Deserted (22 page)

           
He looked at me and laughed. “If I’m going to erase your memories, then why
should I bother telling you anything at all?”

           
He, unfortunately, had a point.
“…
Touche
.”

           
“Tell me…”
Krastanov’s
hand was still meticulously
rubbing his chin, “do you know where the flower is?”

           
“Maybe…” I started, hoping to use it to my advantage. I looked the scientist up
and down, remembering his time at the lab in the desert, and started to question
myself. He was a botanist…maybe he
could
save this wasteland.

           
“Well what
do
you know?” He replied in a huff.

           
I contemplated if I should tell him. His earnest demeanor caused my distrust to
falter momentarily but I wasn’t about to let him cause any more harm. “What’s
it to you?” I asked. “What do you plan on doing with that?”

           
“Exactly what you said,” he smiled and his eyes glistened with excitement, “a flower
that can withstand the wasteland is…is a miracle! Think of everything I could
do with that! I don’t need to try to reprogram an old plant if I can just
redistribute the seeds from a resilient strain! I could study its
chemistry…maybe such resistance could be transferred into medicine. The
opportunities are endless!” I was taken aback at his enthusiasm…but could I
trust him? “Please…you must tell me what you know.” I scrutinized his words and
body language for any sign of dishonesty but found none. I decided to take a
chance on him; if anyone could save this world, it would be him. But what could
I really do? I hadn’t the slightest idea where this flower was.

“It
won’t do you any good, unless you know the whereabouts of all the cliff faces
in the wasteland. All I remember was that it was tucked into the very corner of
a cliff wall. It was in the shade at the time but depending on the time of day
it would have gotten plenty of sunlight.” A sudden thought burst into my head.
“Maybe the vial can show you.”

Dr.
Krastanov’s
face lit up at the idea and he rushed to my
side as I retrieved my Memory Vial. Holding it as firmly as
Tsvetan
had told me to, I concentrated on the flower – and was surprised to see it
actually show up!

“There
it is,” I said. “That’s the flower I saw. See? I told you it was sturdy.”

It was
as beautiful as I remembered, but the vision showed little else. Shadowed sand
and a rocky wall; how was that going to be of any use?

Dr.
Krastanov
was lost in the swirling mist, his eyes bulging
at the mist’s image. “You…you were completely right. That is most definitely
growing. How does it survive? Where is its water source?”

I handed
the vial to the scientist and the liquid turned stagnant. “Like I said, I can’t
be of much help. Unless you know that specific cliff…”

“No,
no…it’s fine. Maybe I could get the Pirates to…” He trailed off, biting his lip
harshly in thought.

I
furrowed my brow at him.
“Again with the Pirates?
Why
would they help you?”

“Oh, we
work very closely together, the Pirates and I, whether they know it or not.”

I stared
him down. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It
means exactly that. But forget about it; you probably shouldn’t know that,
either.”

“Of
course…” I huffed.
“Always with the secretive bull.”

 “Telling
you would be inconsequential, so why bother? Things are proceeding at a set
pace and we don’t want people trying to meddle in things that they would never
understand. We’re not secretive; we’re quite open to the right people.”

“Right
people, huh? You mean Yes Men?”

“Well
that’s a rather degrading term for scientific geniuses.” He crinkled his nose
at me.

“Yeah?
Well, do you have any
dissenting
scientific geniuses?”
Krastanov
scowled at me and headed back towards his
machinery, placing my Memory Vial with the utmost care upon the chair’s
footing. “
Mhm
…didn’t think so.”

“I’m not
here to argue with you. If you want the procedure done again, let me know.
Otherwise, my dear – you’re wasting my time.” He huffed at me and returned to
wiping down whatever invisible particles seemed to be bothering him on his
precious chair.

           
I turned my attention back to the shelves at my side, readying myself for my
first foray into theft when the now two empty spaces near the bottom drew me
away. “
Krastanov
…” The scientist mumbled something in
response. “Do you remember a woman named Samantha
Morgansen
?”

           
He stopped and stared off for a moment. “No. Should I?”

           
“I…I think she came through here once upon a time. Probably not long after the
Reckoning.”

           
“Well the last name is certainly familiar; a relative of you and Chester, I
presume.”

           
“My mother.”

           
“Hah, well now; that’s the first I’ve heard of providing work to an entire
family.”

           
I narrowed my eyes at him but he didn’t seem to notice. “She has a bottle just
like this at home. I don’t remember seeing a name on it, though.”

           
“Well, was it glowing? Did it move at all?”
Tsvetan
asked and I nodded. “Then it was hers, for sure. The Vials won’t react to the
wrong person.”

           
“And it’s most definitely your handiwork?”

           
“Well I’m the only crazed doctor in the wasteland, so I should think so.”

           
I ran my hands along the fine wood of the shelf with a morose feeling deep in my
gut. “The correct term is
mad scientist
, by the way. Nobody says ‘crazed
doctor’.” I scoffed but my mind was elsewhere as
Tsvetan
responded. My thoughts were hard to control - my mother was here? Why? And did
my dad know about it? Did he come here on purpose? Did he
want
to forget
about us?

           
“What happened to them…
”
I murmured but in the still
air of the facility,
Tsvetan
heard it quite clearly.

           
“I don’t know, my dear. The Reckoning was many years ago, now, and I’ve had
many patients. She was probably lost and found me, like most people do.”

           
“Then how did she get her vial?” I asked. “That would require her to be
somewhat self-aware and you don’t exactly encourage that, do you?”

