Variant (24 page)

Hector and Joel were already up front, hacksaw and shovel in hand, attempting to get through the sturdy chain link. Becky ran forward, dropping to her knees at the fence line. She put the mouth of the pruning shears onto a wire and then strained to close it, trying to snap the thin steel. It wasn’t cutting, so I joined her, my arms next to hers on the handles, trying to force the blades closed.

I grunted and Becky let out a labored cry, and the shears snapped the wire.

There were cheers behind us, and we moved to the next one.

My arms burned, and sweat dripped down my back, despite the freezing temperatures. Becky’s forehead was wet with tiny droplets, and her skin was pulled tight as she clenched her jaw. We clipped another. And then another. By the time we’d snapped through ten of the wires, we were surrounded, everyone applauding each little success. Finally, Hector, who had given up with the hacksaw, told us to get out of the way and he began unweaving the steel links. In a few minutes there was a hole in the fence big enough to climb through.

He held it open proudly and gestured for Becky to go through. She grinned, her face beaming, and for the first time in almost a year and a half, Becky walked outside the fence. I followed her, and it was as though I were stepping out of a dark closet. Even though we remained in the same endless forest, it felt easier to breathe, like a heavy weight had been taken off my chest.

People were streaming through the hole now—Gabby, Hector, a few unarmed Society kids, Oakland, Mouse. All were moving with confidence and surprise; I don’t think any of us expected we’d get this far.

“That’s enough. Very good.”

My heart fell into my stomach.

All the students were frozen. Ms. Vaughn had a Taser in her hand and another on her belt. Other than that, she was completely unarmed and alone.

She raised a finger and pointed. “I wouldn’t go through there,” she said simply and quietly. I looked back to see Mash standing at the hole.

“Why not?” he demanded and then tried to climb through. The moment his hand touched the chain link he froze and convulsed. We all stared in horror until one of the Society guys kicked Mash’s feet out from under him and he fell, releasing his grip on the now-electrified fence.

“Turn it off,” I shouted. “Let them through.”

She shook her head. “I don’t believe that’s going to happen.” Once again, she pointed at the fence. “You’ve broken the rules, quite severely, and you all know the punishments.”

Firing erupted from somewhere behind the fence and I turned to see one of the Society girls firing her gun at the other students. Some shot back, but the same paint that was stinging their skin and threatening their eyes didn’t phase her at all. She calmly lowered her gun and raised a butcher’s knife.

“You see?” Ms. Vaughn said. “I’m not alone.”

I spun, raising my gun at Ms. Vaughn.

Joel was in front of me, and his fist hit my jaw before I could react. I collapsed, lights dancing in my eyes, and watched as the few students on my side of the fence began fighting. The androids in the group were changing sides.

I grabbed Joel’s leg and tried to trip him, but he managed to stay on his feet and smashed his gun down on my bad arm. I fell to the ground with a heavy thud and had to shake my head to try to see.

There were shouts and screams all around me, and the hissing sound of flying paint. I realized now that it was stupid to bring the guns. The paint couldn’t hurt the robots—only the humans. And all the androids were armed with it.

I could see the fallen pruning shears a few yards away and wondered where Becky was, but there wasn’t time to look. Joel grabbed me by the shoulder and lifted me off the ground—far stronger than any human could. But I twisted away, and his grip slipped, leaving him with a handful of shirt.

I reached for the pruning shears—my fingers could just touch the long handle—but I was too far. Joel flung me to the ground and then stepped on my braced wrist. I screamed in pain, and he kicked me in the ribs.

I couldn’t move. My arm throbbed and burned, and I felt like my lungs had stopped working.

Joel was moving away from me, inching toward the unarmed Society kids. Becky was in the front, her arms outstretched in a vain attempt to protect those behind her. He swung his heavy arms at her, missing by inches.

Taking a desperate gulp of air, I pushed myself to my feet, my ribs flaring with pain.

Joel brought his fist down on Becky’s shoulder, and she crumpled to the ground.

I grabbed the pruning shears. Recklessly, I lunged toward Joel, holding the shears in my right hand, just above the blade. I tackled him, plunging the sharp tool into his ribs.

He rolled underneath me, but I didn’t let go. I yanked out the shears again—they were bloody, but I knew it was only from the skin; there was no blood in his mechanical body—and again rammed them in, this time just below the neck. He spun, trying to throw me. He brought his fists down against me, but I was too close for it to hurt much.

I felt someone behind me jump on Joel’s fallen body and grab his thrashing legs. Another person—Becky—leapt on him, too, her arm around Joel’s neck.

