“Hello, Father,” I said, in a crisp blue button-down and black slacks and patent shoes, trying my best not to sweat. It was a new day, and my situation did seem less dire after getting a few hours of sleep on Penny’s couch.
I spun back and forth on one of the Cog Lab’s wheeled desk chairs. Penny kicked me lightly under the table until I stopped. She wanted us to be seen together at work, because she thought it might help put Father at ease.
“You’re not at home,” Father replied, peering at me through the computer screen. There were distorted sounds cutting through our call. Still, I clearly heard the disappointment in his voice, even with the discordant clamor of various businesspeople coming and going in the background. What stuck out to me mostof all was that he didn’t seem surprised: Father had counted on me to mess up.
“She’s been staying with me,” Penny chimed in. She elbowed me out of the way to speak. “Helga was lonely by herself—it’s not good for her development. I thought she could live with me when we weren’t busy in the lab. Naturally, I’ve been keeping up with her routine tests.”
Penny didn’t stumble over the lie, even though she hadn’t made me do a single test in her apartment or the lab. I hoped Father would be happy seeing the two of us together at the lab, but instead, his brows knit together.
“I suppose it’s fine that she’s staying with you, Penelope, and it’s good to see you both busy at work. However, you shouldn’t call her Helga. The more she hears the name Marietta, the more she’ll get used to it.”
My heart plummeted. But at least Penny wasn’t testing me and was okay with lying to Father about what I’d been up to. He’d probably pass out if he knew I’d stayed up all night with a Downhill boy.
I didn’t blame Penny for keeping an eye on me and making me come to the lab with her, especially after what had happened with Clyde. What if he figured me out? What would he even do?
“Marietta’s your name,” Father reminded me. “And Penelope, you need to be very careful. You know that no one can see her. No one can know who she is. I need to get through this conference, and then I’ll take care of everything.”
“Of course, Doctor,” Penny said, lying through her teeth. “No one’s seen her. We’ve been very careful.”
“Good.” He smiled. “You’re both eating well?”
It was rare to see him remotely relaxed. I wasn’t sure if I remembered him ever smiling. Maybe Penny was right; maybe in time, Father would see that I was perfect the way I was.
It was already extremely hard, juggling the different stressful things I had going on. I fiddled with the buttons on my shirt and tuned out Penny and Father’s small talk. Next to the bank of computers, the row of pink Cogs gurgled, processing new data.
It was strange hearing Penny talk about data models she was working on for the lab, because this progress potentially related to me. The result could be tied to my own fate.
Was there a better Marietta waiting to replace me?
Even through the computer screen, Father made me antsy. No matter what I did and how I acted, I knew that I was somehow letting him down. I knew there was some hidden test I was failing.
“I need to get back to the conference,” Father said. He looked at me through the screen, his expression sharp behind those reflective glasses. “Is there anything you want to ask me, Marietta? Otherwise, I will check up on you later.”
There were so many questions I could have asked him. Why did you make me? Did you really want to change my Cog? Why was there this random song in my head, anyway?
And why couldn’t you tell me, just once, that you love me?
But I knew asking any of those things would only cause further disappointment. Whether face to face or through computer screens, there was always some barrier between us, visible or not.
“I hope you have a great conference,” I said, and that was all.
As soon as he hung up, I unbuttoned my shirt, kicked off my shoes, and let out a very long sigh.
The morgue might’ve been bad, but the lab was honestly worse.
At least in the morgue, the corpses were whole. Here, the parts were either grafted into perfection or discarded like the rotten girls behind the steel lockers.
This whole room felt eerily austere. Lights dimmed where Penny needed them to. The temperature was perfectly controlled. Everything bent and shifted to Penny’s needs; everything was meant to serve the scientists—even the island itself. The Institute extracted geothermal energy from Mount Amaris through the drills I could faintly hear even now, incessant and methodic like the pattering rain.
I watched Penny typing away on the computer. A pink wire was lighting up—the information was being transferred from computer, through wire, to the Cog.
