"This is Dr. Snow," Jake said to me. "Our leading expert on superhuman biology and technology. She was the one who designed the infinity matrix. She will also be the one giving you your tests. "
"You made the infinity matrix?" I asked her.
"Yes, I did," she said. "You're probably wondering how an eighteen-year-old girl designed technology well enough to be integrated into a person's body while not harming any normal functions- which I might say, is an incredible feat- but I assure you, I am the most suitable-"
"Dr." Jake gave the woman a look that I was sure meant "stop talking."
"Yes. I understand," Dr. Snow said. "But nonetheless, I made the technology and put it in your body just after you were born. It was designed to regulate the amount of energy you released and at what times you released it."
"When I was born?" I was confused. "That can't be right. I got my powers when I turned sixteen."
"No, you didn't," the doctor said. "You had them as soon as you were born. They just weren't available to you yet. Come, let's talk somewhere more private." She glanced at a camera above the door. Then she turned around and walked further into the room behind her.
Inside, there were various types of lab equipment everywhere on top of black lab tables. There were scientists here, too, just like in the dome.
Dr. Snow took us through the middle of the tables, the only place you could walk without bumping into something. She opened a door in the back of the room and went through. We followed, hurrying to catch up with her fast pace.
The next room was much smaller. In it was a desk, some chairs, and what appeared to be an operating table in the corner.
"Ugh, where's the switch?" the doctor muttered. She fumbled around for the light switch.
The lights weren't on? But I could see perfectly fine...
"Here you go." I reached over to the wall and flipped the switch.
"Ah, there we go," Dr. Snow said. She sat in the chair behind the desk. "Shut the door now, please."
Jake closed the door. Then the both of us sat down in the two chairs in front of the Doctor.
"Okay, now, where were we?" Dr. Snow tapped her chin. "Oh, yes. The infinity matrix. You won't understand anything unless I start from when you were born." She watched me carefully. "Don't judge anyone, please. Especially him." She pointed to Jake.
"Alright." I nodded my head.
"When a woman gets pregnant, her baby always has to be checked for anomalies- to see if the child is normal, if it will develop abilities, or if it will have uncontrollable powers that will kill millions."
"This was after the Meta Revolution," Jake explained. "It was one of the new rules to keep anything like that from ever happening again."
"Yes, right," Dr. Snow continued. "So when your mother found out she was pregnant, she checked into Jackson-Estate Hospital. The person who checked her, she discovered what powers the babies would have."
"Babies?" I asked. "There were two? Me and who?"
"Let me finish," Dr. Snow said irritably. "What she found out was that one of the babies would be able to control and produce any type of energy or radiation. The other, unfortunately, would have the same powers, but had a genetic defect- it would have to send out waves of a deadly energy we call the X-factor constantly in order to survive. We don't really know what it is, but that doesn't matter."
Jake snorted. Doctor Snow ignored him.
"According to the law, the baby with the defect should have been killed upon discovery, but your mother convinced her to hold on before making her have the abortion. Apparently, she had some connections that would allow her to 'fix' her other baby." The doctor sniffed in disdain.
"She contacted us-Afterlight. Back then, we were just a new organization trying to discover what made metas...well, metas."
"Of course, we accepted immediately. We couldn't wait to experiment on an embryo still in development." She sighed, probably from some past regrets.
"Eventually, we were able to create a certain type of biotechnology that was able to not only withstand, but control the baby's energy output. It was made of an extremely rare metal- so rare that there was only enough to make one version of the technology."
"When we inserted it into the embryo, it performed perfectly fine, just like its twin. We thought we had made an achievement. We were wrong." Dr. Snow removed her thin-wire glasses and pinched her nose with two of her fingers.
"Apparently, when we inserted the foreign technology into the defect embryo, we didn't account for the fact that the other embryo would be affected as well." The doctor sighed. "Out of our own stupidity, we didn't even check to make sure it was alright."
