Scarecrow

I went to breakfast.

Liam said I shouldn’t. Toby said I shouldn’t. Liam said that if I went to breakfast with my face like that, everybody in the cave would know by the time the porridge was cold, and Toby said, very quietly, that my rib needed rest more than my pride needed porridge.

I went anyway.

Because if I didn’t, it would be a thing. The Dask boy, hiding in the infirmary. The Dask boy, too hurt to come to breakfast. And then people would ask why, and then somebody would answer, and then it would be four names, and a letter, and a car on a crane.

So I went. I walked into the mess at seven with three strips of tape over my left eyebrow and my lip split and swollen and my ribs strapped under my shirt, and I sat down at the end of the Calders’ table, slowly, and ate my porridge.

The mess hall went quiet. Then loud. Then quiet again, in patches, in waves, the way a field goes when the wind crosses it.

I didn’t look up.

I didn’t look at the end of the Squad Two table, where Brock Haddon was sitting with his big shoulders hunched over his tray, not eating. I didn’t look at the two boys from Squad Six, at their table, who’d gone a color I’d never seen anybody go. I didn’t look at Fenn, at the far end of the Frieses’ table, who was staring at his hands.

I ate my porridge. It was gray. It tasted of nothing.

Seraphina sat down across from me without a word. She looked at my face for a long time. The air round her went hot. Then, very slowly, it went cool again, as if she’d closed a damper on it with both hands.

”Who,” she said.

”Liam already asked.”

”I’m not Liam.”

”No,” I said. ”Nobody.”

Seraphina looked at me for a moment longer. Then she looked down the long room, at Squad Two’s table. At Brock. At Fenn. At the two boys from Squad Six. One at a time. Slowly. She didn’t need me to tell her. She’d been at the Calders’ table for three months. She knew what guilty looked like from across a mess hall.

She didn’t say anything.

But at the end of the Squad Six table, a cup of tea in front of one of the boys began, very quietly, to boil.

Sigmund Friese didn’t eat breakfast either.

I noticed him, the way you notice a change in the weather. He was sitting at the head of the Squad Two table, where he always sat, with his tray untouched in front of him. And he was looking at Fenn.

Not at me. At Fenn.

Fenn, who sat at the far end of the Frieses’ table and never said anything to anyone. Fenn, who was in Squad Two. Sigmund’s squad. Fenn, who had his hands under the table and his eyes on his porridge and who had a long scrape across the back of his knuckles that hadn’t been there yesterday.

Sigmund looked at that scrape for a long time.

Then he looked at Brock. At Brock’s hands, wrapped round a cup he wasn’t drinking from.

Then, finally, down the long room, at me. At my face. At the tape.

His narrow face didn’t change at all.

But the lamp over the Squad Two table flickered. Once. Twice. And then went out with a small, sharp pop, and sat dark on its chain for the rest of breakfast.

Sigmund got up and walked out.

He didn’t go toward the fields. He went the other way. Down the long corridor. Toward the instructors’ offices.

Okafor sent for me at nine.

She was behind her desk when I came in, with the photograph on the wall behind her and her hands folded on top of a slate. She didn’t tell me to sit. She looked at my face. The tape. The lip.

”Shut the door, forty-one.”

I shut it.

”Shirt.”

”Sergeant—”

”Shirt.”

I took off my shirt. It took a long time, because of the rib. She watched me do it without any expression on her face at all. Then she looked at the bandage round my chest, which Toby had wound, and at my back, where the boots had been.

She didn’t say anything for a long time.

Then she said, ”Put it back on,” and I did, and she sat there and looked at the slate under her hands.

”Who strapped that?”

”Toby Marsh.”

”In the infirmary? At one in the morning?”

”Yes, Sergeant.”

”Without waking the medic.”

”Yes, Sergeant.”

”He did it properly,” said Sergeant Okafor. ”Tell him I said so. Don’t tell him I said anything else.” She looked up at me. ”You weren’t going to tell me.”

”No, Sergeant.”

”Why not?”

”Because then it’s something else,” I said. ”Then it’s names. And letters home. And somebody’s father finds out. And somebody gets thrown out of the program.” I stood very straight. ”It’s done. It’s over. I don’t want it to be anything else.”

