The Real Maya

The Real Maya

Maya's POV

I threw the folder of photographs at Adrian's face.
The pictures scattered everywhere in the wind.
"You're lying!" I screamed, even though I couldn't hear my own voice.
Adrian shook his head and picked up Dante's phone.
It's all true.
"No, it's not!"
Maya, your hearing is coming back. You just yelled.
I stopped shouting and listened.
He was right. The ringing in my ears was getting quieter.
"This is all insane," I said. My voice sounded strange and far away, but I could hear it.
"Is it?" Adrian asked. "Think about how easily you learned to fight. Think about how you knew exactly where to aim when you shot those men in the warehouse."
"That was just instinct."
"Was it? Or was it training you forgot you had?"
I looked at the photographs scattered around us.
Pictures of me doing things I couldn't remember.
"Even if this is true," I said, "I'm not going to kill my mother."
"She's not your mother."
"Yes, she is."
"Agent Chen is your handler. The woman who programmed you. But she's not your mother."
"Then who is my mother?"
Adrian was quiet for a long moment.
"We don't know."
"What do you mean you don't know?"
"We mean Agent Maya Seven was created from nothing. No family. No past. Just a mission."
"That's impossible. Everyone has a past."
"Not you."
I felt sick.
"So I'm nobody?"
"You're somebody. Just not who you thought you were."
Marcus had been listening to our conversation while keeping watch on Isabella.
"Maya," he said quietly. "There's something else you need to know."
"What now?"
"Agent Chen isn't here to save you."
"What do you mean?"
"She's here to kill you."
"That's ridiculous. She's my..."
I stopped.
What was she to me?
If she wasn't my mother, if she wasn't my aunt, if everything about my life was a lie...
"Why would she want to kill me?"
"Because your programming is breaking down," Dante said. "Because you're remembering who you really are."
"And that's bad?"
"It's bad for her. Agent Maya Seven was supposed to be a weapon she could control. But you're becoming something else."
"What am I becoming?"
"Free," Adrian said simply.
Isabella groaned and started to wake up.
We all turned to look at her.
Her eyes opened slowly, and when she saw us, she smiled.
"Well, well," she said. "Agent Maya Seven. I was wondering when you'd remember."
"You know about this?" I asked.
"Know about it? Sweetheart, I helped create it."
My blood went cold.
"What?"
Isabella sat up slowly, wincing from her injuries.
"The whole thing was my idea. The crime families. The inheritance. The big scary grandfather who wanted you dead."
"You're lying."
"Am I? Think about it, Maya. Did you ever actually see Ivan Volkov? Did you ever meet him face to face?"
I tried to remember.
Had I seen him?
"No," I said quietly.
"Because Ivan Volkov has been dead for twenty years. I killed him myself."
"Then who was I supposed to inherit from?"
"Nobody. There was nothing to inherit. It was all just a way to make you feel important. To make you feel like you had something to fight for."
I looked at the four heirs.
"And you guys?"
"We thought it was real too," Marcus said. "We thought we were protecting the last Volkov heir."
"But you weren't?"
"We were protecting Agent Maya Seven. We just didn't know it."
Isabella laughed.
"Oh, this is rich. None of you knew what you were really doing."
"And what were we really doing?" Dante asked.
"You were helping me test the perfect weapon."
"What weapon?"
Isabella pointed at me.
"Her."
"I'm not a weapon."
"Aren't you? Look around, Maya. You just destroyed an entire building. You killed dozens of trained soldiers. And you don't even remember doing it."
"I didn't kill anyone. The building was empty."
"Was it?"
Isabella pulled out her phone and showed me the screen.
News footage of rescue workers pulling bodies from the rubble.
Real bodies.
Real people.
Dead because of me.
"No," I whispered.
"Oh yes. Congratulations, Maya. You just committed your first real mass murder."
I felt like I was going to throw up.
"They were your men. Your mercenaries."
"They were expendable. Just like everyone else in this little experiment."
"What experiment?"
