Khanh, first of her name, mother of bunnies > Books: action‎ (42)

I’m stranded on Mars. I have no way to communicate with Hermes or Earth. Everyone thinks I’m dead. I’m in a Hab designed to last 31 days.

If the Oxy

I’m stranded on Mars. I have no way to communicate with Hermes or Earth. Everyone thinks I’m dead. I’m in a Hab designed to last 31 days.

If the Oxygenator breaks down, I’ll suffocate. If the Water Reclaimer breaks down, I’ll die of thirst. If the Hab breaches, I’ll just kind of explode. If none of those things happen, I’ll eventually run out of food and starve to death.

So yeah. I’m fucked.

I’m pretty much fucked.

That’s my considered opinion.

Fucked.

Six days in to what should be a greatest two months of my life, and it’s turned in to a nightmare.

It was a ridiculous sequence of events that led to me almost dying. Then an even more ridiculous sequence that led to me surviving.

We were six days in when all hell broke loose, so that leaves enough food to feed six people for 50 days. I’m just one guy, so it’ll last me 300 days. And that’s if I don’t ration it. So I’ve got a fair bit of time.

But if I could communicate, I might be able to get a rescue. Not sure how they’d manage that with the resources on hand, but NASA has a lot of smart people.

So that’s my mission now. Find a way to communicate with Earth. If I can’t manage that, find a way to communicate with Hermes when it returns in 4 years with the Ares 4 crew.

Remember those old math questions you had in Algebra class? Well, that concept is critical to the “Mark Watney doesn’t die” project I’m working on.

I need to create calories. And I need enough to last four years. I figure if I don’t get rescued by Ares 4, I’m dead anyway. So that’s my target: four years.

I have an idiotically dangerous plan for getting the water I need. And boy do I mean *dangerous*. But I don’t have much choice.

As you can see, this plan provides many opportunities for me to die in a fiery explosion.

Firstly, Hydrazine is some serious death. If I make any mistakes, there’ll be nothing left but the “Mark Watney Memorial Crater” where the Hab once stood.

Presuming I don’t fuck up with the Hydrazine, there’s still the matter of burning hydrogen. I’m going to be setting a fire. In the Hab. On purpose.

If you asked every engineer at NASA what the worst scenario for the Hab was, they’d all answer “fire.” If you asked them what the result would be, they’d answer “death by fire.”

“He’s stuck out there. He thinks he’s totally alone and that we all gave up on him. What kind of effect does that have on a man’s psychology?”

He turned back to Venkat. “I wonder what he’s thinking right now.”

LOG ENTRY: SOL 61

How come Aquaman can control whales? They’re mammals! Makes no sense.

I’m going to use the RTG.

The RTG (Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator) is a big box of Plutonium. But not the kind used in nuclear bombs. No, no. This

Plutonium is way more dangerous!

Plutonium-238 is an incredibly unstable isotope. It’s so radioactive that it will get red hot all by itself. As you can imagine, a material that can literally fry an egg with radiation is kind of dangerous.

I'm turning my pee into rocket fuel. It's easier than you'd think.

Urine is mostly water. Separating hydrogen and oxygen only requires a couple of electrodes and some current. The problem is collecting the hydrogen. I don't have any equipment for pulling hydrogen out of the air.

If I survive this, I'll tell people I pissed my way into orbit.

I chipped his sacred religious item into long splinters using a pair of pliers and a screwdriver. I figure if there’s a God, He won’t mind, considering the situation I’m in.

Ruining the only religious icon I have leaves me vulnerable to Mars Vampires. I’ll have to risk it.

One thing I have in abundance here is bags. They’re not much different than kitchen trash bags, though I’m sure they cost $50,000 because NASA.

"We updated Pathfinder’s OS without any problems. We sent the rover patch, which Pathfinder rebroadcast. Once Watney executes the patch and reboots the rover, we should get a connection.”

“Jesus what a complicated process,” Venkat said.

“Try updating a Linux server some time,” Jack said.

After a moment of silence, Tim said “You know he was telling a joke, right? That was supposed to be funny.”

[12:04]JPL: We’ll get botanists in to ask detailed questions and double-check your work. Your life is at stake, so we want to be sure. Also, please watch your language. Everything you type is being broadcast live all over the world.

[12:15]WATNEY: Look! A pair of boobs! -> (.Y.)

Once again, my chest tightened, and there was that weird fluttering sensation that was like butterflies. But it couldn’t be butterflies. I did not

Once again, my chest tightened, and there was that weird fluttering sensation that was like butterflies. But it couldn’t be butterflies. I did not have butterflies over David Stark.

“So, Harper Jane Price. Are you ready to accept your destiny?”

His breath was coming out in short gasps, and there was a dark red stain spreading across his expansive belly. There was no doubt in my mind that he was dying.

“Look after him, okay?” he said, his eyes looking glazed again. “Make sure he’s...he’s safe.”

“I really can’t think of a worse choice,” he said, still smiling, “than the bimbo who wrote a paper on the history of shoes for my class.”

The sword was still poised in the air when I came to an abrupt stop and sunk the heel into his throat, right under his jaw.

Mr. Hall hadn’t been a superhero. He’d been a Paladin, and that was . . . different, right? And what—or who—had been his noble cause?
What was mine?

Under the picture of me and Bee, there was a smaller caption: Homecoming Queen misses crowning under mysterious circumstances. My eyes darted over the rest of the article as my heart started pounding. “...hiding in the boys’ room...violently ill...tension between the ‘Queen Bee’ and her underling, Bee Franklin...this reporter...”

