Extracted (24 page)

“You and Lex are special. Hmm, perhaps we should go to my office so that I might begin at the beginning.”

I wave my hand in a “go on” gesture, then follow him into a smoke-filled room. He motions for me to take a seat on an old bench.

“I would appreciate your discretion with the information I’m about to give you.”

I hesitate. The idea of keeping secrets doesn’t sit well with me. “I can’t promise. But I’ll do my best. I do need you to tell me the truth about Tesla and why you broke off from the Institute.” The party line has never sat well with me. They told us it was because they were selfish and wanted to pillage history, but the more I begin to understand Tesla and what he’s capable of, the less sure I am about his motives. About any of their motives.

He nods, as if that’s good enough. “Tesla had an assistant. The first Rifter. He discovered her abilities after a freak lab accident. Once he realized what she could do, he was like a man obsessed. Long story short, he found us. The originals. There were five. He mapped our family trees, using our genealogy to discover the source of our abilities. And he found a common thread.”

He pauses as footsteps pass by, and then he goes on. “A royal thread, as it happened. He began experimenting. Trying to gather as much sample DNA from the line as possible. He also identified people with high potential for the gene. Your family was on the short list.”

I shift, bringing my legs up to my chest. “So why Lex? Why not Mother or Father?”

“Tesla convinced a like-minded man to help him. A man from your time. A man with access to you and your family. A man of science.”

“Rasputin.” The name slithers past my lips like a ghostly snake, sending shivers up my skin. He was my friend. Confidant. The only person I trusted other than my own family. Violent memories crash to the front of my mind. Him taking blood from Lex and me. Trying to cure Lex’s hemophilia. The transfusions. Him brushing my hair. Singing folk songs. Bile rises in my throat like acid.

Him walking out the door for the last time. Mother telling us away with tears in her eyes, about his murder.

“Yes. He was working for Tesla.”

I don’t know what to say, so I settle for biting down on my lip.

“Of your siblings, Tesla felt only you and your brother showed enough potential to warrant training. By this time I and some of the others—disgusted by his growing obsession—had gone our separate ways. But we had a spy. She told us about his plans for you and your brother. She died getting us that information.”

I sit back and let the sofa engulf me. There are too many words and, at the same time, no words at all that can help any of this make sense to me.

“Ember, we tried to get you both. It was our intent but…”

“But what?” I croak out.

“But you stopped me.”

I shake my head, racking my brain for some memory of seeing him that day. “I don’t remember that.”

He waves his hand, dismissing my claim. “Yet you did. You brought your brother to me. Told me to take him. You called me by name.”

He lets those last words hang between us until I can fully absorb them. “Wait. That means I knew you. Me. Not the past me, but right now me. I was there.”

He stares at me, as if silently challenging me to put the pieces together. It’s like with the first key. At some point I go back to that day, and I make sure Lex is taken by the Hollows. Why would I do that? It doesn’t make any sense.

“But it’s a Fixed Point. Flynn told me. I can’t go back and change what happened.”

With the flick of a switch, his train engine growls back to life. He tosses a handful of coal into a chamber under his seat and it bellows steam from the pipes in the back. “Which can only mean one thing. You aren’t changing anything. You will go back again because you always have. Your actions are part of the Fixed Point, so maybe it’s not naturally occurring. Maybe, just maybe, you create it.”

“But then I can change it. I can make things different this time,” I blurt out without really thinking. I would never choose to separate myself from Lex. Not if I could help it. But if I don’t, what if he dies? What if Tesla gets us both? Then, none of this—right now—ever happens. A sharp pain explodes behind my eyes as my brain struggles to process everything. All the possibilities and repercussions. A paradox.

“But, what I wanted to say to you is this. I know you don’t trust us, and that you probably have every intention of leaving here as soon as possible. But, you are welcome to stay for as long as you like.”

“Thanks, I guess.”

“And as for changing your past, well, I suppose you can try,” Gloves says as he spins and chugs away, quite literally turning his back on me.

The migraine in my head is pounding like a jackhammer and I feel pure rage bubbling up inside me. In five long strides, I cross the room and slam the door behind me as I leave. Then, not quite ready to let go of my rant, I stomp off to find my brother.

