Undiscovered (Unremembered #1.5)(8)
“We’re not doing anything,” I corrected. “I’m looking for dandelions. You insisted on coming along.”
“Dandelions? Why dandelions?”
I shrugged. I wasn’t about to tell Klo or any of my friends what had happened yesterday. If Seraphina lived in a place not even marked on the compound maps, then clearly she was some kind of Diotech secret. And I intended to keep her my secret as well.
“I think they’re … beautiful.”
Klo nearly choked on his spit. “You think they’re beautiful? Are you kidding me right now?” I heard his footsteps crunch to a halt behind me. “Wait a minute. Is this for Xaria? Are you two finally glitching?”
I rolled my eyes. “Flux, no. I told you, I’m not interested in Xaria.”
“You should tell Rustin, then. He’s been spazzing after her for months.”
“He can have her,” I muttered.
“Then what is this for?” His footsteps started up again.
“I just like them.”
“They’re weeds.”
“They’re survivors.”
“I’m sorry. Survivors? Man, what kind of experimental pharmas did you steal from the Medical Sector? And more important, when are you going to start sharing them?”
I turned around to give him an exasperated look. He smiled wickedly back at me.
That’s when, out of the corner of my eye, my gaze landed on something white.
Excitedly, I pushed past Klo and bent down. I plucked the dandelion as close to the root as I could, careful not to shake it in the process. I sealed it in a clear vacuum tube that I’d “borrowed” from one of the aerospace labs and kept walking.
“They tried to eradicate them,” I explained, “but they failed. Somehow they just keep growing and popping up, despite Diotech’s efforts.” I smiled. “I admire their determination.”
“Okaaaay.”
“Like I said, you didn’t have to come.
“No, no,” he insisted. “It’s fine. I’ll help you find your … survivors. Whatever makes you happy.”
*
By the time I left Klo in the Residential Sector thirty minutes later, I had gathered four dandelions. I wished I’d been able to find more, but I figured four was enough. Plus, I couldn’t wait any longer to see her again.
She wasn’t outside when I scaled the wall, and when I knocked on the front door no one answered.
“Sera?” I called, praying that her father didn’t burst through the door and stun me with a Modifier or worse, a Mutie Laser.
A moment later, the door opened a sliver and I saw her vibrant violet eye peer through the crack.
“Who are you?” She sounded small and afraid, very unlike the girl I left yesterday.
“Seraphina,” I said, hearing a pleading quality to my voice that I barely recognized. “It’s me. Lyzender. I was here yesterday.”
The door opened a tad wider and I felt my insides start to untangle.
Until…
“No, you weren’t,” she proclaimed, and the door was slammed shut again.
What?
My stomach twisted. Had I imagined the whole thing? Was I going insane? I couldn’t, for the life of me, figure out what I had missed. What had happened.
I knocked again. “Sera, please. Don’t you remember me?”
“No. I don’t. Please leave.”
The world started to implode around me. Like an uncontrolled demolition. Bam, bam, bam, bam, BAM!
I turned away, feeling dejected and lost. Then I remembered the tube in my pocket. I spun back and pounded on the door again. “Dandelions!” I shouted, half desperate, half terrified. “I found more dandelions. Remember? They’re more beautiful than any other plant. They’re fragile. You wish on them.”
There was a long silence. Too long. And still no answer came.
How could she not at least remember the dandelions? She seemed so entranced by them.
It was like the entire day never even happened…
The thought nearly knocked me to the ground.
I staggered back, stumbling through the yard, until my feet bumped into something hard. A bench.
I collapsed onto it.
Like the day never even happened.
No. They couldn’t. They wouldn’t. To a helpless, innocent girl?
Why?
Memory alterations were for security breaches, for people who saw things they weren’t supposed to see. Did things they weren’t supposed to do.
She didn’t do anything.
She didn’t see anything.
Except me.
The realization exploded painfully in my brain. I leaned forward and buried my face in my hands. It was my fault. It was all my fault. I’m the one who bypassed the VersaScreens. I’m the one who scaled the wall.
I broke in.
And she paid the price.
Or at least her memories did.
They must have taken the whole day. Every reference of me. Every word. Every smile. Every miniscule ounce of her trust that I earned.
To my surprise, when I looked up again, she was there.
Not close. But there. Standing on the porch, peering at me from behind a pillar.
Talk about déjà vu.
“Who are you?” she asked timidly.
I knew right then that I should have run far away from here. I should have leapt that wall and never looked back. If my mere presence was a danger to her, was the reason they wiped her memories, then I shouldn’t be here.