Imprisoned (30 page)

“What did you say, Mitchell?” Mrs. Reynolds asked.

All eyes shifted to the boy, who now looked stricken to be the center of attention. “Nothing,” he said. “I was just joking.”

Mrs. Reynolds smiled. “Never forget, Mitchell, that you are here because you broke a rule. You have no rights, no choices, and you’ll do as you’re told.”

His face had paled and I knew exactly how he felt. I’d been in his position only the night before. I’d been made to eat four drug-laced power bars. And the people who had made me eat them knew all too well what would happen to me. But they didn’t care. In fact, they
wanted
me to have the reaction I’d had so that they could verify the power of the drugs they were giving us.

Now, as Mrs. Reynolds made her pronouncement about our new meal plans, I wondered if my experience had led them to make this new rule. I felt sick knowing it most likely was. Now everyone would suffer more. I knew it wasn’t my fault, but I knew how they would feel, and it made me even angrier at these people.

I pictured my friends and suddenly wanted them all to leave with Billy and me tonight. But how could I convince them?

Chapter Thirty Two

When I got back to my room after the counseling session, I was surprised to see Alyx there, until I remembered that she’d delivered her news to Austin. She was sitting at her desk working on homework. “How’d it go?”

She put down her pencil and turned around, then laughed. “You could say he was a little surprised.” She paused. “Why did you come to his office?”

“During my workout he told me to. He said he had to talk to me.”

“About what?”

“I don’t know. When I got there, he told me it wasn’t a good time.” I smirked. “You were in his office then.”

“He’s such a jerk. Why didn’t I see that before?”

I shrugged. “Tell me how it went.”

She went to her bed and sat. “When I told him I thought I was pregnant, he freaked, just like I thought he would. And when I asked for his key card so I could,” she did air quotes, “’get it taken care of’, he was eager to help.”

I laughed. “Wow.”

“I know. So here’s the plan.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out Austin’s key card.

When I saw it, I felt home was finally within reach.

“I’m supposed to use it tonight at midnight,” she said. “He’s friends with most of the Enforcers, so he said he’d arrange it so they wouldn’t sound the alarm if I’m on the elevator at that time or if my chip shows up on the security monitor in a place where I shouldn’t be.”

“Well, that should mostly work.”

“What do you mean?”

I hesitated, wondering if I should confess the plans Billy and I had made. I decided to tell her some of them. “It’s not just me who’s going to escape.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “Piper changed her mind?”

“I wish. But no, Billy is going too.”

“Billy? For real?”

“Yeah.”

“Huh.” She stared at the wall. “Yeah, I guess I can see that.”

“There’s a little more to it than that.”

“What do you mean?”

I chewed on my lower lip, wondering how much to tell, then decided she had taken a big risk for me and deserved to know all of it. “Well, at midnight he and I are both going to start a fire in the bathroom. Then I was going to go get him and we were going to escape. We hoped that during the confusion of the evacuation, we could slip away unnoticed.”

“What makes you so sure they’d evacuate us?”

No other option had ever entered my mind. “Why wouldn’t they?”

“I don’t know. I’m just saying you never know with them.”

That reminded me of the announcement Mrs. Reynolds had made. “Alyx, I found out that starting tomorrow, we’re all going to have to eat three power bars at every meal.
And
they’re going to reduce the amount of actual food we eat.”

“What? Are you serious?”

I nodded. “Yes. Mrs. Reynolds told us.”

“But why?”

“Don’t you get it? They want the drugs to be more potent. The food dilutes it. When I didn’t have anything but power bars for those two days, it really affected me.”

“But what happens when I leave here in a couple of weeks and I stop eating those? Won’t I go through withdrawals?”

“Do you really think they care about that? They just want us to be zombies while we’re in here.”

She stood and began pacing. “This is crazy, Morgan. It’s not like I did anything wrong. I was just a little overweight.” She stopped and looked at me. “Are you sure they’re doing this to everyone and not just to you guys?”

“By ‘you guys’, I assume you mean us delinquents.” I frowned.

“Don’t be offended, but isn’t that what you are?”