Whatever the reason, my right hand shot up to slap David Stark across the face.
Half an inch from David’s cheek, my hand stopped in midair. And it wasn’t because I had some crisis of conscience, either. It was like my hand hit an invisible wall right by his head.

I withdrew my hand. “No, thank you.”
Saylor and David both stared.
“I appreciate your offer very much,” I continued. “But I’m afraid I have to refuse.”

“But you’re always arguing with him. Or talking about him. Or competing with him. And sometimes I wonder how you can be so obsessed with someone you supposedly hate.”

“I love you,” he said at last. “You know that. But it’s...it’s like we’re speaking two different languages most of the time. Harper.” He tugged on my hand. “If there’s something going on with you, you can tell me, okay?”

“You guys seemed pretty...intense yesterday,” Ryan said, dropping my hand.
“Yeah, we were intensely arguing over him writing that stupid article,” I said even as I had a sudden vision of me and David, laughing in his car. Hugging. God, we had hugged.

And the next time I did school stuff in the middle of the night, I just did it in my closet with the door locked. Honestly, what is wrong with this country when striving for excellence means you need antidepressants?

Ryan was a good guy. He always had been.

He lowered his head and kissed me, albeit pretty chastely. PDA is vile, and Ryan, being my Perfect Boyfriend, knows how I feel about it.

“Ladies,” Ryan said, nodding at Amanda, Abigail, and Mary Beth. “Let me guess. Y’all are...plotting world domination?”
“No,” Amanda told him, deadly serious. “We’re talking about Cotillion.”
“Ah, world domination, Cotillion. Same difference,” Ryan replied with an easy grin, and this time, all three girls giggled, even Amanda.

He and I had loathed each other since kindergarten. Heck, even before that. Mom says he’s the only baby I ever bit in daycare.

“I’m sure you’d hate to miss everyone’s felicitations.”
David had beaten me in the final round of our sixth-grade spelling bee with that word and now, all these years later, he still tried to drop it into conversation whenever he could.

For one horrifying second, I thought he was going to kiss me. I wasn’t really sure how I’d react if he did.
But it was only a hug. And if I maybe spent a second or two thinking that he actually smelled really nice, or that he was much more solid than he appeared, so what?

Still, I had to admit, yellow was a good color on him. It brought out the gold in his hair, and—
I stopped myself. The gold in his hair? Since when did I care about David.

“But, God, Harper, sometimes I feel like your whole life is a checklist, and I am way down at the bottom. And, you know, every once in awhile, you throw me a bone to keep me happy.”
I flinched at that, hard. Not only because it was insulting, but because it was way too close to the truth.

The man I shot was named Jason Earhart, dean of the math department. But then, he was only a body.
I am wicked because the moment Jason died, the on

The man I shot was named Jason Earhart, dean of the math department. But then, he was only a body.
I am wicked because the moment Jason died, the only thing I felt was relief.
I murdered an innocent man in cold blood.

Fifteen years ago, government scientists manufactured an accurate test for morality—an obstacle course, where the simulations within proved whether a candidate was good or evil. It was named a Compass Room.

The footage of my crime rolls. Crying families outside Roosevelt College. Students and professors wailing, screaming. FBI, police, bomb squad.
All storming the school to catch one of the shooters who initiated fifty-six deaths.
All storming the school to catch me.

After the law passed, engineers updated the Rooms to kill the wicked. They became the most accurate form of the death penalty ever created.

She creeps to me, shoulders erect. Her head hangs at an angle, stringy blonde hair falling limply around her shoulders, eyes sunken in their sockets.
“Shh.” She reaches out, like she’s going to place a finger to my lips. I shut my eyes, waiting for her touch.
“Don’t tell him I’m here. I want it to be a surprise.”

Clasping her hands on either side of his head, she twists, elbows swinging as she snaps his neck in half.

Casey hacks and hacks, blood splattering across his face and clothes as he rips the knife away. He doesn’t stop, not when his dad has to be dead—again—his back nothing more than ripped denim and mangled pockets of swelling blood.
My breath rattles through the air. Nothing happens.

Fifteen years ago, government scientists manufactured an accurate test for morality—an obstacle course, where the simulations within proved whether a candidate was good or evil. It was named a Compass Room.

“I bet you’re enjoying this, dying just like her. Like you think you’re some fucking martyr,” he spits.

I was the one who kept proving myself to be a killer over and over in the Compass Room.

“Of course you wanted to kill him. We all did.”

The Compass Room is pregnant with sin. Not the ghost of our crimes, but real, pungent sin.

He doesn’t look at peace, more like a baby. A frightened baby.

“Bugger off,” I snapped.

“Just because you kissed me don’t mean I’m your girl none,” I told him.

Did he think I were John’s bit of fun for the day? My belly twisted and I didn’t like the feeling.
And he weren’t Rob. But then, maybe that weren’t such an awful thing. Rob’s sort I could never deserve.

His eyes looked into mine in a way that made my breath suck out of my pipes. “You’re every kind of surprise, you know that?”

He looked at me, his eyes running over my face. He came closer, and I were against the wall, so my heart started to flutter-beat in my chest. I didn’t much like feeling trapped. He palmed my hat, pushing it back.
“What are you doing?” I asked, pulling away.
“I need to see your eyes when I ask you this.”
“Ask what?”
“Are you in love with Rob, Scar?”

His lips pressed against mine, strong like the rest of him and a little wet, pushing my lips into a fair good kiss. He caught me up ’bout the waist and kissed me deeper. I shut my eyes, and Rob’s face popped into my head.

“About John,” he said at long last.
I blinked.
“I don’t want to know how you two are fooling about, but if it interferes with the band I’ll kick you out myself.”

Chiron looked surprised. “I thought that would be obvious enough. The entrance to the Underworld is in Los Angeles.”

