Page 58 of Anarchy Chained: Alpha Thomas

I let that linger until I can’t stand it anymore. “You’re forming an opinion about me.”

“I suppose.”

More silence.

“Well, what is it?”

“Do you care?”

“Why not? We’re stuck here for the duration. Let it all out, Sadie. Hit me with your opinion.”

“Well,” she says, pushing herself up until she’s on her elbows. I can’t see her leg in the darkness, but I decide she’s probably well enough along her little healing journey to sit up. So I help her until she’s got her back against the hard stone wall. Our shoulders are touching, which I find oddly comforting. “I think,” she continues, breathing hard from the effort, once she’s settled. “I think we might be parts of something, you and I.”

“Yes. It’s the most likely answer. But definitely the worst-case scenario.”

“Why?”

“Because they only do that for one reason, Sadie. They pair us up to keep us in control. Have you ever heard of the Alpha-Omega Program?”

“No,” she says. “Not that I remember, anyway.”

“It was a genetic program at my Prodigy school. Maybe they did that at your school too. I don’t know. But the basics go something like this. If your goal is to make a superhuman you’re gonna need a way to control them. There’s only so many ways to control a genius like Lincoln Wade, right? He has super-strength on top of that giant brain of his. Same with the rest of us, although Linc was always the leader in the superpower shit. Thomas kept him in check with the planning, but Lincoln was, is, and always will be the most dangerous Alpha to come out of that school. Regardless of what they think of me and Thomas.

“So you have to have something to hold over him. A threat. They did that by genetically engineering each of us a counterpart. The Omegas were created with one thing in mind. To be able to kill us if we got out of hand. They coded something called inhibition poisoning into our DNA. So if we tried to hurt the Omega, we’d get sick immediately. Like, crippling sickness that makes you double over, fall to the floor, and hug yourself.”

“But couldn’t you kill all the Prodigy people?”

“No,” I say. “They gave us drugs so we’d experience the same effect if we tried to hurt them. Those drugs wear off, but not the Omega bond. That one is forever.”

“Do you think I’m your Omega?”

I shake my head. “No again. This is why I tied you up that first time. I was testing it. Even today, Lincoln can’t physically hurt Molly. She is, and will always be, his worst weakness. But when I tied you up, I felt nothing. So you can’t be my Omega.”

“Well, that’s good, right?”

“You could be something even more dangerous. There’s just no way to tell. I have no clue what they did to you. And you don’t either.”

“But Thomas said my memories will come back.”

“It’s been almost a week, Sadie. I don’t think they’re coming back.”

She ponders this for a few moments. “So… who am I?”

I shrug. “No clue.”

More silent thinking.

“I realize this… past of mine can’t be ideal.”

“Pfft.” I laugh. “Understatement.”

“But it is my past, right?”

“I get it, Sadie. I do. I’m missing parts of my past too. Lots and lots of years. Almost more are missing than I remember. So it sucks to lose something of yourself like that. But do I really need to know what they did to us back when Thomas was in control and I was suppressed? Do you really want to remember those things?”

She huffs out some air. “Yes.”

“Well, I tried,” I say with a sigh. “I don’t entirely believe me, either. I’m pissed as hell about all the years since Prodigy School. The years when Thomas had me locked away while he was off living his life. But it does me no good to dwell.”