CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Leave us a review

Copyright

Dedication

Part One

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Part Two

Nine

Part Three

Ten

Acknowledgements

About the Author

By Laura Kat Young

and available from Titan Books

The Butcher

The Collector

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The Collector

Print edition ISBN: 9781789099058

E-book edition ISBN: 9781789099065

Published by Titan Books

A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd.

144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP

www.titanbooks.com

First Titan edition September 2023

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Copyright © 2023 Laura Kat Young.

All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

For Bill

PART ONE

ONE

That morning, Dev had breakfasted on sausages. He’d woken ravenous, his salivary glands tightening at the thought of it. He’d forgotten to eat dinner—yes, that was it—and he’d stumbled into the kitchen, groggy and still dreaming. The sausages had tasted salty, comforting. But now, sitting in his car, waiting to go inside Doris McGregor’s home, the meat churned in his belly. He swallowed his hot, thick spit down twice and tilted his head down as if he were looking at something—a map perhaps. His hands. It was only for a moment, and to anyone that had been watching it could’ve been anything. He breathed in, but it was short and rushed and unsatisfying.

Dev pulled the car visor down and looked in the small lighted mirror on its back. His throat felt tight, and he half expected to see his neck bulging, swollen and spilling over the starched fabric of his shirt. He slid his forefinger in between his sticky skin and collar. He tugged at it and then slowly placed his hands on the steering wheel, curling his fingers around the braided leather cover and squeezing until his knuckles turned white. There on his thumb were three tiny marks, little scabs from scraping against something. He dragged a fingertip over the scabs. They were fresh. It was the most curious thing.

He flipped the visor back up and looked out the side window toward Doris’s house. It was like the others on the hidden road: a detached sandstone cottage with a slate roof, and stone pillars flanking the old timber door. But unlike the other cottages on the street, whose windows gleamed and front steps were swept clean, Doris’s curtains stayed drawn. A black wreath hung on her door. There were other telltale signs that she was struck as well—an overflowing garbage can, weeds in the daffodils, a rain-soaked package that had tipped onto its side. They were things that some might easily overlook, but Dev, who had eyes trained to spot such anomalies, noticed. The Bureau had tackled blight during the early years of Mitigation, and now the streets, once rundown and dirty, were tidy; it was nearly impossible to neglect household responsibilities without someone taking note. Doris’s home looked dingy and old compared to the others. But it was to be expected.

Dev straightened his tie, his pocket square, too. Then he adjusted the delicate silver pin on his left lapel. With his thumbs and his forefingers, he reinforced the backing and made sure that the crest of the Collection Unit—a carrion crow landing in front of a setting sun—was upright and secure. When he was satisfied, he breathed in slowly through his nostrils and held the air in his lungs to the count of four. He was supposed to exhale double: four in, eight out—they taught him that in one of the trainings—but when he got to the fifth count, he let the rest of the air out through his mouth quickly, noisily, his lips flapping together in a quick drum.

He grabbed his briefcase, opened the door, and stepped out of the car onto the empty, quiet street. The early morning air was cool. The wind had shifted overnight and now blew up and over the crags, its speed carrying the scent of low tide to the small village where he lived and worked. Dev’s shoes, issued from the Bureau, clicked on the asphalt and then the gravel drive as he approached Doris’s door. He bent to pick up the package on the edge of the stoop—it was the least he could do. The cardboard was soggy and whatever was inside small but heavy. He cradled the box in his arm, and at precisely nine in the morning he rang the bell. A muffled chime announced his presence. A moment passed and then another—perhaps she was not home, and Dev would not have to collect Doris’s donation to the Catalog. He looked at his hands again. Or maybe this was the day, the one he’d kept waiting for, kept dreading, dreaming of. Dev rang the bell a second time. The dog barked. One more ring and he’d have to go in; the collection would turn into a search and rescue. Maybe in the minutes he waited for Doris to come to the door she was swallowing the last of the pills. He tried to steel himself against the idea, but it was of no use. He had already envisioned it, a messy scene played on the backs of his eyes. He wanted to enter then, but he had to give the bell three tries. He turned his good ear toward the door and listened, counting up to twenty in his head. When he reached nineteen, he lifted his hand and at twenty rang the bell for the third and final time. From his pocket, he took a lock opener and opened it to the gauge of the door handle. He thought of Doris, of her photo in her file, and wondered if she wasn’t tucked away somewhere in a closet, a belt or a rope or even bedsheets wrapped tight around her neck.

There was a sudden movement then, a shadow behind the small, frosted window, and the heavy curtains swayed and fell still behind the glass. A dog barked. Three locks clicked, and the door opened. Doris stood there, a good two heads shorter than Dev. She held a small, white dog back with her foot. “Oh,” she said. “It’s you.”

“Yes, yes. Ms. McGregor,” Dev said loudly and put the lock opener back into his pocket. He cleared his throat and still held the small package in his left arm. “Here,” he said. “Careful. It’s a little heavy.”

Dev handed her the package gently. She took it in her old hands but did not look at it. The dog whined and its tail wagged, and Dev bent slightly to hold out his hand to the little pup. “I’m Lt. Singh, from the Collection Unit,” he said as the dog sniffed and then licked Dev’s knuckles. He stood up straight again and took his badge out of his pocket, flipping it open to reveal his photo and credentials. “You should’ve received our correspondence.”

Doris squinted at his identification and then said, “I never got anything.” This may or may not have been true, and Dev saw that the post box was full. “Lt. Singh, huh?”

“That’s correct,” he said, stuffing his badge back in his pocket quickly. He motioned to the post box. “May I?”

“By all means,” Doris said.

Dev pulled out the bundle of mail and flipped through each piece quickly, scanning the upper left corners for the Bureau’s crest. He found it near the middle of the stack, pulled it out, and handed it to Doris. She shifted the package to her other arm to take the piece of mail, and as she did, Dev saw the mourning band tied just above her elbow. Doris must have seen him eyeing it. “I got a right,” she said. “One year from the warning.”

“Of course you do,” Dev said gently. He smiled at her and spoke softly. “I’m sure you are aware, Ms. McGregor, that is today.”

Doris stared at him, her face still and expressionless. She blinked her eyes, glassy but not wet, and she did not reply.

“It’s the twenty-first of June, Ms. McGregor,” Dev said.

She squinted her eyes and looked down at the ground. The dog whined behind her. “Huh. So it seems,” she said. “How do you like that?”

“It’s not uncommon to forget.”

“I didn’t forget. Just didn’t realize what day it was.”

“Yes, well, in any case, it happens often. You’d be surprised.”

Doris’s eyes focused on Dev’s face as if she just noticed he was standing there. “So,” she said. “You’re the Collector. You’ve been out here? Watching me?” She pointed out the door and over his shoulder toward his car.

“Watching you? Oh, no. That’s Surveillance. I simply get the report and do the collections. You won’t see anyone else but myself, and later, the Resetters.”

“Oh, yes. That’s right—I forgot about them.”

The dog barked, a tiny yelp that could have meant anything, and Dev and Doris jumped. “Alright, alright Max,” she said and the dog wagged its tail. “He won’t do a thing,” she said. “Least he hasn’t yet.”

“I like dogs,” Dev said. “Never had one myself, though.”

“They make for good company.”

“Yes, I imagine they would.”

“Well, come on in, I suppose,” she said. “I’ll put some tea on.”

She pulled the door open all the way, and Dev entered, closing the door firmly once he was inside. She bent and put the package on the floor next to the scattered mail and newspapers still in their sleeves leaning up against the wall. Though people could be struck for any reason really, the evidence was always the same: an unkempt property, the stale air of a house sealed shut for months. Dev recognized the thick scent of sadness, and his stomach lurched. He instinctively brought his hand to his nose, but then lowered it. He did not wish to be insulting.

As Dev followed Doris down the hall, he glanced quickly at the art and photographs hanging on the walls. There were people in some. They were smiling, heads leaning in close. Landscapes of various places and handwritten notes hung crookedly in others. The frames sloped to the left or the right, the nails holding them bent and nearly coming out of the cracked plaster. When Dev approached the end of the hall, he saw on his left through a door an unmade bed. Next to it was a nightstand littered with glasses and bottles of medication. Crumpled paper lined the floor next to the bed. He looked away, but he’d already seen it.

Doris turned right and walked through another door into the lounge, closing it as soon as Dev was through. The weather, wet and gray most of the year, found its way easily through the cracks and broken seals of the houses in the village. It was not a poor village— or, rather, no poorer than any other. Doris’s house was somewhat in disrepair both inside and out, but keeping one up took energy, desire, and Dev did not wish to judge the old woman any more than he had to already. In the lounge, large windows faced the street. Two armchairs flanked a fireplace, blackened and well used, and a television in the corner buzzed, the sound turned down low. At first glance, the room looked no different from any of the others he had been in over the last fifteen years. But Dev’s eyes were keen and he was quick to gather evidence someone else might miss. There, on the table next to the armchair closest to the window, was a half-filled jar of jelly beans sitting on top of a neatly arranged stack of glossy magazines. He went to place the rest of Doris’s mail next to them, and as he did he looked at the seat of the chair, indented as if someone had just gotten up and left the room. Though he knew the circumstances from the report, he would have been able to deduce the situation even if it was not his job. Two seats, one empty. Things around them organized as if another person would be right back.

Though Doris had mentioned tea, she did not go into the kitchen. Instead, she lowered herself slowly down into the other chair, the one closest to Dev. Once settled, she patted her lap and the dog jumped up, circling once and then twice before laying down. Dev watched Doris. He made sure to take note of her hands, knobby and buckled, and the single balled-up tissue on the table next to her.

“This shouldn’t take long, though feel free to take as long as you need,” Dev said quietly. He reached into his breast pocket and took out a small black recorder no bigger than his hand. They still did it the old way, on tape, despite the progress that society had seen. There was comfort in pressing the tiny buttons—play, record, rewind—a kind of physical finality to it all. The memories transferred to the tape, and only the tape, invisible on the thin, black material. Whenever he collected a memory, for just a moment, Dev held it all in his hands inside his suit jacket. “I’ve just got to read you the statement from the Bureau and take your donation, and then I’ll be on my way.”

“Would you mind putting the tea on?” Doris asked.

“Oh, yes,” Dev said. “Of course, Ms. McGregor.”

He put the recorder back in his pocket and went into the kitchen. He filled the kettle with water from the faucet and turned it on. Then he opened the middle cupboard, but instead of tea, he found only one box of wheat cereal and a tipped-over jar of instant coffee. He stood the jar upright and closed the door. He opened another cupboard to find mouse droppings—just a few—lining the back edge of the shelf. While he waited for the water to come to a boil, he took a paper towel from underneath the sink, wet it, and wiped down the shelf. He straightened the items on the shelves— bottles of medication, jam jars opened and half-empty, containers of gravy granules, and a Christmas tin of cookies—and then moved to the next. Doris must have heard all the rummaging for she called from the lounge, “The tea is on the counter.”

“Ah, yes,” Dev said. “I’ve got it now.”

The water in the kettle rumbled and bubbled, and when the steam finally rose out of the spout, Dev flipped the switch to the off position. He poured the hot water slowly into a cup with a letter G on it, allowing the teabag to soak and settle to the bottom before topping it off. “Milk or sugar?” he called to Doris.

“No,” she said. “Just a splash from the bottle in the drawer below you.”

Dev pulled open the drawer and found a single unopened bottle of whiskey. He did not recognize the label nor the name, though he himself did not drink much alcohol. She’d been saving this, and for how long was anyone’s guess. He opened it and poured a small amount into the cup. Holding the string between his fingers, he bobbed the teabag up and down in the cup and watched the water darken. Then, for no reason at all, he poured just a tiny bit more of the whiskey into the cup and carried it slowly back into the lounge, careful not to spill on the cushioned linoleum on his way out of the kitchen. He held his right hand underneath the cup just in case, and when he crossed the kitchen threshold, he noticed the balled-up tissue on the small table beside Doris was gone.

Doris had placed a coaster on the table. As Dev bent to place the teacup on it, he saw that the picture on the coaster was of the Bureau’s clocktower. It was a beautiful clocktower—no one could argue otherwise, and Dev, who grew up in the Bureau’s care like the other children of Resets, had spent many days looking at it out of the Home’s window. In fact, if Dev thought hard enough, he could hear the bells that very moment, the deep, reverberating clanging of metal against metal, a reminder that time was indeed passing even if it didn’t seem like it.

Doris leaned over and inspected her teacup, sniffing quietly the steam that rose from it. She did not look at Dev, nor motion for him to sit in the other chair, and so he remained standing. He clasped his hands together in front of his waist and twirled his thumbs softly. Around and around they went, the soft pad of his finger brushing over the nail again and again.

“Shall we get started, Ms. McGregor? They should be here shortly.”

“What do they need my donation for anyway?”

“The correspondence should’ve explained—here—” Dev walked back over to the table where Doris had placed the letter. “May I?”

Doris waved her hand in Dev’s direction. He opened the mail and unfolded the thin letter inside. He cleared his throat and read: “‘Dear Ms. McGregor. You are slated for Reset two weeks from the date of this letter. Should your condition improve within that time, we will notify you via mail. Should your condition remain or worsen, you will be assigned a Collector, who, at 9 a.m. on the date provided, shall come for collection. You may call the number below with any questions. We thank you for your support of the Bureau’s Mitigation program. We look forward to your speedy recovery.’”

Doris sat still for a moment. Then she turned her head upwards toward Dev. “Who reported me?” Doris asked quietly. “Was it Roger on the other side of us?” She leaned her head to the right. “Always nosing around. I never liked him. He got on with Gemma fine, but me… huh,” she said. “That was how it was with her though. Won everyone over in the end.”

“Actually, it was your cleaners,” Dev told her. “You brought in your wife’s clothing two months ago.”

Doris brought her hand to her mouth quickly, and her eyes fell to the floor just beyond her feet. She knitted her brow as if trying to remember doing such a thing. The dog squirmed, but did not move from her lap.

“Yes,” she said. “You’re right. I must’ve forgotten, I…”

But although her mouth remained open, she said no more. Instead, she reached for her tea and brought it to her lips. She held the cup there, not drinking or blowing to cool it. She simply sat, the ceramic edge touching her flesh, a distance in her eyes as though she were looking at something other than the carpet. Dev waited patiently for it to pass as he had been trained to do. Then Doris took a sip. This time the sip was not as small. She took another and another still until the cup was empty. She placed it back onto the coaster gently and looked up at Dev. “I didn’t think they’d say anything. We’d been going there for so long, I just thought…”

Dev waited until he was sure Doris was finished speaking. Then, quietly, he said, “There were other signs, too, Ms. McGregor. You’ve only left the house three times in the last four months. And the weeds—”

“I’ve got arthritis. And who cares if there are weeds?”

“Well, it’s just an indicator, Ms. McGregor. And you’re correct—just one indicator wouldn’t stand on its own, but with the other evidence… it all amounts to it.”

“The cleaners? I just can’t believe it, I really can’t,” she said and shook her head. Her brows creased, her eyes darting, trying to put the evidence together herself. But whether or not she recognized her own behaviors as problematic was of no use; whether the cleaners or the grocers or the neighbor who sat looking out the window all day long had reported her, none of it mattered.

“Not sure if you knew this, Ms. McGregor, but the Bureau added ‘preserving artifacts’ to the list. Not too long ago. Maybe that’s what did it.”

Doris did not say anything at first. Dev stood there, his feet hot in his shoes and the large hand of the clock on the wall in front of him inching toward the hour. “Well,” Doris said eventually, “I see how it might seem. You know, to others who maybe haven’t… but— Lt. Singh, does it seem like it to you? I mean it was just a matter of respect, not like I wasn’t getting on or anything.”

“I’m sure it was,” Dev told her. “Lots of people find themselves in your situation, Ms. McGregor. Quite understandable. However, the cleaners said—and I have to tell you this directly—”

Dev read from the statement he had taken out from his pocket. “‘July 7th. Doris McGregor, of 68 Watson Drive, delivered four garments to V&I Cleaners. As the operator took the garments, Ms. McGregor gripped the sleeve of a shirt and would not let go. Only when the operator reminded her that she was on camera did she release the garment and draw her hand back.’” He folded the statement and put it back into his pocket. “Is this true, Ms. McGregor?”

“What is it to you if it is?”

“Ms. McGregor, it is simply my job to report—”

She sat up straight. The dog jumped down from her lap. Then she rose slowly from her chair, grasping both of the arms with her small hands, pushing herself up into a standing position before bending to pick up the empty teacup and placing it on a tray on the table next to her. “Think I’ll have a little more,” she said. “Care to join me?”

“Of course, Ms. McGregor. Whatever you would like.”

Doris lifted the tray and went into the kitchen. Dev heard the opening and closing of cupboard doors, of drawers, the seal of the refrigerator breaking. While he’d done a cursory scan upon entering the lounge, now that Doris was out of the room he could inspect more closely. He wasn’t required to do so—all the evidence he had needed was in Doris’s file. But he wanted more. There on the walls were photos, framed and aged by the sun. He walked over to look and saw Doris and her wife, Gemma. Their wedding day. Standing beneath one of the giant trees in the forest, walking sticks in hand. Shoulder to shoulder at a café late at night. In some, they were young, but still he recognized Doris. On the mantle was a small collection of shells, driftwood, tiny bits of sea gems. Several jars of layered sand, each section labeled with a date and location directly on the glass. A visual history of their time together. Dev leaned in close to read them, but his eyes suddenly blurred and stung, and when he went to rub them, there was a pull from deep inside his ribs. He shoved his hands into his pockets and balled his trousers’ lining up in his fists to absorb the sweat.

Doris came back into the lounge carrying the tray carefully. On it, Dev saw the open bottle of whiskey, a small container of milk, a dish stacked high with brown sugar cubes. Wedges of lemon fanned out on a plate. Doris put the tray down on the coffee table but did not move to serve. Instead, she returned to her chair and eased herself down, holding onto the arms the same way she did when she arose, her skin above her knuckles thin and white. When she’d settled back against the worn cushion, she clasped her hands together and curled her old fingers around each other. “I couldn’t just leave the clothes on the floor,” she said as the dog jumped back up on her lap. “That would be disrespectful.”

“Hmmm, yes,” Dev said. “Could you not have washed and hung them up yourself? Or perhaps a neighbor or a relative could have helped?”

Dev knew the answer to the questions—of course she couldn’t have. How many days had she spent in bed staring at the clothes? By the time she had thought of dealing with them she must’ve known her actions would draw attention. Or maybe she hadn’t known that. Maybe she had no idea how much time had passed or that she was even still being monitored. Doris’s eyes looked around the floor just beyond her chair, as if she could still see them—the clothes—laying crumpled in a pile she hadn’t the fortitude to tidy up. “They still smelled like her,” she said. “I thought if I got rid of the smell, it’d be easier.”

“Ah, yes,” Dev said softly. “People try all sorts of things, I can assure you. It’s quite understandable, really.”

“I never did pick up the clothes.”

“I know.” Dev spoke softly. “Even if you had, it might not have mattered—there was other evidence, as you know. Besides, there’s no use trying to make sense of it now. May I?” he asked and motioned to the tea there on the table.

“By all means,” Doris said.

Dev fixed himself a cup with two sugars and just a splash of milk. How many times had he been here, sipping tea in someone’s lounge, lording over a person’s grief? Suddenly the back of his neck was hot, and he nearly spit his tea back in the cup. For some reason, Dev’s mind went to his own mother—or rather the idea of her, as he could not actually remember her. After all, he’d been reset when they’d taken him from her. He didn’t remember that, either. He just had an empty feeling where something once was. All the children had it—this feeling—and he had it still. His forehead itched as sweat broke through his skin. If he wiped the sweat, even if it was with his sleeve, Doris would see. It wouldn’t matter in the end—after all, she wouldn’t remember this moment or any other moment tied to her wife. But it mattered to Dev. And as for his faltering, when he tried to understand it, to say to himself he was simply overworked, he couldn’t. He thought quickly again of his own mother and then of the yellow notebook from the Bureau—part of his award package. It was always the same: a sealed envelope, a letter, the notebook. It was stored in his kitchen wall behind a loose piece of paneling. He saw it there wedged in between the old wood frames, years of dirt and dust and silt sitting in the cracks and corners.

“Want a splash?” Doris asked and held the bottle of whiskey out toward Dev.

“No. Thank you. On the clock, and all.”

Dev tilted his glass and saucer toward Doris as a means to show thanks. But moving, even just that little bit, caused a small bead of sweat to drop from his brow into the corner of his eye.

“Ah, yes, of course,” said Doris.

“Unfortunately, Ms. McGregor, we don’t have much time. The Resetters will be here on the hour,” Dev said and took a sip of the hot tea. As he did, he brushed the cuff of his shirt up across the left side of his face. When he brought the teacup back down to the saucer, the porcelain scraped together and drummed under his trembling hands. Too much caffeine in the tea perhaps. “Do you know what you want to donate to the Catalog?”

“Ah, yes. You’re not just here to give me a check-up?”

“Like I said, we’d sent notice, and—”

Doris waved her hand. “Either way,” she said, “glad to be talking to someone, even if it is you. This place’s been empty for a long time.”

Dev gave a small smile with his eyes. “I understand how you feel, Ms. McGregor, and I assure you that as soon as I finish collecting, all of it—the loneliness, the emptiness—it simply won’t be there anymore. We’ll get you right. Now, about the donation?”

“Right. Well I thought I knew what I was going to use. Right up until you knocked on my door. But now,” she shook her head, “now I just, I don’t know, there’s just so much and I—”

“It’s alright, Ms. McGregor. There is no one way— no right way, that is—to do any of this. If I can tell you one thing, it is that everyone lands on something different. No better or worse than the others.”

“Just seems so, well, I don’t know. Small.”

“Well, why don’t you tell me what you were thinking, and I’ll tell you if it’s a good one for the Catalog. I’ll record it just in case, but we can always redo it if you’d like. You have a few extra minutes.”

“I see.” She nodded toward the tea tray on the table and held her cup out to Dev. “Fill me up please?”

Dev placed his own cup, still nearly full, back on the tray. His hands were steady once again. “Of course. Milk and sugar?”

“Just the whiskey.”

Dev uncorked the bottle and brought it over to Doris. He filled her teacup up halfway, tilting the bottle back and pausing as he asked, “More?”

“Yes, just a splash. Maybe two. Gemma—my wife— was always going on and on.”

Dev handed the cup back to her, and she lifted it to her lips. “‘We’ve got to be healthy, Doris,’ that’s what she always said.” Her head was bowed, speaking nearly into the teacup itself. “‘Exercise, Doris. Stop eating so much candy, Doris.’ And for what?” Doris looked up at Dev. “Gemma was fit as could be. Didn’t make any difference, though, did it?”

“Maybe it did, maybe it didn’t. Hard to say. We’ve all got to go sometime,” Dev said. “Haven’t figured out a way otherwise, have they?”

“No,” she said with a small smile. “You know something? You’re okay, Lt. Singh.”

“I am certainly glad you think so, Ms. McGregor,” he said. “Now, what was that memory you wished to donate?” He took the small recorder out from his breast pocket once again and, without looking, pressed the record button down until it clicked.

Doris took a sip and set her teacup on the coaster, covering the face of the clock on the stone tower and hiding the inscription: Damnatio memoriae. “It’s the two of us,” she began. “We’re young—maybe twenty? I’ve forgotten the exact year. Her parents had a cabin on a small lake. Really just a big pond, I suppose. Had cattails and frogs in the summer from what I remember. We took the boat out—I rowed. It was fall, but that day was cold—real winter-like. It was the afternoon. Late in the afternoon, because I remember the sun through the trees low on the horizon. And the water, well, it froze, you see, but just on the top,” Doris said, motioning with her hand as if the air beneath her palm were frozen as well. “And it was so clear that you almost couldn’t tell it was ice but for the oar breaking through. Every time I rowed, it cracked. Crack, splash, crack, splash. Well, we went out to the middle of the water and bobbed for a while until Gemma said she was cold. So I rowed us back. And I stared at the back of her head, at her long hair…”

She did not finish speaking. Dev waited a moment, and then said, “I think it’s a good memory, Ms. McGregor. Just the sort the Catalog needs.”

“But nothing happened. Not really. Don’t you want something bigger? More dramatic?”

“No,” Dev said and pressed the stop button. “This will do just fine. More than fine.” He rewound the tape to the beginning and then held the recorder to his ear and pressed play, making sure that the tape had captured the audio. When he was satisfied, he turned the recorder off and put it in his jacket pocket.

“I heard,” Doris said leaning forward in her chair, her hands cradling the teacup, “that some get to keep theirs. You know, if they have money, that sort of thing. It’s not a lot, but I do have some set aside.”

Dev shook his head, his eyes kind and soft. “That is categorically untrue, Ms. McGregor. I can promise you that. I don’t want you going into this thinking there was some way around it. That’s never good for anyone.”

“Figured it wouldn’t hurt to ask. And you’re sure you can’t let me keep just this one?”

“No,” Dev told her. “I know it seems frightening right now, Ms. McGregor. It is frightening—the unknown, that is. And I know that it’s difficult to understand simply not having certain memories anymore. But you’ll sleep better tonight than you have in ages, and when you wake up, all of this…” He gestured to the walls, to the jar of jelly beans. “All of this will be taken care of for you. You won’t have the slightest idea.”

“You promise that I won’t know?”

“I promise. You’ll have no memory of Gemma. Any common acquaintances will also be erased. You might find yourself forgetful or unable to concentrate, but that will wear off. Some people are hungry after, some are tired. Some feel nothing. Others—” He gestured toward Doris and then the window as if people were just outside the glass. “It’s hard to say.”

“Don’t know why they want them anyway. What good does it do?” she asked. Dev opened his mouth to respond, but she waved him away. “You know,” she said. “It crossed my mind. What some do to try and save— to remember—”

“Whatever you may have heard, Ms. McGregor, are simply rumors. If someone really had been spared, wouldn’t you be able to tell? No, I assure you, there is nothing that can be done.”

“Well,” Doris said. “There is one thing.”

Dev held his breath for just a moment trying to figure if he’d heard her correctly. “Are you referring to a life event?”

“I am. Can’t be worse than this, I imagine.”

“Oh, Ms. McGregor, but it is,” Dev said softly. “Years ago, before Mitigation, I might have even agreed with you. After all, the thought of living with such anguish is terrifying. But this works—just like the other schemes. The Bureau has your best interest in mind.” Dev brought his fingertips to his pin as he said this.

“I suppose,” she said. “And anyway, Gemma—she would’ve, she wouldn’t have wanted me to—”

“I understand, Ms. McGregor,” Dev said. His hand was still on his lapel and this time he felt his heart pulse quickly.

“And you can’t let me just keep the one?”

“I can’t,” Dev said. “I understand how you must feel. Rest assured, nearly all feel like this, and what I mean by that is you are not alone.”

“Is there nothing else to do? What about the Sanitarium?”

“The Sanitarium is, as you know, reserved for essential workers. There just simply isn’t the infrastructure yet to accommodate others that aren’t deemed—deemed—”

“Important?”

“Everyone is important, Ms. McGregor. But to keep the village running smoothly, preference must be given to those with certain responsibilities.”

“So they get to keep their memories?”

“They are treated and reconditioned.”

“Hmpf,” she said. “Doesn’t seem right, does it?”

“Well, the people did vote for it. The mitigation efforts, I mean. Did you vote?”

“Yes. I voted no. Said I’d rather die than lose what I have up here,” she said and tapped the side of her head. “Now look at me. Still alive and about to be reset.”

“If you can try to see it as a new opportunity, a renewal in a way. I’ve found that just shifting a mindset can help immensely.”

The doorbell rang, and the dog jumped down from Doris’s lap. He ran out of the lounge and down the hall to the front door, barking. Doris put her empty teacup on the table beside her and slid a tissue out of her sleeve—the balled-up one that had been there on the table when Dev had first arrived. She brought the tissue to one eye and then the next. What else was she to do? “Well,” she said. “You can let them in on the way out.”

“If you want,” Dev said, “I can stay here with you for the reset.”

Doris looked at Dev with surprise. “You can do that?”

“Yes, Ms. McGregor. This is your collection, so, in a way, you get to make it how you’d like. It’s my job to help you do that.”

“Oh, well, then yes, I think I’d like it if you stayed.”

Dev felt himself smiling and nodding his head, but suddenly none of it was clear. He was staring at Doris, that much he knew, but he didn’t see her, not really. She was saying something else that Dev couldn’t quite catch, her hands moving slowly as she spoke to him. He watched her hands, though, and he thought it was as if she were writing her words in the air. Yes, there was a P and there was an R, and he kept on moving his head up and down. He blinked once, twice, and when he opened his eyelids again he was standing by himself in the lounge. He was staring directly at the bookshelf behind the chair in which Doris had been sitting. For a moment he felt as though he were falling, and he heard the clock chime. It was ten, and the Resetters were due to arrive. Quickly Dev looked around. The shelves themselves were tightly packed—books, pictures, magazines, small vases with long dead flowers poking out from the top. Dev heard voices, muffled and dim, and his eyes fell on the jar of jelly beans. He had a deep and sudden urge to thrust his hand into the jar. He walked over to it, took off the lid, and reached in. His fingers touched the smooth, hard candy, and he heard a knocking at the door. Quickly, he lifted one out of the jar and dropped it into his trouser pocket. He quietly placed the lid back on.

He heard a thump, and a hot panic broke through his skin. He’d let Doris out of his sight; he’d been lost in thought, taking something that wasn’t his to take and now, Doris might be—he ran quickly toward the door, grabbing his briefcase on the way. It knocked against his legs and the doorframe, and he felt the equipment inside banging around. Maybe she’d changed her mind. Maybe she’d hidden a knife underneath a piece of mail on the floor. She’d said Gemma had told her to stay alive no matter what, but Dev knew that most people didn’t think clearly, not this close to a reset. She could have used the knife at her neck or down the inside of her forearm; the blood would come out quick and hot and fast. Dev felt sick at the thought of it, of having to first staunch the bleeding but not before it went everywhere—onto his suit, his trousers as he kneeled on the carpet. But when he turned out of the doorway and into the hall, he saw Doris standing and there at her feet the sodden package Dev had handed her at the door.

“Forgot it was heavy,” Doris said.

“Oh,” Dev said, forcing a smile. “Here, let me help. Is it broken?”

Dev set his briefcase down, thankful he’d hadn’t needed to resuscitate Doris. He bent to pick up the package. As he did a deep shame rose in him—that Doris could’ve done something, that something had impeded his work. He tried to focus.

“Please,” Dev said, holding the package out to Doris. “Use both hands.”

She took it in her hands. The two of them stood there in front of the door, each with their eyes on the package. There was another knock, and one of the Resetters pressed the bell twice in a row.

“Ms. McGregor,” Dev said. “Why don’t you go sit down? I’ll let them in.”

“Oh?” she said. And then, “Alright. Come on, Max.” The little dog circled her feet and pressed his front paws on Doris’ shin. “Come on you old dingo dog, you.”

Dev waited until Doris had gone back into the lounge before unlocking the door. He quickly took his handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his forehead and the back of his neck. He stuffed it back into his pocket and opened the door.

Two Resetters stood before him. They were large men—they were always large men—hulking and wide. They wore white hazard suits emblazoned with a cursive R on the left upper chest. The clear plastic square on their hoods allowed Dev to see their faces, but he didn’t recognize either of them, though he did not often associate with Resetters. He didn’t like their brutishness, the way they’d been selected for their jobs only because of their physique. They were trained to be intimidating, and even though Dev knew there was nothing to fear, he was uneasy. And there were always two of them, their adrenaline and epinephrine surging; it took more than one set of hands to handle the equipment, especially if the struck fought back.

“Hello,” Dev said. “I’m Lt. Singh, Collection Unit. You’re here for Ms. McGregor?” he asked.

The one on Dev’s left looked at the clipboard he held in his hand. “Yep,” he said. “She ready?”

“I believe so,” Dev said. “I’ve just finished her collection.” He watched one Resetter gaze down toward the floor and the piles of mail by Dev’s feet. “It’s alright. I’ve already noted it,” he said.

The Resetters nodded, and Dev stood to the side up against the open door. They entered, and their suits, unwieldy and noisy, brushed up against the walls. Dev pressed his teeth together hard, and his ears filled with the strain. He followed behind them, and when he entered the lounge, he saw that Doris had sat down in the other chair—Gemma’s chair—and had the package sitting in her lap. Dev watched the Resetters flank Doris and take out their equipment. Doris did not watch them. Instead, she watched her own hands open the package. The tape came off easily, and soon she lifted out of the shredded cardboard a small vase. No, not a vase. An urn. She tossed the empty package to the floor and placed the urn on her lap, balancing it so that when she leaned back and dug her bony fingers into the threadbare fabric, it remained upright and still. The dog jumped up and nestled himself in between her thigh and the arm of the chair, whining as she leaned back. Dev watched her hands, how they pushed down into the batting underneath the upholstery, the tips of her nails white from the pressure. By the time she woke up in her bed, the Resetters would have cleaned everything up. All the photos and art and letters—all of it would be gone. She’d wake from her sleep more rested than she could ever remember being, and she’d make her way to the kitchen. There she’d find the tea. She’d make herself a cup and go sit in her chair. As the tea cooled, she’d stare at the indent in the other chair’s seat, the darkened fabric where the cushion had sunk, and think that come next week she’d need to have the upholsterer come around to have a look.

For the second time that week, Dev thought of the extra tapes in the car arranged neatly in a black case he kept in the trunk. They were for emergencies—if the tape split, or the struck got hold of it and smashed it. He could tell the Resetters there had been a malfunction and ask them to wait outside. He’d make something up to say to Doris—the recording was too quiet or the playback full of static. He could record another memory and leave just this one for Doris, hidden somewhere in the hall closet for her to find. Perhaps she would be dusting months or years from now and come upon it. Maybe she might pick it up with bent and worn fingers, turn it over in her palm and hold it to her chest. She’d slip it into her stereo player and hear her own voice, full of love and heartbreak, and know somehow that it was her Gemma, their pond, and the cold autumn’s afternoon.

