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“No,” I said. “I was just wondering if you knew anything about that door—”

Before I had a chance to finish the sentence she looked up at me.

“You do?” I asked.

“Oh,” she said, frozen for a moment. “I—no. No idea. Maybe it’s for groundskeeping?” She looked back down.

What was that?
It was definitely a reaction. Was it nervousness? Fear? Surprise?

“So you’ve never gone in there?” I asked.

“No.” She bent down to get a closer look at the pipe. Or, to make it look like she was too busy to talk.

“You’re one of the oldest here, aren’t you?” I said, trying to draw the conversation out. I slowly unfolded a new garbage bag and placed it in the basket.

“Um, yeah,” she said. “I guess so. I’m eighteen.”

“So you got here when you were, what, sixteen?”

“Yeah,” Rosa said, turning her head in my direction but not looking directly at me. “Listen, I’ve got to finish this up and then there’s a broken light switch in the girls’ dorm. I need to concentrate.”

“And you’re sure you’ve never been in that room, not even a long time ago?”

“Very sure.”

“Okay,” I said. “Good talking to you.”

“Yeah.”

I pushed the large garbage can back out into the hallway and headed for the next room.

I needed to take things to the next level.

Chapter Twenty-one

I
sat alone at dinner. I ate almost every meal alone now.

I took my plastic dinner tray and sat on the fourth floor, in the common room that no one ever used. It was already dark outside—sunset was earlier and earlier now. I watched as a few people walked past my door. Three Society girls were somewhere down the hall, talking and laughing about something that had happened in class that morning. I still couldn’t fathom it—how could they be so calm? How could they be
laughing
?

One thing I hadn’t figured out was where I’d go when I finally broke out. Of course, I’d go to the police first, and if they didn’t help I’d go to the newspapers. But after that, I didn’t know. I guess, up to now, I’d kind of assumed that escaping would be the happy ending—it’d be so much better than inside Maxfield Academy that it didn’t really matter.

But it hadn’t been that long since I’d left my foster family, and I hated it there. I didn’t want to get shipped back. I didn’t want to return to Pittsburgh at all—I wanted something better. I wished that I actually was in a private school, like the scholarship had advertised. Real teachers, real learning—real
people
. A real life.

I left the room and walked to the broad windows that overlooked the grounds in front of the school. I’d stood at these windows and waited for Jane the night of the dance.

I cupped my hands around my eyes and leaned against the glass, trying to see past the glare of the hall lights and into the darkness. There was fog or mist that hung over the trees in the distance. Could it be smoke from a guard camp? There didn’t seem to be enough moisture here for fog.

I heard soft footsteps padding up behind me.

“Hey, Bense.” Becky.

“Hey.” I kept my eyes on the forest.

“What are you looking at?”

She leaned beside me and peered outside.

“Just the woods. Do you ever see the campfire smoke out there?”

She pulled back from the window and so did I. She was wearing thick green flannel pajamas and flip-flops, but her makeup and hair were still flawless.

“Yeah,” she said. “Not very often. It’s not far.”

I looked into her eyes for a minute. Was she real? And if she was, was she one of the Society members who doled out punishments? Had she been lying to me?

I turned back to the window.

“What do you think it is?”

“I like to think that it’s a town,” she said. “But it’s probably too close. Some people say it’s guards.”

The stars were almost entirely blotted out by clouds, but there was one dark patch of sky where a few bright lights twinkled through. I wished I could get out of the school and see them.

“You said you don’t do security, right?”

“Right.”

“But you have the contract, so your necklace can open doors, right?”

“Sure.”

I turned to look at her—stared. I gazed into her eyes, studying the iris and the color and the eyelashes. Up close her eyes were bluer than they looked from far away, and right around the iris they were tinged with reddish brown. Everything about them—the delicate blood vessels, the streaks of color, the pink of her tear duct—seemed so real. So
human.

Becky smiled awkwardly. “What?”

“Come with me,” I said, and started toward the stairs.

She didn’t move, so I turned back and grabbed her hand. “Come on.”

We hurried down the empty stairs and made our way to the first floor and the big open foyer. I led her to the front doors.

“Can we go outside and look at the sky?” I asked.

A flash of concern crossed her face, but she hid it quickly. “Why?”

“I like being outside at night,” I said. “I promise—we won’t leave the front steps.”

She looked at me, her lips pursed in thought.

“Listen,” I said. “When I was back home, I was always outside at night. That’s where I’d go to think. And I can’t do it here.”

