“You’re a Vitro, Sophie. Skin Island’s own special, very first Vitro.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
SOPHIE
She shook her head and shut her eyes, denying it with every fiber of her mind.
“Oh, come on,” said Nicholas above her. “You seriously never saw it? Never suspected? Never wondered?”
How could she? She hadn’t known the Vitros existed until yesterday.
“You’re pathetic, Sophie. Now get up.”
She heard him, but only distantly. Her brain moved as if she’d left the emergency brake on: haltingly, agonizingly. I’m a Vitro.
“Get up.” He hauled her up by her collar and kept a firm grip on her neck to keep her from sinking down again. She slipped on the glossy photographs of her past. “Get control of yourself, will you? There’s still so much to do!”
“You can’t make me!” she spat.
“Oh?” He seemed amused by her vehemence.
“I’ll fight you with every ounce of strength I have, you bastard.”
“Not after you’ve imprinted on me,” he whispered in her ear. “Now let’s move.”
Nicholas led her through the resort and smuggled her up the hill to the Vitro building, where he took her through a side door using a key he carried in his pocket, on a ring stuffed with them.
“You steal all of those?” she asked hollowly.
He rolled his eyes and pushed the door open.
The hallway was deserted, but she heard loud voices from the atrium—her mother, Strauss, Andreyev, among others. They were arguing intensely, from the sound of it. Nicholas led her in the opposite direction, to a small door that led to a downward staircase, and into a long hallway. They passed rooms with padded walls, and Sophie recognized the one in which she’d been kept after she’d blurted out her identity to Strauss. For a moment, she thought Nicholas was going to lock her back inside, and she panicked and jerked away, nearly tripping when the cord went taut and caught her ankles.
“Relax,” he said. “I’m not going to lock you up.”
“What do you think you’re going to do?” she said. “Make me imprint on you, really? That’s impossible. It’s not like I’m a baby you can start hardwiring, like the rest of them.”
“You’d be surprised at what I can do.” He pulled her further along, past the padded cells. Her borrowed sneakers squeaked on the tile.
She felt raw inside, worked over like a lump of used chewing gum. He knew everything about her, all her darkest memories. Had her mother been whispering the secrets of Sophie’s life into his ear? Was she just a source of gossip for the people on Skin Island to laugh over? The control, it’s all about the control. His laughter echoed in her ear, and she looked up abruptly, but his face was solemn and the laughter was only in her head. Skin Island’s own special, very first Vitro.
She couldn’t process. Couldn’t breathe. A lifetime of lies. A mother who was not her mother. A father who was not her father. A sister she never knew existed. Lux is all I have—my only true family. And I don’t really have her at all. Her sister was an echo of another person, without a will or identity of her own. She felt as if she’d toppled off a high wall and was falling still, wind rushing in her ears, her stomach in her throat and her heart in her mouth.
She felt hollow with the loss of Jim and the baring of her soul to the person she now hated most in the world, more than her stepmother, more than Strauss. She didn’t know how many more blows she could take before she would deserve one of those padded rooms. She felt as if the layers of her life were being stripped away one by one; she was being whittled down, smaller and smaller, until she was nothing but a tiny speck on the face of the planet, a pebble, a scrap, a nothing.
Nicholas opened a door, and the room behind it glowed with faint blue light. It was completely empty.
No, wait . . . There was something odd about the walls. They were lined from floor to ceiling with panels made of filmy glass, and the blue light was shining from behind the panels. Trailing the cord between them, Sophie walked to one wall and pressed her hands to the panel; it was warm. She squinted at the glass, at the shadowy figure behind it.
Horrified, she pulled away, looking at Nicholas in sudden comprehension.
“The rest of the Vitros,” she whispered. “The ones that haven’t been woken yet.”
He nodded, a slight, intent smile on his lips.
She turned back to the panels, her eyes moving from one to another; she had to stare at the glass for a moment before she could make out the sleeping Vitro behind it. There were at least two dozen of them.
