The Replaced(52)

I drew fireflies. Everywhere, fireflies. On the inside flaps, on the cover, all over the pages of the book . . . even on the palm of my hand.

And so it goes, I guess.

The tent flap wavered and Buzz Cut’s voice filtered into our musty space. “Drills.”

I shoved the book beneath my pillow and bolted upright. I was more than ready to get outside, and wished they hadn’t waited so long to come get us. This part of our day, joining the rigid workout routines of the other campers, even if it meant heading out beneath the blazing hot sun, had quickly become my favorite part. A bright spot amid the dull routine of aimless pacing, scratching out games of tic-tac-toe in the floorboard dust, and our one daily trip to the cafeteria, where we ate even if we weren’t hungry because it was more interesting than sitting in our tent.

Plus, I had my book-slash-journal now too, so there was that.

For a camp of not-troubled teens, Griffin kept these kids in tip-top shape. The drills were brutal. On the first day, after only an hour, I thought the combination of exertion and heat would make me puke, and I wanted nothing more than to collapse on the ground, but the athlete in me knew that would only make the cramping worse, so I’d forced myself to take small sips of water and walk it off, until the excruciating stitch in my side had faded to something closer to a dull ache.

Still, when Buzz Cut had called us to drills again yesterday, I’d jumped at the chance.

I’d do it each and every day we were here if it meant not staying cooped inside this musty tent all day. Or if there was even the slightest chance I might get a glimpse of Willow or Simon or any of the others.

So far, though, they’d managed to keep us separated enough that we never ran into one another. And Buzz Cut refused to answer whether it was only Natty and me who were allowed outside.

I was this close to changing her name to Buzz Kill.

Slipping on the athletic sneakers we’d been given, Natty shot me an eager look. We’d been doing our best to speak as little as possible, trying to develop our own silent version of communication in order to avoid being eavesdropped on. But Natty wore her emotions all over her face. Her codes weren’t all that hard to crack.

“Me too,” I told her while I drew my hair back into a ponytail, not bothering to hide my enthusiasm from Buzz Cut.

When we got outside, I leaned my head back, absorbing as much of the sun’s radiation as I could until my cheeks were good and smoldering. According to my pink watch, it was nearly six o’clock, and there wasn’t a whole lotta sun left for the day.

We were passed off to the drill instructor, the same short guy who’d smacked me with his rifle when they’d ambushed us in the desert. His freakishly developed body made sense now that I knew the workout regimen he put his people through on a daily basis.

He rolled his eyes, making it crystal clear we were a burden he didn’t care to be hampered with, but he stepped aside nonetheless, letting us join the rest of his squad, where they were already on the ground doing push-ups.

Training like this made me feel alive. And if I closed my eyes, I could almost imagine I was back in Burlington, on the softball field with my coach calling out the drills and blowing her whistle. The only difference was this coach had a squat body and Popeye-sized forearms.

By the time we were running, I had sweat dripping down the center of my back and stinging my eyes. I was buzzing with energy even while I was wilting from the heat. But from day one it had been obvious Natty wasn’t exactly built for this kind of conditioning, and it was a challenge for her just to keep up. For her the only benefit of the exercise was being outdoors. Watching her run, the way she clomp-clomped along like her feet were made of iron, was almost painful, and the actual act of sweating repulsed her, something she complained about so much I wouldn’t have felt totally guilty to leave her in the dust.

Unfortunately, part of us being prisoners meant we were also bound to the buddy system, and Natty had been assigned as my official “buddy.”

“Look,” she panted. “Look.” The second time she said it, the word came out as an airy wheeze.

It took me a second to follow her rising and falling finger, and eventually see what she was trying to point to.

I almost stopped moving then, which almost surely would have gotten me banned from the daily drills, messing them up like that, but I caught myself in time and found my stride again.

She’d been pointing at Griffin. But not just Griffin—Jett was there too.

I squinted, trying to get a better look from where we were, which was suddenly far too far away from where they were on the opposite side of the field, over near the cafeteria. “What do you think they’re doing?” I asked, never taking my eyes away from Jett, who was walking alongside the Blackwater Ranch leader. He was clutching his laptop to his chest, and from where we were, it looked like Griffin was carrying something too. “Is that . . . ?” I lifted my hand to my eyes, trying to shield them from the sun. “It looks like she has Simon’s backpack,” I told Natty.

Natty saw too, and she nodded. “Yeah,” she rasped. “Think . . . so . . .”

“You think Jett’s helping her? That they finally cracked the codes to those files?”

I glanced quickly at Natty. She lifted her eyebrows and I realized it was her equivalent of a shrug.

“I wish I knew what the hell was going on here. And why they’re keeping us apart.”