The Academy

Chapter Four

4

Zane

The hole in the backyard was barely deep enough for the wardrobe-turned-casket. It took five of us (three guys, two women) more than three hours to dig up the stone-laden soil. I insisted it be dug the old fashioned way—no gifts. Lexi deserved that much.

She deserved more. Of the small gathering who’d attended the sham of a funeral, none were actually related to Lexi. I was the only one who even knew her.

Her mother and father will never know what happened to their little girl, why she never came home after hopping in my truck three days ago. For a while I had myself convinced they didn’t deserve her. They were planning to send her to the Academy anyway, I told myself, to be brainwashed. Made into a killer.

And for a time, I didn’t feel so guilty. It didn’t last. Because for all my indignation, the memory of her mother waving to her as I pulled out of their driveway dug its way through the anger, reminding me that she was loved. That more likely than not, her parents truly didn’t know the Academy was probably a death sentence.

Running away with me was supposed to offer her a future.

“Come inside,” my mother says, her voice coming from just over my shoulder. “Your coming out here to stare at the ground won’t bring her back. I know you’re hurting, but loss comes with the life we’ve chosen. You know that. Lexi won’t be the only person you lose before this fight is done.”

That’s my mother. Practical. Never getting bogged down with silly things like actual emotions. Exactly why she was chosen to lead our little group of rebels. “You chose this life,” I say. “Not me.” From the corner of my eye, I see my mother flinch. There is a certain satisfaction that comes from forcing her to feel something. Even if its hurt.

Her voice is lower when she speaks again. “The call will come any minute now. He’ll want you to be there.” The fading crunch of leaves lets me know that my mother has started back for the house. With a sigh, I turn to follow.

The parents are already present when I arrive, gathered around a disposable cellphone on the kitchen table. All except Isabel’s mother, who is downstairs watching over the children—where I would be, too, if my first-hand account of what transpired the night Lexi was shot wasn’t needed. Her death is the reason this meeting was called in the first place.

The phone rings the moment I plop down on the kitchen counter. My mother sets it to speakerphone and announces, “South Carolina, group two, present.” A deep male voice answers, “Noted,” and then, after a minute or so, “South Carolina, group three, present,” blares through the speaker. The roll call continues, each of the other groups just like our own, clusters of parents who have come together to protect their children from the Academy. From the Collective. Parents once desperate for opportunity to have a child, now desperate to keep them.

I’ve long since tuned out the grainy voices on the phone when the male voice, the man we call ‘Commander’ calls the conference call to order. Every face in the room now stares at the phone intently, solemn-faced and still. The Academy has long been in the business of murdering children, but never before outside its walls.

Commander clears his throat. “Three nights ago, South Carolina, Group Two, called to report the shooting death of a gifted child, by Retrievers. They reported it as a deliberate act to harm, and I felt that, if verified, an investigation on my end would need to be launched to ascertain the cause behind the use of lethal force toward a child who has not yet entered the halls of the Academy. That report no longer requires verification, nor does the child who witnessed the act need to testify. The specifics are now of little importance. I know why the Retrievers have been authorized to use deadly force against perceived runners. The child I’ve warned you about is already at the Academy.”