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  The two doctors cast a series of thoughtful gazes between one another, having a silent conversation between themselves. Rain stepped forward. “Miss, is it okay if I touch you? It won’t hurt. I’d like to examine you, so we can see how you’re feeling.”

  Sunny gave a single, abrupt nod. Rain washed her hands briefly in a basin on the table before taking the hand 62 had been holding. The doctor looked over the scratches on her forearm, then turned her palm over. Pulling an ancient timepiece from her pocket, the doctor pressed her fingers to Sunny’s wrist and moved her lips in time with the beat of her pulse. A moment later, she placed Sunny’s hand back in 62’s palm. He interlocked fingers with her as Rain returned the watch to her pocket. Then, Rain ran her fingers under Sunny’s ragged hair without pushing it back. The doctor felt around her jawline, down her neck, and over her shoulders.

  Rain backed away, nodding to her companion. Hazel scooted her chair closer to the bed. She stopped when she was within arm’s reach of Sunny’s knee. Hazel cleared her throat and asked, “Do you have a name, Miss? Something that we can call you while we chat?”

  “My name’s Sunny,” the sullen Woman croaked.

  Hazel looked back at Dr. Rain and the concern in their gazes intensified. Dr. Rain opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. Hazel leaned forward and brushed a clump of Sunny’s hair aside, tucking it gently behind her ear. One of Sunny’s wary, red-rimmed eyes looked up at them.

  “Sunny?” Hazel said with a panicked lilt. “What are you doing here?”

  “The Oosa hurt her,” 62 explained. “She ran away.”

  Hazel nearly fell out of her seat as she lunged forward. Hazel wrapped her arms around Sunny’s jagged frame and buried her head in her hair. “Oh, Sunny. I never thought we’d see you again,” she said with a trembling voice.

  Dr. Rain rummaged around the supplies on the table, talking as she worked. “62, thank you for being here for Sunny. We’ll need some privacy to give Sunny her exam. Do you mind waiting outside?”

  62 looked at the doctor and patient embracing beside him. Sunny let go of his hand and wrapped her arm around her friend. Their bodies rocked back and forth together as Sunny began to cry. 62 was afraid of leaving Sunny alone, but he trusted the doctors to take care of her. “I’ll be in the hallway,” he announced. He patted Sunny on the back and got up from the bed. He moved toward the door. He paused and glanced at Rain one more time. “Please don’t tell Parker about her,” he said. “She’s not ready for him to know she’s here.”

  “We won’t say anything,” she assured him. “Keeping patients’ secrets is our specialty.”

  “Thanks,” he said. He nodded and opened the door. He heard the door chain slide through the lock. No matter what happened now, he couldn’t go back in without permission. He wasn’t sure how long he’d have to wait, so he ventured down the hall to his room. He had a few pieces of paper from Hanford stashed away. He’d have to find supplies to make his own soon. Sarah, from Hanford’s hospital, had told him how to press paper the last time he was in quarantine. He’d never had a chance to watch her do it, but he figured he remembered enough about it to try it soon. He took a single sheet from the few pages he had left, plucked a pencil from his supplies, and grabbed Charlotte’s Web so he’d have something firm to lay the paper on.

  62 returned to the hall. He sat down beside the doctor’s door and began to draw, something he’d done little of lately. He wasn’t sure what he was sketching. He let the pencil wander across the page. It took a while to take shape, but he ended up with a geometric pattern of shapes. Sunny still wasn’t done so he set about filling parts of them in, shading others, and adding more lines to give the image more detail. He was running out of ideas of what to do next when the lock slid back on the door and it cracked open.

  “Is anyone out there?” Hazel asked.

  “Just me,” 62 answered.

  The door swung open and he peered inside. Sunny was lying on the bed now, covered all the way up to her chin with a blanket. Rain hovered over her, smoothing the blanket and whispering soft words that 62 couldn’t hear. Hazel stepped out into the hallway and closed the door behind her.