She screamed. “Kill it!”

With a surge of adrenaline, I thrust the shears back down into Joel’s twisting body, again and again. On the last time the blade caught something, and I worked the handles back and forth cutting whatever cables or wires I’d snagged. Immediately, Joel stopped. His limbs and mouth frozen in place.

I lifted my head, surprised to see that no one else around us was still moving.

Mason stood disarmed, his hands on his bloodied head. On the other side of our group, Gabby was on the ground, moaning in pain, blood all over her shirt and arms. Mouse was down on the ground, Oakland’s machete lodged in her chest. For an instant I wondered what that meant—I couldn’t even tell who was on my side—but then I saw Oakland standing next to Ms. Vaughn, another knife at her throat.

“We’re not going to be your guinea pigs anymore,” Curtis yelled at the captive Ms. Vaughn. He was still standing on the other side of the electric fence. Many on that side were down on the ground now, crying in pain or cowering in fear, but I didn’t think there were any other androids there.

Curtis’s face was ashen. Carrie was trying to prop him up. “You can’t test us anymore,” he shouted. The pistol was in his hand, pointed at Ms. Vaughn. If Oakland didn’t get her then Curtis would.

Ms. Vaughn stared back at him, her amused smile visible in the dim light.

“How very egocentric,” she said, her voice cold and cruel. “We weren’t testing you. We’re testing
them
.” She gestured at the bodies of Joel and Mouse.

The androids? Jane?

“We have to test the programs somewhere, in a controlled environment,” she said scornfully. “This was never about you.”

“The tests weren’t for us,” Carrie said, her voice almost a whimper.

“Well,” Ms. Vaughn said, grinning at Carrie. “That’s not precisely true.”

And in an instant Curtis’s pistol was in Carrie’s hand. As he collapsed to the dirt—as Carrie let him fall—she fired three rounds into Oakland’s chest.

Screams erupted again, and Carrie fell—maybe Curtis pulled her down, I couldn’t tell.

I leapt from my place beside Joel, shears in my hand as I charged Ms. Vaughn. I knocked her backward and landed on top, the shears dangerously close to her throat.

“Call them off,” I shouted, my face only inches from Ms. Vaughn’s. I pressed the shears closer against her neck.

She laughed.

“Call them off!” I pushed the shears harder against her neck, and a thin line of blood appeared.

“You can’t harm me,” Ms. Vaughn said calmly. “I’m stored on the mainframe.”

My eyes went wide.

Someone was shouting, “Run!”

“You’ve failed, Mr. Fisher,” Ms. Vaughn said. “No one will get away. No one ever does.”

Becky was next to me, pulling on my arm. “Come on!”

I glanced back at the others. Tapti had turned on them now, and another Havoc boy.

I saw Curtis’s face. “Run!” Curtis yelled. “Go! Get help!”

Mason jumped toward Tapti, knocking her down. He snatched up someone’s dropped wrench.

I jumped off Ms. Vaughn and darted toward Becky. We paused on the edge of the trees, looking back. She was taking huge panicked gulps of air. “Come on,” I shouted to the others who were cowering against the fence, but they weren’t moving.

“Go!” Curtis shouted again. “Go!” There was despair in his voice.

Carrie had stood up again, but the gun wasn’t in her hands.

“Run!” It wasn’t just Curtis now but Gabby, too, and Skiver, all pleading with us to go.

“We can’t help them now,” Becky gasped, grabbing me by the shirt, pulling me forward. Mason was only twenty feet behind us.

I took one last look and then turned to the forest, running beside Becky as fast as we could. It wouldn’t be long before they sent someone after us.

Chapter Twenty-eight

W
e ran for ten minutes at least, Becky a few steps ahead of me and Mason somewhere behind.

Fifty-four students had tried to escape, and only three had made it. And who knew whether we’d ever get out of the forest—there were miles and miles left to go before we could even start looking for help.

We couldn’t go for the highway. They’d be watching the road. We had to go cross-country, pick a direction and hope we find help.

I thought of Curtis and Gabby, both viciously wounded. And others had been, too. If we weren’t fast, they’d die.

They might die anyway.

What if the school got rid of everyone else? Killed them? I looked at Becky’s small backpack and remembered the journal inside. It suddenly felt much more valuable.

We crested a low hill, and Becky slowed to a stop by a long-dead, fallen log. She was panting for breath. I noticed she’d been hit in the neck—there was a perfectly round cut where a firm paintball had broken the skin. The area around it was raised and bright red.