One of the Resetters fixed the mask to Doris’s mouth and nose, and Dev heard the pop and hiss of the gas. He looked downward so as to not be disrespectful and he shoved his hands in his pockets. His fingers found the jelly bean, and, suddenly embarrassed, Dev made to leave.

“Hey,” one of the Resetters called after Dev just as he was about to exit the lounge. “You get everything you need?”

“I did,” said Dev, who could not help but think only of Doris’s pond, and the way the ice sounded when the oars broke through.

TWO

The tape recorder bumped against Dev’s chest as he went over the bridge seams. A quiet whir came from underneath the car, the wheels meeting metal as he crossed the inlet below. Though he could not see it, he knew the dark water churned beneath him, splashed hard up against the jagged rocks. He hadn’t been down to the shore in years, and he knew he should go, just as he used to do as a child when the Caretakers took them to spend a nice afternoon in the sun. The fresh air and salt breeze would be good for him from a physical standpoint—all the literature the Bureau issued said so. Exercise, enjoying nature, feeling the warmth of a summer’s day on his skin—these were the things that, if done on a regular basis, would keep him content. And so Dev made a note to himself to walk from his housing block down to the sea as soon as he had time. Maybe he could get Shay to go with him. She would be pleased by Dev’s efforts; he knew she worried after him. Twice that day he’d slipped up—first he hadn’t gone through the mail and then he’d forgotten to accompany Doris to the front door. He swallowed hard and tasted the bitter leftovers of his morning coffee on his tongue.

Up ahead the Absorbers were out. There were dozens of them, dispatched to the bridge perimeter since the incident; they were on foot and stood in a line across the road, a kind of human wall that blocked the railing. They all wore the same white trousers and shirts, their beards a range from red to black. Facial hair was a prerequisite of the job; during the early years of Mitigation, the Bureau had discovered the look disarmed even the most combative. Dev brought his hand up to his cheek. He wouldn’t be able to grow a full beard even if he wanted to. The Bureau was right, though—Dev felt at ease in their presence, and not just because they were guarding the bridge. Dev slowed the car as he approached the first one and rolled down his window.

“Good morning,” Dev said.

“Morning,” said the Absorber. “Where are you headed?”

Dev took his identification out of his pocket and showed it to the Absorber. “The Bureau, Clocktower,” he said.

The man squinted at Dev’s credentials and then said, “Collections, huh?” He put his forearm on the car and leaned down toward the empty window so that he was eye to eye with Dev. “I hear you’ve been busy, too,” he said. “Something must be going on. Don’t know—between you and me, I think they aren’t telling us everything.” He looked around and over his left shoulder as he spoke.

Dev nodded, but he was startled. The Absorber spoke with nonchalance, and Dev figured they weren’t being recorded, not out there in the open on the bridge. Maybe the Bureau wasn’t sharing all they knew; after all, it was their job to protect the villagers. Perhaps not informing them kept them safe. As it was, things had been getting worse, and not just because of the bridge incident. Dev felt it, the tipping of scales.

“Hopefully,” the Absorber said, “something like this won’t ever happen again.” He tilted his head back toward the bridge railing and the sea below. Over twenty had jumped, some of them with children in arms. But not before first setting themselves on fire. A pact, the Bureau had said, made strong by lies and deception. They’d had accomplices, family, and friends that had risked their lives to keep secret the fact that all those people were struck. The Bureau had been clear in their messaging: there was no cause for alarm. But now, as Dev sat and waited at the checkpoint, he felt for not the first time that day a wave of unease.

“I’ll wave you through the other checkpoints,” the Absorber said.

“Thank you,” replied Dev.

But then the Absorber paused and held up his finger. “Actually—may I ask—is it true that more like this will happen?”

A horn beeped behind Dev’s car, and he quickly glanced in the rearview mirror. There was a red ambulance behind him, lights flashing. The Absorber stepped back, and Dev pulled over as much as he could. The ambulance sped up and narrowly passed Dev’s car. There weren’t any sirens—hadn’t been in years—but one always knew if the person inside was still alive or not by how fast they drove. As the vehicle whooshed by, Dev lowered his eyes. There was a pang, a tumbling down to his toes.

“Anyway,” the Absorber said. “You go on ahead. Guess we’re all busy.”

He patted the roof of Dev’s car and took one step back. He was close to the edge. Dev wondered if the Absorber had ever thought of jumping or if he’d only ever thought of falling toward the sea from high above and if there was even a difference. Would Dev’s own body break if it hit the water, too?

Dev pulled away slowly and drove along the autoway. He headed west toward the Bureau, which was situated in the middle of the village. The outline of the clocktower sat up against the sky. Mitigation had spared it, and Dev looked at how high it rose above the verdant earth. They’d said demolishing the clocktower would’ve displaced too many workers, and so while all other structures in the village were no higher than six meters tall, they left it as it was. Dev was glad—he liked to stand at his office window and look down to the rooftops and the streets below. The clocktower provided a common talking point, a meeting place, a reminder that the Bureau was working constantly, ticking away at keeping the villagers happy.

As Dev drove, he passed the shops on either side of him; there were many people out. They walked in twos and threes. Groups gathered on the corners, and the cafes and restaurants bustled with the pre-solstice crowd. He stopped at a crosswalk and looked to his left. Four people sat dining in the sun. They leaned into one another, their elbows touching, listening intently. Someone said something funny, and all four laughed at once. Dev smiled instinctively, but the smile quickly dropped from his face as soon as he turned his head away. He just wanted to go home, open the wooden panel on the kitchen wall and carefully lift out his yellow notebook. He’d find a blank space to write, and he’d put down Doris’s words—all of them. The frogs and cattails. Gemma’s hair. The cracking of the ice. He’d have her memory then, and he would hold it close to his heart.

* * *

Dev watched the elevator needle move. Reporting, Surveillance, Collections, Resetting. One by one, he rose toward the top of the building. The Bureau was immense—floor after floor, and wings that stretched farther than the eye could see. He rarely if ever had business anywhere else but Transmitting on the seventh floor. He was glad for it, for though he was friendly and amenable, he did not like interacting with the other departments. Their questions were, on the surface, innocent enough, but Dev knew what simmered underneath. They were now adults, but those that worked for the Bureau had all lived in the Home, just like Dev. He remembered the songs and the whispers after lights out and how the children had been sorted and filed into this department or that. When they were young most wanted the excitement of Resetting. Being a Collector seemed so boring and dull. But now, now as they all got older each day, Dev noticed the ways they looked at him from across the room.

When the elevator arrived at the seventh floor, the doors opened to a darkened hallway. It was the day before the Feats, and many had already gone on holiday. The lights were on a sensor, and as Dev stepped out of the elevator, the first bank flickered on. As he walked down the corridor in front of him, his feet quiet from the carpet and the overhead foam boards, the lights clicked on and off. On. Off. On. Off. On his left was a wide open space overlooking the atrium below, on his right was one door after another, all closed, the small inset windows darkened. At the end of the corridor was another door, this one propped open. Beyond the door was a room like all of the others; a single office no bigger than a school coatroom. Despite the magnitude of their jobs, the Transmitters had tiny workspaces. When he approached the doorway, Dev paused. “Shay?” he asked.

“Hey, Dev. Two seconds.”

Shay was at her station in the corner of the room. He could see only her short, dark hair as the rest of her body from the head down was hidden from Dev by big steel boxes and plastic tubing nearly running the length of the room. From where Dev stood, he could see that a chin rest cupped Shay’s jaw. Her forehead leaned into a small, firm pillow attached to a metal band. The configuration held her head still, which Dev knew was a requirement of waveform readings. Too much movement resulted in incorrect codings, and if the codings were incorrect, well, there was no way to know if the memory collected was as it was supposed to be or just the Transmitter’s version of the memory. The Bureau had promised the integrity of the Catalog: all memories collected would be transcribed and stored forever in servers scattered across the globe; the tapes, even with preservation measures, eventually deteriorated. The transcriptions provided an eternal record so that if hopelessness and despair were someday eradicated, the memories could be given back. This is what the campaign for Mitigation had promised. But that was before Dev. Before his parents, even.

“I’m almost done with this one, and then I—” but her voice stopped, and she held up a finger. Headphones on, Shay typed on the shorthand keyboard below the monitor. Only those that could effortlessly compartmentalize were selected to be Transmitters. And Shay was good at her job. She had a focused mind, and she didn’t move one bit, not even if the alarms went off. He was lucky that she’d been assigned as his handler this cycle, and not just because of their history together—she was the best there was. Shay knew how to read the sound waves the same way an archeologist might have read strata: Here are the folds, there the sills and the planes. Dev had a cursory knowledge, and he watched the waveform’s muddied reflection in the window, saw how the formants gave way to plosives. He knew, of course, that all points in a waveform were just phonemes strung together. But it was the empty space between them, the things the Resets felt but did not say—that was what they should be putting in the Catalog. What their hands looked like, how their chin had trembled, what their eyes focused on so that if, years from now, they got their memory back, they would be able to say yes, yes, I remember. I remember all of it.

As Dev waited, he listened to the clicking of the keys. The room smelled hot and electric. A quiet ringing slipped into his ears, the high pitch of energy pulsating all around him. Recycled air tumbled down from above. It was cool, but not too so, and Dev stared at Shay’s desk and barriers and little tubes of hidden wires neatly strung from one end of the room to the other. It looked like a hospital—no, a hospital room—and Shay, hooked up and tethered from one side to the other, the patient.

Dev saw the waveform die away until there was nothing there reflected in the window behind Shay. She continued to type through the silence, though, quickly, her hands moving up and down with the keys. And then suddenly it was done; no more than five minutes had passed, and Dev heard the wheels of the tape spin as Shay rewound it. There was a suctioning sound then as she inserted the tape into the tube that went to the incinerator. She pushed her chair away from the desk and rolled back toward the window. It was dusk, and the sky glowed along the wide horizon far on the other side of the sea.

“Okay,” Shay said. “You’re up. Ugh,” she said and stood. “Sometimes I wish I had your job. At least you get to be out of the office.”

“Yeah,” Dev said. “But I’m mostly in the car.”

“Or sitting in a stranger’s lounge.”

“True. And that’s not—”

But Dev stopped abruptly, forgetting for a moment where he was. He and Shay stood looking at each other. Dev closed his mouth and smiled, a kind of offertory gesture as if to say, Well, what else can we do? Shay’s eyes flickered quickly once up toward the ceiling above Dev’s head. He did not look up, nor did he need to; there was a camera above Shay’s head, too. If he let himself look, he’d count ten cameras in plain sight, endlessly recording every sound and movement he made from the time he parked his car until the time he drove away.

“I’m beat.” Shay said. “What about you? How you holding up?”

Dev lifted his eyebrows. “I’m okay,” he said. “I had seven collections in the last four days.”

“But no life events, right?” Shay asked.

Dev thought of Doris. She would be sitting in the chair perhaps, her small dog at her side. Maybe the television was on low. She’d be groggy and might think that what she needed was a good nap. She’d close her eyes and fall asleep, but her dreams, the wildness and realness of them, would keep waking her. “No,” Dev said.

“I guess that means you’ll get the award next week. Is anyone else even close to you?”

“I’m not sure. I don’t think so, but you never know. Especially now that it’s this busy. Did you see the Absorbers on the bridge?”

Shay nodded her head. “I did,” she said. “I wouldn’t want to be them right now.”

Dev wanted to tell Shay how the Absorber had tried to ask him something, that there had been something in the man’s voice, his posture, that made Dev think it was something he shouldn’t have been asking.

“Seven collections, huh? Have you done your Processing?” Shay asked.

Dev shook his head just the tiniest bit. “Dev,” Shay said, her eyes widening. “When was the last time you had a session?”

“Not too long ago,” he said. He knew the rules: no more than five collections in a calendar week. Processing once a month. But he had missed his last one, and then the uptick started; he was surprised the Bureau hadn’t approached him. Already he was over his quota for the week. He wasn’t hiding or trying to get away with anything; after all, the Bureau had records on all of them.

“No memo, huh?” Dev asked.

“Nothing yet,” Shay said. “But there has to be, right? I mean they have to give us some kind of explanation as to why we are so busy. You think it’s just because of the bridge?”

Dev swallowed. He didn’t want to answer the question, and anyway it didn’t matter what he thought. Maybe Shay was right. Only a small number of people had been directly impacted. The families, the fisherman who saw it from the sea, the black smoke and licks of flames. Still the rest of the village struggled. One of the fishermen interviewed said at first he thought a large piece of fabric—a parachute, maybe—was falling from the sky. But then the bodies broke apart and separated from each other, some falling faster than others.

“I don’t know,” Dev said. “Hope we get something by Monday.”

“You think there’ll be updated guidelines?”

The window behind Shay creaked as the wind picked up. After the following day, the days would shorten; if it were busy now, what would it be like when the sun never rose above the rooflines? When dawn to dusk was just a handful of hours? All of the employees were overworked—the Bureau had to address it at some point. Dev felt it, too. An ache deep in his bones, restlessness that sat just beyond his reach.

“Well,” Shay said after Dev didn’t answer. “Maybe they’ll review the Mitigation scheme. How many you got, anyway?”

“Just this one,” Dev said. He reached into his breast pocket to retrieve the recorder. When he had lifted it out, he pressed the eject button with his right thumb and popped the tape into his left hand. “Oh,” he said. “I forgot to label it. Hold on.” From his pocket, he took a pen and put the tip to the tape. He wrote the date and below that his employee identification number.

Shay came around from behind her station and walked toward Dev. As she did, she held her hand out for the tape. But instead of putting it in her hand, Dev closed his fist around it. He had the sudden urge to put his arms around Shay, hug her tight and pull her close to his chest. He could feel it almost, the way his back would flex as he touched his fingertips to his elbows.

“Dev,” Shay said.

She had stretched out her hand to Dev, palm flat and facing up. Her eyes widened, and she flicked her fingers back and forth. “Come on, then,” she said. When Dev handed the tape over, she said, “Must be a good one.”

“No—it’s not that—it’s—”

But Shay was already walking back behind the machines. “Just wait there,” she called. “Won’t take long.”

The recording was only a little over a minute. But there in the bright Transmitting room it felt endless, insufferable, even. His palms itched, and he dragged his fingernails along his skin slowly trying to find the spot. But the itch jumped to his cheek and then his chest. In his ears, too. Though he was standing only a few feet away, Shay’s typing sounded far off and dim. Dev heard it but did not hear it, for the sound that held his focus was the tiny squeak, the spinning, of a little plastic spool. He pictured the thin material winding and winding from one side of the tape to the other. Fast forward, rewind. Pause.

“And I’m done,” Shay said as she took off her headphones. “Fancy a drink?”

“No,” Dev said. “I think I’ll head home.” He slipped his hands into his pockets. As he did, his fingers found the jelly bean he had plucked from Gemma’s candy jar. He rolled it around between his fingertips, squeezed it as hard as he could. But the sugared shell did not give.

“Come on. Just one. You never come,” she said.

“That’s not true.”

“Name the last time.”

Dev opened his mouth, but he could not recall exactly. “It’s not as easy for me as it is for you,” he said. “You see how they are.”

“No one is any different around you than they are around me,” Shay said. “You’re just projecting.”

“Projecting what?”

“I don’t know. Your weirdness. You’ve always been like this.”

“You can’t say you haven’t noticed it—when we were little, they would—”

“Yes, okay fine,” Shay said, waving her hand in the air. “When we were ten, yes. But we’re all grown-ups now, and everyone knows you’re not on the clock.”

Just as Shay spoke, Dev heard the bells again calling the Home’s children back from the great green space just beyond the Bureau’s doors. It was lunchtime, and Dev felt his own stomach rumble. It’d been fifteen years since he’d taken a meal there—Shay, too. Shay meant well, Dev knew. But he also knew that what she was saying was untrue. People did grow quiet around him.

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll have one.”

As the two of them walked across the car park, the bells struck twelve-thirty. Lunch at the Home had begun. Dev missed that, the closeness of sitting at a long table with others and the Caretakers’ songs of hope. He wondered if Shay did, too.

* * *

The pub was off an alleyway near the northern edge of the village. Dev had been there before, with Shay and others from Transmitting, but he did not often go out after work. Maybe Shay was right. Dev knew of course what she had not said: if he never socialized, someone might say something. Of course he had nothing to worry about in the other areas; he kept his curtains open, his rubbish stored away, and he was nearly always positive if not enigmatic. Any lack in socialization could easily be dismissed—he was overworked, tired. Old. But still. He needed to put in the effort, even if he was employed by the Bureau.

The pub, like the surrounding buildings, was designed to be inviting and reflective of the small village atmosphere one could expect in that part of the country. Tiny latticed windows, wooden slat doors, oil lamps hanging from the eaves. Garden boxes stuffed with heather, bog myrtle, and gorse sat along the sills. It was all very beautiful, and Dev knew that the planners had gone to great pains to replicate the charm scientifically proven to put people at ease. And for the most part, they had. The cobblestones, the neatly swept streets and shopkeepers waving from their doors. Dev appreciated it—he did. He understood the effort that went into it—even though he was a Collector, he’d been required to take courses in planning like all the other children. But the tugging just below his collarbone never fully went away, and because of this, try as he might, he could not make himself feel as jovial as others seemed.

Just outside of the pub’s door was a group of Absorbers. There were five of them—big, hulking men that towered over Dev and Shay even from afar. Some were bearded, others not, but Dev saw quickly that they all had on the same white uniform with a black crest embroidered on their front left shirt pocket. They didn’t have pins like he and Shay did—too dangerous, especially for those Absorbers posted at the Sanitariums. Much damage could be done, even with a short pin. An eye could be taken, a wrist slit. Dev swallowed and kept his eyes down; Absorbers made him nervous. They always had. Even as children, those destined for the Sanitariums spooked him. They were effortlessly disarming, but as children had used it for trickery. Dev supposed they still did to some extent.

As Dev and Shay approached the door, one of them reached out and touched Shay’s shoulder. “Shay,” he said. As he spoke, he smoothed his beard to his face as if to give himself a better look. He was nearly a head taller than Dev, and his thick muscles bulged against the crisp sleeves of his uniform.

“Hey!” Shay said. “How are you? Off early today?”

“Prepping for the solstice,” he replied.

“Are you participating?”

“No. My number didn’t come up. Which is just as well—seems like everyone is real crazy right now!”

Dev cringed at the word. He was surprised by the use of it, especially by an Absorber. But maybe that’s how it was—Dev didn’t know. He watched him take a cigar out of his pocket. This, too, surprised him, and he looked to Shay. She also looked surprised. “Sorry,” Shay said. “Mika, this is Dev. Dev, Mika.”

All five Absorbers looked at Dev—his lapel, actually. Instinctively Dev’s hand went to the pin, and with his fingertips he adjusted the metal crest. “Hello,” Dev said. “Nice to meet you.”

Mika nodded and let out a steady stream of smoke. It lifted up into the sky, crawling up the side of the building. Dev followed the swirls until he could see them no more and then looked back toward Mika.

“Likewise,” Mika said. “Shay—meant to tell you. I got a promotion. Head now. At the Sanitarium.”

“That’s great!” said Shay.

“Oh. Congratulations,” said Dev. He didn’t mean to let his voice fall, but as he spoke, he thought suddenly of when he was young and in the Home. They’d already been divided into groups—what had he been, seven? Eight? He’d grown used to the other three boys in his Collectors group, their docile nature complimentary to his own. But whenever he interacted with anyone outside of his group, Dev felt a deep disquiet. For although others were kind—and they were all kind— there had been something about the other children, the ones headed for Absorption anyway, that he couldn’t then, nor now, concretely describe. But he felt it then there just outside of the pub, the same way he’d felt it when he was a boy. He must’ve looked disinterested as Mika gave him a confused smile and turned to Shay. “You going to the solstice?” he asked.

Shay put her hand on the door handle and pulled. “You bet,” she said. “Wouldn’t miss it.”

Dev turned his closed lips up into a smile. He nodded his head toward Mika who turned back toward the group he’d been talking to, dropping his cigar on the ground and stamping it out with his foot.

It wasn’t until they were seated with their drinks that Shay said anything. “Seriously Dev? Oh?”

“What?”

Shay put her elbows on the table and leaned forward toward Dev. “Why the ‘oh?’ Why not just ‘congratulations?’”

“I was surprised was all.”

Shay stared at him without blinking for a moment, before looking around and leaning forward just slightly—Dev almost missed it, but he’d known Shay a long time.

“Surprised? Or rattled?”

“Why would I be rattled?”

Shay held up her hand. “You can’t fool me.”

“Shay, I told you. I’m tired. I don’t really feel like talking to anyone and—”

“You never feel like talking to anyone.”

“I talk to you, don’t I?”

“Only because I make you.”

“You don’t make me.”

Dev said this last part quickly—too quickly—and Shay sat back, looking around to see if anyone had noticed. He hadn’t meant for it to come out like that, so gruff and rushed, but as the words flew out of him he realized the answer to what had eluded him just outside of the pub. That thing that crept up inside of him, the same feeling that had been constant when he was a boy, was instinctual. Protective. Dev thought back through the children in the Home. There had been one, another boy tracked to Absorption, whom he’d befriended during outdoor play. They spent much of their free time together.

One day, about two years after Dev had arrived at the Home, he found a small, injured bird out by the grassy quad. It was not dead, but other than an occasional twitch, it did not move. He cupped it in his hand, so light it didn’t feel like anything was there at all. He carefully slipped it into his jacket pocket when the dinner bells rang out from the clocktower, and he followed the others inside and down the long hall to the dining room.

As he took dinner, he watched the other children shouting and laughing with one another. Dev smiled and laughed along, as he knew he should, but he kept his hand on his pocket and thought of how the bird was not dead but not alive; its body worked, but its brain was unable to remember how to fly. He resolved to care for it, to keep it secret, and tend to it when the others weren’t around.

There was a small box on the table filled with little pieces of paper intended for their nightly gratitudes. Without looking, Dev knew that they read things like Love Life Lately? and Feelings are Fun. He had nudged the box with his fork and slowly inched it toward his plate and then to the edge of the table. He waited until no one was looking and knocked it into his lap, quickly slipping it up into his shirt and folding one arm across it. He raised his hand, indicating that he would like to be excused, and he took his plate and glass toward the conveyer belt in the back of the dining hall. He walked slowly, careful not to jostle the box or the bird, and placed his items in a bin with the other used dishes.

When he returned to the dormitory, he found himself alone as all the other children were still at dinner, and the Caretakers, who took dinner in their own dining hall, had not yet finished. He walked slowly down the center aisle passing the neatly made beds on either side of him. Next to each bed was a table with a lamp. On some tables, there were books, on others remnants of pictures drawn during Art, or thick pamphlets intended to teach the children the preliminary responsibilities of their eventual jobs. But none of them had any kind of personal effects—no photographs or small stuffed animals or little trinkets and figurines.

Dev had walked to his bed and lifted the small box out of his waistband. He placed it on the bed, and then he reached into his pocket and cupped his small hand around the bird. He felt it move, and he gently lifted it out and placed it into the box. One wing flapped. As it tried to stand, Dev saw that the left leg was missing two talons. The skin was torn and crusted over, but the wound was fresh. Perhaps the bird had lost them in a fall or a confrontation with another animal. Dev worried that it hurt and silently hoped that birds really did have very small brains. He had laid the bird on the bed and sat to poke holes in the cover of the box. “It’s okay,” he whispered to the bird. “You’ll be okay.” And he felt in his chest a tightening, a hot sting in his eyes.

He put the bird in the box, covered it with the top filled with holes, and slid it underneath his pillow. When morning came, he would go out into the field and with his small hands dig in the earth until he found worms. He would feed the bird by hand until it recovered, and then when no one was looking, he would take the bird outside, placing it gently at the base of a tree or the edge of the prairie and tell it to fly.

Just then, his only friend came into the dormitory. Or rather, it was a boy with whom Dev spoke regularly, even though he was tracked to Absorption. But at his appearance, Dev must’ve jumped up because the boy asked, “What’s going on?”

“Promise you won’t tell?” Dev asked.

“Promise.”

Dev lifted the blanket at the foot of his bed, and the boy leaned forward. He put his hands on the bed to hold himself in that position. “Where’d you get that?” he asked.

“It was out by the prairie,” he said. “Flapping around in the grass.”

“You’re going to get in trouble.”

“It’s just until it gets better. I’m going to put it back.”

The boy, with whom he had nearly shared his loneliness, shrugged and stood up straight. Dev was surprised by this, having assumed that since he and the boy were friends, the boy would feel the same way about the bird.

“Looks dead to me,” the boy said.

“It’s not.”

“If you say so,” he said and walked across the aisle to his own bed, picking up a book from the side table and opening it randomly to the middle. But as Dev watched, he saw the boy didn’t look down at the book. He turned the pages with his hand, but his eyes looked straight ahead toward the dormitory door.

Dev woke in the morning to a Caretaker standing next to his head. The boy, his friend, stood at the foot, and Dev could hear him saying, “Go on. Look. It’s under the blankets.”

Dev scrambled up in bed, swinging his feet and legs out over the side. He put one hand on the blanket at the foot of his bed, gently. “Is not.”

“Oh yeah?” the boy asked him. Then again to the Caretaker, “Look.”

The Caretaker went over by Dev and gently lifted his hand off the blanket. Then the woman, who had always been kind to Dev and all the other children, lifted the blanket to reveal a small, yellow box with holes punched into the top. She picked it up and held it out toward Dev. “What is this?” she asked.

Dev did not reply but instead watched the Caretaker walk around his bed to his trunk. He kept his eyes on the box in her slender hands, worried that the bird inside was indeed dead, and that he would be thought to have been harboring it instead of trying to save it.

“What is this?” the Caretaker had asked again. he lifted the box up and held it out to Dev, but he was not sure what he was supposed to do. After a moment, he reached out to take it, but the Caretaker raised it up high in the air above where he could reach and put her hand on the electrical gun at her side “I didn’t say you could have it, Dev. I only asked what it was.”

“It’s a bird.”

“A dead bird?”

“No. I mean, I don’t think so. It was alive when I put it in there. That’s why I put in the holes,” he said, pointing up at the box.

The Caretaker brought her arm down slowly. With the box in one hand, she lifted off the top with the other. They both looked in at the bird that remained still. “Hmmm,” she said. “I’m afraid, Dev, that this bird is dead.” But as she spoke, she poked at the body with one finger and when she did, the bird fluttered and stood, flapping its wings and flopping out of the box. Instead of hitting the floor as Dev expected, it flew up into the rafters above the beds. Around and around it flew, up and over the timber beams, trying to find a way out.

As Shay spoke, Dev thought about the boy. What had his name been? Nolan, perhaps, or Nate? He couldn’t now remember.

“All I’m saying, Dev,” Shay was saying, “is just—just be careful.”

“I know, Shay.”

“So then why don’t you come with me tomorrow to the fairgrounds? Unless you were going to your own festivities. You were going to do something, weren’t you?”

“Yes, yes. I was going to go. Really,” Dev said.

“It wouldn’t look good, Dev, if you didn’t. And try to stay for the whole thing.”

Shay was talking about the fact that as soon as the sun went down the next day, Dev would try to slip away from the solstice crowd and quietly return to his own apartment. There he would draw the curtains and sit in the dark as he always did on solstice days. He would not partake in the festivities that followed the celebration. Shay was right.

“So you’ll come?” Shay asked.

He took a napkin from the caddy and put it down on the table in front of him. The picture on the front was of the clocktower, the time on the face five o’clock. Twice in one day. He straightened the napkin so that its edge aligned with the table’s edge and drummed his fingers three times.

“Yes,” Dev said. “I’ll be there.”

* * *

When Dev returned to his apartment, he parked his car in the garage and went in through the back garden as he usually did. In the moonlight, Dev could see tall dandelions sprouting high above his crabgrass. It was not his fault that his side of the garden had gotten to this—he’d been putting in long hours at the Bureau. He’d need to cut the dandelions down—take them out, really—but there were so many of them. And there in the moonlight he stared for a moment at the slender stalks and the heads, the clocks gone to seed. Soon the tide would change, and the wind would blow down from the north; the filaments would spread and disperse, landing somewhere new and taking root. It was impossible to eradicate them entirely, and Dev knew this. Still, he made a note to take out the trimmer on his day off tomorrow and tidy up.

Dev’s apartment was on the second floor; his neighbors below, a young family that had moved in recently, were nice enough. And though Dev should have made more of an effort to get to know them, his schedule prevented him from seeing them very much. There was evidence in the garden of their existence—a miniature bowling set, a half-open jug of soapy bubbles, tiny clothes hung on the lines to dry. He didn’t mind; it was nice to have people around, even if they kept their polite distance purposefully.

His apartment shared a wall with that of a young girl who was perhaps in her early twenties. When he made his way up the stairs to the landing, he could hear bright music coming from the other side of her door. He did not mind, as his neighbor preferred classical to anything Dev might have heard in a pub. It was rather soothing actually, the quiet hum of the clarinets, the crescendo of violas, the vibrating pluck of an upright bass.

After he’d taken off his jacket and shoes, Dev went to the front door to fetch the mail. He walked out of the kitchen and through the lounge, past the mantle where his awards were. The congratulatory letters, too. They were in their dusty silver frames—he was running out of room. He didn’t really like that they were on display, but where else would they go? He wanted to just put them in a box somewhere, stack them one on top of the other like bricks. But if anyone came around, if anyone found them hidden away in the back of some closet, they’d wonder why he wasn’t prouder of his accolades.

He retrieved the mail and went back into the kitchen. There was a cold pudding in the fridge, and he got it out and grabbed a spoon from the drawer. Then he pulled out a chair and sat down heavily, leaning up against the paneling long painted over and now chipped and peeling. He felt his notebook’s presence there, just on the other side of the thin piece of wood: the yellow leather case, the thick and curled pages. His own secret hidden just an arm’s length away from where he sat. By now, he knew the words in it by memory. Even if he added something new, which he did nearly every day, the old entries held fast inside of him: the woman whose best friend married her lover, the waterfall up north, the way the gulls dipped and rose against the pink sky. Dev had scribbled it with his own shaking hand in the near dark, and now that he was alone, he could do it again.

He pressed the paneling in slightly and then pulled out the exposed corner. The piece came out easily, and he placed it on the kitchen table next to his plate of food. He should eat, but the pudding was dry. Reaching inside the small opening in the wall, Dev took out the notebook and reread the first page as he’d done time and time again.

He told me he’d heard the storm from the bath. Looked out the window at the leaves and branches. He said they’d swayed, but not too so. He hadn’t thought much of it but did notice the bright line of the horizon tucked underneath a looming sky. He heard his children in the hall. One of them—the youngest—stuck his fingers underneath the door and wiggled them. David said he bent and squeezed them lightly, and with a squeal they ran down the hall and slammed the door. Minutes later, as he stood in front of the mirror with a razor in his hand, there was a flash and a clap, the cracking of wood and the creaking of metal. He said he felt the electric buzz on his scalp, as if should he look in the mirror, his hair would be standing on end. He fumbled with the lock on the still shaking door, and as soon as it was unlatched, it flew open and hit him on the side of the face. Wind barreled down the hall. He’d cried out to his children, but he could not hear them over the claps and the peals of lightning. And then suddenly the storm stopped. I remember this, too, that they had found the children’s bodies huddled in the corner far underneath the hot rubble. David wanted to donate not the memory of the storm, though. He made sure to talk again of those fingers under the door and the innocent laughter that followed. That he heard their small little voices every moment of every day. David said they were so pure and wonderful. I told him it was a good donation, and when the Resetters came, he did not struggle at all. I guess he was already gone. Maybe he thought that it’d be like dying, which is, I suppose, what he’d long wanted to do anyway.

With his forefinger, Dev lightly turned the pages, the inks red and blue and black. Sometimes an entire sentence was crossed out—had he remembered it correctly himself? He tried hard to recollect their verbiage, their way of saying how the thing they wanted most, that they cherished more than anything on the earth they lived upon, was this one thing. To do it an injustice was cruel. And so Dev sat, with his pen poised above the yellow paper, and thought of how Doris had talked about the ice. The cracking of it, and Gemma’s hair in the falling light of early winter.

When he’d written down all he could remember, he closed the notebook and slid it back into the small space between the frame and the concrete block. Then, he affixed the paneling just as it was, pressing it in with the heel of his hand until it was seamless. No one would ever think to look there, even if someone did come looking.

THREE

When Dev woke, it was bright despite the fact the blinds were shut and the curtains drawn. He had not closed the curtains completely, though, and the light crept through the cracks, drawing thin, straight lines across his wall. He rolled over in bed, surprised to see the clock reading just after ten. For a moment, he couldn’t understand how he’d slept so late, but then he remembered: he’d lain awake in the dark for a long time trying his best to fall asleep. He kept thinking of Doris, of his own mother when they had come for her. He didn’t remember her at all—not a single feature—nor did he remember any interactions. That did not lessen his thoughts, though. As he lay there counting and tossing and turning, he thought of getting up and calling Shay. Even as a child she’d been able to comfort Dev. The two of them were kindred, linked together by disease; both Shay’s mother and his own had been struck not by some terrible incident, but rather by genetics. He knew this as all children knew of their histories. The sadness had been in him and Shay always, and Dev, who had no recollection of ever having a family, felt it there in his bones as he tried to fall asleep. He had pills issued by the Bureau, but he did not like to take them as they made him drowsy, his sleep dreamless and quick. Perhaps he should’ve last night. At least then, he might have the energy to stay at the fairgrounds until the clocktower struck midnight—only shorter days ahead after tonight. But it didn’t really matter. All that mattered was that on the solstices—the longest and shortest days of the year—everyone celebrated. Dev understood of course the need for the distraction; even he, sometimes, was glad for it. Either way, no matter which way he looked at it, it made no difference. It wasn’t as though he had fewer cases in the weeks that followed either holiday.

Despite that he did not like the fairgrounds during the solstice, Shay had convinced him to meet her there. Even when they were children and the Home had taken them out to play for the day, there had been disquiet in his heart. It was as if there had been a memory in there, tumbling around the very thing that kept him alive. He’d wanted to ask Shay about it—had she felt it, too?

