{"id":1700,"date":"2026-01-03T21:45:49","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T21:45:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/darkest-minds-02-5-sparks-rise-bracken-alexandra\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T21:45:49","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T21:45:49","slug":"darkest-minds-02-5-sparks-rise-bracken-alexandra","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/darkest-minds-02-5-sparks-rise-bracken-alexandra\/","title":{"rendered":"Darkest Minds 02.5 – Sparks Rise – Bracken, Alexandra"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Book Preview<\/h3>\n
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\"SparksRiseNovela_Final_ch.psd\"<\/span>ONE<\/p>\n

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SAM<\/p>\n

I DON\u2019T<\/span> forget faces.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t forget anything my eyes have landed on\u2014not the smallest detail of the white flowering wallpaper in our neighbors\u2019 house, not the cursive letters written on my classroom\u2019s whiteboard, not the numbers that flashed on the screen as the man in the white coat adjusted my position under the machine\u2019s metal halo, the signs on the towering fence as our bus pulled in for the first time. DANGER! HIGH VOLTAGE, AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY, NOT A LOADING ZONE, STAY ALERT.<\/span><\/p>\n

Its smells and sounds have gone hazy; I think, sometimes, that I can remember what it was like to lay out in the freshly mown grass in our backyard. I think it smelled sweet. I think I can just about remember how silky Scout, our golden retriever, was, lying in a patch of sunshine. There was laughter, too, from the Orfeo kids trying to climb over the wall between our houses, half tumbling into the bushes. What I remember most is the cloudless powder-blue sky. I couldn\u2019t take my eyes off it. I haven\u2019t seen one like it since.<\/p>\n

This place has reduced my world to gray, black, brown.<\/p>\n

Everything gets filed away inside my head, neat and tidy, until I need it. Somehow, without trying, I pull the right card out of the deck each time. I test myself all the time; that same white coat, the one who\u2019d been all freezing fingers and sneered words, told me not to\u2014that using my freak catchall of a memory would somehow overload it, and I\u2019d be as dead and stiff as the kids already buried. They tried that lie on all of us, I\u2019m sure.<\/p>\n

For the first two years, I\u2019d catch myself doing it, drawing out those memories, and close my eyes, throat swelling with thick panic. Stop it, you\u2019ll die, you\u2019ll die, Sam\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

For the next three, it was like a dare. Each success was a small pop of bright exhilaration to pepper forever sunless days. Every time I did it and nothing happened, I\u2019d get that same feeling I had each time I snuck over to the Orfeos\u2019 house on the Fourth of July, and they\u2019d secretly save me one of their sparklers to run around with before my parents could even realize I was gone. I\u2019d think of Dad preaching from Job, Yet man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now…I just don\u2019t care. A few months turned into years and now those years are morphing into forever, and there\u2019s no getting out. It used to be enough to live inside the gray, to accept the things I couldn\u2019t change even if that meant everything. They\u2019ve been holding these warnings about a possible second wave of deaths, like an axe over our heads, as long as I\u2019ve been here. Using our abilities will trigger it. Acting out will trigger it. Speaking or reading or thinking too hard about anything will trigger it. Only, they\u2019ve done such a good job of making this place hell that I wouldn\u2019t be surprised if the real one turned out to be a much nicer place.<\/p>\n

Salvation will be found in obedience.<\/span> Dad\u2019s parting piece of advice when he walked me to the school bus that morning. I\u2019ve dismantled the phrase a thousand times in my head and tried to reassemble it into something I read in the Bible. He spoke in parables and proverbs, and when he realized what I was, he barely spoke at all. Some part of me still thinks he would have loved me more if I\u2019d died, because it\u2019d mean I was saved.<\/p>\n

Mom only wanted whatever Dad wanted.<\/p>\n

I thought that was what I wanted, too, until I saw my bunkmate actually die in front of me. In this cabin, almost a year ago, as hard as it is to believe now. And it was nothing like those men in suits with the dead-eyed smiles promised\u2014that it\u2019d be as simple as going to sleep and never waking up. But that night, I\u2019d stood over her and watched death come and electrify her from the inside out\u2014I remember thinking, stupid and stunned and exhausted, This can\u2019t be right,<\/span> because IAAN wasn\u2019t supposed to make your body thrash, wasn\u2019t supposed to make you scream loud enough that not even clenched teeth could contain the sound. I thought it would be quiet, and authoritative\u2014like a steady, warm hand reaching through the darkness to lift you out of this world.<\/p>\n

Dad always spoke of God with more fear than reverence\u2014always conscious of how angry He was with us, always disappointed as we fell short of His plan. In Sunday school, every lesson and teaching had been softened for us. He wasn\u2019t an angry God, but a loving God. He was there for us when no one else was. We could lean on Him for strength.<\/p>\n

Now I think that Dad was right all along. There\u2019s no mercy, not in life, not even in death.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m already awake when the morning alarm starts clanging through the speaker in the far corner of the room. I stay on my back a moment longer, rubbing my hands over my face, before sitting up and sliding over the side of the bunk bed. My bare toes land on the edge of the wooden frame beneath me, and I use it to stretch over my mattress and straighten out my sheets. My shoes and sweatshirt are under the bottom bunk, but the space next to them is empty and has been since they took Ruby away.<\/p>\n

