by Zoe Cannon
“It’s not like I’m going to turn you in.”
Another furtive glance from side to side. “It’s nothing, really. It’s not important. It’s just… they’ve given us a few things to study before the real training starts, and some of it is…” He let out a long breath. “I want to help these kids, not… I mean, interrogation is one thing. But these kids are… we’re supposed to be helping them, right? I don’t see how we’re going to do that by…” He gave a convulsive shrug. “I don’t know.”
Maybe this was her chance. To save his life, to save him from becoming what neither of them wanted him to become. She could talk him out of it, convince him to turn down the job, to walk away. She would still be able to get to the reeducation center if she—
If she what? Told him the truth? Asked him nicely to tell her where the center was so she could help the kids kill all the other counselors?
He shook his head sharply, as though he could clear away the doubts with one simple motion. “I just need to keep reminding myself why I’m doing this,” he said, talking to himself more than to her. “I want to help those kids. I want it more than I’ve ever wanted anything. And if this is the way to help them, then that’s what I’m going to do.”
His uncertainty pulled her closer—like attracting like, fear attracting fear—until her lips were on his with no conscious memory of the seconds in between. She kissed him as if it could dissolve the mask that she couldn’t drop even now. She drank him in hungrily, greedily, as though she could store up a lifetime’s worth of connection from one kiss.
He was the one to pull away. “If I don’t leave now, I’ll never make it in time.”
She stepped back, still feeling the pull of him like a physical force. “Go. It’s okay.”
He tossed the duffel bag into his passenger seat, then faced her. He took a deep breath. “I know it’s only been two weeks. Not enough time for… for anything, really. And I know we’re never going to get more than that, so maybe it would be easier for both of us if I didn’t say anything, but I have to, because if I don’t say it now I’ll never get another chance.” Another breath. “I love you, Becca.”
The words ripped her open, leaving behind a mangled mess of longing, a gaping hole of guilt.
And still her mask held.
She whispered her answer. “I love you too.”
She wished she were lying.
There was nothing left to say. Micah crossed around to the driver’s side and climbed into the car. He started the engine, but didn’t drive away yet. Instead he watched her, as if she were a tether holding him here, as if he couldn’t leave until she cut the cord. Only after she got into her car did he start to pull out of the parking lot.
There. He was gone. Whatever had existed between them, and whatever it could have become, was gone. Now he was nothing more than a source of information, a life to sacrifice for the greater good.
Her mother would have been proud.
Micah waved at her in his rearview mirror. Against her better judgment, she waved back.
She waited until he was almost out of sight.
Then she followed.
Chapter Sixteen
They drove until Becca could no longer recognize the unending stretch of highway, until the hazy light of early morning hardened into the uncompromising brightness of day. Becca stayed as far behind Micah as she dared—she couldn’t risk him spotting her. But she also couldn’t risk losing him. Every time his car dropped out of sight, her heart took up residence in her throat and didn’t move back to its proper place until she had a clear view of the back of Micah’s head.
They had left just after six a.m. By midmorning, they had left the highway. By the time the clock began to edge toward noon, they had left civilization behind entirely. They drove down desolate roads, with bare trees looming overhead like they were trying to reclaim the space. Becca couldn’t remember the last time they had passed a house. She made a mental note of every turn, every street name. She repeated them in her head like she used to repeat the names she would pass on to Jameson.
When Micah made the next turn, she almost followed him. She caught sight of the gate just in time. Made of thick industrial metal, it rose at least ten feet into the air; each side connected to a fence that stretched into the woods in either direction. There were no signs to indicate its purpose. Nobody would come here unless they already knew what this place was.
A guard, hand on his gun, stepped around to Micah’s window as the car stopped.
This was it. It had to be.
Excitement—or was it dread?—danced along her skin.
She didn’t stop. Didn’t even slow down. She couldn’t risk that guard noticing anything suspicious.
She drove until the fence ended. Then she kept going for another five minutes, just to be safe. Only when she was sure she was far enough away from the center not to raise suspicions did she pull over to the side of the road.
So close. She was so close to putting the final pieces of her plan together, so close to flinging open that unlocked door. So close to making all of this worth it.
So close to finding out whether any of this was even possible, or whether she had sacrificed her mother for nothing.
She got out of her car and started walking.
She crossed into the woods, pausing with every step, watching for any telltale signs of movement. She froze every time the leaves crunched a little too loudly, every time a bare branch snapped against her arm. She wished she weren’t doing this in broad daylight, at the end of the fall, with no foliage to shield her and foot-high drifts of rustling leaves under her feet. There had to be guards along the fence, watching for people like her, and she was exposed with nowhere to hide.
There. A break in the trees, an unnatural strip of bare grass—and in the center, the fence. Ropes of metal stretching into the sky. She stopped. Didn’t move. Didn’t breathe.
But there was no movement. No guard as far as she could see in any direction.