“We’re experimenting with implementing system intent,” she said, chewing the ends of her pink hair. “It’s part of most automated objects, but we hadn’t used it for Cogs yet.”
“You mean I don’t have system intent,” I said flatly, which caused her to stop typing.
“Yes,” she said, whirling around in her desk chair. “You don’t have system intent. You perform whatever actions you want.”
“Is that why I’m a failed experiment? Because I don’t do exactly what Father tells me to?”
Penny looked stricken. “Helga, you’re not an experiment. You’re a living person. You were from the moment you woke up.”
What was even the long-term purpose of this place and the research she was doing? It didn’t seem remotely good. I hated this stupid lab. I hated this stupid Institute.
“I need lunch,” I told Penny sullenly.
“Can it wait a few minutes? I’m in the middle of something.”
“No. I’m hungry now, and I can’t leave because you said someone might see me.”
Penny got up with a sigh. “I’ll be back soon. Don’t leave and don’t—don’t do anything. Got it?”
“Sure,” I said.
As soon as she left the room, I went snooping.
There was the anatomical side of the lab to investigate, and then there was the Cog side. I was tempted to pull open another steel locker on the anatomical side and put the Marietta uniforms over a Bunsen burner. There was also this deep compulsion in me to see the bodies again—the rotten girls who were festering behind closed doors so that I could live.
I wanted to compare my hair to theirs and touch their rotting green hands. I knew I could have spent hours there, equally disgusted and fascinated by death and decay. I was so close to it—to them. The girls who didn’t make it.
Then there was the tech side of the lab, where computers and Cogs were lined up in orderly rows. I could get insights from either the computers or the bodies.
But the computers were a direct extension of Father’s mind. The computers could show me what he’d initially created, and what could be coming next. These clues would be easier to parse than the ones hidden in the various bodies, in the rot and decay. And maybe the computers were less creepy too.
Penny was coming back soon. I probably had twenty minutes total, if that.
I sat down at a computer and typed in the word “Marietta.”
Immediately, hundreds of files came up. They were neatly organized by category. There was so much data to sift through. I pulled up Prototype_V1 and saw mockups of a girl who was surely decomposed by this point. Thinner, shorter, more breakable than me.
I pulled up CharacterTraits_Final and saw a dashboard of my own characteristics. There were growth models for Strength, Intellect, and Determination.
The bank of computers hummed. Behind them were the gurgling Cogs. Then I was seized with a sudden idea.
A chill spread through me, even as I sweated in my uncomfortable button-down. I plugged a pink wire into the computer I was using and, before I could think better of it, got up and plugged the other side into one of the Cogs behind it.
My hands were covered in cold slime from the vat. I wiped them off on my business-casual pants. I suppressed a sudden urge to laugh. This whole thing was so wild, so beyond me, even when it was me.
I shouldn’t be doing this at all, I knew. But Father had done it. Penny had done it too.
I opened a blank file, TestDataModule_TraitDialogue, and scrolled until I found a category that seemed interesting. Compassion. I could use someone in my life with more of that, for sure.
I ran the test for maximum growth in Compassion. The time estimate for completion was five minutes, then three. It was rapidly processing. I wanted to laugh again, for reasons I didn’t quite understand. My whole body coursed with nervous anticipation.
I heard something behind the computer—a sloshing sound. I looked to see that the Cog I’d plugged in was moving. It was beginning to spasm. The gurgling became higher pitched. The Cog thrashed against the vat.
I exited the program midprocess, and, slowly, my heart rate decelerated. The Cog was quiet. I was a bit horrified by my own excitement, given that I was a product of this kind of work myself. But the pros outweighed the cons, and I knew I had to continue.
I didn’t have much time before Penny returned. One more file at most. But there were so many to choose from. I found myself with decision paralysis.
I could look at Father’s Cog presentations and see what he was telling other scientists. I could look at files for the old Mariettas or even files for the final version: myself.
But instead, I went for a file that was strangely labeled. It didn’t follow the proper file-naming system that Father had set up. It was a simple note documentation titled “X”.
I opened the file, bracing myself for whatever I’d find. Inside there was only one line:
Progress can only be made going forward. At what cost?
