Synthetic: Dark Beginning (27 page)

Chapter 32

Alex slipped through the door to the Mirafield prison ward and slithered up to Vaughn’s cell. She’d locked them in only an hour ago and now she was back, alone this time.

“Come to finish me off?” asked Vaughn.

“That was fun but no, I’m here to spring you.”

“And I was just getting comfortable.”

Alex pressed a hand against the glass, her face almost pleading. “That plastic bag Kora had over her shoulder when I caught you two trying to escape, what was in there?”

Vaughn hesitated. “Why should I tell you?”

“See anyone else here to help?” She turned and looked behind her.

“Stop yakking and open the door.” Ivan banged his fist against the glass. “Joshua is starting to smell in here.”

Alex glanced down at Ivan, then over to Joshua who lay on the floor. “Why won’t you let me dump the corpse?” she asked Vaughn.

“He’s still alive. I need to get him to Kora,” said Vaughn.

“No please, take him away and bury him,” said Ivan.

Vaughn stood up. He and Alex were the exact same height. “There was a drive in the bag and we think it might contain something important about Kora's past.”

“I see.”  Alex had a tingling feeling that the drive was her ticket. Kora had a lot of dangerous secrets. If she
was
synthetic, Kora was probably stronger than Alex. It was reasonable to assume that someone as smart as Kora wouldn't give herself some wimpy body. Alex should have dragged Kora through the windshield of that weird car instead of the stupid vampire just to test her out. But no, she needed to use her brain, for once, instead of her fists. Kora had offered to remove Alex's chip in exchange for the hard drive. That was her new goal. With her chip gone, Alex could spend the rest of her long life dishing out revenge.

Alex's face must have betrayed her thoughts because Vaughn looked suspicious.  “What do you need us for?  Why not just go get the hard drive on your own.  You're Randall's assistant.” 

“At work, but not at play.  He's at his pleasure palace, right now.  I don't have clearance to enter that area so I'm improvising.”  She pressed the button to release the door. Ivan rushed out but Alex caught him up like a rat and held him dangling in the air. “You didn’t think you were coming, did you?” Ivan stretched his neck up and sank his yellow teeth into her arm. She dropped him and stared at the bite in horror. “Does that thing have all of its shots?”

“I’m not going back in there,” said Ivan.

Alex held up her arm so Vaughn could see the bite mark. “Would you please capture that mongoose and put him back into the cage.”

“I’m well acquainted with those teeth. I’m not touching him.”

“Look at your shoes.” Ivan pointed at Alex’s feet. “Where did you get boats like that?”

Alex’s face turned bright pink. “I just have big feet, you nasty little toad.” She lunged at Ivan but he was too quick. He shot through the swinging doors and Alex stormed after him.

Vaughn walked over to Gus and Berta’s cage. He tried to open it by hitting the button like Alex did on their cage, but the doors didn't budge. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

“Good luck,” said Gus through his intercom. “We’ll be fine.”

When Vaughn caught up with Alex, she was searching the hall for Ivan like a hungry cat.

“Where are we?” asked Vaughn.

“The dead floors,” replied Alex. “Where scientists worked before Kora came along and rendered them obsolete.”

With still no sign of Ivan, Vaughn and Alex passed dozens of empty labs outfitted with dusty equipment looming in dark corners. She stopped when she reached the office at the very end. Inside, a stylish black leather couch spread along one wall with a set of matching chairs.

“That’s what we’re after,” she said, pointing to a rounded door in the corner.

“Looks like a space-age closet,” said Ivan, appearing out of nowhere.

Alex eyed him maliciously, but made no move to catch him.  “It’s actually an old, forgotten dock for the executive elevator which is our way into the elite part of Mirafield.” She pressed her fingers into the cracks of the door. “Vaughn, help me pry these open.”

“I’ve got a better idea.” Ivan smacked the glowing button to the right of the door.

“Why the hell did you do that?” hollered Alex. “Now everyone on the whole damn campus will know that an out-of-use elevator from the prison floor has been activated.” She turned to Vaughn. “I told you we should leave him.”

