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“Science,” Harvard said, relishing the word like it was just as exciting to him as
escape
. “You don’t want to load a school full of robots if you’re testing the robots. Our assumption is that the whole point of the robots is to meld into the real world—to interact naturally with humans. If the school was mostly robots, then it would be a lousy experiment.”

He pulled a pair of thick wool socks from Dylan’s box and stuffed them into the pocket of his coat. Lily blew out the lantern.

“Where’s your dupe, then?”

“The last time I was aware of him, he was in a dark room somewhere in the underground complex. It looked like a closet.”

I looked over at Lily. She nodded. “Me, too.”

We left the room and headed for the massive front door. Harvard knocked on a door and got a kid I didn’t know to follow us out and lock the gate after we’d left. Lily pulled my sweatshirt hood up to cover my face. They were still searching for me, after all.

“They’re just waiting to use your dupes? Saving them for later?” I asked as we trudged out onto the snowy road. The mud was frozen solid now, and it seemed petrified, like the tire ruts were dinosaur tracks preserved in stone.

“I guess,” he said. “There are a lot of us like that. And the implants do more than just connect us to the dupes. They trap us here in town, and they can disable us, too, like they did today—”

“Or kill us, like with Dylan,” Lily said.

“So we all have implants,” Harvard said simply. “I’m only aware of mine once or twice a month. I’m hoping they’ll use it when they repopulate the school.”

“Repopulate?”

Lily didn’t seem nearly as excited as Harvard. “It’s empty now. Everyone’s underground getting chips in their heads. If the experiment continues, they’ll need a new batch of dupes—and humans.”

I didn’t want to think about that. More innocent kids at the school. More screwed-up kids in the town.

I couldn’t see the other buildings of the town yet—they were on the other side of the creek and through the thick stand of cottonwoods—but the smoke from their fires was hanging in the sky. I’d watched that smoke from the school. It was what had led us here.

“So what’s the deal with Fort Apache?” I asked, glancing back at the moonlit adobe box we’d just left. “Jane said something about that being where it all started.”

“It’s a guess,” Lily said with a shrug.

“A guess that makes a lot of sense,” Harvard added enthusiastically. “Picture the whole complex. The oldest is the fort, probably built in the mid–eighteen hundreds. Then we have the washroom and commissary—maybe built in the thirties?”

“A guess,” Lily added.

“It’s all guesses,” Harvard said, ignoring her. “Then the Greens’ barracks, which are maybe forties or fifties?”

The shallow creek was partially frozen over, though I could see the smashed ice where the truck had driven through it. The layer of snow over the ice gave us plenty of traction—I didn’t slip once as we crossed.

“We’re not sure how old the school is,” Harvard said. “But I have a theory about the history of this place—”

Lily cut him off, plainly tired of Harvard’s long explanations. “The experiment started in the fort way back two hundred years ago. Then it moved to the school, and the humans stayed here to control the dupes.”

“So when the experiment was here—when the dupes were here—where were their humans?”

Harvard paused, looking down the road.

“We have extra guards on duty tonight,” he whispered, his mind suddenly elsewhere. “They’re going to be looking for you.”

Lily leaned closer to me. “We don’t think they had humans before.”

Harvard put his finger to his mouth, watching something, and then motioned for us to follow him down the dirt road toward the barracks.

“We think Iceman and Ms. Vaughn are older models of androids,” he finally said. “Straight AI, no humans attached. But the AI wasn’t good enough, so they couldn’t fit into society—they couldn’t blend in.”

We stopped again, pausing in the shadow of the commissary while Harvard watched.

“I think we’re good,” he said, and started moving forward. “Keep quiet, though.”

I didn’t know what he was looking for, but I was glad Dylan’s windbreaker was dark blue to cover up the white-and-yellow logo on my sweatshirt.

One day I wasn’t going to have to watch over my shoulder, afraid for my life. Paranoia had become normal life, and I was sick of it.

We left the road. The untouched snow gave me confidence that we weren’t walking into an ambush as Harvard directed us around the back of the buildings. Steam was pouring out of the washroom’s broken windows, and I could hear the running water of showers.