“I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Yes, you did. You passed out cookies at school.”

There’s nothing wrong with that
, I wanted to scream. Instead I closed my eyes and shook my head.

“Are you denying it?” she asked.

I stared at her. “No, but I disagree that it’s a crime.”

“Whatever. We’re getting off track here.” She sighed dramatically. “The issue isn’t what you did, but how they’re treating us all like criminals.”

“They look at everyone like criminals, Alyx. Remember, being overweight in this world is a crime.”

“What do you mean ‘in this world’?”

I blanched at my mistake. “Uh,” I stammered. “I just mean in this society.”

She looked confused. “As opposed to…?”

“It wasn’t always like this, was it?”

She sat on her bed. “No, I guess not. It’s just always been this way since I can remember.” She paused. “Anyway, the point is, I don’t understand why they’re doing what they’re doing.”

This time I stood, anxiety at what lay ahead making me fidgety. “Because they’re evil. That’s why.” I walked over to the closet and looked at my things jumbled on the shelves. There was nothing I needed to take with me. I spun around. “Come with us. You need to get out of here too.”

“But I’m out of here in a couple of weeks anyway.”

“And in the meantime you’re going to become addicted—well,
more
addicted—to those stupid power bars. Then what? When it’s time to go you’ll want to stay so you can get more?”

“No way. When they tell me I can go, I’ll be gone.”

“So you say now.”

“Look, I’ve done what I can to help you.” She handed me the card. “But that’s all I can do.”

I took it from her before she changed her mind. I worried about the security monitor showing Billy and me walking around in the middle of the night, but hoped the evacuation would cover our movements.

“I’m going to bed,” she said, then she turned away from me, making it clear our conversation was over.

When I went into the bathroom to get ready for bed, several other girls were there, including Beth.

“Morgan,” she said. “Where have you been?”

Not now, I thought, my nerves already feeling stretched tight.

“You didn’t come by after dinner.”

I glanced at her, then began brushing my teeth.

“I’m talking to you,” she said.

I finished brushing my teeth, then turned to her. “You know they make us eat those before we can leave.”

“So?”

“So, how am I supposed to get some for you?” I noticed the other girls looking at us, but I didn’t care.

“That’s your problem.”

“Fine. I’ll find a way to get you some tomorrow.” It was an easy promise to make, since I would be gone by then.

“Okay. Make sure you do.”

I was able to finish getting ready for bed in peace after that. As I washed and dried my face, I glanced around the bathroom, mentally making a bonfire out of my textbooks. I could add some toilet paper for extra fuel, I thought. But nothing else looked flammable.

Feeling optimistic, I went back to my room. Alyx was in bed and the lights were off. I climbed under the covers and stared at the ceiling, waiting for the next two hours to tick by.

Chapter Thirty Three

At exactly eleven forty-five I climbed out of bed. Alyx was softly snoring. I put on my clothes in the dark—making sure the matches and the key card were still in my pocket—then pulled my bed away from the wall and felt around until I found the knife and first-aid supplies. I slipped them into my pockets, then gathered my textbooks and carried them to my door.

As I pulled open my door to make sure no one was around, adrenaline pulsed through my veins as I realized this was it. My escape was really happening. I hoped Billy was awake and doing the same things as me.

An image of him sleeping in his bed, never getting up to start his fire, filled my mind. What would I do if I was completely on my own? Panic started building in my chest as I imagined being caught all by myself. I stood in my doorway, paralyzed by fear.

Alyx coughed in her sleep, which jolted me, and I took a deep breath and forced myself to move. Even if Billy didn’t come through, I had to move forward. I had to get back home, no matter what.

I tiptoed down the hall toward the bathroom. All was quiet. When I got to the bathroom, I closed the door to the hallway, then set my pile of books on the floor. I picked up the first one and began ripping out the pages, crumpling them loosely. Once I had a pile, I grabbed several rolls of toilet paper out of the stalls and arranged them in a circle around the papers, like rocks around a fire pit.

