Variant

There wasn’t as much selection in the drink machines-just juice and milk. Still, there was no way I was going to complain about my lunch. If it tasted anything like it smelled, it would be the best meal I’d had since two foster families ago.

I chose a bottle of orange juice, but as we turned to leave I noticed a panel of darkened windows on the far wall. The word discipline was on a sign above it.

“What are those?”

“More fun,” she said. “Sometimes the punishment is like what Curtis and Carrie got-no food at all. Sometimes it’s just that you’ll only get certain kinds of food. They don’t use it much.”

“Have you ever been punished?”

Jane laughed. “Everyone gets punished.”

I followed her outside. The cafeteria’s back wall was floor-to-ceiling windows, and a door was propped open letting in the cool autumn breeze. Jane told me that the V’s always ate on the bleachers unless the weather wouldn’t let them. I liked to think it was because they were getting a few steps closer to freedom, leaving the confines of the building whenever they could. But it was probably just for the fresh air and to get away from the Society and Havoc. Even so, I loved being outside, and my mind instantly flew back to the wall.

A grappling hook might work. There had to be rope here somewhere.

But first I was going to eat.

I walked next to Jane who, despite her skirt, didn’t seem to mind the chilly November air. She’d been here for two and a half years-how old had she been when she came? Fourteen? Fifteen? I thought of Mason. He was young, too. This was bad enough for me-it must have been a lot worse for the younger ones.

We were the last of the V’s to get to the bleachers. The girl from the window was there, her brown hair pulled into short pigtails. She gave me a little wave as she chewed her food.

I counted sixteen V’s-eighteen including Curtis and Carrie, who were still off somewhere working. Mason told me that it was the smallest of the gangs; the Society was biggest by far-about double what we were-and Havoc made up the rest. Jane said there were sometimes a few holdouts who refused to join any gang, but they didn’t last long. People needed their gangs.

I was the center of attention for a while, answering questions about where I was from and what my life was like before Maxfield, but for the most part the group kept up a normal lunch conversation-how much they hated class, how one girl was excited for winter, how another wondered when we’d get another school dance. No one talked about escape. I tried to bring up the subject once, but it died out fairly quickly.

The whole time we sat there I kept an eye on the trees. There were Society kids out there. One was at the tree line, patrolling on the back of a four-wheeler. I could hear a second one, but couldn’t see it.

What would make them act like that? Why wouldn’t they just make a break for it?

As I watched them I thought about what they’d need to have to keep the four-wheelers running: gasoline, oil, tools. All of that could help my escape.

After lunch we sat through another class on aesthetics and then had a break. The schedule on the TV screen called it study hall, but Mason told me that no one ever had homework other than reading the textbooks-which we were never tested on anyway-so most people just hung out in the dorms or took a nap.

I explored. Aside from the dorms, the fourth floor had a long common room with heavy wooden tables and leather couches. It smelled like dust and was completely empty.

The third floor was all classrooms-there had to be thirty of them, all almost identical. I tried to do some math in my head. There were seventy-four kids in the school, and my classroom held about twenty-five. So only three or four rooms were being used. Did that mean more kids were on the way? There was plenty of room for them.

Mason had told me that for a while, about a year ago, there were new students every week, sometimes two or three at a time. But then it tapered off. I was the first one in four months-Lily was the last before me.

The second and first floors were more interesting: the library (which didn’t seem to have a single book written in the last hundred years), the cafeteria, the trophy room, a few large multipurpose rooms, a tiny theater, and a dozen small rooms that had no furniture. All of the architecture in these rooms was amazing, with stained wood, painted plaster, and carved stone. But why was there so much space unless they planned for more to come? Or had more been here and left?

Had they all been killed?

I pushed on every door and window, but they were all locked. The sensors didn’t make a sound. The V’s didn’t have a contract that let us outside.