The Ones by Daniel Sweren-Becker

Author:Daniel Sweren-Becker
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781250083159
Publisher: Imprint

CHAPTER 11

HOURS HAD PASSED since she’d been arrested, but Cody still couldn’t get the smell of gunpowder out of her nose. It wasn’t just her nose; it was all five senses, really. She could taste it in her mouth. Her eyes burned. Her ears were still ringing. And she swore that her body was still vibrating from the first big explosion. She hadn’t been injured in a conventional sense, but she had felt a wave of invisible force shake every cell in her body. That is what finally broke the office door down.

Cody had been so dazed from the SWAT team ordnance that she could barely remember what happened. She was pinned to the ground, a knee crushing her spine, and then handcuffed. Dragged out of the building. Thrown into a cop car and driven to the local police station. And now here she was, locked in an interrogation room by herself, having been ignored for what felt like several hours.

She rested her head on the cold metal table and tried to sleep. It was impossible, though; her mind was racing too fast. It wasn’t fear that gripped her. She had mentally prepared herself for a night in jail, for having the cops condescend to her, even for the inevitable misdemeanor charge and her mother completely freaking out. What kept her from sleeping was a nervous anxiety that Cody couldn’t really explain. She had the gnawing sense that something serious was happening on the other side of the locked steel door, that beyond the tiny bubble of her interrogation room, events were transpiring that had the power to change her life.

Cody hoped those events were positive. She engaged in some wishful thinking and imagined that their little stunt had gone viral across the country, that maybe they had inspired countless other schools to protest for the rights of Ones. Maybe one of the SWAT team members hit a student with his club, and it had been caught on camera. Maybe the Board of Education was firing Ms. Bixley at this very moment.

But Cody couldn’t know any of that for sure, stuck as she was in this barren room, devoid of all stimuli. She was desperate for any indication and going mad with the realization that everyone else in the world besides her knew what was going on. For the first time, she considered the intensely punishing power of being confined in utter isolation.

Her prayers, such as they were, were finally answered when the door swung open and a tall, elegant woman in a fancy suit entered. Cody could tell she wasn’t from Shasta and definitely had nothing to do with their local police force. She wore her short blond hair like any other government drone, but the expressiveness of her face indicated something else to Cody. This woman was clearly passionate about something, but in a scary, obsessive way. She had the look of a zealot.

“Cody, I am not here to bullshit you.”

The woman entered, dropped a closed folder on the table, sat down, and placed her long, bony fingers on top of it.

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