Extracted

Jeremy

The house is quiet. Lily has cried herself to sleep on the Dixons' bed, her hair wetting the pastel pillow. Cecelia crawled in beside her. I pull the blanket near the end up around them.

Lawrence and Benjamin are still scouring the Internet, though they haven't come up with more. After the obvious ones, any other graduates must be well camouflaged or had taken on less noticeable assignments.

I keep glancing toward the door, waiting for Mitchell and Fletcher to walk in, safe and alive.

If they've been caught, will the director automatically order them to be put back in the tanks?

I look around the house for Jeremy and don't see him. My heart takes a little dive when I search all the rooms and come up empty. Until I go out on the back porch. It's one of those wide wooden walk-arounds with fixed planters built along the rails. Jeremy is sitting out here in the dark on the bottom step, wriggling his toes in the frozen grass. He's changed into jeans that he's rolled up since they're a bit long on him and a brown hoodie. His hair is a tousled mess as it dries from his shower without benefit of being combed.

I resist the impulse to finger-comb the waves and sit down on the step beside him. "You okay?"

His head bounces, but doesn't lift to mine.

"I found a box of mac and cheese. I'll make it if you want." Jeremy loves mac and cheese.

"Not hungry," he mutters, his hanging bangs obscuring his eyes.

"Okay." I lace my fingers together over my knee to keep from draping an arm across his shoulders. Some kind of insects chirp from the trees surrounding the yard.

"How do you know I'm him?"

My breath catches and I squeeze my fingers around my knees.

"That you're my brother?"

His head bobs up to look at me and then quickly he looks down to the lawn again.

I wet my lips, searching for the right way to handle this. He has to believe me, he just has to.

"Because I know you, all right. I know you." This time I do touch him, curling my palm over his bent fingers. "I know you like red apples better than green and you split your green beans open before eating them. I know The Dark Knight is your favorite movie and that you like rocks..."

His hand jerks under mine, and then he pulls it away to dig inside his pocket and brings out a few smooth stones, which he holds out in his open palm. His eyes are huge and so vulnerable, something tugs in my belly. I go on with cracks rasping my voice. "I know your heart. I know you'd never willingly hurt anyone. I know you're brave enough to stand between a hurt girl and a trainer telling you to finish her."

"I'm not," he cries. "I'm not all those things. I'm not Jeremy." He throws the rocks he's collected into the dark grass. "Get it through your thick head. I'm not your brother."

"Yes, you are. Yes, you are. You just don't remember, but you will. We'll find a way to get your memories back."

"No! Don't you get it? I'm not him. I'm not brave. They were going to—" He slumps forward, falling on the grass to his hands and knees. His shoulders shake. "They were going to put me in one of those tanks. He...he showed me."

I go to my knees and wrap my arms around him. His body is vibrating beneath harsh sobs.

"That won't happen. That will never happen." Tears blur my vision and stick in my throat. "That will never happen."