Dev had dressed in his civilian clothes, and though he was required to wear his pin, from far away no one could pinpoint him as a Collector. As he stood in front of the mirror, he attached the pin to his collar point and put a comb through his dark hair. He was just a little grayer than he had been at last summer’s solstice, his eyes a bit more tired. Maybe Shay was right—he needed to get out more, make more of an effort. All the things he needed—all the things the Bureau said he needed and wanted—were right outside his door. The clean bricks of the buildings, the neatly swept streets, the cheerful greetings of passersby. Every comfort was accounted for, and Dev was left wanting nothing. But thinking of it made him heavy and full, like something was stuck behind his ribs.

He took a path to the fairgrounds, the brae that led down in between the houses then up along the ridge of the park. It was the same park the Home had taken them to when the summer days were long. The small hill to his left, mowed but not manicured, gave way to a large playground, a newer one than the one he remembered from his own childhood. Three children were on the merry-go-round, and two adults stood perhaps a few meters away. As he walked, Dev watched the children spin around and around, the whites of their solstice clothes bright in the sun. A little girl wore a long dress. The ends rippled in the breeze as she held tight to the metal bar with her small hands. Dev heard their laughter and screaming, no doubt looking forward to a day of play. He looked at what he assumed to be her parents, and a chasm opened up inside of him. He saw families all of the time—in the village, sometimes at collections, but there standing at the top of the park hill, he felt the absence of his own as if for the first time. There was a longing, a pang that knocked around his heart.

There was a loud boom, and Dev snapped his head in the direction of the fairgrounds. The festivities had started, and he saw the top of the Ferris wheel, the cages swinging heavily back and forth as it went around. It was almost as though he could hear the creaking from where he stood, the slow churn of metal gears pushing the riders up and up toward the sky.

* * *

As Dev approached the fairgrounds, he was careful not to walk too close to anyone. If someone did come walking toward him, he retreated to the side or turned his body to let them pass. In front of him was a large, young family, and the children were holding a rope so as to not get lost in the crowd. To his left were two elderly women, one in a dress, the other not. There was a breeze, warm but not weak, and the woman’s dress pressed up against her body. Dev didn’t mean to, but he saw the thinness of it, the curved back and crooked shoulders. He wondered if Doris and Gemma had walked slowly, too. Had they also held onto each other’s hands and elbows, leaning in close as if they were sharing a secret?

Dev was supposed to meet Shay near the candy stand. It already had a line, and so after seeing that Shay was not in it, he took his place at the back. As the line slowly moved forward, he watched a child with spun sugar get in a small train car and go around the tiny town built inside the ring of the track. It was a replica of their own village, and the clocktower, which rose to about six feet high, even kept the correct time. He followed the train car as it went around the circle, dipping down just a bit to add speed. The children aboard squealed and screamed and laughed, and Dev could not help but smile.

Then he felt a hand on his arm, and Shay was there. She was in a wide-brimmed sunhat and white trousers not unlike his own. Pinned to her collar was the crest of Transmitting: a small circle inside of which was the letter T. The circle was made to look like the sun, but instead of rays protruding out as a child might draw, it had the lines on an echograph, the dips of the plosives. Her pin was also on the left collar point just as Dev’s was. He reached up and touched his own.

“It’s fine,” Shay said. “You look great.”

“Thanks,” Dev said. “So do you.”

They stood in silence for a few moments. It was a comfortable silence, the kind they fell into as children when outside playing at the sea. They’d dig with sticks and scoop with rocks, and when the sand pile was high enough, they’d begin to mold it. It was usually just the two of them off together on excursions; they were the only two that had genetic dispositions. The other children—their parents had suffered a great loss, a trauma of some kind. But for Dev and Shay, the illness lived in their cells.

The line moved forward. “Do you remember when we used to go to the sea?” Dev asked. “When we were young?”

“You were always trying to find clams,” Shay said.

Dev laughed. “I was.” And then, “But I always wondered—why did they let the two of us go off alone? Remember we’d make the sandcastles?”

Shay shrugged. “I don’t know. Probably had something to do with contagion.”

Dev nodded and fell quiet. He supposed she was right; because his own potential for grief could not be isolated, he was a danger—even as a child. And while they were integrated into all activities, they frequently found themselves alone on the edge of a group.

“We had some good sandcastles, though. Surprised they didn’t switch our tracks. We could’ve been village planners!”

Shay laughed at this, but of course she knew Dev was not serious. Dev’s track, as with Shay’s, had been determined upon intake.

“If they’d had, we might not have gotten to work together.”

“Aw, Dev, are you being… sentimental?”

He was and it was alright because it was the solstice. Shay nudged him with her elbow. “It’s good to see you like this, Dev,” she said.

“Like what?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “You’ve just seemed a little off lately. I worry about you.”

Dev gave a half-smile and shook his head. “You don’t need to worry. I’m fine. Just tired. Aren’t you? We’ve been so busy. I just don’t feel rested.”

Shay put her hand on his elbow, leaned her head in toward him and said, “Listen, we will stay for a bit—we can go when the Feats are done. If you want I’ll go to your block’s celebration with you. We don’t have to stay here. But we should stay out, you know?”

“No, no it’s fine,” Dev said. “It’s just—the crowds. Since the bridge and—”

“I know,” Shay said and then fell silent. The two of them thought of it, of the way the people had jumped, burning, into the sea below. How the steam must have risen above the water as their bodies cooled and sizzled. “But that’s normal. You’ll see—they’ll talk about it in Processing—you are going, right? There’s a recording they’ll show you. I don’t know—something about the way it looks is supposed to help you. I felt better after watching it…”

Shay drifted off, and the line moved forward. His stomach turned; maybe he was hungry after all. When it was their turn at the counter, Dev ordered a bag of licorice for himself and a fried dough for Shay. He liked the way the bitter squares tasted, and he’d tuck one between his cheek and his teeth during the Feats. He’d do his best to look like all of the others at the fairgrounds that day—he’d be upbeat, gregarious even. Whatever was expected of him, he’d do. If he needed to laugh at a story or sit through the worst Feats ever, he’d do it. He owed it to Shay, if nothing else.

The two stood off to the side and ate. Dev watched as people made their way toward the large main tent. They walked in twos and threes, some alone, scurrying past like little white mice. Dev thought for a moment that if he were a giant, he’d pick them up by the backs of their necks and carry them to the sea. There they’d breathe in the salt air like he did as a child. He remembered that, the way it filled his lungs and his cheeks.

“Dev, look,” Shay said quietly.

Two Caretakers walked toward them. Their robes were white, their hair white, and even the holsters slung across their waists were white. It’d been a while since Dev saw one up close, but as soon as they drew near, he felt the familiar sadness, the weight of it down deep in his belly. There were Caretakers for all ages— the ones who had tended to him in the Home were just as capable of tending to patients at the Sanitarium. Behind the Caretakers, the patients moved slowly. Their gestures lagged, their worried eyes wondered. They were medicated, and their brains, foggy and tired from the treatments, could not quite process what they were seeing. Dev watched only briefly as it was rude to stare. Everyone looked like that in the beginning.

The announcements began. Out of two speakers attached to the top of the main tent’s central pole, a voice welcomed everyone to the celebration. “Come one, come all,” it cried, “the Feats are about to begin.” Over and over again, the voice called out to the masses that had gathered on the fairgrounds: “Who will be reset? Who will keep their memories?” People cheered and clapped their hands above their heads, whooping and hollering, getting it all out of their system before entering the tent. Once inside, the crowd was quiet, regardless of what happened.

“We should go in,” Shay said.

“Shay, you know—”

“I know, I know, but it’ll be fun, right?” She said this loudly, grinning as wide as she could. But then she bent her head toward her plate of fried dough and said, “It should be enough, okay?”

“What?” Dev asked.

But Shay just looked up at Dev from underneath the brim of her hat. Her eyes held his for just a second. Then she turned her head away and looked in the direction of the tent’s entrance.

“Come on,” she said. “It’s starting.”

* * *

The grass leading up to the tent’s entrance was trimmed low and neat, looking not unlike the bowling green near his own housing block. Of course the fairgrounds grass was always well-manicured, but Dev felt it underfoot as if for the first time. He wanted to crouch down and run his fingers over the tips of the grass. Was it as soft as he thought? Would the blades bend under the weight of his hand easily? How hard would he have to press to sink down into the earth? Instead, he walked through the draped entrance of the circular tent with Shay and waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkened space.

There were long, massive benches all along the inside edges of the tent. They created a heptagonal shape so that no one person blocked the view of another. It was important that everyone could watch and witness what unfolded so that there could be no question, no disparity. Many of the seats were already filled, but Shay and Dev found a spot, squeezing themselves between a young boy and a woman that might have been nearly thirty, though with everyone in their solstice dress it was difficult to tell.

The ring was just like he remembered—a flattened dirt floor, a pole rising up from the center. Attached to the top of the pole were long ribbons—they would be wrapped around the pole later, after the Feats, in hopes of bringing forth good health and fortune. Around the pole sat four metal chairs, and the light streaming in from the tent opening shone down on them. They were arranged in pairs—two facing west and two facing east, but placed close together so that whomever sat in them nearly touched the knees of the person opposite. This placement was intentional, but not safe in Dev’s opinion, though it had been years since something horrifying had happened. Still, Dev remembered the last time—the way the woman had torn at the Absorber, catching his throat with a nail file before anyone could get to her. He remembered the white uniform and the bib of blood. He shuddered.

A cymbal crashed, and the crowd, which had been laughing and high-spirited, slowly quieted down. The people inside of the tent made last minute adjustments to their seated positions, smoothed out their skirts and adjusted their collars. They cleared their throats and put arms around the children seated next to them or on their laps. It was important to not disrupt the entrants, to not distract them with any unnecessary movement. It could disqualify them, and being responsible for such a mistake was not something anyone wanted to bear.

From a small opening on the far side of the ring from where Dev sat, a tall man stepped out, bending as he walked under the tent fabric. He walked toward the empty chairs and slowly circled them, touching each one with his hand and moving his lips. He held the microphone down by his side; the audience did not hear the blessings he whispered. They knew what he was doing, though. The audience then whispered their own blessings, bowing their heads and murmuring their wishes for either themselves or someone dear to them. Dev lowered his head, but the words he had held in his mind just moments ago now escaped him. He stared at his feet on the dirt ground and dug his heels hard into the rocky dust.

“Welcome, welcome all,” said the ringmaster who, also dressed in his solstice whites, glowed against the dirt floor. “What an absolutely wonderful day for the summer solstice. Hard to remember a nicer one.”

Dev raised his head, and the crowd cheered. Some clapped, and the young children, many of whom had small, metal noisemakers that they spun above their heads, screamed and giggled.

“I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again,” said the ringmaster as he circled the four metal chairs. “It’s a shame we only get to do this twice a year. Such an opportunity!”

The crowd booed and hollered at this. Shay elbowed Dev, and he held up his right hand, pointing his thumb down. His hand felt heavy, his arm anchor-like. The motions were not unfamiliar, but something else was, and he walked back through his mind trying to place it. Over to his right was the section for the Home. Dev let himself look at them, watched them as they watched the ringmaster. He remembered attending the Feats himself when he was young. While everyone had closed their eyes and whispered their blessings, Dev had stared at the empty seats. What story could he tell, if it was him sitting there? Would anything he had to say be enough? After all, the children he’d been with were all in the same situation, so even if he had found the words and had been able to make them leap from his lips, would it have been any more than anyone else’s?

“We know that it has been difficult for many of you in the last months,” the ringmaster said. “There was the incident on the bridge, which in itself would’ve been terrible enough. And on behalf of the Bureau, I assure you, such a thing will never happen again.”

There was a loud barking, or so Dev thought, and he turned around toward the entrance to the tent expecting to see a large dog. But the entrance remained empty. There was a rustling to his right, and he could see people beginning to move, bustling, first standing up and then sitting down over and over again. The people looked around and then to the ringmaster, but he just stood there by the empty chairs with the microphone near his lips. Though the barking sound continued, he did not speak. Only then did Dev realize it was not barking at all, but a woman, her arm high up in the air so as to show her mourning band. She was close enough to Dev that even in the dim light of the tent, he could see that her face was red and swollen. One of her children must’ve been on the bridge. Surely, she wasn’t the only person in the tent who had lost a child that day, and though she had every right to act in any way she wanted, to give into the anguish that no doubt engulfed her blood and bones, it was not a common sight to see. But everyone in the village knew what to do in such situations, and so they embraced her as they knew they should, whispering condolences and offering her their handkerchiefs. It did not matter if they knew the woman.

“Thank you kindly,” the ringmaster said. “What a wonderful display of support. I can’t think of a better way to begin this season’s Feats. And with that, may I introduce our entrants.”

The spotlight, which had been focused on the ringmaster, swept across the crowd to the other side of the tent where another opening appeared. In a single line, the four entrants walked into the ring, the sunlight behind them casting long shadows. Two men were in solstice dress, both with mourning bands tied to their upper arms. The other two men, the Absorbers, were dressed in their Sanitarium uniforms, and although all wore white, there was no mistaking one for the other. While the civilian participants came in all shapes and sizes, the Absorbers were all the same—large, wide bodies, thick-necked, their forearm muscles strong enough to restrain. But they weren’t brutes and knew how hard to press on a windpipe without causing suffocation. They’d been trained, too.

The four entrants took their seats, leaned forward toward one another and shook hands. From where Dev sat, he could see only the faces of the Absorbers. One of them seemed familiar. In fact, when the man had walked into the ring, Dev had noticed his pronounced forehead, his quick gait. The thick, reddish beard. As the man had walked toward the chairs, he had waved at the crowd, brought his hands together and shook them over his head in a celebratory gesture. The crowd had clapped but had not cheered. Dev tried to place him— in line at the grocers, an acquaintance of someone in his housing block—but he could not. Still, it was as though he knew him—he was sure of it. Perhaps he’d met him through Shay. Dev turned to her to ask, but as he did, he saw the second Absorber come out. This one smiled and nodded toward different sections of the audience, but Dev kept his eyes on the first one, and had he placed a bet like many of the solstice-goers did, he would’ve put all his money on him.

“Please remember,” the ringmaster said, “remain seated. Internal encouragement is allowed, but silence is expected. Secure any children.”

The struck—and they were both men—fidgeted in their seats, their mourning bands darkly pronounced against their solstice dress. They looked young and strong, but of course, that did not matter. What mattered was only that they could put their woe into words in such a way that the Absorber they faced would have no choice but to falter, their eyes glistening, their jaws clenched tight. That was all it might take to win. The first to do that walked away from the tent, from the fairgrounds, their memories safe from the Bureau’s reach for the rest of their lives. It was a big prize no doubt, the biggest thing one could win in those parts. But the high of winning often faded quickly, and the winners—two a year—were sometimes found floating in the river shortly after the solstice, having stepped off the bridge quietly and without pause. But now there was no bridge. The only other structure high enough from which to jump was the clocktower and it was nearly impossible to access.

“Let us begin,” the ringmaster said.

Dev watched as it began. The spotlight shone down on the four entrants. The two men leaned toward their assigned Absorber, shoulders hunched, forearms resting on knees. They spoke. From where Dev sat, he could see only the backs of their heads, but he knew the men were speaking fast, their angst spilling from their mouths. It was a competition after all. They would’ve thought about what they were going to say long before the actual event, but there in the moment, Dev wondered if they’d remember any of it at all. The struck on the left straightened up and held his thumb and forefinger to his temples, and Dev could see his back heaving, his shoulders shaking as he said aloud all that he carried in his heart. It could’ve been anything really—a love that vanished, a child taken, the weight of an existence they didn’t wish to bear. Everyone had something—none worse or better than anyone else’s—but Dev knew that the cells inside predetermined everything. His own cells, given to him by a mother and a father whom he could not remember, bent and collided as the man he’d been watching finally broke, and a howl that seemed as though it came from a distant trapped animal bounced around the tent walls. But the bell had not rung, and his anguish continued.

Dev looked at the struck on the right. The man sat in a similar position—hunched, head lowered. But Dev did not watch that man for long, for his attention then went to the other Absorber, the familiar one. He knew Absorbers were trained to withstand a torrent of sadness, their ability to compartmentalize unparalleled. A dead spouse went there. Here, the accidental drowning of a child. One by one, the Absorbers took what the struck gave them, and though they had kind eyes, their faces remained expressionless, nodding only every so often to indicate that what the struck had said had been heard.

Suddenly, the Absorber on the left reached a hand out and held it to the man’s upper arm. It wasn’t unexpected, but still. The crowd rustled and whispered, This is it, this is it, but Dev had witnessed the Feats many times and knew not to be fooled by such a gesture. Perhaps the Absorbers had been told to do this or do that in order to excite the audience. Sure enough, the Absorber took his hand away and sat back against his chair as the struck in front of him dropped his head and sobbed, punching his own legs with his own fists over and over again. No one stepped in.

As the man on the left cried—his time wasn’t up, he still had a chance to win—the man on the right leaned forward and put his elbows on his knees. The Absorber opposite him shook his head, as if in disbelief about something the man had said. When this happened, Shay nudged Dev with her arm. She had money on this, and therefore, watched intently and without breath.

Dev knew that the struck on the left would need to calm himself to stand any chance of winning. He’d need to, with a clear voice and little reaction, tell the Absorber all of it. But the words that he might’ve used— shame, guilt, sadness, anger—would they be enough to convey the bleak gulf he felt from rib to rib? They were just words, after all. Phonemes strung together to create a sound. Maybe to some that was all they were— only words. Nothing more, nothing less. The others, though, the people that were weighted and dragged by the collective association of that sound, well that was the thing, wasn’t it? They’d try to find the word— maybe it’s this one, maybe that—but when it came from their mouths it felt peculiar. To those that were struck, it didn’t matter how many words they knew. None was ever the right one.

Meanwhile, the struck on the right leaned forward. The Absorber opposite him suddenly shook his head quick and sat up straight. The struck must’ve said something outrageous and alarming to elicit such a response. Dev watched the Absorber, and though his mouth remained closed, there was only so much one could withstand even with sufficient training. Dev saw the Absorber’s eyes dart back and forth, his brows crease and his lips tighten. Then the Absorber lifted his giant, bulging arms, lunged forward and put them around the struck’s neck. The two men, one large, one small, struggled, falling to the ground beside the chairs. Dev heard the scraping of their boots in the gravel, the hmphs and growls, the chairs banging against each other and the ground as they were kicked over. There in the dust of the once cornfield, the struck and the Absorber punched and howled. Whether the Absorber cried or yelled or grew angry, it did not matter. The struck had been able to undo him, and as his prize, would retain his memories forever. There had been a victory, and though they still rolled on the ground, the bell rang out, and the audience stood.

The one on the left remained seated in his chair. The commotion had happened so quickly, that only after the others were on the ground did he turn his body to look. As he did, Dev watched as the struck whipped his head back and forth, twisting his back and neck so that he could get a look at everyone in the tent. The ringmaster was trying to break up the two still fighting on the ground, and the other Absorber, having won in his own way, had stood and was now waving and gesturing to the audience. Dev kept his eyes on the struck, though, and when the man stood, he took a step to the side. It was nearly imperceptible, but Dev saw.

“Shay,” he said.

“What?”

But before Dev could respond, the man who had lost began to run toward the opening of the tent. No one in the audience moved. No one went after him, though certainly he did not think he would actually get away. Or maybe he did. Maybe somewhere deep down, his grief propelled him. The man did not make it very far, however, for at the tent entrance appeared three Resetters, suited up, masks in hands. The man, seeing this, suddenly darted to the right and from a child’s hand plucked a windmill toy. He tore the metal blades off of the attached stick and threw it on the ground. He jumped back and spun around in a circle, holding the wooden stick up to his neck. “If you come near me,” he cried, “If you take one step—” But the circular shape of the tent and the arrangement of the benches left him with nowhere to go, and his voice trailed away. The audience watched as the Resetters approached him slowly, methodically, each with their hand on a piece of the equipment. “I’ll do it—I swear—” he said, and the Resetters took a coordinated step forward together. Dev wanted to jump over the barrier and run to the man, and he moved to stand up; he was good at talking people down. But Shay put her hand on his shoulder and pushed him back into his seat. He listened to the swishing of the suits from where he sat, the rustle of a thousand whispers, the snapping in half of the wooden stick. And he heard the soft cries of those near the man as he brought the jagged end again to his neck. But this time he didn’t pause, and he didn’t spin, and he didn’t jump. With two hands he shoved it deep into just the underside of his jaw and yanked as far down as his hands would go. He pulled the stick out and Dev saw the empty black hole for just a moment before the red blood came bubbling out. The man threw his hands to his neck, but it was too late; a life event had occurred, and even if Dev or another Collector could’ve intervened, the puncture had been too deep. Dev could tell from where he stood. The Resetters stepped back, but the one on the end had been close to the struck, and the blood had sprayed the side of his suit. He tried to wipe it off, and a giant smear went from his waist to his knee. It was an instinctual reaction, not a thoughtful one, and as the dying man lay in the dust of the fairgrounds, the bells rang out. The Feats were over, another solstice come and gone.

FOUR

The next morning Dev woke with a start. As soon as he opened his eyes, he saw it again just as he had in his dreams.

He rolled over and looked at the clock. It was Sunday, and for the next six months, each day would be approximately two minutes shorter than the last. Two minutes didn’t seem like much, but a lot could happen in that time. The struck from the day before—it had taken only a second to choose a weapon, a couple more to finish the act. Dev reached up and touched his own neck, dragged his finger along the underside of his jaw. He pushed into his neck, and he felt it give softly.

The telephone rang. Dev heard it in the other room and decided to let the machine answer it. He pulled the covers up around his body—he’d gone to bed in his clothes—and he wished quietly but repeatedly for the gray skies outside of his window to stay.

“Dev,” Shay was saying on the machine. “Dev, wake up. I’m coming over for dinner. It’s Sunday, and the start of a new season. Let’s have a roast! I’ll be there at seven.”

Dev lay there and listened to the machine click off. A roast, just like when they were children.

* * *

Dev sat at the kitchen table waiting for the roast to cook. Shay was coming to dinner as she did most Sundays, and as he waited, he wrote in his notebook, trying to put to paper what he’d seen: the man’s crumpled body on the dirt floor of the main tent, the shocked eyes of the other solstice-goers, the quick movements of the Resetters. They had formed a circle around the body—and it was quickly just a body—that much Dev knew. They built a wall, but the dirt had been dry, and the blood flowed quickly. Dev had watched it creep under the Resetters’ feet toward him. Shay had pulled at his arm, but he had not been able to look away from the deepening half-moon shape. Maybe the broadcasts would say something about it; maybe he’d get a memo delivered—some kind of guidance to follow. His instinct in the moment had been to try and save the man; it was good that Shay was there to prevent him from getting involved. How many other Collectors in the crowd had also to fight the urge to intervene? Had any of them showed any signs of breaking—well, Dev knew the protocol. Besides, the wound had been fatal. There was nothing Dev could have done.

The door buzzer rang, and the pen he’d had in his hand fell to the floor. It clacked on the linoleum, and for a moment Dev stared at it laying there. From where he sat it looked like a worm or a short shoelace, and he bent to pick it up. He half expected it to move in his hand, and when it did not, he put it inside his notebook. He always kept a pen in between the pages. It lifted the spine and warped the pages, but he didn’t care. All he cared about was that he could easily get to the next blank page. He quickly put the notebook into the small opening in the wall and pressed the piece of paneling back into place. The buzzer rang again. Shay was early.

Dev went to the door and opened it. Shay held a grocery bag in her arms, and she shifted it. Bottles clinked against each other. “I brought wine,” she said. “And gin. To ring in the solstice.”

“Isn’t that what we did last night?” Dev asked as he stepped aside.

“Some of us did,” she said. “You left just as it was picking up. You should have stayed. I think you would’ve had fun.”

Dev followed Shay into the kitchen. She set the bag on the counter and took out bottles of gin, tonic, and wine. She lined them up, labels facing forward, and pushed up her sleeves. She turned to Dev, folded her arms across her chest, and looked at him.

“I had two pints,” Dev said.

“Yeah, but you could’ve stayed longer. I don’t know, maybe drink them slower or something.”

“Shay—”

“I know, I know,” Shay said, holding up her hand. “It’s just that yesterday—I was worried about you. The way you started after him.”

“I didn’t,” Dev said.

“I watched you,” she said. “Who knows what would’ve happened if I hadn’t been there? I know what you want to do—it’s what you always want to do.” And then, quietly, “It’s what you do every time.”

“What?” Dev asked. “What is what I do every time?”

“Nothing,” said Shay and waved her hand. “Just that you want to help—I know that. And you are, I’m telling you. Collecting from all those people—don’t they count, too? You save them. In a way, at least.”

Shay had been making the drinks while she spoke. When she finished, she turned and handed one to Dev. “Listen, I’m just saying this for your own good. And anyway, we missed you is all. I missed you.”

Dev smiled at this; after all, how many solstices had the two of them spent together? “It’s—well, you know. I’m drained. Beat,” he said quietly. And then, “Aren’t you?”

The smell of the roast was strong, and Dev went over to the window. The cool shoreward air lifted the edges of the curtains and found its way to the hot back of Dev’s neck.

“Sure,” she said. “But it won’t always be like this—nothing’s permanent. We’ve had upticks before, and they’ve always died down.”

Shay took a sip of her drink, and Dev said, “Yes, but the Feats yesterday—and no one talked about it last night. Didn’t you think that was strange?”

Shay shrugged. “I don’t know. Not really. I mean, what are we supposed to say? Come Monday they’ll just send a notice saying that everyone who witnessed it should take an extra Processing session.”

“I don’t know. I guess I just felt uncomfortable.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re all Transmitters.”

“So?”

“So the way you—well, not you specifically, but the others. The way they were talking about the cases.”

“What were they saying?”

Dev hesitated. The night before, when the others started discussing specific cases they’d uploaded, Dev had listened. It wasn’t inconsiderate. Not exactly. Had anyone else been listening too, the group would have sounded concerned and intelligent. Overworked, yes, but not embittered. When Dev looked at someone for more than a quick moment though, he saw their eyes shift and the heaviness in their lids. The large swigs of ale, the way they went around the table each with a story to tell that should have been interesting but instead seemed irrelevant.

“It wasn’t so much what they were saying. I don’t know,” Dev said. “Just seemed very casual. Like none of it means anything.”

“None of what?” Shay asked.

Dev gestured toward Shay as if to suggest something. “The cases, the people. I mean, don’t you ever wonder what it’s like?”

“What? To be reset?”

“Yes.”

Shay sipped her drink. “I haven’t ever really given it much thought. I suppose I wouldn’t know, right? That I’d been reset?”

“Don’t you think you’d feel something?” Dev asked.

“Like what?”

“I don’t know. Like something was always here,” he said, putting his hand behind his head just beyond the base of his skull.

“Anyone who thinks they are remembering something is just experiencing residuals. They’re firing—the synapses—but the neurons are dead. Empty.”

“Okay, but what about before? I mean how do you think you’d react if a Collector showed up?”

“I’d like to think that I could keep it together, you know? Have a good donation ready.” Shay said.

“And do you? Have one ready?”

Shay put her drink down. “Dev,” she said. “What is all of this about?”

“I guess it’s just different for you. For Transmitters, I mean.”

“What’s different? We hear the same things you do,” Shay said.

“Yeah, but…” Dev trailed away.

“Dev, you sure you’re okay?”

Suddenly the kitchen seemed small, and he turned his head from left to right as if trying to find a way out. The fat of the roast bubbled in the oven, the potatoes and carrots hissed. It sounded like the gas used on Resets, the constant quiet stream transforming one thing into another. Shay didn’t understand. Or maybe she did but just didn’t want to say, Yes, yes, I hear it too. Maybe she was afraid of what it would mean.

“Yes, I told you I’m fine. I just thought they could be a little more—I don’t know—sympathetic.”

“You don’t think I’m sympathetic?”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I know, but try to remember that we all do what we have to do. No better and no worse for anyone.”

Just then the kitchen timer went off and they both jumped. Dev picked up the oven mitt and opened the oven door. The heat tumbled into the room and the sizzling of meat on metal filled his nose. His stomach lurched, and the thought of putting a forkful of food into his mouth nauseated him.

“You know what this reminds me of?” Shay asked. She was trying to change the subject, and Dev followed. Maybe she was right.

“What?” Dev asked.

“The Home.”

“Ha,” Dev said.

But Dev knew what Shay meant. Every Sunday, the children were served a roast of some kind. It was always done well, a real proper meal with vegetables and rolls and butter and fresh milk. At dinner in the dining hall, Dev and Shay would look down the table at each other. Sometimes they’d make faces, but mostly it was just to acknowledge the grotesque way in which the other children took their forks and knives and tore at the food. There was laughter and joy and thanks, too, as the children were nothing if not grateful. But Shay and Dev watched the children, giggling and scrunch-eyed, as they ripped off long pieces of bread and meat and shoved them whole in their tiny mouths. They had reminded Dev of animals, hungry and primal and unpredictable. He tasted the memory of tallow on his tongue. He didn’t want to talk about the Home or of the dinners he spent hoping that no one would notice he wasn’t interacting with anyone. The children had sat according to eventual occupation, and the Collectors had been quiet by nature. Still, the children spoke to each other about their lessons, or of the Caretakers, or of what game to play when they had time outdoors. But not Dev. He chewed his food quietly. He smiled and nodded if he was spoken to. But infrequently was there anything more.

“Still quite nice out, isn’t it?” Dev asked Shay as he brought the pan out of the oven and sat it on top of the stove.

“I’ll be happy when the sun goes down before ten. I mean I enjoy it—don’t get me wrong—but, well, you know,” Shay said.

“Yeah,” Dev said.

“But then again, if we think it’s busy now, think of three months from now. It seems like it gets worse every cycle.”

Suddenly the word accumulation came to him. Was this what that was? That with each passing year it became harder and harder to dismiss the creeping thoughts that found their way into his sleep? “Shay,” Dev said. “Do you think anyone ever dreams of it? Of their memories?”

“Dev—”

“It’s just a question, Shay. It’s just—maybe that’s what dreams are. Our past experiences.”

“Well, I do sometimes dream about things I’ve done, if that’s what you mean. Like I’ll be uploading, and the equipment breaks down or something. Or the incinerator is jammed—things like that.”

Dev took out the carving knife and pierced the flesh with the fork. Juices ran from it onto the pan below. He watched it pool around a piece of carrot, blackened and crisp. He should have let it sit longer. “Sometimes,” he said. “I dream of—at least I think I do—of my—”

But he stopped himself. How could he tell Shay that he saw his mother in his sleep? Felt his father’s hand upon his head? But maybe she did, too. “Do you ever wonder what it would’ve been like if we hadn’t gone to the Home?”

“Hadn’t gone? Where would we have gone then?”

“No—that we wouldn’t have needed to go to the Home. That no one was reset. Do you ever think about what it’d be like if they weren’t reset?”

“Dev!” Shay said.

“What? I can’t talk about it? Talking about it isn’t going to undo our training.”

“Better not let them hear you saying anything like that,” Shay said. “They’ll take your parking spot.”

She was trying to lighten the mood. It was a common tactic of hers, and so to play along, Dev laughed at this as he knew he should. “Let them,” he said, dropping the line of thought. “It’s not the best thing to be the best at anyways.”

“I know that collecting is hard, Dev. Remember—I hear the same things you do. Lots more, actually.”

“I know. It’s just different,” he said. “You’re not there, you don’t see—”

“But I do,” she said. “I see with my ears—you get that, right?”

“Yes, but when it’s in person—it’s just—”

“It’s not a competition, but I think it might be harder to hear everything with no visual cues—just my background knowledge and imagination to go on. I hear a cough—are they crying? Sick? I hear a click—is that the door? A gun? I get worried about you.”

Dev sliced into the roast with the knife he’d been holding in his hand. The gray meat gave way to light pink. He had cooked it perfectly. “You don’t need to worry about me. I’m the Collector of the Year, remember?”

“I’m not joking,” she said. “I do worry about you. I mean I always worried about others, but once I was assigned to you, my worry just went…” and she threw her hand up over her head. “In fact, I just uploaded one,” Shay continued, shaking her head. “So much destruction—glass, furniture—the screaming. I don’t know how you do it.”

As Shay was speaking, Dev had been slicing away at the roast, placing finger-width pieces on a plate. “Some people have a difficult time donating,” Dev said mechanically.

“Well, what do you do when that happens?” Shay asked.

Dev turned to tell her that he could typically talk them down, but as he did Shay leaned forward. He saw that the paneling behind her back was misaligned. It was unremarkable, the wood just slightly uneven on the wall, but a thickness started in his throat. He felt his heart beating in the back of his mouth, down in his belly right behind his navel.

“Dev?” Shay asked. “What do you do?”

“I—I guess I just listen is all,” he said. He tried not to look at the heaving wall, tried to tell himself that it was his imagination. He was still tired from the solstice, his work hours long and unrelenting. He held the knife in hand, the blade heavy.

“I stay until they feel comfortable enough to be able to donate something,” he said. “If you stay long enough, they usually come around.”

Shay nodded her head and leaned back up against the wall, and Dev exhaled the breath he’d been holding. “I wish they were all like you,” she said. “Must feel good to have only lost the one.”

Shay meant well, and Dev knew this—it should have felt good, better than it did in any case. Twenty-seven months had passed, twenty-seven awards given at the monthly inter-Bureau meetings. But it didn’t matter to Dev. The one he’d lost—a woman in her forties, childless—it had stayed with him all this time later. The way she’d played him. He’d not seen the gun—hadn’t even thought to look. But then there it was in her hand and then in her mouth, and when she pulled the trigger all Dev could do was watch her brains fly out of the back of her head.

Shay leaned to adjust her chair. As she did, the panel board that had been right behind them came loose and fell with a solid clank to the floor. Dev watched Shay as she focused her eyes on the wood. She lifted her head up toward the wall. There, brightened by the kitchen light, was his notebook.

“What’s that?” Shay asked.

The room went electric. The light from above buzzed, the oven popped as the metal cooled. The thin bass of his neighbor’s music. He heard all of it, and it wormed its way to the space inside his ears. He brought his fingers up to his lobes and squeezed them tight.

“It’s—it’s just my journal. You know, for reflection and all. We get one—I get one—when I get the award, when they notify me I mean…”

He said this jovially enough, though he felt embarrassed talking about an award he wished didn’t exist.

