I shrugged. I wasn't about to tell Klo or any of my friends what had happened yesterday. If Seraphina lived in a place not even marked on the compound maps, then clearly she was some kind of Diotech secret. And I intended to keep her my secret as well.
"I think they're ... beautiful."
Klo nearly choked on his spit. "You think they're beautiful? Are you kidding me right now?" I heard his footsteps crunch to a halt behind me. "Wait a minute. Is this for Xaria? Are you two finally glitching?"
I rolled my eyes. "Flux, no. I told you, I'm not interested in Xaria."
"You should tell Rustin, then. He's been spazzing after her for months."
"He can have her," I muttered.
"Then what is this for?" His footsteps started up again.
"I just like them."
"They're weeds."
"They're survivors."
"I'm sorry. Survivors? Man, what kind of experimental pharmas did you steal from the Medical Sector? And more important, when are you going to start sharing them?"
I turned around to give him an exasperated look. He smiled wickedly back at me.
That's when, out of the corner of my eye, my gaze landed on something white.
Excitedly, I pushed past Klo and bent down. I plucked the dandelion as close to the root as I could, careful not to shake it in the process. I sealed it in a clear vacuum tube that I'd "borrowed" from one of the aerospace labs and kept walking.
"They tried to eradicate them," I explained, "but they failed. Somehow they just keep growing and popping up, despite Diotech's efforts." I smiled. "I admire their determination."
"Okaaaay."
"Like I said, you didn't have to come.
"No, no," he insisted. "It's fine. I'll help you find your ... survivors. Whatever makes you happy."
By the time I left Klo in the Residential Sector thirty minutes later, I had gathered four dandelions. I wished I'd been able to find more, but I figured four was enough. Plus, I couldn't wait any longer to see her again.
She wasn't outside when I scaled the wall, and when I knocked on the front door no one answered.
"Sera?" I called, praying that her father didn't burst through the door and stun me with a Modifier or worse, a Mutie Laser.
A moment later, the door opened a sliver and I saw her vibrant violet eye peer through the crack.
"Who are you?" She sounded small and afraid, very unlike the girl I left yesterday.
"Seraphina," I said, hearing a pleading quality to my voice that I barely recognized. "It's me. Lyzender. I was here yesterday."
The door opened a tad wider and I felt my insides start to untangle.
Until...
"No, you weren't," she proclaimed, and the door was slammed shut again.
What?
My stomach twisted. Had I imagined the whole thing? Was I going insane? I couldn't, for the life of me, figure out what I had missed. What had happened.
I knocked again. "Sera, please. Don't you remember me?"
"No. I don't. Please leave."
The world started to implode around me. Like an uncontrolled demolition. Bam, bam, bam, bam, BAM!
I turned away, feeling dejected and lost. Then I remembered the tube in my pocket. I spun back and pounded on the door again. "Dandelions!" I shouted, half desperate, half terrified. "I found more dandelions. Remember? They're more beautiful than any other plant. They're fragile. You wish on them."
There was a long silence. Too long. And still no answer came.
How could she not at least remember the dandelions? She seemed so entranced by them.
It was like the entire day never even happened...
The thought nearly knocked me to the ground.
I staggered back, stumbling through the yard, until my feet bumped into something hard. A bench.
I collapsed onto it.
Like the day never even happened.
No. They couldn't. They wouldn't. To a helpless, innocent girl?
Why?
Memory alterations were for security breaches, for people who saw things they weren't supposed to see. Did things they weren't supposed to do.
She didn't do anything.
She didn't see anything.
Except me.
The realization exploded painfully in my brain. I leaned forward and buried my face in my hands. It was my fault. It was all my fault. I'm the one who bypassed the VersaScreens. I'm the one who scaled the wall.
I broke in.
And she paid the price.
Or at least her memories did.
They must have taken the whole day. Every reference of me. Every word. Every smile. Every miniscule ounce of her trust that I earned.
To my surprise, when I looked up again, she was there.
Not close. But there. Standing on the porch, peering at me from behind a pillar.
Talk about dej vu.
"Who are you?" she asked timidly.
I knew right then that I should have run far away from here. I should have leapt that wall and never looked back. If my mere presence was a danger to her, was the reason they wiped her memories, then I shouldn't be here.
"I'm no one," I said as I stood up. I walked slowly toward the wall, preparing to climb it, preparing to spend the rest of my life with an empty hole in my chest.
And then she spoke again.
"Don't go."
I turned and sucked in a breath. The mere vision of her was haunting and soothing and melodic and torrential.
"It's not safe out there," she told me.
It's not safe in here, I wanted to argue.
"I live out there," I told her instead. "I can assure you it's safe."
She shook her head decisively. "It's not safe out there."
The blank repetition of her statement made me shiver.
I dug my fingernails into my palms. "Who told you that?"
But my voice was too forceful. My teeth too clenched. I regretted my frustration the instant I saw her recoil.
"I'm sorry," I whispered, taking a deep breath. "I'm just trying to understand what's going on here."
"I live here."
I sighed. "Yes. You live here. But do you ever leave here?"
She nodded. "My father takes me outside the walls. But I have to go with him. Otherwise it's not safe."
I fought to keep control of my voice, my breathing. It wasn't her that was aggravating me. It was whoever had been doing this to her. Whoever had been confiscating everything she knew, rummaging around in her brain for loose thoughts like one rummages around a messy drawer.
"Where does your father take you?" I asked.
"Today he took me to the beach."
Ice formed in my veins. "The beach."
Her face flashed nostalgic. "Yes. We went this morning."
"It's impossible." I murmured it so softly, I didn't think anyone could hear. But she did. She heard everything.
"Why is it impossible?"
"There are no beaches around here. We live in the middle of the desert."
"You're not correct," she argued. "I went there. With my friends. We played in the ocean."
My eyes closed. My heart slowed. My anger became very clear and focused.
That's when I knew that I couldn't walk away. That I would never be able to walk away.
Something bad was happening here. Worse than I'd imagined. Not only were they taking memories out, they were also clearly putting memories in.
And there was only one reason to do that.
The very reason the Memory Coders have a job in the first place.
To hide things.
"Why did you say you were here yesterday?" she asked, crashing into my thoughts.
"Because I was."
She tilted her head, her recollection of the previous day obviously failing to match my account of it.
"I don't remember that."
I nodded. "That's because someone made you unremember."
This still didn't compute. "Why?"
"I don't know. I want to know. I will keep coming back here until I know."
"Is that why you're here now?"
A faint smile worked its way across my lips. "I'm here now because you asked me to come." I dug out the tube from my pocket. "And because I wanted to bring you these."
Her eyes zeroed in on the four dandelions contained inside, suspended in air, like a moment trapped in time. She took a step forward, then another. I kept my hand as steady as I could, but everything started to tremble as she came closer.
She reached out and took the tube from me, holding it up to eye level.
"What are they?"
"Dandelions," I said, feeling an overwhelming sadness to be having this same conversation all over again.