Cole’s giddiness has drained away. He presses against my leg, saying nothing. His fingers find mine and clamp on.
The last tumbler falls into place with a loud gong that echoes through the square.
Cole lets go of my hand and covers his ears. I scoop him up into my arms, trying to shield him from so much more than the power of that melancholy note.
The lid springs open with a drawn-out hiss.
“Lucky, I’m scared,” Cole confesses to my ears alone.
“Me too.” Why deny it, when my trembling embrace would betray me anyway?
Cassius’s tongue traces his lips. He reaches into the box and pulls out a large envelope bearing the seal of the Establishment. The seal depicts a lone fist clenching the hilt of a sword; the tip of the sword is jagged and broken, the missing piece presumably resting in the heart of the past. Cassius then trades the box for a golden letter opener Valerian hands him, which looks more like a dagger. He nods and wedges the blade’s point into the envelope’s edge, then tears straight through.
Mrs. Bledsoe winces. One hand clutches her chest. I wrap my free arm around her, pulling her close. No one should have to experience this terrible feeling once in their lifetime, let alone twice.
Cassius tilts the envelope and pours five small computer chips into the palm of his hand-five lives that will change forever in just a few moments, along with those of the ones they hold most dear.
The chips momentarily disappear from view when he clenches them in his fist and strides toward a pedestal known as the Revelation Terminal.
“Citizens of the Parish,” he announces. “I now give you this year’s Recruits. May they serve the Establishment and its people with all the courage of those that have come before them.”
He inserts the discs into the terminal. Outside, the jumbotrons surrounding the Citadel come to life, flashing bright colors from all over the spectrum, interspersed with fragments of faces compiled from the town’s records of all the eligible candidates in the Parish. A drum roll builds to a crescendo as the crowd waits in a mixture of excitement and dread for the first name to be revealed.
The whole thing is pretty theatrical, as Cassius could just rattle the names off and be done with it. But this is what the Establishment does best-prey on the fears and sanity of its citizens.
The screens explode with a graphic of shattered glass, revealing the image of the first Recruit.
A girl with long curly red hair. Then the still image morphs into a live feed, where her bright blue eyes are opened so wide it looks like she doesn’t have any eyelids. She’s looking around frantically, as if she’s not exactly sure what’s going on. A hand comes into view and points her toward one of the viewing screens. My stomach sinks when I see the fear soak her eyes, as she realizes in front of thousands that she’s been selected.
“Ophelia Juniper!” Cass announces. “Come forth to serve your country!”
Ophelia looks dazed. Behind her, I catch a glimpse of two cloaked figures holding on to her before she’s prodded away by an Imposer working the crowd.
“What’s going on?” I can read her lips until the directional mic picks up her audio like a sniper’s target. “Where do I go?” The surveillance feed tracks Ophelia’s movements through the crowd, which parts to give her a wide berth as she makes her way toward the reception area. She attempts to go left, scratches her head, turns right, then left again. “I’m so sorry. I’m a little confused.” She teeters in a circle a bit until an Imp grips her by the arm and guides her up the stairs.
“Why is she crying?” Cole’s lower lip quivers.
I shift my stance to try and block the screen, but it’s pointless as the image is visible from everywhere. In all the excitement, I’ve forgotten that this is the first Recruitment Cole has actually witnessed. “She’s just sad because she has to go away from her family a little while, that’s all.”
“You mean like when Mommy and Daddy had to go away?”
My mouth goes dry. “No, not like that at all.”
“You’re right,” Mrs. Bledsoe blurts out, her voice heavy with emotion. Her eyes are glued to the screen. “This is very different.”
Cole’s arms wrap tighter around my neck, his cheek like ice against mine.
The jumbotrons are doing their thing again, flashing a collage of desperate faces. This time there’s a graphic of an explosion, replaced by an image of the second Recruit-a spectacled face I recognize from the Instructional Facility.
“Gideon Warrick!” Cass’s voice booms through the plaza. “The time has come for you to take your place and serve. Come join your fellow Recruit!”
The cameras scan the crowd before homing in on Gideon’s face. Unlike Ophelia, Gideon doesn’t look confused, just resolute, as if this is exactly what he’s been expecting all along. It doesn’t surprise me. I remember him being an outsider at school, always the butt of one joke or another just because he was smart and withdrawn, not fitting in with the rest of us. But he was never afraid. He stood up to anyone who gave him a hard time, even if it resulted in a beating. It’s this same determination I see etched on his face now. He turns and hugs some indiscernible figures behind him, then marches forward and up to the platform next to Ophelia as if he’s making his way past the snickers in the school corridors. The crowd stares at him in awe, and in relief that he’s spared one of them, I’m sure.
Cole twists and turns in my arms. “I wanna go home!”
“Behave yourself. It’ll all be over soon.” But a chill courses through me as I realize that for Ophelia, Gideon, and their loved ones, it’s just beginning. Just like it was for Cass on that terrible day two years ago, when the sound of his name being announced ground my heart to pulp.
I look at him now. His back’s still to me. I fight the urge to rush up to him, turn him around so I can look into his eyes, make sure I can find the hint of disgust that I know has to be there. He wants to change all this. He will change all this.
Won’t he?
The jumbotrons go dark and the images flash faster. You can feel the crowd’s anxiety like a chilly film coating everything.
A clash of cymbals reveals the likeness of the third Re-cruit, a beautiful girl with long raven hair and green gems for eyes.
“She’s pretty,” Cole says to me.
“Yes, she sure is.”
“Cypress Goslin,” Cassius announces. “Your opportunity to attain the highest level of citizenship awaits you. Come and begin your new life!”
The feeds cut from the photo to a live shot of Cypress staring directly into the monitors, cold, fearless. When the Imposer arrives to pull her away, she rips her arm out of his grip and marches forward and up the stairs to take her place besides the statue-like Gideon and the quivering Ophelia.
Cassius clears his throat. “Here you have the first three of our brave new Recruits. Only two slots left. Two more opportunities to be a part of the greater good that is the Establishment. And just who will join them now? Who will step up to the podium without fear and assume their responsibility as a citizen of this noble society?”
The screens go crazy this time, flickering faster and faster, creating a disorienting strobe effect. Around me, I catch a series of snapshots of Cole’s frightened face, Mrs. Bledsoe with tears streaming from her eyes, and Cassius’s profile as he turns his head-the flare of his nostrils, the twitch in his cheek-and in that instant I know something’s wrong.
The jumbotrons explode with color, and then everything goes dark before an image appears.
There’s a disconnect between my eyes and my brain. The face I’m seeing … it’s not possible. It’s too much of a coincidence. We were just talking. Things like this don’t happen to people you were just talking to. They happen to strangers, or people you barely know. Not him. One look at Mrs. Bledsoe’s grief-stained face hammers home that it can happen to anyone.