Chiron looked surprised. “I thought that would be obvious enough. The entrance to the Underworld is in Los Angeles.”

Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends—I guess she’d gotten tired of stealing from the tourists—and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover’s lap.
“Oops.” She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.

"Another time, Athena and Poseidon competed to be the patron god for the city of Athens. Your dad created some stupid saltwater spring for his gift. My mom created the olive tree. The people saw that her gift was better, so they named the city after her.”
“They must really like olives.”
“Oh, forget it.”
“Now, if she’d invented pizza—that I could understand.”
“I said, forget it!”

“About sixty years ago, after World War II, the Big Three agreed they wouldn’t sire any more heroes. Their children were just too powerful."

Now that I was declared a son of one of the Big Three gods who weren’t supposed to have kids, I figured it was a crime for me just to be alive.

"During the winter solstice, at the last council of the gods, Zeus and Poseidon had an argument. The usual nonsense: ‘Mother Rhea always liked you best,’ ‘Air disasters are more spectacular than sea disasters,’ et cetera."

In his pocket was a set of reed pipes his daddy goat had carved for him, even though he only knew two songs: Mozart’s Piano Concerto no. 12 and Hilary Duff’s “So Yesterday,” both of which sounded pretty bad on reed pipes.

Annabeth nodded. “Your father isn’t dead, Percy. He’s one of the Olympians.”
“That’s...crazy.”
“Is it? What’s the most common thing gods did in the old stories? They ran around falling in love with humans and having kids with them. Do you think they’ve changed their habits in the last few millennia?”

“What? You assume it has to be a male god who finds a human female attractive? How sexist is that?”

“Come now, Percy. What you call ‘Western civilization.’ Do you think it’s just an abstract concept? No, it’s a living force. A collective consciousness that has burned bright for thousands of years. The gods are part of it."
"Did the West die? The gods simply moved, to Germany, to France, to Spain, for a while. Wherever the flame was brightest, the gods were there. They spent several centuries in England. All you need to do is look at the architecture. People do not forget the gods."

I didn’t know what else to do. I waved back.
“Don’t encourage them,” Annabeth warned. “Naiads are terrible flirts.”
“Naiads,” I repeated, feeling completely overwhelmed. “That’s it. I want to go home now.”

“All right,” I said. “It’s better than being turned into a dolphin.”

“But a quest to . . .” Grover swallowed. “I mean, couldn’t the master bolt be in some place like Maine? Maine’s very nice this time of year.”

Battles are all about strategy, and strategy pivots on priorities. Since my priorities were Prince Jalan, Prince Jalan, and Prince Jalan, with “loo

Battles are all about strategy, and strategy pivots on priorities. Since my priorities were Prince Jalan, Prince Jalan, and Prince Jalan, with “looking good” a distant fourth, I took the opportunity to resume running away.

There’s power in a name. “Prince” has served me very well—something to hide behind when trouble comes.

She had to have seventy years on her, but no one would have called her more than fifty. Handsome or not, though, her eyes would turn any man’s bowels to water. Flinty chips of dispassion.

She turned that awful face towards me, one eye dark, the other milk and pearl. It had felt hot, suddenly, as if all the great hearths had roared into life with one scorching voice, sparked into fury on a fine summer’s day, the flames leaping from iron grates as if they wanted nothing more than to be amongst us.

"Men of the Drowned Isles broke amongst us. Some living, others corpses preserved from rot, and other creatures still—half-men from the Brettan swamps, corpse-eaters, ghouls with venomed darts that steal a man’s strength and leave him helpless as a newborn."

Tenth in line to a throne will get you into a not-insignificant number of bedchambers, but if a man dons the scarlet cloak of the Red March riders and wraps his legs around a destrier, there are few ladies of quality who won’t open theirs when he flashes a smile at them.

I could see corpses and timbers, some black against the hot glow, others melting into it. Even the wind’s strength couldn’t keep the scent of roasting flesh from my nostrils. The walkway ran with hot fats, burning even as they spilled down the inner wall.

I’ve always found hitting a man from behind to be the best way to go about things. This can sometimes be accomplished by dint of a simple ruse. Classics such as, “What’s that over there?” work surprisingly often.

“You’re a man of honour.” Louder this time, looking right at me. Where the hell he got that idea, I had no notion.
“Yes,” I lied.
“We should settle this like men.” Absolutely the last words I wanted to hear.

“What’s his name?” A tall Nuban girl with copper loops through her ears and a mouth made for kissing. “How is he called?”
“Snorri,” I said. “It means wife-beater.”

I have a bad habit of blanking unpleasantness from my mind—something I’ve done since I was a child. They often say the best liars half-believe their lies—which makes me the very best because if I repeat a lie often enough I can end up believing it entirely, no half measures involved!

Bravery is just a different kind of broken. Scared of being a coward, is that what bravery is? Am I brave because I don’t fear being afraid? You’re of the light; the light reveals. Shine a bright enough light on any kind of bravery and isn’t it just a more complex form of cowardice?”

Snorri cut me off. “I took the prince out of the palace, but the palace is still crammed firmly up the prince’s arse. You need to stop moaning about every hardship, stop chasing every woman you lay eyes on, and concentrate on surviving.

“An axe for me. Swords trick you into thinking you can defend. With an axe all you can do is attack. That’s what my father named me. Snorri. It means ‘attack.’” He lifted the axe above his head. “Men think they can defend against me—but when I knock, they open.”

The air between Snorri and me spat and sparked as our hands shaped to grasp the other.

He brought his hand closer to mine and a pressure built against my skin, all pins and needles and fire.