The clouds had broken around the moon, and there were fewer trees blocking the light up here. I could see a vague mass of forest—rolling hills stretching out toward the west. It felt strange to have a new vantage point after spending so long in one place.

“Look,” Becky said, her outstretched arm pointing toward something in the distance that I couldn’t see. “Is that smoke?”

I squinted. That was the general direction of the camp, but I couldn’t see in this light.

Mason reached us.

And suddenly Becky collapsed, violently crashing onto the fallen log. She screamed in pain but it abruptly changed into a groan.

I took a step toward her. She must have tripped. She must have—

Mason was standing above her, and he turned to face me. He was holding the wrench.

He had hit her.

No.
He couldn’t be one of them. All the androids had given themselves away back with Ms. Vaughn. I stared at him, too stunned to speak. His eyes were dead.

I raised my hands, but it was too late to block him. He brought the club down onto my wrist brace and I crumpled to my knees. I tried to turn away, but he struck me in the ribs before I could.

He was still, looking down at me. He was going to kill us both. I glanced at Becky. She was struggling to move and softly gasping for air.

“Mason,” I said, tasting blood in my mouth. “You’re . . . like them?”

His lips didn’t move, and it wasn’t his voice. “Please return to the school.”

He’d been taken over. Whatever I knew of Mason was gone, just like Jane. Someone else was controlling him now.

“Who are you?” I yelled. He’d raised the wrench again. “Come on, Mason. Don’t do this. You have to be in there somewhere.”

His body tensed, and then he swung.

But before it reached me I heard a pop and a buzz, and something shot toward Mason. He froze and then fell forward, as stiff and dead as if he’d been made of stone.

I looked at Becky. Her side was covered in blood, her face even paler than usual. She was holding a Taser.

She forced out the words. “I stole it off Ms. Vaughn.”

I was too much in shock to answer. Becky was bleeding. I was wracked with pain. Mason was dead—short-circuited, maybe.
My own roommate . . .

Becky had begun tugging at her sleeve, and I watched numbly. She had a cut on her head where Mason had hit her, and her upper arm was drenched in blood, which looked black in the darkness. I stared as she struggled to take off the jacket. It was cumbersome. She was only using one arm.

I shook my head to clear it, pushing myself off the ground and toward her. Gingerly, I helped guide the jacket sleeve off.

“I landed on the log,” she said through gritted teeth, and nodded toward a mass of sharp, broken branches protruding from the trunk of the tree. One of them had pierced her bicep like a spear.

She leaned back, wincing at the pain, and I tried to clear the shredded strands of cloth from the wound. The cut wasn’t wide, but it was deep. I could see the whiteness of her bone.

Yanking a wad of loose material from her jacket, I balled it up and then pushed it onto her arm. She pressed her lips tight together, trying to hide a groan.

“Hold that,” I said. As she did, I pulled off my belt and cinched it around the makeshift bandage.

My hands were wet with her blood as I knelt beside her.

“We have to keep going,” she said weakly.

“I know.”

She leaned forward, trying to will herself to stand. She was tougher than I realized.

I stood shakily, reached for her good hand, and helped her to her feet.

Looking into her eyes, I smiled. Tears were forming but I blinked them away.

“What?” she said, cocking her head and grinning weakly.

“You’re real,” I said. “I saw the bone.” Before she could respond, I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her against my chest. She hugged me back with her good arm, the other hanging limp at her side.

“We have to run,” she said, not letting go.

“I know.”

Looking beyond her, I watched the forest below us. Nothing was moving. That wouldn’t last long. Once they knew that Mason had failed, there’d be someone else after us.

I put my hand on the back of her head, holding her against me, and I bent my face down into her brown hair. I couldn’t help but cry.

“I wanted you to be real.”

I felt her breathing, rapid and unsteady, as her arm tightened around me.

We had nothing. No supplies. We’d both taken off our packs to work on the fence. Becky was bleeding, and my ribs were as bad as they ever were.

But we were free. They were going to chase us, but right now we were free.

“We’ll move downhill,” I said, my eyes locked on the smoky hills to the west. I was already picking out the trail in my mind.

Becky turned her head so she could see the forest floor but didn’t let go of me.

“That’s what they say,” I said, remembering something I’d seen on TV. “Downhill until you find a stream, follow that to a river, follow that to people.”

I felt her nod, and then she craned her neck to face me. She cracked a weak half smile. “Try to keep up.”

I took a deep breath. “Let’s run.”