Ford raised her eyebrows. “True. But that’s only a problem if we are caught killing you.”
A good point that I hadn’t thought of. Very literal and logical.
Zane muttered something under his breath about ducks, and I could feel sweat gathering at the back of my knees.
“Oh, I’ll make sure you’re caught,” I said with a shrug that I hoped conveyed ease, confidence, instead of the horrible, creaking tension in my shoulders. It was like balancing on the edge of a cliff, not sure which way the wind was going to push you—toward solid ground or into stomach-dropping, life-ending nothingness. Not that, of course, any kind of wind was going to move us anywhere with them holding us down.
It was taking every ounce of self-will I had not to struggle against the power binding me. I didn’t need my hands to fire back at them. Knock them over, throw them together in a heap, find and stop their hearts. The power buzzed eagerly in my head and under my skin, building in an automatic response to the threat.
But fighting back would (a) confirm that this was indeed a fight, which I was trying to avoid, and (b) give them an idea of my strength.
My logical side was whispering that that would be a very bad idea. The fact they didn’t know how strong I was—or wasn’t—might be the only thing holding them from an all-out attack. They didn’t want to take the chance of a mission failure. In this case, it was better to let them wonder whether I could beat them rather than to try and prove that I couldn’t. As hybrids, we knew nothing about one another’s capabilities, and that same ignorance that had put Zane and me in danger walking into the school might now save our necks.
“Yes, you are the GTX superior specimen. So we have heard.” Ford’s dark eyes were fixed on me, her gaze boring through my head.
I frowned. “I—”
“But there are three of us against you and a human.” The sneer in her voice, if not actually showing on in her expression, was quite obvious.
I sensed Zane bristling behind me and prayed he would stay quiet.
“You are still so confident?” Ford said.
“Yes,” I said, even though it had sounded more like a statement than a question. But no sense leaving any doubt on the table.
Ford cocked her head to one side, like a bird examining an unknown object.
With a jolt, I recognized the movement as one I used as well. But viewing it from the outside, the foreignness of it sent a chill through me. It screamed NOT HUMAN. No wonder Zane had noticed something off about me, despite my best efforts. Had we inherited that gesture from the alien species from which we’d been made, something buried in the DNA that survived even after it was comingled with the human cells?
I wondered what, if anything, the three of them knew about our genetic donor. My father had always said that a body—alive or dead, he’d never been clear—from the Roswell crash in 1947 had been the source. But I had no way of knowing if that was true. They likely didn’t have any more information than I did, but I felt a pull toward them, a tug of kinship. We were, essentially, four orphans from the same family. If we could compare notes…
“Perhaps we should turn you over to our creator instead for examination and analysis,” Ford said. “He would welcome the opportunity to deconstruct a superior specimen.”
So, no family gabfest, then. Ford’s tone had gone flat again, but I suspected she’d used the word superior in sarcasm. She was really hung up on that whole idea—someone had gone to a great deal of trouble to convince her that I was the real deal. I guess that answered my earlier question of who came first.
“Perhaps our creator would reward us,” she added with enough of a speculative lilt to make my stomach cramp with dread.
I hadn’t given much consideration to the idea that she would sic Laughlin on me; I’d been counting on her hatred of him to rise above everything else. But her desire for advancement and/or preservation of her unit might be stronger. I had no way of knowing what her “home life” at the lab was like.
“Or maybe he’ll just decide he likes her better,” Zane spoke up for the first time, his voice ringing out clear and with a hint of a sneer. “I mean, one of you is clearly the original and the other just an imitation. Which do you think he’d rather have?” Zane continued.
His words stole my breath. “Zane,” I whispered through gritted teeth.
But when I turned to glare at him in warning, he wasn’t looking at me; he was staring defiantly at Ford instead, as if challenging her to deny his words.
I tensed, waiting for the first sign of her attack, prepared to break free and intervene if necessary.
TRUST ME. Zane’s words echoed loudly in my head, his attempt to make sure I heard him.
I winced.
SORRY…
And to my surprise, he seemed to have picked up on something I’d missed. Because Ford didn’t attack. She simply watched him for a moment longer, as if he were a monkey who’d managed to hoot something that sounded like Shakespeare before lapsing into nonsense again, and then she returned her attention to me. “Why are you here?” she asked. “It is an automatic disqualification from the trials to attempt sabotage.”
“I’m not here to sabotage.” Well, not technically. “I just want to talk,” I said.
“There is nothing to discuss. We will meet in the trials and we…I will kill you, proving our…my superiority.”
That had been an odd little hiccup. Perhaps the interconnectedness went deeper than I’d realized. That was the first time she’d referred to herself as an individual entity rather than “we,” and she’d seemed to struggle with it.
Huh. I didn’t know what to make of that, exactly, but I bet I could use it. Surely, all three of them wouldn’t be allowed to compete as a single unit. That meant two of them would be left behind. Carter and the as-yet-silent one, Nixon, most likely.
“Is that what you want?” I asked. “The humans dividing you up, using you for whatever they want, however they want?”
Behind me, I sensed Zane’s spike of alarm at my words. But getting them on our side was vital, and if that meant drawing a firmer line between human and not for the moment, so be it.
And it seemed to be working. The three hybrids inched closer together, as though I was the one threatening to separate them. “Our fate is none of your concern,” Ford said.
And yet, she…they weren’t leaving.
“If we refuse to participate in the trials, then they lose control,” I offered, the words tumbling out as if speed would keep her from rejecting the proposal. “We could leave, do anything we want.”
A faint furrow appeared on Ford’s forehead, as if I’d said something that truly mystified her. “How are you here?” she asked. “What kind of supply did you obtain?”
What? I struggled to keep my expression blank, praying that the silence I heard from them went both ways. They’d done and said nothing to indicate otherwise.
Ford tipped her head to the side slightly, an inquisitive posture that reminded me of the raptors in Jurassic Park seconds before they moved in for the kill. “Did you wean yourself?” she asked rapidly, the speed of her words lending intensity where her expression did not. Whatever she was talking about, it was important. That much was obvious.
But before I could begin to work out how to respond, the door to the room opened, sending a wave of surprise through everyone. The power holding tight around me immediately disappeared, and it was a struggle not to stumble backward.
The teacher who’d confronted Zane and me at the school entrance—I’d dubbed him Mr. Coffee after the stain on his shirt—stuck his head in and scowled at Ford and the others. “What’s going on in here? Did you kick Kyle Wagner out of his practice time?”