  “She needs to rest a while,” Hazel said, settling down on the floor beside 62. “We’ll keep her here until she wakes up, and then move her to another room. Thank you for convincing her to be seen, 62.”

  “I didn’t know what else to do,” he admitted. “When I checked on her today, she was doing something. I don’t really know what, but it scared me.”

  Hazel’s grave expression matched her words. “She’s been hurting herself. If she’d been left alone any longer, she could have done something much worse.”

  “Is that where the scratches came from?” 62 asked. The realization of what she’d been doing crashed into him with a wave of panic. When Hazel nodded, he shuddered. “Why?”

  “Sometimes, when terrible things happen to someone, they have no way of understanding their own hurt. They forget what it’s like to heal. It becomes worse and worse until…” Hazel’s words trailed off and her eyes welled. She wiped her tears away before they fell. Hazel patted 62 gently on the knee. “It’s just a very good thing that you brought her to us. You may have saved her life.”

  62 slumped against the wall behind him. “You mean, she could have died?”

  “She still may,” Hazel admitted in a solemn tone. “It all depends on if she decides if she wants to get better, or not.”

  “I hope she gets better,” 62 said in a whisper.

  “Me, too,” Hazel agreed.

  CHAPTER 21

  Dinner was a somber affair. The doctors sat apart from the others, whispering quietly at their own table. 62 pulled Blue and 00 aside to fill them in on everything that happened before dinnertime, and now they sat in silence, their heads hanging over their plates. 62 couldn’t bear to look at Parker, who was the only one clueless about Sunny’s appearance.

  Parker tried to spark up a conversation with the Boys, but to no avail. Regardless of the topic, all he got out of his companions were grunts, nods, and one-word answers. It was easy for 62 to tell that Parker was getting frustrated, but he didn’t know how to pretend everything was normal. 62 bit his tongue and shrugged his shoulders.

  Parker had just asked the Boys what their plans were for the evening when a door slammed somewhere beyond the cafeteria. Rain and Hazel turned around in their seats, their eyes wide in surprise. All three Boys froze in place.

  “What was that?” Parker asked. He looked around at the others, but no one answered. “C’mon, I know you all heard it. What’s going on?”

  Sunny pushed the cafeteria door open and took a few steps into the room. She was wrapped in a layer of bedsheets and looked like a ghost with her pale, drawn skin encased in the stark white sheets. Her bare feet stuck out of the bottom of the bundled fabric, toes wriggling against the cold tiles. “It was me,” she said quietly.

  Parker’s face slackened and his fork dropped from his hand. He got up from his chair halfway, gripping the table for support. “Sunny?”

  She nodded and dragged her tired body the rest of the way across the room. Rain got up from her table and rushed to Sunny’s side. The frail Woman hung her arm over her friend’s shoulders, allowing Rain to support her while she made her way to Parker. Sunny never let go of the sheet wrapped around her body, her knuckles tight around the stiff fabric. Sunny stopped walking just beyond Parker’s reach. “Hello,” she whispered.

  “What are you…” Parker searched her face. His eyes watered and his lips kept moving although no words came out. He pushed himself off the table and rushed toward her. He wrapped his long arms around Sunny’s tiny body. He was so broad, and she was so petite that she seemed to disappear into him. His head bowed over hers, and for a moment, 62 thought it looked like Parker was hugging an empty sheet. They stood there for a long while, and Rain backed away, returning to her seat.

  “I can’t believe you’re here,” Parker said, his words muffled
as he spoke into Sunny’s hair. He looked up at the Boys and a flash of anger darted across his eyes. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Sunny pulled back, stretching her arms out to create distance between her and Parker. “I asked them not to tell. I’m not the same as I was. I thought it would be easier.”

  “But if I’d known you were here…” The words caught in Parker’s throat. He wiped tears from his eyes. “I wouldn’t have waited so long to come. I would have been here in an instant,” Parker said.

  “I know, you would’ve come if I’d sent the Boys for you. But you would have seen me like this.” Sunny’s voice drifted away as she looked down on herself. She unfolded the sheet so that Parker could see how much she had changed from when he last knew her. “I didn’t want you to know what I’ve become.”

