I try to sit up but I’m stuck. My upper body is stiff but it moves, my arms and upper torso will do what they’re told, but from the waist down, absolutely nothing happens. There’s no movement. I’m paralyzed.
Feeling trapped, I start to whimper with the effort. I throw off the covers and try to lift my legs with my hands. They’re heavy and I can move them, but I can’t feel a thing. I thump them, slap them, try to wake them up, force them to obey.
The curtain is pulled back and I jump, startled. Tina appears.
Tina. The guard who was with me during the branding, the guard who disappeared. The guard who I thought had disappeared, along with all the others. She’s wearing her Whistleblower uniform and everything I thought I knew dismantles in my mind. The neat little theory that she had been on my side, that she’d smuggled the footage to me, that Crevan had hidden her away, all disintegrates. She is the enemy.
She holds her finger to her lips conspiratorially.
“He gave you some kind of injection to paralyze you,” she whispers. “They plan to do a skin graft to remove the sixth brand.”
“What?” I hiss.
“Shh,” she says loudly. “Dr. Greene has been brought in by the Guild to carry out the surgery. I’m sorry, Celestine, this is a mess.”
“I thought you were missing. I was actually worried about you.”
She comes closer, takes my hand. “He threatened me and my daughter. I saw what he did to the others. I couldn’t…” Her eyes fill. “I tried to help you as best I could. Did you find the USB I gave you?”
“In the snow globe?” I ask.
She brightens with relief. “Bark added a fake base. I wasn’t sure you’d figure it out, but he thought you would. She’s a clever girl, he said.” She smiles sadly at the memory of him. “I thought I should write it down but then I didn’t want a paper trail, or for it to fall into the wrong hands. I couldn’t contact you; I wasn’t sure if you would find it.”
“I didn’t realize it was there until too late. Mary May removed everything from my bedroom. I don’t think she knows it’s in the snow globe, though, otherwise I wouldn’t be here. Where would she have put it?”
“I don’t know.” She thinks, eyes panicking. If they find the footage in the globe, it will land her in a lot of trouble.
“Please, Tina, I need to know. Please find out for me.”
The door opens.
She reaches out and I think she’s going to slap me but she pushes my head back down on the pillow and places her hand over my eyes so that I instantly close them.
“She’s still sleeping, Dr. Greene,” Tina says quietly.
“Goodness, I’ve never known somebody to sleep so heavily.”
“I suppose she has been on the run for quite some time. I imagine she’s exhausted,” Tina says, and I hear the pity in her voice.
“Hmm.” Dr. Greene doesn’t sound so certain. “Are you sure she’s not on any medication?”
“I wouldn’t know, Doctor,” Tina says carefully. “I’ve just been asked to keep an eye on her.”
“Usually I prepare for weeks in advance, to make sure the medication doesn’t interfere with the blood’s ability to form clots.” She talks to Tina like she distrusts her, like she is giving her a chance to fess up to drugging me.
There’s an awkward silence. They’re watching me.
“I’m afraid Judge Crevan is the person to ask about that.”
“I already did.”
And they both know that they can’t ask him twice.
I try to keep my breathing steady. I’m reminded of being under the ground in the cooking pit. At least now I can breathe. Things are looking up. Though the paralysis is a new one.
“Have you seen the brand?” Dr. Greene asks in a hush.
“I was there at the time, Doctor.”
“I can’t believe that the girl would do this to herself. How did she get the branding tool from the guard in a moment like that? Aren’t the Flawed supposed to be restrained in the chair?”
“Excuse me?” Tina asks, surprised.
“Judge Crevan tells me you were all unable to stop Celestine from branding herself.”
Silence.
“It’s important that we remove it immediately. Her accusations against Judge Crevan would have serious repercussions. You know she’s telling people that he did it to her? No wonder he’s been going out of his mind to find her.”
Tina is completely silent.
“It is what happened, isn’t it?” Dr. Greene asks uncertainly.
“Is she awake?” Crevan’s voice booms as he bursts into the room.
“Not yet, Judge,” Dr. Greene says, startled.
“Call me as soon as she is. I don’t want her talking to anyone, spreading more of her lies.”
“Yes, sir,” Tina says quickly.
“All is in order? The operating room is to your satisfaction, Dr. Greene?”
“Yes, Judge, thank you. May I ask, what is this facility? I wasn’t aware of its existence.”
“This section is new. Secret government stuff, Dr. Greene.” I hear the smile in his voice and imagine his face. I used to think he was handsome, too, before the mask came off.
“I’d like to take a look at the scar before surgery, if I may,” Dr. Greene says firmly.
Tina and Dr. Greene roll me to my side. I hope that Crevan isn’t standing by and watching. Dr. Greene sucks in air.
“Gosh, that looks painful. Like torture. Why would a young girl do that to herself?” she asks.
“Who knows what goes through the mind of a Flawed? We’ll reconvene after surgery, Dr. Greene,” Crevan says. “I’m afraid I must prepare for this dreaded interview that the prime minister has asked me do ahead of the election. I must prove to the public I’m not the big bad wolf the Vital Party is making me out to be,” he jokes again, trying to play it down.
If the government has asked him to do this interview, then he is in a lot of trouble indeed. Damage control.
“Oh, indeed, a sit-down with Erica Edelman. She’s”—the doctor stalls—“an efficient interviewer. I wish you luck.”
“Luck indeed,” he says. “She’s out for my blood, I think, but I’ll get around her.”
His footsteps die away as he leaves the room.
“What is entailed in the surgery?” Tina asks in a small voice.
“When Celestine wakes we’ll place an IV in her arm, to administer the general anesthetic and fluids. I’ll inject medicine into the IV and she’ll go to sleep; she won’t feel any pain. I’ll be doing a split-level thickness graft; I’ll remove skin from her inner thigh, then I’ll fix it to the brand with stitches. I’ll cover the donor area with a dressing. We’ll take her back here to recovery, where we’ll administer her pain relief, anything to make her feel comfortable. I’ll need to observe her for a few days to make sure both the donor site and the graft are healing well. She’ll have to avoid strenuous activities for three to four weeks and the donor site should heal within two to three weeks.”
“She’s been there before, treating her wounds,” Tina says quietly.
“You seem … forgive me for saying this, but you seem concerned about her. Fond of her, perhaps?”
“My daughter is her age,” Tina says.
“Interesting,” Dr. Greene says. “You sound just like her.”