Snorri’s magic had reached into me again and made me brave. In that moment I wanted to be the one to stand between the child and her attackers. To keep her safe. And failing that, to hunt them to the ends of the earth.

“Be reasonable. If I leave you here, you will most likely die, and Guy de Molay wins. Come with me, and you get your chance at retribution. Which option appeals to you more?”

Junaid did not smile back. His eyes were hard. “I cannot teach you if you are afraid. Faithful Ones are chosen not only because of strength of mind and body, but also strength of character. You will be expelled at the slightest sign of weakness, and I will take you back to the sheepherder’s shed so that you may finish what I interrupted.”

“I speak for many of us when I say this,” Bashar continued, ignoring her. “We do not think she belongs here. She will only cause us trouble. Furthermore, it has come to our attention that she is currently unclean.” He watched Zayn’s jaw drop with relish. “We strongly believe she should abstain from handling holy texts and training with us until she is clean again.”

“Your anger,” he interrupted, his voice firm but gentle. Like his eyes. “She says your passion burns brightly in your face, Zayn. How will you deceive a Frank, a lady, a knight, when your hatred for them is so clearly written in your eyes?”

You are ruined, and no man will ever love you.

Its domes, spires, and minarets shimmered white in the sun, contrasting brightly with the aquamarine water. Ships from Venice and Genoa and even farther away crowded the harbor, a forest of galleys and pinnaces, all laden with goods. A caravan of bedouin camels traipsed through the dust, carrying bolts of silk and bales of spices.

Beggars pulled at her skirts, stretching their disfigured hands out to her in supplication. Blind, legless, leprous—they were all there, hiding in the shade. A one-eyed woman, cradling a tiny baby, peered up at her from within a worn, sun-beaten face. Zayn tossed down her coins and tried to shut the woman—all of them—from her mind. She had never seen such human suffering. And this in the holiest of cities.

I’m damaged. I’m afraid to trust men. I don’t know how to cope with my feelings for you.
I’m afraid to love you.

She hated herself, the curves of her body, the hairless skin of her face, her childlike eyes and lips…everything that made her female and feminine.

She detested men and their lust, and she loathed herself for inspiring it in them.

Filth. Nothing but filth.

But there was something else, too…something that maddened her with its simplicity, with its validity: Earic Goodwin. His presence had shattered her focus.

“Listen.” He jerks his head over his shoulder, checking that we are more or less alone. “I know he’s got this moody, broody artist act down, and some girls go for that. Oh, look at the sad puppy. But it gets to be a drag, you know?”
“Not really,” I say stiffly.

Me, I’ve found how to focus thoughts and memories through touch, like steadying a radio antenna with your fingertips, the static sloughing off until a clear melody remains.

Brilliant pinks, blues, reds spin across the dance floor before us, and thoughts and smells spiral away in the dancers’ wake: sweat, eagerness, acrid perfume, regret. One thought is faint, but unmistakable to me— the hum of a brain that’s encountered a scrubber.

I catch a flash of lightning in the crowd— feel it more than see it, ripping through my mind.

“You were an idiot to try to give this up,” Misha says, and Masha nods. “Look around you— isn’t this a better life?

“You shut your stupid mouth! Stupid bitch who believes these things are our friends! Do you feel friendly now?”
“Stupid bitch,” he said again.

Seriously, the elderly that had made it onto the ships had gotten crankier and ruder than I’d ever known them to be on Earth. Like there was some unspoken agreement between all of them that this was all our fault, the young people were to blame, that they deserved better in their twilight years. Lectures from some grouchy, pissed off old-erly hunched over on a cane were not uncommon. ‘Respect your Elders,’ they said. Like they wanted to teach us, to impart their wisdom before it was too late. But in my book it already was too late.

Most of the Gov officials had died in the cataclysmic failure of Earth that had come suddenly after twelve years on the precipice.

Rationing had never been necessary because more ships were built and stocked than had actually taken off.
During that time we’d taken food from other vessels and over-stocked ourselves.

there were beautiful green, yellow and pink dancing lights waving across the sky and illuminating the land below. It looked like the northern lights back home, but it was everywhere.

Straight lines, different patches, like a quilt.
Then I realized what I was looking at. Crops. Huge, rolling fields of crops. Others realized seconds after I did. Then the image got so close the plants became unmistakable. There was obviously food growing in abundance.

Almost immediately we discovered that our landing site was a nesting spot for animals about the size of a pig, with mud-colored shells, hard as diamond. The kid got to be the first to name something in our new world, and he called them Steves.
Chief had ordered a special feast tonight with some of the reserve Steves."

I supposed I was pretty-ish. Somehow, I’d grown into a girl that some boys might like to look at. But it didn’t matter.

“Oh, everyone knows me?” I asked, not understanding.
“You’re only the most popular girl on Reflection,” the girl answered.
That shut me up. I was? Not to my knowledge.

People looked at me first. Everyone assumed I was a leader so I went with it.

I whispered into Chief’s ear. “Let Legacy out, bring him to the depository. Resume removal of the weapons.”

“This girl is providing intel to the creatures after all! Behind your back, Chief!”
Chief’s face became completely composed. “I asked Hope to create those.”

“Chance said you were amazing."

Legacy paused. "The truth is I think you’re amazing."

“You’re so strong, Hope. How can you be that strong?”

I searched its eyes and I thought maybe I saw sadness.

I had no answer. We weren’t their enemy. Each session seemed so different, I couldn’t explain it.

He’s dangerous, I reminded myself. And this is not the experience you left home for. You should run away.

I didn’t move.

He’s dangerous, I reminded myself. And this is not the experience you left home for. You should run away.

I didn’t move.

That night I thought more about Luther than astronaut boot camp.

