Warning for mentioned minor character deaths from illness.
Ava and her memories
Ava tries very hard to find the difference in her memories – as if she should be able to find a seam between who she has been told she is, who she was made to be, and who she has lived as for six years. She can't find any. Her memories are fuzzier the longer back she tries to remember, but from what Gary has explained, that's perfectly usual. Recall is harder as you grow older and the experiences are further away, whether clone or not. It's a relief that it isn't just her design, a trick. Then she remembers it is still a trick, isn't it? All those memories might be indistinguishable from any others but they aren't real, they just seem as if they are. Implanted to mimic how they should be because of the biology she shares with everyone else. Those things did not happen to her and without the file to explain - without Rip - she will never know who made her how she is.
She wants to look them in the eye and ask why they made her cry her eyes out over her first crush. Or why the bullies who harassed her for a whole semester when she unwisely let the knowledge of her crush slip out in class. Why her grandmother died of cancer when she was ten and her grandfather a year after that of pneumonia. But she knows the answer to that – to make her strong, to write her history so she takes up martial arts, to make sure there are no more questions about her family. At least she doesn't have to wonder anymore about what the terrible feud was that severed ties with her mother's parents. They simply don't exist. The pain all imagined, acted out conveniently by her mother so nothing more need be said.
They gave her more too that she wishes she had done. The Valentine's day card she proudly delivered to her crush in defiance of the bullies. Chairing the model UN at her high school. Being Valedictorian and addressing everyone with the best speech of her life, one she's never topped to this day. The letter she wrote to the White House about inadequate regulations after her trainer got seriously hurt in a competition. She has a framed reply for that, signed by President Clinton. She doesn't doubt that the signature is real. Knowing Rip, he could make it so - he could sell a lie like no other. He gave her everything he thought she would need to be Ava Sharpe.
Including an ex who made her wary of starting anything for years. Another useful lie to keep her focused on work. Something she has overcome. She gets to decide who Ava Sharpe is today.