Sergeant Okafor looked at me for a long moment.

”It already is something else, forty-one,” she said quietly. ”It stopped being just yours the moment four cadets in my cave put a boy on the floor who wasn’t fighting back.” She tapped the slate. ”I have four names on here. I have the place. I have the time. I have which of them did what, as near as the witness could tell from what he was told, and what he’s since confirmed by asking the people concerned to their faces.” She paused. ”I have the letter.”

I went cold.

”The letter?”

”Haddon’s father’s letter,” said Okafor. ”The one that came on Wednesday. The witness took it off Haddon in the showers this morning and brought it to me.” She paused again. ”Haddon let him.”

I stared at her.

”I didn’t tell anyone,” I said. ”Liam didn’t. Toby didn’t. Sera—Calder guessed, but she didn’t say anything. She wouldn’t.”

”No,” said Sergeant Okafor. ”None of them did.”

”Then who—”

She didn’t answer straight away. She looked at me. And there was something on the side of her face that wasn’t steel. Something I’d seen there only once before, on field four, at the edge of the dark, the night Toby sang the whole song through.

”Friese,” she said.

I didn’t say anything for a long time.

”Sigmund Friese,” I said finally.

”Cadet Friese,” said Sergeant Okafor, ”came to my office at seven-twenty this morning. Before breakfast was over. He stood where you’re standing. He said, Sergeant, a member of my squad and three other cadets assaulted Cadet Dask in the boys’ locker room last night. Four on one. Dask did not defend himself. I want it on the record.” She paused. ”And then he gave me the names. Including his own squad’s. Including Haddon. And then he went to the showers and took a letter off Haddon and brought it to me. And then he went back to the mess and asked each of the other three, to their faces, in front of witnesses, whether it was true.” She paused again. ”They said yes.”

”Why?”

”I asked him that,” said Sergeant Okafor.

”What did he say?”

Okafor was quiet for a moment.

”He said, because Squad Two doesn’t do four on one, Sergeant. Not while I’m leading it.” She looked at the slate. ”And then he said, and I want it clear that this is not for Dask. I can’t stand Dask. I want that on the record too.”

I didn’t know what to say.

”I put it on the record,” said Sergeant Okafor. ”Both parts.”

She told me what would happen.

The two boys from Squad Six, moved to Squad Seven, split up, on the beam every morning at five for a month, before laps, with no families’ day and no pass. The boy from Squad Seven, the same. Fenn, the same, and out of Squad Two. Sigmund had asked for that. He’d said he didn’t want a coward on his comms.

”And Haddon,” said Sergeant Okafor.

I waited.

”The beam, at five, for a month,” she said. ”No pass. No families’ day.” She looked at me. ”And he stays in Squad Two.”

”Sigmund asked for that too?”

”Friese asked for that too,” said Okafor. ”He said, and I’m quoting, I want to be the one who has to look at him every day. And I want him to have to look at me.” She was quiet for a moment. ”I think that’s the hardest punishment any of them got. I’m not sure Friese knows that. I’m not sure he doesn’t.”

”And the letter? His father?”

”The letter’s in my drawer,” said Sergeant Okafor. ”Where it’s going to stay.” She looked at me with her dark still eyes. ”Nobody’s father hears about this from me, forty-one. Not Haddon’s. Not anyone’s. It’s a training matter. It stays in the cave.” A pause. ”That’s what you wanted. Isn’t it.”

”Yes, Sergeant.”

”Then that’s what you’re getting.” She picked up the slate. ”Get out. Go to the infirmary. Let the medic look at you properly. Tell her Marsh did the strapping and she’ll leave it alone.” She didn’t look up. ”And forty-one.”

”Sergeant.”

”Your father would have shut his eyes too,” said Sergeant Okafor. ”I saw him do it once. In the war. A prisoner. One of ours, who’d sold us out. He shut his eyes and walked away, and the whole unit thought he was a coward for a week.” She was quiet for a moment. ”Then we found out what he’d have done with them open.”

She didn’t say anything else.

I went.

Sigmund found me at lunch.

At the fern. In the corridor outside the observation room, where I was sitting on the floor with my back against the wall and my tray on my knees, eating very carefully because of the lip. Risa was sitting against the metal stand, the way she always did. Toby was beside me. Liam was in the mess, because Liam had been asked by Seraphina to stay in the mess and not go near any of the four of them, and Seraphina had asked it in a way that meant Liam was going to stay in the mess.

