BOOK OF MIA: 2081
Chapter 19: Chipped
I chomp on a piece of apple from the fruit bowl on my food tray. I eye Huff and I eye Puff, the two guards I've dubbed thus. One because he huffs a lot, like this little detail of 'keeping an eye' on me is boring — boring and beneath him. And Puff, because that one looks like he is always midway through a bee sting allergy. His face is always red and puffy. Could be from living in our hazardous world.
They have become unshakable shadows this past week as I recover in the general ward. I haven't yet seen Nate at all, despite demanding it several times. Guess it fell on deaf ears. Geeta, the only nurse they trust near me, tells me he is recovering and should be fine. Just a little 'complication' during surgery, nothing 'fatal'.
Nothing 'fatal', and 'not to worry', in the same sentence as a 'little complication'? Damn right, I'm worried. I have to see him for myself. If something happens to him while I sit here with my extra security, dad will have a few things to say, and there's no way I can face his parents.
Tonight. That's my plan. Tonight I'm going to give Huff and Puff the slip. I don't know how yet, but I'm working on it. Once I slip them, I will locate Nate and see for myself whether I need to worry.
I crunch the apple and glare at Huff from my lonely table. The entire mess hall is full of others with their breakfast. At least let me mingle, but nooo... They can't have that, Dr Hill's orders. Who the hell does that woman think she is? The dictator and I'm the dictatee? Is that even a word, dictatee?
I crunch another piece, pondering. Bet Nate would know, since he's the one with a freakish computer brain. That's Nate. "So how many floors are in this bunker?" I ask Huff and Puff. Is it obvious what I'm trying to do? I hope not.
Huff doesn't even throw me his usual sneer.
I turn to Puff. "When was this place built?"
Nothing. I don't even get a puff. How rude.
These days, I feel like I'm talking to myself. Besides the hour or two with Dr Hill while she runs weird tests on me or with me, I have limited human interaction. To be honest, I'm creeping myself out. I'm beginning to wait for her sour face with a smidge of eagerness. At least she talks to me, even if it is to ask questions — really random questions — or jab needles in my arm, or hook me to this machine or that. My arms would look like a mosquito feast if I didn't heal fast — unusually fast. My fastest vanishing needle hole? One minute. One damn minute and bam — nothing. My skin is as good as new — and she didn't even notice! I'm disappointed.
Huff's radio crackles with an order from Hill that I am to be brought to her lab immediately, and without ceremony, they snatch away my food and I get dragged to my feet. Marching orders.
"Move it!"
"All right, all right. I'm going." I shrug Huff's gruff hand away and ponder if I should change his name to Gruff. The man needs moisturiser. Bucket-load of moisturiser!
As we near Dr Hill's lab, I notice the dark little alcove we always pass. Whenever I ask these numb-nuts where it leads, they ignore me, or say "None of your business!"
But it is my business. Something about that alcove calls to me. Like all the answers lay there. How silly does that sound? For old times' sake, I ask again, "Go on. You can tell me. Where does that lead?"
I'm ignored again. But I don't need an answer, anyway. Geeta told me on the second night of tests. Something about it being a private lab of the scientist who founded the facility, Dr Amoure, Armour, or Moore? — or something like that. Geeta had mumbled the name, perhaps on purpose, so I couldn't catch it.
Huff pushes me towards the good doctor.
"So what do you have for me today, doc?" I grin. Half loathing her and wishing I could shoot laser darts through my eyes like Superman.
She points to the treadmill set up inside a cage that sits in the middle of the room where she's conducted many, many tests on me this past week. A giant hamster wheel? — and I'm the hamster.
"If you are checking my stamina? I should tell you I'm a terrible runner!" I try to break the ice. What is it with these people and their lack of humour? Did someone remove all their funny bones? The glares I get could skin a cat.
Her assistant grabs me by the arm as if I've been a naughty child and shoves me into the cage. The man is getting rougher each day. "T-shirt off!" he barks, as if I don't already know the drill.
"No!" I cross my arms, cause YOLO. Besides, I'm tired of being bossed around. For Pete's sake, even my mum doesn't get this much compliance out of me on a good day.