“Why is it there?” Shay pointed toward the wall but kept her eyes on Dev.

“I do my writing here. At the table.”

Dev put a fork in a piece of meat. It gave easily, the muscle cooked tender. He lifted his hand and brought the fork to his own plate. He watched his hand move automatically, again and again piercing the meat and transferring it. He filled his plate, the other one empty.

“You going to save some for me?” Shay asked.

“Oh,” Dev said. “Sorry.”

“Seriously,” she said and stood up. She walked over and reached out her hand toward him. “Are you OK?”

Dev thought she was trying to take the fork, but after a moment he realized she had placed her hand over his. Her skin was warm, and he pictured suddenly himself lying in bed. He was a child, but he could not see clearly whether or not he was in the Home. He was just waking—or had he been falling asleep? There were fingertips on his forehead, blankets being rearranged. He took his hand away from Shay and brought it to his hairline as if he’d feel the fingers there still.

“Are you?” Shay asked again.

He could trust Shay. She wouldn’t report him, but what was he supposed to say? That he was experiencing residuals? The Bureau would put him on leave.

“Yes, yes, I’m fine. I’m doing all the things,” he said.

“Okay,” she said. “You want to tell me about anything you write about? I mean you don’t have to.”

Shay waved her hand as if to disregard the offer. It was a kind gesture, the sort that everyone was trained to give in the beginning of Mitigation. “No,” Dev said. “It’s just the same things as when we were kids. Gratitudes, feelings,” Dev said. “Why, what do you write about?”

“The same I suppose. I usually read mine aloud in Processing. Helps me to get a better idea of it all. Have you done your allotment for the cycle?” Shay asked.

“No.”

“No?” Shay repeated.

“I have gone, it’s just—I don’t have the time. Besides, how often do you go?”

“I’m better at keeping it all separate up here,” Shay said and pointed toward her head. “Always have been.”

The notebook in the wall burned in his periphery. “Maybe,” Dev said.

“It’s just, well, maybe you should go more often. At least do the allotment. You’ll get in trouble otherwise. And I know you struggle—and Dev, this is nothing personal; it’s just how you were born. You couldn’t help who you were born to any more than me.”

Dev nodded, but he didn’t reply. He picked up the plates and walked them over to the table. Then he pulled the chair Shay had been sitting in away from the wall.

“I mean it, Dev. Go talk to Processing. They’ll help you. It’s their job.”

He bent down and picked up the panel board on the floor, his heart in his throat. So as to not seem panicked, he moved slowly and purposefully and gently placed the piece of wood back onto the wall.

“Maybe,” he said.

FIVE

The next day, Dev pulled into the Bureau’s car park and made his way to the space reserved for him. He’d gotten notification of an assignment in the early hours of the morning and decided to go in—he hadn’t really gone to sleep as it was. He slowly turned the steering wheel, tucking the car neatly between two yellow lines. A metal pole stood cemented into the ground at the front of the space. Attached to the pole with screws was a metal placard: Dev Singh, Collector of the Year. Beneath his name and title were several dates— seven of them, actually—one for each of the years in which he had won the Bureau’s award. He turned off his car, sitting for a moment in the silence and stillness of the early morning. He was the only one there— always, always the first one in, the last one out—and he could see across the car park to the entrance of the Home. Other than adding an additional wing, it had not changed much in the last thirty years; the doors were white, the steps leading up to them white, the signs white. A design meant so as to not frighten the children.

He rubbed his right thumb over the side of his middle fingertip, felt the tenderness of the skin, the small blister made by the force of the pen. He’d written long into the night again about the weekend’s festivities; the way the strucks’ shoulders shook, their necks bent long and heavy with sweat in the heat of the tent. He wrote of the Absorbers and the facelessness of it all, how the ringmaster could not find the winner’s hand to raise; the man, who lay curled on his side in the dust, had buried it into his stomach. But now in the light of morning, Dev’s two fingers looked swollen. He could say he’d been knitting or painting. Fixing something in his apartment. No one would question him. But that was the thing, wasn’t it? He had a perfectly good explanation should anyone ask, but they would not. They would only glance and remember what they saw, so that if they were called in and interrogated, they could say, Yes, I did notice something. And so even though he’d likely be the only one there at that time, he made sure to keep his hand in his pocket.

He walked through the front doors and into the atrium, the white marble of the floors gleaming from their nightly cleaning. In each corner of the open space, a tree grew. They rose up high toward a retractable glass ceiling that allowed in what little sunlight they had in the northern part of the country. The trees, downy birches planted many years ago, now reached up almost to the roof. Their seeds, long and worm-like, were nearly as long as Dev’s hand.

He could not be sure why, but instead of walking toward the elevator bank as he had done countless times before, he turned in the direction of one of the planters. He could not remember the trees being this tall; but then again, had he really ever looked? When he neared the planter, he leaned on the edge of it. Then he reached his arm toward the tree, lifting up on his toes, stretching as far as he could in order to brush his fingers against the scaly bark. He let his fingertips drag down the trunk. The jagged edges, the bumps and knots. He drew his arm back and looked at his fingers, half expecting to see something, but the trunk had been smooth and sapless. Maybe the tree’s seeds fell and were either collected or composted quickly. He looked down through the understory plants at the base of the tree. Then he thrust his hand into one until he felt the peat beneath, grabbed a fistful, and brought his hand back up. When he opened it, he saw nothing but the rich soil. He looked up at the tree again, and though it was only a flash, he thought he saw one of the seeds twist and curl.

* * *

Dev rode the elevator up to Collections, stepped off into a darkened hallway, and waved his arms quickly overhead to activate the lights. The department was like any other—long halls, identical doors, carpeted floors. He passed the common room and saw in it the glow of vending machines stocked with freshly prepared meals, but it, too, was empty, and for that Dev was glad. He didn’t mind the other Collectors, but all that attention, the shaking of hands and patting of backs, was excruciating. Inevitably they asked what his secret was, but all Dev could ever do was shrug. The truth was that he didn’t know—he didn’t have anything that the other’s didn’t have as far as he could tell. Yet somehow, he had received the award again and again, though he had difficulty remembering each of the seven times distinctly. They all blurred together, and when he tried to focus, there was an intangibility to it all, as if trying to touch the fog that rolled up the crags and into the valley.

His office was at the end of the hallway. It was tiny, just a little bit bigger than his own closet at home. It was featureless with the exception of two clear plastic tubes that came down from the ceiling. They stopped about waist-high, their openings covered by a sliding panel. The tubes themselves ran throughout the entire Bureau, but there in Collections was the final stop. By then the report had traveled through all of the departments, checked and double and triple checked. No less than a dozen people had to sign off on a case before a Collector received it. For just a brief moment—one that happened so quickly that Dev could not be sure afterwards that it had really crossed his mind—he imagined going down three floors to Surveillance and making whoever was there delete any evidence they’d gathered. He could use the fire extinguisher, a letter opener, his own tie. He could quickly wrap it around the neck of the person watching the reels, be done and gone before the sun had fully risen. And then the thought was gone, and he found himself clenching his fists, hot spit in his mouth. He swallowed and cleared his throat, making sure not to look up at the cameras above.

As soon as the automated lights switched on, Dev saw that the tube reserved for classified memoranda contained something. He slid open the panel at the bottom of the tube and pulled out the small, plastic canister. A piece of paper, rolled tightly but not sealed, sat inside. Dev lifted it out, closing and putting the canister back into the tube where it would remain until he pressed the button marked “return.” He unraveled the report between his fingers, stretched it out so that he could see the entire thing, and read it. At first Dev didn’t understand—he was expecting an announcement of some kind, perhaps about the uptick he and Shay spoke of. But it wasn’t an announcement; it appeared to be a report like any other he’d be assigned. Dev looked up at the cameras, behind him down the hall toward the elevator bank. He held the scroll up again, closer this time. And then he saw. An intra-Bureau collection.

At first glance he hadn’t noticed it; he double-checked the equation on the report, calculated it quickly in his mind to make sure that what he was seeing was correct. The metrics were all there: what the struck had purchased at the grocers. The way they greeted their neighbors. A history of television shows watched, music played, foods cooked. But unlike other reports, this one had two additional metrics: Bureau status and Sanitarium history. Dev let his hands fall to his sides, and the report that he was holding brushed up against his leg. He looked over at the empty tube on his right again as if, should he look at it long enough, something, some kind of guidance or explanation, would appear. But there was nothing there.

The address was no more than a ten minute walk from the Bureau. Dev could use the fresh air, and the sun was already out and bright. But as he exited the building’s main entrance, he paused. A group of children from the Home were taking their morning exercises out on the lawn. And though Dev knew that none would pay him any attention should he walk by, the thought of it saddened him suddenly. He thought of the bird and the boy, of the way Shay had come to him as he cried after. He remembered that she had said something to him that calmed him, but what it was he could not recall. Perhaps she had just sat with him on the corner of his bed, the empty nest box in his hands. The pills, the therapy—it had worked just as the Bureau promised. But although he could not retrieve that specific moment in his mind—what happened after, whether there had been consequences—he felt the shame, the worry, the unbearable sadness that another thing he loved had been taken from him.

The apartment to which Dev was going was just at the bottom of the hill where the creek ran toward the sea. He took the long way back through the car park and around the other side of the Bureau so as to avoid the children outside. He went down the hill on the concrete path, and as he neared the small bridge, he saw a large group of ducks huddled just underneath. The quacks and the splashing grew louder, and Dev stopped on the bridge to watch. They bobbed and darted and bit one another until with one giant woosh they scattered. His eyes fell again to the creek. There, where the male ducks had been, now floated a female, half-submerged and lifeless. The water lapped and from above, the children’s voices tumbled down down down in the cool breeze of the morning air.

* * *

At 9 a.m., Dev rang the bottom buzzer of the housing block. Carlisle, Noah, Apartment 2E. The name wasn’t familiar; there were hundreds of Bureau employees, only some of which worked in the main building. It was possible that Dev had met him in passing, but the Bureau wouldn’t let him collect from a friend or even a regular acquaintance. There were too many variables, too much risk. Dev had a responsibility to forfeit the collection if the name sounded familiar. And he had before—there was the woman that lived on the corner next to the post office, the young man that washed and pressed his suits each week. Dev knew them, knew their names; there was a simple but prolonged chatter whenever Dev had errands to run. And though they knew he was a Collector, Dev was able to strike a balance between friendship and reverence. He considered them close acquaintances despite only knowing them peripherally. And so when he unrolled the tape and saw their names, he had dropped the paper to the floor as if it had stung.

The door buzzed and unlocked, and Dev entered the building. The lobby was similar to that of the Bureau’s main building—large planters lined the walls, cannas rose high, monsteras curved and flopped over cement blocks. The air was earthy, the soil freshly watered. The leaves gleamed under lights kept clean and dusted by unseen workers in the night. Dev’s own block was the same, but as he pushed the button for the lift, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen workers in his building. He saw them on the streets, in the pubs, and near the shore; they did come, didn’t they? They must. Maybe he was too preoccupied. After all, he arrived home most nights desperate to hold his notebook, to flip quickly to a fresh page and begin again. It wasn’t always the collections he wrote about. Sometimes he wrote about his dreams, of a secret room he discovered time and time again. It was never in the same place— sometimes the room was in the back of a large building, sometimes a farmhouse, or a shop at the edge of town. But wherever he was, he’d know that there was a hidden stairwell or a closet door behind a cabinet. And he knew whatever was beyond was bright and fearsome.

When Dev reached Noah’s door, he knocked and then took one step back. The carpet underneath his feet was just like that of his own housing block. A wave-like pattern in muted earth tones ran from one end of the hall to the other. It was a small comfort, an effort on the Bureau’s behalf. Or at least it was intended to be. Everywhere he looked he’d see some detail the Bureau took responsibility for—the constant blooms lining the streets, the neatly trimmed roadsides, the sparkling tram cars. Dev knocked again but kept his head down and his eyes focused on the carpet. The pattern didn’t look like waves at all to him. They looked like snakes, like thousands of snakes, and if he moved, they’d start to slither. And so he remained still and listened for the source of the high-pitched ringing in his left ear.

No one answered, and Dev knocked again. “Mr. Carlisle,” he called out. “This is Lt. Singh from the Collections Unit. We have an appointment.”

Dev stood in front of the door and pressed his ear up against the wood. There was a soft hum and a vibration in his inner ear. He knocked again and placed his hand on the door handle. It gave easily, as if it had not been latched all the way, and the door swung open. “Hello?” Dev asked. “Is anyone at home?” He stood looking into a long hallway. A light above him hung down, the bare light bulb flickering and dull. “Hello?” he asked.

He heard a noise—a chair scraping the floor perhaps. Wood creaking rhythmically. For a moment, Dev saw it all before him. He’d enter the apartment, and when he got to a bedroom or the lounge, he’d find Noah hanging from a closet rod, or a ceiling fan. Dev looked at his watch. “May I come in?” he asked.

Dev gently closed the door behind him and there was nothing but silence then. A stillness had fallen in the apartment, and though Dev could hear the gulls outside circling, there was no other movement of any kind. The morning light shone behind him, and his shadow stretched long along the hallway’s carpeted floor. He crept slowly toward the first door and looked in. It was a bedroom, the bed neatly made and shoes lined up against the wall. He moved further into the apartment. The walls were bare, the carpet thin. On his left was another bedroom. It appeared unused; there was a bed, a small table, and one lamp, but there were no other signs of occupancy. Dev took the report from his pocket and looked at it again. Carlisle, Noah. Aged thirty-seven. Absorber.

Dev went through the door on his right and found himself in the lounge. A man sat in the corner by a set of sliding glass doors that led out to a small garden. He had his back turned to Dev and was slumped over his lap, his hands hanging at his sides. Dev could see long strands of spit stretching from Noah’s mouth to his hands.

“Mr. Carlisle?” Dev asked loudly. “I’m Lt. Singh. Collections Unit. You should have received our correspondence.”

But as Dev spoke, he instinctively brought his hand to his mouth and nose in an attempt to block the stench that surrounded him. Stacks of magazines and newspapers lined the walls, plastic bags stuffed with items were piled high upon the sofa and table. The room bulged, and it seemed as if the apartment itself was trying to swallow him up.

“Mr. Carlisle?”

Noah slowly moved his hand from his lap up to his face. He rested his fingertips gently at his forehead by his hairline as if trying to remember if he had been expecting someone. Now that he was closer, Dev saw that the cuffs of Noah’s shirt were brown. His hair was matted and dull. Dev brought his hand suddenly to his own scalp and combed through the short strands. He felt the cool damp of his palm as he touched the back of his neck.

“It’s nice to meet you,” Dev said. “This shouldn’t take long.” He took out a handkerchief from his pocket and folded it up into a small square. Then, slowly and gently, he approached Noah. “Here,” he said. “Let me help.”

Dev spoke but felt the spit pool in his cheeks as he did. He blotted first Noah’s mouth and chin, then wiped up the excess that had fallen to his lap. Noah moved his fingers from his temple. It was then that Dev saw three little marks on Noah’s hand. Dev looked down at his hands, at the damp handkerchief.

“Mr. Carlisle,” Dev said, “I’m here for your collection. Your donation—to the Catalog.” He spoke loudly as he first folded and then put the handkerchief back in his pocket. His fingers brushed up against the recorder. “Perhaps you have some questions that I may be able to answer for you?”

But Noah remained silent. If he heard Dev at all, he gave no indication. Dev had encountered this before. People who refused to talk as if it would in some way exempt them from collection. He waited a moment, and when Noah didn’t move to speak, he took the report out of his pocket. He unrolled it, stretched it out wide an arm’s length away, and read it. Maybe he’d not read the metrics correctly before. He studied the report from left to right, top to bottom. Noah was an essential worker, an Absorber. He’d been sent to the Sanitarium, spent six weeks there. Standard procedure.

Dev pulled the recorder out of his breast pocket. “I think we should get started,” he said to Noah. “If you could just speak clearly, we won’t have any issues. Voices don’t carry as far as you would think.” He was rambling, trying to ease the discomfort that wormed in him. He felt it down in his belly and there at the tips of his feet, his toes tight in his shoes.

“Do you know what you would like to donate, or would you like some guidance?” Dev asked.

He asked this even as he knew the answer; whatever was in Noah, whatever the thing that had made his cells change and his dopamine disappear was there still. He sat there, barefooted and dirty, breathing heavily. The recorder kept going. Dev listened to the quiet whir wondering what, besides his own voice, he would have for Transmitting. He checked his watch. The Resetters would be on their way shortly; even if Dev got nothing, even if he told them to wait until Noah came out of his fog, they wouldn’t. They had a job to do.

“Feel free to jump in—whatever you want, it’s your donation.” Dev fumbled over the words, caught them in his sticky mouth. “I can wait, it’s fine. But the Resetters will be here at ten. If I don’t have your collection, then you won’t get to have one in the Catalog.”

Suddenly Noah stood, and Dev, startled, dropped the recorder. He bent quickly to pick it up, but Noah scrambled and got to it first. He crouched there at Dev’s feet, his movements suddenly quick and purposeful, and he opened the recorder and pulled out the cassette. He held it up to his face and examined it, tracing the etching of his own name on the plastic casing with his fingertips. Over and over the etching they went as though should he do it enough it might wear away. Then he tilted his head up, his eyes bloodshot and pupils small. He squatted there only inches away from Dev and pulled the tape ribbon out of the cassette slowly like a magician; he kept pulling and pulling, and the tape, wound around his fingers and hands, dangled down to the floor. It was a lot of tape, and Dev could not ever remember having had a need for all of it.

“I know, Mr. Carlisle, I know,” said Dev. “Trust me when I say that no one wants to give a donation, not really. Even if they say they’re ready. You are not alone. I promise you. Here, let me help you.” Dev bent and hooked his hand underneath Noah’s arm and pulled him up. “There you go. Steady now.”

Noah stood slowly. His shoulders slumped and his neck bent. He wasn’t quite lucid, not yet. But he was bigger than Dev, and, lucid or not, might quickly overpower him.

“Let’s sit you down,” Dev said. “Sometimes just finding a comfortable spot helps to select a donation.” Dev helped Noah sit back down on the sofa. “We can stay here as long as you’d like.”

Dev didn’t want to leave without a donation, but it wasn’t because of how it would look when he turned up in Transmitting with a tape full of nothing but static and the quiet sound of someone catching their breath. It would be unlike him, yes, but he knew Shay would understand. A silent collection was more work, but Shay was an expert. She could measure the decibels of a blink, of a tear dropping and landing on someone’s knee. And she could turn those decibels into meaning. That was the thing the Bureau collected, in the end. It wasn’t the thing itself, the moment the struck recalled; it was how they felt when they remembered. That’s what the Bureau wanted. Dev stuck his hand in his pocket and felt around for the jelly bean he’d placed in there that morning. Since he’d taken Doris’s collection, he’d carried it around with him at all times outside of the house. He knew he shouldn’t have it. There was no proof that he’d always eaten jelly beans, and now that he thought about it, he didn’t even really like them. Something as simple as that could get him in trouble. He could easily pop it in his mouth should suspicion arise, but he did not want the taste of a talisman on his tongue. He took the jelly bean out of his pocket and held it in his fist.

“Don’t worry,” Dev heard himself say. “I’ll stay as long as you need. Even when the Resetters show up.”

He meant it, too. “Can I get you anything? Tea, perhaps?” Noah shook his head quickly, so forcefully that Dev heard a crack in his neck. “Okay, okay, we can just sit. How’s that? Yes, that’s right. I’m just going to clean this up here. Perhaps closing your eyes might help.”

Noah did as Dev suggested, and Dev knelt down to the floor to collect the unraveled tape. If he wound it up slowly, he could preserve it. “If you’d like,” Dev said to Noah, “I can give you some suggestions of recent collections. Sometimes that helps decide.

Still with the jelly bean in hand, Dev picked up the tape with his thumb and forefinger. With the pinky on his other hand, he wound the tape back, hopeful that Noah was coming gently to without alarm. “Well, let’s see. Just recently I happened to meet a lovely woman— older than you, much older, actually. She was worried her donation wasn’t going to be enough—you know, that the memory wasn’t important enough. Lots of people feel that way. But they always are—important, that is. Anyway, she settled on a time when she was in a boat with her wife, when they were younger. It was a beautiful memory.”

Dev waited for Noah to respond in some way, but after a few moments of silence, he swallowed and continued. “Before that,” he paused. “Before,” he said again, but he could not place them, their names and faces on the tip of his tongue. Who had been before Doris? He smiled and chuckled under his breath, but the hairs on his arms stood thick and rigid. They brushed against the inside of his shirtsleeves, and he thought of the way a bird might be skinned for a feast. His eyes glanced quickly across the floor of the lounge; they looked at everything but took nothing in. He continued to wind the tape until it was taut, and then he put it back in the machine and pressed record. Only then did he realize that he still held the jelly bean in his fist.

“Does that help at all?” Dev asked. “Really, anything you can think of, good or bad. The Catalog has a need for all kinds of donations. The tape is recording, so feel free to just speak up.”

Noah leaned forward on the sofa and put his forearms on his thighs. He gazed toward Dev. “You,” he said.

Dev waited a moment, and when Noah did not continue speaking, he said, “You… what? Do you mean me?” He raised his hand and pointed at himself.

“They—they—” Noah said slowly. “Dev—”

Suddenly, the buzzer rang, and a surge of panic went through Dev. He could not understand what Noah, who stared at him, was saying. He hadn’t told him his name, had he? Lt. Singh, yes, but that was all.

“Again, I’m sorry. I don’t understand—” said Dev.

Noah held up his right hand and pointed to his thumb with his left hand. He slid his forefinger across the three small marks on his skin. He pointed back to Dev.

The buzzer rang again, this time longer than the last. Dev shook his head and looked at his own hand, in which he held the recorder. He felt the vibration of the motor in his palm. He thought he saw there on his skin next to his thumb a slight discoloration, a hyperpigmentation of some kind. “Just a moment, Mr. Carlisle, I’ll get that. You just keep thinking of that donation.”

Dev turned and went back down the hallway towards the front door. He pressed the talk button. “Yes?” he asked. He kept his ear turned toward the lounge.

“Resetting here,” a voice said, the connection broken and full of static. “We’re just about ready,” Dev said and buzzed them in. He went quickly back to the lounge and was relieved to see that Noah was still on the couch where Dev had left him.

Noah mumbled and rocked. Then he brought his fist to his forehead, and Dev watched as he twisted it into his skin. His eyebrows rose and fell, his eyes squeezed tightly closed. Then he brought his other fist to his face and rubbed his eyes, his knuckles circling around his sockets. He leaned forward, put his hands on his knees, and tried to stand. Dev rushed to his side.

“Mr. Carlisle, please, there’s no need to get up. They’ll want you sitting down anyways,” Dev said. “I know, Mr. Carlisle. It’s a lot to take in. But I assure you that you’ll be as good as new, if not better.”

Dev was doing exactly as he should. If the struck were uncommunicative, their silence would count as their donation; Shay could make something of it in the end—she might hear a sigh, or the way that Noah twisted the skin on his forehead. Maybe the recorder picked up something that Dev hadn’t noticed, or maybe he had missed something when he was speaking into the intercom. And though Dev was following protocol as he always did, he could not help but feel a twinge there at his fingertips. Absorbers had difficult jobs no doubt; the amount of emotion, pain, worry thrown at them was unparalleled. Noah was not stationed at the Sanitarium, but it didn’t matter. Whether he was absorbing from a young person on the street or standing on the bridge or in a treatment room, he had to listen and de-escalate. That was his job. They could not intervene, could not offer suggestions—that was strictly Processing’s responsibility. And whether Noah got this way from one or one hundred interactions, Dev didn’t know. The report never gave a reason, only the data collected, the infractions that amounted to undeniable guilt.

The Resetters knocked, and as Dev went to answer, he could feel Noah’s eyes following him. Noah wasn’t completely incapacitated, but whatever treatments he had endured in the Sanitarium had rendered him nearly so. A sudden fear sliced through Dev; no one was above Resetting.

Dev opened the door, and three Resetters in hazmat suits stood in front of him. Their heavy equipment hung from their shoulders, and Dev could barely see their eyes through the face shields.

“Mr. Noah Carlisle?” one of them asked.

“I’m Lt. Singh,” Dev said and stood to the side. “Mr. Carlisle is in the lounge.”

He pointed down the hall and toward the lounge, but quickly put his finger down as if he had just implicated Noah. He thought of Doris, of Gemma— did Noah also have someone? Had he lost someone? And as Dev wondered after what had been Noah’s undoing, the Resetters filtered past him and into the apartment. The suits swished as they always did, and Dev did not know why the suits were so large to begin with. He’d never met anyone who came close to filling one out, and in actuality their giganticness made the Resetters look even smaller than they probably were outside of the suit.

Noah had pulled his legs up onto the couch and encircled his shins with his arms. Even from where Dev stood, even in the dank dimness of his apartment, he could see Noah’s knuckles stretched white. The Resetters had stirred the air when they entered, and a wave of nausea hit Dev.

“I’ve not been able to obtain a donation yet,” Dev said and checked his watch. “Could you give us a few extra minutes?”

The three Resetters looked at each other. The one on the left spoke. “Can’t. We’re booked solid this morning.”

“Ah, I see,” said Dev. “Well, then let me just try once more. Mr. Carlisle—is there anything you wish to donate?”

But Noah, who had somehow grown smaller sitting on the couch, brought his hand up again to his forehead. He made a fist and pressed his knuckles into it, tapping first just slightly, then with each movement brought his hand to his forehead faster and harder each time until he was hitting himself with a closed fist.

“Mr. Carlisle!” Dev said and rushed over to him. “Please, sir, there’s no need. They aren’t here to harm you.”

“We can take it from here,” one Resetter said. “Nothing we haven’t seen before.”

He spoke with a carelessness, an indifference for the man sitting there on the couch. It made Dev sick.

“Sir, please,” one Resetter said to Dev as he tried to maneuver his way over to Noah. “If you could just let us—”

Dev stepped back toward the wall, careful not to trip on a garbage bag, and made his way toward the door. Suddenly there was a commotion, a rustling and a slamming and then there were shouts, but they came from the Resetters. When Dev turned around all he saw was the three of them grabbing on to the back of Noah’s shirt as he lunged for the sliding glass doors. Dev scrambled and ran to help the Resetters but just as he got there Noah, who was hulking and trained, had rendered the Resetters weak. Dev stared, thinking that he was next, but Noah just looked at him. His eyes went soft, and they focused for the first time on Dev. They studied his face, looked at his uniform. Then he turned and with as much force as he still had in him, he leaned forward and ran headfirst as fast and as hard as he could into the nearest sliding door. The glass wobbled and vibrated, and Noah stumbled backwards but he did not fall. Instead he leaned down even farther and ran again into the door. When he stumbled back again, Dev saw a small circle of blood on the glass. Dev called out Mr. Carlisle, Mr. Carlisle, but somewhere inside he thought of joining him, of ramming his own head into the window. For just a moment, Dev wished he had the strength to do what Noah was doing—that he had the wherewithal to even think of it in the first place. Noah had scrambled to his feet once again and, though not as quick, ran as hard as he could again against the glass. He stumbled back and fell to his knees. Dev saw that there were bits, chunks of red on the glass, and he watched Noah tip forward and collapse there on the dirty rug surrounded by bags of filth. The Resetters, who were fumbling in their suits trying to grab onto Noah’s arm or waist or neck, were useless, for when they finally got to him, when Dev looked, all he saw was the top of Noah’s head and the mealy pulp of his brain. Even with his briefcase, his close proximity to Noah, his training. It mattered not. Noah was gone.

* * *

Dev drove along the sea steadily, never faster or slower than the cars beside him. If they slowed down, he did. If they sped up, he did. He held onto the wheel tightly as if, should he relax his fingers for just a moment, he would suddenly veer and spin out of control there on the autoway. For a brief moment he saw himself going around and around and then over the bridge to the sea and the rocks below. They’d find his body, Noah’s tape crushed into his heart. Dev pulled himself closer to the steering wheel and lifted his back off of the seat behind him. Noah’s brain. For just a second, Dev had thought of putting his fingers into it to feel what it was like. Was it soft and wormlike and warm? Could he wipe the bits from the glass and put them back in? Would Dev have been able to save him then? His shirt stuck to his skin, and he fumbled with the vents on the dashboard. He just needed air, to breathe in the sea. He rolled down his window. The tide was out; fishermen and diggers dotted the shore, little needles poking up toward the gray sky above.

By the time he arrived in the car park, his shoulders and hands were stiff from holding onto the wheel. The sweat on his back had cooled but his shirt was damp underneath his jacket. He flipped down the visor and blotted his face with a handkerchief in the mirror. As he took it away from his face he saw the shadows underneath his eyes, the lines in his forehead. Even his lips were dry. He tried to swallow once, but the spit sat glue-like on the back of his tongue. He just needed to get up to Transmitting. Shay would know what to do.

He went in through the front of the building—he’d see more people than if he went through the back, but he’d get there quicker. He walked through the atrium; small clusters of Bureau employees gathered here and there on benches and underneath the trees that reached to the ceiling. They were grouped by occupation—the Processors, the Transmitters, the Surveillants. They stuck to their own, their life experiences nearly identical to one another’s. There were two Collectors on the far side of the atrium, and Dev was glad he would not have to talk to them. He turned his eyes to the floor and went to the lift. He moved purposefully, steadily, knowing that until he returned home and was seated at his kitchen table, he’d be recorded. Every step, every word would be picked up and watched, listened to, studied if need be.

When the lift doors opened at Transmitting, he kept his head down and walked quickly to the end of the hall. He reached in his jacket pocket and drew out the recorder, popping the tape out and into his hand. He was on official business, but Shay would be able to see in his eyes that there was more. She’d be able to decode what was hidden behind his words.

Shay was behind her equipment. Her fingers worked the keyboard, her pinkies reaching far as if she was playing piano. Dev stepped into the room and stood over by the interoffice tubes. They were empty; perhaps there had already been a memo that morning. He wished for one, really. Something to say there was an uptick, that such and such might be what people are feeling—Bureau employees included. But what would it say? Would it describe what Dev himself felt in that very moment, a kind of roaring worry just there past his line of sight?

Dev waited until Shay stilled for a second before pushing her chair back toward the window. “Hello!” she called. “You’re here early!”

“I—” Dev said and then stopped. What would he say there in the building? Even if he spoke quietly—no, he had to get outside. “Only one case today.”

“Huh,” Shay said. “I wonder why. I’m booked solid.”

“Nothing came?” Dev asked and gestured to the clear tubes on the wall. He shoved his hands in his pocket and found the jelly bean. He rolled it between his fingers nervously; he felt sick and hot.

“No—and I just heard some people from Processing down in the cafeteria. Patient load is at a maximum. That’s what they were saying at least. You better schedule or you won’t get in by the end of the quarter.”

Dev nodded but he didn’t say anything. Instead he waited for Shay to look at him, and when she finally stopped talking and did, Dev’s eyes grew large and he motioned ever so slightly with a tip of his head to leave the room. Shay didn’t skip a beat and said aloud, “Think it’s time for tea.”

The two of them walked out of Shay’s office and down the hall to the lift. Transmitters didn’t congregate—not like Collectors or Processors; they kept to themselves mostly, which was interesting because outside of work Shay was nothing short of extroverted compared to Dev. The corridor was silent but for the far-off clicking of small plastic keys.

Once outside Dev walked toward his car. “Come on,” he said to Shay. “I’ll drive.”

Once inside the car, however, Dev did not move to start it. He pressed his front teeth together, tried to line up the edges, and pressed his tongue to the back of them. He stretched his big toes up against the tops of his shoes as if something inside of him wanted out. “Shay,” Dev said. He shook his head ever so lightly and put his hands up on the wheel. The car remained silent.

“What is it? Are we going somewhere?” Shay asked. And then, “What’s this about?”

“It happened,” Dev started, his head still shaking back and forth. He looked around out of the windows—even the one in the back. “My case this morning. It was a life event, and I, I—”

“Oh Dev, I’m so sorry,” Shay said. “I’m sure there was nothing you could’ve done.”

Dev’s lips twitched and he brought his fingers quickly to them, the words dancing on his skin. “But I was right there. And so were the Resetters. He became violent toward them, and then he turned that violence on himself.”

“What did he do?” Shay asked.

“He just threw himself at a window. Or ran into, rather. Over and over again, head first. It happened so fast, and the Resetters were on the ground because he’d punched them, and—”

He shook his head again, this time quicker and more forcefully. “He wasn’t alive—his brains, they were— they were on the window.”

Shay brought their hand to their mouth. “That must’ve been awful to see.”

Dev reached up and ran his fingers through his hair. He dragged his nails on his scalp and brought his hand down behind his ear. He touched his lobe. His fingers shook.

“Did you try to resuscitate?” Shay asked.

“No, there was no use. His brains, Shay, his brains were on the outside of his head. It looked like, like—” and suddenly Dev gagged and quickly opened up the car window. He vomited the little breakfast he’d had, heaved until nothing but spit came out. He quickly closed the door and wiped his mouth with a handkerchief he’d taken from his pocket.

“Dev,” Shay said. “Dev, it’s alright.”

She reached up and placed her hand on his. It was a kind gesture, a comforting one even. He thought of the way Noah kept bringing his fist to his forehead. Twisting his skin. Dev pulled his hand away from Shay’s and touched his own forehead. It was warm, smooth. Damp.

“But Shay,” Dev said. “He was still coming down from treatments—he’d been at the Sanitarium, but he was lucid enough, right? Why would they have just left him there if he wasn’t?”

“Did he seem it?” Shay asked.

“He didn’t talk, but he was awake. Alert. But I—I should’ve waited for him to fully come down before collecting from him, but the Resetters were scheduled to arrive and, and, I just wanted to make sure—”

“Dev,” Shay said and put her hand on his shoulder. “It’s okay, take a deep breath. Complications do happen— you know that.”

“But I haven’t had, I mean it’s been twenty-seven months, and I just, I can’t—”

And at this the hot alarm, the creeping anxiousness that was worming its way through his body slithered up to his eyes. They stung and blurred. Dev brought his hands to his face as if he’d be able to stop it, to push it all back down inside as he always did, but it was too late. There was a choking sob, and his shoulders shook. Shay put her hand on his back.

