsmoor, Patrick and me have you ‘treated’? How many good people are out there slowly but surely losing control over their bodies and maybe their minds?” Her voice had risen with every word until she was all but shouting.

Jasper closed his fingers over her arm. “Callie.”

She struck out without thinking, slamming her iron fist in his chest. He stumbled back several steps with a sharp groan. Rubbing his chest, he looked up at her in surprise.

Callie gasped and rushed to his side but stopped short, drawing her hand back before touching him. “Jasper, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to—please, it was automatic. It just happened—” She spun around to see Patrick’s mouth hanging open and the doctor watching her as if mentally taking notes. “I didn’t mean it,” she repeated, her voice a thin whisper.

She saw his hesitation, the flash of wariness in his eyes. Her mask had slipped a little more and he didn’t like what he was seeing beneath it. She moaned and clenched her eyes shut. It might have been inevitable, but didn’t stop her world from crashing to pieces all around her.

Jasper finally straightened and came forward, enfolding her in his arms. She resisted, but unless she wanted to hurt him again, she was eventually forced to give in and let herself be enveloped in his warmth.

“It’s okay, Callie. It was only an accident.”

“That was no accident,” Dr. Helmholtz said. “How long have you been exhibiting symptoms?”

Chapter Seven

In spite of her vehement objections to being left behind like a child with the nanny, Jasper and Patrick took a carriage into the city. They were armed with the file they’d been given listing Captain Dunsmoor’s history, former address, close friends and family members. Hopefully, they would find out where the captain was hiding, since there was very little doubt he was in Manchester at this very moment.

Jasper left without saying a word to her. She wouldn’t let him. Even before her violent outburst, he’d been hurt and angry with her for keeping secrets, and she couldn’t listen to him whisper words of love when everything between them was imploding. As much as she wanted to justify her actions—even to herself—it wasn’t working. Her stomach turned and turned…even as the twitching and vision disruptions bombarded her.

Perhaps she should have apologized again, tried to explain, but what could she have said? There’d been no privacy in any case…and what could Jasper have done? Forced her to retreat back to Yorkshire? Or would he have worried and paced the floor? Glared at the doctor’s back while the man hunched over his instruments? She was already doing the pacing and glaring perfectly well on her own.

She remembered the leather strap and buckle she thought she’d glimpsed hidden behind the curtain earlier, and was thankful for the momentary distraction, as morbid as it was. She took a deep breath before casually pulling the heavy fabric aside.

She didn’t find what she’d expected. The only things on the other side of the curtain were more of the doctor’s medical instruments, apparently being stored here out of the way. Big, bulky machines with knobs and buttons, wires coming from all sides, and casters on the bottom so they could easily be moved from one location to another.

Confusion got the better of her and she subsequently stalked over to all the other sectioned-off areas. But after snapping the curtains back and looking in each, only one contained a hospital bed. There was no body strapped down to it, no leather straps attached to the frame, and it was completely stripped of bedding.

In fact, even the doctor’s lab coat, retrieved from a rack at the entrance of the room when they arrived, was crisp, clean and perfectly white. She glanced at him again to make certain. There were no splatters of blood—or anything else—on it.

What was going on? She would have placed money on what she thought she’d seen, but…nobody had been in this room, had they? If there’d really been a body, where had it gone?

Could this be part of the degeneration problem as well? Was her mechanical eye seeing innocent pictures, but by the time the messages reached her brain for translation they’d somehow warped into something else entirely? Did everything she saw have to be considered with skepticism and doubt?

Did it mean Jasper was right, and she’d been completely wrong about what she witnessed on the train as well?

Finally straightening from the microscope, the doctor snapped his fingers. “Of course, that’s it! Why didn’t I see it before?”

Callie started pacing again, from one end of the room to the other while Dr. Helmholtz dosed blood samples with dye, peered at them through different lenses, then moved to another set of instruments—she had no idea what any of them were. After a while he stopped and flipped through his notebook, scribbled some notes…and turned to the microscope again, muttering unintelligibly.

She tried to peer over his shoulder. “What is it, doctor? Have you found something?”

He swung around to face her. His frown made her think he didn’t quite know where to start.

“Just give me the truth, please.”

“I designed the nanites for the sole purpose of carrying commands between the brain and the artificial implants. They’re the only reason the human body doesn’t reject the iron, and the only way for you to control them as easily as you control your own flesh-and-blood parts. It’s truly a feat of brilliance in both engineering and medicine, and should really be more seriously recognized in—”

“Doctor,” she warned. He gave her a reproachful look, but Callie didn’t have the patience to feign amazement and awe over his impressive accomplishments. “Please.”

“Yes, yes. Well, when I was informed of Captain Dunsmoor’s uncharacteristically aggressive behavior, I asked to see him and performed a series of tests. He became agitated and paranoid, forcing me to restrain him. However, one night he broke free and attacked me. His unprovoked attempt on my life was thwarted by General Black, but the captain managed to escape.”

Helmholtz didn’t come right out and admit it, but if Dunsmoor had been forced to “break out” in the first place, it stood to reason he’d not been here voluntarily. Not only that, but she suspected the doctor’s tests had been more akin to torture.

“I was left with only a very small blood sample for further testing. With it, I detected changes in the active organisms and I began to think they were indeed deteriorating. It would have accounted for the symptoms that were described.” His words ran together as his excitement for the subject became more pronounced. “But I should have looked closer. I made a horrible mistake.”

“It’s worse than that?” She held her breath.

“No, not at all. In fact, the nanites aren’t deteriorating at all.”

She held up her hand, showing him that her middle finger was twitching spasmodically. “If this isn’t degeneration, then what in God’s name is happening to me?”

The avid light in his eyes was both frightening and compelling. “This has nothing to do with God. This is an evolution. I built the nanites almost too perfectly. Their purpose is to communicate continually between mind and body, to improve the connection between the natural and unnatural. And that’s exactly what they have been doing.”

She shook her head. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

“Of course you don’t.” He dismissed her ignorance with a wave of his hand and she gritted her teeth to keep from shouting. “Essentially, the organisms in your blood are designed to continually seek new and better ways of doing their job. Obviously, they have independently identified issues which stand in the way of that. Therefore, they’re attempting to remove them by altering your genetic structure to be more compatible with their composition and function.”

“Do you mean they’re slowly turning me into a monster? Because the more like them I am, the easier it is for them to communicate with me?”

His gaze narrowed in a frown. “You are far from a monster. As I said, the nanites are hard at work, continually enhancing everything about you. I suspect they have begun to reproduce as well. There are very likely double or triple the amount of nanites working in your systems than I originally injected. They’re making you stronger and more efficient. Given enough time, you may even be virtually indestructible. You, my lady, are a marvel of modern science!”