In vitro, she thought. In glass. They’re literally raised in glass boxes. She shivered, correcting herself. We, she thought. We are raised in glass boxes.
The place made her feel dirty, creepy, as if she were watching a stranger shower. These sleeping people were intensely vulnerable, and she felt as if she’d broken into a private sanctuary.
Nicholas, however, seemed to feel no such compunction. He walked around the room, pressing buttons beside the panels. One by one, they hissed and slid open with a rush of white gas.
“What are you doing?”
“Sh.” Nicholas pressed a finger to his lips as he popped open a smaller panel in the wall that revealed a handheld instrument inside. “I’m creating a diversion. And also getting a little revenge. And also just creating general chaos. I’m very good at it, you know.”
“Very good at which one?”
He paused, then grinned. “All three.” He pulled out what looked like half a hair straightener; it was a thick baton with a plastic grip on one end and a thin metal plate screwed to the other.
“What’s that?” asked Sophie.
“This is a . . . well, we don’t really have a fancy name for it. We just call it the wand. It activates the Vitros’ chips. Wakes them up.”
He walked back to the first glass panel, which was so low on the wall he had to get on his knees to look inside. The boy lying within—Sophie could see that they were all the same age, around sixteen—was pale, thin, and groggy. Nicholas pressed a button on the wand and held it over the boy’s head. After a moment, it beeped three times, and the boy’s eyes opened.
“Stop!” Sophie cried. “You can’t do this! They’re helpless—leave them alone!”
He looked up at her. “You want to do it instead?”
“You’re evil.”
“Oh, seriously,” he sighed, standing to wake the next Vitro. “You shouldn’t see the world in such black-and-white terms. It’s very naive of you.”
“I won’t let you!” she yelled, and she charged at him, intending to beat him over the head if she could.
But he still held the other end of the cord, and he pulled it quickly, bringing her crashing down. Her head hit the floor and stars exploded in her eyes; foggily she grappled with the knots around her ankles, but they were too tight, too complicated. Her skull aching, she tried to crawl toward Nicholas to pull his feet out from under him, but he just sneered and dragged her to the door, where he tied the cord to the handle, taking up all the slack in the line so her hands were forced up over her head. Her fingers tingled from the tight knots that hindered her circulation, and her shoulder screamed; if she’d been hit directly she was sure she’d have died of sheer pain by now. She felt as if she’d been mauled by a mountain lion—what would a real bullet wound feel like? She couldn’t imagine anything worse than what she was already feeling.
“And it’s no use shouting,” he said. “They’re all outside hunting for you, so they won’t hear. But still. If you do make a sound, I’ll stuff your mouth.”
She could only watch in horror as he woke the Vitros one by one, taking the time to look each in the eyes, giving them a chance to imprint on him.
“I’ve wanted to do this for years,” he said amiably. “But I had to wait for the right time.”
/>
“Why? What part do they play in your delusions?”
“I told you,” he replied, impatiently. “Don’t you listen to a word I say? I’m creating a distraction.”
“So you can imprint me,” Sophie said flatly.
“Now you’re getting it.” He was halfway around the room now, smiling encouragingly as a black-haired Asian girl blinked her eyes open for the first time and locked gazes with him.
“But you still haven’t said how you plan to do that.”
“And I’m not going to. I’d much rather show you.”
She twisted her hands against the cord; she thought the knots might be coming loose, but it was hard to tell. A thin trickle of blood ran down her arm from where the cord had cut her, and she bit her lip, holding back whimpers of pain as she worked at the bonds. Whenever he turned her way she froze, hoping he wouldn’t notice.
After he’d woken all the Vitros, he began helping them out, making them stand on wobbly legs. They stumbled and swayed as if they were made of paper; if a kitten had rubbed against their legs they would have fallen over. They clumsily clustered around Nicholas, making no sound but the shuffling of their bare feet. Each one wore a plain white gown that hung loose on their shoulders and fell to their knees. Some still bore white patches that clung to their faces and arms, where tubes had run into their veins until Nicholas had pulled them out. Their nails were inches long on their fingers and toes, and their skin had a saggy, sallow look that made Sophie’s stomach turn. They looked almost like cadavers. Had Lux looked that way, before the doctors brought her out of this place and cleaned her up to present her to Andreyev?
