Stephanie Johnson:

We need to leave.

I picked at my fresh bandage covering my arm. Miranda, or Trigger, apparently did a sorry job with the wrap. I'm not quite sure how she was related to the Secretary of Defense, because Mr. King seemed so put together and formal during all his speeches. Even more, she was nothing like the woman I had spent hours watching on Wetube. This lady was full of spunk but had no elegance.

No wonder Park liked her.

Park.

That stupid traitor.

Obviously I didn't know for sure, but as far as I was concerned, Park had abandoned us to follow more power-hungry people. As if the conversation with Jason didn't clear that up. I furrowed my brows, pretending I could see into the never-ending darkness in front of me.

"Steph." I looked up at my brother, having forgotten my turn at watch was over. Santiago seemed so sad, a sharp contrast to what I had grown used to. Sure my brother could be a nervous wreck, but that didn't mean he wasn't busy flirting or exuding stereotypical bad boy romance vibes. He sat next to me, giving me a playful punch.

"Come on, you need sleep," he raised a dark eyebrow at my appearance.

"Fuck you, too. Let me know when you and Park switch off." The boy in question hadn't held a normal conversation with us in at least a week, not that we ever really saw him. We were all in more of the same classes since getting additional tallies. Gone were fun classes about makeup and hotwiring cars. Now we had dumb classes about politics and treaties with cranky old people. How Park hadn't gotten in trouble for missing classes, I don't know.

"Why?" Bringing me back from my thoughts was Santiago's warm voice. I think if we met under better circumstances, I wouldn't have minded having him as my brother to begin with. Now he was a source of comfort, even though he wasn't necessarily the older brother figure. More of a clutz.

"Don't worry about it."

...

Pulling 2 shifts is not going to work. I stretched my arms, ignoring the pounding in my head. I'm sure the circles under my eyes were dark as hell by now, getting three hours of sleep for a week does that to you. My days were spent watching the guards and getting as close as possible to the gates. If I can memorize their schedule...

"Morning." I turned to Park in surprise. He stood in front of me, unamused. "You know I can handle my own shifts, right?"

Shoot, how'd he know?

"I'm not stupid. Plus I can feel your gaze a mile away." I felt a fire crawling up my neck, my ears were probably bright red.

"Well, I-"

"I don't really care why you're doing it, but don't bother pretending otherwise." With an abrupt end to our conversation, Park left the cave. I sat in silence, did I misjudge him?

"Hey Steph," Santiago had woken up and tiredness filled his voice, "I want pozole."

"What the heck am I supposed to do with this information?" I looked at my brother in confusion. His normally tough exterior was crumbling in front of me. Gone was his confident smile and eyes sparkling with mischief, even his copper skin seemed to have faded with an unnatural gray undertone.

"I just can't do this. I-I thought it...," he paused, "I thought this was some kind of sick joke." His eyes watered as his voice cracked, "I want to go home."

I think I understand where he's coming from, within a few months, countless kids our age had been killed. Why haven't our parents come for us?

"Where is mom?" Santiago echoed my thoughts, although I was thinking more of my dad. I almost chuckled, thinking of how glad he would be that the two of us were on good terms now.

Without warning, Santiago melted into a puddle of tears. Heart wracking sobs broke through the air. My chest hurt watching my brother come apart. How do I fix this? Before me was my brother, the same one I stabbed with a pencil. It's my fault we ended up here.

"I'm sorry." I tried to pat his back, any attempt at comforting him would do.

Drip.

Next thing I knew, I was also crying. We ended up in this situation for such a trivial argument. I wiped away the tears, determined to overcome whatever was happening.

"All right, let's leave then." Santiago sat up, confused. Carefully and quietly I explained my plan to him. We would leave in the afternoon, during lunch. If we left at night, the guards would be doubled to prevent anyone from escaping. In the early afternoon, we were all in the dining hall, or at least we were supposed to be. With the small servings we get, there's no way anyone would skip a meal. Getting off our bracelets would be a different matter. I had tried to pry my hand out, but regardless of how much weight I lost, it stayed on, firm.

"The dining hall is in the middle of the camp. How do we get to the gate?" In my mind, I pictured us knocking out guards and stealing their uniforms, but I knew that was pretty unrealistic with our abilities.

"We can stage something to distract them long enough, maybe set off a makeshift explosion...," I trailed off, knowing full well that it wouldn't work.

"Maybe we should ask Min-"

"No!" Santiago looked at me in shock of my outburst.

I collected myself, "I don't trust him, who knows what he's been doing behind our backs."

"What if he's struggling? Maybe he wants to leave here, too," Santiago paused, looking at his hands.

"Then he could ask for help. Instead, all we know is that he killed someone, he's been sneaking off, and Jason is looking for him."

"But we're all in the same boat, Steph," he tried to reason, being the gullible idiot he was.

"So why did Mason want him? Why does Jason want him now? Huh? Answer that, would you?"

Santiago remained silent.

"Let's go see if breakfast is still open."