Free Spark by Rachael Craw

wince, but Miriam is careful as she discharges the anaesthetic and withdraws the shaft, pressing a cotton ball in its place. “Hold that.”
    Numbness spreads like cold water through my palm. “What about making things explode?”
    Frowning, she rips another packet open to reveal a tiny curved needle, like a cat claw. She lifts it with a pair of tweezers, the blue suture uncurling. “What do you mean?”
    “Wineglasses. Light bulbs.”
    “You can do that?”
    “Not on purpose. Just seems to happen when I’m worked up.”
    She taps the end of my thumb. “How does it feel?”
    I tremble with cowardice or horror. Probably both but I can’t feel anything. I nod and grit my teeth as she bends over the wound and inserts the needle in a deft dig.
    “I’ve never heard of it.” She catches the tip and draws it through, glancing up as she tugs my senseless flesh. “Maybe it’s a third-generation anomaly. I don’t know a lot about third-generation distinctions.” She knots the thread and snips at the base.
    “Third generation? You said second generation before.” I feel suddenly present, no longer hovering outside myself, and the questions I haven’t been able to form in my dazed state all press forwards. “What’s the point of all this? Affinity? What on earth were they hoping to achieve?”
    Bending back over the wound, she stabs the skin, making me wince though I feel nothing, explaining as she works. “Imagine the perfect soldier. One who doesn’t fear death, or pain, who never quits, never gets sick. A soldier stronger than ten men, fast as a horse and able to sense the approach of danger. Imagine a soldier untroubled by heat or cold, able to heal in a day from a bullet wound and who, in hand-to-hand combat, could anticipate the enemy’s every move and counter it.”
    “We’re supposed to be soldiers?” I’m so breathless it comes out like a whisper.
    “I guess that was the goal back then, in the early seventies. A human weapon, or whatever.”
    “For what, an army?” Instead of a lab, I visualise a high-tech bunker with zombie-eyed rows of men and women dressed in black body armour, waiting to be deployed.
    “For hire. Corporate, private, political or military application. Short- and long-term assignments. Defence, acquisition and protection were the services on offer.”
    “Hired assassins?”
    “Who can say where they would have drawn the line? Now it’s all about damage control.”
    “Because of the Strays? Explain that again. They were a mutation?”
    The crease in her brow sharpens as she cuts the thread. Her cell phone starts up on the counter and she swears. “It’s them.”
    I clamp my good hand to my mouth as though afraid I might scream.
    She peels her gloves off, crosses to the counter and answers the call. “Carolyn?” She uses her business voice, assertive but polite, though she looks pale and presses her hand to her forehead. “I’ve been trying to get hold of you. Yes, I know, the alert didn’t seem to go through. I’ve been clocking up demerits in the hope you’d call … Last night. New York … It was clean. Ready for disposal.”
    Disposal?
I shudder at the implications, picturing the blond boy and his wild black eyes, the feel of his breaking bones still fresh in my mind.
    Carolyn talks. Miriam listens. Her eyes flick to me. “Of course. I’ll be expecting you.” There are no parting words. She turns her phone off. “You have to go upstairs.”
    “What? Why? Shouldn’t I meet her?” The idea is terrifying but if it will help me save Kitty–
    “No.” She makes a choking sound. “She may not be a Warden, but still, I don’t want her anywhere near you.”
    “Why?” My voice flies high. “What’s a Warden?”
    Coming to the table, she starts throwing medical supplies back into the leather case, jams the lid closed and holds it out to me. “She’ll be here any minute.”
    Bewildered, I take it with my good arm. “You’re scaring me.”
    “Go upstairs.