Part 22 (1/2)

Nothing is making any sense! Not the great white doors of the Capital Building opening to welcome me and Ang, not my boot-steps on the white carpet inside.

*Give me your jacket to hold,' orders Uncle Mentira.

*Watch where you're walking,' says Ang. *You nearly tripped over my dress hem.'

I nearly trip over thin air I'm so dazed.

Ang claps a hand over her mouth. *Look who's going to be giving us our medals! They'll be twice as special now . . .'

Marina Furey is there in full uniform, her own medal glinting. This has got to be a dream. No, I scratch my arm and it hurts.

*What a surprise!' Furey cries, shaking our hands vigorously when it's our turn to be presented in a blindingly bright hall. *Well deserved, girls, well deserved!'

I just gawp. How can I look this amazing woman in the eye when I've just touched her skin and seen how she dies?

*What are you doing here?' I ask in a hoa.r.s.e voice.

*All last-moment!' she grins. *An ac-req from Aura, a rush for the train a” spick and span uniform waiting for me to mess!' Under cover of hugging me she whispers in my ear, *I can tell from your face you'd rather be back with the squadron too. Don't worry, we won't spend the rest of the war sitting here stuffing our faces. I'll see we get back to Sea-Ways.'

I know she will. I've foreseen it.

I blink away that vision and stare where Furey's pointing a” a room-long banquet table loaded with more food than we see in a week at Sea-Ways. Zoya would be dribbling at the mere sight of such a feast, especially now rations on the squadron are tighter than ever.

Furey talks normally again.

*It's great to see you get all this praise, Rain. You've earned it, every last bit. I'm proud of you. The squadron are proud of you. Tilly says h.e.l.lo, by the way.'

Her face shadows. It must've been awful to leave Tilly behind. I wish she hadn't! I wish none of this was happening!

Ang lifts her Hero medal high, to be captured by cameras and spread to every screen in the Nation. I manage a couple of mechanical smiles, that's all. Big army soldiers are next in line for their awards.

Time seems to compress. I'm at the buffet. I'm holding a drink. I'm saying, thank you, thank you, thank you and hearing my name repeated. The room is too white. I need to get out of here!

Be careful what you wish for . . .

*Please, Uncle Mentira, can I just go somewhere and be quiet?'

*Exactly what I've been thinking all along,' he says, suddenly at my side. *Come this way, through here, just along here, not that door, this one . . . Yes, it's part of the hub laboratory. Sit there and wait. No a” I said, wait. The door's not yet locked but it could be. It will be. Not that it needs to be. You won't try to escape, will you? I know you'll be a good girl for me . . .'

How clever they feel, tricking me like this. How smug they are, in white uniforms, with black tattoos inked on their eyelids. How small I am, suddenly chained to a chair with bane-metal round my boots. Needles stab into my arms and legs. Pads press on to my head. I'm hooked to a humming machine.

White walls, white floor, white ceiling. Whites of eyes as they lean in to peer. White lights in my eyes as they probe. White ice in my veins as I s.h.i.+ver with fear.

It's some kind of laboratory, one of the laboratories in the hub where Aura is housed. I'd never have come here if I'd known. Was Furey in on the trick? Was Ang? Was Reef? I can't bear to believe it. If I sit very, very still and do as I'm told will they think I must be normal after all and let me go home a” wherever home is now?

*Have a drink,' says Uncle Mentira.

*I'm not thirsty.'

*I didn't say you were. Drink anyway.'

*What is it?'

*Just drink, please. Down in one, or little sips. Do you need a straw?'

I need all this to stop.

*She won't drink it,' announces Uncle Mentira.

*She'll drink it,' says one of the Scrutiners in the room.

They're all wearing stretchy fibre gloves the colour of dead flesh. They pull my head back. I clamp my mouth shut. They jab my jaw to prise it open. Some of the liquid trickles in. I sick it back up again, all over my gold dress.

*So sorry,' murmurs Uncle Mentira. *It's necessary. Required. Essential. How are you feeling?'

*Cold.' That's the only word I can get out.

*Really? Here's your jacket.' He wraps it round my shoulders. *No, leave all those pads and needles. We need to keep monitoring your vital signs. Just be good and everything will be all right. We don't want to hurt you.'

Be a good girl. Aren't I being good? Aren't I doing almost everything I'm told in the hope that if I don't sprout up I won't get yanked out? Except I know what people do to weeds. I look around for any sign of Slick.

Uncle Mentira smiles with his mouth, not his eyes. *We won't keep you here any longer than we need to. It's the science, you see. Always, with me, the science, the chemistry. These blood samples shown here on the screen, they've been puzzling me for a long time, but now we've got you we'll be able to set up experiments to explain them.'

I shake my head. *I don't know what those pictures are.'

*Of course you don't. I'll tell you. The image on the left of the screen is your blood, greatly magnified. Pretty, isn't it?'

*Is there something wrong with it?'

*Oh no! It's perfectly normal.'

*Then why . . . ?'

*Look at the second image.'

*Is that one abnormal?'

*No! All nice and normal too.'

*Then . . . I don't understand. They both look the same.'

Uncle Mentira punches his fist in the air. *Ha! You've got it. We'll make a scientist of you yet. They are both one hundred per cent exactly the same, which is why we're so intrigued because the sample on the right belongs to someone else. Not a twin, not a sister, not a blood relation of any kind. We took it from a girl named Haze a” yes, you know her. Ah, before you ask, yes we did check there wasn't a mix-up in the blood-taking. Absolutely none at all.'

*I swear I never met Haze before I joined the squadron.'

Uncle Mentira nods kindly.

*It's all right. I know you're telling the truth. We had no records of her either. Why would we? She lived in the woods all her life, no better than a wild animal. Still, you must admit the physical resemblance is striking. She's thickset from hard work and tanned from sun exposure. Ignorant, of course, without the benefit of your education. Simple coincidence, a non-scientist might have thought. Then Aura flagged up the match in your blood samples. Impossible for two people to be so exactly the same. We began to speculate. We wondered what would happen if we let the two of you interact. I studied the Scrutiny reports myself. Her behaviour can all be explained by superst.i.tious irrationality on her part. You, my niece, were more puzzling. How very normal you seemed in every respect.'

*I am normal.'