I race down six flights and stand on the twelfth-floor stairwell landing, panting. What if he’s not here? Or worse, what if the twelfth floor is crawling with cadets, all aware of my escape and on the lookout for me because they’re soldiers in training?
I press my ear to the door, but I can’t hear anything, so I take a deep breath and ease it open.
The hallway is deserted. I sneak into it and stand beneath the security camera so it can’t see me. A reexamination of the footage will show exactly where I went, but staying out of sight as much as possible on the live feed should buy me some time.
I scoot down the hall with my back pressed against the wall, on alert for the sound of a toilet being scrubbed by a rule-breaking cadet while I assess the threat of each camera I pass and listen for footsteps. I see and hear nothing but my own thundering heartbeat. If Trigger is being punished in the Defense Academy rather than the dormitory, my escape is doomed.
Near an intersection of the hall, I hear a splash, accompanied by a sigh. I recognize the splat of a mop hitting the floor, and frustration feeds my fear. The custodian trainees may not know that I’m wanted, but they will know I don’t belong on the cadets’ floor.
Carefully I peek around the corner, expecting to see a member of the manual labor division—the other half of Workforce—hard at work. Instead, I find a cadet with skin a few shades darker than mine and familiar short loose curls slinging a mop back and forth over the already spotless tile floor. His gaze is focused on the tile, his shoulders stiff. He hates this work.
It’s Trigger. His shoulder braid is missing—our violation obviously cost him his leadership position—but who else would be mopping tiles as punishment on his dormitory floor?
His mop pauses and he pushes his sleeves up to reach into the wheeled bucket full of murky water. Alarm shoots through my chest, and I scramble silently back from the corner. There’s no scar on his arm.
It’s not Trigger.
What am I doing? My heart slams against my sternum and I close my eyes, fighting for calm. What made me think I could sneak onto a Defense dormitory floor, without getting caught, and find a Special Forces cadet who might not even be there?
I’m a gardener.
But if I don’t find Trigger and get out of the city, I’m not going to be anything more than a memory—Lakeview’s greatest disgrace.
Determined, I peek carefully around the corner again, and when the cadet turns to mop in the other direction I cross the hallway and press my back against the wall on the other side, directly beneath one of the cameras. Quietly I ease my way down this new section of hallway until a deep voice freezes me where I stand.
“…ever disgrace the unit like that again, Trigger 17, I will see to it that you spend the rest of your life scrubbing toilets and polishing boots.” The voice is deep and mature—an instructor or a dormitory conservator. It’s coming from an open door two rooms down. “Do you understand, cadet?”
“Yes, Commander.”
I exhale, thankful to hear that Trigger is still alive and well. But my relief is fleeting. He’s with his commander. Which is surely some kind of instructor. “My biggest regret is that I’ve embarrassed my unit,” Trigger continues.
Embarrassed? Not condemned? Not even shamed?
I’ve suspected that our infraction wouldn’t be as devastating for Trigger as for me and my identicals. I understand that his genome was designed for creative thinking and that subterfuge is part of his training—though I shouldn’t understand any of that. But how could the violation that will result in the euthanasia of my entire genome be nothing more than an embarrassment for Trigger and his?
“See that it doesn’t happen again,” the commander says.
“Yes, sir!” Trigger shouts, even though he’s inside, presumably in a small room.
“Dismissed,” his commander barks.
Trigger moves into the hall, but his steps falter in front of the doorway when he sees me. I can only stare, panic-stricken. I’ve found him, and that’s as far as my desperate, impulsive plan goes.
The commander’s shadow appears in the doorway, but Trigger is still blocking the threshold. Staring at me. “Step aside, cadet.”
My heart hammers so loudly it seems to be beating in my head. I need to move. But I have no idea where to go.
Trigger’s eyes widen, sending me a silent warning I don’t know how to heed.
“Now, cadet!” the commander shouts.
Trigger takes one large step out of the door way, opposite the direction I’m standing.
His commander steps into the hall, carrying a tablet, and starts to turn toward me.
My pulse spikes. My hands begin to shake.
“Armstrong 38!” Trigger shouts.
The commander pivots sharply toward him and away from me. “What is it, cadet?” he snaps while I glance around the hall, desperate for some place to hide. If I turn the corner again, the cadet mopping the floor will see me.
“Sir, I respectfully request that you consider returning my braid.”
“On what grounds?” Commander Armstrong tucks his arms behind his back, still holding his tablet. The screen shows a large image of my face above print too small for me to read.
He’s gotten the alert.
I suck in a quiet, terrified breath and back silently away from them.
“On the grounds that breaking one of the city’s most consequential directives took an inordinate amount of courage and ingenuity—two qualities highly valued by Defense leadership.”
“Management has been very clear about the leniencies afforded cadets in consideration of your training. Defense projects and exercises may not affect students from other bureaus. No exceptions.”
“And if I’d followed that rule, Management would still be ignorant of a flawed genome less than two years from joining Workforce,” Trigger insists. “Lakeview should be thanking me. Instead you’re taking my braid.”
I stare at him in shocked silence. Is he actually demanding a reward for getting me and thousands of my identicals sentenced to death?
It’s just a distraction. I can see that. But the fact that his commander is considering his argument tells me more than I want to know about the Defense Bureau.
“Denied.” Armstrong 38 starts to turn, and I freeze again.
“On what grounds?” Trigger demands, and I flinch. I’ve never heard anyone speak to an instructor like this.
The commander spins toward Trigger, clutching his tablet so tightly that his fingers have gone white. “On the grounds that you got caught, cadet. Special Forces does not get caught.”
I glance around the hallway again, my heart racing. Halfway down, a plaque marks one closed door as a supply closet. The doorknob has no keyhole. It can’t be locked.