I do have a biological connection. Your mom and dad enhanced me surgically, just like they did for you, beano. Our brains have implants from the same chip set, and some of our organ tissue is cloned from the same sources. You do the biology.”
Shaking my head in confusion, I stepped into the boathouse, which was filled with familiar old smells of fishy water and musty equipment, and started loading gear into the skiff.
“That’s terrible, losing parents so young,” I said. “Both at once? Some kind of accident?”
“No, it was totally deliberate,” she said. “The Elites declared them enemies of the state-and then executed them. Your friend Jax Moore did the job himself. Someday I’ll cut off both his murdering hands, fry ’em in bacon grease, and eat them.”
“Ah,” I said, “well put.”
Chapter 45
Lucy sat perched in the bow of the skiff as I rowed out onto the clear, smooth waters of the bay. Even though she’d had a lifetime to absorb it, the pain of her parents’ death still must have cut very deep. It certainly seemed that way. I was starting to understand humans better, and to feel something for them-other than contempt, that is.
“Finally, some unexplained things are starting to fall into place,” I said. “I couldn’t figure out what my sensors were telling me that night. I was sure you weren’t an Elite. But I didn’t know anything about humans being able to be enhanced to this degree.”
She nodded. “Just to set the record straight-I’m
I stopped rowing in mid-stroke. “You’ve got to be joking. You
“I’m simply stating a scientific fact.”
“Not possible,” I said, and dropped the oars back into the water.
“You think I
I didn’t bother to answer.
“Remember, I’ve seen you in action. But you’ve never really seen
I shrugged. “I don’t need to see your moves. I know what I’m capable of. Few, if any,
Lucy put her fists on her hips. “You’re starting to make me very mad. I’ll race you to the house.”
“From here?” I glanced around. We were about a mile from the beach.
“Why not? You can swim, can’t you,
I shook my head and grinned. “I’ll do my best. What are the stakes?”
“Sheer satisfaction, and bragging rights, of course.”
She kicked off her sneakers, unbuttoned her shirt and tossed it aside. Then she wriggled out of her jeans, leaving herself in a halter top and panties-which were turquoise blue and nicely revealing.
I pulled off my boots and shirt and stood up.
“You’re going to leave your pants on?” she said.
The uncomfortable truth was that when I’d been hurrying to buy new clothes, I’d forgotten to get underwear.
“I’ll take my chances.”
“Whatever you say, hotshot. Quit staring at my legs though.”
“Sorry. But, you know, there they are.”
“Not for long. Ready?”
“Any time.”
“How about
We dove off the boat at the same instant, both with powerful arcing leaps that carried us a good ten yards.
But actually, Lucy hit the water at least a couple of feet ahead of me. I couldn’t believe it.
I stayed under for another hundred yards, aware of Lucy right beside me. She was slicing through the water like a seal.
By the time we broke the surface, her lead had increased to half a body length, and those strong thighs of hers were churning along-next to my head.
I attacked the remaining distance with ferocious strokes, moving faster than the fastest human could run.
But by the time my toes found the sandy bottom, she was scampering up the beach, her turquoise behind twitching back and forth as if it were waving good-bye.
That iced it.
I was damned if I was going to let her outrun me too.
With the two of us bounding along like giant, insane grasshoppers, I poured on everything I had, springing after her in huge stretching leaps, barely skimming the ground when I touched down. Each time, my longer legs gained a step on her, and as the house came into sight and loomed closer, the two of us were in a dead heat.
I couldn’t let her win-not
I landed on the porch an instant before Lucy did. But before I could declare any kind of victory, she turned and said, “I let you win-
Then my “sister” disappeared inside the house.
Chapter 46
I had to retrieve the skiff, and when I got back to the house, my father was sitting out on the porch. Just the sight of Dad there brought back the most powerful memories of past times at the lake.
“I’d like to chat,” I told him. “I really need to talk some things through. Like 7–4 Day.”
“Can’t help you,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m a clone.”
Like Mom’s, this one appeared to be an exact duplicate-with a beard, hat, and worn-out work clothes. Anticipating my next question, it said, “We take care of most of the chores and require no pay. Slavery at its very best.”
“Where’s my father then?”
“Working in the lab. Where else? Nice chatting with you,
Shaking my head, but smiling at the “slavery” line, I walked down the stairway to the underground lab and found my father sitting in front of a bank of monitors that lined one wall.
Some of them showed maps of different areas around the globe and contained colored clusters that looked like they represented populations. Others were flashing coded messages.
“Feeling better?” Dad asked, swinging his chair around to face me.
“Suppose I did agree to fight against the Elites,” I said. “Then what happens?”
He pointed to the bank of monitors. “I’m in contact with resistance leaders around the world. We were just discussing you.”
“Around the world? What are you talking about now? There’s nothing out there but… savages.”
“That’s what the Elite leadership wants everybody to believe, Hays. Things are actually much more organized on our side than they like to let on.”
So, more government lies. Supposedly, Elites made up only about 5 percent of the world’s population. But they controlled North America, and their military power kept the rest of the world cowed into submission. The official story was that other continents were crowded with humans, dirty and barbaric, and the only Elites actually