“It’s okay, Dev. I’m sure you did everything you could.”

But he hadn’t, had he? He’d suspected Noah wasn’t fully lucid; whatever they’d done to him in the Sanitarium either hadn’t worn off yet or was permanent. Had Noah recognized Dev through his fog? Did Dev know him, too?

“Dev—” Shay said. “Did you hear me? You’ve got to get it together.”

But Dev could not stop crying. All he could think about was what these people had lost—all of them, Doris, Noah, those that came before. Some had lost a person or persons, yes, but some had lost something—their joy, their spirit perhaps. The Bureau expected it to be temporary whatever the cause; anything long in duration was costly. And when their time was up—and the Bureau made it very clear from the beginning that equality of healing time was paramount—they were treated. But those feelings? The way one’s body can feel something crawling inside before the brain is even conscious of it? They never went away. What Dev had learned in training, what he’d learned on the job and felt deep down, was that grief grew unrelenting inside. It changed cells, and the gas eliminated them as if they were a cancer. But Dev wondered if they were still somewhere inside, dead but floating still, a constant reminder of all that had hurt the most.

“Dev,” Shay said. She rummaged in the glove compartment and found an old napkin. “Here,” she said. “Come on, you can’t let anyone see you this way.”

“What does it matter?” Dev asked. “They expect us to just go on as if we haven’t seen, haven’t seen such things—”

“I know,” Shay said. “And I agree with you. It’s awful, it really is. But, Dev, you’ve got to get it together. I wasn’t going to say anything, but they asked me about you.”

“Who did?”

“The Bureau. It wasn’t obvious, just a ‘How’s Dev?’, but I thought you should know.”

Dev brought his fingers to the bridge of his nose. He closed his eyes and took a slow breath in. “So what am I supposed to do?”

“You didn’t do anything wrong, Dev. Just go to Processing, make your report, get your pills, go home— you’re done for the day, right?”

Dev nodded and reached into his pocket. “But the recording—I didn’t even get anything.”

“I know, but there might be something there that you didn’t notice. Something my equipment can pick up.”

Dev took out the recorder and held it out to Shay. She did not look at it or touch it. He had the sudden urge to play it then and there, to listen to the quiet static and movement—he’d left it running the whole time. Shay would hear Noah’s head on the glass, the banging that sounded as if a large bird had flown at top speed into it. But he also wanted Shay to hear perhaps what Dev could not. He wanted to watch her for any sign of recognition. But her eyes held his. He popped the tape out.

“Go up to Processing and file your report,” Shay said. “And while you’re there, do your session. Just talk— that’s all you have to do. Tell them you’re overworked and tired and that you need some rest. Give the report of the life event. I know, Dev, that it’s been a long time since you’ve had one. But these things… they happen to lots of Collectors. You’re not alone. Promise me you’ll go upstairs right now.”

Dev felt a wave, a tingling from the left side of his face down his arm and into his fingers. It was a rippling, like the movement of Doris’s pond. He brought his hand up to his face and touched his cheek. “I promise,” he said and placed the tape in Shay’s hand.

“Oh, by the way, the memo finally came.” Shay reached into her back pocket. “About the uptick. Here.”

Dev unfolded the long piece of ticker tape and read it. It was all there—everything he and Shay had wondered about. The explanations—the bridge, the wind’s seasonal shift—were brief, but the Bureau’s guidance was listed on the bottom. Rest, replenish, recharge.

“See?” Shay said. “We’re all feeling it.”

Dev took in a deep breath and sighed it out slowly. He brought his fists to his eyes and rubbed hard, the deep itch at the edges giving way to Noah’s face, his head, his matted hair mixed with brain matter.

“I have to go before someone notices how long I’ve been gone,” Shay said. “I’ve got other cases to upload.”

The car door opened. Dev brought his hands down and waited for his vision to return. His head was turned toward Shay. He could hear the ocean, the clanging of eleven bells. He watched Shay’s lips smile at him, and she opened her mouth and said, “I think it’s starting again.” She wasn’t looking at Dev when she spoke, and her words, caught in the wind, garbled.

“What’s that?” Dev asked.

But Shay was already closing the car door. Dev watched her walk back toward the building. He held his hands up, spread his fingers wide. He opened his mouth and moved around his jaw. Stretched his lips across his teeth. Shay was right. He’d done nothing wrong. Noah was going to commit a life event regardless of what Dev did. But what if there had been something Dev could’ve done or said? What then?

SIX

Dev rode to the eighth floor. With the exception of the clocktower, it was the highest vantage point in the village. He knew the floor’s layout well, despite not having been there in—how long had it been? As he stood in the lift, he pictured the long hallways of room after room, brightly lit and serenely decorated. All the couches faced the windows, which Dev liked as it gave him something to focus on other than the Processor sitting in front of him.

When the lift doors opened, Dev stepped out into the hall. There was a small group of people waiting to get on, and Dev watched out of the corner of his eyes how they stood together silently. They’d clearly all finished their sessions at the same time, yet no one dared speak to another. Their eyes, puffy and bloodshot, looked distant as though they were still thinking of what they’d talked of. It was alright, expected even.

When he got to door S216 he stopped and rang the small bell underneath the room number. He heard a distant chime and leaned back on his heels. His shoes felt tight around his toes, and he looked down as if he would be able to see them bulging underneath the leather tips. They looked no different than they always did. The door opened.

“Why Dev, hello! How are you?”

“Hello, Beatrice. I’m well, thank you.”

She wore a green blouse like all Processors, and her hair, straight and light gray, fell past her shoulders. It covered the insignia at her breast—a white cursive letter P.

“And what brings you here?”

“I need to file a report.”

“Oh, I see, I thought—I mean, you haven’t been seen in a while.”

“Yes, I thought I might also do a session.”

Beatrice held her wrist up and looked at her watch. “Yes,” she said. “I’m between appointments; we will need to make it quick, if that’s alright with you. Come in, please, and we’ll get started.”

Dev crossed the threshold and stood just inside the door. Large glass windows ran the length of the room, which was probably not more than four meters. She gestured an open hand toward a couch and a chair. Dev chose the chair, worried that if he got too comfortable on the couch he might drift off and say something incriminating. The jelly bean, or his notebook, or how when he was a boy he’d wondered how to climb up to the top of the clocktower and that he wondered it still.

“Dev, well, it’s been a bit—let’s see,” she said and sat down at the monitor. She typed in what Dev figured was his name. “Yes, I think it’s been about two months.” She paused and pressed her lips together after addressing him and smiled quickly. It was a trained smile, recognizable and effective.

Had it been that long ago? Dev smiled back and tried to remember, but all he could think about was Noah. He looked around the room and felt just on the underside of his bones a deep desire to rest. To lay down. His feet were large and heavy in his shoes, and he suddenly wished he’d gone home and not said anything to Shay. The Resetters would’ve called the ambulance even though Noah had certainly been dead. Protocol was protocol, after all. Dev hadn’t needed to file the report right away either. He could’ve waited until the next day—he had twenty-four hours. The last time—had he waited? He looked down at his hands and tried to think of it. It had been a woman, young— at least, younger than Dev. He’d been too late—he probably could have saved her, too. He’d never told anyone about it—not even Shay. He’d written of it, and there, tucked in his notebook between the memories of those whom he collected from, was her yellow hair. She’d clawed at it, and it had stuck in her hand. Dev, who had lifted her down from the wooden rafter that ran the length of the room, had taken it and put it in his pocket. When his notebook was closed, a bit of it hung out of the pages. But so far, he’d not lost any strands.

“Dev? Isn’t that right? Two months?” Beatrice asked.

He crossed his arms and then let them fall to his sides.

“Yes,” he said. “That sounds right. I apologize, I’ve just, well, I’ve not been sleeping.”

“It’s alright, Dev,” she said. “You’re Collector of the Year after all… Think we can probably let it slide.” She winked at him as she spoke and gave a little nod of her head as if the two of them were in on a joke together. “Besides—and I’m probably not supposed to tell you this—but you’re not the only one who has missed a few sessions. Still, it’s good that you’ve come now. Much longer and there would’ve been a report— even for someone with your accolades!” She smiled as she spoke, her white teeth flashing. “We’ll address your concerns in session. For now, shall we get on with the report?”

“Yes, alright,” said Dev.

“Alright,” she said and pulled up Dev’s calendar on the computer. “Was it the case from today?”

“Yes,” said Dev.

Beatrice glanced up at the clock and then back to Dev. “You’re an early bird, aren’t you?”

“Nine in the morning, as always,” he said.

She smiled. “I just want to tell you that anything you say can and will be used in the report to the Bureau. Are you ready to begin?”

“Yes,” said Dev.

“Very good. Question one. What was the purpose of your visit to Mr. Noah Carlisle?”

“To obtain a collection.”

“Very good. It has been busy as of late, hasn’t it?”

“Yes,” Dev said.

It seemed as though Beatrice was waiting for Dev to say more, and when he didn’t, she said, “Let’s continue. Question two. Was the collection successful?”

Dev didn’t answer right away.

“It’s alright, Dev, I understand,” Beatrice said. “It is unnerving, to say the least. But that’s why you are so good at your job. Something happened, and you came directly here for guidance and support. Let me ask you—were you able to at least get a donation?”

Dev shook his head. “Not a verbal one, no,” he said. “He never talked.”

“I see,” she said and typed something on her keyboard. “Well, I’m sure your handler—who is it?” She leaned toward the computer monitor and scrolled with her right hand. “Shay Robinson, yes, that’s right. I’m sure she’s perfectly capable of extracting something. You still recorded it, correct?”

“Yes.”

“Very good. Question three. Was there any attempt at self-harm?”

Dev swallowed. At least he tried to, but it got stuck— his cheeks, tongue maybe. Was it swollen? He tried to swallow again. “Head injury,” he said.

“Head injury? Could you clarify further?”

“He ran into a glass door head first.”

She paused in her typing and turned toward Dev. “And that killed him?”

“He did it multiple times.”

“I see,” she said. And then, “Question four. Did you attempt mitigation?”

“No,” said Dev. “I couldn’t. I mean I couldn’t stop it, he just—he was violent and even the Resetters got hurt—”

“A yes or no will suffice. This is your last gentle reminder that anything you say can and will be used by the Bureau.”

He thought he imagined it, but Beatrice glanced up quickly toward the ceiling. Dev had seen the cameras when he had walked in. But he’d forgotten about them momentarily—and not for the first time that day.

“Dev, yes or no?”

“No, mitigation was futile,” he said.

Beatrice typed as Dev spoke. She nodded her head every so often. “Thank you, that completes the questioning. Now, Dev, how have you been?”

She motioned to him with her hand, He thought of the brains, of the blood on the glass, smeared and chunky. He reached up to his own head, as if he’d be able to feel his own insides.

When Dev did not immediately answer, Beatrice said, “Whatever it is, we’ll talk about it. And you’ll leave here feeling better than you can ever remember. What do you say, Dev? How does that sound?”

She was trying to make him comfortable, but her voice reminded him of the Caretakers in the Home. Her tone was measured and kind, saccharine and purposeful. Dev knew that all he had to do was tell Beatrice that he hadn’t been sleeping, that the sky stayed too bright too long. But there was more than that, wasn’t there? The indelible weight that he felt every time he tried to close his eyes. He’d see someone in their last true moments when they still had cognitive awareness of their sadness. But the thing was, Dev suspected no matter how far back they reset, no matter how much gas poured into someone, it was never enough to rid the body of those memories, not really. They stayed with the struck, and Dev knew this, because he, too, was a reset. The Home had tried to wash it away, but Dev still felt it under his own skin. And whether it was his mother or father or someone else he loved equally, he could not place it.

Beatrice picked up a pen and opened a large ledger. She wrote something at the top—his name, perhaps. “Now,” she said. “Have you had trouble falling asleep or staying asleep?”

“Both, I guess,” he said.

“And why, Dev, do you think that is?”

He saw the back of Noah’s head, and he felt a swirl of panic in his belly. “I don’t know.

Beatrice nodded. “I understand completely. That’s why we encourage all employees to do Processing at least once a month. We’ve got to measure your levels and adjust your supplements if necessary.”

Dev held up his hand. “I know, I know,” he said. “I will come more frequently in the future.”

“Hmmm,” she said. She leaned forward on her elbows and looked Dev straight in the eyes. “Let me ask you,” she said, “is anything else happening? I only ask because we’ve had—well, there have been reports of hallucinations since the solstice. We’re not sure—it’s possible one of the Resetters’ gas was leaking. Quite a few have reported it—employees, citizens. Has anything like that happened to you?”

“What kind of hallucinations?”

“Things that aren’t there,” she said. “Distortions and such. Have you had any?” She leaned forward and held the pen to the ledger.

“No—I don’t believe so,” Dev said. He held his breath as he spoke and as he waited for her to answer.

Beatrice looked at him, tilted her head to the side and said, “Hmmm,” and then, “but you were at the Feats, correct?”

Dev nodded. He let the breath he’d been holding out slowly, controlling the whistle through his nose so that the sound would not travel. He pushed the air forcefully out of his diaphragm—another training trick—and sat up straight. “I was,” he said.

“We’ve had some residuals—the particles travel farther than you would think. Something to watch for, is all. If you do notice anything, be sure to alert the Bureau.”

“I will.”

“Alright then—and have you been taking your supplements?”

“I have,” he said.

“All of them?”

“Yes.”

“Well, we can always adjust. But let’s get back to your sleep. Is it always difficult to fall and stay asleep or does sometimes one happen but not the other?”

Dev thought about it. Just the night before he’d lain awake staring up at the ceiling. He’d done all the things—the ablutions, the supplements, the creams, and the compression blanket. But even with all of his aids, he’d not been able to sleep. If he closed his eyes, they trembled and moved across the back of his lids in little spasms. It made his heart race. Dev glanced down and realized he was gripping the chair’s arm tightly. He lifted his hand quickly, but his skin, sticky and moist, peeled off the padded leather too fast. It burned.

“Both, I suppose,” Dev said. “But like I mentioned before, I think if it wasn’t so light—”

He trailed off and looked away from Beatrice’s stare. Something beyond her shoulder moved, and he caught sight of it out of the corner of his eye. Something was there, back behind the corn plants that were clustered up against the wall, maybe in the foliage itself. He watched the leaves rustle back and forth, and he looked back at Beatrice expecting her to be looking at the same thing. But her head was down; she was busy writing in the ledger.

“Tell me, Dev,” she said without looking up. “Have you had much experience with hypnosis?” She flipped back through the ledger, stopped on a page, and dragged her finger to the bottom before tapping it twice.

Dev shook his head. “No, nothing beyond the Home. Oh, and training, of course. I don’t really remember it, though.” He looked back at the plant leaves expecting them all to tremble up against the paneling, but they were still. Dev pushed his feet into the floor, flexing his thigh muscles tight. He nearly rose up off the chair.

“Well that’s the thing—it’s designed to make you forget,” Beatrice said. “It’s not a perfect science by any means, but it’s something. It can help. I know that some Collectors are—” She waved her hand in the empty space before her. “In any case, it’s something to think about. It takes just a few treatments—people have raved about it. Lots of positive sleep trends, even during the solstice. And it’s just an office visit.” At this, her hand, which had been held in mid-air, palm up, and fingers spread wide, fell to her lap.

The mention of such a thing alarmed him, and he thought back to the late spring when the hyacinths bloomed. He’d seen Beatrice then, hadn’t he? The flowering bulbs in the atrium had been purple, Beatrice’s shirt green, like it was now. That he remembered. Was she wearing the same shirt? Dev pulled at his collar.

“Listen, Dev. You’re our top Collector, something which we value. I’m mandating a period of recovery for you. One week. I’m also going to up your supplements for the time being. We’re seeing a spike right now—just got the memo, in fact.” She reached over and lifted a piece of paper off of the desk. “Have you seen it?”

“Yes, I just saw it before I came here.”

“It explains a lot of things, doesn’t it? Regardless, let me know if you suspect any hallucinations. They most likely would’ve occurred by now—it’s been over the peak time of forty-eight hours—but everyone reacts differently. As I’m sure you know.”

She spoke softly while writing on a prescription pad. Dev did not tell her that he still had many supplements in his apartment, and that even when he took just a little bit it made him feel—what was it? He couldn’t remember the last time he’d taken one, but all he said was, “Thank you.”

When Dev left her office, he did not stop to see Shay again. He took the lift down and walked through the atrium and out to his car. Each step was quicker than the last. He wondered how fast he could go before he’d be running, his legs pumping, toward the shore and the dark water beyond.

SEVEN

One week later, Dev drove along the motorway toward his next case. Beatrice had been right; he felt physically better. He was certainly more rested from the additional supplements he took with a large glass of water before going to bed. Each morning when he had awakened—when he lay prostrate between sleep and wakefulness—he had thought of nothing. Just on the edge of dreaming, he thought not of the bridge, not of Doris, or Noah, not of the curling leaves in Beatrice’s office. But then his brain caught up with his body, and his belly churned. It was the same feeling each time, a kind of confrontational panic that started at the top of his head and washed over him. All seven mornings he’d waited for it to reach his toes, and when it did, he rose and did his exercises. The quick beats of his heart comforted him.

The address was on the edge of the village, where the stone and rocky homes gave way to tall windswept grass. As he drove, he looked to the wide sky, blue and clear. He stared far in the distance at a point which he could not clearly see but knew was there. It led to the village beyond and the one beyond that, each similar to his own. Wherever the Bureau sent him, he felt as if he’d been swallowed halfway, like he was walking through water with his eyes open. He saw the same buildings, the same street corners. There was the baker, the stationer, the druggist. The clocktower—their clocktower—rose just as high as his own; he could not help but wonder after the children below and whether there was an injured bird hidden underneath some child’s blanket.

Dev exited the motorway and followed the road until just after the curve. He pulled into the drive, turned off the car, and got out. It was beautiful there, and he took a slow breath in. The air was pure and full of the sea, and it filled his lungs with brine and sulfur. He felt his back swell and the shoulders of his jacket tighten. Then he relaxed and shut the car door, careful not to slam it. And although he heard all kinds of things—the blades of bluestem brushing up against each other, the cry of the gulls, the distant hum of the motorway— the land that surrounded him was quiet in its own way, like a secret tucked up tight.

Like most properties along the edge of the village, the house itself was a former farm once owned by the Bureau. When Dev was in the Home, he’d studied the maps alongside the other children—here is the sea, and there are the people. Each structure was labeled and identified, and its use explained in a legend. But the small squares and rectangles on the edge of the maps seemed to Dev drawn in a rudimentary way as if they had not always been there and were only added by hand at the last minute.

The drive bent to the left, and Dev saw that the garden was tidy, the gravel raked and leveled. There were no obvious signs of being struck, though that did not guarantee anything. He looked closer. The hedges were neatly trimmed, the birdbath fresh. As he followed the drive around the giant yews, it gave way to a side-gabled building. The roof, slated red, pitched high enough to have once been able to store hay and feed come winter. There were chimneys on either end, massive brick slabs built up and out of the house. Blackened wood beams lined the eaves, but for as old as the building must have been, it was in remarkable shape.

Dev slowly approached two heavy wooden doors, propped open and held in place by moss-filled stone urns. As he stepped up onto the porch, he ran his hand over the top of the moss and found it to be freshly watered. He reached into his pocket for a handkerchief, and his fingers touched something hard and stuck to the fabric—the jelly bean. He’d forgotten to take it out before washing his trousers. He pulled at it, peeled it from the lining, and held it in his palm. It had melted and hardened, one side jagged with sugar. The realization saddened him; he hadn’t intended to destroy it. There was no trash bin, and he did not want to throw it in the bushes, so he put it back in his pocket.

“Hello?” he called into the house. “Lt. Singh, Memory Collection Unit. I’m here for Ms. Donaldson.” When, after a moment, there was nothing, he cupped his hand around his mouth. “Ms. Donaldson? The Bureau sent me. You should have received notice.”

As he said this, he opened the iron letterbox next to the door. The metal creaked, and he quickly stilled. He didn’t want to be intrusive; it was simply his job to check the surroundings thoroughly. Perhaps the notice had gone unopened or had stuck to the inside of the letterbox. But when he pulled the lid open all the way, he saw that it was empty. He turned his head to call once more, but when he did, he saw that a small boy now stood in the entryway.

“Oh,” Dev said. “You—you—” He stumbled over his words. “I’m looking for Ms. Donaldson. Is she here? Maybe I have the wrong address.”

Dev’s ears got hot and itchy deep inside, and his heart thumped. In all of his years as a Collector, he had never encountered a child during an actual collection. The Requisitioners were always first—come in, secure any children, transport them to the Home. But there, out on the edges of the village, the small boy looked at Dev.

“Are you—” Dev began, “okay?”

The boy did not respond. His eyes stayed on Dev, and seconds passed. Neither of them spoke, and Dev tried to think of a good reason why the boy would still be there in the first place. Perhaps he had not heard or had been taught not to speak to strangers. But then the boy slowly raised his left arm until it was even with his shoulder and pointed his index finger down the hall.

“Ms. Donaldson is in there?” Dev asked quietly, pointing past the boy and into the house.

The boy held his arm up and did not move it. He then took two steps backwards, and with his other hand motioned for Dev to enter.

Dev looked up and down the hall, and the walls seemed to bend and shift. The bottoms of his feet tingled as if they had fallen asleep. The unease—yes, that’s what it was—came on quickly, as if he’d suddenly fallen from a great height and was falling still. He held his hand out to the wall to steady himself.

“Down here?” Dev asked and pointed toward the hallway. Dev wasn’t afraid. Not exactly. But as he walked forward, the boy close behind and silent, he saw door after door. Was Ms. Donaldson behind one of them, unresponsive in a bed or a chair? Each was closed, but there in the darkened hall, slivers of light shone through the cracks between the floor and the wood. He heard nothing but his steps on the soft carpet, the gentle brushing of his coat sleeves against the wallpaper. When he got to the end of the hall, he stopped and turned to his left.

“In here?” he asked.

The boy nodded. Dev put his hand on the doorknob and turned it.

A woman—Ms. Donaldson, Dev supposed—sat near the window in a high wingback chair. She was thin, but not too so, and her hair, streaked gray and nearly white at the scalp, fell over her shoulders. She was still alive.

“I’m sorry that I didn’t get up,” she said. “I want to savor every second. I’m sure you understand.”

But Dev did not understand. He stared at the center of the room. There, on the round braided rug, sat three other children. The boy who had let Dev in went and sat down with them, and another climbed onto his lap. Aside from age, the four were indistinguishable. They had the same ginger hair, the same pale skin of the North. They wore summer linens and squirmed and fidgeted.

“It’s alright,” she said to them. “This is—what did you say your name was?”

“Lt. Singh. Memory Collection Unit.”

“This is Lt. Singh. He’s here to do the thing I told you about. He’s going to make Mommy better.”

“Oh, no, I—” Dev began and held up his hand. “Perhaps I have the wrong date.” He lifted his wrist to check his watch, but it said June 22nd, nine a.m. “I don’t understand,” he continued. “Did Requisition not come?”

“Oh, they did,” Mrs. Donaldson said. “Came by first thing this morning, right on schedule.”

She spoke softly, her voice kind and steady. Her hair fell just below her shoulders, and she reached up with her hand and spun the strands around her fingers. She twisted again and again, the movement the same each time.

“Perhaps there has been a misunderstanding,” said Dev. “I think, Ms. Donaldson, that I will need to return to the Bureau for an updated file. I will be back shortly and—”

“I knew one of them from my housing block when I was younger,” she said, interrupting Dev. Her voice was quicker, darker, and she snapped her head toward him. He took one step back. “One of the Requisitioners, I mean,” she said. “We knew each other. Know. We know each other.”

“Oh?” Dev asked. And just as he was trained to do when something seemed amiss, he slowly took out his recorder. He made sure his movements were not sudden. “Is that correct?”

“I paid them, of course. All I had—so I don’t have anything more. For you, that is. But I just couldn’t leave it this way. Leave them,” she said and nodded toward the children at her feet.

Dev did not know if she was telling the truth, or if, should he look behind the house, he might find a pile of uniformed bodies, bloody and still warm, waiting to be burned in order to get rid of the evidence. It had happened before. Requisitioners had a difficult job: gather the children, lead them out one by one to a van, hold them down if they struggled, gas if needed. Dev knew how it went intellectually; after all, he himself was led from his house by a Requisitioner—he knew this logically and had accepted it as fact as all children of Resets did. But as Ms. Donaldson’s children looked up at him, as he wondered if he’d fought back as they took him away, he suddenly thought of dry crumbs of plaster. He saw them behind his eyes, little white chunks. He pictured them in his palm, the dust wedged under his nails when he scraped his bedroom wall—hadn’t they? When he was a boy? But when he went to think of the plaster again, it was gone. He tapped his fingertips together at his side.

“The Requisitioners—what they do—it’s for the best, Ms. Donaldson,” Dev said.

“That’s what they say,” she said and waved her hand in the air dismissively. “But I’d like to think I know what’s best for me. And them,” she said, nodding to her children. “Even now.”

The children, though quiet, were nearly on top of each other, their limbs tangled, and their heads leaned up against each other’s. They were huddled there, inches away from their mother’s bare feet. They stared at Dev, all with the same wide eyes of their mother. They did not speak, but their bodies, unable to be still, made noise: the sound of skin brushing against skin. The squeak of a heel on the floor. The youngest child— maybe two years old—pulled himself up using his siblings for balance and walked over to Ms. Donaldson. He held his arms up to her, but she did not look down at him. She did not look at Dev either but seemed to stare just over his shoulder, as if something important was hanging on the wall behind him.

“The children—they’re what I’m keeping. Or what I’m giving to you, or whatever you call it.”

“Collecting.”

“Collecting,” she said. Her voice had softened again.

Dev held the recorder. It was heavy in his hand, the plastic shell and metal buttons cool on his skin. He pressed the record button down until it clicked into place. The wheels inside spun around and around. The machine vibrated in his hand. He must’ve made some kind of movement, because Ms. Donaldson asked, “Is it going?”

“Yes, but the children—”

Mrs. Donaldson held up her hand. “They’re staying. And if you leave, if you don’t record what I say, I’ll use this.” From underneath her left leg she pulled out a stun gun and pressed it to her chest. “You say it won’t kill us—are you sure?”

Dev was sure—wasn’t he? That was the point. Render the struck incapacitated but not lifeless. Ms. Donaldson squeezed the handle tightly, and Dev saw the narrowed determination in her eyes. He looked at the children, who looked back at him.

“Ms. Donaldson, please,” Dev said and held up both of his hands. They were hot, sweating, and the recorder nearly slipped from his fingers. “There’s no need for that.”

“Okay, then,” said Mrs. Donaldson. “Annie, you come here first.”

Two girls sat close on the floor, their upper arms pressed together. One of them rose and walked over to her mother, and as she did, her sister reached out for her hand. The one standing—Annie—was clearly the oldest of all the children.

“You sit right here,” Mrs. Donaldson said and patted her knee.

The girl, though nearing late adolescence, did as she was told. She sat down and then quickly threw her arms around her mother. Dev watched the stun gun in Mrs. Donaldson’s hand as she wrapped her arms around her daughter. The white steel glowed against the girl’s dark hair.

“You smell like the water,” Mrs. Donaldson said. She combed her fingers through the girl’s long hair. With her free hand she tapped the girl’s nose with her finger. “And you have a freckle right on the tip of your nose. Here, let me see your hands.”

The girl held up her hands, palms down, fingers spread wide. Her mother traced the shape of them with her own fingers and closed her eyes. “Remember that with these, anything is possible.”

“I will,” the girl said, speaking for the first time. Her voice was small, tinny and hollow. She turned her head toward Dev, her eyes wide.

“Ms. Donaldson,” Dev began. “Why don’t you allow me to take the children, and I will come back and we can—”

“Nonsense,” she said. “This will only take a few minutes. Aran. Come here,” said Mrs. Donaldson.

The boy who had let Dev in rose. He waited for his sister to rise off her mother’s knee. Dev watched and saw the way the girl did it, slowly and purposefully, holding on to her mother’s shoulder until the very last minute. She then took her place once again on the floor and grabbed her sister’s hand. It was a small movement, but Dev had seen it. They knew. Of course they knew.

Ms. Donaldson looked at the boy who now stood in front of her. She looked up at him and held the stun gun in her lap. “Your eyes are gray like the sea,” she said. “They are your father’s eyes. Your nose, too. I’d know them anywhere. He’d have been so proud of you.”

The boy smiled embarrassedly and dropped his head. But after a moment, he brought his hand up to his eyes. Dev realized that he wasn’t embarrassed—he was crying, and Dev watched him flick the tears from his fingers, wipe his hand down the front of his shirt.

“He’s in you—I am, too. Never forget that,” she said.

“I won’t,” Aran said.

“Caleb. Your turn,” said Mrs. Donaldson. She adjusted herself in her chair, and as she did Dev saw that she had put the stun gun behind her back. Another boy, perhaps a few years younger than his brother, rose and made his way to his mother. He walked slowly, reluctantly, as if should he never reach her, none of this would be happening. He approached his mother and stood in front of her. His head was only to her shoulder. She pulled him in close with her arm.

“Someday you’ll be big. Like your father was. I can tell,” she said. And then she shifted her body toward the boy and grasped the bottom of his chin with two fingers. As she did, Dev realized that her back was to the stun gun. If he could get close to her he might perhaps be able to get at it. But he held the recorder in his dominant hand, and he knew if he made any kind of movement, Ms. Donaldson would reach for the gun again. He’d have to make a dash for it, leap over the children and tackle her from the chair to the floor.

“You just had to do everything yourself,” Mrs. Donaldson said to Caleb. She touched her fingertip to the boy’s bottom lip. “This lip. Took eleven stitches, but now I can’t imagine you without it. A kite string against a red sky.”

The boy reached up with both of his hands and grabbed her wrist. “Do you have to go?” he asked.

“My darling boy,” she said. “I do. It’ll be better this way.”

“Says who?”

“Well,” she said. “Lt. Singh, for one.”

When Dev heard his name he snapped to. The tape spun—he could hear it—and he realized he’d been clutching the recorder tight. He felt his right side pull toward the ground from the weight of it, his spine bent and stiff.

“That’s right,” Dev said softly. “You’ve nothing to worry about. I promise you that, and—”

Without warning his throat caught, and he nearly dropped the recorder. His hand felt numb, as if he’d been holding it above his head for too long. His felt the soft give of the carpet under his feet, and the rush of breeze pressed up against the windows. They shook in their panes.

“Yes, Lt. Singh? They won’t know any difference, right?”

“That’s right,” Dev said automatically. “They will be reset at the Home.”

“Caleb, my love,” said Mrs. Donaldson. “You always had to do everything yourself—wouldn’t ever let anyone help you. Let them help you, okay? Let Lt. Singh help you.”

“Okay,” the young boy said and threw his head into his mother’s neck. His little body heaved and rattled.

“There, there,” Mrs. Donaldson said. “Shhh, my love. Just a few more moments. Little Winnie, come here.”

The youngest child stood and joined her brother at her mother’s side. Ms. Donaldson leaned forward and grasped the girl’s forearm, pushing up her sleeve.

“Your birthmark is what makes you who you are,” she said and nodded toward the dark skin on the girl’s arm. “Don’t hide it. Its oval shape. Don’t ever hide it. Because you’re the key, Winnie. You’re the key. This,” she said and held up her daughter’s arm, “is my map back to you.”

And just like that Dev understood: she was leaving a trail to follow. Of course—he had been distracted by the children, the stun gun. He loosened his grip on the recorder and took a small step forward.

“Ms. Donaldson, as you know only the Bureau has access to the Catalog. The struck often—”

“I’m not struck,” she said. “Or maybe I am, but I want to be. I want to remember. For the rest of my life.”

“Ms. Donaldson, I’m sure you know that the Bureau has your best interest in mind. You’ll have a much brighter, fulfilling life. The grief—well, you won’t remember it.”

“But I’ll feel it, won’t I?”

“I—I’m not sure I follow—”

“Annie, get that pamphlet,” she said.

The eldest girl did as she was told and walked over to a small table where a stack of newspapers sat. She took the top paper and brought it to her mother.

“Ms. Donaldson,” Dev began.

The woman held up her fingers, and Dev paused. “Listen: ‘Our encoding system becomes diseased thus causing mental processes to malfunction. The hippocampus shrinks, amygdala and prefrontal/anterior cingulate function decreases. One’s cellular memory is then stored at the stem cell level—cells that can remember and respond to one’s surroundings. Resetting affects only working memory.’”

She looked up at Dev. She’d gotten her hands on some anti-reset propaganda, from where, Dev had no idea.

“Where did you get that?” Dev asked.

“Never mind where it came from. What do you say to that?”

As she spoke, she put her hand on the gun at her side. It wasn’t a threatening gesture; she did it as though to comfort herself. What Dev said mattered, though.

“Please, Ms. Donaldson, there’s no need to—”

“I’m never going to escape it, am I?” she asked.

The children looked back and forth from their mother to Dev as they continued to speak.

“Well, Ms. Donaldson, as you know the Bureau has your best interest in mind.”

“You already said that.”

“I did?”

Suddenly the room seemed small and tight. The children moved restlessly. Dev realized he was clenching his teeth together as hard as he could. His palms were sweating, and he put his hands in his pockets. The jelly bean was there, hard and crushed. There was a thumping deep down in his legs. He pressed his thumb on the recorder’s stop button. There was no sound at all in the room then. Dev kept his mouth tightly closed, but he pressed the tip of his tongue through his front teeth. The rough edges scraped his taste buds— first the salty, then the sweet. He raked his upper jaw back as far as he could. There was Noah and his piles and piles of garbage just waiting to swallow him up. There was Doris with an empty chair. A man whose last memory was of the ring and the tentpole and hundreds and hundreds of eyes upon him.

“If I’m going to remember here,” Ms. Donaldson said and patted her chest with her hand. “Then I want to remember it here.” She pointed to her head. “Leave the tape. Annie knows what to do. We already planned it.” She gestured toward her children on the rug. They had wet cheeks and red eyes and stared at the floor.

Dev looked at the eldest girl, Annie. She nodded her head gently, gave a small, upturned smile, and Dev found himself pressing the eject button on the recorder. He slid the tape out and felt the cool, smooth plastic shell.

