Chapter Nineteen

I found Audrina first. She was leaning up against the wall, her eyes fixated on her pale fingernails as she picked at the almost nonexistent cuticles.

"What do you think of your partner?" I walked up next to her nonchalantly, hoping she wouldn't suspect anything about my disappearance.

"He's quiet, so it's great," she shrugged her shoulders, not looking up. The words began to roll out of her mouth without any sort of punctuation. "He showed me the workout arena. It was super interesting. Can't you tell? I love Merak and I'm so happy we are here. Everything is awesome. I'm awesome. You're awesome. It's just wonderful."

Both of her hands finally fell next to her body, in defeat.

I chuckled at the obvious dramatic sarcasm that dripped from of her mouth. "I'm not sure you really feel that way Aud. What really happened today? Are you okay?"

For the first time she looked up at me as she took a step backwards. "I just told you Esa. Nothing. Why are you acting so weird?"

Her question caught me off-guard. I felt like I was acting normal right now. My body was relaxed as I stood next to her. "I don't know. It's just something in your voice. You're not happy and obviously it's because we are here on Merak."

"How do you know that?" She turned her face within inches of mine and threw up her arms.

Several uncomfortable seconds of silence fell between us again before I slightly pushed her body backwards. "You just told me so. Seriously, Audrina, is everything okay?"

She bit down on her bottom lip and then shook her head. I draped my arm around her shoulders and let her body lean into mine. "No. It's not okay Esa. Everything has changed. I'm so mad right now."

Gave appeared near us. He looked like a schoolboy who had just snuck some candy from the teacher, almost instantly he began to ramble excitedly. "What do you guys think? Isn't this place really cool? I like Aurora. She's very smart and super awesome."

Audrina narrowed her eyes as she looked over at Gave and then back at me. "Ugh!!! See Esa, I told you this place sucks! Gave is acting like some sort of crazy teenager right now!"

I placed my hand on her shoulder, suddenly nervous. We didn't know much about Merak and I didn't want to find out information in this manner, but both Gave and Audrina were acting different right now . "Calm down Audrina. You don't want to draw attention to yourself. Remember, someone is always watching."

She pulled away from my grasp. "Stop Esa!"

Gave walked near us. A concerned look on his face. "Aud, I agree with Esa. You are acting weird. Are you feeling okay?"

"Yes. You?" She responded quickly to our teammate as she trust her hand up on the wall. "I saw the look in your eyes a few seconds ago."

Gave narrow his eyes as he glanced back at her and then he struggled his shoulders and his entire demeanor changed. "Yes! I'm just having the best time here! It's so interesting. Did you realize that they can easily transform into anything? It's like no technology that I've ever seen. Aurora changed several times in front of me! It was the most awesome thing I've ever seen!"

I walked in front of both of them. I didn't know much about this place, but every time a word left their mouths, I suddenly got more nervous. I let my hands guide both of them into a sitting position on the floor. "You guys need to take a deep breath."

"Why?" Gave shot back. "We're both fine. I feel great!"

I didn't immediately respond and instead let them both sit on the floor, heads down, staring at the floor below. Audrina let out several deep breaths.

"Aud, you good?" I wrapped my arms around her shoulders. I hoped they would both act normal again. I needed them right now.

Adriana turned her head up towards mine. "No. I think something smells. I hate this place and I just want to leave. Now!"

"We both know that's an impossible request."

"Why?!"

"Audrina, put your head back down and think about Station One or some place that might make you happy."

"Why?"

"Because I need you to focus right now. I can't do this alone."

Audrina's head dropped back towards her knees. There was so much I wanted to tell her. She should know about the Regency, but I knew I couldn't say anything... yet. They had told me no one could know about their existence since Dr. James thought they were dead. Instead, I thought about Gave's partner. He seemed to like her, but there was still something about her that didn't sit well with me.

I cleared my throat as they both sat silently. "Gave, don't you think it's weird that Aurora looks like me?"

"She doesn't look like you," he quickly shot upwards and stood over me.

I looked over at Audrina for support. "She looks like me before I changed. Don't you member, I had long brown hair just like her?"

He rolled his eyes. "Esa, it's been years since we were all changed. How am I supposed to remember what you looked like back then when I'm so used to seeing you in this form now? Besides, I don't even remember what I looked like before we were changed."

Audrina pinched her lips together and then jumped up next to him and hit Gave on the shoulder. "You're a moron. Aurora looks just like Esa and you know it. You just don't want to admit that you remember and ruin any chances of you having a new friend."

"Ouch!" He pulled his arm away. "This is one of the reasons I welcome the idea of more team members. Both of you are no longer any fun."

"That's because someone has been messing with our lives!" Audrina looked up at the ceiling, fists clenched to her side.

"Shhhh..." I put a finger in front of my lips and then whispered, "I think I need to tell you guys something. I figured how some portions of our bodies were disappearing—"

"How?" Audrina suddenly looked interested in the conversation. It was a complete change to how she had looked just minutes ago.

"She is adding more RaCO into us, not some random serum. The more she adds and the length that it is inside our bodies, the more it takes over. Think about it, none of us have eaten any food in days. We should be weak and starving right now, but I don't feel anything—"

Gave looked down at his stomach. "That's a good point. I haven't been hungry at all lately. I haven't even thought about food. That must mean we are changing more, but what happens we we are fully changed? Will we no longer be human?"

"I don't think she wants to fully change us. She is still working out the correct equation. Dr. Marie hasn't found the right numbers just yet."

"That doesn't make sense," Audrina huffed. "And, it certainly doesn't make me feel any better. One day, I'd like to show her how it feels to be treated like a science experiment."

"Audrina, it does make sense. Marie couldn't immediately travel back here and that gave her time to work on her experiments. She's still perfecting us, but she needs humans in different forms. It's not a one size fits all. She wants to create different combinations to use for different reasons. We need to talk to Samuel, maybe he has more information."

"Where is he?" Gave looked around the empty space in front of us.

"He was partnered with someone too. Thankfully, she wasn't that cute," Audrina rolled her eyes and then I realized why she was so upset. It had nothing to do with Merak and everything to do with her current situation with Samuel.

"Aud, just remember, Samuel doesn't have anything human inside of him. He's from Merak. I'm not really sure of what he can really feel."

She let out a deep sigh. "I know, but I'm still mad at him. I just don't understand why he didn't tell me anything before. It feels like such a huge betrayal that he kept this secret from me."

Samuel had probably kept a lot of secrets from Audrina. I didn't have the heart to tell her that everything she had ever known about him was probably a lie. He had known where and why I had disappeared. He had intentionally created Station One near Artek so he could work with Dr. James and he had known all along who was attacking our team. Audrina was just a cover for him.

"It's okay. At least we are all together. We just need to stick together and find a way out of here."

"I know. That's what I keep telling myself, but I'm really not sure who to trust right now if I can't trust Samuel," she said.

**Author's Note: What do you think so far?  I'd love to hear any of your feedback.  THANK YOU!!