"Morning everyone." Kellen emerged from his room, fully dressed in a warm looking pullover and a pair of fitted jeans. "It seems we have something to discuss."

Once again, I went through what I'd learned the previous night, for the benefit of those who had not witnessed my dramatics.

"Personally, I think Katia is right," Hadley droned when I finished. "We should all pretend we've been drugged and stay in our rooms."

"And what are we going to gain by that?" She was going to test my patience, that was for sure.

"Well, you know, if we don't go to class, we can't get detention, and if we don't get detention, then we can't get drugged."

"Oh wow, Hadley, that's so smart!"

"Thanks!" She flushed at my words, until she caught the sardonic sneer on my face.

"Think about it, Hadley, if they're drugging us in detention through water bottles, then they can drug us with anything else consumable. If we stop going to classes altogether, they will find new ways to drug us."

They were silent for some time, the severity of what I'd said not lost on any of them.

"What did you say this guy's name was again?"

"Tannen."

Vivienne pondered my answer, and we all waited for her to say why she'd asked. "I remember that name... My Dad was talking about a bio-something scientist a while ago who wanted to make some kind of bio-something-something that was supposed to be really bad. I mean in theory it was good, but it was unethical, I guess? And could be twisted for bad? But Dad said he died when his lab was destroyed in a fire."

"The lives of their vacuous children for my prodigy brother..." I said, slowly adding what Vivienne had said to what I already knew. "So our Tannen is that Tannen's brother! And I think he intends to test that stuff on us." 

She paled, then slumped in her seat. "Well, what can we do? If it's really that bad, then we're already screwed," Vivienne said with such finality that I wanted to kick her in the face for it.

As if Kellen could see that very thought forming in my head, he suddenly shifted, putting himself in the middle of the room, blocking me from lunging at any of them.

"Cole, you're right." He sighed, "They'll just find another way to drug everyone. But, as weird as this is going to sound, I'm kind of with the girls on this... At this point, there isn't anything we can do."

It was as if my brain just died right then and there from an overdose of anger. I willed myself to move, yell, call them stupid, lazy hypocrites, but I was so dumbfounded by all of them that the only thing I could focus on for some time was the rush of water that was pressing on the backs of my eyes. 

"Do you know what he said?" I raved, finally finding my voice, as quavering as it was with the weighty build up of tears I was attempting to dam. "Do you want to know what that psycho fuck thinks of us all? Why he targeted us? Why he thought he wouldn't even need to drug us to take us all hostage?"

I had no success with stonewalling my tears, and they were trickling down my face as my voice rode the annoying high, squeaky-squawk roller coaster it always did when I got emotional. I'm sure if this had been any other situation, any other reason for getting so emotionally worked up, I might have felt embarrassment.

As it was, I didn't care how it made me look, and I swiped a hand across my face as I continued in a mocking tone, "These kids don't know that they're trapped on campus or that we've blocked all communication outside of the grounds. The ones smart enough to figure out something's going on have decided that this is time off to party. They don't even notice the increased security."

If we didn't do something, we were only making it easier for him. I needed them to see that.

"Okay, so we're a bunch of spoiled, self-involved brats to him," Jackson interjected as he handed me a tissue. "That's how most of the world sees us. But what he said, kind of... well, we are screwed aren't we? We're trapped, we have no way of communicating with anyone outside of campus, and there's increased security!"

"But," I turned to him with a sliver of hope, "I'm worried about everyone, especially the ones who've gotten a couple detentions. Fine, Katia, maybe some of us should pretend; it's not a bad avoidance tactic. But we need to figure out a way to get everyone clean, and how to get out of this." 

Every time one of them supported pretending, I envisioned the word sailing from their mouths and falling into a growing heap of letters beside Kellen. When none of them acknowledged my plea for action, I felt all my hope being buried by the useless heap of rubble.

Before I could catch myself, I'd shoved Kellen into my seat, and imagined myself kicking the letters so they scattered across the room. "How the hell can you guys call yourselves leaders?"

Hadley and Vivienne looked at me with a blinking stupor I found easy to dismiss. I wasn't talking to them—they generally did whatever Katia wanted. I glared, instead, at the remaining three, especially the two I had always followed.

"What? So it's fine for you guys to expect and demand allegiance and respect in exchange for protecting your sublings from the other side of a useless prank battle? And I guess, it was also fine for you to demand immediate action and obedience from us whenever you needed us for our skills, regardless of anything else going on in our lives?

"But now when those same sublings are in grave danger, and you're the only ones who can unite them and motivate them, you're just giving up? You're just going to let them fall? What ever happened to One Team, One Scheme, and unity and family and all that crap you Idiots say when recruiting? That's what it is, right? Crap! Just a load of crap? You don't give a shit about—"

"Don't!" Kellen warned, his eyes as waterlogged as mine. "Don't say it, Cole."

I jutted my chin out, daring him to tell me he cared, when it was clear he wasn't willing to fight past his own fears to help his peers.

"You know I care," he mouthed at me, emotion so thick, he couldn't even manage a sound.

"You care?" I retorted, with a raised brow. "If you cared, if any of you really cared, you would put your fucking big-kid pants on, and deal. I know you're scared, I know you're terrified, but so is everyone out there. And everyone out there, well, they look to you idiots to tell them what to do, to give them orders, to strategize and organize and think. So, Kellen, Katia, please, for the love of living, stop hoping this will blow over and start planning to blow it up."

They stared at me for a long time. Hadley and Vivienne's eyes darted from me to Katia to Kellen, an awed look on their faces—surprise at the tone and words I'd dared to use and who I'd used them against. After some time, I grudgingly leaned against the table and ignored them in favour of my phone.

When I glanced up again, only Kellen, Katia and I remained in the room, and they were gesturing at a vacant spot on the couch with grim expressions. "So, say we do something," Kellen ventured. "What would it be?"

A tiny victory yell went up in my mind, but I forced myself to remain calm and rational. "Not just pretending we're drugged. His whole thing is that this is going smoother than he expected. He said it would be only one week till they make their next move; two, if things didn't run as smoothly. If we're all drugged and staying out of the way, then he'll initiate their plan." 

Katia made a startled noise, "I didn't think of it like that."

"But what are—?"

"I don't know, Kellen! But we can't go around making it easier for him, and we can't wait around to be rescued! I mean, for one thing, no one's going to miss us for at least a month!"

"A month?" Katia crinkled her face, clearly evaluating me as over-dramatic.

"Yeah, a month. That's when our families will notice that we haven't shown up for whatever off campus spring break things we've got planned. That's when they'll try to call us, or call the school. That's when they'll notice something's up."

"A month." Kellen shook his head. "That's a long time to get more detentions and more wasted."

My face probably read, "Duh!" but I refrained from calling them dumb yet again. "Which is why we need to do something! I mean, we can all work out a plan; it doesn't have to be some rash split second decision. But you guys will have to convince everyone."

Kellen sighed heavily, swinging his gaze to Katia. They each took a deep breath, "I'm in."