Jonas sat back in his chair and regarded his woman. “That is one scary plant, Camellia. I can see why people would fear her. Do you think Whitney had any idea of what he was actually dealing with?”
“Not a chance. He doesn’t like anyone smarter than he is. Can you imagine if he thought a plant was more intelligent? He sure wouldn’t have taken a chance putting Red in our DNA.”
“What do you think he was hoping for?” Jonas asked. “Antiaging?”
“I think he believed she might have some healing properties, but nothing nearly as advanced as she does. He may have suspected she had some ability to communicate as well, but he had no idea of her true abilities. He had theories, but he changed them all the time. He wanted to know how she survived when other plants died out.”
“Longevity then?”
Camellia shrugged. “Whitney was big on experimenting with anything he thought might help his soldiers survive when the enemy couldn’t. He put Middlemist Red in me when I was very young. When nothing happened, he operated a second time when I was around ten. I remember being very ill. After that, he watched me like I was an insect under a microscope. He brought me to his office once a week and into the greenhouse—or as he referred to it, the hothouse—at least once a week. I think he thought the plant would react to me or I would to the plant.”
“You felt nothing?”
“I felt her gathering power. She doesn’t feel rage in the way we do. She feels disgust.”
“What does she do when she feels this disgust?” Jonas couldn’t help the wariness creeping into his voice. He was used to being at the top of the food chain. But now, he had the feeling he wasn’t quite as high up as he had envisioned himself.
Camellia stood up and stretched, raising her arms above her head before reaching for her plate to take it to the sink. He suspected she was buying herself time before she answered him. He would know if she lied to him—or even deflected.
“Camellia?”
She turned to face him, leaning against the sink. “I just told you what she did when she was disgusted. You weren’t listening—or you didn’t want to hear. You do it too. So do I. We both have Middlemist Red in us. I might have more of her, but you have far more natural aggression in you than I do. She allows you to draw on that when you gather power.”
Jonas pushed back his chair and paced away from her. She stated it so softly, almost gently—matter-of-factly, as if a plant gathering power didn’t mean anything—but it did, and they both knew it. Middlemist Red was a weapon. Pure and simple. He kept his breathing under control as he paced, trying to keep his thoughts from going to places Camellia would be upset with him for going.
She watched his agitated motion with a slight frown on her face. “Honey, why would you think this is any different than you or me being disgusted with an evil person doing evil things and reacting to it? You accept that a leopard retaliates against something or someone hunting it. Or that a wolf pack does. You utilize the strengths of those animals. You admire the cunning intelligence of them. Why is it so much more difficult for you to accept that Red might react to Whitney’s evil?”
Jonas had to think about that. Why was it so much more upsetting? He looked out the kitchen window at the plants that hadn’t been there before. They could effectively block his sight if an enemy was coming. Even as he thought it, the branches parted to show him a clear, unobstructed view. Just as the plant had reacted to his thoughts when he’d been in Camellia’s garden, the ones outside his kitchen reacted to his. How was that even possible?
“I can understand how Whitney managed to insert animal DNA into us, Camellia, but plant? I don’t know. I’m not a science expert like a couple of the others. Some of it, like the communications network, I can get that even on some small level. I get the healing maybe because I can visualize it. But the way the plants react when I’m thinking . . .” He trailed off, shaking his head.
“We’re connected to them.” She sighed and shoved both hands through her hair. “When I first escaped, I didn’t want Whitney to ever be able to take me back to his laboratories. Not ever. I wasn’t going into his breeding program. No child of mine was going to have to go through what I did. No son was going to grow up a soldier the way he wanted him to be. And no daughter of mine was going to be used for his purposes. I knew, sooner or later, he’d find me. That was inevitable. I moved often to buy myself time, but also so I could get stronger.”