The Adoration of Jenna Fox (Jenna Fox Chronicles 1)

‘What do you mean, engineered?’

‘We had to make some changes so nutrients and oxygen could be delivered in a modified way.’

‘So it’s not human skin.’

‘It is human. Completely human. We’ve been genetically altering plants and animals for years. It’s nothing new. Tomatoes, for instance. We engineer them to withstand certain pests or to give them a longer shelf life, but it is still one hundred percent a tomato.’

‘I am not a tomato.’

He looks at me sharply. ‘No. You’re not. You’re my daughter. You have to know, Jenna, I would do anything to save you. You’re my child. And I want to be honest with you. So let’s cut the crap. Lab skin is yesterday’s news. You want to know more than that. Let’s move on.’

I always loved that about Father. He was direct. Claire and I could dance around a subject for days and weeks. But not Father and me. Maybe because he was around less. He didn’t have time to dally. Right now I want to dance. I feel like I could dance forever.

‘Jenna,’ he says, nudging me.

‘Skin, bone, that’s one thing,’ I say. ‘But Lily says you only saved ten percent of my brain. True?’

‘True.’

‘Then what am I?’

He doesn’t hesitate. ‘You’re Jenna Angeline Fox. A seventeen-year-old girl who was in a terrible accident and nearly died. You were saved the way so many accident victims are saved, through medical technology. Your body was injured beyond saving. We had to patch together a new one. Your skeletal structure was replicated. You have all the bone structure of a normal teenage girl. Muscle areas are taken up with additional modified Bio Gel. Most movement is accomplished through digital signals within the bone structure. Some is accomplished through the traditional method of cabled ligaments. Your skin was replaced. Your brain, the ten percent we saved, was infused with additional Bio Gel. But obviously ten percent is not enough for full function, so we scanned your whole brain and uploaded the information for safekeeping until we had the rest of the elements in place—’

‘Uploaded? You uploaded my brain?’

‘The information. Every bit of information that was ever in your brain. But the information is not the mind, Jenna. That we’ve never accomplished before. What we’ve done with you is groundbreaking. We cracked the code. The mind is an energy that the brain produces. Think of a glass ball twirling on your fingertip. If it falls, it shatters into a million pieces. All the parts of a ball are still there, but it will never twirl with that force on your fingertip again. The brain is the same way. Ille

gal brain scans have been going on for years. Nanobots the size of blood cells are injected, sometimes even without a person’s knowledge since it’s all wireless transfer. Bits of information are extracted. But the mind, the mind could never be transferred. It’s an entirely different thing from bits of information. We found that it’s like a spinning glass ball. You have to keep it spinning or it falls and shatters. So we upload those bits of information into an environment that allows that energy to keep spinning, so to speak.’

‘To keep thinking.’

He nods.

That environment was my hell. My black void I didn’t understand. My endless vacuum where I suffocated, screamed, cried, but no one came to help me.

My own father put me there.

I lay my face in my hands. The hands that are not really mine. I suck in a ragged breath. Do I even have lungs, or is this just a remembered action? I shudder, repulsed at everything that I may or may not be, wanting to escape but trapped again. By what? Myself? I don’t know who or what I am anymore.

I feel Father’s arms around me. His stubble scratching my cheek. Whispering in my ear, ‘Jenna. Jenna. It will be all right. I promise.’ He is my father again, not the doctor. The confidence is gone. I hear the fear in his voice. He is not sure things will be all right.

I push him away. ‘I need to know. Everything.’

‘You will. But even that ten percent needs rest. Let’s both get some sleep. We’ll talk more in the morning.’

I am tired. Drained. I nod and I lie back on my pillow.

Just before he reaches the door, I stop him. ‘Is it true?’

‘True?’

‘Is there really a most important ten percent?’

‘Yes,’ he says. ‘I truly believe there is.’

Day One / New Jenna

Father staples my skin together. I feel a quick pinch.