No one is talking this morning, but the cabin is filled with small sounds of life. The old bunks creak and groan as the girls sleeping up top jump to the ground. Yawns stretch tired faces wide open. Joints crack as stiffness is worked out. I slip my shoes on, running my fingers along the fading number scrawled there in black permanent marker, 3284, to brush the dirt away. I can\u2019t bring myself to look at the empty bed again, the bare mattress where she used to sleep.<\/p>\n

I need to stop obsessing over this, but I can\u2019t help it. Climbing up, climbing down, I can\u2019t avoid the empty space; it sucks the air out of my chest, makes my head ache. I don\u2019t understand how someone I barely knew can bring tears to the surface faster than thinking about my parents, my cousins, the other girls I\u2019ve lived with for the last seven years. It\u2019s like sitting in front of a nearly complete puzzle that\u2019s missing only one piece\u2014but that piece, the one that completes the image, is just…gone. Not in the box.<\/p>\n

Somehow, I lost it.<\/p>\n

I know I must have, because Vanessa, Ashley, all of them gave me these looks when the dark-haired girl first showed up a few years ago. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhatever you fought about, it\u2019s not worth it,\u201d Ashley had whispered to me. The older girls were braver about talking in the morning. \u201cI hate to see you guys like this. She doesn\u2019t even talk now.\u201d<\/p>\n

This swell of hurt and fear and something that felt too close to panic had tackled me from behind. The air was coming in and out of me in sharp bursts. There was no explanation for it, other than I was…something was wrong with me. My head. I didn\u2019t forget faces. I didn\u2019t forget anything. And yet everyone was acting like she\u2019d been with us from the beginning. They were making me dizzy with these looks of confusion and pity and curiosity. I broke into a cold sweat at Ashley\u2019s words. The pieces of me that were already barely holding together after the punishment I\u2019d taken a few days before began to drift apart.<\/p>\n

Is this the second wave? <\/span>I remember thinking. Do we slowly lose what we can do? <\/span>Were our minds just going to one day blink out?<\/p>\n

But all the other cards were in place. I tested it every morning, every night. Address numbers on my block. Mia Orfeo\u2019s bookshelves. Pages of the Bible. Patterns of Christmas tree ornaments. No Ruby, never any Ruby before that moment. She\u2019d come right over to me, small and pale\u2014face smeared with grime like she\u2019d been working in the Factory all day with us. And she\u2019d gripped me like I was going to be able to drag her out from whatever she was drowning under. Green eyes, shining with pain. The PSF that day had pounded me into the ground with his baton before locking me in the cage for hours. I must have said something to him to make him punish me. A wrong look, something I muttered. But that was hazy, too. They must have brought Ruby in while I was gone.<\/p>\n

That was the only word she ever said to me: Ruby.<\/span> I asked when she\u2019d come in, what her name was, and the only thing she\u2019d managed to choke out was her own name.<\/p>\n

The truth is, she lived like a shadow. Silent, always trying to make herself as small and quick as she possibly could. The PSFs, they never picked on her, they never noticed her, and it was hard not to be resentful when I could barely make it one day without\u2014<\/p>\n

I shook my head, smoothing my hair back into a ponytail.<\/p>\n

How can I remember each day from the moment they brought me through the damn gate until that evening, but she\u2019s just not there? She\u2019s dissolved like smoke.<\/p>\n

How can you miss something, feel so awful about it, when you\u2019re not sure you had it in the first place?<\/p>\n

From the next bunk over, Vanessa clucks her tongue in warning\u2014a hurry the heck up<\/span>. I can tell we have a day of rain ahead of us by the way the mildew stench seems particularly strong. If we\u2019re getting rain, it means it\u2019s too warm for snow, and that is always, always, always a blessing. <\/p>\n

The winter uniforms are nothing more than forest-green sweats. There are no coats, unless you\u2019re working in the Garden. The Laundry, Factory, and Kitchen are all, in theory, heated. At the end of each Garden shift, you pass the woolen gray monstrosities back in; I can\u2019t tell if it\u2019s because they just aren\u2019t willing to pony up and pay for coats for the whole camp, or if they\u2019re afraid we\u2019d try to stash something inside of them. Hiding sharp-tipped trowels and hand pruners, smuggling strawberries, I don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n

I take another deep breath and hold it in my chest until I can\u2019t resist the burn. Falling into my spot in line, the earthy dampness of the cabin finally fades under the familiar smells of plain detergent, shampoo, and sleep-warmed skin. The overhead lights that snapped on at the alarm wash everyone\u2019s skin out to a chalky ash.<\/p>\n

The electronic door locks click one, two, and three before the heavy metal swings open and a PSF steps inside, her eyes sweeping over our lopsided lines. With Ruby gone at my right, Vanessa has had to step up into her space, leaving Elizabeth alone at the back to walk with the stare of the PSF burning into her neck.<\/p>\n

The steel-gray light from the overcast sky creeps into the cabin like a delicate fog. I blink my eyes against it, fighting the urge to hold up a hand to shield them as the PSF inspects first our uniforms and, next, the general state of the cabin.<\/p>\n

