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PROLOGUE
TALIA
Blowing out a nervous breath, I crane my neck back to once more look at the place I will be working. Nano Industries, which is a lab here in Athesa’s residential district, is spectacular.
The tallest building there is, it’s a shining beacon throughout the city, and I get to work there. More than that, I get to make a difference and change the way we live. Nano hired me for my specialty training in genetics, but my true passion is something I can’t tell them yet, not until I earn their trust. I know I will have to work my way up from the bottom, but hopefully, after I complete the research they want and give them the results, I can look into what I want—no,needto.
I want to research the effects the cultivated food we are making is having on the poorer section of our world, especially regarding the children. My eyes flick to the slums I can just glimpse behind the taller buildings. I’ve been there a few times, trying to help as much as I could, handing out food and clothes, but after the last time, when I gave a little girl a coat and I found her with her throat slit for it the next day, I stopped going. I knew I couldn’t help that way. No, I needed to do something bigger and more important to change our way of life.
While we live across the bridge with more food and riches than can be counted, they suffer with diseases that were eradicated years ago, ailing health, and even birth defects that could easily be avoided. A lot of it stems from the food rations that are handed out every now and again, but it’s more than that. It’s affecting the kids on this side now too. It is rare, and the cases are few and far between, but my friend at the hospital let me look at their readings and I was right.
Our bodies and chemistry are changing.
I need to figure out why and how to stop it before it’s too late.
Nano is the place to do that. Squaring my shoulders, I slick back my blonde hair, tug my black-framed glasses back into place, and storm inside like I’m going to war.
Most of the morning is a rush. I’m sent to security to have my fingerprints scanned, as well as my eyes, body, and hands. My blood is taken, as is my height and weight. I’m subjected to screenings and more tests before I’m given security clearance. The in-depth tests make me raise my eyebrows, but I guess it makes sense. The research they do here is very important, and it wouldn’t do for someone who didn’t belong to get their hands on it.
Once escorted back from security, I am shown around the lobby and scanned through the turnstiles. I’m just waiting for the elevator when a disturbance has me and the man escorting me turning around to watch.
There’s a woman fighting security as she flings questions at them. She wears a camera around her neck, hanging from a thick strap. Her black hair seems to catch and absorb all the light. She is bold and reckless and nothing like me. Her curves are enough to even have me looking down at my boring body, especially in the unflattering jumper and slacks I’m in. She’s wearing a tight white top tucked into black jeans with a big belt and a leather jacket slung over her shoulders. Her eyes sparkle as she carries on fighting them as they yank her from the lobby, shouting.
“Journalists,” he snaps, annoyance lacing his tone before he forces a smile as he looks down at me. I ignore that. I’m used to men using their height against me, their stature. I’ve been looked down on my entire life. It didn’t matter that I was born into money or that my parents were scholars before they died. All that matters is that I am trying to get into a male dominated field and they hate it. It makes them feel nervous and weak. I became good at using my words and keeping my eyes down, simply letting my work talk for me.
I worked harder than every single person to get my PhD, and I refuse to be cowed now. I have given up my entire life in the pursuit of research and the hope of bettering our world.
I tilt my head back and nod with a smile that’s well practiced—mocking yet not enough to be called on. My momma would have been proud. I take after her, after all.
She was just another woman trying to change the world created by men.
“Please.” He gestures for me to step inside the elevator, and I do, turning to face the doors as they slide shut and we shoot up into the air towards my future.
ONE
THREE YEARS LATER…
TALIA
Kicking off my trainers, I collapse onto my sofa with a groan, not bothering to turn the lights on after dragging my exhausted self inside my penthouse apartment and locking the doors. The moonlight from the floor-to-ceiling windows lights the spacious, modern apartment enough for me to feel a twinge of loneliness. I have no one to come home to, no one to care if I’m late, and no one to worry that it’s been two days since I was here.
There was once, but not anymore.
He betrayed me. I thought he loved me—hell, I thought I loved him, but I guess I was more in love with the idea of him. I liked not being alone and having someone who shares the same values and ideals, but it was all a lie. I’m starting to realise there is strength in loneliness, but during nights like this, I miss my parents.
I turn to stare at their painting above the fireplace. It used to hang in their mansion, but I never wanted their life. I wanted to pave my own way, so the mansion remains untouched, and the only thing I took was this painting. My mum’s familiar brown eyes and blonde hair, and my dad’s grey eyes, which swirled like a storm, just as mine apparently do when I’m angry, just makes me miss them even more.
I miss them something fierce tonight. I wish I could just call them and hear their voices one more time as they remind me that what I’m doing is worthy. Yet wouldn’t they be disappointed? Three years ago, I set out to work my way to the top so I could change things and help people, but here I am. I am no higher up, just a lacky scientist double-checking research and working on things they seem to trust me with.
Nothing important nor world changing.
I’m stuck in limbo, working every day. I nod submissively to men who look down at me, men dumber than me, and silence my voice and ideas for fear of what might happen again.
“Mum, what shall I do?” I sigh, talking out loud like I often do to reason out my problems. She used to say there was always a logical solution to everything, but right now, one evades me. “Do I stay and hope I can one day get to do what I want? Or do I leave and try myself? I have enough money. I could buy a building, start my own small lab, and make a name for myself. It would be hard, nearly impossible if Nano blocks me, which I think they would. They don’t like to be rivalled… I think I made a mistake working for them. I know they do good and help people, but I’m starting to think it’s only at their expense and on their terms. Am I wrong?”
There’s no answer, so I drag myself up and to the kitchen. I make a quick, healthy meal of chicken, rice, and veg, but after the first few bites, I push it away. It’s a reminder that people are starving right now, and it’s unsettling my stomach. Shaking my head, I force myself to shower off the day, the leers, and comments, and collapse naked into my emperor-sized bed.
My wet hair is spread messily across my silk cushions, and my glasses sit closed on a pile of notebooks and research textbooks I keep next to my bed. My old boyfriend used to call me a triple threat—beautiful, smart, and submissive. He actually called me that once, saying I knew when to bite my tongue, and I hate that he was right. I back down so easily. The only time I don’t is when it’s something I’m truly passionate about, otherwise I try to find a logical way around it, which often misleads people to believe I’m cold and emotionless.
