A younger kid sat at a desk. Someone closed the door behind us.

“Glad to have you on board,” Curtis said, sitting on the lower bunk. Neither he nor the young kid seemed to have the same weird fashions I’d seen on the others. They were just wearing the uniform, nothing special. “Sorry about Oakland. The Society usually keeps him out of the way. There’s no way to stop Isaiah from jumping on all the new students—there are just too many Society guys—but they can usually fend Oakland off for a few hours.”

I pulled the rag off my face to see if the bleeding was slowing. It wasn’t, so I reapplied the cloth.

“Listen,” I said. “Thanks for coming in there, but I don’t think I’m going to be sticking around here very long.”

“That’s why you’re perfect for the V’s,” Curtis answered. He pointed at the other kid in the room. “This is Mason, by the way. Your roommate.”

I waved, and then stood and gingerly walked to the sink, my abdomen aching from Oakland’s punches. When I checked in the mirror, my face didn’t look too bad yet. My shirt was covered in blood, but I didn’t see any bruising.

“You’re trying to get out?” I asked.

“Some of us are,” Curtis said. “We don’t know how, but at least we’re not just accepting everything.”

“What’s the V stand for?”

“We’re the Variants,” he said. “The other two gangs are playing the game. Havoc—that’s Oakland’s deal—they just want to rule. Get as many points as they can, be in charge, party. The Society thinks that the only way we’re getting out of here is to play by the rules, roll over and do whatever Iceman tells us to. The V’s are everyone else. If you don’t want to be part of that other stuff, we’ll take you.”

“Iceman?”

Curtis laughed a little. “That’s what we call the guy who makes the announcements.”

I ran cold water through the towel, rinsing out the blood, and then put the cool cloth back on my face. “So what is this place?”

“Who knows?” Curtis said. “I’ve been here a year and a half, and none of it makes any sense.”

Mason spoke up. “I think they’re testing us. We’re rats in a maze.”

Curtis nodded. “A lot of guys think that. All the cameras always watching us. And every now and then they make us do weird things, like an experiment. Other guys think they’re training us for something. And some think maybe it really is a prison.”

“You guys do something that would put you in prison?” I’d been in plenty of fights in my life, but I doubted I’d done anything worthy of jail time.

Curtis shrugged. “No one has any ties to home—no friends, no family. With a life like that, not everyone was totally clean before. But I haven’t met anyone who did anything terrible. You?”

I shook my head. “No, just a foster kid.”

“That’s pretty common.” He stood up. “I’ll take care of changing your room assignment. Mason’ll show you around. Don’t worry about going down to the cafeteria tonight—we’ll find some food for you. For now, don’t go anywhere by yourself.” Curtis smiled. “You’ve pissed off Havoc—most new students just ignore Oakland or maybe take a couple hits.”

“I thought fighting was against the rules.” Then again, very little I’d seen in the dorm seemed to follow the rules.

“The rules are weird,” Curtis said with a tired shrug.

“I guess this wasn’t ‘violent fighting.’”

He smiled. “Exactly. Anyway, I’ll be back. Welcome to the V’s.”

He went out the door and closed it behind him.

“Don’t worry, Fish,” Mason said. “Just stay close to the rest of us. The gangs have a truce, and they won’t start anything big.”

I nodded and stood, walking to the small window. I could see a large track behind the school, and miles and miles of forest.

“I’m going to get out of here,” I said.

Mason shrugged. “Everyone says that.”

Chapter Five

I didn’t leave the room that night, and didn’t talk to anyone else. Curtis came back with lasagna and bread sticks. It was better than I expected—it tasted more like it came from a restaurant than a cafeteria. Mason sat up reading. I think that he expected me to ask him questions, but I stayed quiet in my bunk.

I went through the manual hoping it would have some answers, but it didn’t. It was mostly a retread of what I’d already heard—do this, don’t do that. There were no explanations for why any of the rules existed, and they weren’t even linked to punishments. I got the impression that the others had just figured out the punishments through experience.

Only twenty-four hours ago I’d been in my old foster home, lying awake, imagining how amazing my new life was going to be. Now I was lying awake, wishing I was back there. This wasn’t fair. But since when had life been fair to me?

When dawn came, I was sitting by the window, searching for any sort of escape route. I didn’t see anything promising. Just a couple equipment sheds, a tiny set of bleachers—I had no idea what they’d be for, since we couldn’t compete with other schools—and endless pines.

A girl was down on the track, jogging.

“That’s Mouse,” Mason said, standing behind me. “She’s the girl version of Oakland—the two of them run Havoc.”

“Mouse?” I asked with a halfhearted laugh. She was a tall, tan brunette, wearing short shorts and a sports bra. She looked nothing at all like her nickname.

“Yeah,” Mason said, watching her run. “All of Havoc has stupid names. I guess that’s part of their image. Mouse, Oakland, Skiver, Walnut.” He left the window to go get dressed.

“And that’s supposed to intimidate people?”

“Don’t let it fool you. Mouse is vicious.”

She followed the oval of the track, jogging fast and steady. I wondered if she was training for an escape. I wished it was me down there—I’d run straight for the woods and get out of this place.

“Can anyone go out on the track?” I asked.

“No. Havoc has the contract for groundskeeping. They can get out there most of the time. The Society’s security, so they can go wherever they want. But we can’t.”

“I ought to join the Society for that,” I said, and then wished I hadn’t. I’d just been thinking aloud, but the idea was so good that I wished no one had heard me.

“It won’t work,” Mason said. “Other people have tried it—joined the Society to get on the security team. But those guys are handpicked by Isaiah, and you’d never make it.”

“Why not?”

“You’ve said no to him. People who say no to Isaiah don’t do well in the Society.”

“What contracts do we have?”

Mason smirked. “Janitorial and maintenance. Not very flashy, but it pays pretty well.”

Mouse bent down to retie her shoe and then stood and continued jogging.

I heard Mason open the closet door behind me. “Hey, Fish,” he said. “Your stuff came.”