Disrupted (15 page)

“I’m sorry you got pulled into all of this, Willow. I wish...” His voice was low and gruff. “I wish I could send you home with Clarrie.”

It sounded as if he’d had to drag the words, tortured and ragged, from a pit of the Unspoken Damned. I didn’t care to analyse why he found it so hard to say such a little, normal wish.

“I wouldn’t leave,” I said softly. Resisting the urge to smooth down his upturned collar. Maybe slide my hands down, until they were flat against his chest. All those little things I’d never get to do.

“Neither will Clarrie.” Chris sighed. “Even after I told her almost everything.”

“Almost?”

“I left out the part about Jack and me being dead.” His eyes narrowed on me. “She understands the danger, but insists on staying. Does that make any kind of sense?”

My brows went up and I shook my head in an outright lie. Of course it made sense. Clarrie wouldn’t leave him any more than I would.

Even if it meant keeping company with death and other things that go bump in broad daylight.

Chapter 16

“I
suppose we should...” Chris gestured toward the front of the building.

“Yeah.” But I didn’t move. Not yet. I figured 2106 owed me a couple of minutes to reclaim a little of my heart before I had to deal with Gale, and Clarrie, and Dr. Stanton. Which reminded me.

I turned slightly, my shoulder pressed to the wall as I faced Chris. “Dr. Stanton’s not in. I guess we’ll have to stay the night. Do you think she can get us back to Drustan?” I slapped a hand to my mouth. Why hadn’t I thought of this before? “What if she’s helping Callum Jade?”

“Of course she is, Willow.”

“Not necessarily,” I hedged too late.

Sometimes I really should just shut up. And sometimes Chris has to be wrong, doesn’t he? Because Dr. Stanton was, forgive the bad Western cliché, the last stand between us and the Razok at Drustan’s door.

“What I mean is,” I said, “you and Gale seem to be regular visitors to Remnant City, same as Callum Jade. It’s possible that Dr. Stanton’s on your side and not his. Gale obviously thinks so, else she wouldn’t have brought us here.”

“Does she even know Callum Jade’s behind this?” Chris rubbed his brow, speaking slowly through his thoughts. “Drustan sent Gale out the room before he said anything... She definitely doesn’t know about the genetic stamping.” His hand fell from his forehead as he looked at me. “She wouldn’t know that Callum Jade had to have a genetic expert working with him.”

Did he have to search so hard for problems? “I thought you didn’t believe Drustan’s genetic stamping theory.”

“I don’t believe we should risk Jack’s life on the basis of some vague coincidence and a hunch.”

But that wasn’t the whole story. I knew Chris a little too well by now. “And what if Drustan’s proved right? What if Callum Jade did use Jack’s original treatment to camouflage the genetic stamping?” My voice rose in anger, because I already knew his answer. “What then, Chris?”

“Depends,” said Chris thoughtfully.

I blinked. Surprise levelled my anger. “Depends on what?”

Chris turned his eyes back on the sea. “On what we find in Dr. Stanton’s office. She must have researched Jack’s case before deciding he’d fit their schemes. She must know what was wrong with him.”

Great. Now we had to break into the institute.

Although, I wondered if getting busted was such a bad idea. Spending the night in a damp cell had its advantages. Like thick metal bars and some heavily armed policemen between us and the Razoks.

“Come on.” Chris pushed away from the wall, grabbing my arm as he went. “If it’s nothing life-threatening, then Drustan can do what the bleeding hell he wants with Jack and Mrs Townsend.”

Uh oh. I tugged back. Somehow that left me with my back to the wall again and Chris standing in front of me.

“And what if Jack’s life is at risk without that operation?” I asked warily. “What then?”

“What do you suggest, Willow? That I sacrifice Jack’s life for mine?”

That’s exactly what I wanted to suggest. Exactly what I knew Chris would never do. I briefly rated my chances of convincing him otherwise.

Chris was determined to keep Jack alive. I was determined to keep Chris alive. Our goals were like north and south, and in the ancient words of some brainy scientist somewhere, ‘ne’er the two shall meet.’

I opened my mouth to say something utterly brilliant to persuade Chris to change polarity. The horror of what I was about to attempt filled my throat instead.

I didn’t want Jack to die. I didn’t want Chris to die. I didn’t want to have to choose.

I didn’t have to choose. A wave of relief swept through me. “Drustan said time was up and he had to act. There’s nothing we can do now, Chris. It’s too late. And whatever he’s done is not your fault. This is Drustan’s decision.”

“He hasn’t done anything yet,” said Chris. “I spoke to Drustan before he left the apartment. He promised to wait and see if something more conclusive shows up in TIC.”