I followed Harvard to the last of the barracks. The green paint was flaking off, exposing the bare old wood underneath, but it seemed sturdy enough.

He motioned for us to wait along the side of the barrack, and went around the front.

“Why do we trust this guy?” I whispered to Lily.

She smiled. “I don’t trust anybody. I like Harvard, though. He’s in charge of escape.”

“I thought that Birdman was in charge.”

“Birdman’s in charge overall,” she said. “Mouse is in charge of something, too, though I haven’t figured out what. I get the feeling that she just latches onto whoever is in charge. That’s what her dupe did.”

Harvard’s head appeared around the edge of the building and he waved to us. “We’re clear,” he said, louder than I’d expected. Whatever he was worried about, it wasn’t here.

The inside of the building wasn’t what I was expecting, either. I’d pictured tidy rows of cots, like an army barrack, but it was much nicer. There were rows of soft beds heaped with blankets and pillows, each with a dresser and lantern. Three overstuffed couches surrounded a community fireplace. The fact that anyone chose to live in the fort instead of the barracks was a testament to how paranoid Birdman was about security. Maybe Maxfield made the barracks more pleasant to entice people out of the relative safety of the fort.

Only a few lanterns flickered, and the fire on the hearth had burned down to coals. Harvard guided me to the couch, where Shelly sat wearing a pink hoodie and flannel pajama pants. Lily stayed by the front window, watching the road.

“First things first,” Shelly said. “I won’t say a word until you unchain her.”

Harvard glanced at me. “You’re going to make a big deal about this in front of Benson?”

She ignored me. “That has nothing to do with it. If you want my help, you unchain her.”

Harvard glanced to the far end of the room, and I stood to see what he was looking at.

It was Laura, her hands wrapped tightly in heavy chains that were padlocked to the wall. She was staring back at me, quiet. Her eyes looked black in the darkness.

Harvard sighed, but lightly. Nothing seemed to really concern him. “She’s a murderer.”

“I don’t want to get into it again,” Shelly said. “Let her get off the floor or this is over.”

Beds creaked as other kids rolled over to watch what was going on.

“Birdman won’t like this,” Harvard said, his smile eerily glued to his face.

Shelly cocked her head. “Do you think that carries any weight with me?”

“She stood trial.”

Shelly laughed coldly.

“Fine,” he said. “But only her hands, not her feet.”

I watched him walk the length of the room, all eyes on him as he bent over Laura and loosened the chains from her hands.

She deserved to be in those chains. I’d been there. I’d seen what she’d done.

Obviously in pain, Laura stood, her fettered feet clanking against the wooden floor as she took the few steps toward her bed. Harvard kicked her in the butt and she stumbled to the mattress.

As she lay down, she flipped Harvard off, and then looked at me. “Looks like you chose your friends as well here as you did back at the school.”

My muscles tensed. She was small, frail, and chained, and I wanted to punch her in the teeth. She deserved everything she got.

Harvard plopped onto the couch, grabbing the poker and jabbing at the fire.

Shelly finally looked at me. She was tense, uncertain.

“How’s Becky?”

“Alive,” I answered, sitting down.

“Shelly has some interesting news,” Harvard said, sitting on the edge of the couch and slapping her knee. “Since you’re the most recent to come from the school, we wanted to run it past you.”

“It’s probably nothing,” she said, obviously annoyed with Harvard, “but something seems weird.”

“Everything seems weird,” I said, and she heaved a sigh.

“We”—she gestured around the room, but I assumed she meant the whole camp—“try to keep track of exactly what’s going on at the school. Like the meeting today—Birdman gets us together every day and we write down what’s been happening with our dupes.”

I nodded. “So, what’s the weird stuff?”

“Two kids,” she said. “They’re in the cells in the underground complex. It seems like they were there before my dupe got there.”

“Isn’t the underground complex full of kids?” I asked. “Everyone from the school?”

“I’ve never seen these two before,” Shelly said. “I’ve asked around. No one who still has an active dupe has seen them before. We were wondering if you knew anything about them.”

“How would I know?”

She scowled. “We only see snippets. You were there—you saw everything.”