“A homeschooled, black-eyed Latina.” He whistled. “You are turning into a very ripe fruit for the plucking.”

[My father told me that teenagers are] not biologically capable of being fully rational. I swore right then that I’d be a smart, cautious teenager.

Now those underdeveloped parts of my brain were perking up and looking around.

“We’re both going.” Wilder’s words were as heavy as bricks.

“I know it, but I can’t get myself to believe it!”

“But...” He didn’t look at me. “I wasn’t expecting this.”

Wilder’s eyes seemed darker, his whole mood blacker. His gaze slid off me as if I were too lowly to contemplate, and he got up and walked away.

I wasn’t experiencing any inclination to start taking over the world in advance of an alien army. The only change I felt, beyond the headache, was an increased awareness, I guess, of Wilder.

The need to find him became an ache. Maybe if I got there first. Maybe if I found him before the others were near, he might look at me the way he used to—

His presence was like coming into an air-conditioned house on a sweltering day. His pull eclipsed worry for my parents, for Mi-sun and Jacques, for anything.

I was going to see Wilder for the first time since I’d heard that he killed [her].

But he was still Wilder.

“Who is this trog?” Luther asked.

I stood up fast, moving away from Wilder, and blushed as if I’d been doing something bad. Luther was standing on the sidewalk, his arms folded.

“This is Jonathan Wilder, a...friend I met at astronaut boot camp. Wilder, this is my best friend Luther.”

The boys looked at each other. The mood was Arctic Circle.

My breath sort of stops, right there in my lungs.
Standing behind the glass...is the person I swear I’ve waited my entire life to see.

I should be mad. I should be angry and embarrassed.
Instead, all I can think is I might love this girl.

The stars are out tonight. But the stars aren’t what I want to see right now.
It’s the moon. The moon that reminds me of the moonlit girl.
My moonlit girl. She’s the cure to my nightmares, the one thing that helps me feel safe when I can’t even trust my own dreams to harbor me.
There aren’t many things I want.
But stars, I want the moonlit girl.

"...maybe there’s a chance she’s been dreaming of me, too."

He is beautiful. Shaggy brown hair sweeps across his face, and I am shocked at how bad I want to touch it.

I’m imprisoned inside a pillar of fire...How did it come to this?
What did I think would happen? I’m an eighteen-year old girl, he’s immortal e

I’m imprisoned inside a pillar of fire...How did it come to this?
What did I think would happen? I’m an eighteen-year old girl, he’s immortal evil personified. I’m a fool.

“That means robe-cleaning, foot massage, and groveling etiquette, as well as our lesson for today, meal preparation.”

“Let’s get started.” Tank blasts his whistle again. “I want you all to practice running around the yard, flailing your arms, and screaming ‘Take me! Take me!’ On my mark. Set. Go!”

My rage boils over. Jumping super-high, I haul up my knees, then kick my opponent squarely in the chest with both feet. The Choker falls flat on his back with a satisfying thud. Meanwhile, I use the momentum from my chest-kick to flip backwards into a somersault, landing right by his head.

Adair clears her throat, then sings with a warbling old-lady voice:

Who will worship the Scala Adair?
All the thrax if given the time
My powers are great, my face is so fair
Who won’t want the love that is mine?

He looks at me out of his slate-blue eye. “Well, it’s not like I wowed you with my dazzling personality when we met.”
I can’t help but chuckle. “No, you didn’t.”
“In fact, I was closed-minded and awful for far too long. I’m very sorry.”

They can shoot me through the bars of this sweatbox or hang me from the flagpole or throw me to the sharks, but they cannot make

They can shoot me through the bars of this sweatbox or hang me from the flagpole or throw me to the sharks, but they cannot make me cry or beg. I will not show them weakness. I will stay strong. If they kill me, they will remember my strength; I will force them to live with the memory of my strength forever.
And if I live, I will escape from Phoenix Island, and I will tell the world. I will bring these people down.

The baton crackled, and two needles of energy plunged into Carl’s forearm. Electricity coursed through him and locked his muscles rigid, filling him with sparking, yellow pain. Parker grinned through his anger. “Not bad for the first one.”
The first one...And then the horror of it dawned on him; Parker had no intention of stopping no matter what Carl did. He was going to keep shocking Carl until Carl couldn’t take it anymore.

You are all orphans. Why had they taken only orphans? He thought of the kick he had received, the rough handling of Davis. Here they were, on Phoenix Island, somewhere outside of the United States and its laws.
We’re as dead to the world as our parents, Carl thought. These people can do anything to us.

That made no sense.
Unless . . .
Odd misgivings warbled through him.
Something weird was going on. Really weird. Bad weird.
The date suggested that whoever wrote this was either psychic or had been planning his placements months in advance...

“If Dr. Vispera had been born in London or Detroit, he would no doubt have risen through the ranks of respected physicians and scientists and established himself in more conventional ways. Unfortunately for him—and even less fortunately for his symphony of victims—he was born in place that valued power over science. Sometimes, the only difference between a Nobel Prize winner and a war criminal is geography. Do you understand?”

“That jungle will eat you alive. Bad things live out there. Bad, bad things. This fence right here? It’s not to keep you in. It’s to keep them out. You go AWOL here, it’s a death sentence.”

Girls like Rice, though, didn’t even think about the outside. They had turned inward, had become truly institutionalized. They didn’t get scared; they got interested. They didn’t look for a way out; they looked for ways to manipulate the system, ways to push buttons. There was no reforming them—and certainly not by shouting.

