The Resisters (9 page)

Do the right thing
.

Ethan opened his mouth and started to tell Coach where he’d stashed the suit.

He realized that “doing the right thing” was a knee-jerk involuntary reaction—what he’d been taught to do for the last twelve years by his teachers and every book he’d read in Santa Blanca.

But Ethan had also been raised by Franklin and Melinda Blackwood, who’d taught him to think for himself.

And while he was thinking for himself, another very important fact clicked in his brain.

“You didn’t get them—Madison and Felix got away. If they hadn’t … you’d have
their
suits and you wouldn’t need the wasp.”

Coach went back to his side of the desk without comment.

Ethan was relieved that Felix and Madison hadn’t been captured or killed. Leaving a fight was a mistake he’d never make again, if he got the chance. Coach Norman closed Ethan’s file. He got out a rubber stamp and blew the dust off it.

“Please, Ethan,” he said. “One way or another we
will
get what we need out of you. In the end, you’ll see the Ch’zar Collective is the best thing that ever happened to the human race.”

“I don’t think so,” Ethan said. “You know why?”

“Tell me, son.”

“Because the Ch’zar don’t
ask
if anyone wants to join. If the truth was really so great, you’d give us kids a choice. You wouldn’t have to lie.”

Coach pinched the bridge of his nose and replied, “Would you give a baby a choice to get a life-saving vaccination?”

He jotted a few notes on Ethan’s file folder:

Coach rubber-stamped it with large red letters: SRS.

“I’m sorry, Ethan,” he said. “We’ll get your willing co-operation, whatever that takes.”

“SRS …,” Ethan whispered. He had a sinking feeling about those three letters.

“Sterling Reform School,” Coach told him.

Reform school was for criminals and kids who went crazy. Ethan had never known anyone bad enough to go … although he’d heard stories. Reform school had forced labor and remedial training, and no one ever got into a good high school after reform school.

He caught himself. What was he thinking? Why worry about high school now? That was just another lie.

He had to get out of here!

Ethan stood, knocking over the metal chair.

Officers Grace and Hendrix grabbed him from behind.

He struggled, but they were too strong.

“It won’t be that bad,” Coach assured him. “A couple of injections of growth hormone and a few other chemicals will trigger puberty for you in a matter of hours instead of months. We would’ve preferred to have you fully developed before you understood the Ch’zar’s universal message—but this will have to do.”

Ethan kicked and screamed, but they dragged him off.

“Don’t worry, son,” Coach said as he filed Ethan’s record. “Soon you’ll understand … like the rest of us.”

OFFICERS GRACE AND HENDRIX ESCORTED
Ethan into the hallway.

Any ideas he had about making a break for it died the instant he stepped outside. Every Northside teacher and janitor was in the hall making sure students didn’t enter the central corridor.

The adults turned at the same time to look at Ethan—all staring at him with unblinking eyes.

Ethan had seen that look before. Bottomless. Unreadable. It was the same look in the segmented eyes of the giant wasp when it had first noticed him.

The adults went back, holding up their hands and telling everyone that this hall had to be kept clear for five more minutes. It was an “emergency drill.” There was “nothing to worry about.” And the kids were told to “move along to your classes.”

Ethan spied his soccer teammate Bobby walking from first-period English to second-period pre-algebra. Mary Vincent was with him. They were talking and laughing. Neither saw Ethan.

What were
they
doing together?

He jerked toward them and opened his mouth to shout.

Officer Grace pulled him back. “Not a word, Blackwood,” he whispered. “Contaminate any of these others and we’ll ship them off with you.”

Ethan considered.

For a moment he imagined he’d tell everyone what was going on—yell it out—and all the kids would join and rise up against the mind-controlled adults.…

But that’s not what he did.

If he started shouting the truth, he’d get dragged off, probably hurt in the process, and he’d definitely get Bobby and Mary into trouble with him.

Plus … who’d believe him?

He
barely believed any of this, and he’d seen the Ch’zar firsthand.

He hung his head and reluctantly let himself get pushed along by the police. A half-dozen adults went with them to make sure there was no problem.

Ethan wondered if Coach Norman had been an A student and all-star athlete too. Raised in a neighborhood just like this, he probably thought he’d go to high school … then he hit puberty … his brain changed … the Ch’zar got inside … and they had him.

The real Coach Norman must have died that day.

They took Ethan to the garage and guided him to a black bus. Ethan had never seen this particular bus before. Stenciled on the side of it in silver letters was:
THE
STERLING
SCHOOL
.

Sterling
. The place was legendary. Notorious.

It was where the criminals and antisocial types were sent. The troublemakers. Like Ethan Blackwood.

There’d be no sports scholarship, no MIT, no learning from the best science teachers and one day becoming an astronaut. He felt a stab of regret.

But those dreams had never been real.

At least now he knew the truth … for all the good it did him.

Officers Grace and Hendrix marched him onto the bus. There were no chains or shackles inside, as Ethan had expected. Instead, it was like any other bus he’d been on, with rows of side-by-side padded seats, overhead video monitors, and the faint scent of bubble gum.

They gave Ethan a shove and indicated he should go all the way to the back.

The seat belts weren’t the standard lap variety. They were five-point harnesses—probably designed to prevent the passengers—or rather the
prisoners
—from escaping.

Ethan couldn’t be here. He had to get off this bus. Now! It’d be his last chance to escape.