When they were all awake and on their feet, Nicholas stood in their midst like a god, touching their faces and shoulders as if he were blessing them. They reached out to grab his hair and his clothes, to press their fingers to his lips, their eyes wide with adoration.
Sophie resisted the urge to vomit. Everything about the scene was eerie and perverse; she felt nauseated just from watching.
“Come,” Nicholas murmured to his acolytes. “Follow me.”
He led his stumbling, disoriented crowd of newborn Vitros out the door, slowly and with much awkward shuffling. They could hardly stand, let alone walk, but he helped the ones who fell and led them by the hand. Sophie tried to trip him when he went by, but he just laughed and hopped over her.
“What will you do with them?” she asked when the last Vitro was in the hall.
“Set them free.”
“How?”
“I really don’t see why you should care. Soon, you’ll be one of them.” His Vitros waited in the hall, staring at him vapidly and blinking in the harsh fluorescent lights while he knelt and brushed her hair behind her ears. She jerked away but only succeeded in hitting her head against the door. “Wait here,” he murmured, then chuckled. “As if you had a choice.”
He returned to the Vitros and began leading them away down the hall. She heard the ding of the elevator; he likely didn’t trust them to handle the stairs. By scooting along the floor, Sophie could swing the door shut, which put her outside the room and in the hallway, her hands still tethered to the handle. She caught a glimpse of the last Vitro disappearing into the elevator before the doors slid shut.
Hollow silence fell across the basement hall. Sophie took the chance to wrestle at her bonds, pulling against them with all her weight. She twisted and bucked, then forced herself to stop and think. She couldn’t see the knots very well because her hands were bound behind her back, and though she was pretty limber, she couldn’t get herself turned around without pulling her shoulders out of their sockets. So she began feeling with her fingertips for any loose coils, but found none.
Her wrists were red and raw by the time Nicholas returned, not five minutes later. He glanced at her hands and raised a single eyebrow. “Get anywhere, did you? Maybe if you broke your wrists?”
She snarled at him like a trapped raccoon, but he ignored her and untied the knots himself, loosing her from the door but keeping her wrists bound. Then he dragged her down the hall to the next room and shouldered the door open.
“The Vitro prep room,” he said cheerfully as he pushed her onto a large, padded metal bench. “You’ve been here before, though you wouldn’t recognize it.”
“This is where you hid me after . . . wait. It wasn’t Mary, was it? If was you who knocked me out.”
He shrugged. “You shouldn’t have run off. I really didn’t think they’d find you here, I must admit. But I never planned on your pilot making off with Lux, or I’d have stashed you somewhere better. Ah, well, everything’s worked out in the end.”
The room resembled an exam room in a clinic, with a counter, a sink, and cabinets, and assorted mystery equipment hung on the wall. The only thing missing was thin tissue paper to cover the bench. Nicholas flicked on a light that hung directly above Sophie; the bulb’s conical shade directed the glare in a kind of spotlight, illuminating her in yellow pool but leaving the corners of the room in shadows, like the room in which she’d awoken to Moira, Strauss, and Andreyev.
“This is where they usually wake the Vitros,” he said. “I’ve seen it several times. I’m not just the botched experiment they keep like a pet, you know. I help them.” He waited, perhaps to see if she’d be impressed, but she wasn’t. He shrugged and went on. “Granted, mostly they have me cleaning things, sorting their crap, changing sheets, and filling out dull paperwork they don’t want to deal with. But it lets me see everything. Everything. When you’re just standing in the corner wiping off scalpels, no one pays attention to you, especially when they think they know you.” He shut the door and locked it. The click of the lock gave Sophie a chill; the hair on her neck rose on end.
“What are you doing?” she demanded.
He pulled the wand from his back pocket. “I’m activating your chip, Sophie.”
