Variant

Curtis turned on Isaiah, jabbing his fingers into Isaiah’s chest and speaking in a low growl. “I don’t care what you think happened here, but you have the medical contract, and you’d better get someone over here this minute.”

Isaiah opened his mouth to say something, but Curtis grabbed him by the sweater. “And if I find out that Dylan was doing this under your orders, I will break every bone in your body. One at a time. Slowly.” With his last word he shoved Isaiah backward.

One of the Society kids threw a punch, but Curtis easily dodged and then knocked the kid to the ground. Isaiah barked out a harsh order, and the fight was over as quickly as it started.

A crowd was forming around us now, and almost all of the V’s were there. Mason stood quietly at the edge of the crowd, his face stoic. He’d been right. I shouldn’t have gotten involved with Jane. Did that mean that he wasn’t one of them? He’d tried to get me to not fall for Jane-he was working against her.

Or was this all an act?

Carrie, Jane’s roommate, was on her knees at my side, tearfully pleading to know where Jane was. I told her I didn’t know.

“Were you together?” Curtis asked. They thought she was still out there somewhere. Maybe they’d find her, like they’d found me.

I tried to nod, but even that hurt. “Yeah,” I said. “We’d left the dance. We went around the front of the building…” Everyone’s eyes were glued to me as I spoke, even the Society’s. Oakland and Mouse stood at the edge of the circle, listening to every word. “It was Laura and Dylan. He had a pipe.”

There were murmurs in the crowd, then raised voices, and then people began shoving each other again. Curtis bellowed at everyone to shut up.

“Go on,” Carrie said, her face red.

Jane’s face was like that when she cried. Then again, so was everyone’s.

“They attacked us,” I said. “Dylan knocked me into the window well.” I paused, wondering what I should say. How would I explain how I got over here?

Carrie touched my hand. “And Jane?”

I shook my head. Pain. “I don’t know.”

I should be crying, I thought. I should be sobbing. Why can’t I?

A moment later Isaiah broke back through the crowd, with Anna following him. She looked terrified as she knelt beside me.

Everyone grew quiet as Anna fumbled with her first-aid kit. She opened it uncertainly, looked at me, then looked back at her kit. She pulled out a gauze bandage and with trembling fingers tore the plastic shrink-wrapping off. But then she paused, staring back at the various items. She pulled out a little bottle of something, then set it down and chose another.

“Come on,” Curtis snapped, motioning to Mason and Joel. “Let’s get him down to the infirmary. The rest of you get out there and find Jane. She could be anywhere.”

Chapter Eighteen

I spent five days in the infirmary. Anna was out of her league. She could take X-rays, but never saw the results. Instead, she’d put the undeveloped films in a locker-an elevator, like my closet-and then get back a list of things to do. In the end, I was surprised to find that the only serious injury was a concussion. I had bruises and contusions from head to toe, a nasty cut on my forearm (Anna said it would normally have had stitches, but too much time had passed before they found me), and two dislocated fingers. My arms and hands were bandaged like a mummy’s, both my wrists in braces, and I was on a heavy dose of pain medication, but that was all. She said I probably felt worse than I was. I felt terrible.

Some days I was the only person in the infirmary, and other days the entire gang was there with me. I heard it was different now-things had been shaken up. For a while Curtis worried about another gang war, like before the truce, but that had blown over. In the end, four people left the Society. Three had gone to Havoc, and Anna joined the V’s. Since Dylan was gone and Anna was now a V, the medical contract was automatically transferred to us, which infuriated Isaiah.

The strangest news, however, was Iceman’s explanation of events. Jane was dead, though we got no explanation about how or where. But Dylan and Laura were sent to detention. Curtis had asked Isaiah about that, and Isaiah insisted he wasn’t involved. Someone else must have taken them.

On the fifth day, knowing that I was about to be discharged I got out of bed and looked around the infirmary. I couldn’t face the idea of going back to my room, back to the normal routine. I needed to find a way out of here. I needed escape plans and weapons and tools.

I inspected the elevator through which Anna sent X-ray film and received instructions. It was short and built into the basement wall. I would have assumed it was just a cupboard if I hadn’t known better. There were no buttons or controls.

The other cabinets had about what I expected: gauze and tongue depressors and latex gloves. There were syringes but no needles. Nothing that looked like a weapon of any kind.