Kass Morgan: Day 21

He slipped in through the rarely used service entrance and hid the blanket in his usual spot, a grate in the wall too low for anyone to notice. He’d come back for it tonight and trade it on the black market. The dim, narrow hallways were deserted, which meant that everyone was still shoved into the cramped gathering room for Remembrance Day, being force-fed fun facts about radiation poisoning and the Cataclysm.

Bellamy turned the corner. To his surprise, there were noises coming from the girls’ dorm, high-pitched laughter that wasn’t quite loud enough to mask the sound of—was that crying? He picked up his speed, and burst inside without knocking. The long room was mostly empty, but there were a few older girls standing in a circle, so absorbed with whatever they were doing that they failed to notice his arrival.

A tall blond girl was holding something in the air, giggling as a smaller hand stretched out in a futile attempt to grab it. Octavia . Even in the dim light, Bellamy caught sight of her tearstained cheeks and huge eyes through the gaps between her tormentors’ bodies.

They had her red ribbon, the one Octavia wore every day in her dark hair. “Give it back,” she pleaded, in a trembling voice that made Bellamy’s heart cramp.

“Why?” one of the older girls taunted. “It makes you look like an idiot. Is that what you want?”

“Yeah,” the third girl said. “We’re doing you a favor. Now people aren’t going to ask, ‘Who’s the weird little kid with the ugly ribbon?’ ”

The girl holding the ornament made a show of examining it. “I don’t even think it’s a real ribbon. I bet it came off a garbage bag or something.”

Her friend giggled. “I bet that’s why she smells like the recycling deck.”

“And you’re going to smell like a rotting corpse when they finally find you,” Bellamy interrupted, striding forward and snatching the ribbon out of the blond girl’s hand. He shoved them out of the way and knelt down next to Octavia. “Are you okay?” He reached out to wipe away her tears.

She nodded with a sniffle. He handed her the ribbon, which she clutched in a tiny fist, as if it was a living thing that could escape.

Bellamy rose and, keeping a hand on his sister’s shoulder, turned to face the girls. His voice was tight. “If I hear one word about you bothering her again, you’ll wish you’d been floated.”

Two of the girls exchanged nervous glances, but the blond only raised her eyebrows and smirked. “She’s not even supposed to be here. She’s a waste of oxygen who was only born because of your stupid slutty mother. And your sister ”—she said the word like it was something disgusting—“is going to turn out just like her.”

Bellamy’s muscles reacted before his brain did. Before he realized what he was doing, he’d grabbed the girl by the throat and shoved her against the wall. “If you ever talk to my sister again, if you do so much as look at her, I will kill you,” he hissed. He squeezed her neck tighter, overcome with a sudden and terrifying desire to shut her up for good.

In the distance, he heard someone cry out. He released the girl and staggered backward just as a pair of arms wrapped around him and dragged him away.

It wasn’t the first time Bellamy had been sent to the director’s office, although he’d never shouted quite so many obscenities en route. The minder who’d grabbed Bellamy shoved him into a chair and told him to wait there for the director. “Stay away from this one,” the man said, addressing a girl in the chair across from Bellamy.

Bellamy scowled as the minder waved his hand in front of the scanner, waited for the door to open, and strode back out. Part of him wanted to make a run for it now. Did trying to choke that piece of space trash who’d been bullying his sister count as an Infraction? He’d already had so many warnings, it was only a matter of time before the director wrote a report that landed him in Confinement. But he wouldn’t last more than a few days as an outlaw, and then who would take care of Octavia after he was captured? Better he stay here and try to make his case.

He looked up at the girl. She was about his age, but he’d never seen her before; she had to be a new arrival. She was sitting with her feet tucked under her while she fiddled nervously with the buttons on her sweater. Her wavy blond hair was neat and shiny, and he felt an unexpected pang of pity as he imagined her getting dressed in her room for the last time, carefully arranging her hair for the trip to this hellhole.

“So what did you do?” she asked, interrupting his thoughts. Her voice was slightly hoarse, as though it had been a long time since she’d spoken—or like she’d recently been crying. He wondered how she’d wound up here, if her parents had died or perhaps committed Infractions and been floated.

There was no point in lying. “I attacked a girl,” he said in the light, careless tone he generally used when discussing his various indiscretions. The girl’s eyes flickered, and suddenly, he wanted to explain. “She was hurting my sister.”

Her eyes widened. “Your sister ?” Unlike the blond girl, she made the word sound like something rare and precious. Okay, she was definitely new; everyone at the care center knew about him and Octavia. With the strict population laws, there hadn’t been siblings on the ship in at least a generation.

“Well, technically she’s my half sister—but we’re the only family each other’s got. Her name’s Octavia.” He smiled, just like he did whenever he said her name. “So did you just get here?”

She nodded. “I’m Lilly,” she said.

“That’s a pretty name.” The words slipped out before he realized how stupid they’d sound. “I’m Bellamy.” He tried to think of something else, to prove that he wasn’t a complete doofus, but the door slid open and the director trudged in.

“Not you again,” she said, shooting Bellamy a look of disapproval before turning her attention to Lilly. “Lilly Marsh?” she asked, in a voice Bellamy had never heard directed at him. “It’s very nice to meet you. Let’s go into my office and I’ll tell you a little more about how things work here.” As Lilly rose slowly to her feet, the director turned back to Bellamy. “One month of probation, and if you so much as step a toe out of line, you’re out of here. For good.”

Relief and confusion washed over Bellamy, but he wasn’t going to stick around long enough for the director to change her mind. He jumped from the chair and hurried toward the door. As he waited for it to open, he glanced over his shoulder to look back at Lilly.

To his surprise, she was smiling at him.

Whatever you do, don’t go inside the lab.

The anguished cries reached out to her, until Clarke couldn’t tell what was coming from the other side of the wall, and what was echoing in the shadowy depths of her own brain.

The experiments use dangerous levels of radiation. We don’t want you to get hurt.

The lab was nothing like she’d imagined. It was full of hospital beds instead of workstations. And in each bed was a child.

It’s our job to determine when Earth will be able to support human life again. Everyone is counting on us.

Clarke glanced around the room, looking for her friend Lilly. She was lonely. And scared. Everyone around her was dying. Their small bodies withered away until they were hardly more than wisps of skin and bone.

We never wanted you to find out this way.

But where was Lilly? Clarke came to visit her often, whenever her parents weren’t in the lab. She brought her friend presents, books she took from the library and candy she stole from the pantry at school. On Lilly’s good days, their laughter drowned out the sounds of the heart-rate monitors.