Pass/Fail (2012) by David Wellington

Somehow it was slowly electrocuting him. It must have malfunctioned—but no, that was impossible. It didn’t plug into the wall. It didn’t even have any batteries. Mr. Irwin had assured him it was totally passive and completely incapable of hurting a human being. Mr. Irwin, who had also practically said out loud that he was in on the Curriculum. That he was one of the Proctors.
    Mr. Irwin had lied.
    “Jake, let go. Just—just let go,” Megan said. “Jake, you’re scaring me! Let go of that thing!”
    “I… can’t,” Jake said, even as he felt the skin on his hands start to scorch.
     

Chapter Twenty-One
    Cody tried to grab the box away from Jake. The second his hands touched it his legs went out from under him and he jumped backwards shrieking as if he’d been bitten by a wild animal.
    “Jesus,” he said, clambering back up to his feet. “The whole thing’s rigged. Jake, you have to let go of this thing.”
    “Why can’t you let go?” Megan asked, reaching for Jake’s arms. She looked like she was going to pull him off the box.
    “Don’t!” he said. “You’ll get shocked, too.” He had to grit his teeth to keep from shouting at her. The pain was intense and it wasn’t going away or getting any easier to bear. “Somehow it’s got me trapped. I keep telling my hands to let go but they aren’t obeying me.”
    “Yeah. Yeah! I know about this,” Cody said, grabbing the edge of the table. “When you’re getting shocked with electricity, your muscles contract. You can’t help it. When guys try to break out of prison by climbing an electric fence, this same thing happens—their hands contract around the wires and they can’t let go.”
    “Well how do we turn this thing off?” Megan demanded, but Cody didn’t get a chance to answer, even if he knew.
    The door of the practice room opened quietly and a Proctor walked in, dressed in the traditional blue serge suit and mirrored mask.
    Megan let out a gasp. Not a scream. Jake was proud of her for not screaming—she’d never seen a Proctor before. She’d thought they were a delusion until the one walking in the door.
    Cody started running toward the Proctor as if he would knock it down but the Proctor just held up one gloved hand and said “Sleep,” in the buzzing fan voice Jake had come to know all too well. Instantly Cody collapsed on the floor in a heap. Jake hoped he hadn’t hit his head on the floor on the way down.
    “What are you doing to him?” Megan demanded. Jake was a little surprised to see that she hadn’t fallen asleep herself. A little surprise was all he could manage—the rest of his brain was taken up by the overwhelming pain. He could feel sweat rolling down his face and he was having trouble breathing it hurt so much.
    The Proctor took a step toward the table. Megan took a step back.
    “Jake is undergoing a test of his pain threshold,” the Proctor droned. “It will be over shortly. Jake, you may observe the needle gauge of the galvanometer.”
    “What?” Jake demanded. He stared at the needle. It was still hovering just a little above zero. “Yeah? So what?” he asked. Then he saw what he was supposed to see.
    What he should have seen before. If he’d been smart, if he hadn’t been so worried about convincing Megan he was telling the truth, he might have noticed and saved himself a lot of trouble. There were some scratches in the enamel paint just above the needle gauge. They looked like random scuff marks unless you knew they were supposed to be letters. About two-thirds of the way between zero and maximum, someone had scratched a rough P into the paint. A little farther toward maximum, maybe a sixteenth of an inch farther, were the letters AFC.
    He knew instantly what they meant. P was for Pass. AFC was for Automatic Failure Condition.
    “Megan,” he said, “this is going to be tricky. I need your help.”
    She turned to face him but she couldn’t stop glancing back at the Proctor.
    “Pretend he’s not