Becky took a deep breath. Her eyes were suddenly somber and intense. “You promise? Don’t lie to me.”

“I promise,” I said. “All I want to do is stand out there—we’ll be right next to the door.”

She moved toward the door. It buzzed and clicked, and she pushed it open.

We stepped out and stood side by side, looking at the forest.

It was colder than it appeared from the window. Becky folded her arms tightly, her shoulders raised as she tried to fend off the chill.

It smelled good out here. Completely different from inside the school, but also unlike the cold nights back home. Fresh and earthy. For a moment I thought I got a whiff of wood smoke, but couldn’t be sure.

Freedom. I felt free.

“I need to ask you a question,” I said.

Her arm touched mine as she stood beside me. “Okay.”

“Who decides the punishments?”

There was a pause. She seemed like she’d been expecting something else.

“The school,” she finally said, as if it was obvious.

“Does Isaiah have anything to do with it?”

From the corner of my eye I saw her shake her head. “No. We get the list of punishments every morning, and then the teachers read them in class.”

“They come on your computers?”

“Well, no. They come on Isaiah’s computer,” she said. “So, I was wrong. He distributes the list to the teachers to make the announcements. At least, that’s what would happen with Laura, back when . . .”

Her voice trailed off.

I wanted to believe her. But she’d never believe me.

“What if—” I stopped myself. What was I going to say?

Becky turned to me. She was shivering now, but didn’t move back toward the door.

“What if,” I continued, “things here aren’t what we think they are?”

She smiled, but it seemed sad. “What are they?”

“I don’t know.”

I looked down at her, her face pale in the dim light. I wanted to put my arm around her.

“We can go back inside,” I finally said.

But Becky just stared at me, the smile gone from her face. Her eyes flashed out to the forest and then back to me.

“What time is it?” she finally asked.

I checked my watch. “Seven thirty.”

“It feels later,” she said, staring out at the cold, dark forest.

“We can go in. Your feet have to be freezing.”

She nodded absently and exhaled long and slow, her breath a puff of gray in the cold air.

“I want to show you something,” she said, and motioned for me to follow her. Before I could say anything she was down the steps and heading across the lawn. I jogged after her to catch up.

“Where are we going?”

“I want to show you something,” Becky repeated. We were going around the front of the school, walking past the deep window wells. The last time I’d been outside in the dark, I’d been right here, with a girl. I could see it all, replaying over and over.

I tried to push it away, to focus on something else. The distant hum of a four-wheeler engine. The crunch of the frosted grass under my shoes. The swirling clouds of frozen breath that escaped Becky’s lips.

She led me to the corner of the school. Directly above us was the boys’ dorm, but no one could have seen us. We were too close to the building.

She stepped into the garden and crouched down. I didn’t see anything. Just the foundation—bricks and cement and dirt. It was too dark to make out any details.

“I had the groundskeeping contract once,” she said, her voice trembling slightly. “A long time ago, before the gangs. A bunch of the girls bid on it together—me and Laura and Carrie and . . . some others you never met.”

She took my hand and pressed it against something at the base of the wall. It was ice cold. Metal.

“Sorry,” she said. “It’s too dark to read it, but can you feel the numbers with your fingers?”

It was some kind of pipe jutting out of the cement, and I could tell there were raised bumps, but they were rough and uneven with rust and age. I couldn’t guess the numbers.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Eighteen ninety-three,” she said. “Around the bottom side of the pipe it says Steffen Metalworks, but you have to lie down in the garden to read it.”

“What does it mean?”

Becky stood, shivering now. “Let’s get back inside.”

I followed her. “Does that mean this place was built in 1893?”

“The pipe is from 1893,” she said.

“What was in New Mexico in 1893?”

“No idea,” she said, rubbing her arms to stay warm. “But there wasn’t much. There wasn’t much in Arizona in 1893—mining towns and Catholic missions and Native Americans. Probably the same for here.”

“Maybe they just used an old pipe when they were building this.”

We climbed the stairs, and the door unlocked for her. Warmth poured out of the foyer as we stepped inside.

“Maybe,” she said, turning to look at me. Her cheeks were red from cold. She lowered her voice, even though no one was in sight. “But either way, this building is really old, and it seems designed to be Maxfield Academy. Even the elevators don’t look like a recent addition.”

“What are you saying?”

“People have been here for a long time. A really long time.”

