“ADMIT IT!” PROVOST ALLEN SAID. “You are lying!”
“We aren’t lying!” I snapped. “I don’t know what the deal is, but we aren’t lying! I have no idea why that prison seemed unused, because believe me, it’s been used.”
I glanced over at Cassie. Since we’d gotten back to town, she’d been oddly quiet. Even more than me, she seemed shocked by what we’d found. Now as we were getting yelled at in the Provost’s office, it seemed like she was somewhere else.
“I don’t know what you were hoping to accomplish by that stunt,” the Provost said with a sneer. “But I’m glad that you were publicly shown to be liars and manipulators. In the morning the Overseer Committee and I will decide on a proper course of action. But between you and me, I’m sure a quick mood-adjust will help you both become the upstanding, productive citizens you should be. In the meantime, you’ll be guests of the United—in our cozy jail, right here in the Management Building.”
Cassie blinked and sat up straighter. “No.”
The Provost pounced on her eagerly. “No?”
“I’m not going back to jail,” Cassie said flatly. “And neither is Becca. We’re going home.” She stood up as the Provost’s face started turning red.
“You’re not going anywhere
!” he said with barely controlled fury. “Except to prison, where bad citizens and traitors belong!”
I stepped closer to Cassie, rage boiling up inside me. “Listen, old man,” I ground out. “Either one of us could easily beat the shit out of you—we’ve been trained to. Both of us together and you’ll never find all your teeth. If my sister says we’re going home, then we’re going home. Got it?”
The Provost opened his mouth, and I held up a finger. “Go ahead,” I said. “Call the guards. We’ll take them on, too. It’ll be fun.”
The Provost looked like he was about to have a stroke. “Then you’re under house arrest!” he hissed. “My guards will take you home and make sure you stay there until tomorrow morning’s hearing!”
Cassie shrugged.
“You’re the worst kind of citizen!” the Provost added. “The best kind for a mood-adjust!”
“Like your wife?” I said, meanly.
I’d never seen anyone go from purple to green in just a few seconds, and I watched his face with interest.
“Guards!” he shouted. Immediately the door burst open and two guards ran in. “Take them to their house. You and another unit will be on guard tonight. Make sure they don’t leave.”
“Yes, sir!” the guard said, then motioned me and Cassie out the door.
Whatever. We wanted to go home, anyway.
107
CASSIE
THE GUARDS NUDGED US OUT of their cars and up onto the porch. One of them wanted to follow us inside, but Becca stopped him with a glare.
“Forget it,” she said flatly. “You’re staying outside.”
With a sour look, the guard motioned to the other three to surround the house. He made a big show of standing at attention, his rifle at the ready. I had no doubt he was hoping that Becca or I would try to run away.
Feeling beaten all over again, Becca and I trudged upstairs.
“How could the prison—” I started, but Becca held up her hand.
“There’s no way,” Becca said bitterly. “You know and I know that that prison was there, that we went through all that shit, and that we aren’t crazy. But besides that? I got nothing.”
“That’s right,” I said, feeling a weight in my chest. “We have nothing! No school, no vocation, no Ma, Pa… and you know the Provost is going to send us for a mood-adjust. I can’t go through that. I’d rather die!” I thought about Nate, how there was no chance for us to be together, and felt even bleaker.
“They would love for us to choose that option,” Becca said. “They’d get the SAS van here in five minutes. We can’t give them that satisfaction.”
“Then what? We have the so-called hearing in the morning!”