The Search for Sam

CHAPTER 6

I lie in my old bed, in my old bedroom, staring at the wall. I was surprised to find everything just as I left it, half-expecting it to be stripped bare following my supposed “death.” I guess my mother won that battle with the General.

I try to get comfortable. After months on a bare cot at the aid camp, my expensive pillow-top mattress should feel unbelievably fluffy and soft. But it feels like a bed of nails.

After a strained dinner, during which my father and I both pretended to be happy I was home, alone in my room I can finally let my guard down and drop the fake smile. I’m exhausted and scared. Even if I somehow manage to avoid being executed within the trial week the General has granted me, that’s no guarantee I’ll manage to break into the labs. And even if I do, that’s no guarantee I’ll find a successful means of reviving One, of keeping her imminent disappearance at bay. And even if I manage to save her, I have no plan for how to save myself, for how to escape this place once I’m done.

I’ll need to figure that out, because right now death doesn’t even feel like the worst-case scenario. Passing my father’s test and being “allowed” to remain in this place, having to indefinitely maintain the pretense of being a loyal Mogadorian, feels like the grimmest fate of all.

“That was hard to watch.” One appears, standing in the doorway.

I sigh, grateful for her presence.

“Didn’t realize you were there.”

She ambles towards me and sits at the foot of the bed. “I hung back. Tried to stay out of your line of sight. Figured you needed to focus.” She gives me an affectionate look. “Performance of a lifetime, huh?”

“You said it.”

She looks guilty, worried for my safety. “You sure I’m worth it?”

I manage to fake a confident smile. “Definitely.”

My bedroom door opens and my sister Kelly swings in.

Surprised, I hop off the bed.

“So you’re back,” she says bluntly, sizing me up.

“Yeah,” I say. I’m not sure if I should rush up and embrace her.

I decide to wait and follow her lead.

“Well, that’s good, I guess.” She fiddles with the doorknob hesitantly.

“You weren’t at dinner.” Over dinner my father explained that Ivan had been promoted to a new position somewhere in the Southwest—news that filled me with such relief I had to cover my mouth so the General wouldn’t see how happy I was—but I hadn’t been given a reason for Kelly’s absence.

“Ran late. I’m doing an afterschool program at the Nursery now.” The Nursery is what some of us call the piken pens in the underground complex. Pikens are bred in the labs down there and conditioned for combat. “I think I’m going to be a trainer when I graduate. They say I have what it takes.”

“Oh,” I reply. “That’s great.”

I can’t believe how dumb I sound, how tentative. Back in the hornets’ nest of Ashwood, and I’m scared of my own kid sister. It’s pathetic.

“Whatever,” she says. “So listen. Congratulations on surviving and stuff, and for coming back here. But, you know, having you dead was embarrassing enough. Now I have to explain to my friends that my loser brother is back. You’re basically ruining my life.”

I’m stunned by her callousness, but I understand. In Mogadorian society, dying in combat is not afforded the prestige it is among most human cultures. And failing in combat and surviving is hardly better than being a traitor. My mother’s relief at my survival won’t be shared by my sister … or anyone else at Ashwood.

“I’m just telling you this so when I ignore you in front of the others, you don’t freak out, okay?”

“Fair enough,” I say.

“Okay,” she says.

She leaves, without a good night, much less that hug.

I shoot One a despairing look.

She quickly covers her expression of pity with one of her best, most sarcastic grins. “Welcome home, Adamus,” she says.