She took a careful step closer, then another, until she emerged from the meager safety of the trees. No one yelled a warning. No gunshot ripped through the air. The only footsteps she heard were her own.
No guards. It didn’t make sense.
Maybe something had called them away. Maybe she had simply hit a stroke of luck. In which case, she needed to get over the fence before her luck ran out. She reached for the fence, then stopped, hand hovering inches away. If the fence was electric, that would explain why it wasn’t guarded. It wouldn’t need to be.
Only one way to find out.
Holding her breath, she reached out toward the fence until the barest tip of her finger touched metal.
Nothing.
She didn’t have time to waste on relief. She pulled herself up, hand over hand, muscles burning as she gained one inch at a time. There were still no signs of life as she reached the top, as she swung her shaking legs over to the other side. She eased herself down, slowly, cautiously, until she dropped to the ground with a thump.
More trees stretched out in front of her. More trees, and beyond them, a tiny flash, sunlight glinting off metal.
She kept walking.
As she walked, the glimmers of metal resolved into a fence. Shorter than the other one, thinner, less solid. Past it rose a concrete structure, a twin to 117—and yet not, she realized as she got closer. Where 117 brought to mind an impenetrable fortress, a monument to Internal’s iron control, this building crouched in the center of the parking lot like the neglected stepchild, small and grimy and windowless.
This was it. Where Jake had died. Where Micah would die. Where Becca would finally do something that mattered. It drew her closer, closer, until only a few paces separated her from the fence.
And then the guard stepped into view.
She froze, afraid to move, the sound of her own breathing too loud in her ears. The guard stood just inside the fence, his back to her. As soon as he turned around, he would see her.
But he
didn’t turn around. His eyes remained fixed on the building.
He wasn’t watching for people like her after all.
He wasn’t here to keep dissidents out. He was here to keep them in.
Becca began to inch sideways, one tiny step after another. She squinted, trying to see how close the next guard was, but although the fence continued as far as she could see, she didn’t spot anyone else.
Movement from the building. A door opened, and a second guard came through, letting the door slam shut behind him. He—no, she, a scrawny woman in an ill-fitting uniform—strode toward the fence like she was on a mission.
Heading straight for Becca.
But the woman didn’t call out. Didn’t try to alert the guard at the fence. She just kept walking.
No time to wonder what it meant. Becca turned to retreat into the trees. One frozen step, and another, and then another another another as she broke into a run.
“It’s about time,” she heard the first guard grumble behind her. “My shift ended fifteen minutes ago.”
And then, “What are you doing?”
And then a choked gurgle.
“Shh,” crooned a second voice, a female voice. A girl’s voice. “It’s okay. I’m doing this to help you.”
Slowly, Becca turned around.
Wet sounds left the guard’s mouth as he slowly slid down the fence. Something protruded from his throat. Blood gleamed bright red in the noonday sun as it spilled down his body.
The second guard yanked the weapon from his throat. Then, without so much as a glance in Becca’s direction, she started climbing the fence.
Her uniform hung too loosely on her. The bottoms of her pant legs kept slipping down over her feet; she cursed as she stepped on her cuff instead of a link of the fence. Droplets of blood glistened off her face and her hair.
She couldn’t have been more than sixteen.
She wasn’t a guard. She was one of the prisoners.
Another escape, another death, just like Micah had said. And he was already here. Had he—
The girl gave a soft gasp as her eyes locked on Becca. She froze.
“It’s okay,” Becca whispered. “I’m on your side.”
The girl looked from Becca to the building she had just left. She started climbing again, her breath ragged. Apparently Becca was the least frightening of the two options.
She strained to get her leg across the top of the fence. Her foot slipped, and for a second she hung precariously by her hands before regaining her footing.
Becca held up a hand to her. “Here,” she said, still whispering. “Let me help you.”
The girl laughed. The sound made the hairs on Becca’s arms stand on end. “Oh, you’re here to help me.” The humor evaporated from her voice all at once. “Try to help me and you’re dead.”
Becca lowered her hand. She took a step back. “You don’t understand. I’m trying to get all of you out of here. I’m a dissident. Like you.”
“Liar. You’re a liar. Dissidents never get out. Never.” The girl managed to swing herself over to Becca’s side of the fence. “Or did they make you one of them?” She started climbing down. Landed on her pant leg again. Dropped to the earth in a heap.
Becca took a step toward her. The girl scooted backwards against the fence, holding her weapon out in front of her, something rough and jagged and dark with blood. A piece of twisted metal, maybe, or a shard of broken glass. “Touch me and I’ll kill you,” she snarled. “Liar. Filthy traitor.”
“It’s okay.” Becca held out her empty hands. “I just want to make sure you’re not hurt.” She tried to focus on the girl’s face. Not the weapon in her hand. Not the smell of blood in the air. Only this girl, this prisoner, this dissident she had come here to help.
The girl braced herself against the fence as she clambered to her feet. She didn’t look injured, only a little unsteady. Maybe from the fall, maybe from whatever else they had done to her. She kept the weapon positioned between her and Becca as she slowly stepped forward.