I shook my head. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

Becky’s trademark smile came back. “Since when does anything here make sense?”

I almost told her, right there. I almost spit it all out.

But there’s a difference between believing that the building was really old and believing that one of our friends was a robot.

I needed to show her. I had to find a way.

I lay awake that night, staring at Mason’s bunk above me. I wasn’t going to be able to convince anyone with words. I knew that. And I wasn’t going to be able to figure things out by just observing.

I looked at my watch. 11:56
p.m
.

Jumping out of bed, I hurried to my closet and pulled out my minicomputer. Bidding on the contracts ended at midnight.

I’d never bid on anything before. That was done by Curtis for the gang. But we all had access. I clicked on groundskeeping and entered a bid of one point. Then I clicked on security and did the same thing. I waited until 11:59, and hit Save.

There was going to be hell to pay in the morning.

Chapter Twenty-two

I
was shaken awake. Curtis and Carrie were standing over me.

“What did you do?” Curtis whispered, his voice harsh and angry.

I looked to the window. It was still completely dark outside. My head was foggy from too little sleep.

“What’s going on?” I said.

“Benson, do you realize what you’ve done?” Carrie said, her arms folded across her chest. She was still in her pajamas. Curtis was just wearing a T-shirt and shorts.

“The contracts,” I said, coming out of my sleepy daze.

“Yes, the contracts.” Curtis glanced toward the door.

“I bid on some contracts.”

I heard Mason shift on the upper bunk, and then his feet swung over the side. “You did
what
? Which ones?”

“Security,” Carrie said, “and groundskeeping.”

Mason whistled. “Please tell me he didn’t win the bid. Fish, you’re an idiot.”

“Of course he did,” she answered, taking a deep breath. “He bid one point for each.”

“Tell me it was an accident,” Curtis said, though in his voice I could hear that he knew it wasn’t. “Tell me that you hit the wrong thing, or you were goofing around and accidentally pressed Save.”

I stood and walked to my closet. I’d ordered more supplies last night, figuring this was my last chance. They hadn’t come.
Crap.

“Well?” Carrie said.

I looked at her and shook my head. “No. Not an accident. How did you get in here?”

Curtis stepped toward me. “Benson, you don’t understand what you’ve done. Hasn’t anyone told you about the truce we have with the gangs? Haven’t they told you why we needed one?”

“I had to do it,” I said. “They can have the contracts back later. Heck, I have lots of points. I’ll buy them whatever they need.”

“No,” Curtis said again. “The truce wasn’t just like we got together at lunch and flipped a coin. There were fights. Riots. You’ve seen the graveyard.”

“People died,” Carrie said. She turned from me and walked to the window.

I looked up at Mason, but he just shook his head, his lips pursed.

“We have to get all the V’s up,” Curtis said. He pointed to Mason. “Start going around, but be quiet. I don’t even want to think about what would have happened if Havoc or the Society had checked the bids before Carrie.”

Mason nodded and rubbed his face. “Where are we meeting?”

Curtis looked over at Carrie, but she was still staring out the window.

“Downstairs,” he finally said. “First floor, maintenance room.”

Mason understood something from Curtis’s words that I didn’t—his eyes went wide and he paused, thinking, before he hopped down from the bunk.

As Mason was pulling on a pair of socks, Curtis spoke. “Make sure they all get dressed. Jeans or something, not uniforms. And good shoes.” Mason nodded.

“What could happen?” I asked. I wanted to tell them what I was planning, but it was too soon—I had only one chance, and I didn’t dare blow it. I had to wait until the outside doors were unlocked—until I could open them. I had those contracts now.

Carrie turned back to me, her eyes burning. She didn’t say anything.

“We’ll go get the girls,” Curtis said. “You get to the maintenance room, Benson. We have to find a way to fix this.”

The two of them went for the door, but he turned back, looking me in the eyes. “If any of the V’s get hurt because of this it’s going to be on your head. Got that?”

I nodded.

I got dressed quickly, wearing my Steelers sweatshirt and the cargo pants—stuffing the pockets with everything I could. The radios, a little bit of food, the binoculars. The three pepper spray grenades. I wished I had more. As I quietly headed out into the hall, a few of the other V’s were groggily getting out of bed. Hector’s eyes met mine as I passed his door, but he didn’t look upset. Mason must not have told him.

Honestly, I hadn’t expected this. I knew that the other gangs would be mad, and I figured that I’d probably get a beating for it, but I wasn’t expecting gang war.