Rather than say a word, the woman, blond hair twisted into a tight, low bun beneath her black cap, whistled and waved us forward, the way she would have called a dog to her side. It set my teeth on edge and spun my exhaustion into annoyance. There\u2019s something about her smirk today I don\u2019t like. Her eyes keep darting back and forth between whatever is standing out along the soggy trail and us.<\/p>\n

I square my shoulders as Vanessa and I pass by her, a halfhearted attempt to brace myself for the freezing January air; the sting of it turns our skin pink and our breath white. I was wrong about it not being cold enough to snow; in a West Virginia winter, what\u2019s rain one moment turns to icy sleet in the next, and then, just as you settle into that misery, suddenly there are large, fluffy snowflakes drifting down around you like feathers.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m so distracted by the effort it takes to not give in to the clench of my shoulders and arms, to concentrate on not showing them how badly my body wants to shiver, I don\u2019t even see them until the lines have filed out behind me. Cabins are opened and emptied by number, a careful sequence that involves stopping, going, stopping again as everyone is led out onto their right trail, wherever it is they\u2019re supposed to be going\u2014wash houses, Mess Hall, or straight to work until lunch. It\u2019s timed down to the second, and half of the time I think it only works because everyone\u2019s too tired and cold to try to resist being dragged into the pattern. What\u2019s the point, anyway?<\/p>\n

But because every day is exactly the same, it should have been the first thing I noticed\u2014the very first, given the bright red vests they\u2019re wearing. The uniforms beneath them are dark, smoky gray\u2014not the black of the PSFs. The pads of my fingers sting just looking at them\u2014it\u2019d been so hard to get the plastic needle through the thick fabric I\u2019d pricked myself enough times to draw blood. Three months ago, we\u2019d sewn buttons on them, as well as patches of numbers across the breast pockets. I\u2019d thought nothing of it at the time. We\u2019d dyed and stenciled any number of prison uniforms, so I\u2019d just assumed…I just thought we\u2019d never see them again.<\/p>\n

Beside me, Vanessa manages to cut off her gasp but can\u2019t get her body\u2019s instinctive response under control. To our PSF\u2019s satisfaction, she flinches and looks away quickly, like the sight of the Red alone could burn her.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t need to look around me to know that at least half of our cabin has already figured out what\u2019s happening. Those same girls have already moved on to drawing further conclusions that will take me another week to puzzle out. For all our differences, our Green minds really only function in two ways\u2014my way, the storage locker, or their way\u2014the ability to connect multiple dots of a situation or problem as easily and quickly as breathing. I get the impression we bore them every time we try to talk to them, like they always know what we\u2019re about to say next. In a fraction of a second, they can look at Vanessa\u2019s reaction, see how young the new people are, assess the color of the vest, recognize the uniforms we helped stitch together, and recognize now, in context, that the frustrating number patches were really Psi identification numbers. I can practically feel their minds churning behind me, whipping up a frenzied series of thoughts. Reds.<\/span><\/p>\n

If I know them, those girls will be thinking ahead, their conclusions slanting toward the future. Why are they here? How will it affect me? When will they leave?<\/span> But I\u2019m trapped in the past. Do the other girls remember, the way I do, the faces under the caps they wear? They\u2019re blank, so completely vacant that it looks like their features have been painted on their skin. <\/p>\n

My stomach begins to turn over itself, the burning taste of sick rising in my throat like acid. How? How did they do this to these kids? I know the first face that we pass along the way to the Mess Hall; I know that girl because she was at this camp. She was here for almost two years before they took the Reds and Oranges out that night. I don\u2019t forget faces, and even though I\u2019d tried cutting the memories up and storing them in a dark, locked place, I can feel them bubbling back up, trying to merge together again. Fires in the cabins. Fires in the Mess Hall. Fires in the wash houses. The sky stained black with smoke. The boy who tried running from the Garden, who fried himself against the fence when his fire couldn\u2019t melt the metal fast enough. That winter, that whole winter, we\u2019d gone without real vegetables and fruit because the only things he\u2019d set on fire that day were our food and himself.<\/p>\n

The thing about the Reds was this: no matter how still they were, watching them was like having eyes on a pot of water set to simmer. A small uptick in temperature could set them to boil\u2014it could happen that fast, in a second of carelessness. They were the monsters of our stories, ones who couldn\u2019t bring themselves to lurk in the shadows. And as terrifying as they were, as little as they cared about the rest of us, I never felt so defeated as I did when the camp controllers removed them. Because even if the rest of us were pathetic and too scared to even make eye contact, they were always pushing back, they were always fighting, they never fell into the pattern. <\/p>\n

I thought they\u2019d killed them. We all did. <\/p>\n

My feet get sucked down into Thurmond\u2019s dark mud; I can\u2019t even feel the cold anymore; panic heats my blood and makes my hands jitter at my side uselessly. <\/p>\n

They hold no weapons that I can see\u2014no guns, or knives, or even the handheld White Noise machines. I guess that makes sense. They\u2019re the weapons themselves.<\/p>\n

What have they done to them? <\/span>How easy would it be for them to do it to the rest of us?<\/p>\n