“Unless you can draw a picture of them, I have no idea how I’m supposed to know who they are.”

Harvard poked the fire again. “No new students came after you, right?”

“Right.”

Shelly ran her fingers through her hair and sighed, tired. “They’re sisters.”

That didn’t sound right. “I never knew any sisters. No one at Maxfield had any family.”

“These girls don’t talk much—they’re in the cell across from my dupe—but they’re obviously related. They look almost the same, both blond, same face, same mannerisms; one is just older than the other. They’re terrified, and the younger one clings to the older.”

“How old?”

“Maybe thirteen and sixteen? I don’t know. My dupe has tried to talk to them, I think. But they almost seem to have a pact of silence.”

I shrugged. “I have no idea. Maybe they were scheduled to come to the school before we all tried to escape.”

“We’ll know them soon enough,” Harvard said with a smirk. “They’ll end up in the town once Maxfield gives them implants and makes dupes. But that’s not the point. We can’t figure out why they’re bringing in new people and taking them straight underground. It seems like they have plenty of us humans already. Why would they need more dupes? And why sisters?”

That
did
seem weird. “So we’re assuming that everyone in the school—everyone who tried to escape with me—is getting an implant and coming here?”

“That’s probably why they’re having us build more barracks,” Shelly said, and stood. “Speaking of, I need to go to bed. We’ll have to get to work tomorrow morning.”

She looked down at Harvard, something in her eyes. Annoyance? Disgust? “I hope Birdman will be sending us some help this time.”

“I haven’t heard,” he said with a carefree shrug.

From the back of the room a voice called out sarcastically, “Well, you can count on Benson to help. He’s always thinking about everyone else.”

I jumped to my feet and took a step toward the bed. “Excuse me?”

Shelly grabbed my arm. “Don’t.”

“You’re actually claiming that I don’t care about people? I tried to get everyone out.”

Laura sneered. “Nice job, too.”

“At least I tried. I’m not a killer.”

“I was trying to prevent deaths,” she snapped.

I laughed, because I wanted to break her jaw and I had to force myself not to. “You were trying to prevent deaths by beating Jane to death with a pipe?”

She paused, but her face only got colder, more vicious.

“How many died at the fence? Sixteen? And I’m the bad guy?”

I jumped at her, but Lily was in front of me in an instant.

“Slow down, big boy,” she said. “You’re gonna hit a girl?”

“She killed—”

Laura was on her feet. “That Jane was a robot.”

“You didn’t know that!” I shoved Lily out of the way, but Harvard caught me from behind.

“Let it go,” he said. “She’ll get hers.”

Shelly had moved to Laura’s bed, standing between us.

“This isn’t over,” I said.

“No, it isn’t,” Laura snapped. “You’re not the only person who lost friends yesterday.”

I threw Harvard off my back, but didn’t move toward her. “Everything you did,” I said, stabbing my finger at Laura, “every kid you hauled to detention, everybody you stopped from escaping, every rule you enforced—that didn’t matter to the school at all, did it? When they hauled you underground—when they drilled into your head and crammed a bomb into it—they didn’t give a damn who you were. Did they?”

Laura didn’t move, didn’t answer.

“
Did they?
” I screamed.

She looked shaken. “No.”

“I hope it was worth it.” I turned and stormed out.

CHAPTER EIGHT

L
ily and I stood outside the barracks, in the shadows, while Harvard scouted ahead.

“Laura was on trial?” I asked, taking deep breaths to calm down.

“If you want to call it that. Everyone here knew what she’d done before she even arrived. She got to say something in her defense, and then they locked her up.”

“She deserves it.”

Harvard was close to the tree line, talking to another kid. He’d said there were always guards out there, day and night.

“Why don’t you just run?” Lily asked, her voice low but intense. “You don’t have the implant. They’re already searching for you, and if they don’t find you out there, it won’t be long before they tear this town apart looking for you.”

“I have to wait for Becky.”

“We can take care of her. You go for help.”

“No.”

“Becky’s one of the worst,” Lily said. “Don’t you remember? She was in the same gang as Laura. They were roommates. Besides, I thought you and Jane—”

“Things changed after you left.”