“What was your plan?” asked Ivan.

“Pry open the doors and climb to the top using the emergency ladder in the shaft.”

Ivan yawned. “We already did something like that yesterday.”

The door whirled open and Ivan strutted into a room decked out in modern furniture and silk rugs. “This is more like it.” He yanked a bottle of champagne from the fridge and popped the cork.

Vaughn flopped down on a couch and folded his arms behind his head. “Now that they’re onto us, we should try to land someplace where they won’t be waiting.”

Alex crossed over to a control panel beside the door and banged it open. “We’ll take it to the top. I’m sure there’s some kind of maintenance dock up there.”

The elevator shot straight up, sending Ivan and his champagne tumbling behind the bar. Seconds later, the door opened onto a steel walkway that ran parallel to a set of massive fans drawing air from outside through a set of filters. Alex pounded down the ramp with Vaughn behind her and Ivan straggling in the rear. A dividing wall receded from beneath their feet, revealing the breathtaking view of an enclosed city. A luminous, old-world palace sprawled in the center topped with a high dome and a golden statue of Prometheus gripping a fireball. Off to the side, surrounded by lush gardens, sat the famous Hollywood sign that had been relocated to Randall’s backyard and painted gold to match the baroque architecture.

Alex grunted in disgust. “That must be Randall's pleasure palace.”

“You’ve never been here before?” asked Vaughn.

“No way,” said Alex. “You get sent here, you never get off campus.  I like to travel.”
Vaughn walked over to stand beside her as she gazed down at the tawdry building. “See that roof?” Alex pointed at the golden roof that gleamed in the screened sunlight. “The statue of Prometheus is solid gold—or so I’ve heard.” She drew a finger across the glittering streets far below. “He redid all those blocks of Santa Monica until he ran out of money. He’s counting on this new line of synthetic products to let him finish his city complete with its own ozone layer and purified air.”

“Let me guess, Ruby was the guinea pig for this new venture?” asked Vaughn.

Alex nodded. “She was supposed to be his floor model.”

“What an idiot to trust Ruby,” said Vaughn. “Now he has no proof that he’s successfully turned a human immortal.”

“Doesn’t matter,” said Alex. “I’m sure he’s whipped up some amazing sales pitch. He’s a master at getting money out of people.”

“We’ll see about that,” said Ivan.

They continued their descent but Alex kept her eyes glued to the golden dome. Walking down the maintenance ramp would take forever, and then there was no guarantee they'd get into the palace itself. She felt sure Kora's drive was stashed somewhere in his palace office. He hadn't had time to destroy it yet. “I bet if we jumped from here, we could latch onto that roof and find our way into the palace through a window.”

“But it’s hundreds of feet down from here,” said Ivan, gazing over the edge. “And I’ve heard gold is rather slippery.”

“You stay here then. Vaughn and I can do it easily,” said Alex.

“I don’t know,” said Vaughn. “I’m an old man compared to you.” He glanced at Ivan and lowered his voice. “Besides, I can’t leave him up here alone.”

“What the hell are we going to do with him once we reach Randall’s palace? We’ll stand out because of him. He looks like a troll.” Alex glowered at Ivan as if he were a stray dog that refused to be shooed away.
“If your precious Kora was here, she'd dismantle that rat in a heartbeat.”

Vaughn's face tightened with anger. “Kora's not like that anymore. She's back to how she should be. How she used to be.”

Alex's arm shot out and grabbed him by the throat; she relished the fear in his eyes. “That girl deserves to suffer for what she's done to us.”

“You're not here to help us at all, are you?” wheezed Vaughn after she let him go.

Alex continued down the ramp. “What harm could I do her anyway? Kora's human.”

Vaughn face gave Kora away. Alex chuckled to herself.

When they finally reached the bottom of the maintenance ramp, they could still see Randall’s palace that blared like a horrendous star on an asphalt Christmas tree. They crept into a marble square lined with opulent shops and restaurants where Mirafield executives, dressed in evening attire, lounged on couches like feasting Romans, sipping booze in the filtered breeze. A sleek car whizzed by, taking Ivan’s attention with it.

