The Beyond: Dystopian Survival Fiction (The Breeder Files Book 4) by Eliza Green (most popular novels TXT) 📗

the old man. She did trust him. Why, when she’d never met him before?

With a nod, she walked inside the room. A woman with curly, blonde hair waited there. She wore a beautiful, black suit that was perfectly tailored to her body. She looked important.

Agatha gestured to the woman. ‘Carissa, I want you to meet Genevieve. She’s in charge of security in New San Francisco.’

Genevieve offered her hand. ‘Pleased to meet you, Carissa.’

Carissa shook her hand. It felt warm. But something about her felt off.

She stepped back. ‘Who are you?’

Agatha said, ‘Genevieve is one of our synthetics.’

Carissa’s pulse went from a mild thud to an excited frenzy. She stared at the woman. ‘A-are you real?’

Genevieve laughed. ‘As much as you are. Please’—she gestured to a chair—‘let’s talk.’

Carissa sat down and listened while Genevieve explained her position in the city and that synthetics lived side by side with humans.

She couldn’t believe it. ‘Are you saying I can have a life, out there?’

Agatha nodded. ‘Synthetics have the same rights as humans.’

‘As long as they pass your test.’

It’s what Agatha had said to Jacob.

Genevieve laughed. ‘Yes, I’m afraid we must comply with the rules. Mandatory annual testing, to make sure we haven’t gone rogue.’

Carissa’s mind reeled with questions, with the possibilities of what a life in the city might look like. She glanced back at the old man who was leaning against the door.

‘Would I live alone?’

‘If you wanted to.’

She sensed she had never been alone, that there was more to her story than she’d been told. After exiting the machine, the doctor had said she was a reborn, not a newborn—a term that sounded familiar.

She looked at Jacob. He had his arms folded now. Tension lived there.

‘Where will you live?’

He uncrossed his arms. ‘In the city, like you. Like the others. Charlie, Vanessa, Sheila, June, Jerome. We will all have our own accommodation.’

He spoke to her like she was supposed to know those people. But there was only one person she truly knew.

She turned to Agatha and said, ‘I’d like to live with the Inventor.’

She heard a gasp behind her.

Agatha’s eyes widened a fraction. ‘What did you say?’

Carissa frowned and combed over her last words. Genevieve looked as confused by Agatha’s reaction as Carissa was.

‘I said I would like to live with the Inventor.’ She looked back at him, surprised to see tears in his eyes. ‘Is that okay?’

He strode forward and pressed his hands into the tops of his thighs. ‘I never thought I’d hear you call me that again.’ He shook her shoulder gently. ‘I would be delighted with the company, miss.’

34

Anya

2 weeks later

Anya settled into the warm-brown leather sofa. Her gaze roamed the office. Pictures of a family were mounted on the wall, alongside three framed certificates.

A woman dressed in a light-blue blouse and black trousers sat opposite her on a chair that matched the sofa. She had her legs crossed and balanced a screen on one knee.

‘You didn’t answer my question,’ she said.

Anya blinked. ‘What?’

‘I asked you if you’ve settled in yet?’

She’d been in the new city for two weeks. The shock of being surrounded by so much technology had freaked her out; she hadn’t left the base for the first three days. Agatha had arranged for her and the others to receive psychotherapy, to help to adjust to the change. Or to readjust to their old life, as Agatha had put it. According to Agatha, it was too soon—and would be too traumatic—to simply reverse the deeply repressed memories of New San Francisco. Given her current feelings about the city, Anya was in no hurry.

The psychologist waited.

‘Uh, fine.’

Anya smiled in an attempt to end this session sooner, but the woman didn’t look like she was buying it. This was her tenth session—one per day. The others had been forced to undergo similar sessions to gauge their mental stability.

‘I mean, I’m getting used to it.’

The woman nodded. ‘It takes time to adjust from the poverty you had to a city with endless possibilities.’

This psychologist was calling the Region poor but Anya had never felt that way about it. Sure, Praesidium had boasted better tech than the towns, but trade and barter, plus the ability to grow their own food, had not left the townspeople destitute.

Although, one command from the Collective—meaning Quintus—and everything could have changed in an instant. She realised that now.

‘The bright lights—I’m still not used to them. The noise of the city gives me a headache.’

It was the constant hum of cars travelling on the roads above her that bothered her the most. It created a buzzing in her ears.

The therapist nodded. ‘It’s common to feel like that. Your system is in shock.’

‘I suppose that’s what it is.’ She smiled again, done with talking about it. ‘I’m sure I’ll get used to it.’

‘Have you come to terms with what Quintus did to you?’

‘Sure.’

‘You said he had a fixation on you in particular.’

Carissa had told her that. Quintus had decided Anya was the ideal candidate for the Breeder programme. That was before he’d found a way out, using Alex.

‘I’m over it.’

The therapist paused, looking unconvinced. ‘Agatha wants to schedule your mind repression reversal treatment soon, if you want it. That should help this city to feel familiar again.’

‘Why not now?’

‘You’ve all been through a trauma and the process is lengthy. The memories are buried too deep for conventional methods to reach them.’

That must have been why the memory reversal machine the Inventor, Thomas and Jason had built had only unlocked memories from the Region.

She’d lived a lifetime in New San Francisco but she remembered none of it. This city did not feel like home. While she had only