Decker just kept staring, a terrible amusement playing across his face. It was a cold humor Carl had seen in other bullies. The toughest ones. The ones with real confidence. Counselors and teachers told you bullies were insecure and cowardly, and, sure, some were. But guys like Decker, guys who got that look in their eyes, were neither insecure nor cowardly, and they weren’t just acting out for attention. Guys like Decker were confident and tough and mean to the core, and they hurt people because they liked causing pain.

And all these years, that’s what Carl thought he’d been doing: keeping his promise to his father. Standing up for the weak.
But he’d been fooling himself.
Carl’s historical pattern of self-destruction did point toward a deep personal weakness—all those fights, all those placements, all the trouble he’d gotten himself into here..always a bully, always a victim, always Carl stepping into the middle.
But Carl’s weakness wasn’t his need to help the victims. His weakness was his need to destroy the bullies.
He’d been fighting not out of love but hatred.

“You’re so much more extraordinary than you give yourself credit for. And I’m not just talking about your mind. Your body too.”

Micah gives her a smile and Dyl returns the favor. Like a prize racehorse, she’s even showing teeth in perfect, pearly order. She’s passing with flying colors.

Beauty. Dyl’s worth is no longer in her looks, it’s in this strand of hair. And I’ll use my own, plain, unspectacular self to help her.

I’m a total embarrassment. My refusal to wear makeup, nice shoes, or tight clothes. My penchant for getting excited over CellTech News, my favorite holo channel. My endless nagging about her flashy dresses and too-shiny lipstick.

I point to myself and silently mouth the words What did I do? to Wilbert.
“My guess is, you’re female and you exist. Probably an alpha female thing, like wolves or rats—”

I’m not shocked by the fact she’s wearing the latest fashion from Hookers-R-Us. It’s her face.

Vera is on my floor, staring at her crotch.
Well, she’s doing yoga, but in essence, that’s what’s going on.

The tattoos. No wonder they keep changing. His body must metabolize the ink so fast that he gets a clean slate every day.

Cy’s not done. He spits on the floor again. “She’s damaged goods.”

It’s a painting of a dismembered hand, fingers stretching to extremes, but cut off at the wrist, leaning against the wall. The one next to it shows a long bone, still smeared with blood, floating in the same pale blue void the hand is in.

It warms his slate eyes just a touch, like cold butter that softens after landing on warm toast.

“Oh, you know. After you passed out, Cy knocked us out of the way to give you mouth-to-mouth. He freaking French-kissed you all the way home, in the name of saving your life. What a goddamned romantic. I had no idea he had it in him.”

Boyfriend is too limited a term for what Cy has become to me. Water? Oxygen? That might do.

I rev the engine afresh, and the char thrusts ahead with a roar. The speed is therapeutic, but does nothing to erase the memory of two very different kisses.

Beneath me lies a city. It is not in ruins. It isn’t decimated by war and poisoned by radiation. It is a thriving city with massive glass buildings

Beneath me lies a city. It is not in ruins. It isn’t decimated by war and poisoned by radiation. It is a thriving city with massive glass buildings glistening in the late-afternoon sun. This is not a postapocalyptic wasteland. Where am I? What is going on?

But as I walk I begin to get an idea of the scale of the city and start to realize how stupid my plan is. It would be like trying to spot a friend at the Super Bowl without having a clue where their seat is. How in the world am I going to find one girl in the middle of this enormous city? I am well and truly fucked.

You’d think she was seeing everything for the first time. Like she’s Tarzan or something—raised by wolves in the deepest, darkest forest. And then there’s the fact that she keeps stopping people and asking their name.

I’m lying here in a tent, pretending to be asleep but actually fearing for my life as I watch a bunny murderer have a conversation with our campfire.

He is likely the stupidest boy I have ever met.
He has lived what Dennis would call “a fortunate life, unfortunately for the rest of the world.” The blissfully ignorant spawn of the rich.

“In 1984, at the outset of World War III, my parents and some friends of theirs escaped from America to settle in the Alaskan wilderness.”
“There was no World War III,” I interject.
She gives me a frustrated look. “Are you going to listen or what?”
I lean back on my elbows and listen.

"Most people I know would have a hard time believing that you weren’t...I don’t know...crazy.”
He presses his index finger to his temple and opens his eyes wide. “Or on drugs,” he continues. “Wait, no...I have another theory. You were brainwashed by your hippie cult into thinking you have magical powers. In your head you’re like a cross between...I don’t know...Superpower-Flower-Child and Harry Potter.”

“Oz has changed,” Gert said. “The trees don’t talk. The Pond of Truth tells lies, the Wandering Water stays put. The Land of Naught is on fire. People are starting to get old. People are forgetting how it used to be.”

Tornado or no tornado, I wasn’t Dorothy, and a stupid little storm wasn’t going to change anything for me.

My stomach dropped and kept dropping. I felt my body getting heavier, my back plastered to the cushions now, and suddenly—with a mix of horror and wonder—I knew that I was airborne.
The trailer was flying. I could feel it.

“Welcome to Oz,” the boy said, nodding, like he expected I’d figured that out already. It came out sounding almost apologetic, like, Hate to break the bad news.

A vast field of decaying grass stretched into the distance. It was gray and patchy and sickly, with the faintest tinge of blue. On the far side of the pit was a dark, sinister-looking forest, black and deep. The air, the clouds, even the sun, which was shining bright, all had a faded, washed-out quality to them. There was something dead about all of it.

I knew the answer already: what I was going to do next was the same thing I’d been doing my whole life.
I turned back. Just put one foot in front of the other. Nothing had changed except the color of the road.

Before I could even touch it, a black vine sprung up from the ground and curled around my arm like a whip, squeezing tight. It burned.

