Vanessa hooked her arm under hers. ‘We should check you out in the medical bay to be sure that’s all it is.’
Jacob nodded at Carissa. ‘We need more of your growth repressors.’
The Copy, who resembled a thirteen-year-old girl, had abandoned her city and the Collective to help the humans escape. The attack had left her shocked. Apparently Quintus had been talking to her during the battle. Now, she stood taller than a day ago. But her rounded eyes told Dom she was unsure about something.
And that made him nervous.
Carissa nodded at Jacob, then at June.
June flashed the Copy a smile. ‘Thanks.’
According to Jacob, Carissa’s growth repressors meant she could not age any more. They were also the only thing keeping June’s foetus at a manageable size. But it couldn’t last.
Another reason they had to return to the city.
Vanessa walked June out. Jacob and Carissa followed them.
Charlie said to Dom, ‘I’ll support whatever decision you make. I know that girl doesn’t have much time.’ He nodded at Thomas. ‘Back to it, son. It shouldn’t be long before the wolves move the boulders out of the way. Until Jacob returns with them, we can shift the smaller stuff.’
‘I’ll help,’ said Kaylie, flicking her eyes to Dom and Anya, then away.
The room cleared until only he, Anya, Sheila and Imogen remained.
Imogen said in a broken voice, ‘I’m sorry for not seeing what Julius was.’
Sheila glared at Anya, as if willing her to do something.
Anya’s shoulders dropped. She stepped forward and hugged Max’s former first in command. Imogen crumpled in her arms. Sheila smiled and breathed out a sigh of relief.
Dom shook his head at Imogen. ‘It’s not your fault. He had us all fooled.’
3
Carissa
Quintus’ instructions to Carissa on the battlefield replayed in her head as she and the Inventor followed June and Vanessa out of the town hall. Quintus had told her to return home, threatening to hurt her friends if she didn’t. In the end, she’d chosen to stay with her friends. That’s when Max, Jason and Warren, along with several soldiers, had been killed. She worried her that her inaction had been the catalyst.
They walked past the trucks parked to the front of the medical bay building. Beyond the camp’s open gates she heard the hum of the anti-magnetic field, back in place while they were not working to shift the boulders.
The Inventor had reassured her that any move to help Quintus wouldn’t have made any difference. He still would have given the order to kill. But she’d never know now. She’d betrayed the Collective by ignoring Quintus’ demands. Then Julius, the newborn with a neuromorphic chip, had taken Alex and Jerome.
Imogen blamed herself for not seeing what he’d been. But if anyone should have spotted the newborn, it was Carissa.
Maybe her friendship with the Inventor had made her soft.
The old man glanced down at her. She smiled, but his deep frown said he wasn’t buying her pretence. She needed more practice to perfect her “game face”. The humans could still see through her.
‘Are you okay?’ he asked.
She nodded, not wanting to talk about what had happened. Not while Quintus’ voice continued to play like an echo in her head. She worried he’d found a way to listen in. He had said her NMC was only damaged and that it could self-repair.
Ahead, June and Vanessa burst through the double doors of the medical bay. Keen to forget about Quintus for a while, she ran to catch up. A distraction might be just what she needed to chase him from her mind.
The old man kept pace with her as she marched up to the first free bed, where Vanessa was getting June settled. The bay was close to full of injured soldiers. Seeing them did little to ease her guilt. She turned her back to the soldiers so she wouldn’t see them.
A medic came over. June winced and protected her belly. It had grown since the day before—approximately one inch bigger on all sides. The foetus was growing again.
The Inventor said to the medic, ‘We need to give her another growth repressor injection. Could you get the syringe ready?’
The medic nodded and walked away.
Carissa’s gaze grazed the soldiers. Some were sitting up. Three additional medics were checking bandaged wounds. Wounds that Copies like her had inflicted.
Her escape from the city, her plan to help the rebels—it had all been for nothing. Max was dead. So were Jason and Warren.
The Inventor shook her arm. ‘Carissa?’
She blinked and refocused on him. ‘What?’
‘I said I need you to roll up your sleeve.’
She blinked again and the medic was back, carrying a large needle that made her shudder. Carissa did as the Inventor asked, sucking in a new breath. But a little pinch was nothing compared to what June must be going through. She couldn’t imagine something stretching her insides so fast; it could burst through her skin at any moment.
June winced again. Carissa closed her eyes and held out her arm. A sharp pinch followed and she inhaled sharply. She opened her eyes to see the syringe now contained a clear fluid—her biogel. The Inventor had assured her she could live without some of her growth repressors. Losing some would not affect her own growth.
She trusted the Inventor more than she did herself. He hadn’t helped to kill anyone recently.
The medic took more repressors from her. June and Vanessa were watching her. She smiled at them, a pathetic attempt to assure them it was no big deal. The medic removed the needle a second time. Carissa swallowed back tears. It bothered her that she was losing more of herself each time. That she was neither