The door at the end of the hall was propped open with a book, so I didn’t make any noise as I opened it and left.

There were no lights on anywhere, only the faint glow of obscured moonlight coming in the windows. I hurried as quickly as I could in the dark and jogged to the front doors. They were still locked, even now that I owned the contracts that would let me outside. I held my watch up to the window to read it. It was almost five. I’d seen Mouse jogging on the track as early as six.

There were footsteps above me as more of the V’s came down. Leaving the front doors, I headed for the maintenance room. I assumed Curtis wanted to meet there because only the V’s could access it. It would be safe, but it wouldn’t give us any way out.

I was the first there. The door buzzed and unlocked, and I went in and flipped the light switch. The room was mostly empty, with a few folding chairs on the wide cement floor. On one wall hung dozens of tools—wrenches, hammers, and saws of all shapes—and the other wall was taken up by three large cabinets filled with paint, cleaners, and glues. A big red metal tool chest sat near the door. I set my bag and backpack behind it.

The guys were the first to arrive, dressed but bleary-eyed. Joel was wearing sandals—I wondered whether he would regret that later.

Hector sat down against the wall. “Do you know what’s going on?”

I looked over at Mason. His face was flat and emotionless as he stared back at me.

“I’ll tell you,” I finally said. “But let’s wait till the girls get here.”

“I’m not running,” Joel said. “Not now. Not without a plan.”

“That’s not what this is about,” I said, only telling half the truth. If everything went well we might run, but that was a long way away. First I had to persuade my gang not to feed me to the wolves, and then hope we could survive until six.

“Are we at war again?” Hector asked.

I didn’t answer, but stepped to the doorway and looked out. I heard Mason say yes. Hector swore and reached above him, taking a hammer off the wall. He held it in his hands tightly, staring at the floor.

A few minutes later the girls appeared at the end of the hall. They were carrying backpacks, so Curtis must have given them more direction than Mason gave the boys. I stepped back from the door as they entered, but the glares on their faces as they passed me were evidence enough that they’d been told about the contracts. A few refused to even look at me. When they were all in the room, Curtis took a final check of the hall, paused to listen, and then closed the door.

Curtis looked at Mason. “Everybody know?” Mason shook his head.

“Well.” Curtis took a deep breath, watching the nervous, tired faces around him. Almost everyone was standing, waiting for an explanation. “I guess we’ll start with what we know and then we’ll figure out what we can do about it.” He glanced at me, and then back at the V’s. “Last night Benson made one-point bids on grounds and security.”

Immediately, the guys who hadn’t heard the news began talking. Curtis cut them off.

“I’m going to give him a chance to speak in his defense,” Curtis said, “but first we should know what’s coming. He’s pissed off both gangs. They probably won’t be working together, but they’ll both be after us.”

“After him,” Hector said, pointing at me. “Why should they be after the rest of us?”

Curtis nodded, his mouth shut tight. “Well, that’s what we need to figure out. The V’s take care of their own.” He looked at me. “We’ll give you a chance to explain.” He turned back to the group. “But first, how many of you were here before the truce?”

All but five raised their hands. Anna was one of the five, and she looked terrified. I’m sure she now wished she’d never switched sides.

“For the benefit of those who weren’t,” Curtis said, glancing again at me. “It was bad. We had the truce to end the fighting, and all of us knew what would happen if the truce was broken.”

Anna timidly raised her hand. “How bad is bad?”

Mason spoke. “You’ve all seen the graveyard. People died.”

Curtis’s face was ice cold. “Four died. Three in fights and one stabbed while she slept. Twelve others were sent to detention. Two haven’t ever been accounted for. Just disappeared.”

Anna lowered her head and started to cry.

Curtis turned to me. “Talk.”

I looked around at the faces of my fellow V’s. Some were scared, others angry. Carrie stared at the floor.

“I bid on the contracts last night,” I began, my heart pounding. I’d expected to feel like I was standing in front of a firing squad, but it actually felt the other way around, like I held their lives in my hands.

“I bid on those contracts because they’re the ones that have access to the outside doors.” I paused, watching their faces. I’m sure that some of them expected that I meant I was going to make a run for it and wanted the Society guys locked inside. It might come to that.

But as I watched them my eyes caught Rosa’s, and I was suddenly gripped by fear. Any of the people in front of me could be androids. What would they do? Stop me? Kill me? Send me to detention?

