Risa takes a moment to take an all-too-invasive look at him. “What’s bothering you?” she asks.

And although he still hasn’t gotten a handle on it himself, he finds that his gaze immediately goes to the shark tattooed on his arm. The last time he was in this basement, that arm was part of Roland. Risa catches that gaze and, as always, reads him better than he reads himself.

“Being down here might feel like we’re back where we started—but we’re not.”

“I know,” Connor admits. “But knowing that and feeling it are two different things. And there’s a lot of . . . stuff . . . that being here brings back.”

“Being here?” she asks. “Or being home?”

“Akron isn’t home,” he reminds her. “They might call me the Akron AWOL because it all went down here, but it’s not home.”

She smiles at him gently, and it melts at least some of his frustration. “You know, you never actually told me where home is for you.”

He hesitates, as if saying it might bring it closer. He’s not sure if he wants that or not. “Columbus,” he finally tells her.

She considers it. “About an hour and a half from here?”

“About.”

She nods. “The state home where I spent most of my life is much closer. And you know what? I couldn’t care in the least.”

And she walks away, leaving Connor unsure if her words were an attempt at commiseration, or a gentle slap in the face.

* * *

THE FOLLOWING IS A PAID POLITICAL ADVERTISEMENT

With all the confusing information out there, it’s hard to know what to vote for. But not when it comes to Measure F—“the Prevention Initiative.” Measure F is simple. It provides special funds to form a new arm of the Juvenile Authority that will monitor thousands of preteens who are at risk, offering counseling, treatment, and alternative options for their futures before they reach divisional age. What’s more, Measure F won’t cost taxpayers a dime! It will be fully funded by harvest camp proceeds.

Vote yes on Measure F. Isn’t an ounce of prevention worth a pound of flesh?

—Sponsored by the Brighter Day Coalition

* * *

In Sonia’s basement, it’s hard to tell when night has fallen. There’s a small window high up in a far back corner, but it’s behind such a maze of junk, one has to strain to detect any light coming in through the frosted glass. The few clocks among the junk in the basement don’t work, nor does the TV, and of the dozen kids down there, not a single one has a watch. Either they traded it for food before they landed here, or they were so used to using their phones as timepieces, they never had them. Phones, however, being traceable, are the first accessory ditched by the smart AWOL. Connor, of course, wasn’t too smart his first night on the run. They tracked him by his phone, and he came within a hairsbreadth of getting caught. He wised up fast, though.

While everyone waits for Sonia to bring dinner—an event that never happens on any predictable schedule—Grace weaves the tale of the night before, getting more and more animated as she realizes she has the rapt attention of most of the kids.

“So we’re upstairs in some lady’s house, and I see these special-ops guys in black slinking across the lawn in the middle of the night,” she says. “Prob’ly trained to kill. Hands are lethal weapons, that kind of thing.” Connor cringes at her embellishments. The next time she tells it, they’ll be dropping by helicopter.

“I hear them whispering and there’s something in their words and the way they’re speaking that makes me realize they’re not after Connor or Risa or me—they’re here for Camus Comprix! They want the rewind, and they don’t even know that the rest of us are there!” She pauses for dramatic effect. “Suddenly they crash in through the back door, and they crash in through the front door, and we’re all upstairs, and I tell Cam he’s done for, but the rest of us don’t have to be. Then I push Risa under the bed, and squeeze in after her, and Connor makes like he’s asleep on the bed facedown, and they burst into the room, and tranq Connor and take Cam away, never realizing they just missed a chance at the Akron AWOL—and all because I figured it out!”

Some of the kids seem a bit dubious, and Connor feels its his responsibility to back Grace up. After all, credit where credit is due. “It’s true,” he tells them. “If Grace didn’t lay it all on the table like that, I would have fought them, and probably would have been recognized and caught.”

“But wait a second,” says Jack, the Lev-ish kid. “Why would he let himself be taken without turning the rest of you in too? I mean, you guys are a big catch—he could probably cut himself a deal or something.”

Grace grins way too broadly, and Connor knows what she’s about to say. Now he wishes she’d never started this story.

“Because,” says Grace, “Camus Comprix is in love with Risa!”

She lets her words hang in the air. Connor reflexively glances to Risa, but she won’t meet his eye.

“But I don’t get it,” says another kid. “That whole media thing about them being a couple was fake, I thought.”

Grace’s grin doesn’t slip an inch. “Not to Cam . . .”

It’s Risa who finally puts an end to it. “Grace, enough. Okay?”

Grace deflates a bit, realizing that her moment in the spotlight is over. “Anyway,” she says, without any of her previous dramatic flair, “that’s what happened. Cam got caught, and we didn’t.”