Sigmund came round the corner, and stopped, and stood there.

Risa looked up at him. She didn’t say go away, Siggy. She didn’t say anything at all. She just looked at him, with her light gray eyes. And then, after a moment, very slightly, she moved her tray along the floor. Making room.

Sigmund didn’t sit.

He stood at the end of the corridor with his hands at his sides and his narrow face perfectly blank. Looking at me. At the tape. At the lip.

”I want to be clear,” he said.

”All right.”

”I didn’t do it for you.”

”Okafor said.”

”I want to be clear,” said Sigmund. His voice was cool, and careful, and very precise, the way it always was. But it was too fast. ”I didn’t do it for you. I did it because Squad Two doesn’t put a man on the floor four on one when he isn’t fighting back. Because that’s what cowards do. And I’m not a coward, and my squad’s not cowards, and Fenn is not in my squad anymore.” He breathed in. ”That’s all. That’s the only reason.”

”All right,” I said.

”Don’t say all right.”

I didn’t say anything.

”I can’t stand you,” said Sigmund Friese.

He told me why.

He stood at the end of the corridor, with his hands at his sides, and the lamp over the fern flickering faintly every few seconds, and told me. All of it. At length. As if he’d been keeping a list. As if he’d been keeping it for three months and had decided, somewhere between the mess hall and Okafor’s office, that it was finally time to read it out.

He couldn’t stand that I’d walked into the mess on the first day like I owned it, without looking at anyone, without even knowing what I’d walked into.

He couldn’t stand that I’d closed my eyes in front of him when he flickered the lamp. That I’d made him feel like the one who’d done something wrong.

He couldn’t stand the steel ball. The splash. That it was still out there on the field, gleaming, and people walked round it on their laps, and he had to run past it every morning.

He couldn’t stand that I’d put out a fire one flame at a time and nobody in the cave had talked about anything else for a week. He couldn’t stand the Town. He couldn’t stand that I’d turned it into a beach and got zero points and Okafor had nearly laughed. Okafor never laughed. He’d been in her cave for three months and she’d never nearly laughed at anything he did.

He couldn’t stand that I’d said goodnight to him.

He stopped there for a moment. Just a moment. The lamp flickered.

Then he went on.

He couldn’t stand that I sat at the fern every day with his sister. That his sister talked to me. That his sister had raced me, and carried on about it for a week, and talked more in that week than she’d talked to him in a year. He couldn’t stand that she’d smiled.

He couldn’t stand that I’d taken the name. Scarecrow. That I’d stood on the field in front of the Director and the Council’s woman and said it like it was mine, and four people had said copy, and then Brock had said copy, and then the whole cave had started saying it like it was just a name. He couldn’t stand how easy I’d made it look. Taking the thing they called you and making it yours.

”You make everything look easy,” said Sigmund. ”Everything. You don’t even try. You just are. And everybody looks at you. The Director. The General. Okafor. Windsor. My—” He stopped.

He didn’t finish it. He didn’t need to.

My father.

The corridor was very quiet. Toby, beside me, wasn’t breathing. Risa was sitting very still against the stand.

”That’s why I can’t stand you,” said Sigmund Friese. ”I wanted that on the record.”

I put my tray down.

I looked up at him. At his narrow face. At his very neat hair. At his hands at his sides, which were shaking very slightly. At the lamp over the fern, flickering.

”It isn’t easy,” I said.

He looked at me.

”Any of it,” I said. ”The steel ball. I was frightened the whole time. The Town. I was frightened. The hall. My hands shook for three days. Last night, I lay on the floor and counted to forty-one with my eyes shut because I was so frightened of what I’d do if I opened them, I couldn’t think.” I breathed. It hurt. ”I don’t make it look easy. I make it look slow. That’s all. Because if I go fast, people die.”

Sigmund didn’t say anything.

”You went through the Town in five fifty-one,” I said. ”Faster than anyone ever has. I watched. I couldn’t do that. I’ll never be able to do that.” I looked at him. ”And your father walked out.”

His face went white.