           
“I prefer not to let my patients know they’re patients, if that’s what you’re
asking.” Dr.
Krastanov
looked down towards the shelf
that I had been staring at. “So Samantha is the missing vial, is she?” I nodded
in response. “I don’t remember her that well, but I remember the man who took
that vial from me.”

           
“Man?” I couldn’t hide my surprise. “I assumed she picked it up herself.”

           
“Oh, no.
A Pirate wanted it.
Knew
her real well, apparently.”

           
“A Pirate?”
My head was starting to hurt. “My dad is
not a Pirate. Who would want some random woman’s Memory Vial?”

           
“She was no ‘random woman’, I can assure you; they knew each other, though I
don’t know how. First time a Pirate’s ever been in here.”

           
I sighed in frustration. Why would a Pirate want my mother’s vial? Why would
she even
know
a Pirate? Just who were these people…and who was my
mother, for that matter? “Did my father know about this?”

           
Dr.
Krastanov
shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m a
scientist, not a mind-reader.”

I rubbed
my forehead and tried to will away the jumbled thoughts of my mother; she
was
not the reason I was out here. I took another glance at the vials I wanted and
contemplated just how I expected to leave here with them. I can’t just ask him
to open the doors, now can I? I looked over my shoulder in quick bursts,
ensuring Dr.
Krastanov
was not looking my way as I
took Kay and Chester’s vials carefully from the shelf. Their names glowed
brightly in a golden calligraphy upon the glass and I was afraid that their aura
would give me away as I tried to hold them to my chest, hoping they would not
clink together when I made my escape. I turned around and inched my way towards
the door, my heart starting to pound as I grew closer to my escape.

           
I was only steps away from the entrance now when I heard the shuffling of feet
behind me. “Have you made up your…hey, where are you going with those?” Dr.
Krastanov
called after me and I bolted at his voice.

           
I barely touched a stair as I charged down them and onto the landing area in
the hallway. I quickly looked to the right of the scientist’s door and pressed
the invisible button I had seen earlier, causing the door to immediately close
just as I saw
Tsvetan’s
face appear at the top of the
stairs. I cradled the vials in my jacket and glanced towards the stairs at the
far end; they felt so far away now. I looked at the edge of the landing before
me and down to the main floor below and made a hasty decision. I jumped down
from the upper platform, landing right in front of my room below me. I didn’t
hear Dr.
Krastanov
anywhere behind me but I didn’t
want to risk it all the same. I rushed into my room and searched frantically
for a backpack of any kind, finding a small brown satchel stuffed into a
corner. I wrapped the glowing vials tightly with my jacket and shoved them
inside the backpack and turned my attention to my journal that still lay upon
my bed. I snatched it up and instantly realized that it would be far too big to
fit in the small bag I had available.

“Fine;
I’ll have to carry it then.” I swung my head around, making sure I wasn’t
forgetting anything while I strained my ears for any sound of the scientist in
the distance. The Facility was just as quiet as it had always been, though; I
wasn’t even sure he was trying to follow me but I wasn’t going to waste time
finding out. I raced from my room with a journal in one hand as I swung the
small satchel on my back, running down the few steps ahead of me that led to
the foyer with the large doors. It was yet another large, echoing room with
nothing but a grated floor and an ominous door before me. With no way to open
them myself, I looked frantically for a mechanism. I felt the walls around me,
trying desperately to find a crack or a switch. I still didn’t hear anyone
coming after me and there were no running footsteps but my heart was still
racing. The walls continued to look flat and smooth and my stomach had started
to drop as I struggled to find a button of some kind. I prodded the walls
blindly until I heard something suddenly click into motion. The sound of gears
turning reverberated throughout the foyer as the large doors before me shrieked
and shook with the pulleys. Dust puffed out as they screeched their way open,
grinding and scratching upon the metallic floor as my method of escape became
wider. The bright sun soon bathed the foyer and sand poured in around me as I
shielded my strained eyes from the sun. I hurried my way to the great outdoors
when a sudden thought hit me hard in the gut, almost knocking me down in its
intensity.
Ponika
…would he still be there, waiting
for me? I rushed faster now, barely able to see as my eyes adjusted to the
brightness of the wasteland. I staggered out into the sand, shaded by a large
awning of the Facility.

           
“
Ponika
!”
I called out,
turning my head wildly as I strained to hear him. My eyes burned as I continued
to pry them open, desperate to see a sign of him somewhere around me.
“
Ponika
!”
I cried out his name
again as I stumbled further into the wasteland.

           
I shut my eyes tight and willed my heart quiet as I listened to the winds.
There was nothing at first, but ever so quietly I heard a sound nearby; a
huffing and whinnying from the side of the Facility. With a large grin I rushed
towards it, shielding my eyes as they adjusted to the harsh light. Rounding the
corner, I saw what appeared to be a makeshift stable and there was definitely a
horse there alright…but it wasn’t mine. There was a small, brown horse stabled
at the corral, one I had never seen before and one that was clearly a mare. I
stopped in my tracks and whirled around me, hoping to see
Ponika‘s
friendly face somewhere in the distance.

           
“
Ponika
!”
I called out
again. My stomach was in knots and I was afraid I was going to be sick. I was
greeted by the sound of the wind on the sand and the horse nearby snorting
defiantly. I huffed as I stumbled on the small dunes around me, climbing their
hills and scanning the horizon for my horse. This couldn’t be happening. “Where
are you…
”
I eked out the words so quietly I had barely
heard them myself. He…he couldn’t be gone. No; surely I would not have been so
stupid.