CHAPTER FOURTEEN
* * *
The next morning Mum is driving us through London streets that I now see with different eyes.
I see the menace. This close to the hospital, there are Lorders in black operations gear at every corner. They stand in twos and threes: more of them than the last time we came this way. With machine guns. I see the signs of conflict: boarded windows, damaged and abandoned buildings spaced between ones full of life. And most of all I see the real damage, the eyes of a beaten people. In the way they hold themselves, where they look, where they don’t. It is much worse in London than in the country.
‘All right?’ Mum asks, and I nod. ‘Your dad will be home when we get back; he called earlier.’ She says the words casually, almost too casual to be anything but contrived.
‘Is something wrong?’ I ask, the words out before I can censor them.
‘Why do you ask?’
‘You seem funny when you mention him, that’s all.’ And I remember how she changed the subject the last time his name came up.
She doesn’t answer, eyes straight ahead on traffic, until I think she isn’t going to.
She sighs. ‘Grown-up stuff. It’s complicated, Kyla,’ is all she says.
We continue in silence until the hospital rears up, a great ugly sore on the landscape amongst old buildings and twisty streets: a modern monstrosity. This hospital is a Lorder symbol of power: it is an obvious target, where Slating takes place.
I study the number and positions of towers on the perimeter. I promised Nico accurate maps, outside and in. I am going to deliver. Anyone could note this, and I’m sure they already have. The inside arrangements, likewise. Someone in the multitude of medical and other staff could be bought. Nico must want confirmation from eyes he has trained; eyes he trusts. Mine.
We continue to the main entrance, and get in the queue. Lorders at the gates are searching cars. Visitors must get out and go through a metal detector on foot, before getting back in their car and driving it below to park.
Unease twists my stomach. What if Nico is wrong, and the com on the underside of my Levo isn’t undetectable? Maybe I should have taken it off before I came. Can I even get it off? I haven’t tried.
We inch forwards. Finally, it is our turn; the Lorder on this side of the gate puts up his hand to stop us. He makes a deferential gesture to Mum, as daughter of the Lorder hero: hand touching heart, then held out. An apology on his face that this time we must comply like everyone else.
We get out of the car and my feet are like lead as I walk to the metal detector. An alarm goes off as I step through, and I almost panic, until I realise it is my Levo. A Lorder with a handheld scanner gets me to hold out my arms and runs it across my body. It beeps again at my Levo and he nods for me to go through.
That was it? Inside, I snort. How obvious is it that the one place to hide metal on a Slated is on or in their Levo? What if it was an explosive?
Though the com is well disguised. If I didn’t know it was there, I couldn’t even find it by touch. And I suppose it wouldn’t be possible to have something like this on most Slateds. If their Levo is working properly, putting it on would cause pain and levels to fall.
We get back in the car and spiral underneath the hospital to park. Nerves are twisting in my stomach: can I pass muster in Dr Lysander’s eyes? Every Saturday I see her; she digs and pokes around in my mind. Checks up on me, looks for cracks. Places where I am different to other Slateds.
I am so different now. How will I get through this?
She is smart, the brainiest person I’ve ever known. She sees what you try to hide.
Easy. Don’t hide anything. Tell her about your inner terrorist.
Yeah, right.
I must be Kyla, the girl she knows, and only her. Nobody else. I focus, concentrate, think of Kyla.
‘Kyla?’ Dr Lysander stands at the door to her office. ‘Come in.’
I sit on the chair opposite her desk, glad of the door closed behind me: there is a Lorder guard in the waiting area once again. They must be on alert for another attack.
When the last one happened – several weeks ago today – Dr Lysander was whisked away at the first sign of trouble. She vanished before the terrorists came on their killing spree. One pointed a gun at me before his mate told him not to waste a bullet on a Slated. Where did they take her, to get her hidden away so fast?
She taps at her screen a moment. Looks up. ‘You look very thoughtful. Perhaps we could begin today by you telling me what you are worrying about.’
The truth, but not too much of it; lie to Dr Lysander at your peril.
‘I was thinking about all the security we came through to get in today.’
‘Ah, I see. Does it worry you?’
It certainly did today. ‘Yes.’
‘Why is that, do you think?’
‘It makes me feel like they are going to haul me away and lock me up.’
‘Guilty conscience?’ Then she laughs; she thinks she is telling a joke. Slateds never do anything wrong. Almost never, that is: what about Ben? Anyhow, if being Slated means you can’t be a danger to self or others, then why are we all watched and monitored so carefully?
And I am different. More so now, but I always have been. Is this why she is my doctor? Dr Lysander is famous; the one who invented Slating in the first place. In all the times I’ve seen her, there has never been another patient in her waiting room. And without being able to define how I am different, she somehow knows something is wrong, and tries to find out how, and why. Yet even she has no grasp of the degree of difference, the implications. The ticking time bomb I was, and am.
A terrorist bomb, like the one that hit Robert’s bus.
My stomach twists.
‘What is it, Kyla? Tell me what is upsetting you,’ she says.
‘The terrorist attack here,’ I answer.