He stopped and tried to turn—but the police grabbed him and forced him into a seat.

Ethan struggled and screamed.

The two officers were strong and seemingly impervious to his punches and kicks.

They wrestled him into a window seat and snapped his harness in place.

“You’ll see this is all for the best,” Officer Grace told him.

“Just relax, boy,” Officer Hendrix soothed. “It’ll be easier.”

“I bet it’ll be easier,” Ethan said, “for you!”

He wriggled and strained, clutched at the release button on his safety harness—but, of course, it didn’t work.

The police officers looked at each other and shook their heads, as if Ethan was a terrible disappointment. They got off the bus.

The folding doors sealed with a swish, and the bus on full autopilot pulled out of the garage.

It cruised through his neighborhood and turned onto Main Street. Was this the last time Ethan would see his home? There was the drugstore on the corner where he and Emma went to listen to the mystery radio shows every Saturday afternoon. Looking over the downtown rooftops, he thought he caught a glimpse of blue and white—the peak of his house.

Ethan hugged his stomach and felt like he was going to be sick.

Were his parents like Coach Norman? Part of the alien Collective? Had they ever loved him? Or was that an act?

No. Franklin and Melinda Blackwood
were
different.
Everyone had always said so. Hadn’t they taught him and Emma to think for themselves? That didn’t seem to fit into being a good citizen of the Collective.

And what had they told him at breakfast?

We’ve done everything we could to get you and Emma ready. We don’t know how this will end. If it goes bad … then you can’t know
.

Which made sense only if his parents
weren’t
controlled by the aliens—and they’d been trying to hide that from him! They’d have had to, because if Ethan got absorbed into the Collective … then the Ch’zar would know everything he did.

Maybe his parents were secret Resistance spies. They were just waiting for the right moment to rescue him before he changed into a mind-controlled zombie.

His heart sank. Did that now mean the Ch’zar, when they absorbed Ethan’s mind, would suspect his parents as well because he did? Had he blown it for them?

Ethan strained against his harness, looking out every window, waiting to catch a glimpse of his family’s station wagon racing down the street after the bus.

But that didn’t happen.

The bus turned off Main Street. Straight ahead was the Geo-Transit Tunnel that had a four-lane road and railroad tracks—the only way into and out of the mountain valley that held Santa Blanca.

It looked like a huge mouth about to swallow the bus and Ethan.

No one would swoop in at the last moment and save him.

Ethan arched his back, pulling his arms and legs once more against the restraints.

There was no way he was letting anyone take him away from his home! There was no way he was letting them take his mind!

His struggles just tightened the seat harness.

He slumped, exhausted.

The bus entered the tunnel, and darkness filled the bus.

“Welcome to the Sterling School for the Gifted,” said a friendly girl’s voice.

He blinked back brimming tears. Video screens lowered from the bus’s ceiling. On-screen was a redheaded girl in a crisp black school uniform. She walked down an ivy-covered corridor.

“You’re special!” the girl said. “And at Sterling, we know exactly how to put your special abilities to use.”

She smiled, and the scene dissolved to a chemistry lab where boys and girls set beakers of boiling goo behind clear blast shields and watched the stuff explode.

What was this? They would
never
let him do that at Northside.

The girl in the video laughed. “We know you’re inquisitive and creative, and maybe you even got punished because you were ‘different.’ ”

The scene cut to a field full of boys and girls in black sweats who sparred with padded sticks. They seemed to be having a great time beating the snot out of each other.

Ethan gaped at the mass roughhousing. This stuff was totally frowned upon at Northside. Why make them aggressive
on purpose
?

“We’re going to channel your natural leadership ability and make you stronger.”

That was a lie.

Ethan figured it was to keep these “troublemaker” students busy until they hit puberty. Keep them from finding out the truth and escaping.

“We’re proud of our Sterling graduates,” the girl continued. “They go on to become senators—judges—policemen—and the leaders in
your
community!”

“More lies,” Ethan said.

He balled his hands into fists.

The bus emerged from the tunnel, and the sudden sunlight made him blink. Through the windows he saw wheat fields waving in a breeze, windmills spinning to make clean energy, and a fruit stand selling apples.

“It’s all lies!” He pounded his fist on the window—once, twice, three times.

The video presentation stopped.

A computer voice crackled through the speakers:
“Please do not damage Sterling School property. Demerits will be awarded. This is your only warning!”

Ethan laughed. They thought demerits or detention were going to scare him
now
?

“You want to give demerits for something? Try this!”

He laced his hands and hammered them—right in the
middle of the window—again and again—once more … and a hairline crack splintered.

It was weird. That crack was white and red against the green fields.

Just as Ethan
knew
it had to be … because it wasn’t a real window. It was a computer monitor, showing him what they wanted him to see.

He moved closer and looked through the crack.

He saw the
real
outside. It was dusty and red and gray, and the sun blazed overhead. Huge machines rumbled in the distance chewing through the mountains.

At least he knew he wasn’t crazy.

He glared up at the speakers. “You can’t stop me from knowing the truth.”

Ethan heard a gentle hiss from the air-conditioning vents and smelled a faint chemical odor.

His heart raced.

Like Felix had told him, they were going to drug him.

While he was asleep, would they inject him with those chemicals that’d make him reach puberty faster? When he woke up … would he even be Ethan Blackwood anymore?

He turned back to the window and hammered over and over.