The door hissed behind me and I turned around to see Reid.

"You made it," I said with a tense smile. He nodded and looked down the hall. I smacked his arm.

"Please, man, lighten up! We're all nervous, try to be excited."

Reid rolled his eyes and took a step forward. As the rest of the 16-year-olds came into the hallway, we began to walk, slowly, to the World Studies classroom. It was the very first one on the right so we couldn't see the other classes down the hall. These ones were also super-secret and the younger students hardly knew any of them. I did see a stamp on a 17-year-old's arm that said "Politics" one time. I assumed that was a class down here.

I took a hold of the silver door handle and pulled the door open. The teacher, Professor Harven, was at a desk, probably looking through his slides for the class on his tablet. His fingers lazily brushed the screen. I cleared my throat and he looked up at us. He was an older man, hair silver and funny looking glasses on his nose. He was the only one in the Institute to have glasses. Any weak eyes could be fixed at the Infirmary with a short procedure.

"Welcome, young terminated ones!" Professor Harven said, standing and waving a hand. We giggled awkwardly at his greeting. All of the teachers had funny nicknames for the students, "terminated" being the most popular one. It was just a pet name, like buddy or pal, I guess. The new headmaster of the Institute, three years ago, asked all of the teachers to stop calling us these names. He said they made the students feel like they were being made fun of. Still, some of the older teachers either refused or had a strong habit because they didn't give it up.

Professor Harven gestured to the white tables. "Take a seat, anywhere. We'll get class started after I make sure everyone is here."

The seats in the back of the room filled quickly so I ended up with a front-row seat, Reid to my left and Opal to my right. Opal was taking deep breaths and Reid was staring grimly at the blank front board. My leg bounced at a hundred miles an hour and I tried to get it to stop.

"So you're my new class," Harven said. "I assume most of you know who I am because I'm the best professor here."

There was a light chuckle.

"But you're not here for me. You're here for..." The board lit up with a circle spinning on. The circle was blue with green spots on it. I cocked my head at such a random image.

"I do wish they wouldn't hide you from so much," Harven said, regretfully. "It makes my job a little bit harder. But, oh well!" His wrinkled hand slapped the board, the projection shaking a bit. "I would ask who knows what this is but you wouldn't know. I still have to remember that I'm not teaching 'out there' anymore, even after 30 years."

"You taught in the World?" Reid said, suddenly alert.

"Oh, yes. I taught at a prestigious college. I had several classes but I was recruited by the Institute 30 years ago and I have never looked back. But back to our picture." He sighed and took off his glasses to clean them. "I have to start at the very beginning for you guys. All of you know you are on a planet, traveling around a sun, right?"

We nodded. "Earth," a girl said. "In the solar system. We've had planetary science."

"Good, good. But what does Earth look like?"

There was silence. I finally raised my hand and spoke. "We don't know, I guess. How do you take a picture of something in space?"

Harven laughed. "This teaching is so skewed! You know everything there is, yet you know nothing. This-" he pointed to the circle again, "Is the earth! I mean, not exactly but this is." The slide changed and a beautiful image of the circle, but more realistic and sharp, came into view. The class "oohed".

"Yes, we can get pictures of the Earth. And this is America." The slide zoomed into a spot on the Earth. Everyone recognized it and their hands went up. "We've seen this!" Reid said. "That's the country we're in right now. Does that mean that those other land pieces were other countries?"

"Yes! See, this class is easy! You know these things, I'm just connecting the dots and showing the bigger picture. You've taken ancient history classes so you know the names of these countries." An island came into view. "This country used to be a monarchy, with King Henry, Queen Elizabeth and their lot."

"It's England," I said quietly.

"Precisely."

The Institute is a place of academics and there is nothing the people here love more than to learn. And when pieces fall together, it was satisfying. Anything we were confused about, Harven cleared it up with a picture and a brief explanation. We spent nearly the hour catching up on World history, which we knew. We finally ended up at a discussion of America.

"You'll understand these things more later but America has a president, like the king, but not. And believe it or not, President Corton is your president. You'll learn more about how the presidency and government works in your Politics classes." A picture of an olive-skinned woman was on the screen. She was middle-aged, with a very wide smile.

Harven swiped through the presidents in descending order, ending with Washington. I had noticed a pattern: The last 10 or so presidents had been female, with the rest being male. "I raised my hand to ask a question but I wasn't the only one curious.

"Sir," Opal said, "Why are the presidents so divided in gender?"

"In the last few decades, we had our first female president and the country discovered they liked the female approach to politics and government. But our second female president-" A picture was shown- "Had very radical ideas that nearly caused another Civil War. She was able to pass laws against traditional American history, such as making guns illegal."

Reid's head popped up. He loved Weapons Study class. "Wait, no more guns?" he asked.

"Sadly, yes. She decided that the common citizen were not to be trusted with such powerful weapons."

"You just have to learn to be safe with them," Reid said, leaning forward at the table. "No one has ever been shot in the firing range here. Was it so bad in the World?"

"Unfortunately, yes." Reid slumped into his chair.

"People had gotten... stupid, more or less. So President Josley, that's her name, decided America needed a reset. And maybe she was right. Her original plan was to ban guns, drugs, abortions, illegal immigration, etcetera then to bring them back, one by one as they were seen needed but she died in office only a week after the bill passed. Her Vice President, President Adams, brought back the things she wanted and the big ones were legalizing some drugs and abortions.

"What kind of drugs?" I asked.

"Marijuana was the one going on for years but there were EyeLights and Hopper's Meds. They just mess with your head and EyeLights we're making people start to rot, like their tongues and fingers."

Opal gagged. "Why would people do that?" she asked me in a whisper. I shrugged. It did sound foolish to wreck your body like that.

Harven suddenly became solemn. "Before this class ends, I need to tell you something."

I looked at Reid and he looked ready to throw up. Quite honestly, I wasn't feeling to pumped myself. My leg began its bounce again and I didn't even try to stop it.

The slide changed to the word "Abortion."

"I assume you've all heard of this word?" Harven said. We all nodded.

"With Adams' new bill, abortions were not only allowed in all 50 states, but they were also encouraged. People believed the population had gotten out of control so they felt this was a way to clean up unwanted children, instead of sending them into foster care. Not only that but babies born and then put up for adoption were taken and... killed."

The class gasped and I recoiled. The slide changed to a picture of a small box.

"Babies were... thrown away in these. At the hospital. When they were born, they never even leave the hospital before they're disposed of."

"Why?" a girl said in a hushed and strained voice.

"It was the norm. It actually still is the norm." Harven looked at us, studying our pale faces, seemingly debating whether or not to tell us more.

"But people began to infiltrate the Abortion clinics and hospitals. They saved the babies and fetuses and brought them back to a facility to nurse back to health and proper size. The slide changed to show a tiny fetus is a cylinder.

"This is what we put them in at the clinics. After the newer, "safer" procedures, we were able to take the unborn children to safety and grow them. And then they were properly taken care of."

"What do you mean?" Reid asked.

"We took them to a facility and raised them. As students. They are regular people now. We are still collected The Terminated and raising them in the facility."

"Wait, we?" Reid looked at Harven warily.

Harven sighed. "You think by now I could keep us anonymous. But yes, I was one who gathered The Terminated and took them to the Institute."

The realization fell on me like a bucket of ice water, running down my spine and freezing me.

"All of us?" Opal asked hoarsely. Harven nodded.

"You are The Terminated."