I count twenty along the way to the Mess Hall, spaced out evenly, filling in the gaps where there used to be PSFs. Where there are black uniforms, they\u2019re hanging back off the trails, watching us pass by in clusters, talking to each other and smiling, actually smiling<\/span> about it, the sickos. <\/p>\n

It feels like a challenge\u2014like they want to see us shrivel up just that little bit more when we see how helpless we really are. Just when you become numb to the cold running bony fingers up and down your bare skin, when your muscles become too used to the punishing schedule of go, go, go, go, work, work, work, work, when you realize it\u2019s possible to turn a deaf ear on hateful words\u2014that\u2019s when the men up in their Tower know they need to change the rules of whatever game they\u2019re playing with us.<\/p>\n

Vanessa keeps trying to catch my attention; I see her nodding toward each Red we pass, as if I could somehow miss that they\u2019re there. The sleet has turned back into rain, and before we get within a hundred feet of the Mess, we\u2019re all drenched, the icy water slicing through our clothes and skin, down to our bones. I can\u2019t give the PSFs the pleasure of seeing me look at each of the Reds. I try to watch them out of the corner of my eye, assessing each face. I recognize about half of them; that makes sense. There just weren\u2019t that many Reds at Thurmond to begin with, and even back then, they tried to keep boys and girls separate at meals and the different work rotations. It was harder to cross paths with them, and it takes me a little longer to dig around for the right memories, but I have them. My eyes shift again, assessing what\u2019s ahead as we come up on the Mess Hall. And then\u2014<\/p>\n

I think I\u2019ve been shot.<\/p>\n

It happens that fast; the pain slices clean through me, and I imagine the bullet hits my heart at an angle. There are snipers on the roof of the Control Tower. They are always watching, always adjusting their aim. It\u2019s intolerable. The hurt takes away my breath. Sinks my feet in place.<\/p>\n

But I\u2019m not bleeding. I touch a hand to my chest, just to be sure.<\/p>\n

Sammy.<\/span> I can hear him say it even now. I\u2019ve fought so hard to keep the sound of his voice from disappearing. Sammy<\/span> Sunshine.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m not dying. Hallucinating, maybe. Because I think I just\u2014I think I just saw\u2014<\/p>\n

Vanessa is the one that ultimately moves me forward again, driving her knee into the back of mine. The sting of it eases as I convince myself I imagined it. My fingers curl and uncurl into and out of fists and I feel like I\u2019m somehow running inside of my own skin. I can\u2019t settle myself. I\u2019m going to scream. The only way I can keep it from escaping is to press a fist against my mouth.<\/p>\n

By the time we\u2019re inside the cloud of warm air drifting out from the open Mess Hall doors, the urge to look again is like a rubber band snapping and snapping and snapping against my skin. I wish I had resisted, not looked up at the boy posted at the door, his hands clasped in front of him, his stance steady and strong. Our eyes meet and dart away, and I hear his stiff black gloves creak as his fingers tighten around each other. The Mess is heated, yes, but it feels only lukewarm compared to the heat that\u2019s coming off him. A twinge of dread-stained recognition creeps down my spine, bone by bone, until I think my legs will dissolve under me. I recognize him the way you know the feel of sun on your skin after spending too long in the shade.<\/p>\n

My mind doesn\u2019t let me forget faces. Sometimes it feels like a tiny miracle. A blessing. Others, a curse, some kind of punishment for all those times I disobeyed my parents and ran wild around the neighborhood. Good kids go to heaven; bad kids need to be rehabilitated. Now I know that must be true; I know that someone, whether they\u2019re up in paradise or down here in this little slice of hell, is trying to break me. I am being tested.<\/p>\n

The years between us have thinned out his round face, made good on the promise of inheriting his father\u2019s chiseled features. Dark eyes sit below dark brows, thick dark hair. The rest of us are so drained of life after a sunless winter, we may as well blend into the snow, but he is lit from within. He is the best thing I have ever seen in my life. The worst thing.<\/p>\n

I can\u2019t\u2014I swallow the bile, try to shove away the last image my mind\u2019s preserved of him. Ten years old, calling up the singsong password to get into our imaginary castle in Greenwood\u2014that secret kingdom he invented in the thick cluster of trees behind our houses. His hair shines like a raven\u2019s wing as he climbs up the rope to the tree platform his father had helped us build, takes his seat on the pillow we stole from one of their couches, and starts to read the story of the lost prince of Greenwood and a young knight\u2014me\u2014setting out to find him. He\u2019d spent all day in school writing it; it made my chest tight to picture it, one arm wrapped around the notebook, protecting it from the cruel eyes of the boys sitting around us.<\/p>\n

If I could, I\u2019d spend my days locked inside the fantasy of our stolen time there, but I\u2019d never been able to disappear so completely into my imagination the way he could. It was stupid to be so hung up on it now. Even then, we should have been too old for play like that, or at least old and clever enough to name our magic land after something other than our neighborhood street. But it hadn\u2019t mattered then, and it didn\u2019t matter now, and what surprised me, more than almost anything, was how badly it hurt to realize by our own rules I would be denied access to Greenwood, anyway\u2014the requirements were kindness and goodness in your heart, and I barely know what those words mean anymore. I think of them and I see him<\/span>. So how did they do this\u2014to the boy who\u2019d struggled not to cry when we found the overturned nest of eggs in Greenwood? They didn\u2019t even have a chance,<\/span> he\u2019d said.<\/p>\n

