over our heads. They strike the ground and disappear before they can catch.
When I dig my heels in, the escort signals to another soldier and they lift me, kicking, up the short stack of stairs into the warm arms of the building. The doors slide shut and seal behind us. A lock beeps.
Every head in the small, cramped entryway swivels in our direction. Mia and I are half walked, half dragged down the length of a door-lined hallway.
I am used to being watched. I am used to knowing that, even when I showered in the Wash Rooms, there was a camera there, keeping its eye on me. I ate under supervision. Worked with the eyes of PSFs drilling into my back. I am used to living like a shadow, a poor imitation of a person, but not invisible.
What I am not used to…is being stared at. Having men and women lean out of doorways, trail steps after us like we’re the circus coming to town. It feels like I’m being passed around, crumpled by their careless hands. These aren’t lethal looks. Mostly just plain, ugly curiosity. Fascination.
I can see the same realization dawning on Mia. Her shoulders hunch, her fingers curl, and a look like death comes over her face as she stares into each of the faces we pass. She’s winding herself up, cranking up her temper. I shake my head, but she ignores me.
We make a sharp turn down another hallway with more doors. But these have glass observation windows, and instead of offices and supply closets, there are cots and four blank walls. These are prison cells.
They don’t even cut the zip ties off our hands before they push us inside and let the door slam and lock behind us. Mia surges toward the window, where a crowd of soldiers and men and women in suits are slowing as they pass, or stopping altogether to look in.
“Where’s my brother?” she yells. The men and women turn toward each other, whispering, confused. “What are you even looking at?”
Mia whirls back to me.
“Don’t,” I say, reading her expression. She wants me to pick a target for her—I think she wants them to see that glass isn’t enough of a barrier to keep her from them. “It’ll only make it worse.”
It’s my turn to address them. “We want to talk to whoever is in charge. Hey! Are you even listening?”
We can hear the rumble of their muted voices, but no one actually speaks to us, no one so much as moves, until a short, stocky man pushes his way through the crowd, slides a key card through the door’s lock, and lets himself in. Two National Guardsmen trail in behind him, looking decidedly more worried.
The man in the blue beret motions for us to sit, but Mia and I remain on our feet, stepping back to the far side of the small room.
“I am Major Benn.” The man’s accent is heavy, filling whatever space his physical presence doesn’t. None of them are armed with guns, and I wonder if that’s a reflection on them, or on us. “You are at the Zone One Processing Center.”
“Where’s my brother?”
Major Benn waves his hands, shooing the question away. “You’ll be kept in this facility until you are collected for…re-homing. You understand?”
“Where’s my brother?” Mia repeats. “I want to see him!”
“Perhaps you will soon, if you are a good girl, okay?” the man answers, and I know I will hate those words, good girl, always. “You are…Mia, then? Mia…”
“Orfeo,” one of the National Guardsmen finishes, shifting uncomfortably. He glances down at a printout in his hand before passing it to the major.
The man’s blond brows rise and rise as he reads it over. “Then you are blau—Blue?”
My whole body tenses. Mia stares at him, her hands clenching where they’re bound behind her back. “Yeah. So?”
“You do the trick, please—you show us?”
What?
Major Benn unclips a pen from his shirt’s front pocket and lets it drop on the ground. “You pick this up. No touching, right?”
Mia and I exchange a look of disbelief. I think I’ve misheard him until I see the blood drain from the faces of the National Guardsmen. The muscles in my back tense to the point of pain. He’s watching us, brows still raised expectantly.
The pen is a deep blue, rimmed with gold. It’s still rolling back and forth, back and forth on the ground.
Maybe he does just want to see her abilities, marvel at them the way he would a magician’s