She tilts her head to one side, considering my words. ‘Still thinking of that day, are you? Don’t be frightened. You are quite safe here now, I promise you. Security has gone to new measures.’ The way she says it: she thinks they’re going too far, being too careful. She’s wrong.
Find out.
‘Do you mean the new security gates we had to walk through to get in?’
She nods. ‘That, and some other things. Technological things. The whole hospital is protected.’
How?
But I can’t ask. Excessive curiosity is not a Slated trait.
Then, I see. Her telephone and intercom on the desk have changed: they are not cordless any more, but hard-wired. Her computer, too: a snake of wires reach out from it, and run along the room to the corner and out through the wall. But isn’t that old technology?
She taps at her screen. Looks up.
‘I’ve got conflicting reports from your school.’
‘Oh?’
‘Apparently you’ve been both distant and miserable, and a happy bundle of energy, sometimes all on the same day.’ She half smiles. ‘Care to explain that?’
‘I’m not always the same person.’ The truest thing I’ve said so far today.
‘Being a teenager can be hard work sometimes. Still, I’d like to schedule some scans, see how things are. Perhaps next time.’
They might see the memory pathways have changed. Scans must be avoided!
But how?
Dr Lysander closes her computer, folds her hands and faces me. ‘Now, Kyla. Have you thought any more of what we were speaking about the last few visits?’
‘What do you mean?’ I ask, stalling.
An eyebrow goes up. ‘We were talking about difference. Deviation. What is happening with you inside that is outside of the usual. You said you would think about it, and speak to me.’
Give her something.
I swallow. ‘Sometimes…I think I remember things. That I shouldn’t.’
She considers. ‘That is not unusual with Slateds. It is human to abhor the void, the absence of accessible memory. To make things up to fill it. Yet…’
She pauses, thinking. ‘Tell me what you remember.’
Without meaning to, without thinking or choosing something either real or made up, I go straight for the one I want to hug to myself and not share. Dr Lysander has that effect.
‘Playing chess with my dad. My real dad. It was long ago, my hands were small. I was much younger.’
‘Tell me about it,’ she says, and I do. Everything. The feel of the rook in my hand. The sense of warmth and security when I woke.
‘Just a dream, most likely,’ she says.
‘Maybe. But it was so detailed. It felt real.’
‘Dreams can be like that sometimes. Anyhow, I’m glad you’ve left nightmares behind.’ She smiles, looks at the clock. ‘Nearly time,’ she says. ‘Is there anything else you would like to talk about?’
Keep her curious.
I hesitate. Then shake my head.
‘There is something: tell me.’
‘It’s just that before I had the dream, I was playing chess. And I kept picking the rook up in my hand, feeling it.’
She sits forward. ‘You felt drawn to touch and hold it?’ I nod. ‘That is interesting. Perhaps a physical memory lingers? Triggering the dream, which may be a subconscious fabrication, but still: very interesting.’
‘I don’t understand. If a memory is gone, it is gone. Isn’t it?’ And I know I should leave this alone, shouldn’t make her focus more closely on it, but can’t help myself. I want to know.
‘That is the popular understanding of what happens with Slating. It isn’t quite accurate.’ She sits back. ‘It is more like this, Kyla. Your conscious access is what is destroyed. The memories are still there, you just can’t find them.’
They are still there? Trapped like Rain was, behind a wall. Does that mean Lucy is somewhere inside me still, screaming to get out? I shudder. ‘Is that why things come out in dreams? My conscious mind can’t get at them, but when I’m asleep…’ I stop, not liking where this is going; not liking what she will think of it. Slateds don’t have memories, awake or asleep. Do they?
‘Rarely, this can happen. It is far more likely that your dreams are made up in that overactive imagination of yours.’ She taps her fingers on the desk a moment. ‘We’ll leave doing scans. For now. Away you go.’
It isn’t until I’m back in the car with Mum, driving away from the hospital, that I trust myself to think. What happened? One minute Dr Lysander wants scans, then she doesn’t.
If I’m accessing old memories, and the pathways show up on scans, she’d have no choice but to tell the board. I’d be terminated.
But if Dr Lysander realises something has gone wrong with my Slating, surely that is what she is supposed to do? I think about our conversation, what was said, and not said; her facial expressions. All I can come up with is that she is curious.
She can’t study me if I am dead. She wants to know what makes me tick.
Tick like a bomb.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
* * *
Dad’s car is out front when we get home. He and Amy are arm in arm on the sofa with cups of tea when we walk in.
‘There’s my other two girls!’ he says, smiles, and holds out a hand. I walk across. ‘Give your dad a kiss on the cheek,’ he says, and with no obvious escape, I do.
He’s in a good mood today.
‘Sit down, Kyla. I’ll make us some drinks,’ Mum says, and disappears into the kitchen. No kiss on the cheek from her.
Third degree follows.
‘So, how is school?’
‘Fine.’
‘Who is this new boy I’ve been hearing about?’ he says, and winks.
I glance at Amy. Thanks a lot, I say with my eyes. But she just smiles, oblivious to the look I give her.
Amy doesn’t seem to get that some things should be said, others not. It used to be when I first got here that I was the one with that problem, when it came to her and Jazz, before they were officially allowed to see each other. But the more I understand the less I realise Amy does.