I want to cry, I want to cry so badly, but the helpless fury that\u2019s been threatening to choke me for years has finally burnt through the last soft part of me. I want to give up.<\/p>\n

Even in another life\u2014another world\u2014where everything was good and sweetly normal, seven years would never have been enough time to forget the face that belonged to Lucas Orfeo.<\/p>\n

We won\u2019t be fed again until dinner, but I couldn\u2019t bring myself to eat a bite of the soggy mashed potatoes or the vegetable stew. We\u2019ve been eating the same tasteless crap for weeks, so it wasn\u2019t like I was missing much. I just didn\u2019t trust my stomach not to send it sailing right back up as soon as I managed to swallow it down.<\/p>\n

Fear followed us into the Mess Hall, coating the silence, expanding until I thought it would eventually push the walls out of alignment. It multiplied faster than the weeds in the Garden. This is what makes it so hard\u2014well, one of the many things that puts this place at the corner of bleak and misery. There\u2019s never an explanation. Not for the way we\u2019re supposed to behave, not for why they do the things they do. When they first began work on the Factory, Ruby said\u2014<\/p>\n

No. That wasn\u2019t right. Ruby wasn\u2019t here when they began turning the dark dirt over, burrowing down into earth. She hadn\u2019t been the one to wager the guess that the camp controllers were finally going to take care of the problem of us\u2014permanently. Put us where no one would ever be able to find us.<\/p>\n

I braced my forehead against my hands, trying to rub away the throb of pain behind my temples. I blinked again, and the image of a little dark-haired girl was gone, replaced by a panicked kind of anger. It grated on my nerves. Sent my heart galloping for no reason at all.<\/p>\n

I was thankful for it, though, because the anger was the only thing strong enough to distract me from watching Lucas. The Reds, the five we\u2019d seen before, had entered the Mess Hall and had made steady passes up and down the rows of silent wooden tables and benches. I wondered if they\u2019d sensed as clearly as the rest of us had, that they were still being watched, even as they\u2019d been clearly elevated to watch us. The PSFs clustered in the corners of the large room, heads bending toward each other as they picked and tore apart the firestarters\u2019 every stiff movement. Part of me wondered if they were more afraid of the Reds than we were.<\/p>\n

Lucas passed by our table twice, once behind me, once in front of me. Each time I looked away before he could catch me watching him, taking in every inch of his appearance, searching for my friend in him. Trying to convince myself I wasn\u2019t drowning myself in some kind of desperate delusion. It was like not realizing you were starving until a feast was laid out in front of you.<\/p>\n

Older, taller, harder Lucas. Lucas with the dimple in his chin.<\/p>\n

Red.<\/span><\/p>\n

The word ran circles around my mind as we walked over to the Factory, a single word that somehow encompassed a whole dark cloud of thoughts. Red, Red, Red, Red.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019d thought about it, you know, wondered if the two of them were still alive, if they were in a camp like mine. My first few weeks here, I\u2019d daydream about seeing them from across the Mess Hall or Garden, get hit with the false high of warm recognition despite it all being in my head. I clung to the possibility of it, even as the years marched on. Lucas would be Green, like me. I just wouldn\u2019t see him because they kept the boys and girls separate. Mia would be Blue, which would also explain why I hadn\u2019t seen her. They didn\u2019t let the colors mix unless we were in the Garden. I nursed that little hope for years, shielding it, keeping it close to me like a candle in a rainstorm.<\/p>\n

And maybe some part of me remembered that story\u2014Sir Sammy, fair knight, off to find and rescue Prince Lucas from the outcropping of rocks that doubled as a dungeon and fortress depending on the day. I\u2019d sing, and he\u2019d answer with a shout, I\u2019d sing and he\u2019d answer again, over and over until we were tired of the game or were called in for dinner. I always found him where I knew he\u2019d be. It was the searching that was the important part.<\/p>\n

Eventually, you grow up and you stop pretending. This place beats every last dream out of you. It clears your head of such stupid things. The truth was simple, not a glossy fairy tale. Lucas was a year older than me and three years older than his sister, Mia, but neither had been hit with IAAN in the time I\u2019d known them. They moved away a few months before I realized I\u2019d already been affected by…the virus, the disease, whatever it was. Their parents had both lost their jobs and headed a ways north to try to find work in a bigger city.<\/p>\n

Bedford was a small town made even smaller by the economic crash and the bottomed-out markets that the people on TV couldn\u2019t shut up about. My parents hadn\u2019t let me say good-bye to the Orfeos\u2014they\u2019d never liked their \u201cinfluence.\u201d They\u2019d whisper that word like it was the devil\u2019s own name. Influence.<\/span> They didn\u2019t like how I acted when I finally came home, zipping through the rooms, trying to recreate the carefree way we\u2019d run around their house and outside in Greenwood, smacking each other with plastic swords. They didn\u2019t like it when I told them about Mrs. Orfeo giving us snacks, or when I repeated something she had said. It took me a while to understand that when you don\u2019t like someone, nothing they can say or do will ever seem right. Something as harmless as giving a kid a cookie becomes something aggressive, a challenge to their authority.<\/p>\n

