Zoe heard a cry and saw that Gina had scurried under the table where Lucy had been tortured and was shaking like a leaf. Lucy had her eyes trained on the cavalry, and Gina tried to make a run for it.
Lucy saw. She let the doctor get a few feet, maybe to let her believe she was going to escape, then she let her electrified whip loose. It struck the doctor’s calves. Shocks rippled up the woman’s body, and she collapsed to her knees. Lucy retracted the weapon and let it fly again. The cord wrapped around Gina’s throat, and with a firm tug she yanked the doctor back, her cries sounding through the room.
Agents still filed into the room, but Lucy gave them no mind as she crossed to Gina, dipping low to grab a scalpel from a fallen tray. Zoe knew what was coming and thought to stop her. But then she remembered the electricity that had been pumped into her system, and she said nothing.
“Please, Lucy, please,” Gina begged as she tried to crawl backward, but Lucy didn’t slow.
She reached the doctor, raised her to sit, and drove the knife through the center of the woman’s chest. Gina gasped, tears rolling down her cheeks, and crumpled as Lucy released her. Gina heaved a few final breaths, blood dripping from the side of her mouth, and then she was utterly still.
“Number Nine,” a male voice called.
Lucy yanked the scalpel from Gina’s corpse and stood, facing the gathered agents, shield still in her left hand, knife in her right.
Director Hammon stepped forward with hands slightly raised. “Enough, Number Nine,” he said, his voice calm and steady.
“My name is Lucy.”
Two agents dared to move, and Lucy flung her tray like a Frisbee in a perfectly straight line at the first, hitting his gun and causing it to blast the ceiling. She used the distraction to roll and grab more scattered medical tools. With inhuman strength and precision she threw them at the two attacking men.
Two scalpels punctured the front man’s throat. Blood gushed out as he stumbled back. Long forceps landed in the second agent’s left eyeball. His screeching wails were enough to make Zoe cringe, blood pouring down his face.
“Don’t move! Don’t shoot!” Hammon yelled. “That’s an order!”
Lucy rolled forward, swept up the neck-scalpel agent’s gun, pushed up to standing, and aimed the weapon straight at the director.
“Do not shoot,” he repeated to the agents. Then back to Lucy, “Number Nine, this isn’t within protocol. Think about your purpose.”
Lucy cocked the weapon, but the director didn’t flinch.
“You murdered all the others like me,” Lucy said.
“Yes, I was following orders. You understand orders.”
“You would have murdered me.”
“So you wouldn’t have murdered them.” He tilted his chin to the bodies piled up around them.
Lucy eyed the fallen agents and medical team, one still whimpering for life, barely hanging on. “You made me this.”
Light danced behind the director’s eyes. “You remember.”
“I’m supposed to be a weapon for good.”
“There is no good. The best we can hope for is progress.”
Lucy shook her head. “No, I will be for good.”
Hammon dropped his hands, new confidence sparking in his face. “You will be whatever I want.”
“No,” Lucy said, but her voice had a slight shake.
“You will follow orders,” he said.
Lucy was shaking her head but saying nothing. Zoe needed to do something, but she was still strapped down to the medical bed.
“You will tell me where Olivia hid the files about Grantham.”
“I want to be more—”
“You are more, Number Nine,” the director started, taking a step toward Lucy. “Grown here, with unbelievable abilities, remarkable talents, fostered, trained, more skilled than most people can imagine. You can’t be anything other than what you are.”
The shiver in Lucy’s voice had moved to her fingers.
“You are the property of the Grantham Project,” the director said. “My property.”
“Lucy,” Zoe called out.
The girl turned at the sound of Zoe’s voice, and for a moment they shared a glance. Lucy, scared like a child.
Then before Zoe could realize what she had done, it happened. Director Hammon nodded to someone in the shadows, and pops from the darkness carried the same tranquilizers they’d used before.
One pierced Lucy’s shoulder. She tried to react and was stronger than she had been in the woods. She managed to swing her gun around and get one shot off. It hit the director in his upper leg, and he swore. Then Lucy wobbled, and five armed men rushed in, disarming her and taking her to the ground.
“Lucy!” Zoe cried out and yanked against her restraints. She knew it was in vain. The drugs still swam through her body, and even if she were free from the hold of her straps, she wasn’t sure she had enough strength to stand.
Others were assisting the director as he cursed through the pain, blood darkening his pant leg. “Get her to a cell,” he ordered, “and get me a doctor who isn’t dead!”
Agents moved on command. Zoe was helpless to do anything but watch. Then Director Hammon raised his eyes and landed on her.
“Take care of her,” he said to an armed agent beside him. “Make it clean. There’s enough mess in here.” The man nodded and signaled to two others.
The director’s words echoed through Zoe’s head as they approached. “Take care of her.” She thought to fight back, her instincts screaming for her to do something, but she was too numb. Too tired. So she just watched them come. Felt them release her and drag her away, one thought playing over and over through her brain.
She was going to die.
TWENTY-SEVEN
HOURS HAD PASSED since they tossed her on the hard floor. The moments dripped by. She wished it was over already. The waiting was more painful than just being dead.
When they came, she wasn’t ready. Her body froze, her mind raced. Surely there was a way to freedom. They grabbed her sore body from the cold ground and yanked her to standing. Three in total—one on either side and a third following directly behind—as they led her out of the holding room and down a long, dim hallway.
At the end of the hallway was a door. It opened and light cascaded in, stinging Zoe’s eyes and causing her to blink. They pulled her into sunlight, exiting the building, the door shutting loudly behind them. The dirt was rough and rocky under her bare feet as they forced her to walk.
The wind nipped at her thin covering, the sun beaming down but providing little warmth. Her mind was swimming, her chest filling with panic as she imagined where they were taking her. Somewhere off the grid, where they could shoot her, bury her, and let her body rot in the ground without ever being discovered.
Or maybe it would be worse than a simple end? Maybe they would toss her in a deep hole and let her starve to death. Let her wither away in the elements. Let her be eaten alive by whatever creatures roamed the woods. Terror gripped her legs, and they stopped functioning.
So they dragged her until they came to the edge of a cliff, and she knew they were going to toss her off. They stood her at the edge, saying nothing. No last words, no instructions, just placed her there as she shivered, staring at the rocky ground a hundred feet below. She heard one of their weapons cock, and she tried to swallow the hard lump in her throat. For a moment she considered jumping. Would it be more painful to land alive or be shot in the back?