The Darkest Minds: Red

Fifteen

I didn't know if it was the smoke that calmed me or the sudden reappearance of Zu. As she wrapped her arms around me, the others began to pool together whatever food was left from Betty.

"So that's how you figured out the clue," Liam said. "You saw a memory of it?"

Ruby nodded. "Not so impressive now, is it?"

"No - no, that's not what I meant," he said, adding quickly, "It's just I'm trying to imagine what the inside of that kid's head looked like, and the best I can come up with is a swamp filled with alligators. It must have been terrible."

"Did you?" Chubs said after ten minutes of silence. Liam was busy testing out whether he could use Betty's car key to pry open the lids of the fruit and soup cans. Zu and I chose to appear at that moment to help.

"Did she what?" I asked, walking towards them, Zu right behind me. The three turned to look at me before Chubs turned back to Ruby.

"Did you ever get inside our heads?" He finished. 

"Of course she's in our heads," Liam said, his arms straining to open the can's lid. "Ruby is one of us now."

"I don't think that's what he meant, hon," I told Liam.

"Right," Chubs agreed. "I just want to know how it works. I've never met an Orange before. We didn't have any at Caledonia."

"That's probably because the government erased them all," Ruby said, dropping her hands in her lap. "That's what happened to them at Thurmond."

Liam looked up, alarmed. Chubs, Zu, and I widened our eyes in shock.

"What do you mean?" Liam asked.

"For the first two or three years I was there, we had every kind of color, even Red and Orange," She explained. "But... no one really knows why or how it happened. Some people thought they were taken away because of all the trouble they caused, but there were rumors they were being moved away to a new camp where they could do more testing on them. We just woke up one morning and the Reds, Oranges, and Yellows were gone."

"What about you, though?" Chubs asked. "How did you avoid getting bused?"

I snorted at his comment. "She did the same thing I did. Pretended to be a Green from the start." I then turned to Ruby and asked a little more softly, "Right?"

She nodded, then said in a quiet voice. "I saw how scared the PSFs were of the Oranges, and I messed with the scientist who was running the classifying test." It was a struggle pushing the rest of the words out. "Those kids were... they were so messed up, you know? Maybe they were like that before they got their abilities, or they hated themselves for having them, but they used to do terrible things."

Chubs opened his mouth, but Liam held up a hand to shut him up.

"I just knew I needed to protect myself. So now you see what a mistake it was for me to stay." Ruby finally said.

Zu was shaking her head, looking distraught at the suggestion. Chubs rubbed his eyes, hiding his expression. Liam and I looked at her, and I spoke up.

"Try to imagine where we'd be without you," I chuckled at the thought. "Maybe you'll see how you changed our lives for the better."

           ********

That night, we slept in the van, each of us sprawled out on a seat. I let Zu have the rear seat, and stayed up front next to Liam. However, I couldn't sleep. Not with everything that has happened. I tossed around, trying to tire myself. When it didn't work, I let out an annoyed huff.

Liam tiredly opened his eyes at the noise. He sat up, and I turned my head towards him.

"What's wrong?" He asked quietly, trying to not wake up everyone. I took a deep breath.

"Couldn't sleep," I admitted.

I propped myself up, rubbing my eyes. The rain had condensed on the windows, covering the cracked windshield like a filmy overlay of lace. I looked at Liam, studying him in the light.

"What?" He whispered, snapping me out of my thoughts. "What are you looking at?"

My hand brushed against his hair, trying to smooth it down. It didn't take me long to realize that Liam had closed his eyes and leaned against my hand. Smiling, I decided to go to sleep. I retracted my hand, but he pulled it back, grabbing it and tucking it under his chin.

"Nope," he whispered. "Mine now."

I looked at him with an amused face. "I'm gonna need that back, you know. I need to sleep."

"Too bad."

I opened my mouth to speak, but a voice breathed out behind us, "...crackers...yessss...."

Both of us turned, watching as Chubs twisted around in his seat and settled back down, still fast asleep.

Liam and I looked at each other before I let out a quiet snort. I quickly covered my mouth when I realized how loud it was, my eyes widening in surprise. Liam, on the other hand, was silently laughing, but he shushed me when I snorted.

"Welcome to another episode of Chubs Dreams About Food. Today, the dream seems to be about crackers." Liam whispered, saying it like he was a game show host.

I laughed at his comment, trying not to wake everyone. My face turned red from the laughing, and I tried to unred it. I finally stopped and took a deep breath.

"At least they're good dreams," I said.

"Yeah, I guess he's lucky." He told me.

"What do you want to do?" I asked after a couple of moments of silence. 

"I've got to wake the others up," he said. "We have to keep moving. On foot."

I looked at him, but it was clear he made his choice.

"What's the rush?" I asked, lightly.

There, at the corner of his mouth, where his scar met his lips - a faint smile. "I think we could let them sleep, at least for a few hours."

"And then?"

"We'll hit the road."

I settled down, putting my head on Liam's shoulder. I sighed and closed my eyes, finally going to sleep. He looked at my sleeping form, then closed his eyes.