So I\u2019d watched them drive off from my bedroom window, crying my stupid eyes out, hating everyone and everything. I didn\u2019t stop until I found the bundle of sparklers he\u2019d left for me in the tree fort. The notebook of stories he\u2019d spent three years writing. I kept them there so my parents wouldn\u2019t find them and take them away. I wonder all the time if they\u2019re still there. If Greenwood exists anywhere outside of my head.<\/p>\n

My family only got to stay because we lived off the charity of the Church. I don\u2019t know if my parents are in the old house, or if they picked up and moved as far from the memories of their unblessed freak child as they could. I wish I didn\u2019t care.<\/p>\n

Lucas and one other Red, a girl with cropped blond hair, served as our escorts. I had to force myself to stare at the back of Ashley\u2019s head to keep from looking at him when he suddenly matched my pace. I swear, he was warm enough that the snow melted before it touched him\u2014that he kept me warm that whole miserable trek through the mud and sleet. But that would have been crazy.<\/p>\n

Where had he been sent, if it hadn\u2019t been to Thurmond? Where was Mia? Was she like him, or me, or was she one of the other colors?<\/p>\n

The metal Factory doors always sound like they are belching as they are dragged open by the PSFs waiting inside. My hands are useless, cramped and stiff from the cold, but I try squeezing the water from my hair and sweatshirt anyway. We leave a trail of smeared mud and water behind us that the Green cabins on cleanup rotation are going to have to mop up after last meal.<\/p>\n

Ice still clouds the skylights\u2014not that there\u2019s any real sun to filter through the clouds of dirt this morning. Winters stretch on forever in this place, dragging out each dark hour until it becomes almost unbearable. There\u2019s one thing I can\u2019t remember: what it feels like to be truly warm.<\/p>\n

The building is large enough to swallow several hundred kids whole. The main level is nothing but stretches of work tables and plastic bins. The metal rafters above are usually crowded with figures in black uniforms clutching their large guns, but today there\u2019s only a dozen, maybe less. About that many on the ground, too. A thought begins to solidify at the back of my mind, but I push it away before it can take shape. I need to focus. I need to get through today, and maybe tomorrow will feel easier. It always gets easier as you get used to it.<\/p>\n

I see one of the PSFs throw an arm out, pointing to where Lucas needs to stand against the far wall. When he stares at him blankly, the black uniform lets out an explosive cuss and maneuvers him there by force. We see, at the same exact moment the PSFs do, that the Reds need to be shown exactly what to do. And somehow, this scares me more than thinking that these kids have been turned against us, that they might want to voluntarily hurt us. It means that they are nothing more than weapons. Guns. Point, ready. Point, aim. Point, fire<\/span>. They are like the old metal toy soldiers Lucas was given by his grandpa. Unable to act on their own, but shaped with edges sharp enough to cut your fingers if you\u2019re not careful.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t care what he is. I don\u2019t care what he could do to me\u2014I care about what they\u2019ve done to my Lucas. I\u2019ve seen enough Red kids to know what the ability does to them, how hot they burn inside their own heads. We thought that they took these kids out to kill them, and now I see they\u2019ve done something much worse. They\u2019ve taken the soul out of the body.<\/p>\n

Is this the cure? Is this what they\u2019ve been working on?<\/span><\/p>\n

After all these years, this is what we have to look forward to? <\/span>Blank faces, blank minds. And their eyes…My stomach clenched. The Reds hadn\u2019t particularly cared who got in the way of their abilities, but when another kid got hurt, it was more often than not an accident. With each escape attempt, each fight they sparked, we knew that when it came down to it, they would be on our side.<\/p>\n

I move stiffly into place, fitting into my usual spot at our table. It\u2019s only when they shut the doors that I begin to feel sensation coming back into me, and even then, it\u2019s only because Vanessa and Ava are crammed next to me, shoulder to shoulder. Can\u2019t talk, but at least we can share the heat that comes off our skin as we start moving.<\/p>\n

A plastic bin on the table is filled with what looks like an assortment of old cell phones. There are no instructions given, only three separate bins in front of that one, each a different color. In the Factory, you assemble, sort, or disassemble. They want each phone broken down into three parts\u2014I watch Vanessa take apart the first one to see if her suspicions match mine. Battery in one bin, the storage card in another one, the plastic casing in the third.<\/p>\n

The work we do here isn\u2019t important. They can\u2019t give us anything sharp, or anything we may be tempted to take and use later as a weapon\u2014against our soft skin, or theirs. No scissors, even. It\u2019s all just work to tire us out. Make us easier to shuffle around and be prodded into our places. After standing on your feet for six hours each day for weeks on end, there\u2019s not enough fight left in you to resist the pull of sleep at night. Not enough thoughts left in your head to wonder where the uniforms you\u2019ve sewn or phones you\u2019ve dismantled are going.<\/p>\n