  “What you’ve become?” Parker said, eyebrows furrowed. “But, you’re you. You’ll always be you. That’s what matters to me.”

  Sunny looked around the cafeteria. Everyone was doing their best to look like they weren’t paying attention, even though Parker and Sunny’s reunion was the most interesting thing in the room. “I have some things to tell you.” Parker turned to guide her into a chair, but Sunny gripped his forearm. “Not here. Not in front of the children.”

  “Hey, we’re not children!” Blue protested.

  Sunny’s voice was thin and worn out when she answered. “I know. You’re growing up. Each of you more than you should have. But, all the same, I have some things to talk to Parker about that even old Women would have difficulty hearing.” Sunny took Parker by the hand, and he followed her slow gait out of the cafeteria.

  After they left, Hazel and Rain moved over to the table with the Boys. “I’m so glad she came down,” Rain said as she settled into a chair.

  “I knew she would,” Hazel replied with a thin smile. “She couldn’t let us leave without him knowing.”

  “How much longer are you staying?” 00 asked.

  “Two days. Maybe three,” Rain said.

  “Will you take Sunny to Hanford with you?” Blue asked.

  Hazel shook her head. “I wish she’d come, but she’s so afraid of what people will think when they see her.”

  “But the hospital’s there. Doesn’t she need the hospital to get better?” 62 wanted to say N302 had suggested a hospital stay would do Sunny some good, but then he’d have a lot more explaining to do.

  Rain and Hazel gave one another sidelong glances. Hazel spoke up. “We don’t know if she’ll ever get back to the person she used to be. She’s changed a lot because of what the Oosa did to her. Even if we found a way to repair what was done to her physically, who she’s become inside may never be undone.”

  “She says they hurt other people, too,” Blue said in a low voice. “She told us she saw Skye, Robin, and Juniper before she escaped, but they’d already died. When the Oosa come back, they’ll pick more Women to hurt. Sunny’s got to go back to Hanford. If the people see what’s happened to her, maybe no one will volunteer next time.”

  “We can’t make her do that,” Rain said. 62 started to protest, but Rain shook her head at him. “I agree, everyone needs to know what’s happened. But the burden of proof lies with Sunny. Not everyone is simply going to believe her. To put her through that now, when she’s barely surviving, is too much. I think throwing her in the middle of that would do more harm than good.”

  “She wouldn’t have to do it alone. We can help!” 00 exclaimed. “We’re the ones that found her. We could tell them what happened to Sunny. Maybe we could convince everyone to not go with the Oosa anymore.”

  “You could,” 62 said in a glum tone. “I can’t. They all think there’s something wrong with me, remember? If I showed up talking about the Oosa, they’d just throw me out of town again.”

  “Hazel and I will ask to speak with the elders when we get back to Hanford. We can tell them what we’ve seen. But the truth is, it probably won’t make a difference. Even if everyone knows the dangers of going with the Oosa, they’ll still get what they want. If no one volunteers, they’ll make the Women go with them by force. It’s happened before.”

  “We have to stop them,” 00 said, slamming his palm on the table. “Somehow. We can’t let what happened to Sunny happen to anyone else.”

  “I agree,” Hazel said in a soothing tone. She covered 00’s hand with her own and gave a squeeze. “We’ve just got to figure out how.”

  CHAPTER 22

  The next two days went by in a flurry of activity. There were cooking lessons, seeds planted, instructions on how to take care of minor injuries, and Parker even taught the Boys how to do a better job with the laundry. All this took place under Sunny’s silent gaze as she hovered in the background. Parker did his best to seem enthusiastic about each project they handled, but 62 could see the lines of worry deepening on his face, and the anxious glances he was constantly casting in Sunny’s direction.

  Sunny’s room had been moved once more, down to the same floor as 62, Blue, and their visitors. When she wasn’t lurking in the dark corners of the jailhouse, she locked herself up in her room to sleep. Occasionally, Rain or Hazel would ask her to go for a walk, around the building to talk to her out of earshot of the Boys. Sunny didn’t seem to have any desire to participate in her roommates’ educations, or in the adults’ preparations for their impending trip back home.