Other than the twitching, [her lips] didn’t move. At all. Even when she talked.
“What’s with her mouth?” I asked Star under my breath.
I jumped when an actual voice answered in a hoarse whisper from behind me.
“(A) it’s PermaSmile, and (B) are you out of your dumbass mind?”

“Don’t mind those,” he explained, seeing the look of confusion on my face. “That’s just where my wings used to be. Before I cut them off.”

“They talk about Oz where I’m from. I’ve heard about it my whole life. But this is messed up. What happened here?”
Indigo’s impassive face twisted into a snarl. “Dorothy happened,” she said.

"That’s why you’re here. We need you to stop her.”
I sat up straight. I didn’t know the first thing about magic. I didn’t know the first thing about Dorothy. “Me? I just got here. How am I supposed to stop anyone from doing anything?”

“Simple. You’re going to kill her.” She looked right at me and said, “Dorothy must die.”

“It’s your choice,” he said. “It’s not magic that makes you who you are. It’s the choices that you make. Look at Dorothy.”
“What about Dorothy?”
“That’s exactly what makes Dorothy evil.”

His oversize jaw jutted out from the rest of his face in a nasty underbite, revealing a mess of little blades where his teeth should have been.

“You asked why they work for her,” she said. “You asked why the Munchkins don’t just tell Glinda to fuck off and take her machine somewhere else.”
“Yeah. I was wondering that. Maybe it was stupid of me.”
“It was,” Indigo said, shooting me an annoyed look. “Do you think they have a choice?"

“Did that tree just move?”
“They talk, too, but they’ve taken a vow of silence.”
“Voluntarily?”
“The princess felt that their conversation ruined the apple-eating experience and was therefore a violation of the Happiness Decree.”

Instead of farm-girl cotton it was silk and chiffon. The cut was somewhere between haute couture and French hooker. The bodice nipped, tucked, and lifted. There was cleavage.
Lots of cleavage.

Dorothy’s face was burning with aggrieved rage. “I am the only one. There can only be one.”
My gut twisted. I understood. We had the same story. It was like we were wearing the same dress to the prom. Dorothy thought her landing here was fate—that it made her special. Another girl from Kansas meant that it was just a regular occurrence and that she wasn’t special at all. Or—worse—that I was here to take her place.

Why did I hesitate? Was I that weak?
I told myself that I didn’t want to ruin the Order’s plans—they’d told me to wait—but I knew that wasn’t entirely it. I’d chickened out.

I sliced diagonally across his chest and then drew the knife out only to plunge it right back in, drawing an X along his left side with the blade.

We have a traitor among us. Someone has been working with the Fallen to expose the names and locations of the vulnerable Nephilim.

“It wouldn’t hurt you to shut up.”
“Jesus! I’m trying to have a freaking conversation with you! You know, a normal one people have every day. Hey, how are you and all that shit. Is that so hard?”

She didn’t have Julian—she couldn’t have Julian. It wasn’t like he was another Nephilim or even a human—a human would have been better choice.
A rabid opossum would have been a smarter choice.

Lily sighed wearily. This wasn’t going as planned. “Michael, sit down. Luke, shut up.” It was a sad day for Nephilim around the world when she played mediator. “If you guys want to pull out your dicks and see whose is bigger, can you go ahead and do it so we can move on?”

“Say you love me, vampire girl,” he whispered, his voice low and husky. “Tell me...that this is f

“Say you love me, vampire girl,” he whispered, his voice low and husky. “Tell me...that this is forever.”
“I love you,” I said immediately. “And if we have forever, there’s no one else I want to spend it with.”

“Puppy, I am getting so tired of listening to you whine about this,” he snarled at Zeke. “This isn’t rocket science. If you don’t want to be a monster, don’t be a bloody monster! Be an uptight stick in the mud like Kanin. Be a self-righteous bleeding heart like Allison. Or you can stop agonizing about it and be a fucking monster."

“Two lives for the rest of the world?” he continued. “Are you willing to sacrifice everything to save one and destroy another?”

“I want you to understand exactly what you are deciding, right now. If we return to the city for Jackal and Ezekiel, Sarren could reach Eden, complete whatever he is planning, and unleash a virus that could destroy everything. And if that happens, everything we’ve done here will be for nothing. Do you understand that?”

“I just want you to understand the potential consequences of tonight,” he went on. “If we are killed, if we cannot get to Sarren in time, everything could die. It will be like it was sixty years ago. You aren’t old enough to remember the days Before, but when Red Lung was at its peak, the entire world was madness and chaos. And when the rabids appeared, it became hell on earth.”

“It is...a very heavy weight to carry, Allison, the damnation of a world. I want you to be very certain, before we go any further. Is it worth it? Is he worth it?”

I already knew my answer. It was selfish, it was unreasonable, and I knew it was the wrong choice. But I looked up at Kanin, into his impassive face, and whispered, “Yes.”
“You are willing to let others die for this. To let Sarren win.”

“I’m a demon, and the sooner I take myself out of this world, the better.”

“I only have to understand one thing—I’m a demon. I may not have wanted it, but it’s what I am now.”

“This is what I am, Allison! I’m a demon—you know it as well as me.”

“I’m terrified that I won’t be able to fight this, that I’ll turn into a demon and lose my soul forever, if it’s not already gone."

“Still incredible, vampire girl,” he whispered, sounding almost like himself again. “Dangerous, beautiful and unstoppable. You haven’t changed.”

“Oh, isn’t that sweet,” came Jackal’s loud, mocking voice before I could reply. “Let’s make goo-goo eyes at each other in the middle of a stinking corpse field, how very romantic.”

“Aw, isn’t that sweet.” And Jackal sauntered into view, smirk firmly in place. “But don’t wait around on my account. It’s not like I can’t wait for yet another riveting night of listening to you people whine at each other. Oh, woe is me, I’m a vampire. I’m a horrible monster who eats babies and murders bunnies, boo hoo hoo.”