My fingers seem to be as jumbled and clumsy as my mind today. I can\u2019t get it together\u2014keep it together. I drop the phone case in my hand before I can even pop the battery out, sending it crashing against the concrete floor. Ava stiffens beside me, shrinking away so that any PSF who may be watching will know that it wasn\u2019t her. I drop down onto my knees, quickly patting around blindly under the table until my fingers close around it.<\/p>\n

Get it together, Sam.<\/span> My head feels light enough to drift away from my neck like a balloon. I try to stand up, and my vision flashes white black white. When Vanessa takes my arm, I let her help me back onto my feet. But the grip doesn\u2019t ease up, even after I\u2019m steady.<\/p>\n

I feel the approach from behind like a cold wind blowing up the back of my shirt, exposing me. This is what a bird feels like,<\/span> I think, when they feel a storm coming in the distance. <\/span>I know my breath is coming out in light gasps, and I hate myself for it. I hate the way I want to crawl under the table and fold myself smaller and smaller until I disappear completely.<\/p>\n

I do not know what, in the end, makes a person who they are. If we\u2019re all born one way, or if we only arrive there after a series of choices. The Bible claims that the wicked act on their own desires and impulses, because God is good, only good, and He would never compel a soul to wickedness. That I\u2019m supposed to count on justice in the next life, even if I can\u2019t have it in this one. My father would say that the Devil works us all to his own ends and that we must constantly be on guard to protect ourselves from him. It helps, sometimes, to think of the man behind me as the Devil himself; it\u2019s easier to become the lion I need to be. I can pretend I know his tricks, that he\u2019s not an unpredictable human with a temper he carefully cultivates like a rose with razor thorns.<\/p>\n

It helps. Sometimes.<\/p>\n

He doesn\u2019t say anything at first, but his breath is hot on the back of my neck, and his smell\u2014oil, cigarette smoke, vinegar, and sweat\u2014wraps around me like an embrace, trapping me where I am. My movements become painfully careful. The sweat that comes to my palm makes holding on to each case a challenge, but I won\u2019t let my hands shake. I refuse to give him the pleasure of knowing that he affects me any more than the other PSFs.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s one of the few that still wears a full PSF uniform; all black and menace, with the embroidered red Psi symbol over his heart under the stitched name Tildon<\/span>.<\/p>\n

I keep my eyes on the bins in front of me, but I wonder, I wonder all the time, if he or any of them would do these things if we were allowed to meet them eye to eye. Would they feel as free to hurt someone as human as they are? Maybe they just wouldn\u2019t care.<\/p>\n

I should know better; he\u2019s not someone who likes to be ignored. The PSF lets out a disgruntled sound that seems to rip through my eardrums. He takes a step back and I\u2019m just about to release the breath I\u2019d held when I feel a hand slip under my sweatshirt. Under my shirt. A thumb rubs down my spine.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s me.<\/span><\/p>\n

I see the thought reflected in the relieved faces of the girls around me. This is the third day in a row since the rotation began that he\u2019s zeroed in on me, come sauntering over like a hunter picking up a bird he\u2019s shot out of the sky. I can\u2019t believe it. I don\u2019t want to believe that it\u2019s me<\/span>.<\/p>\n

My muscles lock first. My head buzzes, emptied of every thought. The sudden shift from badgering bully to\u2014to this<\/span> actually tilts my world. It\u2019s a soft, delicate touch, and so vile I think my skin is actually crawling to get away from it. I don\u2019t know what to do\u2014I know what I want <\/span>to do. Scream, shove him away, give in to the burn of bile in my throat. I\u2019ve been hit so many times it\u2019s never occurred to me that this kind of touch could be that much worse than the pain. The hand slides around my hip, down\u2014<\/p>\n

I straighten, turning my head to the side. Vanessa\u2019s face disappears as she turns away, letting a cloud of curling dark hair protect her. What does she have to be afraid of? It has taken years for us to see the pattern of his interest, the careful process of his selection. Last month, when we overlapped cleaning duty with another Green cabin, a girl whispered to us about what happened to her bunkmate. While I am in the room, there will be no one else to him. Only, the attention from the past two days has focused, sharpened from mocking cruelty to something…something like this<\/span>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWork faster.\u201d His voice makes me think of the way condensation collected on walls of my parents\u2019 unfinished basement. The stones are so dark and the lighting is so bad, you don\u2019t feel the cold drip until it\u2019s already on your skin. You can\u2019t avoid it.<\/p>\n

I see his reflection in the screen of the next phone I pick up. His body is hot and damp and it repulses me more than even the sight of his face. How can someone who looks so normal, like the man who\u2019d delivered our mail each afternoon, be this way? I want to know what hole he crawled out of, and how I can send him straight back into it.<\/p>\n

There are others watching this happen, from above, from around me. I feel their eyes, can sense the attention in the room shifting the longer he stands there, smelling my hair, pressing against me. Even as the hatred boils over in me, shame is right on its heels. It\u2019s the stupidest thing in the world, I know it is, but I am ashamed of what he is doing to me and that others are seeing it.<\/p>\n

When I still don\u2019t react, he grabs my wrist, wrenching it back up into the air. \u201cSearch!\u201d he calls out, clearly delighting in the word. \u201cAssistance!\u201d<\/p>\n