There was a knock at the door, and everyone jumped. Caleb began to cry, and Annie scooped him up into her arms. “Lt. Singh,” she said. “Give me the tape. Please.”

Annie held her head to Caleb’s, brought her lips down near his ear and whispered something Dev couldn’t catch. He stopped wailing and fell into a quiet whimper.

Dev held the tape out to her. He was not sure what he was doing, but he was sure that he had to do it. What if Ms. Donaldson was right? What if the pamphlet was right? Dev looked at his hand as it held the tape. What had she called it? Cellular memory. Maybe it lived in his fingertips, in his feet and veins. Maybe he had it, too.

Annie put Caleb down and took the tape. She then walked over to the fireplace and slowly slid a brick out from the facade. Dev watched her as she put the tape far back into the hole and slid the brick back into place. There were more knocks on the door. A voice called out.

Ms. Donaldson rose, but Dev held up a hand. “I’ll let them in on my way out,” he said. He put the empty recorder back into his pocket. “Please, have a seat.”

“I prefer to stand,” she said. Caleb began to cry again. “It’s alright,” she said to him, to all of her children, “You won’t be there long.” She was talking about the Home. “I’ll find you, and I’ll get you out.”

But Dev knew that this wasn’t true. Even if she found the tape, even if she listened to it, she would not be able to get to her children. And even if she did, they would not remember her, would they? Dev tried to think of his own mother, but there was nothing there. Or maybe there was, but it was too dark to see. As Dev walked back down the hall to the front door, he nearly faltered. He’d left the tape—he’d have to make a fake, but that was alright. What he’d done, what he’d given Ms. Donaldson—it’s what he’d wanted to do. The Bureau would not know, and Shay would not know. He felt a ray of excitement; he would go home and write in his notebook. He would describe the thin scar, the ginger hair, the birthmark. He would talk of Ms. Donaldson, of the stun gun and the tape hidden behind the fireplace. He would write it all down furiously— leave nothing out. Perhaps years from now he would start looking more closely at his co-workers, hoping to see a glimpse of Annie or Aran or Caleb. He’d remember them. He’d never forget.

EIGHT

The panic set in as the Bureau came into view. The colossal tower, bright and white against the gray sky, stood on the horizon. As Dev descended the hill and drove through the village, he could not help but tug at his collar. His armpits were sweating, and he could feel the heat of his skin through his shirt and jacket. The recorder burned against his breast, and with each bump he went over, he felt it rattle. Only when he pulled into his garage did it stop moving inside his pocket.

The extra tapes were in the trunk of his car. He opened the door and got out of the car. The air was light and fresh; it was warming outside, and the sun shone down from above. It was going to be a beautiful day, and Dev hurried to get the new tape. He’d have to make sure to record inside; Shay would hear if he was outside or in a car, even if the engine was off.

Once inside his apartment, he took off his shoes and went into the lounge. He stood because that’s what he typically did at a collection. And then, having pressed record, he proceeded to speak.

“Ms. Donaldson, shall we get started?

“Feel free to nod that you’ve heard me—there, thank you.

“Sometimes it helps to think of the first thing that pops into your mind. Sometimes the struck get caught up in donating the perfect memory.

“I assure you there is no such thing.

“Take your time, Ms. Donaldson, I’m in no rush.”

Each time Dev spoke, he paused. Sometimes it was only for a few seconds, other times a full minute or more. He tried to recreate exactly what he would do, had done. He paced back and forth on the floor and heard his pant legs swish. There was a creaking of a floorboard. But then he froze: would Shay know he was in his own apartment—could she recognize the hazy stillness in the air? Could she hear his steps on his carpet the way he could there in the apartment? The silence of an empty building on a quiet day with the windows shut? He could not even hear the breeze that rustled the treetops outside. Perhaps Shay had memorized the way his apartment sounded because she couldn’t help herself.

Dev remembered that the recorder was on. “I believe the Resetters will be here shortly,” he said.

“If you’re not wishing to donate anything, I can be on my way.”

“I can stay, if that’s something that you’d like.”

He pressed the stop button. There, yes, that was it. It was precisely the kind of conversation he’d been having for nearly, nearly—how many years had he worked for the Bureau? In the Home until eighteen. He did the math. Could it really have been twenty years? He put the recorder in his pocket and as he did, he heard the jelly bean click against the plastic casing. He picked it out of his pocket between his thumb and forefinger. It was crushed now, dented and smoothed at the edges from wear. He clasped it hard in his fist for a moment. And then he walked into the kitchen and threw it into the garbage. As he did he looked at his hands, his knuckles, the way the skin creased and gathered. He looked even closer at the slight bulge of blue vein that ran down to his index finger. He pressed on it with his other thumb. It gave, but he did not feel it. Instead he felt a tiny little microbe multiplying inside of his body. His eyes itched and blurred. His throat pinched. And when the first tear fell, all he could do was watch it land on his sleeve and sink into the fabric.

* * *

When he approached Shay’s workspace, Dev slowed. There were a few other Transmitters in the building still, but they did not look up from behind their stations as he passed by their open doors. Dev saw their feet, the pleated trousers and shiny shoes poking out from below. He reached into his pocket for the tape. “Knock, knock,” Dev said as he entered. Shay was leaning back in her chair, the headset wrapped around her neck. She was facing away from him toward the window.

“Hey Dev,” Shay said and turned around. “How are you? How was your time off?”

Dev smiled instinctively as if to show that the few days at home had done some good. But the truth was that he’d spent most of the time sitting in one chair or another thinking of the details he’d written about— Noah’s head, his sticky membrane. Had he remembered correctly? Suddenly he would jump up and rush to the kitchen, peel back the paneling and quickly flip to the back pages. There he read and reread and read again until he could remember it in his sleep.

“Just what I needed, I think,” he said. “What’s going on here?”

“You didn’t go to your office?”

“No, not yet. I don’t really need to.”

“Oh, well then here,” Shay said and picked up a piece of paper off the desk. She handed it to him over the monitors.

Dev read the first sentence of the memo. His eyes flitted over a significant amount of gas and at the solstice and two days post-exposure. So there had been a gas leak after all. Beatrice was right. Dev had never heard of anything like it happening before. He looked down to the memo he held in his hands. It was all there.

“Have you noticed anything?” Dev asked.

“Maybe?” Shay said. “Hard to say. I had a few pints on the solstice—. I wouldn’t say I had a hallucination, but things were perhaps a little off. In a good way, though. But we were by the entrance. More air circulation, I guess. Have you seen anything?”

“No,” Dev said.

“Well, I’m glad.”

He wanted to press Shay about the gas—maybe she wasn’t remembering correctly. If she had seen something strange, then yes, he would believe it, too. He thought quickly of Noah, of his caved-in head. But that had happened. He saw it for himself with his own eyes. But still he counted back the days twitching a finger for each one. Two days after the solstice—peak side effects.

“Dev?” Shay was saying. “Want to watch a movie tonight? I could come over, bring something to eat, if you want.”

“Yes, yes. Let’s do a movie tonight,” Dev said. “I’ll stop at the store on the way home, grab something for dinner. Any requests?”

“That roast you made was good. Maybe that?”

It was only a second before Dev felt the nausea. He tried to place it—the sweetness of the jam, the smoky taste of meat in his mouth. If he kept talking, maybe Shay would forget about the tape altogether; after all, she hadn’t asked him if he’d been on a case. Dev didn’t move. He stood there, his shoulders high and tight. “Yes, alright,” Dev said. “Let’s say at eight?”

“Great,” Shay said. She stood and stretched, and Dev thought that she was going to come around and walk with him down the hall. Instead, Shay leaned over her equipment and held out her hand. When Dev stared at her hand, she said, “You had a case, right?”

“Oh, yes right.” Dev reached into his pocket, took out the recorder, and ejected the tape. “It’s—I should tell you—” He looked up at the cameras and then behind him out the open door and down the hall. “It was silent. Lucid, but she wouldn’t talk.”

He placed the tape in Shay’s hand, and her fingers curled around it. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll do it later then.”

Dev’s shoulders finally relaxed. He would not have to stand there as Shay listened to his own voice question an imaginary presence. Would she hear it, too? Would she hear that he was within his own walls? And if she heard it, would she look to Dev for some kind of explanation?

“I’ll be there at eight,” Shay was saying as she sat and put her headset on. And with that she clicked a tape into place and pressed play. Dev heard the wheels spin, the high pitch of electricity.

“And Dev,” she said without looking up. “I’m glad you’re back.”

* * *

When Dev returned home—and he had stopped at the market on his way—he prepared the meal. He rinsed the beans, trimmed the tops, salted and tenderized the meat with the heel of his palm. He brought his hand down hard onto the cool flesh over and over—once, twice, three, four times. Again and again he pounded and only when the oven beeped did he stop. He hovered over the slab breathless, his hairline dotted with sweat. When he had put the roast in the oven and set the timer, he sat at the kitchen table and took out the panel in the wall. There was his notebook, yellow and worn at the edges. He’d had it for—how long? He opened to the first entry. Yes, that was right—it was David and the storm. He dragged his finger underneath the words as he read them and pressed his teeth together hard. They slipped and shifted around his tongue.

Dev took the pen from the middle of the notebook. He put the cap of the pen in his mouth, bit down on it hard, but it did not give. He began to write, starting first with when he arrived at Ms. Donaldson’s house earlier that day. He wrote of the moss-filled urns, the endless hallway, the white of her hair. Was he remembering correctly? The moss in the urns had been wet, hadn’t it? He dropped the pen and rubbed his fingers together, turned his hand over and looked at the skin at the tips. The roast drippings fell from the rack to the pan below. Each drop sizzled and spat. He continued:

She said how she’d remember them, and that Annie would know what to do with the tape. The girl had taken it from her mother’s hands and had left the room and the Requisitioners knocked. Ms. Donaldson hovered over her other children as if her body could save them from sight and

There was a knock at the door. Dev jumped and shut his notebook quickly, bringing it to his chest and turning his head toward the living room. He held his breath—he had heard a knock, hadn’t he? He put the notebook and pen back into the wall and affixed the paneling into place. There was another knock, and he pushed his chair out from the table and rose. His socked feet were quiet on the linoleum and then on the carpet as he neared the door. Shay was early again. He looked at the clock—actually she was late. He must’ve been at the table longer than he’d thought.

When Dev got to the door and opened it, he said, “Sorry, I was—”

But it was not Shay. Three men stood before him. They wore dark suits and hats, white collared shirts, slender ties at their necks. Small pins with a large letter S were on their lapels. He knew what the uniforms meant—that they were Surveillers—but none of them looked familiar. That mattered not, as there were double the amount of Surveillers than any other Bureau position, as two were needed for each case.

The man on the left held a file folder, the white of it stark against his jacket. The middle one stood empty handed while the one on the right clutched the handle of a small case. They looked at Dev. But Dev kept his eyes on the one with the folder.

“Dev Singh?” the man in the middle asked. His voice was soft and had in it the brogue of the North. He strung out the end of Dev’s first and last names, adding an uh after each of them.

Though the man was shorter, Dev felt as though he were looking up at him. He took one step back into his apartment. “Yes?” he said.

“Do you have a moment? May we come in? I’m Lt. Rogers. This is Lt. Dunlop and Lt. McCready.”

At this the three men brought their hands to their pins and lightly touched them before dropping their arms back at their sides. A small but heavy weight settled into the middle of Dev’s chest. He instinctively touched his own breastbone and pushed his fingers into it. The back of his head tingled and burned. He thought of his notebook and tried to glance back through the kitchen doorway. “Yes,” Dev said. “Yes, of course. Please, come in.”

Dev stepped back, and the man with the folder, Lt. Dunlop, entered first. Dev watched him scan the room. His head moved back and forth quickly. Dev had nothing to hide there in the living room, but still a slow burn spread up the sides of his neck. He hadn’t changed out of his work clothes, and he felt the tightness behind his collar. He did not raise his hands to his shirt, though; so as to not provoke them, he kept his hands where the Surveillers could see.

“Sorry to bother you, coming over like this,” Lt. Rogers said as he entered Dev’s apartment. “We tried to find you at the office, but Shay—Shay Robinson— she’s your handler at the moment, right? She said you’d already headed home. In any case, this shouldn’t take long.” He then went over to the sofa and sat down. He stretched his legs far out in front of him and took off his hat. He was bald, or nearly bald, and the little hair he had was gray and white. He smoothed it back, and Dev saw a large ring on the middle finger of his right hand. Lt. Rogers looked just beyond Dev’s shoulder. “Sure smells good,” he said.

“Yes—thank you. May I—can I ask what this is about?” Dev asked.

“Yes, of course,” Lt. Rogers said. “Dunlop? Want to give him the folder? Here,” he said and motioned to the sofa cushion next to him. “Sit down, please.”

Dev went to the sofa and sat as Lt. Dunlop handed over the file folder. It was thick, but not too so. Dev took it with both hands and put it on his lap.

“Go ahead. Open it, it’s alright. We can talk after you’ve had a look,” said Lt. Rogers. Lt. Dunlop retreated back to where he had been standing and now, alongside Lt. McCready, flanked the front door.

Dev opened the folder. The first item in it was a photograph of a mostly empty street, the houses on either side typical of Dev’s village. The photograph was grainy and without color, and Dev studied it. His eyes noticed the hedges and the curved sidewalk, and by the time he focused on the license plate of the car near the bottom of the photograph, a deep well had taken shape right beneath his heart. It was Ms. McGregor’s house and the car, his. He leaned closer and could make out the back of his own head through the rear window. He looked up at Lt. McCready and Lt. Dunlop. Next to him Lt. Rogers tapped his fingers on the tip of his knee slowly. He started with his thumb and made his way to the other side of his hand and back again. Dev heard the quiet thumping of each fingertip.

“Please, Dev. Keep going,” Lt. Rogers said without turning his head. “Have a look through all of it.”

Dev flipped the top photograph with his fingers. It shook and bobbed in the air, and Dev hoped that the others did not notice. He turned to the next photograph. It was another of him—or him and Shay, rather. They were standing outside of the pub, and Dev recognized the Absorbers in the photo as the ones from before the solstice. He stood near the corner, his hands stuffed deep in his pockets. He was looking down at the ground, and his mouth was turned into what looked like a grimace. Behind him Shay laughed. The whites of her teeth were visible to the naked eye. He flipped another photograph over—it was of him standing alone in line at the solstice. One after another he looked through the photographs. In some there were other people, but always he was off to the side, if not alone.

“Those photographs,” said Lt. Rogers. He picked at his fingernails and held his hand up to examine them. “They tell a particular story. The question is, Dev, is it a true story?”

“I’m not sure I follow,” said Dev. He turned his body so that it faced Lt. Rogers, but he made sure to sit up straight with his shoulders pushed down and back. “What story are you referring to?”

Without a pause, Lt. Rogers said, “The one that tells us you’d rather be alone.”

Panic sprung in Dev’s chest. “That’s not true,” he said quickly.

Lt. Rogers then turned his head and looked Dev in the eyes. “That’s not all,” he said and reached into his pocket. He pulled out a small rolled up piece of paper. “You were flagged in Processing, so we entered in all the evidence—Dunlop did that just this afternoon—and it all amounts to it. It’s indisputable, Dev. You know and I know the equation doesn’t lie. You’re struck.”

“No, I’m not,” Dev said.

“It’s understandable, Dev, someone in your position. But still.”

“I’m not struck,” Dev said. His voice rose at the end, and he suddenly worried he’d come across as combatant. “I mean, I feel fine.”

“Well,” Lt. Rogers said. “Only you would know. In here,” he said and tapped his finger to his temple. “Of course this could all just be a misunderstanding. That’s why we’re here. The equation, the report—better to clear it up now, don’t you agree?”

“Yes, but are you—” began Dev.

“We’ll ask the questions,” Lt. Dunlop interrupted. Dev stared at his face. His cheeks seemed suddenly sunken, under his eyes a dark shadow. “What I mean is, just sit back and relax. I’m sure we’ll get this sorted in no time,” he smiled.

Dev sat back, but he didn’t relax. Instead he felt the panic begin, little prickly tingles along his hairline and in his ears. His heart beat wildly. He understood from his training what was happening, but he himself had never even witnessed an initial interview. He clasped his hands at his knee and gave a half smile.

“As you know, Dev, the Bureau implemented Mitigation long ago,” Lt. Rogers said. And then he looked back and forth at Lieutenants McCready and Dunlop. “That’s all we ever wanted—to get rid of this, this sadness. This despair. The suicides. Mitigation has been greatly successful, wouldn’t you say, Dev? After all, a happy society is a successful society.”

“Yes, of course, the Bureau believes—and I believe that—” Dev said.

“Your rate of disengagement—” Lt. Rogers interrupted, nodding toward the folder of photographs Dev still held on his lap. “In the last two months, facial expression declined forty-six percent. If you look— may I?” He gestured toward the folder, and Dev handed it to him.

“Take this for example,” Lt. Rogers said and took out a photograph. “This man had just told you of a promotion. Look how far away you’re standing, Dev. You do not appear to be making eye contact. Would you say that is accurate?”

“I was simply walking into the pub—” Dev said. “I was tired. That’s all.”

“We understand that. You’d had a difficult few weeks—we’ve all been very busy. But you have an obligation, Dev. We all have an obligation. You and I— employees of the Bureau, the villagers. We all have an obligation to be, at the very least, bittersweet. We must see the silver linings—you of all people should know this, Dev. And we think you are beginning to experience difficulty in doing so.”

“But I—”

“And it wasn’t just this moment, Dev. You also went home early from the solstice.” He rummaged through the folder before selecting a photograph and holding it up to Dev. “Your coworkers went to the pub after, but you went home. Were you not enjoying yourself?”

Dev thought then of the Feats, of the man on the ground howling, his hands held fast to his belly. He thought of the way the woman in the audience had moaned when the ringmaster talked about the bridge. The tiny sharp end of a child’s windmill stuck in the man’s jugular. “I was,” he said. “Like you said, work has been busy. I just needed some extra sleep. That’s all.”

Lt. Rogers ignored Dev and continued. “See this one?” he asked and held up the top photograph of Ms. McGregor’s street. “We clocked you in at a little over an hour. Can you tell us what you were doing in the car during that time?”

Dev studied the photograph. It was no doubt his car, and Dev’s head was positioned between the headrest and the door. Had he been sleeping? “I’m—I’m not sure,” he said.

Lt. Rogers quickly glanced at his colleagues. “Perhaps you were doing some work? Looking over the files?”

“Yes,” he replied. “I’m sure that I was.”

“Can you tell us about it? About Ms. McGregor’s collection?”

“What would you like to know?”

“Did it go smoothly?” Lt. Rogers asked.

“Yes.”

“Are you sure there was nothing amiss during the collection?”

Dev thought suddenly of the jelly bean he had taken from her property. Not only had he taken it, he’d harbored it, transferring it from pocket to pocket for what—nearly a week? He brought his hand to his hip, smoothed his palm over his trousers and pocket. But the pocket was empty. “She fretted over the donation a bit, but she didn’t struggle if that’s what you mean,” Dev said.

“And you didn’t—” Lt. Rogers paused and looked at his colleagues. “And after, you didn’t feel any… different?”

Dev swallowed. “No, not that I could tell. Wait—are you talking about the hallucinations?”

Lt. Dunlop rubbed his hands together and then held his fingers to the bridge of his nose. “What hallucinations?”

“The ones from the solstice. I mean the possible ones, from the gas.”

The three lieutenants exchanged glances. “What gas?” Lt. Dunlop asked. “See, Rogers? He’s not making any sense.”

Suddenly Dev felt as if he’d said too much. He had heard Beatrice correctly, hadn’t he? He’d seen the memo, too. He’d held it in his hands. Dev opened his mouth to ask if they, too, had seen the memo, but then Lt. Rogers said, “Processing reported that you are having difficulty sleeping. Is that correct?”

“Yes,” Dev said. “They said it was normal. They increased my supplements, and I took some time off. I’m feeling much better now.”

“Yes, yes, that is good news. But tell us: have you had any urges, any desires to, let’s say, skip over your required duties?”

“No,” Dev said. “No, never. I take my job seriously.”

“Good, good,” Lt. Rogers said. “That’s a relief to hear. It’s just the thing is, Dev, is the evidence and subsequent report.”

“I’m sure there’s some kind of explanation,” Dev said. “Like I said, I feel great. Better than ever, actually.”

The three men looked at one another. The sun had continued to set, and Lt. McCready’s face was almost entirely obscured by the evening light. Dev blinked his eyes. Shay should’ve been there by now, but instead of a knock there was only the ticking of the clock. Dev was quiet, and the Surveillers were quiet, and he thought he could hear his heart pounding. He tried to swallow and coughed, the sides of his throat sticking.

“Search it,” Lt. Rogers said. “Anything you can find.”

They scattered quickly. Dev tried not to look at any of them, but in his peripheral vision he saw Lt. Dunlop go into the kitchen. Dev heard him opening and closing the cupboards. He heard him yank open the drawers, slam the trash can shut. Dev did not look toward the noise; he only hung his head low and stared at the carpet. Only then did he realize that he had the same carpet as Noah—didn’t he? He reached down to touch it.

“The thing is,” Lt. Rogers was saying. He was still in the living room, slowly lifting items off the shelves one by one. “The thing is, Dev, is that we know about the tape. Shay alerted us—we told her we’d take it from there. She’s very kind—very accommodating. How lucky you are to have had such a handler.”

Dev lifted his head and watched Lt. Rogers as he looked under the table and behind the clock. Shay—

“What did you do?” Dev asked.

“Now, Dev, please. We don’t want you getting upset— you said yourself you were finally feeling better.” He reached behind the television stand as he spoke. Then he moved over to the mantle and lifted up his awards and framed certificates. “We didn’t do anything—I’m not sure what you even mean by that. Dev! Listen to yourself!” Lt. Rogers spun around to face Dev as he spoke. “It’s good we got here when we did. With some luck we can move past this with little intervention.”

Dev supposed he had known the moment he saw who was outside his door. It wasn’t the discovery he had to steel himself against; no, the fact that the Surveillers knew about the tape was no surprise, not really. It meant they knew about it all—about his dreams and Noah and the jelly bean. His heart was in his throat, but he was able to ask, “I—I—”

He could not feel his lips as he spoke, and he could not be sure he’d even spoken at all. Lt. Rogers didn’t react but only stood with his hands on his waist. Dev thought of Doris, of the fairgrounds, of Noah’s small, filthy apartment.

“It’s OK, Dev. Just relax, give into it,” Lt. Rogers said.

Dev opened his mouth. “Shay—” he said, but suddenly Lt. Dunlop was on him. Dev struggled, thrashed his head back and forth like an animal. There was the sound of metal snapping, and Dev saw from the corner of his eye Lt. McCready with a mask in his hands. Dev opened his mouth to cry out, but the mask covered it. Dev brought his hands up to his face, but Lt. McCready held them down. Dev instinctively held his breath, but the gas was forceful and strong, and Dev grew weaker and weaker as if trying to move in his sleep. His lids fell, and the grayness fell, and the gas filled his mouth and his nose and his lungs. For just a brief flash, he thought he recognized the darkness, and it comforted him.

PART TWO

NINE

Dev opened his eyes. He blinked once, twice, watching the ceiling fan above him turn slowly. The blades spun around and around. He tried to focus on a single point, but the attempts left him dizzy. He tried to remember what it was that the fan reminded him of before his head, heavy and uncooperative with the rest of his body, rolled to one side. His right eye pressed up against something soft, and he saw with his left eye a door—white, maybe—with a small circle window in the middle. Part of the window was dark, but part of it glowed yellow. It looked painted over, dirty, Dev thought, but suddenly the dark spot moved, and the door opened.

From where Dev lay, he could see the outline of a person in the doorway. He could not make out the person’s face, and he tried to call out. He was weak, though, and he made a sound only in his throat. He meant to say “Who’s there?” but only the spit on the back of his tongue bubbled. He swallowed it down, and it burned. He tried to speak again. His muscles moved and contracted, but there was nothing, not even spit now, in his mouth. He called out again. This time he heard it with his own ears.

“Hello?” he said. He called out to the person who had opened the door, but his voice, which was gruff and quiet, must not have carried. Or maybe he hadn’t really spoken at all. He called out again. “Hello?”

The person came further into the room but did not yet approach the bed. Instead, they took a few steps forward and then stopped. The light from behind illuminated the person’s tall stature, and Dev understood that out of the door was a hallway. He had the sudden urge to dart past the person in the room, a sense that whatever he was in, wherever he was in, would swallow him if he didn’t get out. He felt it in his bones and underneath his fingernails, and as the figure came closer and closer to where he lay in bed, Dev held his breath. He saw that the person was tall—he hadn’t imagined that. The person—a man, Dev realized—had a thick, reddish beard and square shoulders. He looked familiar, but when Dev tried to trace back in his mind, there was only a fog. The man was much bigger than Dev, made even bigger still by the fact that Dev was in a bed. The figure grew larger and larger as he neared. Dev stared and opened his mouth to speak, and as he did, the blurred edges sharpened. The man held a clipboard in his hands. A pen attached to a metal chain swung softly back and forth like a pendulum. The motion made Dev’s lids heavy, and he felt his own breath hot underneath his nostrils.

“It’s not easy to come to,” the man said. Then he leaned down and whispered to Dev, “I know from experience.”

The chain attached to the clipboard clanked up against the metal guardrail of the bed, and Dev lifted his hand to his eyelids in an attempt to hold them with his fingers. But his arm caught. He tried his other hand, but that too raised only a few inches off of the bed.

“We had to restrain you,” the man said and leaned forward. “You were—” He looked back toward the open door. “You put up a good fight when we were transferring you. Surprisingly strong. These,” he said and patted the plastic cuff at Dev’s wrist. “These are for your own good. And ours, of course.”

The light from the hall fell into the room, and it was then that Dev noticed the clothing the man wore. He was dressed in all white; there was a black letter A embroidered on his shirt. It took Dev a moment to understand that he was looking at an Absorber. He should’ve known. The man’s prerequisite beard seemed disheveled against the pointed collar of his shirt and epaulets at the shoulders. Dev scrambled to sit up again, but his restraints caught, and he could do nothing more but raise his upper back a little off of the bed.

Dev opened his mouth to say something, but he could not think of what he was trying to ask. It was there somewhere in the back of his mind, deep down in his throat. He both did and did not recognize the room he was in. It felt familiar yet uncomfortable, and he thought suddenly of the pub he and Shay frequented. There was a burst of images, and he pictured Absorbers sitting around a table, each one turned toward Dev. He jumped then in his bed. His body jerked to the side, and his right hand pressed up against his thigh. He felt his cold fingers through thin fabric.

“It’s alright, it’s alright, Dev,” the Absorber said. “Just take some deep breaths. That’s right, four in, eight out. It should wear off soon—the gas. And we’re sorry about that,” he said. “About how it was handled. But there simply wasn’t any other way. We only gave you a little, just enough for the trip here.”

The Absorber glanced over Dev’s left shoulder, and Dev followed his stare. He rolled his head to the other side and saw that there was another man who was sitting in a chair. He must’ve been sitting there the entire time, even before the Absorber came into the room. Had he been watching Dev sleep? He was dressed in a dark suit and had his hands clasped behind his head. He was old—at least, much older than Dev. He looked at Dev curiously, uncrossed his legs and leaned forward. After a moment, Dev realized he was looking at Lt. Rogers—or was that Dunlop? No, Rogers had the long nose, Dev remembered, and he tried to yell out, but his words garbled.

“Yes, yes, Dev,” Lt. Rogers said. “And please—reserve your strength, you’ll need it! We do apologize though, you know, for that,” he said and nodded toward Dev. “Profusely. We needed to get you here, you understand. We used only a little, the gas that is, the smallest amount required. I promise that you’re all still there.” He pointed to his temple and then tapped his two fingers one-two at the edge of his brow. His ring shone in the light.

A slow sound came from Dev’s throat. It sat in his mouth, filled up his cheeks.

“Please, Dev, relax,” said Lt. Rogers “This is for your own good. All of it.”

Dev’s mouth moved, but his tongue stuck to the back of his throat. “Are,” he said. “Is this—?”

“Is this what, now, Dev?” Lt. Rogers said and looked at the Absorber. “Please, Henry, do tell him what this is.” He spread his arms wide as he spoke as if he were addressing a crowd of people.

“You’re in the Sanitarium,” Henry said.

“Well, not the Sanitarium, Dev,” Lt. Rogers said. “Another one. This one differs just a bit—we have a more, well, refined approach. One that’s only available to those in the Bureau. You should be thankful, Dev. Could have been much worse. I’m sure you know, that is—we are most certain you would’ve realized—”

“What he’s trying to say is we had little other option. We had to get you here, and now here you are. I know it hurts to speak,” Henry said, pressing his finger to his ear. “Can we get fluids in four?” He dropped his hand and said to Dev, “I know this is all a bit much; you need your rest. Things will be clearer after. I promise.”

Dev’s nose itched and without thinking, he tried to bring his hand to his face. The restraints caught.

“Can you loosen those a bit?” Lt. Rogers asked Henry, who then walked to the bedrail at Dev’s side.

“Oof,” Henry said. “These are tight. Apologies again.” He loosened the restraints, though he did not take them off completely. Dev tried to slip his hands out from the sleeves, but he was too weak to move them much. He closed his eyes. “Shay?” he said softly.

“What’s that now?” asked Lt. Rogers.

But suddenly Dev could not remember what he’d just said. Something was missing, and he wanted to ask after it, but he couldn’t quite place it. He closed his eyes.

* * *

That night, when he was alone in his room—Henry had come and gone with dinner—he examined his wrists and hands. He thought they seemed a little red—rough, perhaps—and though a lamp was on in the corner, it was relatively dark, and he could not see clearly. In any case, he was thankful his restraints were gone, and he lifted his right hand to his face. His fingers felt his skin. There was just the start of stubble on his jaw. He dragged his thumb up over his lips and touched the small tube that ran under his nose and around his head. He peeled the tape off and then pulled it down around his neck. The air hissed out of the tiny holes. He followed the tube down over his chest and off the side of the bed. He saw that it was attached to a tank, which was large and appeared heavy. It would be difficult to use as a weapon, and it was chained to the wall. The chain was thick and rusty and brown—he could see that much in the dim light—and Dev wondered how long the tank had been locked up in that room.

It was only when it turned on that Dev noticed there was a television in the corner next to the bathroom. Dev watched as the yellow of the screen dissolved into a black outline of the village’s clocktower. It was the Bureau’s evening broadcasts, something that Dev did not usually see since he was typically writing or asleep at that time. It was alright that he didn’t watch them— he wasn’t doing anything wrong. Of course the Bureau said that they were beneficial, and maybe they were.

Dev watched the screen as the clocktower bent and fizzled, and the horns started playing. He knew the song—he and Shay had sung it every morning in the Home—but he hadn’t heard it for a long while. Shay— where was she? Dev felt a deep pang in his belly as if he’d been punched, and he realized that whatever happened to Shay had been his own fault. He’d given Shay the tape, had let her take it from his hand, and he hadn’t even flinched.

The anthem continued—it was long, a full minute and a half. The strings came in, and they sounded to Dev as if they were one key off, lower and slower than he remembered. He watched the familiar words stream by on the bottom of the screen: let us ease the way and enjoy the day, arm in arm creates no harm. He could’ve sung it in his sleep. When the song finished, the screen went to black. It was ten o’clock, the national bedtime. But Dev was wide awake.

He swung his feet over the side of the bed and steadied himself as he stood, feeling a pinch on his heels as they touched the cold floor. He took a step, and then another, and made his way toward the door while following the small sliver of light near the floor. He put his ear up against the door and listened, but all he heard was a far off hum, the vibration of which he felt up against his cheek. The door was a cool metal. He tried the handle, and it opened.

The hallway was nearly dark, though dull overhead lights buzzed the length of the corridor. He poked his head out of the doorway unsure of what to do. To his left was the end of the hallway. There was a window there, a large one in fact, but Dev saw only his own reflection in the darkness beyond, the round glow of the lights from above. He looked to his right and scanned the yellow, dirty linoleum floor as he did. There were doors on either side of the hall identical to his own. All but one of their windows were dark, and Dev wondered who else was lying in a bed hooked up to tubes and tanks, if Shay was in there somewhere. He crept slowly down the hall toward tables and chairs extending out into a larger room. As he did he tried to surreptitiously glance in the door with the illuminated window. He saw a woman sitting on the bed. She was brushing her hair.

Just then a figure appeared on the opposite side of the tables in the room beyond, and Dev pressed himself up against the wall. The room wasn’t well-lit, but Dev could tell that whomever it was was large. They had their back to him. Unsure if he was supposed to even be up, he quickly walked back into his room and climbed into the bed. He grabbed the plastic tube and brought it back up to his nose. The air that blew from it was cool and dry. He pulled the sheets up to his chin and closed his eyes tight. In the hot darkness he waited for the door to his room to open. He counted one two three four and when he got to seven he heard the click of the handle and the creak of the hinges. He tried to breathe regularly, but the air in his chest was wild, and he felt his heart tumble and bump inside. A person came into his room, and they closed the door behind them. There was a continual squeaking sound, a rattling, the clinking of metal. The sound grew closer to him, and as the person neared his bed, Dev could feel the heat emanating from their body. Whomever it was smelled sterile, like soap and bleach, and Dev’s own hands felt dry and tight as if it were him who had been scrubbing at his skin.

Dev felt fingers on his right hand. They lifted his thumb and forefinger, and Dev felt a pinching and a burn. There was a warm sensation in his hand for a moment and then it was gone. He opened his eyes slowly as if he were just waking up, though he supposed he wouldn’t be tricking anyone. Still, he blinked slowly and focused; he saw that it was the same Absorber from earlier. He had tattoos on both of his arms that went from his shirtsleeves down to his wrists. Dev hadn’t noticed those before. He caught a glimpse of an eight, or maybe it was a snake; he couldn’t be sure.