Her heart clenched. “How?” she whispered, her mouth suddenly dry. “I’m not a newborn like those others.”
“God, you never shut up.”
“I swear, Nicholas, if you don’t—”
“Sh!” He pressed a finger to her lips. “Just listen . . . wait for it . . . wait for it . . .”
An echoing blast shattered Sophie’s eardrums, but it didn’t come from the wand.
TWENTY-NINE
JIM
When he reached the shoreline, he didn’t recognize it. It was Skin Island, not the smaller airstrip island, but that was all he knew. The shore was a thin line of sand that quickly gave way to a short bluff overhung with roots and twisting pines. He rested for a while, exhausted from kicking his way through the water and then battling the surf to reach land. He’d let the wing go when he reached the shallows, and felt a pang of sorrow as it drifted away. It was the last piece of the Cessna he’d had, and letting it go was like relinquishing everything he loved about the sky. But he couldn’t very well lug the thing around on land.
Once he could stand again without his knees wobbling beneath him, he began trekking south, knowing that sooner or later he’d come across the Vitro building. Would Sophie have made it there by now? How long had he been in the water? It was difficult to judge; the moon seemed substantially higher by now, but it was still obscured by the trees.
He was tired. Tired of trekking back and forth across the island, tired of being nearly killed, tired of dancing one step out of disaster’s reach, tired of trying. His exhaustion began deep in his mind and spread outward like a disease, like a leech sapping his strength from within, but he planted one foot ahead of the other with dogged persistence. He let his muscles think for him, lost himself in the monotony of walking, and let his mind run on low, barely floating on the surface of consciousness.
The beach ran along the foot of a high cliff; he recognized it from his first ill-fated attempt to rescue Sophie.
He pressed a hand against the rocky cliff to he
lp himself along, finding handholds in ledges that were covered in dried gull droppings. High above him, the birds nested and watched him with glittering black eyes. Every now and then one would call out, harsh and sudden, startling him. The sea nibbled at his soggy boots then fell away, back and forth like a relentless terrier. There were places where the beach dissolved and he had to feel his way across rocks beneath the water. He went slowly, cautiously. He half hoped a wave would just wash up, grab him, and pull him out to sea so he could have a good reason to just give up, but no such wave obliged.
The shore gradually bent eastward, and by keeping an eye on the stars, he was able to determine when he’d reached the south shoreline. There had to be a way up to the buildings. He saw no ladder, no stair—no, wait.
Ahead of him, a narrow stair was cut into the cliff and lined with rickety metal railings. It zigzagged twice before reaching the top and was barely visible in the darkness. He reached the foot of the stair and began to slowly climb, keeping one hand on the cliff face and the other on the rail, though it wobbled at his touch.
Hardy tufts of grass clung to the sides of the stairs and brushed against his legs. The wind picked up as he went higher, and he pressed himself against the face of the cliff to keep from being blown off balance. Each step was worn at the middle, evidence that they’d been here long before Corpus, back when the place truly was a resort. He imagined men and women in retro swimsuits running up and down these stairs, clutching sun hats to keep them from blowing away, laughing, enjoying their vacation, like models in a vintage Coke ad. They had no idea what this place would become when they had gone. No idea that their paradise could turn so dark.
He tried not to look down. He wasn’t afraid of heights, but he couldn’t help remembering the dizzying view from the top, when he’d been on his knees in front of the Corpus guards, certain that the rocky beach below would become his grave.
When he finally reached the top of the cliff, he ducked several stairs down, out of sight. The area surrounding the Vitro building was ablaze with light and voices. There was a lot of shouting, a lot of commotion. They were still in a riot over Jim and Sophie’s destructive escape, it seemed. He felt a pang of worry for Lux; was she all right? Would they have shot her the way they were going to shoot him? He felt wretched for bringing her into the middle of it all. If he hadn’t blundered in and lugged her out of that building, she’d have been fine—maybe they all would have been fine. Maybe he’d be home by now, sleeping in the plane as he sometimes did when he and his dad had been arguing.