Nobel’s lab is a mixture of wonder and mess. One time he got wound around the axle when a group of girls organized his lab for Valentine’s Day. His idea of perfect organization is piles. So, from then on, his lab became “by invitation only,” like a black tie event at a prestigious science museum.

I like coming to the lab. It’s quiet here and always smells of sulfur and brass. Watching Nobel work on his twisted metal devices helps clear my mind.

“Here, check this out,” Nobel says. “The Dox wasn’t the only thing taken from the Institute. I also pinched a small bottle of rare herbs and metals. Its healing potential is out of this world. Lex, this is how I’m going to regrow your leg.”

Nobel hands me the bottle. I hold it up to a Bunsen burner that is boiling some red liquid in a glass beaker. The brown glass bottle looks like it holds fine sand.

“How is this going to regrow my leg?” I ask.

Nobel points to the glass on the lab table.

“See that petri dish?”

I scan the glassware and find the petri dishes. Most of them have pink gelatin in the bottom. Some have pink gelatin with dark brown carpets of mold growing on it.

“I think I found it, yeah.”

“Great. Now take one with the spores on it to the dissecting microscope and look at it.”

I take the petri dish and go to the end of the table to where the microscope sits. “Now what?”

Nobel explains how to use the microscope while he tightens the rivets on one of his brass contraptions. I eventually get it focused.

“Describe to me what you see,” Nobel says without taking his eyes off his screwdriver.

“Well, I see a field of plant-looking things.”

“Okay, good. Follow one stalk all the way up and tell me what’s blossomed at the top.”

“It looks like a brown daisy or something. There are tons of them.”

“What do the petals look like?” Nobel asks.

I adjust the scope to a higher power and focus the knobs again. What I see takes my breath away. It’s amazing. “The petals are tiny gears.”

“Great! Hand me that one.”

I hold the petri dish in my hands like I just captured a dragonfly and pass it to Nobel; he puts down the screwdriver and takes the dish from me. Taking two fingers, he scrapes the spores into the gel dish.

“Pull up your pant leg,” Nobel says.

I lift my pant leg and reveal the brass mechanical prosthetic. Nobel flings the gel spore mixture from his finger onto my fake leg as if he has something nasty on his hand. Immediately, he wipes his hands on his already soiled lab coat. He takes another scoop of the gel to clean out the petri dish and flings it again. I watch where the pink slime lands. He replaces the surgical mask that has been hanging down around his neck and sits on the edge of the lab bench.

The two spots of pink and brown goop start to transform.

“What’s happening?” I ask.

“Just watch,” Nobel says as he folds his arms.

Slowly the two spots start to bubble, then harden into a skin-like substance.

“It worked,” Nobel whispers to himself.

I now see what it is. This is the new leg. This is what Nobel was talking about. I now have two pieces of skin fused to the metal of my brass leg.

“The only thing I need to do is take the pressure gauge off and cover it with this stuff. The skin pieces will filter moisture from your blood and create steam to be pushed through the pistons so your leg can work. With it contained as a closed system, you won’t need to have the gauge anymore. It will be as close to a new appendage as I can get,” Nobel says. And I can see an apology in his eyes. “You still might not have any sensations in the leg. There’s no way to know.”

“I guess it’s a good thing I’m hot-blooded,” I say. “Thank you, bro.”

“I have to synthesize more before we can cover your whole leg,” Nobel says as if he’s embarrassed that he hasn’t done it already.

I scratch the new patches of skin as if I have hives, but they don’t come off. It’s truly like skin, down to the tiniest nerve connections. While I’m poking and prodding the skin pieces, I don’t see the other Tesla kid come into the lab.

“Hey, guys,” Ethan says.

“You weren’t invited down here.” I don’t even look up. He’s like a lost puppy. Not one of those cute puppies, though. He’s one of those mangy street puppies that follow you home.

“Lex,” Nobel says. “It’s okay.”

“And if you want me to tolerate you—not like, I said tolerate—then you need to leave.”

Ethan steps close—too close—and gets in my face. “What is your problem, man?”