It was quiet in the Factory before, but now I can actually hear the rain bleeding through the cracks in the ceiling. Rain and sleet slash against the walls and glass overhead, washing against them like waves. I think I am drowning; I am actually choking trying to get air to my chest. Before today, I would have stood there and just taken it, but I know now that there\u2019s something he\u2019s looking for. Something he wants to see.<\/p>\n

He\u2019d lie about me stealing something from the bin just to strip off every last layer of clothing and shred of defense I have left in front of everyone. When we were kids, this was nothing. A female PSF would lead us to the far corner of the room and stand over us as we took off our uniform to prove that we weren\u2019t hiding anything. I\u2019m not a kid anymore, and none of the women seem to be coming forward. I see one in the rafters, older, thick at the waist, and she\u2019s watching this all play out with a pinched look on her face. She isn\u2019t walking toward the stairs. None of them are.<\/p>\n

But they don\u2019t look surprised.<\/p>\n

So he starts the process for them, tugging my shirt the rest of the way out of my shorts. I hear Vanessa let out a startled gasp, swinging around and bumping the table.<\/p>\n

I push my elbow back, trying to dislodge him.<\/p>\n

\u201cCareful,\u201d he warns.<\/p>\n

Hot shame washes through me. I\u2019m furious at myself for showing these other girls I won\u2019t fight back. Ava is watching me with eyes that are pools of helpless horror, and I realize, with sudden clarity, that if it were any one of them, any <\/span>of the girls in my cabin, I would have done something immediately, said anything to have made it stop. I need to do the same for myself.<\/p>\n

Because I know where this is heading. Before the Green girl told us, we\u2019d heard whispers in the wash houses and out in the Garden. I know what language his touch is trying to speak, and I feel old Sam, the lion, roaring through my blood again. No one gets to believe that I won\u2019t fight.<\/p>\n

I know that pride is a sin, but I would rather be dead than let him\u2014any<\/span> of them\u2014think for one more second he\u2019s allowed to do this to me.<\/p>\n

When I feel him lean forward again, I don\u2019t hesitate. I drive both elbows back into his gut, catching him off guard. I know it doesn\u2019t hurt him\u2014that\u2019s why I throw my head back and make sure to nail him in the face, too.<\/p>\n

And I feel like I\u2019m spinning, spinning, spinning, reckless with delight in the small power I\u2019ve managed to take back.<\/p>\n

Vanessa and Ava both scream. Out of the corner of my vision, I see a blur of red coming toward us and I realize that my vision is hazy because my eyes are watering from the blow. My blood is thrumming in my skull, but I can\u2019t feel any pain. I barely hear Tildon when he starts cussing and spitting out one vile word after another. A PSF stands a short distance away with bugged-out eyes, looking between us and a soldier talking into his radio, saying, No<\/span>, and, Calm Control<\/span>, and Handled<\/span>\u2014<\/p>\n

I swing around to face Tildon as he gasps out, \u201cLittle…bitch<\/span>!\u201d<\/p>\n

He\u2019s clutching his nose, the words muffled by fingers and blood. He fumbles for the small White Noise machine at his side and I lash out with my foot, kicking it away. I feel a thousand feet high, like I could land another hit on him before the soldiers in black reach me. So, I do. I haul my hand back and slap him as hard as I can across his face, curling my fingers at the last second. The nails I\u2019ve broken working day after day in this Factory cut into the slick, fleshy part of his cheek. The breath goes out of him like a blown-out tire; the blood dribbling down his lips sprays out, sending a fine mist of it onto my sweatshirt.<\/p>\n

He is scarlet with rage as he stumbles toward me, swinging his free arm to try to club me with his meaty fist. The girls around me have crawled under the tables; I\u2019m dimly aware of the voices and wait for the White Noise, the gunshot, the end to my story. It\u2019s been so long since any of us tried this that I wonder if they\u2019ve forgotten what they\u2019re supposed to do.<\/p>\n

They come out of the stunned haze soon enough. The swing of a nearby baton registers as a change in the flow of the air around me. It whistles as it swings down. By the time it\u2019s there to connect with my skull, I\u2019m already falling forward. The weight that\u2019s slammed into me from behind drops me to the floor. My chin connects with the concrete and I taste blood. There is not a single part of me that isn\u2019t throbbing in pain, but somehow I\u2019m not done yet. The figure on top of me is feeding the fire. I kick back, trying to catch him\u2014he can\u2019t have me, I won\u2019t let Tildon do this. <\/p>\n

My hands are wrenched from under me and pinned with difficulty against my back. The hand that closes around them is large enough to capture both wrists at once and secure them with plastic binding. I toss my head back, rearing up like a bucking horse, and the warmth at my back shifts, leaning closer to my ear. He breathes out one word.<\/p>\n

\u201cSammy.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n

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Book Preview ONE SAM I DON\u2019T forget faces. I don\u2019t forget anything my eyes have landed on\u2014not the smallest detail of the white flowering wallpaper in our neighbors\u2019 house, not the cursive letters written on my classroom\u2019s whiteboard, not the numbers that flashed on the screen as the man in the white coat adjusted my … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1699,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[86],"class_list":["post-1700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-alexandra-bracken"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1700"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1700\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1699"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}