“Why would you do that?” I gasped. My wave of relief hardened to frustration. “Why couldn’t you just trust Drustan? He’s the adult here, Chris. We’re just kids. He knows what he’s doing. We don’t. Why do you always have to be such a damn hero?”

Chris frowned. “I’m not a hero.”

“Then stop acting like one,” I snapped.

“I just want proof, Willow. I’d think you’d want some as well before Drustan judges and executes your boyfriend.”

Ooh. That made me madder than mad. I had all the proof I needed. I’d seen Jack coming at us with that blade. I didn’t want it to be so. It just was.

I shrank against the wall, afraid I might lash out at Chris physically. And he might very well lash back at me. I hadn’t noticed his own anger rearing up, leashed in the taut contours of his face. He was holding back, just barely... He
was
holding back, I recalled.

“You already have proof,” I said. “Jack did suddenly turn on you for no reason, didn’t he? I saw the way you reacted when Drustan asked. Jack goes from best friend to worst enemy and at last you have an explanation.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” The splash of colour to his cheeks said otherwise.

I jabbed a finger at his chest. “You should have told Drustan and this would all have been over by now. How long are you going to protect Jack? Until you’re dead for real?”

Chris threw his hands up. His face fell into a slump just before he turned around. “The only reaction you saw was self-disgust and shame. You’re wrong, Willow.” I sensed the bristling tension rolling off his stiff shoulders. “I’ve always known the reason.”

“You’re covering again. Protecting Jack.”

He spun around again, so fast and furiously, I jumped.

“Why do you think I stood up to Jack yesterday? Why do you think I taunted his baboons to join in the slaughter? I wanted the crap knocked out of me because I deserved it.” The cold tremor in his voice unnerved me. “I didn’t keep quiet to protect Jack. I kept quiet to cover my own selfish arrogance.”

“What is it you think you did?” I asked sceptically.

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Try me. Make me understand how you deserve to be sliced open by—”

“Shut up, Willow.”

“No, I won’t shut up. I want to know exactly how selfish and arrogant you think you are.”

Chris balled one hand into the other. “I took the chess championship from Jack, okay?”

“You did w-what?” I spluttered. In no time dimension did ‘Jack’ and ‘Chess’ belong in one sentence.

“I said you wouldn’t understand.” He started to turn away.

I grabbed his arm. “So Jack’s ego took a bruising.”

Chris removed my hand, then continued scrubbing his arm, as if my touch was a clinging virus that wouldn’t come clean. “It was more than that. I had everything. The grades. The ribbons. The certificates. The praise. The bleeding math and science club. Jack had just this one thing, but I had to have that too. I never even liked chess. I ruined way more than our friendship.”

I let the clinging virus thing go. Chris was clearly demented. “Jack doesn’t care about all that stuff. God, he barely drags himself to class three days a week.”

“Exactly.” Chris’s eyes flared pure silver. “But it didn’t used to be like that.”

“Way to go on conceit and arrogance, Chris. You were right and I was wrong. I’m just surprised your inflated self-importance took this long to boast how you single-handedly changed Jack’s entire character and life.”

“I know what it sounds like, but you don’t know Jack nearly as well as you might think. Whatever Callum Jade did to Jack was not the beginning.”

I shook my head. Seriously, Chris’s mind should come with a Whiplash Warning. “So, now you do think Jack was stamped?”

“I don’t care if he was stamped,” muttered Chris. “I destroyed our friendship and I made Jack give up on himself. We’d been friends since the age of three, Willow. Genetic stamping wouldn’t have turned Jack if I hadn’t made him hate me first.”

I didn’t know if that was medical fact or deluded fiction. It didn’t matter. What was or could have been didn’t change the here and now. “But you do accept that Jack is psycho Callum Jade in disguise and needs to be stopped?”

“You’re supposed to be his girlfriend. Spare a little sympathy, would you?”

Sarcastic much?

“And you’re supposed to be alive. Oh, yeah, and then Jack stabbed you and now you’re not,” I said back, every bit as sarcastic.

A rush of air blurred my vision, and then Chris was towering over me. I cringed as his hand slammed into the wall above my head.

“If Jack was stamped, it was done to get at me. If he succumbed to Callum Jade’s psyche, it’s because Jack already hated me. That makes me responsible for turning Jack into a murderer. These are my choices.” He gave a small, anguished laugh that shredded my cynical anger to bits. “Kill Jack, or damn his soul.”

“Chris, don’t,” I whispered. I tilted my head to the side and back, to look up into his eyes. To find he was looking down into mine. “Those are other people’s choices. Not yours.”