"The experiment to see if we could create the perfect assassin. Someone with no conscience, no memory of their crimes, no guilt about killing innocent people."
"I'm not like that."
"No? Then why aren't you crying about all those dead men? Why aren't you screaming about the blood on your hands?"
I looked down at my hands.
They were covered in dust and cuts from the explosion.
But no blood.
"Because it's not real," I said. "None of this is real."
"Some of it is real, Maya. The question is, which parts?"
That's when I heard the helicopters again.
More of them this time.
Coming from every direction.
"Friends of yours?" Adrian asked Isabella.
"Better than friends. Insurance."
"What kind of insurance?"
"The kind that makes sure Agent Maya Seven doesn't leave this rooftop alive."
The helicopters circled us like vultures.
But instead of landing, they just hovered.
Waiting.
"Waiting for what?" I asked.
Isabella smiled.
"For the real Agent Chen to arrive."
"The real Agent Chen?"
"The woman you think is your mother? She's just another actress. Another part of the simulation."
"Then who's the real Agent Chen?"
"The woman who created you. The woman who's been pulling all the strings. The woman who's about to finish what she started twenty years ago."
One of the helicopters broke formation and started to descend.
As it got closer, I could see someone sitting in the passenger seat.
A woman with dark hair and cold eyes.
She looked familiar.
Like someone from a dream I couldn't quite remember.
"Maya," the woman said through a megaphone. "It's time to come home."
"Who is that?" I asked Isabella.
"That's Dr. Elizabeth Reyes. The scientist who created the Agent Maya program."
"I don't know anyone named Dr. Reyes."
"You do. You just don't remember."
The helicopter landed about fifty feet away from us.
Dr. Reyes got out and walked toward us.
She was carrying a small device in her hand.
"Hello, Maya," she said when she got close enough to talk normally.
"I don't know you."
"Of course you don't. I programmed you to forget."
"Why?"
"Because knowing the truth would have made the experiment impossible."
"What truth?"
Dr. Reyes looked at Adrian, Marcus, Luca, and Dante.
"The truth about why I created you."
"Which is?"
"To kill them."
I stared at her.
"What?"
"These four men murdered my daughter. Twenty years ago. And I've been planning their deaths ever since."
I looked at the four heirs.
"Is that true?"
"We've never killed anyone's daughter," Dante said.
"Haven't you?" Dr. Reyes asked. "Think harder."
"We don't know what you're talking about."
"My daughter's name was Sarah Volkov. She was Ivan's granddaughter. The real heir to his empire."
My blood went cold.
"But I'm his granddaughter."
"No, Maya. You're her replacement. Sarah died when she was five years old. Killed by four young men who were supposed to protect her."
"We never—" Marcus started.
"You never what? You never pushed a little girl off a bridge because she saw something she shouldn't have? You never watched her drown while you made sure no one would find the body?"
The four men went completely silent.
"That was an accident," Adrian said quietly.
"Was it?"
"She fell. We tried to save her."
"Did you? Or did you push her because your bosses told you she was a liability?"
Nobody answered.
"I thought so," Dr. Reyes said.
She raised the device in her hand.
"Maya, your final program is about to activate. When it does, you'll remember everything. Every moment of training. Every kill you've made. Every life you've taken in preparation for this moment."
"What moment?"
"The moment you murder the four men who killed my daughter."
"I won't do it."
"You won't have a choice."
Dr. Reyes pressed a button on the device.
Pain exploded through my head.
Images flooded my mind.
Memories I didn't know I had.
Training. Fighting. Killing.
Years of it.
All leading to this moment.
All leading to them.
When the pain stopped, I looked at the four heirs with new eyes.
With the eyes of Agent Maya Seven.
And I remembered everything.
Including why I was born to kill them.
"Hello, boys," I said in a voice that didn't sound like mine anymore.
"Maya?" Dante asked.
But Maya was gone.
Only the weapon remained.
And she was perfect.