I pick up a screwdriver from the workbench, twirl it in my fingers, and poke him in the chest with the handle. “My problem is you. You and your little Tesla buddies kidnapped my sister and kept her from me all this time. So call me crazy, but I don’t buy for one second that you are here because you care about her.” I toss the screwdriver aside and mutter, “You’re probably a Tesla spy.”

I feel his hand on my shoulder, and it takes everything I have not to punch him in the face as he pushes me slightly.

“Hey, I’m the one who broke her out. And don’t you dare give me any crap about keeping her from you. I’ve been keeping her safe. What have you been doing? Screwing around here and getting tattoos? You couldn’t be bothered to come after her, could you?”

His words sting and anger boils under my skin. He turns his back to me and continues, “She’s not here ten minutes and you have her running all over hell and back trying to defy the laws of nature. Oh, and that’s after she risked her life to find you. Some brother you turned out to be.”

I lunge for him, but Nobel steps between us.

“You don’t know anything, you freaking weasel. Ember is my sister and I’ll take care of her. She’d be better off without you,” I growl over Nobel’s shoulder. “Where is she, by the way?”

Ethan waves his hand, gesturing to the room around us. “Your buddy wanted to have a private chat with her.”

“Play nice,” a voice in Russian says from behind us.

“Hey, beautiful,” Ethan says. He looks my way and plants a big loud kiss on my sister’s lips. Then he wraps his lanky arms around her like he’s just won a giant teddy bear at a carnival.

“Your boyfriend is about to get the living crap beat out of him,” Nobel warns her, though his voice is more amused than I’d like.

Ethan releases Ember and glares at me. “Oh, I’d love to see him try.”

That sounds like a pretty good idea to me. “Let’s go, then.”

“That’s enough, boys. I’m going to drown in all the testosterone,” Ember says, pinching the bridge of her nose like she has a headache. Instantly the desire to pummel Ethan fades and I’m left wondering what Gloves said to her that has made her look so pale.

“You okay, sis?”

She sets her jaw and glares at me. It’s a face I know all too well. One that says don’t poke the bear or it’ll rip your arms off. It was a face our mother made sometimes. It used to scare the crap out of me. Still kinda does, actually.

I pull my jester’s hat down a little more.

“I’m sorry,” I say.

She crosses the room, puts her arms around my neck, and hugs me tightly. “I need you to be nice,” she whispers, her voice exhausted.

“I know. But I don’t trust him.”

She sighs and pulls back. “I know. But I need you to trust me.”

I look over her shoulder. Nobel is tinkering with something on the desk, trying to hide a smirk, and Ethan is standing there looking confused. “Can I hit him, just once?” I whisper.

She grins.

I take that as a maybe.

I head back to my room, grabbing my gear and a spare shirt for Ethan. It’s a black T-shirt, nothing as nice as what he has on, but it’ll have to do. I’m not sure exactly why he gets under my skin so badly. I ball up the shirt and stuff it under my arm. It might have something to do with the monumental butt-kicking he laid on me the last time we met. Or it might be the way he looks at my sister. It’s arrogant and possessive. Like she’s his. I sigh. It might also be the fact that she looks at him the same way. If she has to choose between us, I can’t help but wonder which of us would win out.

Ugh. Now I’m just being stupid. I grab my cane, wishing Nobel could have perfected the gear spores sooner so that we could grow my leg back before the mission. This fake leg will slow me down, and with only half a team, I can’t afford anything going wrong. I have to leave some of my best people here in case more unexpected visitors show up.

I argue with myself on the way down to the common room. Should I just leave Ember and Ethan here? Ethan was right about one thing. She came for me. She risked her life and the lives of her friends in order to get here. And as for Ethan, well, he could at least be counted on to protect Ember. I suppose he was right about that, too. It’s really just my selfishness that took her up on her offer to help. I can’t stand the idea of not having her close.

* * *

When I am done getting my stuff, I head to the common area to meet Ethan and Ember. Most of the Hollows are still asleep. Nobel and Journey are on the half-pipe, saying good-bye, it looks like. Ink Spot is doing some rifting stripes for Chernobyl, who rifted back twenty minutes ago. He looks like he got into some gnarly stuff.