“I didn’t know cars like that existed,” Ivan’s voice trembled. “The one that just passed was a Rolls Royce and I hardly recognized it.”

“Ruby’s cars are fossils compared to these,” said Vaughn. “New cars drive themselves.”

“Ideal for you, maybe, but I’ll do my own driving,” sneered Ivan.  “We need to find a car that's a manual.”

“You’ll take whatever we find,” said Vaughn.

They crossed gold-flecked streets and prowled along a line of cars waiting outside of a pounding club, but alert drivers all carefully attended them. Alex turned a corner and was engulfed in a sea of old people dressed in glittering clothes, escorted by a huge entourage of nurses and handlers as they glided along in fleet of high-tech wheelchairs. 
She smiled at Ivan.  “I just thought of the perfect disguise for our little troll.”  She disappeared into the crowd and returned with a wheelchair that she parked in front of him. “Care to take it for a spin?”

Ivan kicked the side of the chair, making it rattle.  “Of all the inept, idiotic failures possible, this takes the cake. I thought we were going to get a decent pair of wheels.”

“This has wheels.” Vaughn pointed at the metal balls stacked in a wild mesh of gears and levers like marbles lost in a net of rubber bands. “It’s not ideal, but Alex and I can push you along in this thing and we won’t draw attention to the fact that you’re small and outrageously ugly.”

Ivan clenched his tiny fists. “I have just arrived in car heaven and you want to push me around in a wheelchair? I’m only nine. I’d rather walk on my own than disgrace myself riding in that trashcan!”

“Get in before I beat the crap out off you,” said Alex. She'd had enough of the little foul-mouthed demon. If Ivan got them caught by security, she planned to rip out his guts with her bare hands.

Ivan groaned but climbed up into the plush seat where Alex fastened him in like a toddler. “How do I make this lawnmower go? It doesn’t even have a steering wheel.”

“This isn’t a car. It’s made for people with limited mobility,” said Alex, forcing herself to be calm.

“You mean cripples,” said Ivan.

“Just think about going forward,” continued Alex.

Ivan leaned forward, his eyes bulging as he pressed against the overly tight seat belt, but nothing happened.

“Don’t actually move your body, just think about it. Clear your mind of everything but speed,” said Alex.

Ivan relaxed back into his seat and a dreamy expression crept over his face. Then the chair shot forward and he belted out a scream that soon bubbled into laughter as the chair raced away.

“I tried one once, for fun, and couldn’t get it to go over one mile an hour,” said Alex, watching as Ivan passed a Ferrari.

Alex and Vaughn chased after Ivan, but she reached Randall’s palace way before the vampire.  It was amazing how slow and weak he was compared to her.  She skirted the driveway where guards were busy unloading the fancy cars that had whizzed past them on their way in, but Ivan was nowhere in sight.  She sprinted over a series of bridges that crisscrossed a meandering canal where a dozen gondolas ferried guests through a watery paradise of Venetian mansions. She spotted Ivan zipping along a path that ran parallel to the Hollywood sign and ducked down like a panther.  She edged around the water, tackling Ivan just as he neared the base of the towering double O’s. Ivan flew out of his chair, rolled down the grass, and bounced to a stop in a patch of lilies.

“Give it back!” he said, scrabbling up the hill to where Alex stood guarding the sinister vehicle.

Gondolas glided across the pond and one, packed with old ladies dripping in jewels, hissed their disapproval. “How dare you steal that poor old man’s wheelchair.”

Ivan rounded on them, his voice edged with venom. “I’m not old you miserable––” He paused and an evil smile crept onto his face. He collapsed to the ground and writhed like a man in the throes of a seizure.

Elegant gondoliers leapt from their boats onto the bank to help Ivan off the ground. They carted him back over to the chair where, once deposited back in his seat, he waved feebly to the growing crowd.

“One of us can escort you back to the palace ballroom,” said one of the gondoliers, eyeing Alex with suspicion.