”I’m not saying it to hurt you,” I said. ”I’m saying it because I saw it. And because I know what it’s like to do the best thing you’ve ever done and look up and find the person you did it for isn’t there.” I picked up my tray again. ”Mine’s dead. Yours just left. I don’t know which is worse.”

The lamp over the fern stopped flickering.

It just stopped. Steadied. And burned there, even and yellow, on its chain.

Sigmund stood at the end of the corridor for a long time, looking at me.

”I still can’t stand you,” he said finally. Very quietly. Not too fast anymore.

”I know.”

”That’s not going to change.”

”All right.”

”Don’t say all right,” said Sigmund Friese. And he turned, and walked away down the corridor, with his back very straight, and didn’t look round.

Nobody said anything for a while.

Then Risa let out a long breath through her nose.

”A hundred and thirty,” she said. ”The whole time. His heart. From the moment he came round the corner.” She looked at the place where her brother had been standing. ”He’s never talked to anyone for that long in his life. Not me. Not Mother. Not anyone.” She picked up her fork. Put it down again. ”He kept a list.”

”I noticed.”

”Of course he kept a list,” said Risa. ”He’s Sigmund. He’s been keeping lists since he was six.” She looked at me sideways with her light gray eyes. ”Do you know what’s on the top of his other list? The one in his locker? The one he doesn’t know I know about?”

”No.”

”Things Father noticed,” said Risa. ”It’s very short. It’s been very short for a long time.” She went back to her tray. ”He added something to it last week. I saw. After the comms drill.”

”What?”

Risa didn’t look up.

”Father asked Crane about Squad Two’s time,” she said. ”After the Town. The second run.”

I didn’t say anything.

”It’s not much,” said Risa. ”But it’s the first thing in two years.” She ate a forkful of something gray. ”And the comms drill was the day you said the word and didn’t flinch. And he said Arc instead of Storm.” She chewed. ”I don’t think that’s a coincidence. I don’t think he does either.”

Beside me, Toby let his breath out all at once, like someone surfacing from a pool.

”I thought he was going to hit you,” he said.

”So did I,” said Risa. ”For about half of it.” She looked at the lamp over the fern, burning steady now on its chain. ”And then he didn’t.”

Luna Windsor looked at my face for a very long time that night in the reading room.

She’d been at breakfast. She’d seen it. She hadn’t come over. She’d sat at the end of the Windsors’ table, very straight, and looked at me once, and then looked down the room at the Squad Six table, and the Squad Two table, and a cup of water in front of one of the Squad Six boys had frozen so hard it cracked the glass.

Now she sat across the table from me with the cell biology book closed under her hands and looked.

”Why didn’t you tell me,” she said. Not a question.

”Because you’d have frozen them.”

”Yes,” said Luna Windsor.

She didn’t say anything else about it. She opened notebook fifteen, which I’d put on the table between us, and read last night’s entry, upside down. Day 78. Locker room. Four of them. Eyes shut the whole time. Forty-one. When I opened them after, the lockers started to bend. I wasn’t telling them to.

She read it three times.

Then she looked up at me. Not at the tape. Not at the lip. At my eyes.

”Look at the lamp,” she said.

I looked at the lamp.

She leaned across the table, very close, the way she’d leaned in to look through the ice lens at the moon. And looked into my left eye. Then my right. For a long time. I could feel the cold coming off her. I could see my own breath.

”The ring,” she said quietly. ”At the edge. The one Halloway saw.”

”Yes.”

”It’s wider,” said Luna Windsor.

She sat back.

”Than Sunday?”

”Than this morning,” she said. ”At breakfast. I looked.” She folded her hands on the cell biology book. ”It’s wider than it was at breakfast.”

Neither of us said anything for a long time.

Then she opened the book, and found the chapter on bone, the one I’d read twice, and turned it round to face me. And asked me how long it took a cracked rib to knit.

”Six weeks,” I said. ”The book says.”

”And yours?”

I looked down at my side. At the bandage. Through it.

”Three days,” I said. ”Maybe less.”

Luna Windsor wrote both numbers in her margin, side by side, in her small precise figures. She looked at them for a long time.

Then, under them, she wrote something else. I read it upside down. She’d taught me how.

Ask Okafor what happened to his father’s eyes. Not the color. What came after.