He said nothing. Just looked at me.

And I understood the helpless guilt. Even in Chris’s case, where it was totally misplaced. A single chess game, or tournament, did not make or break a person. Chris wasn’t responsible for Jack being a poor loser. But that didn’t stop the blame and guilt. I understood.

Chris lowered his head, locking his gaze in closer. Reading my mind. “Now you see.”

I don’t know how long we stood there, searching each other’s eyes for answers that didn’t exist.

And I don’t know who moved first, or at all. But suddenly, our lips were touching. The kiss was light, tender, barely a kiss at all.

My eyes fluttered closed as the warm sensation flushed through me, from our joined lips to my toes. His mouth covered mine, again and again, soft and firm. Small kisses that thrummed my lower lip. Slow kisses that pressed his lips to mine in a perfect fit.

And then his lips parted beneath mine and he was kissing me properly. My hands came up, around his neck, my fingers curling into his hair as small bursts of heat exploded in the oddest of places. The tender skin of my inner wrists. The base of my throat. Rolling down my spine.

We came up for air.

I opened my eyes on a dreamy smile.

Chris sprang out of my embrace and cursed.

Yes, cursed. A low, growling curse. “I promised myself I’d never do that.”

My smile faded. “Clarrie,” I mumbled miserably. I’d totally forgotten about her, just for those few precious minutes.

Chris gave me a puzzled look. “Jack.”

No, not Clarrie.

I was smiling at Chris again. “Oh, you don’t understand. Jack and I aren’t together anymore. We broke up.”

But Chris wasn’t smiling with me. His eyes had gone all dark and stormy. He folded his arms solidly over his chest. “As if that matters.”

Okay, so not Jack either.

Which left me.

Just me.

Something in my pulse ticked cold. My heart, I realised, thudding icicles through my veins. “If you don’t like me—”

“Like you?” From the look on his face, you’d think I’d spoken Greek. Which he was probably fluent in. No, you’d think I’d spoken Flirting.

Shaking his head, Chris unfolded his arms, shoved his hands into his pockets. And he walked away.

“—you shouldn’t have kissed me,” I finally finished to myself.

But he had. He had kissed me. And that just made me mad.

I stood there, fuming at his departing back.

Boys!

Why did we put up with them?

I mean, if you wanted torture, there had to be a hundred other options that were far less crappy. Like boiling your toes. Or jumping head first into a bush of poison ivy.

Chapter 17

W
e were inside the Institute, no breaking or forced entering required. Gale knew all the door codes. The maze of white painted corridors was so narrow, we had to walk in single file. Gale was up front, punching in codes and flicking on lights as she went. I brought up the rear, behind Chris and Clarrie.

There was a series of alarms at each door we passed through, but none of them had been set.

“Odd,” said Gale. “Dr. Stanton must still be here. She never leaves without activating the alarms.”

Gale’s familiarity left me in no doubt that she and the future Christian Wood were not only regular visitors to Remnant City, but to the Institute itself. I knew that Chris had drawn the same conclusion. He was walking right in front of me, and I felt the disturbed tension coming off him in waves.

He glanced over his shoulder every so often, but each time I looked away before our eyes could meet.

As Gale swung open the next door, she called out, “Dr. Stanton! Dr. Stanton...”

I filed in after Clarrie and Chris, and we all came to an abrupt halt. Except for Gale, who was up in the air, flitting without direction, her tubing so yellow it glowed fluorescent.

The room had been trashed.

The only thing left intact was an impressive Persian rug covering most of the floor. Scattered from one end to the other were thick hard-covered volumes and glossy medical journals, lying as they’d fallen from tumbled bookshelves amongst splintered wood and broken glass. A solid desk had been overthrown with enough force to shudder a crack along the wood grain.

Chris picked his way over the rubble and bent low, flipping a book here and there, reading the titles.

“What do you think happened?” asked Clarrie.

“Razoks,” I said dully. “Murderers. Freak experiments gone wild for revenge. Or maybe just gone wild.”

Clarrie’s face drained of all colour.

I hadn’t meant to frighten her. Had forgotten that my personal list of monstrosities were not a mundane, every other second event in everybody’s life. I thought about reassuring her with some reasonable sounding lies.

But then I thought not.

If Clarrie was determined to stay with Chris up until the last hour, she should know just how much she was risking. I didn’t understand her decision, doubt I’d have done the same. I mean, it was just begging for a broken heart, wasn’t it? She knew Chris would have to leave, and she knew she couldn’t follow. Every hour she stayed was another hour she’d have to forget.