“Anyway,” I said, taking a breath and trying to get my thoughts back. “I know that ever since I’ve gotten here I’ve been a real pain in the butt. I know that a lot of people blame me for a lot of things—and I blame myself for a lot of things, too.”

My eyes darted from face to face, hoping for some kind of understanding, but I didn’t see any. I looked at Mason. His expression was somber and cold.

“I don’t expect you people to trust me, because I don’t think that I’ve earned your trust. I’ve acted stupid and stubborn.” I looked over at Hector, and then to Curtis. “And I know that you guys think I’m still doing it.”

Carrie finally interrupted. “Will you just tell us why already?”

I turned to her. Her hair was uncombed and there were dark circles under her eyes. I expected anger but saw only fear.

“No,” I said, and the group immediately began grumbling. “But,” I shouted over the noise, “all I want is an hour. Just help me until the outside doors unlock. I promise that I’m not going to run. If, after I’m done, you don’t agree with me, then I will leave the V’s. The other gangs can have their war with me, not you.”

“They’ll kill you,” Gabby said. “Everyone needs a gang.”

I shook my head. “If I fail at this, then I’ll be going to detention anyway.” I looked at Curtis. “But I promise—I promise—that two hours from now the V’s will not be the target of anybody.”

He stared at me, his face still tight and serious. He was almost like the father of the group, and he had to be feeling a tangle of emotions: fear for the others, anger at me, maybe even a yearning to be free himself.

“We’ll put it to a vote,” he said. “I’m not going to decide this for anybody.” He looked at the group and then checked his watch. “Do we give him two hours, or do we turn him over now? All in favor of giving him time?”

I held my breath. I felt nauseated and dizzy. And, for a moment, no one moved. Finally, Carrie raised her hand. She still didn’t look at me, but she spoke. “What’s wrong with you people? You know what’ll happen to him.”

Hector raised his voice. “But what about us?”

It was Curtis who answered next, his words slow. “We can stall for two hours, I think. We can talk that long.”

The room was quiet, and breathing felt a little easier, though my muscles were still tense.

Carrie spoke. “You said that in two hours we’ll either turn you over or agree with you. What happens if we agree with you?”

I paused. “I don’t know. We’ll see. But if you can agree with me, then hopefully everyone else will, too.”

There was a knock on the door—a pounding fist—and everyone flinched.

Curtis pointed at the wall of tools. “Grab something, guys. But don’t start anything. Let’s see if we can keep it calm.” He moved to the large toolbox and shoved it over to the door, almost blocking it completely.

He touched the doorknob and then looked at me. “You need to get outside, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay.” He motioned for the V’s to move to the other side of the room, away from the door. Most of them were armed now, some with hammers, others with wrenches. I’d taken a crowbar from the wall.

Curtis turned the knob just enough that it unlatched, and the door immediately slammed into the toolbox. The box was holding, but three of the guys put their weight against it, just in case. The door was only open about three inches.

“What the hell are you doing?”

It was Oakland.

I looked at my watch. 5:40
a.m
.

Curtis was helping hold the box, and standing out of the way of the door so no one could hit him through the opening. “Oakland? It’s Curtis.”

“We had a truce,” Oakland said. Behind him, the rest of Havoc screamed and swore.

“I know we had a truce,” Curtis said. “Give us a minute to figure out what happened.”

“Is he in there with you?”

“Who?”

I looked at Curtis and shook my head. “I’m here.”

Oakland let out a string of profanity and pounded on the door. “That’s our contract, Fisher. You stole it.”

“We’re going to sort this out,” Curtis said. “But you have to give us some time.”

“There’s nothing to sort out,” Oakland yelled. “You broke the truce. You’re going to pay.”

“Give us an hour.”

“What’s going to change in an hour? The V’s are the smallest gang. You’ve pissed off the Society, too.”

“Let’s meet,” Curtis said. “You, me, Isaiah.”

There was a sudden surge against the door, and the toolbox slipped an inch. Five more V’s jumped to brace it. The others stood poised, nervously holding their weapons and hoping Havoc didn’t break through.

“Hold on,” Curtis shouted. “Is Isaiah out there? Get him over here.”

A chunk of something flew through the crack in the door, smacking into the peg board with a crack. A handsaw and T square crashed to the floor.

“Curtis,” another voice said.

“Isaiah.” Curtis’s voice was still even, but he had a look of desperation in his eyes. “Let’s meet. You, me, and Oakland.”

“And me,” said a girl angrily. Mouse.