Then I remember what Dax said.
After the procedure, he told me that my gene for eye colour had mutated during the decryption. It should have been impossible, but he kept insisting that it happened. One tiny gene, which controlled the colour of my irises, had flipped. I’d walked into that vat with grey-eyed DNA and walked out with green.
‘Cole,’ I whisper, still staring at my eyes in the window. ‘I lied to you about the procedure. It was supposed to kill me.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘The decryption, it was supposed to destroy my cells when the vaccine passed through me. Dax and Leoben knew, but nobody else did, and we didn’t know how you’d react, so Dax made me promise not to tell you.’
Cole grabs my good shoulder and spins me round, searching my face. ‘Are you kidding?’ He backs away. ‘You’re serious, aren’t you? You thought you were going to die? Is that why you came to my room? Jesus, Cat. You weren’t even going to say goodbye?’
‘I couldn’t risk your protection protocol kicking in.’ It sounds like a flimsy excuse, as if I don’t care about him at all.
He just stares at me. ‘What the hell, Catarina? You were just going to let me watch you die?’
‘You don’t understand what I’m saying, Cole. I should have died. A normal person would have died as soon as that code started running.’
Cole freezes. ‘What do you mean normal?’
I swallow, rubbing the back of my head. There’s an ache starting up there, but it’s not like any migraine I’ve ever felt. This feels like there’s something sparking, burning inside me. Something scratching at my skull from the inside, trying to get out. ‘I don’t know. I don’t know anything any more. I think my father did something to me and made me forget it.’
‘And your eyes?’
I look down at my arm, at the bruises on my skin that will fade as soon as my panel starts working. ‘That’s what doesn’t make any sense. Something happened during the procedure. Dax said my DNA just … changed.’
Cole’s breath catches. ‘So it’s not an upgrade?’
‘No,’ I say. ‘I mean my underlying DNA, the thing that’s supposed to be untouchable, is different than it was before. It’s impossible, but it happened. It should have killed me, but I’m still alive. I don’t understand how my father made me like this, but I’m starting to remember things.’
Cole stands frozen for a long moment. I don’t know if he’s even breathing. ‘What do you remember, Cat?’ he whispers finally.
I turn to the mountains, lifting my good arm to point at them. ‘Those. I’ve been here before, but it’s not clear …’ I close my eyes, trying to dredge up the memory. It’s like trying to remember falling asleep – you know it happened, but the details turn into fog when you focus on them. It doesn’t help that the closer I get to remembering, the more my head pounds, until I can barely breathe through the pain.
When I open my eyes, Cole’s face is white. ‘What else?’
‘My father and I were arguing. We were in a … a lab like the one in the cabin. I was younger, and I was wearing grey. I could see these mountains through the window.’
‘No,’ Cole says, staring at me with wide, haunted eyes. The intensity of his gaze is starting to frighten me. ‘There was nobody else here, no other children. The lab in this valley is where I grew up. It’s where the Zarathustra programme was based. There were ten guards, eight nurses, two doctors and your father. That’s all. I knew every heartbeat. I remember every visitor.’
‘This is where you grew up?’ I turn to the horizon, the edges of my vision blurring. The fog has rolled off the mountains, drawing the memory closer. It’s sharper now. More insistent. The base of my skull is aflame. ‘I remember a hologram. I was young. I was biting my nails …’
I look down at my fingernails, shaking. They’re bitten. I’ve been chewing on them for the last few days, ever since Marcus cut the healing tech out of my arm. No, not just the healing tech – the memory suppressant.
I don’t think I ever bit my nails before that.
When I look up, Cole is staring at me like he’s seen a ghost. ‘Oh God,’ he breathes. ‘Oh no. Oh no.’
My throat tightens. ‘You’re scaring me.’
‘He changed your memories,’ Cole says, grabbing my shoulders, his fingers digging into my skin. ‘He blocked them, and your DNA, it changed, so it’s possible. It’s possible … Jesus, I nearly lost it when I saw your eyes. They’re the exact colour I remember.’
I blink, confused. ‘Cole, you’re hurting me.’
‘Oh God.’ He swallows, tears filling his eyes. It’s like he can’t even hear me. ‘It’s true, I can see it. You came into my arms that night, and I think part of me knew. She always came to me like that. Always in the middle of the night when she had nightmares, curling up beside me, since we were kids. I held you that night and I felt her, I could smell her, but I thought it was crazy.’
‘Cole,’ I cry, struggling against his grip. The pain in my skull is flooding down my spine, into my limbs, burning lines of fire through me. I choke back a cry, my chest shuddering. ‘Cole, what are you saying?’
‘It’s you,’ he breathes. His arms slide around me, crushing me to him. His body is a rock, but his shoulders are shaking.
‘It’s you,’ he whispers, his lips at my ear. ‘You’re Jun Bei.’
CHAPTER 43
Blinding sparks, like crossed wires, race through my brain. Cole’s voice echoes in my mind.
You’re Jun Bei.
‘No,’ I spit, shoving him away. ‘Do you know how crazy you sound? I’m Lachlan’s daughter. I’ve seen my DNA.’
‘What if he changed it?’
‘That’s impossible. That would kill me, it would –’
‘How do you explain what happened in the decryption?’ Cole cuts me off. ‘What happened to your eyes? Shouldn’t that have killed you too?’
‘I don’t know.’ My voice is trembling. ‘But she was a completely different person, Cole. It’s not possible.’
‘She bit her fingernails,’ he says. ‘She had your height, your frame. She used to code with Lachlan all the time, using a holographic display down in the lab.’
‘No.’ I step away, rubbing the heels of my hands into my eyes. ‘I’m not her, I can’t be. I went to boarding school. I remember my childhood. I had a room full of books, and I spent all my time coding. The school was in the mountains, in Canada.’
‘That’s exactly where we are now.’ Cole’s voice breaks. ‘Don’t you see? That’s how you make false memories – you build a story on top of something true and tell it to a person over and over until they believe it. They did it to me, to all of us. Why do you think I kept the scars? They’re the only thing I can trust.’