“Unlocking the Secret Gene,” snorted Chris, tossing aside a journal he’d been flipping through. He picked up another, and another, muttering to himself. “This is disgusting. Look at this stuff.”

I was still ignoring Chris, so I didn’t look or answer. I ambled over to the wall at my left, where some shattered picture frames had fallen off their hooks. I picked up the remains of a framed photo, carefully scraping away the broken glass.

Clarrie made a strange noise.

I glanced up to see she’d moved to Chris’s side.

Chris caught my eye and held up the glossy magazine they were looking at.

The cover model was a young girl with long black hair. Slapped across the photo in bold writing was, ‘What Went Wrong?’

I’ll tell you what went wrong.

Her ears were fractured layers of bulbous skin sprouting like exploding cabbages from the silky confines of her hair. And her nose, it had grown so long and weary, it sagged down to her lips.

Chris read a smaller caption out loud, “Dr. Stanton defends the right to mutify.”

“You shouldn’t be seeing that, Christian Wood.” Gale came out of her anxiety flit at last to land at Chris’s side. She plucked the magazine from his grip and laid it down carefully on the floor. “We need to find Dr. Stanton.”

Chris paused his rubble hunt to give her stony look.

What was he searching for?

I’d ask, only I wasn’t talking to him.

“What are we doing here?” he asked Gale. “Why did you bring us here? What made you think that this—” he scooped up the magazine again and thrust it at Gale “—Dr. Stanton could or would help me?”

Gale took the magazine and dropped it discretely behind her. “Dr. Stanton has access to TIC.”

Well, that shut Chris up.

He stared at Gale, his eyes glinting steel at the fight going on inside. But if Dr. Stanton really had access to TIC and was willing to share, he’d already lost. We were accepting help from the horrific doctor and Chris would just have to eat his disgust.

“I need to find Dr. Stanton,” said Gale. “Stay here, Christian Wood, and don’t look at anything. Drustan is not going to be happy about this. Not at all...” Her voice faded as she flew through the door we’d left open.

“While you and I can do exactly what we like,” I told Clarrie, “because only Christian Wood matters.”

Clarrie gave me a vague smile. I gave her another hour in Gale’s company and she’d come to appreciate my subtle wit.

My gaze lingered on them as Clarrie went back to peering over Chris’s shoulder. He hunched down to scratch through the drawers of a cabinet lying on its side. She chattered away, but Chris said nothing. He moved on to a sheath of papers that had spilled out of a file, then on to the overturned desk. The expression on his face was intense, his mouth set in a thin line. I don’t think he was ignoring Clarrie on purpose, but after a while she got bored and drifted toward the door.

“I’m going to help Gale look for Dr. Stanton,” Clarrie said on the way out. She paused to glance at Chris, but he didn’t even look up.

He’s looking for Dr. Stanton’s medical files, I realised. I wondered if the intruders had found them first. And why they wanted Jack’s medical records. Or maybe they didn’t. Maybe the robbery wasn’t linked to us at all. Maybe it had just been the doctor’s freaks and the timing was one fat coincidence.

I opened my mouth to ask what Chris thought, but I was so not talking to him. I snapped my mouth shut and lowered my gaze. To the photo I’d forgotten I was holding.

The wide-angled shot showed a double row of men and women, some in dark suits and others wearing white coats. There was an attractive blonde amongst the stern faces, the only female. Could she be our doctor?

I dropped to my knees, crawling carefully through the broken pieces of glass as I picked up and examined other framed photos that had fallen. They were all of the professional sort, rows of people, some sitting, some standing, some with a positional list of names beneath.

My heart gave a little jolt when I found the name of a Dr. Lily Stanton. I worked out her position and saw she was the attractive blonde I’d noticed earlier. I squinted at her clear blue eyes and formal smile, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t make her look particularly evil. I stacked that photo against the wall, knowing I should show Chris.

I glanced up. He was pacing the far side of the room, head down, hands in his pocket, randomly kicking aside debris as he went. No longer searching, just kicking. He wasn’t going to find medical records or any conclusive proof just lying around. I suspect he’d known that all along.

Something inside me yearned to say something comforting, but I quickly cut it off. He’d probably just yell at me to shut up anyway. Besides, I was still furious with him. I could deal with him not liking me. I did not have to deal with him kissing me and not liking me. Maybe I’d never have to speak to him again.

I crawled further along, reaching for the next photo. My breath caught. “Drustan.”

“Where?” asked Chris sharply.

I brought the photo up, looked closer.

What was Drustan doing in a photo with Dr. Lily Stanton? It was just the two of them, posing in front of the Institute. I recognised the small high windows, the flat white building, the beach in the background.