"After the two babies were born, your mother raised them separately. One of them was brought up here, at Afterlight. That was the defect baby. The other one was raised at home with your mother. It stayed that way for years without incident."
"Then came the accident," I filled in for her.
"Yes. The accident," The doctor said. "By now, you probably know who the babies were."
"I was the normal one," I realized. "Sage was the defect." But wait. Sage said that I was the freak- that I had no powers. That I was the one who had the infinity matrix in me. But if she was the one that needed the technology, then how did I get affected?
"When we injected the infinity matrix into the embryo, we expected it to go straight to Sage- we designed it to do so. But somehow, it split into two pieces: one for you, one for her. And we didn't even know until your sixteenth birthday." She paused.
"On that day, the infinity matrix triggered something in your body that, for lack of a better word, supercharged it. Your powers weren't expected to come until you were well into your twenties, never mind in the way they manifested."
I opened my mouth to speak, but before I could say anything I was quickly cut off by Dr. Snow.
"Of course, that was around the time you became friends with Jake," the doctor interrupted. "He was fresh off the boat, just learning how to use his powers, like you. He was the perfect candidate for us to have someone watch over you. We offered him a job here, and he gladly accepted."
"I was looking for a job, and they gave me a pretty good-paying one for basically doing nothing more than I did already: be friends with you," Jake explained.
"Okay," I mulled this over in my head. "What you're telling me is that I had technology implanted inside of me before birth because of the twin sister no one told me I had. My mom sheltered me from her for my whole life, and my old best friend is just a watchman to keep me in check. Anything else?" I said sarcastically.
"I didn't pretend to be your friend, Jay. We were friends before I was recruited, Doc just said that." He pointed his thumb behind him at the doctor. "She can tell you, seriously."
"I don't know, Jake. I don't think I can trust you anymore," I said coldly. This was just too big of a secret for me to not know about. I needed time to think.
Jake's face fell. I almost wanted to apologize. Almost.
"So really, there's no way to tell why or how you did what you did tonight. I can give you a few tests, but that's the extent of what I can do," Dr. Snow concluded. She purposely ignored the fact that I just dissed Jake.
I wondered how she knew about the events that had transpired tonight. But I didn't question it.
"It sounds like you don't know much about the technology you created," I commented. Really, it did. She created the technology, inserted it into an embryo, then basically just waited to see what would happen. Those weren't the best characteristics of a scientist.
"I...I uh...well, see-" the doctor started, embarrassed.
"That's enough." Jake stopped her with a stern voice. "You know what, I think Jay can get his tests in the morning. He's survived for this long." He got up to leave. "It's time for lights-out anyway. Let me show you the bunks," he said to me. His voice was emotionless, cold like mine.
"I'm staying here for a second," I said firmly. "I have questions."
"Uh, no. Come on." Jake didn't wait for me to go.
"Okay, so-" I started.
"Sorry Jay," Dr. Snow said. "Jake said go. You should listen."
Wow, okay. Looked like Jake was high up on the chain of command here. He had an educated doctor following his orders. "Fine," I said unhappily. I got out of my chair to leave.
"And Jay," the doctor called after me. "Don't believe anything Sage may have told you. She's delusional and out of her mind."
"Got it," I said. Then I left the room and jogged back through the lab to catch up with Jake. I opened the giant white door (it was surprisingly light) and Jake was standing next to the black portal-thingy.
"Ready?" He asked me.
I looked back through the lab, inside of Dr. Snow's office, where the door stood ajar. The doctor was still sitting at her desk, going through papers.
I gasped. Where a woman in a lab coat had sat only moments before had been replaced by a grey, metal-framed robot, a smile and two dots for eyes drawn onto its face. The desk had turned into a steel operating table. On it was a bunch of twisted and broken pieces of metal that vaguely looked like...body parts. In the middle, there sat a head.
And the worst part? The head was smiling.