"T-shirt off, little girl." He holds up EKG's leads in his hand. "I have to put these on you so we can monitor your heart."
I hesitate. He's a man twice my age. I hug my chest, aware of my situation there. Every day, we do this dance. I feel awkward about my missing breast and he gets cranky and gives me that bored look that says, 'Relax, kid. I'm not interested in you. Just science.'
"Hurry up," he barks again — and here comes the sigh.
I jut my jaw out and shake my head.
"Look, kid, I need to put the leads on you so I can make sure she doesn't push you until you keel over and die from a heart attack."
I dare to shake my head a little, though the man has a point. We cannot trust Dr Hill to know when to say enough.
Exasperated, he takes a step towards me and whispers. "Will it help you, to know I'm gay?"
I nod. It does, but only a little. I see the hesitation on his face. He isn't happy about forcing this on me either, but I'm guessing he doesn't have a choice.
"Alright, here's what we're going to do. You're going to lift your t-shirt. And I'm going to put these on you quickly, and then you get on the treadmill and do as she tells you."
I nod. Lifting my t-shirt up with a cringe, shut my eyes, and brace myself for the cold kiss of the pads on my skin. Seconds later, he says he's done and I hear one word over the intercom. "Ready?"
We both nod. As ready as I'll ever be to run. Note: I'm going to die!
To my surprise, I don't break a sweat or run out of breath. To Dr Hill's immense surprise, my heartbeat barely hovers above normal. I run at the fastest speed setting and the steepest incline the machine offers, and still nothing. I'm a freaking machine. Take that, Nate!
Too bad Hill doesn't share my enthusiasm as she joins me in the cage after a good two hours of me not breaking a sweat. She listens to my heartbeat and airflow with her stethoscope. At one point lifting the t-shirt to check on the scar tissue around the injured site.
"It's looking good. Amal, check Dr Strasbourg's schedule this afternoon and see if he can do the augment on her." She lets my t-shirt fall back and smiles at me — warmly. "Let's see if we can make you whole. I can't bear to look at that another day!"
Sometimes I swear I don't know if Hill is evil or not. She borders on sincere some days and then wham, hits me where it hurts. In the feels. I'm leaning towards 'less evil' right this minute.
Her assistant behind her nods and leaves the room to call this surgeon. Doctor Hill studies my face.
"I wonder what else you can do, Mia. Even elite soldiers with the best of the best CodeTech break a sweat at least."
"I thought you weren't CodeTech?" I narrow my eyes at her.
She laughs. "You're standing inside the original CodeTech facility. What makes you think we aren't CodeTech? But you're right. We are the original CodeTech, not your government's version. So my question still stands, Mia Love. What do you have in you if it's neither ours nor theirs?"
"How do you know my name?" I blurt. It's the one thing that's been bugging me since they dragged me out of that river. I gave them my first name for sure, but I've never told them my last name. So how does she know it?
She grabs my wrist and skims the skin until she finds what she is looking for. Then she grabs my arm and lets me feel the tiny bump moving just under the skin within the muscle layer of my forearm.
"It's called a microchip. Old tech. They used to use it to tag pets. Cats, dogs. It was for ID and medical records, and to find the owners so they could return the critters. You have one in you." She lets go of my arm. "We scan everyone we bring in from the outside using all detectors available to us. We must protect what goes on in this lab, you understand."
"Doctor Hill, Strasbourg has the afternoon free after two." Amal pops his head in, the phone still to ear.
"Book her in," she replies without breaking eye contact with me. Once I see him leave, she smiles. "Whoever you belong to, they put that in you, in case you got lost, and someone found you."
Could it be my parents? But why would they use this old tech, the microchip? I already have the Codex in me. The Hive can track and trace my whereabouts, within a centimetre, anywhere on the globe. Why would they need a microchip?
"So you can have me returned?" I hesitate to ask.
"No, not exactly. This one has instructions that are a little beyond your pay grade."
What? Beyond my pay grade? It's my chip, lady. Geez, that sounds so odd, even in my head.
"What does it say?" I press anyway.
She smiles and turns to leave. "You tell me your secrets first and then I'll tell you mine."