‘What new boy?’ I say.
Amy smirks. ‘Cameron, of course.’
‘He’s just a friend, no big deal. His uncle makes fantastic cakes.’
‘How about you bake us a cake now and then?’ Dad says, calling out to the kitchen. Mum doesn’t answer, but teacups clatter loud on the worktop.
‘Where’ve you been?’ I ask, before he has a chance to ask me anything else.
‘Oh, here and there. Work, you know.’ He smiles again and I can see he is very pleased, and anything that has him that pleased makes me nervous.
As Mum brings in our tea there is a knock at the door. She turns to answer it, but Dad jumps up. ‘I’ll go,’ he says.
She plonks down in an armchair, hands clenched around her cup. She is SO not happy.
Sebastian is asleep on the back of the sofa. I pick him up and put him on her lap. He protests sleepily then flops down, and her eyes meet mine. A half-smile. Cat therapy.
‘Well, look who is here.’ Dad comes back in, and following him is Cam. I groan internally. He is a master of brilliant timing.
He has a bicycle helmet dangling from his hand. ‘It’s a gorgeous day; come for a bike ride? You can use my aunt’s if you haven’t got one.’
An escape?
Best to look neutral.
‘Perhaps I should stay. Dad just got back.’
‘No, no; you go on,’ Dad says. ‘Have fun.’ He smiles, and everything about him is friendly, open, caring. Is this the same Dad who threatened to return me to the Lorders when Ben disappeared?
‘You can use my bike out of the shed,’ Mum says. ‘Don’t forget to wear a helmet.’
Dad follows us to the door. ‘Can you get Kyla’s bike out?’ he says to Cam, and points out the shed to the side of the house. ‘She’ll just be a moment.’
Cam heads out the door, and Dad and I are alone in the hall. Now comes the warning?
He smiles. ‘Kyla, I think we’ve got off on the wrong foot. If I’ve seemed harsh before, it was just because I was worried about you getting into trouble. You know I’m here for you, to help you if you ever need it. Don’t you?’
‘Sure,’ I say, surprised. This is more Dad like he was at the beginning, when I first got here. Maybe he regrets over-reacting?
‘Go on. Have a good afternoon,’ he says, and holds the door open.
‘I’m not sure I know how to ride a bicycle,’ I say to Cam, but as I grip the handlebars and push it across the garden to the road, I feel that I do.
Cam puts his bike down on the grass, and holds mine upright. He has me get on and pedal slow on the pavement while he runs alongside, one hand on the handlebars. I laugh and pedal harder until he falls behind. I drop off the kerb and onto the road.
Faster!
But I hold the speed in check until he catches up on his bike.
‘You learn in a hurry!’
I laugh. ‘Let’s see how fast we can go.’ And take off.
The day is crisp, clear. A cold rush of November air hits my face and body, but I’m pedalling hard enough to be warm. Freedom!
I hold back, just a little, so Cam can keep up. Eventually as we crest a hill he yells out to take a break. I coast onto a footpath on the side of the road, and stop.
He’s breathing hard when he catches up. ‘Not only are you fit, Kyla. You are also FIT!’ he gasps out.
I laugh. We lay our bikes down on the grass, and sit on a crumbling stone wall. From this high point we can see the Chiltern countryside folding out in all directions:
an area of outstanding natural beauty, or so they say.
Lucy went missing from the Lake District: there would have been mountains where she lived, not just hills. Once, not paying much attention to what I was doing, I drew a picture of her with mountains behind. But if I try to think of them deliberately, there is nothing. Is this another memory trapped inside me?
‘Everything all right?’ Cam asks, looking at me curiously, and I wonder how long I’ve been staring off into space.
‘Sorry. Yes, I’m fine.’
I look back at him, and realise a few things. He is staring into my eyes; he is sitting very close. And I like it. And then, all at once, I don’t.
I shift, move away a little. Look back over the hills.
‘Listen, Kyla. I think we need to have a talk.’
‘What about?’
‘About Ben.’
His name tears a hole inside. ‘What do you know?’
‘That he disappeared. And I heard a few rumours, that you were involved somehow. What happened? You can tell me. No one can hear us here.’
I close my eyes tight. There is a part of me that longs to talk about it, tell him everything. He’ll understand. His dad got taken by Lorders, didn’t he?
There is another part – Rain’s – that says no. Don’t trust. Never trust.
I shake my head, and look back at Cam. His eyes are disappointed. ‘Well, if you ever want to talk, I’m here. And I understand something else.’
‘What’s that?’
‘We’re friends, that’s all. Don’t worry on that score. It’s obvious you are still hurting over this other guy. I’m not trying anything on. All right?’
I look at him again, and all I see is friendly concern.
Yeah, right.
But I’ll take him at face value. For now. ‘Friends, then?’ I say, smile, and hold out my hand.
Late that night, the house is quiet. Dad is gone. He stayed for dinner, then after Amy and I went up for the night, he and Mum argued in the kitchen. Voices kept down but you couldn’t mistake the tone. After that the phone rang, and he left.