“Well, hello Dev!” Henry said. He placed his hand gently under Dev’s back and helped him sit up. He then reached behind Dev’s head and adjusted the pillows. “Hopefully the fluids helped you sleep. That first twenty-four hours are always a doozy—most new arrivals have some difficulty acclimating. Here, please—” He gently took Dev’s elbow in his hand and guided him further into a sitting position. “I’m your Absorber, in case you hadn’t figured it.” He pointed to the A stitched into his collar point. “I’ll be here to help you during your stay.”

Dev wasn’t sure if he was supposed to respond to him, and so he remained quiet. He wanted to ask after Shay but also did not want to call any attention to her. He remembered the way the Absorbers had talked with her outside of the pub. They were charismatic and quick-witted, yes, but underneath was a kind of veiled spitefulness. Dev felt it then, too, in how Henry spoke of the night before.

“Am I hurt?” Dev asked. He lifted up his hand and examined the needle and tube that ran from it. “I feel alright,” he said.

“Yes, well,” Henry said. “You are alright—and here, well, you’ll get even better. You’re lucky,” he said and looked over his shoulder at the door. “Lt. Rogers doesn’t take an interest in just anyone. You must really be something. They really want to preserve—that is, I mean—” He folded and unfolded the bottom of the sheet several times before flattening it out on the mattress with the palm of his hand. “Anyway, glad to see you up and alert.” He said the last few words low, quietly, and with gravity.

He left the room and closed the door tightly behind him. Dev thought he heard a click of a lock, but of course, it could have been anything. He stared into the dark nothing of the television, which, though not broadcasting anything, was still on. He heard the high pitch of the electric vibrations. It sounded like Shay’s office, like his recorder did if he had a silent collection. He thought of Noah, of his open skull, and of birds in flight, their wings beating up against the sky.

* * *

The next morning, after Henry had brought Dev his breakfast, there was a quick knock on his door. Lt. Dunlop and Lt. Rogers came into the room, each trying to squeeze past the other as they went over the threshold. They walked up close to Dev, close to his bed, and they stared at him with small smiles on their faces. It was bright in the room—all the lights were on. The walls were painted a cheery yellow. The room was small, and between Dev’s bed and equipment and Lts. Rogers and Dunlop, there wasn’t much extra space.

“Dev, hello, good morning,” said Lt. Rogers. He was in his dark suit and starched shirt. He was not threatening in his manner, yet Dev felt alarm as he looked at Lt. Rogers’s pin perfectly placed on his lapel. “Sorry to barge in on you like this—we don’t mean to startle you awake. After all, we know how important sleep is, don’t we?” He looked at Lt. Dunlop and the two of them laughed under their breath.

Dev slowly pushed himself up into a more seated position. “No, it’s fine, you didn’t—” Dev started. But Lt. Rogers held up his hand.

“Please, Dev,” he said. “Let me finish. Normally, you wouldn’t even see us! We just wanted to check in on you ourselves considering the transfer was so, so—”

“Unexpected,” said Lt. Dunlop.

“Yes,” said Lt. Rogers, spinning the ring on his middle finger. “It was indeed. You are, Dev, very important to the Bureau, and we’re not willing to take any chances. Which is to say, we are unwilling to risk outside variables. Can’t have any mistakes or missteps with someone as valuable as you! That’s why you are here!” He gestured with his hands and laughed as he said this as if it were a funny anecdote shared in an office setting. “We understand the toll your job takes—has taken—on you, Dev, we do. We know that you’ve been feeling listless, perhaps unnerved and under duress. And we’d just like to say that here you’ll get the treatment you need to overcome all of that. We could all use a little help now and then. After all, a high tide lifts all boats.”

“He’s right, you know,” said Lt. Dunlop. “We are here to help. Whatever you need or want, please don’t hesitate to ask. We aim to get you better and to a more stable place so that you can continue your daily activities whether it be work or socializing. And how are you feeling?” asked Lt. Dunlop. “You might still have a bit of a headache, yes?”

Dev lifted his left hand to the side of his head and then the back of his neck. He was sore, and behind his ear was tender. “Yes, a bit.”

“It—the gas—hits some harder than others. One of the great mysteries in life! But in all seriousness, we wanted to apologize again for how this was handled. I—we—there just simply wasn’t any other way,” said Lt. Rogers.

“Yes,” Lt. Dunlop added. “Couldn’t be helped!” He laughed at this softly, exhaled long and slow and put his hands on his hips.

Dev looked back and forth at the two men. They each seemed to be waiting for the other to speak, their bodies pitched forward and their breath in their chest. After a moment, Lt. Rogers said, “But maybe you can help me, Dev.”

“Help you?” he replied.

“Yes,” Lt. Rogers said. “Just help me understand something. Your notebook. The Bureau-issued one that only those recognized for outstanding service get— what was it doing in your wall?”

Dev felt as though he were falling from a great height backwards, and he could not see if the ground was coming toward him or not. “My notebook?” Dev felt adrenaline—yes, that’s what it was. It rushed from his throat down his arms and into his stomach and up again into the tips of his fingers. He clenched his fists underneath the blankets, felt his cheeks pool with spit. “I don’t know what this is about,” he said.

“Oh,” Lt. Rogers said. “Sure you do. Your notebook. The yellow one, in the wall in your kitchen. We supposed that the encouragement of journaling—well, Dunlop and I—we supposed that you just took it a little too far. Nothing we can’t mitigate, of course. It’s just—” and he shrugged.

“It seems, Dev,” Lt. Dunlop said, “that you’ve developed an interest in storytelling. I’d say that if you weren’t so good at being a Collector you might have a knack for Transmitting. Something to think about, after all. Reassignments can be invigorating.”

“Transmitting?” he asked.

“We compared your writing—that is to say the notebook in the wall—we compared it with your recordings and subsequent uploads to the Catalog, and yours are, how shall I say, more colorful and elaborate than what we have in the database. It was a joy to read, quite intriguing actually. It’s no wonder all of those people trusted you so. Don’t worry,” he said and gestured toward Dev. “We’ve destroyed it. Can’t have something like that floating around. Imagine what would happen if it fell into the wrong hands?”

Dev felt a sudden loss as if he had fallen into a deep chasm. His notebook—it sliced through him quick, and the heat in his head and his belly burned. He tried to remember all that he’d written—how incriminating had it been? He had mentioned Shay, had written about their conversations and what Dev thought she meant by all of it.

“Is Shay here? Shay Robinson?” Dev asked.

The two men glanced at each other quickly. Dev saw it, a flit of their eyes toward the other’s. It was fast—nearly imperceptible. Neither one of them said anything, and Lt. Rogers turned to leave. The light from above shone on his large forehead and gray strands, slicked back and kept short. “Intake begins at ten. We’ll leave you here to ready yourself—your clothes are in the bathroom. Then go on out into the common room. You’ll be able to get your breakfast. Henry will get you from there when it’s time.” He pointed behind his shoulder and to Dev’s right as if Henry was standing just behind him.

* * *

When Dev came out of the bathroom, he heard chimes ringing out. He tried to pinpoint the direction they came from, but he was disoriented and searched for the source of the sound. There, in the ceiling, was a mesh-covered speaker. It was square and wooden on the outside, the kind that Dev remembered from his days in the Home. There was a faint crackle behind the ringing. It was like listening to a phonograph, a recording of a recording. When the sound stopped, Dev strained his ear to see if he could hear anything else beyond his room. He couldn’t.

When Dev opened the door of his room, he looked quickly first to his right toward the common room and then the other end of the hall. There was a partially opened window, and the checkered curtain that hung in front billowed in a soft breeze. Dev looked more closely, and a sudden gust of wind blew the curtains wide. He saw lines across the window—maybe a ladder or scaffolding, but then he realized they were bars. His stomach lurched. Perhaps the bars, like the restraints, were for his own good. After all, he felt unlike himself, and he attributed it to the fluids he’d been given. He turned away from the window and walked to his right toward the other end of the hallway.

He stood on the edge of the large room. Dev saw that four others sat at different tables, each alone and facing the television. They were dressed the same way he was—loose pants, a white tunic, new socks on their feet. He didn’t remember changing into the clothes initially; he figured that someone got him out of his suit and into them. Lt. Rogers, perhaps. He felt suddenly violated and embarrassed. A woman on the other side of the room waved at him in a way meant to catch his attention. Dev looked around and pointed to himself. The woman nodded and walked toward him.

“Hello, Dev. And how are you this morning?” she said as she neared. She spoke gently, clearly, and put her left hand on Dev’s upper arm. When she did, Dev froze, and the first thing he thought of was how long it had been since anyone had touched him. Shay consoled, but she didn’t physically communicate, and really, neither did Dev as they’d both grown up without that kind of tenderness; the Caretakers had not been affectionate. Dev pulled away quickly and brought his arm across his body.

“It’s alright, Dev,” the woman said. “Here, come have a seat and breakfast with the rest of us.”

She took Dev gently by the elbow and guided him toward a table by the windows. There were no bars outside of these, and Dev felt a wave of relief. But when they neared the table which was set for three, he saw that instead of bars, there were tiny wires embedded directly into the glass. It reminded him of chicken wire. “Please,” she said. “Sit down.”

She pulled a chair out for him, and Dev slid into it. She took the chair to his left, but he didn’t look at her; he kept his head slightly bowed, his eyes on the table in front of him. There were jam jars and cubes of sugar, a small pitcher of milk. A spoon and a rubber knife.

“I’m Rhona,” she said. “I’ll be running your group for the duration of your stay.”

It was then that he noticed the green of Rhona’s shirt, vibrant against the dull gray skies out the window beyond. She slid a pamphlet across the table to Dev.

“This should cover any questions you might still have after your intake, but please don’t hesitate to ask about anything. I’ll be seeing you for group later today. After your intake, of course. I’ve read your file. Outstanding service, and I’m excited to work with someone of your caliber. I think the others will benefit from your expertise.”

Dev looked at the pamphlet. On the cover was a drawing of the clocktower, below which was the word WELCOME typed in block letters. Above the clocktower were wispy clouds and a flock of birds heading north in the distance. He opened the pamphlet and smoothed it out on the table.

“Group begins promptly at two,” Rhona said. “We’re on a new cycle, which is good for you; everyone is in the same boat. The uptick has been hard on many. I say this not to lessen your experience but rather to negate any isolation you might feel. In other words, you’re not alone.”

Dev nodded and began reading the pamphlet. There were basic directives—lights out, morning bells, meal times. A brief timeline of a sample stay indicated he’d be there for weeks. He looked at Rhona.

“I can’t—” he said. “This is over a month. I have responsibilities—my work—”

“Dev,” Rhona said. “Right now, being here, this is the only work you need to do. You’ve been put on administrative leave—don’t worry, you’re still getting paid. You’re one of the best—that’s what they told me. Honest.” She held one hand to her heart, and one up to the side of her head as though she were taking an oath.

“What about Shay?” Dev asked.

“Who?” Rhona replied.

“Excuse me,” a voice said over Dev’s shoulder.

Dev looked up and next to him stood Henry, a pale yellow tray in his hands. “Your breakfast, Dev.”

Henry put the tray down onto the table in front of Dev. There were six sections, each of which had something in them. There was porridge, beans, two slices of toast, a tomato, a small glass of juice and a little cup filled with what he assumed were supplements. He stared at the tray, his hands heavy in his lap.

“Did you need something else, Dev?” Henry asked. He pointed back behind him toward the kitchen. “We have other things, I could see if we could make something else—”

“No,” Dev said and raised his hand in protest, “no, this will be fine.”

“Go ahead, Dev, eat. We can talk later, after group if you wish.” Rhona stood and pushed in her chair. “I’ll leave you to it,” she said and left Dev and Henry at the table.

Henry straightened Rhona’s chair and repositioned the cutlery where she had been sitting. He smoothed out the fabric tablecloth and then clasped his hands behind his back and addressed Dev.

“Last night,” he began, “I didn’t mean to be so informal. I shouldn’t have talked to you like that.”

“How did you talk to me?” Dev asked. He picked up the rubber knife and put the blade in the jam jar.

“I shouldn’t have told you,” Henry said. “You know— that I’d been through what you’re going through. I was only trying to make you feel comfortable, what with this being such a new experience for you. But I overstepped, and I apologize. It won’t happen again.”

As he spoke, he straightened the other chairs that were around the table. But he never looked at Dev; in fact, it was difficult to see that he was talking at all.

“It’s alright,” Dev said. “To tell the truth, I scarcely remember.” But in actuality, Dev had been relieved by Henry’s manner. He was glad there had been someone there other than Lts. Rogers and Dunlop.

“Well, in any case I’ll leave you to eat. I’ll be back when you’re finished to take you to intake,” he said. Henry walked away, and Dev finished spreading the jam on the toast, glopping on layer after layer. He took a bite, and the tart cherry hit his taste buds. His ears itched, and his eyes watered. When he had swallowed, he scooped a spoonful of beans into his mouth. The tinny aftertaste made him think of the Home, and as he ate, he tried to understand what had happened. They’d learned of the tape—had Shay reported it? No, that couldn’t be. If Shay had suspected, she would’ve come to him for an explanation first. But somehow the Bureau had found out about the tape—was it not disposed of properly? Were all tapes inspected after transmitting? He supposed he wouldn’t know. He then saw in his mind’s eye all that he didn’t know, and it jumbled together, stacked high and wide. They’d searched his apartment, found his notebook hidden in the kitchen wall. They’d read it no doubt, but what had really happened to it? They said they destroyed it, but was that true? And Shay—what of her? Dev turned around as if to ask someone, but all he saw was Henry on one side of him, waiting, and on the other side a half dozen people sitting at their tables, their heads hanging over their breakfast trays. It was quiet but for the faint sound of the television in the corner. It was a game show, the one where people competed for a chance to win huge amounts of money by telling their life stories. It was not unlike the Feats; the only way to win was to have lost everything. No one was watching it.

* * *

A long hallway stretched in front of Dev. Henry walked at his side, matching his step. They did not speak, and Dev counted the white, windowless doors as they walked past them. The hallway was nearly identical to the one by Dev’s room, but in this one there were red lights above each door that they passed. Some lights were on, others off, and he tried to focus on the carpet beneath his feet and put one foot in front of the other. There they were again, stitched into the carpet—the swirls, or waves maybe? For a moment, Dev felt comforted by them. First his own office, then Noah’s lobby, now here. But then he wondered: what else had been the same? He thought of the atrium at the Bureau and of the leaves and fronds that must’ve aged and withered yet somehow never fell to the ground. A fleeting panic passed through his stomach.

At the end of the hall was a single door. It was windowless, made of the same material—some kind of white metal. As he approached, Dev saw that it had a steel handle, and above the door frame was a single light bulb. It too was red, but when Henry opened the door, it flickered and glowed dully. Dev thought he could feel the electricity falling down around him from above.

The room to which they entered was only slightly bigger than the room he’d slept in. There was a bed, a sink in the corner, a television that hung down from the ceiling. There was a mirror in which he could see his reflection and he saw himself in his pants and shirt and socks and slippers. He straightened.

Henry held out his hand toward the chair in the middle of the room, and Dev walked over to it. He looked around; there was nowhere else to sit other than the bed, not even for Henry.

“Please,” he said. “Have a seat. We will begin shortly. Just need to get you set up.” He patted the bed and smoothed the sheets out as he did. “Do you need any help?” he asked.

“No—no, I’m fine,” Dev said. He put the heels of his hands down on the arms first and then lowered himself down. He wasn’t sure if he should cross his legs, but as he was considering it, he felt Henry behind him.

Henry grasped Dev’s head with both of his hands. “Steady,” he said. “We just need to get you attached to the monitors.”

Dev turned instinctively, but Henry was waiting and quick and turned him back around with a strong but gentle redirection. Dev noticed something swing past his peripheral sight—he heard the clicking of plastic— and he turned his head again, this way managing to do so before Henry could stop him. Dev saw that they were cables of some sort, long, thin, and hose-like. The ends of the cables had tiny adhesive electrodes, and Henry stuck them to Dev’s temples and underneath his earlobes and on the back of his neck.

“These here, these are just in case you have any level of difficulty answering the questions. They’ll help you when you most need it.”

Dev sat as still as he could be and allowed Henry to attach the cables to his skin. “Am I to have a physical examination?” he asked Henry.

“Yes,” he replied. “Not much different from any other exam—questions notwithstanding of course— but yes, I’ll take your vitals, etc. When it’s over, when you’re ready, you’ll go to group. There,” he said and affixed the last of the cables to the back of Dev’s neck. “Ooops, almost forgot.” He reached into the pocket of the coat he wore and took out a pair of gloves. “Can you please put these on?”

He handed them to Dev who took them and, as he put them on, examined them. They seemed like ordinary gloves, the kind one might wear when there was just a nip in the air coming off the sea. Not too thick.

“Are you comfortable?” Henry asked. “Cold?”

“No,” said Dev. “I’m fine.”

But he wasn’t fine. In fact, as he said those words, he happened to catch his reflection in the mirror again. He looked like some kind of animal in an experiment with the wires and cables attached to his head and back and chest. The gloves felt tight on his hands.

“Well then, let’s get started. The most important thing, Dev, is for you to answer truthfully. The more truthful you are, the easier it will be for us to help you and the sooner you’ll be able to resume your daily life. Do you understand?”

Dev nodded his head. “Yes,” he said.

“Alright then, I’d like for you, Dev, to close your eyes. That’s it, close your eyes and just breathe normally. Don’t try to regulate your breathing, just breathe as you normally would. Now notice your body. Notice your feet, your legs, your abdomen…”

Dev did as he was told. He was not unfamiliar with such calming techniques, but instead of making him feel at ease, with each command, Dev’s mind raced. Was this the hypnosis that Beatrice had spoken of? Would he dip slowly into a deep sleep, Henry by his side whispering something into his ear? Dev resisted, but his eyelids grew heavy. A warm sensation washed over him. He felt the cables attached to his skin, but even they seemed to lighten as he breathed in and out. He wiggled his fingers in his gloves and listened to Henry speak, the long, quiet way he said the words. Of course Dev was succumbing; he was an Absorber.

“Keeping your eyes closed,” Henry said, “let us move up the spine, that’s it, breathe in and breathe out, Dev. Don’t force it. Notice your neck, your ears, the top of your head. That’s it, just breathe,” Henry said, low and kindly. “Are you there, Dev? Can you hear me?”

“Yes, I can hear you,” Dev said. He wasn’t unconscious, was he? He had spoken just now, hadn’t he?

“Alright. I’m going to turn on this machine here. It will make a low humming noise. Please don’t be alarmed. Let’s do your vitals first. Can you state your name?”

“Dev Singh.”

“Marital status?”

“Single.”

“Do you have any known relatives?”

“No.”

“Do you have any known children, biological or otherwise?”

“No.”

“Very good,” Henry said. “You’re a very truthful person, aren’t you, Dev?”

Dev was not sure if he was supposed to answer the question or if Henry was trying to trick him. After all, Dev was there because he had lied. Well, not lied, but he had done something wrong. He never denied having his notebook, and the tape—Shay. Suddenly he sat up straight as if he’d just remembered something important.

“You alright, Dev?” Henry asked. He picked up the tape again—the reading kept coming—and looked at it.

“Yes,” Dev said.

Henry looked at him with a raised eyebrow. “Hmm,” he said. “It’s okay if you’re nervous, Dev. Lots are. And not just here. I’ve worked in a few Sanitariums, and it’s always the same. I mean, intake is a little different for everyone, of course, but most patients come to us, well, a little rattled. Sometimes more than a little.”

“No, that’s not it,” he said. “I’m fine.”

“Care to share?” Henry asked. “Before we move on?”

At this Dev’s heart beat quick. It was possible that Henry knew about Shay—after all, she knew Absorbers. But if he asked after her and didn’t receive the response he’d hoped for, then what? He shook his head.

“Very well,” said Henry. “I’m going to now ask you a series of five questions. No one question is any more important than any other, and no answer you give will change the questions I ask. It’s imperative that you are as truthful as you can be. If you need more time to answer, simply raise your left hand. Do you understand?”

“I do,” he said. He felt his teeth press together as if they were doing so on their own accord. It was cold in the room, and he shivered.

“Question one. In your own words, can you describe your current problems as you see them?”

Henry reached up with his hand and gently closed Dev’s eyelids for him. “It works best if you concentrate,” he said.

Dev stared into the darkness behind his own eyelids. He saw spots and flashes, colored streaks fly by. He thought he could still see Henry hovering in front of him, as if his eyelids were translucent. He thought he could hear Henry breathing, but then he realized that it was his own breath, rapid and short.

“Go ahead, Dev. Please answer the question.”

Dev was scared, and he wished he could just talk to Shay. There must’ve been some kind of misunderstanding. “I’m not sure what you mean. I don’t have any problems,” he said. “I’m still not sure why I’m here other than the notebook—which is not only allowed, but welcome, and the tape I can explain— Ms. Donaldson—”

An electric surge jolted through Dev. He felt it start in his fingers, like the tips of them were pressed down on a hot burner, but then it traveled up his arms and into his neck. It went from there to his eyes and down to his groin, this sizzling, searing pain. Dev opened his mouth and quickly Henry slid in a thick piece of rolled leather. Dev jerked and spasmed, felt his face contract, his muscles ripple and tremor underneath his skin. And then he went lax, but the electricity that had coursed through him lingered still in his tissue. He twitched and jerked.

“Everything alright, Dev?” Henry asked. He took a small towel and held it up to Dev’s mouth, wiping the spit that slowly dribbled out of him. “First one is always a doozy. I just want you to remember—you have control over that box.” At this, he pointed out toward the small box that sat on the counter next to the sink. “Yes, I’m standing here and using it, but your actions dictate whether I utilize it or not. Do you understand, Dev? Do you understand what I’m trying to say?”

“Y-yes,” Dev stammered. His spit and his tongue tasted metallic.

“Question two,” Henry said. “How long has this been going on?”

“Henry—I—” Dev stammered.

“Please just answer the question,” Henry said and put up his hands. “Otherwise,” he whispered, “otherwise, I’ll have to turn it up.” He gave a small smile and a shrug. He looked behind him at the door as if someone might come through at any moment. “I’ll repeat. Question two: how long has this been going on?”

“I don’t know,” Dev said. But as he did, as he spoke the words, a great wave of sadness washed over him. Were they lies? He didn’t know. He thought back to the Home when he was a child, of the bird and the boy, of the man at the Feats taking a stick to his neck. There was Shay and what had become of her, and Doris, and Noah’s bloody head, the Collector of the Year awards and letters on his mantle. Or maybe they’d taken them; maybe they’d make him give up the title. The sadness edged out, plummeted down his body and gave way to something else. He thought of the question Henry had asked him.

“Yes, that’s it,” Henry said. “Speak louder if you can. The more you say, the easier this will be.”

There was a beeping in the background. It was coming from the small box that Henry controlled. Dev’s body and skin still tingled from the residual electricity. But there was something else that he felt. “I guess,” Dev said. “I suppose I have been…” He trailed off trying to find the right word, and his heart thumped in time with the beeping from the box. He lifted his hand to his chest and touched the electrode stuck to him. “I’ve been a little anxious. A little sad,” he said.

“Good, good,” Henry said. “Of course, we could tell from what you’d written in your notebook—the other evidence, too, it was all clear as day. Our aim is to make sure that such feelings do not impede your job duties. As it is, well, with the tape incident—you understand, of course. We can’t have any of our employees taking matters into their own hands. The system is not set up for that.”

As he spoke, Dev stared at himself in the mirror. He’d done something he knew he wasn’t supposed to; he’d been caught, and what of Shay? Whatever happened to her was his fault, wasn’t it? Dev hadn’t been lying—he had been anxious. But he was more than a little sad. And as he sat there hooked up to cables in a small room somewhere maybe in the village but maybe not, he felt the sadness creep in right there in the room.

“And how long have you been feeling like this?”

“For, for a while now…” It had been with him recently, hadn’t it? And even before. A kind of sadness, intangible and nearly imperceptible sat just there in the corner of his mind.

“Good, good,” Henry said as he watched the monitor track Dev’s vitals. “You’re doing just fine. Next question: What do you hope to gain from this intake?”

Dev knew that he could say anything he hoped for right now, and no matter what he said, it would be alright. But that was the thing—what did he hope for, really? He knew what he wished for—to be rid of his body, to not feel the sour sadness that coursed through him. What if he could go to sleep at night and wake in the morning without feeling as if someone were pressing down upon his shoulders and chest?

“Dev?” Henry asked again. “What do you hope to gain?”

“I just want to be better,” Dev said. “So that I can best serve the Bureau.”

Henry looked at the tape that came out of the little box. It was stacking up in heaps on the floor next to the table, and Dev suddenly thought of a pile of leaves. He wanted to jump down from the table and go over to the tape, pick it up in his arms. Was everything he thought there? Was that question? And that one?

“Very good, Dev,” said Henry. “Question four: when did you last think of hurting yourself or someone else?”

Dev swallowed, and he watched the sensors on the machine bounce up and down. “I—I haven’t,” Dev said. The sensors sped up, and Dev braced himself. But it was no use. The electricity traveled through him, in through his fingertips and scalp and then underneath his skin and muscle to the bones beneath. His shoulders rose up by his ears, and he contracted the length of his body. Whether it was one second or one minute, Dev could not tell. And then his body went limp.

“I’ll give you a moment if you need it, Dev. Intakes can be quite difficult,” Henry said.

Dev spasmed, his head tilted to the side three times in a row. He felt his back muscles. “No,” he said. “I can do it.” But he stammered, and his teeth chattered together.

“Very well,” Henry said. “Question five: how have you tried to cope with your feelings in the past?”

He opened his mouth and said, “I had Shay.” He said it quickly, as though the answer had been on his tongue before ever knowing the question. “I had Shay,” he said again. “I could talk to her about anything.” Dev looked down at his hands. The gloves scratched his burning fingertips.

“Who?” Henry asked.

Dev raised his head and looked at Henry. “A friend,” Dev said. “Shay is my best friend.” When he looked up, he caught his reflection in the mirror just as the light above flickered once and went out. There in the darkness, in the mirror, or rather behind the mirror, Dev saw the outlines of two figures. He turned to Henry and asked, “Are they…?” But he didn’t get to finish, as just as he tried to lift a finger to point toward the mirror, Henry turned the knob all the way to the right and Dev, whose body still jumped and twitched from the previous shocks, went rigid.

* * *

When Dev opened his eyes, he saw that his forearms and wrists, which were on the armrests of a metal chair, had restraints around them. He tried to focus, staring first at his arms and hands, and then tried to wiggle his fingers. But he could not feel them. He shifted and adjusted in his seat, crossing and then uncrossing his legs and trying to fold his arms together over his chest.

There was a cough, and only then did he realize he was not alone. He lifted his head up and saw that he was in the common room and that his chair was one in a circle of five. In three of the others was a person whose forearms and wrists were also in restraints. One—the woman next to him—had her head hanging down and the others were staring straight ahead, blinking hard and wide. Dev looked at each one of them from left to right. There were two women, one man from what he could tell, though he didn’t want to make any assumptions. All of them wore the same expression— tired, confused. Frightened. Did they also work for the Bureau? They must’ve—isn’t that what Henry had said to him during intake? None of them looked familiar; it was possible they knew Dev, but if they did, they gave no indication. They were too preoccupied with their own restraints, too startled from waking up to their new surroundings, to pay any attention to him. There was a communal rustling, the squeaking and bending of the wooden chairs. The woman on his right coughed again. Her long hair half-covered her face, her upper body rigidly bent forward and to the right.

Just then, Dev saw Rhona walking toward the group. He was relieved—there would be some sort of explanation. But as she approached the circle, he saw that behind her was Henry. Behind Henry was another Absorber and another and another still. They walked in a single file line like soldiers, and as they reached the circle, each of the Absorbers took their place behind one of the people sitting in the chairs. Henry took his place behind Dev. He put his hand on his shoulder, leaned down, and said, “Hi Dev, it’s good to see you.” Henry’s hot breath hit the back of Dev’s neck, and he shuddered. His skin was like fire still, and there was something about the way Henry had spoken to him. He’d spoken the words slowly—or had he? Maybe Dev wasn’t hearing correctly. He twisted his head around to try and get a look at Henry’s face, but his arms caught, and he could not turn around all the way. He felt the heat from Henry’s body, smelled the same soapy bleach that he’d smelled before.

Just like Henry, the other Absorbers leaned forward and said something to the people sitting in the chairs. The people, whose demeanor changed liked Dev’s when spoken to, squirmed and flinched. Dev’s muscles quivered, and there was the sensation of pricking on his skin. His bottom lip trembled, and he felt saliva on his chin. Forgetting he was restrained, he reached up to wipe it away. Henry must’ve noticed because suddenly he was pressing a handkerchief against Dev’s mouth.

“There you go,” Henry said.

“Thank you,” Dev said automatically. As he spoke, he was acutely aware of his voice. It sounded hollow and tinny, far away and dim. He was speaking, yes, but it was also not him, rather some other version of himself.

Rhona stood in the middle of the circle, the empty chair directly behind her from Dev’s viewpoint. In her hands she held a stack of folders, the same kind that Lt. Dunlop and Lt. Rogers had used, which had held the photographs of Dev. He straightened at this, the panic starting in his belly. He did not look at the others in the circle, but he felt them stiffen as he did.

“Hello, welcome all. Today we begin cycle one, and this,” she said, spreading her fingers out wide in front of her. “This is your group.”

At this everyone in the circle looked around at each other. They let their eyes meet finally, and Dev glanced at the woman directly across from him. They both gave a brief smile though there was nothing to smile about. It was just a courteous gesture, one that was ingrained in all of them. The woman looked familiar, and Dev focused on trying to place her. But after a few minutes, he realized he’d been staring at a clock behind her head, the hands of which read 2:05. He felt heavy, like something was pushing down on him from above. He looked up at the ceiling, and though he could not be sure, he thought he saw something move behind the vent. He stared at it, his eyes focusing and refocusing until he couldn’t be sure that he was looking at anything at all.

“We’re here—you’re here—because you’ve all been—it’s alright, June. It is June, isn’t it? Is that what you prefer to be called?” Rhona said.

The woman with long hair who sat to Dev’s right nodded her head. “Yes, ma’am,” she said. She sounded as if she’d been crying, and her hair still fell around her face.

“Please, June, we’re rather informal here,” she said, but her eyes had moved on to others in the circle. “Call me Rhona. Like I was saying—you’re all here for a specific reason. That reason, of course, is that your reports show you’ve been struck.”

A visible and audible unease fell upon the group. Dev immediately looked down at his hands, ashamed and terrified. He should’ve recognized the warning signs. After all, hadn’t he been first in his class during training? He thought quickly of Gemma’s jelly bean, of how tightly he had held it in his fist. He thought of his notebook and of the nights he had lain in bed, sleep escaping him. But he had recognized them—the signs, that is. That was the thing. He has felt it there underneath his skin. A snake slithering right beneath the surface.

“That’s right, Dev,” said Rhona. “I can tell it’s clicking. Just think back, as you are all doing right now. Surely there were indicators: issues with sleeping, eating. A sense of panic for some. For others—and I think I know who in this group—you might’ve felt a deep grief that you couldn’t pinpoint. Or maybe you could. Whether you could or not is not the issue. The issue,” she said, “is that the grief was, is, there at all.”

Suddenly Henry’s head was next to Dev’s. Dev flinched, and as he did he tried to raise his hands. The restraints caught again, jangling and clinking, and everyone in the group looked at him.

“It’s alright—it happens to us all,” Rhona said. “The grief, I mean. Even me—yes, I know looking at me it’s hard to believe, but I once gave in to the sadness as well and ended up here just like you. Well, not here specifically—this Sanitarium is for those in the Bureau only, but it was for all intents and purposes the same. And, like you, I too was scared during my first group. That’s why you have your Absorber with you. Yes, that’s OK, turn around and say hello.”

The people in the circle tried to turn around just as Dev had done before, but because of the restraints could not do so all the way. Dev watched as the Absorbers bent down and poked their heads over the peoples’ shoulders. Henry leaned down and placed his hand on Dev’s forearm.

“You okay?” he asked.

But before he could respond, Rhona continued.

“Normally,” she said, “as you know, people who are struck are given a year to recover. But those who work for the Bureau are not in the same shoes as others, so to speak. While you may not have felt sad for long— and I do hope for your sake that you haven’t—you all pose a specific threat to the business with which we are charged. Much like it’s your job out there to mitigate grief, here, in the Sanitarium, it’s our job to mitigate any threat you might pose to the greater good. Take June for example. June—could you tell us what department you’re in?”

“I’m a Transmitter.”

When she said this, Dev’s attention rose. A Transmitter. Did she know Shay? And if she knew Shay, would she also know if anything had happened to her? Dev couldn’t know the likelihood of it, but he resolved to ask after Shay the first chance he got. Maybe June had some information.

“And why do you think you’re here, June? What did Lt. Rogers tell you?” As Rhona asked, she held up the folders that she still held in her hands. “Let me know if you’d like to see your report. It’s all there.”

“No—I don’t want—” she said, shaking her head. She looked around at the others in the circle, and when she got to Dev, he saw that there were dark circles under her eyes and small red marks on her forehead. Did he have them too? He reached up to touch his own forehead, forgetting that his arms were in restraints. June stared at him.

“Go on, June, you were saying,” Rhona said.

“I—I didn’t destroy the tapes,” June said. As she spoke, she shifted in her chair, but because of the restraints could not move much. “Not all of them at least. But I wasn’t going to do anything with them,” she said this last part defensively. Everyone in the group looked at her.

“And why do you think you did that?” Rhona asked.

There was a pause, and June bit her bottom lip as if trying to figure things out in her own head before speaking. Dev stared at her along with the others. Would she say the thing that he, too, felt deep down, whatever it was? Was it true that June felt the same way as he did, or had at least at one point felt it? And if yes, then had Dev felt the same as Doris had, as Noah had? It didn’t seem possible—too many variables to consider—yet there was Rhona saying that they were all struck.

“What if there was something more on the tape?” June continued. “Something that I hadn’t heard? That none of us could hear? I guess I thought if I listened to it again, listened to it more, there might be something there.”

“And did you?” Rhona asked. “Listen to it?”

June shook her head. “I never did,” she said, and then, quietly, “but I wanted to.”

“Yes, well,” Rhona said. “What you wanted to do was dangerous. It posed a specific danger to both the individual and the larger group. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“I think so,” June said.