Finally, I took the book of matches out of my pocket, tore out a match, and dragged it across the rough rectangle at the bottom. It immediately burst into flame. I held it to the crumpled paper and it quickly caught. I fed more paper to the growing fire, then placed two rolls of toilet paper on top.

The room was beginning to fill with smoke, just as planned. I coughed, the air searing my throat. I opened one of my textbooks so that the pages fanned out, and set it on its spine so that the pages faced the flames. In moments it was engulfed. I set the rest of the books around the fire in the same manner, then jumped up and hurried to the door.

I used the metal foot at the base of the door to prop it open, then walked quickly toward the bank of elevators, ignoring the security cameras and hoping Austin was keeping his part of the promise to keep the Enforcers from watching the cameras at that moment.

 I waved Austin’s card in front of the reader and a moment later the doors slid open. I stepped inside and when I waved the card in front of the reader,
all
the floors lit up. My gaze flew to the button for the first floor and I almost pressed it, but forced myself to press number seven—Billy’s floor. A moment later the door slid open and there was Billy, a huge grin on his face.

I smiled back. “Come on,” I urged.

He joined me and a moment later the doors slid closed. I waved the card in front of the reader again, and this time felt great satisfaction when I pressed the number one.

“Did it go as planned?” he asked.

“Yes. You?”

He nodded.

Suddenly, an ear-piercing alarm shattered the quiet. We looked at each other, but neither of us smiled. This was it. The distraction that we’d been waiting for. I watched as the buttons showed us moving steadily downward: Fifth floor, fourth floor, third, second. Suddenly the elevator stopped. Frantically, I pressed the button for the first floor, but nothing happened.

“The fire alarm must have made the elevators inactive,” Billy said.

“But how will they evacuate everyone if the elevators don’t work?”

“Maybe they’ll use the stairs.” He paused. “But if they use the elevators, they’ll be going
up
any second.”

“Crap. We need to get out of here.”

“I know.” He put his fingers into the seam where the elevator doors met and pulled, trying to pry the doors open. “Help me, Morgan.”

I did the same as him, but nothing happened. “I think we’re stuck.”

“Maybe the fires weren’t such a good idea after all.”

I shook my head. “No point in regrets now. Let’s just find a way out of here.” We continued working on the doors and after a moment, I thought I felt them give “I think it’s working.”

“Pull harder.”

We tugged and pulled and finally they gave enough for us to slide our fingers between the doors, giving us better purchase. We pulled as hard as we could—I felt like I was pulling even harder than I had in the tug-of-war—and eventually the doors released and slid open.

“Yes,” I said, triumphant.

The elevator had stopped just below the second floor, but Billy boosted me up through the narrow opening. Once through, I reached down and helped him climb out. I looked around and immediately recognized the floor where I’d gone to visit Mr. Madsen. It looked different in the dark, but I still knew the place. “We need to get down one more floor,” I said over the wailing alarm.

“I know.”

Just then, the elevator doors slid closed and we heard it moving. “Do you think they’re going to start the evacuation now?”

“I don’t know,” Billy said.

I waved the card in front of the reader, but we got no response. “We need to take the stairs.”

“Let’s go.” He grabbed my arm and pulled me down a hall.

A moment later we reached a door marked
stairs
. I waved the card in front of the reader, but the light stayed red. I waved it a second time, then a third. The door didn’t unlock. I looked at Billy and saw my panic reflected in his eyes. “Do you think they know we’re not Austin?”

He nodded. “Yeah. They probably deactivated his card.”

“Crap.”

Suddenly the alarm stopped its screaming. We looked at each other.

“Why did it stop?” I asked.

He shrugged. “They put the fires out?”

It seemed everything was going wrong. “Maybe the elevators are going to bring Enforcers here.” Utter terror built inside me and adrenaline flooded my veins. “Billy, they must know we’re here. We need to get the chips out.”

“Calm down, Morgan.”

My mind raced as I pictured Enforcers swarming this floor, surrounding us, Hansen in the lead. The panic made my breathing increase and I feared I would hyperventilate. I squeezed my eyes closed, working hard to focus on slowing my breathing. After a moment, I was able to get it under control. “What should we do?”