Solstice by Jane Redd

urge? “What about you? Were you in Detention a lot?”
    He raised a finger to his lips. We fell quiet and both listened. Low voices came from outside the door; someone else had entered the dormitory.
    Rueben left the latrine, leaving me alone. A few minutes later, unable to wait any longer, I exited as well.
    The two girls from the night before were back, sitting on their beds. They both looked over as I walked into the room. The girl with the copper skin gave me a slight nod. But the freckled one stared past me, and I noticed she was shaking. Her face looked pale as if she was about to be sick.
    I glanced over at Rueben, who stood at the end of the room, near one of the far beds. He shook his head slightly, as if warning me not to do anything.
    I ignored him and crossed to the freckle-faced girl. “Are you all right?” I asked, touching her shoulder. She flinched when I touched her, but didn’t meet my gaze. Then she opened her mouth to speak.
    Her voice was high pitched like a young child’s, but I couldn’t understand anything she was saying—it was all gibberish. I threw a glance in Rueben’s direction; he’d started walking toward us.
    “What’s she saying?” I asked as he neared me. Something wasn’t right. I felt sick to my stomach as the girl continued her babbling.
    “Come on, we need to stay away from Grace,” he said, motioning for me to move away from the girl.
    I stayed where I was. Something was seriously wrong. “We should try to help her.”
    His hand grabbed mine. “Leave her,” he insisted. “They’ll be coming for her soon, and you don’t want to interfere.”
    I wavered. I didn’t want to be in trouble in this place. I’d had enough of that. I followed Rueben to the far side of the room. The copper-skinned girl had closed her eyes, ignoring Grace completely.
    “What’s going on?” I whispered.
    Rueben hushed me just as the doors opened.
    Three men walked in, a couple of whom I recognized from my testing. They approached Grace, their faces grim. One held a tan jacket with extra long sleeves. Grace didn’t pay them any attention until they grabbed her. Then she screamed.
    “Stop!” I shouted, but Rueben pulled me toward him and covered my mouth.
    “Hold still,” he growled in my ear. I barely caught his next whispered words. “Don’t call attention to yourself, or you’ll be in the jacket next.”
    I nodded, and Rueben released his grip. I stared in horror as the men easily overpowered the young girl and thrust her arms into the jacket. Except they put it on backward, with her arms crossed against her chest, stopping her from fighting against them. With her arms confined, she could barely move, and the men carried out the still-screaming but completely helpless girl from the room.
    Every part of my body trembled as the screams faded down the corridor. “What are they doing to her?”
    “They put her in a strait jacket for her protection.”
    I stared at Rueben, trying to understand.
    “Strait jackets are simple restraints from the Before,” Rueben said, “when they didn’t have Harmony implants to track criminals or ankle cuffs to control dangerous people.”
    Track? Harmony implants don’t track people. They only level out emotions. My stomach went tight, like it might reject my dinner. “She’s just a kid,” I said. “She’s not . . . violent.” Just saying the word violent frightened me. It was on the List of Failures, something that we didn’t have in our world of Order.
    Rueben must have heard the rising panic in my voice, even though I was trying to whisper. He put both hands on my shoulders and leaned close. “She’s in overload.”
    With Rueben so close I noticed his scent for the first time—he smelled like he’d just been outside, in the sun, which was impossible. His usually warm eyes looked worried instead, as if watching Grace had disturbed him as much as it did me.
    “The scientists raised the control level in her implant,” he continued.