Unremembered (Unremembered #1)(68)
She takes a deep breath and stands up. ‘We immediately abandoned the usual suspects that scientists had been trying for decades – wormholes, travelling faster than the speed of light, etc. And we focused more on genetics.’
‘Genetics?’ I repeat. ‘You mean a gene that allows you to transplant yourself to another time?’
‘Transesse yourself,’ she corrects with a playful grin. ‘But yes. The transession gene. We were able to develop it in only a few short years. But we could never get it to work in any of our test subjects. We tried to implant the gene in mice and send them a few seconds into the future, or simply across the room, but they never left. And all of them ended up dying a few weeks later. The gene was literally eating them from the inside.
‘Let it suffice to say we weren’t making much progress and Diotech was thinking about shutting the project down. Looking back, I should have just let them.’
‘But obviously you didn’t,’ I confirm. ‘Because we’re both here.’
She nods solemnly. ‘Exactly.’ She presses her hands together and starts to pace in front of the table. ‘One night when I was alone in my lab, I made a major breakthrough. I figured out why the gene wasn’t working. What we had been doing wrong. I was so confident that I had fixed the problem that I implanted the gene directly in myself. Without even testing it on anything else. And I actually was able to send myself two minutes into the future.’
‘Transesse yourself,’ I correct with the same playful grin.
She chuckles. ‘Of course. By that time, however, I was already starting to have serious doubts about the integrity of the company. And the people who were making all the decisions.’
‘People?’ I echo. ‘I thought Alixter is president of the company.’
‘He is,’ she confirms. ‘On paper. But I had suspicions that it was more complicated than that. That there were other people pulling the strings. People much more powerful and dangerous than Alixter.’
‘What made you think that?’ I ask.
‘Diotech started out very small. A five-person company running out of Dr Rio’s basement. And then suddenly, out of nowhere, there was this massive influx of capital. Alixter was very cagey about where the money came from or what it would be used for. But the next thing I knew, we were being moved to an enormous compound in the middle of nowhere. Hundreds more scientists and staff were hired. Security was ramped up to the point of ridiculousness. We couldn’t go anywhere without scanning our fingerprints. We weren’t allowed to leave without clearance, or talk to anyone outside of the compound who wasn’t on a preapproved list. And even then our conversations were all recorded. The whole thing was just . . . eerie.’
Maxxer gets a far-off look in her eyes before shaking her head clear and continuing. ‘Anyway, it wasn’t until we moved to the compound that some of these very expensive (not to mention secretive) endeavours were initiated. Like my own Project White Flower and the project that created you. I know for a fact Alixter couldn’t have funded those on his own. Which means someone – or some group – must have been sponsoring them.’
‘Do you know anything about the project that created me?’ I ask hastily. ‘Like what they were doing to me? Or even why?’
Maxxer shakes her head. ‘Unfortunately not. Your project was kept highly confidential. Only Rio and Alixter were given full clearance. No one else on the compound even knew that the first synthetically engineered human being was living among us. In fact, I didn’t even know you existed until very recently. But I’ll be honest, I’m not optimistic. Alixter is fueled by one thing: money. And whoever he’s working for – well, who knows what’s fuelling them. Whatever the reasons were for creating you, I’m fairly certain it goes beyond just you.’
‘What do you mean?’ I ask numbly.
‘I mean, why create the perfect human only to keep her locked up in a cell all day? I know they didn’t spend trillions of dollars just to admire a pretty face. If they’re trying this hard to find you and bring you back, then the project is not over. I have a feeling you’re just a small piece of a much larger plan.’
I feel my chest tighten to the point of pain. I want to run. Run far. My eyes dart around the poorly lit space for an exit but the only door I see has a steel lock on it. I force myself to stay put and breathe. The inhales and exhales seem to calm me. Not completely. But enough.
Maxxer starts to pace. ‘So like I said, when my breakthrough in the lab came, I was already having misgivings about what Diotech had become. And I was starting to wonder what my research was really going to be used for. It was funny – since the time I started working on White Flower, I never stopped to think about what a technology like transession would do. What kind of repercussions it could have. Especially if it was used for the wrong purposes. I guess in my heart, I never really thought it would work.
‘But it did work,’ she continues. ‘And so then I was burdened with the idea that if I turned my research over to Alixter, I really had no idea whose hands it would end up in. And if something horrible happened, the responsibility would fall on me. I had horrific nightmares about waking up to find that Hitler had won World War II, or that the planet had fallen into a nuclear winter because someone had intentionally changed the course of history. I couldn’t let that happen. So I destroyed the evidence of my success, submitted the final report containing a mock-up of the older, flawed version of the gene, claimed that transession would never successfully work and recommended that the project be shut down. Then I left. And I’ve been hiding out ever since.’