It was like peering inside Father’s head for once, instead of the other way around. Reading it made me feel weird, like I was intruding on something even more private than proprietary Institute data.
The door handle jiggled, and I immediately exited the program, got up from the computer, and busied myself with one of the dusty anatomy textbooks along the wall.
“I love learning about organs,” I lied as Penny walked through the door. “I can’t get enough of them.”
She handed me a wrapped ham-and-Swiss sandwich, not looking impressed in the slightest.
“We need to talk,” she said. “I overheard a very interesting conversation at the canteen. One of the PR interns was loudly complaining about a girl who’d stolen her boyfriend. Who’d seemingly come out of nowhere.”
Shit.
“Oh,” I said, grimacing. “That’s Anna.”
Apparently, I had something new to worry about.
“The marketing department is close to the lab,” Penny frowned. “You’ll have to be careful navigating Uphill and Downhill. We don’t want her asking any more questions about you.”
This, in addition to dealing with Clyde, Father returning from his business trip, and a total lack of suitable boyfriends. Life was really fucking unfair.
“I didn’t steal Clyde! I don’t even want him.” It was a good thing that I had such an amazing Cog, because arriving at the conclusion that Clyde sucked any later than I already had would’ve caused me even more pain and aggravation.
Penny rolled her eyes. “I told you; no Downhill DJs are dateable. But that’s not the big issue here.”
The big issue was, of course, people finding out that I’d been born in a lab. Especially while Father was away and my future seemed so uncertain. It was spectacularly, nerve-wrackingly bad timing. Anna and Clyde already had their suspicions. Clyde had even heard Penny mention the doctor, just last night. If he ever found out who my father was …
It would cause a whole lot of trouble.
My life remained murky and unclear. It hinged on so many things out of my control—Father, the Institute, what other people would think of me if they knew the truth.
But I wanted to be in control of my own future. And I really wanted a boyfriend too. And so what? Was that such a crime these days?
Neither Penny nor Father had expected me to wake up. But I was here now, and I deserved happiness.
“All that stuff you’ve said might be true, and maybe I should be more careful. But you promised you’d help me with my soul mate. And I can’t find him if I’m trapped inside all day, hiding from everyone.”
“Helga …” Penny sighed.
“You promised.”
Penny’s face tightened. She looked at her black bag, tapping her foot. She kept chewing the inside of her cheek. I was pretty sure she wanted a cigarette. She seemed stressed as hell.
“At least help me until Father gets back,” I added. “You can help me with things to look for and things to avoid. And if you know any good places to meet someone, let me know. It’s definitely not in here.”
Because all that was in here were piles of body parts and computers. And Cogs.
I thought of the one Cog I’d controlled, lurching against the vat, gurgling in a high-pitched voice. Compassion had given it some life. There were other traits I would have liked to add, if only there’d been more time before Penny came back.
The highest level of compassion, plus my own traits. Strength, intellect, determination. Some humor. Maybe even modules for romantic poetry. Music history, especially related to the new genres I enjoyed.
Mutability: a capacity to belong anywhere.
“I still have to work, you know,” Penny said. “My landlord’s raising the rent on my apartment soon. I need to save money. I can’t lose my job, not even for you. I’m sorry, Helga.”
“You wouldn’t have to,” I promised. “I just need a little help.”
Penny hemmed and hawed. She alternated between making excuses and musing to herself about what she could do. I knew that I could probably convince her to see things my way, but there wasn’t much time left to do it.
Something was dawning on me. This lab had everything I needed to make a perfect Cog.
All I needed now was a perfect exterior to match.
Something thrummed through me that wasn’t me. It was coming from outside of my body, coming from outside of this building. First the keyboards rattled like teeth, and then Penny’s face tightened.
It was bigger than me and bigger than Father. Bigger than all of us.
On the organic side of the lab, a silver scalpel clattered to the floor. And then everything went still.
“Just a ground tremor again,” I said. “Isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” Penny said. Her voice was light—so light it felt deliberately calibrated. “It has to be.”