I thought Drustan had never been here. Never been to Remnant City.

There was an inscription beneath. “Oh, crap.”

Chris plucked the photo from my fingers and stared hard.

I jumped to my feet. “Chris, don’t...”

He gave me a silver bullet kind of look. “What? Are you going to pretend it’s not me in the photo, best mates with our resident psycho doctor? You read the inscription, Willow. Mr. Christian Wood and Dr. Lily Stanton.”

“Stop it,” I said. I brought my palms up either side my head, pushing in on the pressure threatening to erupt.

Drustan as he was now. Chris as the photo depicted he’d look in years to come. They could have been the same person. The same silvery grey eyes. The same white-blonde hair. And when Chris grimaced, even now, before he grew into the image of Drustan at age thirty something, the same strong jaw line.

Chris’s eyes were still blazing into mine.

I couldn’t look away.

I couldn’t dispel the single explanation that came to mind. “You are Drustan. In the future. You’re the same person.”

Chris’s face crumpled in shock. “I leaped back to save myself?”

He looked down at the photo again.

“No.” He shoved it at me. “The date, here at the bottom. 2033. The math doesn’t add up. I would be about the right age, but Drustan wouldn’t even have been born.”

“He could be your twin.”

“Or—or my—my grandson. God no, it would have to my great grandson at the least.”

“Chris.” A weird sensation of warmth filled me. “Drustan is...? You actually got to meet your great grandson. How awesome is that?”

I wanted to get another look, but Chris didn’t share my enthusiasm.

He snatched the photo back, folded it in four, and shoved it in his pocket. His movements were stiff, calculated with restraint. “And now we know what makes my life so bleeding important to Drustan.”

“Why shouldn’t it be,” I said testily to his rigid expression. “It makes perfect sense that Drustan should be chosen to preserve your future and destiny.”

“There is no heroic destiny, Willow,” he said in that tone reserved just for me. “Look around you. God, even Drustan is disgusted with this place.”

“And I’m not?” I interpreted coldly. A fight had been brewing inside me for the last half hour. That tone and implied contempt was just the reason I could out it. “What is your problem?”

“My problem is this.” He flung his arms out wide, to take in the room, the institute, Remnant City, the whole world. “Continents blasted out of the earth. Razoks. Murder conspiracies. Mutant experiments. And I’m the bloody missing link. Open your brain, Willow. If Drustan didn’t need to save my life in order to exist himself, he probably wouldn’t bother.”

“That’s not what I mean,” I said. And yes, all of that was way more important. I get it. But right now I’d just taken one bruising too many to care about greater good or evil. “What is your problem with me?”

Chris squinted at me. “I don’t have a problem with you.”

“Oh, please,” I ground out. “You’re constantly mad at me. You’ve never been able to stand me. I had to chase you down just to get you to talk to me about a damn school project. What is it, Chris? What have I ever done to you? Do I have some disgusting body odour only you can smell?”

“It’s nothing like that,” said Chris.

“Then why, in the three months I’ve been in Biggs Hill, why have you never spoken to me?”

“You never spoke to me, either.”

“Fair enough. But I wasn’t specifically avoiding you. I didn’t turn and run when you approached.”

Chris shrugged. “I didn’t want trouble. You saw how Jack freaked out. He doesn’t share, especially with me.”

“He doesn’t share?” I tossed my head in disbelief. Chris hadn’t just said something so archaic. But of course he had, and he wasn’t making any attempt to cover or deny his meaning. “I’m not a bag of Revels or a Snickers bar. I’m not a possession and I make my own decisions.”

Chris’s eyes hardened. “And you decided you wanted Jack on your first day in Biggs Hill. I won’t defend Jack or myself, that’s just the way it is. It’s how we’ve managed to stay out of each other’s lives for two years. And that worked quite well, until, you know.”

Until me.

“Okay, fine. So you avoided me to avoid Jack. But that doesn’t explain why you’re always sniping at me. What have I ever done to you?”

“You jumped me in the woods.”

“You were avoiding me.” And we were going around in circles. “Chris, I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry I chased after you. If I’d known...” If I could take it back. I swallowed down the lump of guilt and regret that had taken up permanent residence in my throat. “I didn’t know Jack would kill you because of it.”

Black anger swamped Chris’s face.

“This,” he said heatedly, “is exactly what my problem with you is. You wanted Jack so bad, you couldn’t wait a friggin’ day before you hooked up with him. But you’ve never paused once to maybe give him the benefit of the doubt. God forbid you might actually try to defend him. God forbid you just once shut up about him killing me, about how he must be stopped, about how we should sacrifice Jack at the first opportunity.”