“Warner?” My eyes go wide. “He’s with them? Is that—is that … unusual?”
“It’s quite odd,” Brendan says. “He’s CCR—chief commander and regent—of Sector 45. In normal circumstances he would delegate this task to a colonel, a lieutenant, even. His priorities should be on base, overseeing his soldiers.” Brendan shakes his head. “He’s a bit daft, I think, taking a risk like that. Spending time away from his own camp. Seems strange that he’d be able to get away so many nights.”
“Right,” Winston says, nodding his head. “Exactly.” He points at the 2 of us, stabbing at the air. “And it makes you wonder who he’s leaving in charge. The guy doesn’t trust anyone—he’s not known for his delegation skills to begin with—so for him to leave the base behind every night?” A pause. “It doesn’t add up. Something is going on.”
“Do you think,” I ask, feeling scared and feeling brave, “that maybe he’s looking for
“Yup.” Winston exhales. Scratches the side of his nose. “That’s exactly what I think. And I’d love to know what the hell he’s looking for.”
“Us, obviously,” Brendan says. “He’s looking for us.”
Winston seems unconvinced. “I don’t know,” he says. “This is different. They’ve been searching for us for years, but they’ve never done anything like this. Never spent so much manpower on this kind of a mission. And they’ve never gotten this close.”
“Wow,” I whisper, not trusting myself to posit any of my own theories. Not wanting to think too hard about
I don’t dare mention it.
“Yeah,” Winston says, picking up his chewed-up pen again. “Crazy. Anyway, if we don’t get a fresh batch of coffee today, I am seriously going to lose my shit.”
I look around the room. I don’t see coffee anywhere. No food, either. I wonder what that means for Winston. “Are we going to have breakfast before we start?”
“Nah,” he says. “Today we get to eat on a different schedule. Besides, we’ll have plenty to choose from when we get back. We get first picks. It’s the only perk.”
“Get back from where?”
“Outside,” Brendan says, leaning back in his chair. He points up at the ceiling. “We’re going up and out.”
“What?” I gasp, feeling true excitement for the first time. “Really?”
“Yup.” Winston puts his glasses back on. “And it looks like you’re about to get your first introduction to what it is we do here.” He nods at the front of the room, and I see Kenji hauling a huge trunk onto a table.
“What do you mean?” I ask. “What are we doing?”
“Oh, you know.” Winston shrugs. Clasps his hands behind his head. “Grand larceny. Armed robbery. That sort of thing.”
I begin to laugh when Brendan stops me. He actually puts his hand on my shoulder and for a moment I’m mildly terrified. Wondering if he’s lost his mind.
“He’s not joking,” Brendan says to me. “And I hope you know how to use a gun.”
EIGHTEEN
We look homeless.
Which means we look like civilians.
We’ve moved out of the classroom and into the hallway, and we’re all wearing a similar sort of ensemble, tattered and grayish and frayed. Everyone is adjusting their outfits as we go; Winston slips off his glasses and shoves them into his jacket only to zip up his coat. The collar comes up to his chin and he huddles into it. Lily, one of the other girls among us, wraps a thick scarf around her mouth and pulls the hood of her coat over her head. I see Kenji pull on a pair of gloves and readjust his cargo pants to better hide the gun tucked inside.
Brendan shifts beside me.
He pulls a skullcap out of his pocket and tugs it on over his head, zipping his coat up to his neck. It’s startling the way the blackness of the beanie offsets the blue in his eyes to make them even brighter, sharper than they looked before. He flashes me a smile when he catches me watching. Then he tosses me a pair of old gloves 2 sizes too big before bending down to tighten the laces on his boots.
I take a small breath.
I try to focus all my energy on where I am, on what I’m doing and what I’m about to do. I tell myself not to think of Adam, not to think about what he’s doing or how he’s healing or what he must be feeling right now. I beg myself not to dwell on my last moments with him, the way he touched me, how he held me, his lips and his hands and his breaths coming in too fast—
I fail.
I can’t help but think about how he always tried to protect me, how he nearly lost his life in the process. He was always defending me, always watching out for me, never realizing that it was me, it was always me who was the biggest threat. The most dangerous. He thinks too highly of me, places me on a pedestal I’ve never deserved.
I definitely don’t need protection.
I don’t need anyone to worry for me or wonder about me or risk falling in love with me. I am unstable.
“Hey.” Kenji stops beside me, grabs my elbow. “You ready?”
I nod. Offer him a small smile.
The clothes I’m wearing are borrowed. The card hanging from my neck, hidden under my suit, is brand-new. Today I was given a fake RR card—a Reestablishment Registration card. It’s proof that I work and live on the compounds; proof that I’m registered as a citizen in regulated territory. Every legal citizen has one. I never did, because I was tossed into an asylum; it was never necessary for someone like me. In fact, I’m fairly certain they just expected me to die in there. Identification was not necessary.
But this RR card is special.
Not everyone at Omega Point receives a counterfeit card. Apparently they’re extremely difficult to replicate. They’re thin rectangles made out of a very rare type of titanium, laser-etched with a bar code as well as the owner’s biographical data, and contain a tracking device that monitors the whereabouts of the citizen.
“RR cards track everything,” Castle explained. “They’re necessary for entering and exiting compounds, necessary for entering and exiting a person’s place of work. Citizens are paid in REST dollars—wages based on a complicated algorithm that calculates the difficulty of their profession, as well as the number of hours they spend working, in order to determine how much their efforts are worth. This electronic currency is dispensed in weekly installments and automatically uploaded to a chip built into their RR cards. REST dollars can then be exchanged at Supply Centers for food and basic necessities. Losing an RR card,” he said, “means losing your livelihood, your earnings, your legal status as a registered citizen.
“If you’re stopped by a soldier and asked for proof of identification,” Castle continued, “you must present your RR card. Failure to present your card,” he said, “will result in … very unhappy consequences. Citizens who walk around without their cards are considered a threat to The Reestablishment. They are seen as purposely defying the law, as characters worthy of suspicion. Being uncooperative in any way—even if that means you simply do not want your every movement to be tracked and monitored—makes you seem sympathetic to rebel parties. And that makes you a threat. A threat,” he said, “that The Reestablishment has no qualms about removing.