‘And it worked?’
Cole nods. ‘Leoben’s genome was the basis for the vaccine’s code. If it wasn’t for your father’s research, we’d all be doomed.’
I let out a slow breath, scratching my arm, dropping back to my knees to pick up Leoben’s file. His young face has dark skin, shaved black hair, and stitches winding up his neck. His genome is like none I’ve seen before.
My hands are shaking, but somehow my mind is steady. Everything is starting to make a twisted sort of sense.
My father hated Cartaxus because he hated himself. He knew the work he’d done for them on this project was wrong. Did he tell me to stay away from them for my own good, or was he just afraid of what I’d think of him if I found out the truth?
‘I know this is a lot to accept,’ Cole says.
‘I don’t know why he never told me,’ I say. My arm is starting to burn, and I rub it against my thigh.
‘What’s wrong with your arm?’
My vision grows dark for a moment, then blurs before snapping back into focus. ‘The guard said my panel was regenerating. I didn’t think it could, but I guess it can. I think my ocular tech is restarting.’
‘Let me look at it.’
‘It’s fine,’ I say, but he reaches for my arm, his movements unnaturally fast. He rips back my sleeve, revealing the bandage underneath.
The breath leaves my lungs in a single, terrified gasp.
‘What?’ Cole’s hands fly back as though I’ve burned him. ‘Did I hurt you? What happened?’
‘Oh shit,’ I whisper, ripping at the bandage, unwinding the bloodstained gauze. Underneath, my skin is pale around the incision, where ugly black stitches trace a three-inch line along my arm.
The incision is healing nicely. The wound is neat and clean.
But there are twenty-four cobalt dots glowing beneath my skin.
I look up at Cole, my heart racing. ‘Get the medkit. Hurry, Cole. I need you to cut out my panel.’
CHAPTER 21
Cole stands up, his eyes wide. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’
‘This isn’t a hypergenesis-friendly installation. This thing is going to kill me.’
The flashing stripe of cobalt light on my forearm casts an eerie glow over Cole’s face. The way it’s flashing tells me it’s installing, which means the hypergenesis protocols have already been overridden. Marcus must have done something to it while I was unconscious. Corroded it, added new code – I don’t know how he screwed it up this badly. I close my eyes and see a flash of Amy’s twisted mouth and scabbed, disgusting horns.
Marcus’s code is inside me right now, rampaging through my cells. I clutch one hand over my mouth, fighting the urge to vomit.
‘Can you turn it off?’ Cole asks.
‘I don’t think so.’ I close my eyes, trying to focus, but none of my mental commands are working. I can’t control my ocular tech or even pull up my comm. It’s a brand-new system – it could take weeks to set up, to monitor my brain patterns until it knows how to respond to my thoughts. Trying to turn it off like this is going to be impossible.
The only way to stop it is to cut the whole thing out.
‘Shouldn’t it check for hypergenesis?’ Cole asks.
I grab my backpack and pull the medkit from it, flipping it open on the floor. Scalpels, stitches. I’ll need a tourniquet. ‘It’s supposed to, but this thing is already installing. It’s flashing, can’t you see that?’
‘So stop it.’
‘I can’t,’ I snap. ‘I told you, it’s installing. It’s not responding to commands. By the time it does, I’ll already be dead.’
Cole still doesn’t seem to understand. He’s looking at me like I’m a child jumping to an extreme solution without thinking it through. Normally, he’d be right. Panels have dozens of layers of security to stop this kind of thing from happening, but mine must be broken. I can’t explain it. The only thing I can do is pick up a scalpel and start this myself.
‘Whoa,’ Cole says, his eyes widening as I slide a gleaming blade from the medkit. ‘The nanites aren’t deploying yet. We can find a doctor.’
‘You’re not listening to me,’ I say, yanking my navy Homestake shirt off. I hurl it across the room and spin round in my bra to show him the patchwork of crinkled scars along my spine. ‘The last time I hacked my panel, it took thirty-seven seconds for this to happen. There were holes in my skin, you could see my spine through them – and that was just from a single app. I have twenty-four in my arm now. Even if we cut this out, there’s still a good chance I’m going to die.’
Cole’s face pales, but he doesn’t respond. I have a sudden urge to punch him. It’s hard enough to keep myself from panicking, I don’t have the energy to argue with him about this. I step to him. ‘You have to do this. I can’t cut it out of my own arm.’
‘I-I c-can’t,’ he says. ‘I can’t hurt you, the p-protective protocol …’
‘Your protective protocol is a pain in my ass.’ I unfurl a roll of gauze from the medkit and squat down on the floor beside it, holding my arm out. ‘OK, we’ll start at the base. Use the incision Marcus left, that’s a start, but it’s still going to hurt like hell when it opens up.’
I look up to find Cole leaning against the wall with his eyes closed, his hands bunched in fists at his sides.
‘You learned how to do this, right? Cartaxus had to teach you panel maintenance.’
‘No … yes,’ he whispers. ‘I don’t know. There has to be another way.’
‘We’re running out of time. We need to do this now.’
‘But I can’t,’ he breathes, his eyes flicking between my arm and the scalpels on the floor. ‘Catarina, I’m sorry, I just can’t …’
‘Get Dax then – he knows how to do this.’
‘Crick isn’t responding. I think he’s in the airlock.’
‘Jesus, Cole!’ I shout, launching myself from the floor. I thrust my forearm across his neck and shove him back against the wall. The bunk beds shudder with his weight, his eyes perfect circles of surprise. ‘Get Dax!’ I yell into his face. ‘I’m dying, do you not understand that?’
He blinks, an unreadable expression on his face, then throws the door open and bolts down the hall.
I drop back into a crouch, sucking in a breath. The stitches I can handle, but maybe it’s better to use scissors. I find a tiny, razor-tipped pair in the medkit and sit cross-legged on the floor. My hands tremble as I force one blade under the closest stitch.
OK, this is hurting a lot more than I thought it would.