Becca held up her hands in a gesture of surrender. “I’m not going to hurt you. I promise. Let me get you out of here.”
The girl laughed again. “I’m already out. You can’t touch me. You can’t give me any more of your help. Never never never again.”
Becca inched forward. “They’re going to find you. If you come with me, you’ll at least have a chance.” Closer. Closer. Almost there.
Becca reached out for the weapon.
The girl lunged.
Becca bit down on a yell as the edge sliced past her jacket and into the fleshy part of her arm. She grabbed for the girl, but her arms closed around empty air. The girl was already running, snapping branches with abandon as she tore through the trees like some wild animal. Becca would never catch up.
Internal would find her. That was almost certain. Someone with so tenuous a hold on reality wouldn’t be able to keep herself hidden for long, and her being here in the first place meant she had no family waiting, no one to protect her.
But there was nothing Becca could do.
What if all the prisoners were like that? Paranoid, dangerous, broken past saving?
Her gaze was drawn to the guard’s body. To the blood still soaking into the ground.
Fifty-nine more kids like that one. And she was going to put knives in their hands and tell them to kill.
But she had to make sure this experiment ended so no one else ended up like that girl. That was all that mattered. And if the kids killed her in the process—well, she had never really expected to make it out of this alive anyway.
She looked down at the guard’s body again.
The girl had gotten out with a stolen guard’s uniform—probably one belonging to the first guard she had killed. But that wouldn’t have been enough to get her through the door. No doubt every door in this place was locked from both the outside and the inside; they probably used keycards like 117. The girl must have gotten one somehow. From the same guard who used to own the uniform?
A plan began to form in her mind.
No. It was too soon. She hadn’t come here for this, she wasn’t ready…
Nobody knew this guard was dead yet.
The knives were waiting in her car.
The guard’s keycard would be deactivated as soon as someone discovered his death. She might not get another chance like this again. Not without killing a guard herself, and the thought of that made her stomach try to climb out her throat.
It only took her a moment to decide.
She was going in now.
* * *
When Becca opened the door, she half-expected to be greeted by the barrel of a gun. Instead, a body tumbled out onto the pavement, covered in blood just like the first, a gash across his throat. Naked—this must have been the guard whose uniform the girl had taken.
She adjusted her own stolen uniform, the one she had pulled off the guard outside. Clenched her fingers around her stolen gun. The uniform felt wrong on her skin—too thick, too bunchy, too heavy with someone else’s sweat. But not as wrong as the gun felt in her hand.
With a silent apology, she pulled the body the rest of the way out the door. She swayed, unexpectedly dizzy. She saw worse than this at work every day, but touching the guard’s cold skin, feeling the stickiness of his blood against her hands, brought it too close. Made it too real.
And soon the building would be filled with more blood, more bodies.
Because of her.
Dragging her suitcase behind her, she entered the building.
She didn’t know what she had expected. Something like the underground levels, maybe, solid and endless and imposing. Or the false cheer of the children’s ward of a hospital, cold hallways painted with blue skies and fluffy clouds. Instead she stepped onto a pitted concrete floor smudged with the dirt of too many feet. There were no echoing concrete walls, no colorful murals. Nothing but unfinished drywall to either side. Ahead of her, a single flickering light bathed the hall
way in a sullen glow.
No shouts. No guards. Nothing but this dim hallway stretching out ahead of her.
But the peace wouldn’t last for long.
She started walking.
Two doors waited ahead of her—one to her left, one to her right. And further ahead, a break in the wall where the hallway branched off to either direction. The dull metal doors looked thicker than the drywall that surrounded them. Next to each door, a jagged hole had been cut into the wall for a keycard reader. Each door had a sheet of paper taped to it, with a number scrawled in marker. To her left: 1. To her right: 2.
Above each paper, a small rectangular window, clear plastic with a crosshatch of wire running across it, gave a view of the other side. Each door led to another hallway, much shorter—not even a hallway so much as an alcove. More doors exited off those hallways. All closed. All unmarked.
All these locked doors—but she had the key.
She didn’t know how long the keycard would keep working. If Internal discovered what had happened before she had a chance to go through the entire building, they would deactivate it, and she would be locked out. She had to move fast.
She wouldn’t think about what would happen to her once they realized something was wrong. Once they locked the place down and searched until they found her.
She shifted the gun to her left hand and started to slide her keycard into the reader next to 1.
The sound of footsteps stopped her.
There was only one place to run. Through the door. She would just have to hope nothing was waiting for her on the other side except grateful prisoners waiting to take their revenge.
She slid the keycard into the reader. The light flashed green. It still worked. They still didn’t know.
“Right, then left,” a voice muttered as the footsteps rounded the corner. “Or was it left, then right?”
That voice.
She knew that voice.
Her second of hesitation cost her. She opened the door, but it was too late. The footsteps stopped.