The woman pauses dramatically. “I’d like to officially welcome you to the Brimstone Bleed. May the bravest Contender win.”

“Put this

The woman pauses dramatically. “I’d like to officially welcome you to the Brimstone Bleed. May the bravest Contender win.”

“Put this on your shirt.”
It’s a small gold serpent pin, and it’s fairly heavy.

Holding the box to my lips, I tell it, “You’re mine, precious. All mine.”

“If you’re hearing this message, you are invited to be a Contender in the Brimstone Bleed. All Contenders must report within forty-eight hours to select their Pandora companions.”

“The Brimstone Bleed will last three months and will take place across four ecosystems: desert, sea, mountains, jungle. The winning prize will be the Cure — a remedy for any illness, for any single person.”

And after almost two hundred thousand miles, the car is an utter embarrassment to the auto community. My parents will wake up to find their daughter gone. I’d hate to have them left with the crap car, too.

I’ve watched a lot of scary movies, and I’ve learned nothing good is ever at the bottom of a winding staircase. Pulling in a breath and preparing myself to be eaten alive, I head down.

I don’t need the device in my pocket to tell me what my gut already knows.
This is the Pandora Selection Process.

He looks back at me, and I wonder if maybe, even though he looks a little like a serial killer, he’s going to help me up.

Pounding my fists against the boards, I scream. I swallowed the pill. I’m in a box. How stupid could I have been? I left without telling my family where I was going, got on a train to a city that doesn’t exist, and swallowed a foreign object. Oh yeah, and I also picked up a rotting egg along the way.

...when the eagle gets close enough — I swing a right hook and collide with the bird. She slams into the ground and slides for several feet.

His head falls back and his spine ripples. Beneath him, his legs and arms stretch longer and wider, and his black coat begins to thicken. My Pandora grows massive muscles and new body parts — morphing.

I close my hand around the lid and pull it off. Inside is a tiny pillow. I imagine all sorts of miniature animals using it in their miniature beds. But that’s dumb, because how would they ever find a pillow case to fit?

I decide to stay put but reason that if I see another Contender soon, I’ll run my tag-team idea across them. Deal? Deal.

Oh Jesus. I’m already talking to myself. Or thinking to myself as if there are two of me. Is that the same thing? I’m not sure. But I do know I’ve been alone for two minutes and I’m already losing my shit.

Because I have no idea of what I’ll need, I also throw in random things from my desk: pens, paper, scissors, tape. The last thing I pack is a photo of my family that’s stuck in the edge of my mirror. That and my glittery purple nail polish.

Running my fingers through my hair, I think about how I should be racing toward Lincoln Station. But the compulsion to repair my face is too strong.

I grab my makeup bag — the one I never leave home without — and fix what I can.

With curls trimmed close to my head and a roguish green-and-blue feather dangling over my right shoulder, I decide I just might seem like someone who would enter a daring race — and win.

For a fleeting moment, before the woman speaks, I pray that the orange pack I’m wearing holds Chanel makeup. And a brush. And a mirror.

“Darrow. Come here. Come.” He grabs my shoulder and pulls me in. “Others may have failed. But you’ll be different, Darrow. I

“Darrow. Come here. Come.” He grabs my shoulder and pulls me in. “Others may have failed. But you’ll be different, Darrow. I feel it in my bones.”

"Say we make his body perfect, there’s still one problem: we cannot make him smarter. One cannot make a mouse a lion.”

I don’t know the math, but I know the pattern. I solve it and four more puzzles, then it changes once more in my hands, becoming a circle. Mickey’s eyes widen. I complete the circle’s puzzles and then toss him back the device. He stares at my hands while working his own twelve fingers.
“Impossible,” he murmurs.

Before I sleep, I drink a tonic laden with processing enhancers and speed-listen to The Colors, The Iliad, Ulysses, Metamorphosis, the Theban plays, The Draconic Labels, and restricted works like The Count of Monte Cristo, Lord of the Flies, Lady Casterly’s Penance, 1984, and The Great Gatsby. I wake knowing three thousand years of literature and legal code and history.

My name, three bars beside it now, floats nearer the Primus hand.
Cassius has risen too.
But there can be only one Primus.

People remain hungry because we’ve yet to build a fire in the castle, and hygiene is quickly forgotten when two of our girls are snatched up by Ceres horsemen as they bathe in the river just beneath our gate. The Golds are confused when even their fine pores begin clogging and they gain pimples.

The Gray soldiers prowl the cities ensuring order, ensuring obedience to the hierarchy. The Whites arbitrate their justice and push their philosophy. Pinks pleasure and serve in highColor homes. Silvers count and manipulate currency and logistics. Yellows study the medicines and sciences. Greens develop technology. Blues navigate the stars. Coppers run the bureaucracy. Every Color has a purpose. Every Color props up the Golds.

“And you may think it a waste of good Golds, but you’re an idiot if you think fifty children make a dent in our numbers. There are more than one million Golds on Mars. More than one hundred million in the Solar System. Not all get to be Peerless Scarred, though, eh?

The agony is beyond language or comprehension. I watch videos of it afterwards to distract me from the residual pain. He uses a vibroScalpel to slice the flesh of my thigh down the middle. He parts my muscle and skin with clamps to expose the bones of my legs. Then he peels off layers of the bone with a bonepeeler and paints new layers with his improved-bone recipe.
“Someone has to dot God’s i’s.”

“This is our bloodydamn planet.”
“Through sweat and toil it was made so,” he agrees.
“Then what will it take to take it back?”
“Blood.”