  There was a debate going between the three Boys on whether they should push Sunny to go back to Hanford with the others, or not. Even though Rain and Hazel had told them not to, 62 knew he wasn’t equipped to help her if she tried to hurt herself again. Although he and his brothers had proven themselves resilient and capable of doing much more than anyone expected, caring for someone so sick seemed to be a task beyond their reach. And then, there was the problem of finding a way to let the Women of Hanford know what the Oosa had done. If she didn’t go, Parker and the others would have no proof of their story.

  Rain, Hazel and Parker decided to extend their stay an extra day, which was a relief to everyone. Even Sunny seemed to relax a little knowing her friends wouldn’t be leaving right away. They couldn’t extend their stay any longer than that, though. The two doctors had to get back to the hospital, and Parker still had students to teach, but the added time meant some of the pressure had been taken off of making big decisions.

  Blue volunteered 62 to use his “brain powers” to let Hanford know of the delay, and after a long, drawn-out explanation to the doctors about 62’s strange ability to connect his dreams to Mattie’s, 62 went to bed. Now, he lay in his room at mid-day, trying to force himself to sleep even though he was anything but sleepy. Tired, yes; he’d been physically and emotionally exhausted for days. But his eyes refused to stay shut and his mind kept poring over everything that had happened. He didn’t want to let the others down though, even if they did look at him sideways whenever the topic of dreaming came up.

  62 thought back to some of the books Mattie had shared with him about dreaming and the importance of quieting the mind. He remembered reading something about using a simple thought-task to drive away invading thoughts when trying to sleep, so he decided to try counting backward from one hundred. He took a deep breath and visualized each number, filling his lungs until they felt they might burst, and then letting them deflate slowly. He’d only counted down to sixty-two when sleep took hold of him. Not long after, he felt himself drifting away into a dream.

  The darkness of his mind took hold, and he forced himself to envision Hanford’s library. It formed around him, and his feet settled on the floor as it materialized. There were more books on the shelves this time, and he heaved a sigh of relief that he wasn’t trapped in the empty nightmare version of the library. He walked through the stocked shelves, noticing that the fixtures beyond the entry were still bare. He hunted through the room for signs of Mattie, but she didn’t appear. 62 closed his eyes, pressing on the edges of his consciousness to see if he could find her somewhere out in the void.

  He
imagined her face, could see her stocking the shelves of the library in his mind’s eye. They’d spent so much time together before his move to the hill that imagining her was easy enough. But he couldn’t seem to find the real her anywhere.

  “She’s not there,” 62 said to himself.

  “Who isn’t?”

  62 spun around. The voice had been high and fleeting, like a child running nearby. But as he looked around, no one was there. He was sure that he’d heard the voice though, it had been so close, as if someone was speaking just behind him. But he couldn’t see anything. 62 willed the lights to brighten, casting away the dark shadows and bringing the dream into full focus. “Who said that?”

  “It’s me,” the voice whispered in his ear. Laughter tittered from around the corner. 62 chased after it, ducking around the next bookshelf, finding an empty aisle. He raced through the stacks, and they seemed to grow around him. Taller, longer, and more ominous.

  “Who are you?” 62 shouted.

  “I’m Pi. You remember?”

  62 froze. “Pi?”

  “Yes.” The smaller child formed, sitting on the lip of the librarian’s desk near the front door. His legs dangled over the edge, swinging back and forth casually. He cast an impartial glance at 62. “We dreamed together once. Do you remember?”

  “I do.” 62 first met Pi in Adaline. After he was recruited by Defense, his friend, 99, had joined dreams with Pi. The smaller Boy was an informant helping Defense extinguish dreamers in hiding. Creativity wasn’t a part of Adaline’s program for the clones, and 62 had gotten a front seat look at the lengths the Head Machine would go to eradicate the flaw. “How are you?”