I couldn't stop staring at my hands. They looked normal, same calloused palms, same dirt under the nails, same scars from years of clumsiness and failed attempts at being useful. But they didn't feel normal. They felt like they belonged to someone else, someone who knew what the hell they were doing.
I flexed my fingers and watched as tiny sparks of something flickered between them, like miniature lightning caught in a bottle. Except there was no bottle. Just me, standing in the middle of a wasteland surrounded by the bodies of things that used to be people, trying to figure out if I'd gone completely insane.
"Okay, Hajidan, get it together," I muttered to myself, shaking my hands like that would make the weirdness go away. It didn't. "You're not crazy. You're just... processing. Yeah, processing."
But what was there to process? That I'd somehow gained powers from killing mutated beasts? That my body was healing itself faster than it had any right to? That some invisible voice was tracking my progress like I was a character in one of those video games my little sister used to play?
My little sister.
The thought hit me like a punch to the gut, and suddenly I couldn't breathe again. Her face was a blur in my memory, just like my parents' faces, just like so much else that should have been clear. I knew I had a sister. I knew I loved her. But when I tried to picture her smile or hear her laugh, there was nothing but static.
Teresa's words echoed in my head: "Looks like someone messed with your memory."
"Who?" I shouted into the empty air. "Who messed with it? And why?"
The wind picked up, carrying with it the smell of blood and decay. I needed to move. Standing here talking to myself wasn't going to bring back my memories or save anyone who might still be alive. If anyone was still alive.
I wrapped the bandage back around my torso, even though the wounds underneath had mostly closed.
It felt wrong to just let Ginta's effort go to waste, even if my body was apparently doing its own thing now. Besides, the pressure felt good, like it was holding me together in more ways than one.
The path Ginta had taken led deeper into the mountain range, towards what looked like an old mining operation. Rusted equipment littered the ground, and the remnants of wooden structures jutted out from the earth like broken teeth. This place had been abandoned long before the meteorite fell, probably decades ago. No one came up here anymore. Too dangerous, too remote, too much nothing.
Which made it the perfect place to hide something. Or someone.
I picked my way through the debris, keeping my makeshift weapon ready. The branch was slick with blood now, most of it not mine.
"Ginta?" I called out, my voice cracking. "Where are you?"
No answer.
I pushed forward, past a collapsed shed and around a massive boulder that had probably rolled down from higher up the mountain. That's when I saw it, a structure that didn't belong. It was too new, too intact, too deliberately hidden behind camouflage netting and strategically placed rocks.
It was a bunker.
My pulse quickened as I approached. The entrance was sealed with a heavy metal door, the kind you'd need a code to open. Or a key. Or someone on the inside to let you through.
I was about to knock when I noticed something carved into the rock beside the door. Numbers. 047.
My breath caught. That was the same designation the mechanical voice had called me. Subject 047.
"What the hell is going on?" I whispered.
Before I could process that, I heard strange sound behind me.
I spun around, branch raised, and my heart nearly stopped.
"Dad?"
The man standing before me looked like he'd been through hell. His clothes were torn and stained with dried blood, his face was gaunt and covered in scratches, but it was him. It was my father. The face I couldn't remember clearly suddenly snapped into focus, like someone had adjusted the lens on a broken camera.
"Hajidan," he breathed, and his voice cracked. "Oh god, you're alive. You're actually alive."
I dropped the branch and stumbled toward him. "Dad, I thought... I thought you were dead. I thought everyone was dead."
I reached out to hug him. But my hand passed right through his shoulder like he was made of smoke.
I jerked back, staring at my hand, then at him. "What..."
"I'm sorry, son," my father said, and his image flickered slightly, like a television with bad reception. "I'm not really here. This is a holographic projection."
"A hologram?" My voice came out strangled. "You're a hologram?"
"I had to find a way to reach you without putting myself in danger. Without leading them directly to me." His expression was pained. "I've been tracking you since you left the city. Watching through surveillance systems, hacking into whatever cameras and sensors I could access. When I saw you heading toward this bunker, I knew I had to warn you."
"Warn me about what?" But even as I asked, dread was already settling in my stomach.
"About Ginta. About what he really is." My father's holographic form moved closer, though I knew touching him would be useless. "Hajidan, everything he's told you has been a lie. He didn't save you out of compassion or friendship. He saved you because you're valuable."
"Valuable how?" My hands clenched into fists.
"Everyone keeps saying that. That I'm special. That I'm different. But no one will tell me why!"
"Because you're Subject 047. You're their most successful experiment." My father's voice was heavy with guilt. "And I'm the one who made you that way."
"I worked for Gimda Corporation. I was one of their lead genetic researchers. They recruited me fifteen years ago with promises of changing the world, of pushing humanity to the next level of evolution."
"You worked for them," I repeated numbly. "You worked for the people who did this."