“What I mean is that if we don’t do our jobs the way they are meant to be done, we can hurt the very people we are trying to help. And in turn they can hurt others. The damage can be wide and irreconcilable. Absorbers, you may unlock them.”

At this the Absorbers stepped out from behind their charges’ chairs. Each of them had a ring of keys attached to their belts, and Dev heard the combined jingling of metal as they reached over and unlocked the restraints one at a time. As Henry unlocked Dev’s right hand, he bent and said to him, “It’s best if you don’t resist.” But Dev did not know whether he was referring to the unlocking of the restraints, or to Rhona, or to whatever was about to happen.

When Dev’s arms were finally free, he rubbed his wrists and his forearms. There were the little marks on his hands, and his fingertips were still a bright red. He looked over at the woman sitting to his left and noticed that she, too, had marks on her hand. He turned to June and watched as she held her palm to her forehead.

“Very good, everyone, that’s it. Try to relax, give into whatever feeling you might be having right now. All feelings are valid and welcome during this time. Cathy, can you tell the group how you’re feeling?”

The woman across from Dev raised her head. She’d been staring at her hands, her feet maybe, and she looked around wide-eyed as if caught not paying attention in school. “I feel OK,” Cathy said.

“Could you be more specific?” Rhona asked. “After all, being ‘OK’ might have different meanings for different people.”

“I don’t know,” Cathy said. “I mean I’m tired. My body feels weird—but I’m here. Right? Isn’t that what you want from us anyway?”

“No need to be combative, Cathy,” Rhona said. “We don’t want anything except for you to be happy.”

“But I am happy,” Cathy said.

“Well, according to your report, you’re not.” When Rhona said this she held up the folders in her hands as if they could all see for themselves. “And that is why you are here—that’s why you are all here. The reports don’t lie—even if you don’t see it, even if you think you don’t feel it, the grief is in you. For your own safety—and the safety of others—that’s why you’re here. Remember, Mitigation is the building block for a successful society. If you see something, say something—surely you remember that from your own childhood?”

Dev twitched, and his hand slapped against the side of the chair. Embarrassed, he held it still with his other hand.

“It’s alright, Dev. I see you had a difficult intake,” Rhona said and nodded toward his hands. “How do you feel now?”

Dev cleared his throat. He stared at Rhona, but he could feel everyone’s eyes on him. Even June’s, who he could tell in his periphery had tucked her hair behind her ears. He wanted to say that he was fine now, that he understood the situation. But he was worried what might happen if somehow he was being measured and evaluated. His heart raced, and the inside of his cheeks were dry and sticky. He opened his mouth, hinged his jaw once, twice, but the words wouldn’t come. After all, what was he supposed to say? They were all looking at him, waiting, as if to allow him time to fumble. He felt the hanging of stillness in the room.

“I feel,” he said, swallowing hard. “It’s just that—”

He faltered, stumbled over his words. They were there, or they had been at one point, but he couldn’t summon them. He saw them, their shapes and outlines, but he could put them in no discernible order.

“Dev,” Rhona said and approached him. She put her hand on his. “It’s alright. You can tell me, all of us. This is your group now. In a way it’s like your new home. Certainly your new community. Maybe even a family.”

When she said that word—family—Dev felt a lurch and a quiver of nervousness. The people in the circle shifted and leaned forward as if they could touch that which Rhona had spoken of. They were all Bureau employees, children of Resets. Yes—that’s what it was, wasn’t it? Dev could see it in the faces of the others— the wonder they felt at that word. The four of them there in the group—all of them were without a family. They’d all been raised like Dev, knowing but not remembering that they’d once had parents. Siblings, perhaps. It was a quiet ache, a roar that they all felt inside. Dev knew because he felt it, too. But though Rhona spoke of it, of family, Dev understood that whatever configuration of people he ended up a part of, it wouldn’t be family, not really. How could it be? No matter how he tried to put Shay and the boy from the Home and this person and that person together—what of it? He could call them family, but that they would never truly be. He felt Henry’s hand on his shoulder as if he’d known what Dev was thinking. Maybe he did; how was Dev to know?

He looked down at his fingers and thought of plaster walls, and he scraped his palms with his nails. Yes, he did remember them. The hallway, of the way he’d been carried out through the door by a stranger in a suit. He looked down at his hands. All he saw, though, was someone else’s hands. Then he realized that Rhona’s hand was still on his, and he jumped back in his chair, startled that she was standing so close to him.

“It’s alright,” Henry said. “Don’t fight it.”

“Dev,” Rhona said. “Would you care to share what’s on your mind? This is as good a time as any.”

“No, it’s nothing, it’s fine,” he said.

“Well everything is something, Dev. Come on, don’t be shy. Like I said. Family now.”

Dev looked around at the others who looked right back at him. “It’s just that my friend, Shay—I just was wondering if there’s any way to get hold of her.”

“What do you mean?” asked Rhona.

“I haven’t heard from her and I don’t think she knows I’m here. I’m worried and maybe if I could just speak with her quickly—”

“Oh, Dev,” Rhona said. “When you signed your papers, you agreed that you would not have access to visitors during your stay here.”

“I didn’t—I don’t recall signing—”

“Papers?” the man across from him interrupted. “Do we all have papers?”

“Yes, Albert, even you!” Rhona said and pulled the folders out from underneath her arm. “In here.” She held the folders up in her hand. They weren’t very full—they were rather thin actually—and Dev had a sudden urge to leap from his seat and push Rhona to the ground, tear the folders out of her hands. Of course Henry and the other Absorbers would be on him immediately, but still he thought what it would be like to hold her down, his knee on her neck, while everyone else in the circle ran. And then he would let her go but not before he, too, was able to get away. “I brought them in case any of you wanted to see them,” she said. “Sometimes it helps to see the paperwork, but of course that is a choice that I leave up to you.”

The others glanced at each other. June finally spoke. “Actually, I’d like to see,” she said. And just like that everyone else chimed in as well. “Me too, me too,” they said. Rhona walked around the circle and handed the folders to each as they stuck out their hands as if they were being given a trifle. When she got to Dev, she had only his folder left in her hands. “Dev?” she asked. “Do you care to look?”

He was about to say that he’d already seen what was in it—hadn’t he? Wasn’t it the same folder Lt. Rogers had? But then he changed his mind. “Yes,” he said, and he took the folder from her hands.

There were two pieces of paper in the folder—or rather, a piece of paper and the rolled tape of the report. He unrolled it and held it up in front of his face. He squinted, did the addition and multiplication in his head. Of course he had no access to his surveillance, but the results concluded that he was struck. The other paper that was in the folder bore his signature at the bottom. Next to his signature was another’s. Dev squinted. H-E-N—he suddenly turned around, folder in hand.

“Happy to help,” Henry said and raised his hand. Dev flinched, squeezed his eyes shut and waited for something—another electrical shock perhaps; Henry’s cool, dry hand upon his shoulder. But when he opened his eyes, all he saw was everyone staring at him.

“As you can all see, you have all agreed to be here. You registered voluntarily—with a little help from the Bureau, that is. We are able to give those in your situations a little, well, nudge, I guess you could say! And sometimes that’s all that’s needed. In other situations, where a more, shall I say, robust course of treatment is necessary, well that is where we step in. The treatments offered here are unparalleled, and you are now on the road to your own recovery. These treatment plans have been specifically tailored to help you and you alone. There are only two rules that all must follow. They’re written there on your contract, but I will sum it up for you. You are not allowed to discuss your treatments with any of the other patients. That is the first rule, and arguably, the most important. Any deviation from this will result in disciplinary action. The second rule is that you must never, ever leave this unit, this floor. There are three wings which extend from this room— the residential hallway, where all of your rooms are located, the treatment hallway, and the atrium. You are, of course, free to come and go between your rooms, this common room, and the atrium—did you know we had an atrium? Right through those doors,” she said and pointed behind Dev. “It’s lovely there, especially on a sunny day.”

Dev turned around and looked at the doors that headed to the atrium. He expected to see a red light above them like the treatment wing, but there was none. The doors had large windows in them, and he could see the atrium beyond. He saw the tall trees and the green leaves—it looked exactly like the one at the Bureau. He was just turning his head back around when he caught sight of movement in his peripheral vision. He glanced back and saw three people walk past the window. He knew instantly that two were Absorbers— their clothing gave them away. But between those two was another. Someone shorter, dressed in the gray clothing that Dev himself had on. For a moment, he thought it looked like Shay, but then they were gone. His heart raced at the thought—on one hand he didn’t want her to be here, but on the other hand he did. If she were there, and he could get to her—then what? He turned back around.

“Only you can control what comes of your treatments,” Rhona was saying. “Ultimately you are in charge of your whole self. In fact, let’s say that together. Let’s say ‘I am in charge of my whole self.’”

There was a mumbling in the group as everyone said the words. Dev himself said them quietly, almost imperceptibly. He tried to turn back around toward the atrium again, but Henry, who stood right behind him, placed his hands on Dev’s shoulders gently but firmly.

“You can choose to be anything you want,” Rhona said. “You are in control. Just tell yourself you’re happy. Tell yourself how great your life is. Tell yourself you have much to be grateful for. That’s it. Say it now, to yourself. I am happy. Life is great. I am grateful. There, yes, three times.”

Dev said the words, but he did not feel them, not really. He felt Henry’s hands still on his shoulders and a weight inside of his chest. Spit pooled up from his throat into the back of his mouth. He said the words again. His palms itched and sweated, his fingertips cold and tingling still. He looked at the others in the group. When he got to June, he paused. She looked up, and they both smiled at each other. He said the words one last time. I am happy. Life is great. I am grateful. But with each syllable he drifted further and further from them, and by the time he was finished, he couldn’t remember even saying the words at all.

* * *

Dev lay awake in his bed thinking of Shay. Had that been her outside of the doors that afternoon? If it had been her, and she was there, then where was she? June was a Transmitter, and he’d thought of asking her about Shay, but he hadn’t gotten the chance. He’d spent the rest of the afternoon and evening resting while Henry came in and out of his room, and after dinner there was some stretching and other rudimentary exercises meant to benefit him. Then he’d had the opportunity to watch the game shows with the others after his meal, but he had not wished to remain. He was tired, exhausted, and his body, though no longer twitching, hummed and buzzed with the electrical currents from earlier.

In his room, in his bed, however, he replayed the moment over and over. Shay had appeared in the right-hand window and had gone left—to Dev’s left that is. He had yet to be in the atrium and thought that perhaps there were other wings that extended from it the way they did at the Bureau. There had been two Absorbers with her, hadn’t there? Why two when Dev had only Henry? Of course, it might not have been Shay—he couldn’t know the chances, although Rhona herself said they were at a Sanitarium specifically for Bureau employees. It was possible that there was more than one Sanitarium like that, though wouldn’t he have known about it? The thought suddenly occurred to him that he might not even be in the village in which he lived, or even in a neighboring one. No, he was being paranoid; Rhona and Henry had both assured him and the others during group that this was normal—a side effect of the course of treatment. There were many side effects it seemed, and Rhona had listed them as if they were everyday ailments. Pay attention, but do not be alarmed, she had said. He realized his mind, his thoughts, wandered, and he refocused on the task at hand. He needed to know, to find out if that had been Shay, and with that, he removed the covers from his body, swung his legs over the side of the bed and walked to the door.

He peeked out of his window and saw nothing but the doors opposite. He pulled the door open just a bit, slowly, quietly, and lined his eye up in the crack. Then he opened the door a little more, and a little more still until he could duck his head out and look both ways. Still, he did not see anyone. It was late, and the evening broadcasts had been over for some time.

He crept along the hallway and stayed close to the wall. Three doors down, a window glowed with light. As he passed, he glanced in. June sat there in her bed, or rather, on the edge of her bed. She was brushing her hair and looking at the floor. Dev ducked down quickly, worried that she might have seen him, and held his breath. But there was no shouting, no yelling, no indication that she had seen anything at all. He crept on.

The common room was empty, the television off. Dev went toward the doors that led to the atrium. If anyone caught him, he could just say that he wanted to smell the atrium’s fresh dirt, feel the dewy air on his skin. He could say that it made him feel better—yes— and that he’d woken in the night with a sudden urge to be close to the earth.

He pushed through the atrium doors and found himself surrounded by lush foliage and glass. It was night, but the moonlight shone down from high above and illuminated the leaves of the plants and trees. On the far wall was another set of doors marked with an exit sign. Dev headed toward them. Rhona had said they were allowed in the atrium itself but could not go beyond. Dev peered back through the window of the door through which he’d come, but no one was there, just an empty room faintly lit from the dull bulbs that hung above. It was possible that there was no patrol because he was being recorded—and with that thought, he froze, though if he were being recorded, it was already too late; he was up and out of his bed wandering around in the night. But when he looked up at the ceiling and in the corners of the room, he did not see the typical cameras of the Bureau—small, encased in a plastic orb, a tiny red light indicating they were running. He didn’t see anything at all.

As he walked through the atrium, he heard only his own quiet footsteps. If he found Shay, if she was really there and he somehow got to her, then what? He didn’t have a plan. Perhaps she would say something logical, something that would tell Dev it hadn’t been her that turned in him. The thought of that, well, it felt like a betrayal. But then again, he’d betrayed her by putting her in the situation to begin with. If he got to her, Dev would be able to apologize. For the tape, for betraying her, for not trying harder. And that’s all that she had wanted, wasn’t it? For him to try to be happy, to put on a smiling face and go through his day in the way they both knew he was supposed to. She’d risked things herself for him on more than one occasion.

There was a noise behind him, and he held his breath. There it was again—a kind of rustling. He turned on his heel quickly but saw only the dark shadows and outlines of the beech trees and the planters that surrounded them. He stood still for a moment, but the silence, the high pitch of the quiet filled his ears. He heard it again—this time it sounded like a piece of paper tearing, and he instinctively walked toward it. There was something on the ground by the wall, and Dev bent to look. It was a piece of beech bark, long and twisted. The ends looked like they’d been gnawed. He almost picked it up, but at the last moment, he took his hand away. He’d been gone perhaps five minutes; if there was someone that monitored the common room, they would probably be back soon. He had to act quickly.

He made his way toward the far exit and pushed the doors open carefully. He found that he was looking at a hallway identical to his own. It stretched about ten doors deep, and at the end of the hall was a window partially covered in a curtain. If he went down the hall, there was nowhere for him to go or hide should anyone come through the doors. There was one door whose window was lit, about a third of the way down the hall on his right. Dev walked along the wall in the shadows. His toes cracked in his socks, and he heard the soft hum of the ventilation system. He paused and listened for any other noise, but he heard nothing.

He approached the door whose window was lit. With one eye, he peeked past the edge just enough to glance in. He saw a figure sitting on the bed, and he darted back to where he could not be seen. He hadn’t gotten a good look at the person. The odds of it being Shay were slim. He knew this, told himself that it wasn’t her. He looked again, this time keeping his eye focused on the person sitting on the bed. He saw first the way the person sat with their legs crossed, and a familiarity came over him. His gaze then drifted up and he saw the way their arm moved up and down her hair, a brush in hand. A feeling of unease rooted down in his belly. He swallowed, and moved his head so that he could see with both eyes. It took a moment for him to understand that he was, indeed, looking at June. He looked to his left and then his right—had he walked back down his own hallway without realizing it? No—he had gone through the atrium. He swallowed again and felt the sting of panic shoot through him. His face tingled and his breath caught and he took one two steps back. He looked again through the window, but June continued to brush her hair. She did not look up.

He withdrew from the window and pressed himself up against the wall. The hallway spun and shook, and he blinked hard, dug his fingernails into the fatty tissue of his palms. He’d gone in a circle somehow without noticing. He’d been focused on Shay, on what he would say to her if he found her, and maybe he got turned around when he was in the common room. He stepped away from the wall and quickly walked back down the hallway toward the atrium. Once inside, he kept his eyes on the next set of doors—there were only two, the one in front of him and the one that he’d just come through. Without looking away, without blinking, he walked forward though the doors and into the common room. Still it was empty, and Dev snaked through the tables and chairs making sure that he did not stop or turn around. He passed the television and the sofa and when he came upon he saw immediately that along the hallway, only one door’s window was lit, about two thirds of the way down on his left. He approached the door quickly and looked in. There, sitting on a bed, was a figure with their legs crossed. Their arm went up and down, and Dev saw that in their hand they held a brush. It was June. He looked behind him and saw the empty space of the common room and the doors beyond that led to the atrium. Then he walked quickly toward the end of the hallway. He pulled open a door, looked inside of the room, and saw his bed just as he’d left it—the bedding crumpled up at the foot, the pillows stacked on top of each other. The rusty tank attached to the wall. And so with only the panic at his heels, he went to his bed, crawled in, and pulled the covers up to his head.

What he’d seen had been impossible, hadn’t it? There must’ve been some sort of explanation. He was disoriented. Sleepwalking, maybe. He’d imagined the entire thing. Of course, there was no one to ask, as he knew without being told that he wasn’t supposed to be up and out of bed wandering around after evening broadcasts. And so he lay there in the darkness, the scratchy sheet rubbing up against his chin, his heart racing.

* * *

One week later—it had been a week, hadn’t it? He tried to keep track in his room, folding the corner of a book page each night as a marker. When he’d woken this morning he’d counted seven. Seven nights he’d slept there in the Sanitarium instead of his own bed. And that morning he woke to screaming. It had come at him in his dream—he and Shay had been walking at the sea. The tide was out. Boats dotted the horizon. The screaming was primal, guttural, and once he was fully awake, Dev could not be sure who it might be coming from. It sounded like a man, but how was he to know?

There was a quick knock on the door, and then it opened. Henry came into the room. “Good morning, Dev,” Henry said. “And how did you sleep?” He closed the door behind him with his foot, but Dev could still faintly hear the screaming. Suddenly there was a loud shrill cry, and Dev looked over at the door. “It’s alright,” Henry said. “They’re okay, if that’s what you’re worried about. Everyone in here goes through it. You did, too, you just don’t remember.”

He said the last bit with a smile on his face. Dev instinctively returned the smile, though when what Henry had said finally registered in his mind he felt it on the sides of his cheeks—little prickles, like someone was poking him gently with a needle. He didn’t remember, and though in that moment he tried to picture it, he saw only what he might’ve looked like as he was transferred from his apartment to the Sanitarium.

Henry neared the edge of Dev’s bed and held out a tray upon which were three small cups. “Here you go,” he said. “And then I’ll take you to breakfast. June’s out there already.” At this he smiled and gave a quick nod of his head. Dev understood what he meant, but Henry was misled. Perhaps Henry had seen Dev sneaking looks at June during group or while he was breakfasting. When Henry had mentioned June’s name, Dev’s breath had held—this was true. More than once during group he’d caught June’s eye hidden behind her long hair. She didn’t brush it during the sessions, but she did hold her hairbrush throughout each meeting. He’d spoken a bit to her—hello, good afternoon, a nod here and there. It was more so than the others—Cathy and Albert, who both moved through the day with their heads down. June was willing to look at Dev, though he always looked away after a moment. If he happened to address her, she always responded to him, her words quietly firm. He’d listened when she spoke in group, too, when she talked with Rhona at breakfast. There was a calm reverie in what she said, but Dev realized that it was only when she told the truth that she stilled herself. The rest of the time she fidgeted and squirmed like the rest of them. Dev included. She reminded him of Shay, and when he thought of that his teeth clenched. He’d not gone out of his room or into the atrium again. He’d gone only to the common room and back.

Dev reached for the first paper cup that Henry held out to him. In it were two pills, one blue and the other white. He knew in the other cups there would be pills that were yellow and pink and green and purple. They had a hard shell coating—like little candies he’d had as a child—and they were stamped with some kind of marking, a number or a letter perhaps. But Henry was always there watching him take the pills, and so Dev had not been able to really get a good look at them. Even if he could, even if he did, he had no way of finding out what he was taking. And he was feeling better, wasn’t he? He thought of June as he swallowed the pills two at a time. How he might get her alone; she was a Transmitter, after all, and Dev only wished to ask after Shay. But it was more than that, wasn’t it? What Rhona had spoken of at the first meeting, the community, the family. He could taste it. Though they spoke rarely, he felt a kind of kinship to the others in his group. And as he sat there with four pills down and two to go, he realized that he finally belonged somewhere. In just a short time, Dev had begun to feel at ease around the other three people on his floor. He’d look over at Albert, older and larger than Dev, but a Collector as well. They’d nod at each other, and Dev would be desperate to ask him if he’d seen a life event, too. And if yes, then how many? And what was worse: collecting memories or bodies because both were empty in the end?

“Dev?” Henry asked. “These, too, please.” Henry stood next to Dev’s bed still holding the tray. There were two empty cups on the tray. Henry held a full one in between his thumb and forefinger. Dev took it from his hand, put the lip of the cup to his mouth and tossed them back. He swallowed them down with the last bit of water.

“Very good,” Henry said. He put the tray down on a small table near the door. “Come,” he said, grabbing Dev’s robe off a book “Don’t want you to catch cold. Rashers this morning. Nice, fat ones, too.”

Dev pushed himself up and out of bed. He slid his feet into his slippers and stood. “I’ve got two bits of good news, Dev,” Henry said as he slipped the robe over Dev’s shoulders. “Today we will begin deeper treatments. These supplements, your intake—” he said. “Those are simply tier one interventions. We needed to get you stabilized. And you are, aren’t you? Can you feel it?”

“Yes,” Dev said. He had answered truthfully, but the mention of deeper treatments—whatever that meant— alarmed him. “Does that mean I might get released early? Since I’m stabilized?”

“Oh,” Henry said with a smile. “No, everyone stays their full duration. Even you.” As he spoke he leaned down and whispered into Dev’s ear. “Collector of the Year! Another trip around the sun, incident-free!”

“What?” Dev asked. He turned around and faced Henry. Henry held the metal tray with the empty paper cups on it. Dev had the urge to smack the tray out of Henry’s hands and run—there was the hill out past the common room window, the glass ceilings in the atrium. Surely there was a way to get out. But he thought of Shay—of June. Henry kept speaking.

“It just came through the tubes,” he said, looking around as if to see if anyone had come in behind him. “I mean, we received notice. Even with all of this,” he gestured toward Dev, “you’re still the best there is. And I can’t tell you what an honor it is to be here with you now on this journey. This healing process.”

Dev stood there in his robe and slippers, his hair messed and his shirt untucked. He did not know how he could still be Collector of the Year. There had been Noah.

“I don’t understand,” Dev said. “There was—that is, before I came here there was a man…”

But as he spoke the words they disappeared on his lips. Yes, there had been a man, someone who had hurt himself, but what of him? Suddenly Dev was dizzy, and Henry kept talking but Dev couldn’t hear him. A slick terror quickened up his arms. He still tasted the pills he had swallowed.

“That was the second bit of good news,” Henry said. “But—and this is the truly unfortunate bad news— you are just not responding as we’d like to the tier one interventions. It’s funny,” he said as held the tray with the empty pill cups on it. “The way it works, I mean. Some respond right away, but others don’t. For you—well, your levels were off when you came to us. Vitamin D for one. Cortisol for another. Your next level of interventions targets those specifically. See if maybe that won’t do the trick!”

“Are they IVs or pills or—”

“Oh, you’ll be in the solarium. The light therapy room. You did do light therapy at home, didn’t you? Did you have access to it?”

“Yes, I used it,” Dev said. And he had, hadn’t he? He had told Beatrice he’d been doing that and more. “And I took supplements.” He relaxed a bit; light therapy was alright, even relaxing at times.

“Yes, well, what you have access to out there,” Henry said and tilted his head back toward the door. “It isn’t as strong as what we have here. We can… do more things.” He said the last part quickly after a pause. “Here, now,” he continued. “Let’s get you to breakfast. Don’t want your rashers to get cold.”

* * *

Dev sat at the same table he had sat at for a week. In front of him was his breakfast. He wasn’t hungry, though, and he looked out the window to the hills and fields beyond. They looked familiar—had he climbed them as a boy? Driven past them to or from a collection? He wondered if he could get out, if he could slip through a window or find an unlocked door, how far would he get before someone was on him?

He sat with his back to June, and since she usually entered after him, he only got a look at her when he finished and rose from his chair. He’d thought about mouthing Shay or coming up with an excuse to go over toward her table, drop something by her feet and whisper it as he bent down. There didn’t seem to be a reason why they couldn’t speak to each other—why any of them couldn’t speak to one another. Rhona had not prohibited it. And although Dev knew all their stories by now, and they spoke and listened to each other in group, outside of any sort of formality, they remained silent.

He stuck his spoon in his beans. They weren’t bad, but the thought of even putting one of them in his mouth made his stomach turn. Henry stood off a bit to the side and watched him eat. Dev wasn’t sure why as the spoon and the rubber knife posed no threat to anyone. Maybe he was keeping track of how much Dev was or wasn’t eating. The half dozen Absorbers stood near their charges, too; some bent and whispered, others stared straight ahead.

Suddenly, as Dev glanced out the window again, he saw something move up and over the hill. Something light colored—a small horse, maybe, or some other animal. It was too far away and had happened too fast for him to get a clear sight. But something had scrambled up the hill. He felt a hand on his left shoulder, and he jumped.

“Good morning, Dev,” said Rhona.

Dev didn’t know why he was surprised; Rhona had joined him every day at breakfast. In fact, she spoke to each and every patient during that time. She made her rounds from table to table, and though Dev knew he should not strain his ears to listen, he did. When Rhona went to June’s table, Dev made sure to stop chewing and sit still in hopes of catching a word or two. He wanted to know if Rhona spoke to June about the same things she spoke to him about. But he could never hear them clearly, not really. And though he might be able to have some indication from just looking at them, he kept his head down toward his food, just as he did now.

“May I?” Rhona asked as she pulled out a chair and sat. She had a stack of folders with her, and Dev saw that his was on top.

“Yes,” Dev said. “Please do.”

“How did you sleep?”

“Fine,” Dev said.

“Sorry about all that commotion in your hall this morning. I think we’ve got that sorted now. Besides, it’s nothing for you to worry about!” she said, and as she did, she placed both hands on top of Dev’s folder. “But I am sorry if that woke you. It shouldn’t happen again.” She smiled, but did not say anything more. Instead she slowly picked up the top folder with her thumbs and forefingers. She paused, looked at Dev, then let her eyes fall once again to the folder. She opened it, but because she held it tilted toward her body, he could not see what was in it. He imagined all sorts of things— photos, a list of infractions, treatments, an inventory of supplements. But the thing was that the folder was just as thin as it was when he’d looked at it during his first group session. Perhaps they didn’t add to it, only swapped out what was in it.

“Henry told me you said you were feeling better. That’s good news, Dev, it really is. Your healing, your betterment, relies heavily on your attitude, as you know. And how have you been getting on with the others?”

Dev instinctively glanced toward June. “Fine, just fine.”

“I know it might be a little, well, uncomfortable for others to see you this way,” she said. “Of course it would! On one hand the Bureau asks that you keep it all inside, and then you come here, and we tell you to let go of it a little. Enough for us to get our hands around, that is. I understand it might seem contradictory.”

“Yes—I—it’s just—”

But Dev did not know how to say that he thought of Shay. “I know,” he said nervously, “that I won’t be able to have visitors. But I was wondering if I might inquire after a good friend of mine. Someone I talk to. Or someone I have talked to at least. Maybe it might help me.”

Rhona closed his folder and put it on top of the stack. “Hmmm,” she said. “You haven’t been progressing as much as we’d like, this is true. I know Henry told you as much earlier. Perhaps it could help—I suppose…” She paused and looked down at her hands. “Normally, I’d say no, but you’re the Collector of the Year— how many times is it now? I suppose you’re entitled to a little special treatment now and then. Henry!” she called.

“Yes, ma’am?” Henry said as he approached the table.

“Can you please get a piece of paper and a pen for Dev? He’d like to inquire about a friend—what was the name again?”

“Shay Robinson.”

“Yes, Shay Robinson. While he writes a letter, could you do a little digging? See if you can’t find her whereabouts. Let her know that Dev is alright. Unfortunately,” Rhona said, turning back to Dev, “you’ll be unable to see her during your stay here.”

“Yes, I am aware,” Dev said.

“But to put your mind at ease—and who knows, maybe hers as well—we will allow you this one communication.”

As she finished speaking, Henry returned with a pen and paper. “Here you go,” he said. And then, “If you don’t mind, I have to watch you. You know, pen and all.”

“Ah, yes, of course,” Dev said. He reached up and took the materials from Henry. The pen was an ordinary pen, black ink. No cap. And the paper—it was lined, a dull white. There was a fold in the bottom left corner. It was old paper, and Dev had the sudden urge to hold it up to his nose and breathe in the smell of it. But that wasn’t all. He thought of his notebook, of all those words now destroyed. But as soon as he thought of it, it was gone, and he could not remember what he had been thinking other than of the urge to write something quickly, furiously, until he could write no more.

* * *

Dev had not been anywhere on the floor besides his hallway and the common room in over a week. Whenever he looked toward the wing where the treatment rooms were, he felt his stomach tighten and his jaw clench. That afternoon after group, however, Dev followed Henry down the treatment hall. He saw again the carpet, the swirls, the windowless doors on each side of him, each with a single red bulb above them. Some were illuminated. Dev supposed that meant those rooms were occupied. He heard the shuffling of his own feet, Henry’s, too, muffled noises that he could not be certain were people talking or recorded announcements or the television perhaps. Dev noticed that as he passed some of the doors, the cracks beneath them were dark then bright then dark again.

At the end of the hall, Henry stopped and opened a door. He motioned for Dev to enter. The first thing he saw was a chair in the middle of the room. It was the kind of chair one might find in a dentist’s office. It was vinyl, brown, and there was a small lever on the side so that it could recline if so desired. The chair faced the wall opposite Dev. There was no other furniture, no other indication of what the room might be used for. “Please, Dev,” Henry said, motioning to the chair. “Have a seat.”

Dev sat down and looked at the folder Henry had brought with him. It looked like the same kind of folder that Rhona carried around at all times, but unlike hers, Dev could see that it was stuffed full of papers. Dev noticed that the light in the room was coming from the floor’s perimeter, a soft, tranquil glow. Dev felt at ease, or at least as much at ease as he’d been able to feel since he’d arrived at the Sanitarium. He glanced at the armrests, but did not see restraints on them, and so he relaxed his shoulders.

“This is the room in which we do light therapy. That’s it, get comfortable—you might be in here for a while.”

“A while?” Dev asked.

“It depends on what you need, what the report says,” he said and patted the folder’s cover with his other hand. “Sometimes it’s quick.”

Dev nodded and leaned back in the chair as Henry had suggested. He reached for the lever on the side of the recliner. Pulling it, he tipped back and was nearly prostrate. It was then that he noticed the ceiling, or rather, what hung from the ceiling. There was a metal grid that extended the length and width of the room. He had not noticed it when he first entered. It reminded Dev of a checkerboard as within the grid were smaller square sections painted white. There were lights attached to the white sections, whereas the darker, plain metal sections had what looked like an intricate sprinkler system. Maybe it was the sprinkler system—Dev hadn’t noticed any on any other ceilings, but then again, had he looked?

“I won’t be in here with you during treatments, but you’ll be able to hear me through the speaker,” Henry said, pointing over his shoulder to a small metal square inset on the wall. “This is similar to your intake in that there is a series of questions I will ask you.” As he spoke, he pulled straps out from underneath the chair. At this, Dev tried to sit up. A sudden panic rose in him, and he looked for any signs of what he’d been subjected to in the intake room. Henry gently placed his hand on Dev’s shoulder.

What will happen then?” Dev asked.

“What do you mean?” Henry replied. He tightened the straps just enough to keep Dev mostly still.

“If I answer the questions one way and not another, what will happen? Will it be like my intake?”

“We do apologize for that. You see it’s all part of it—your treatment plan. I know it doesn’t seem like it right now, but in just a short while, you’ll be cured.”

“So it is or isn’t like my intake?” Dev asked.

“It’s not unlike your intake, which is to say there is a series of questions, but as you can see, there is nothing attached to you,” Henry said. He gestured toward Dev and the chair and then to the rest of the room as he spoke. “Just remember: we want you to get well soon.”

Dev turned his head to get a better look at Henry. As it was he was there for six weeks. He didn’t want to prolong it—and he wanted to talk to Shay. What had become of her? He felt it then, a rippling there right underneath his collarbone. Had he gotten her in trouble?

“Are you comfortable?” Henry asked. “The straps should feel snug. It’s for your safety. Can’t have any accidents!”

“No,” Dev said. “I’m fine, thank you.”

“Very good,” Henry said. “I’ll be over there behind that wall.” He pointed to his left. “You won’t be able to see me, but you’ll be able to hear my voice.”

“Alright,” Dev said.

“Okay then,” said Henry. “Let’s get started.”

Dev watched as Henry walked over to the wall and opened up a door. Dev hadn’t noticed a door there before, and as Henry closed it behind him, Dev watched as it sealed seamlessly shut. A hidden door. He wondered how many others there were, and the thought suddenly occurred to him that maybe there were doors all over, ones he could open and go through. He resolved to check for them.

“Can you hear me?” Henry asked. It was as though his voice was everywhere all at once, booming and raining down all around Dev. He heard rustling—the papers in the folder maybe—and then there was a high-pitched howl of feedback. It dissipated after a moment. “Sorry about that,” Henry said.

“I can hear you,” Dev called. He spoke loudly and craned his neck trying to lift his head from the chair. He felt a sudden breeze as if someone had turned on a fan.

“Very good,” Henry said, and then, “Let’s begin. Question one: how often do you have thoughts of giving up? All of the time, some of the time, none of the time.”

“Of giving up?” Dev repeated. “Giving up on what? I haven’t had—” he began.

“All of the time, some of the time, none of the time,” Henry said. “Those are the only acceptable answers.”

Had he thought about giving up? He understood that phrase, understood it enough to know it was what the people on the bridge felt. But he wasn’t them— those people. They were broken, disassociating, at least that’s what the Bureau had said. Unfixable. Contagious. And Dev wasn’t those, was he? Sure he’d been upset— distraught even. But still he had tried to put one foot in front of the other, hadn’t he?

“Some of the time,” Dev said.

The lights came on. Bright, blinding hot lights from above shone down on Dev. He instinctively tried to bring his arms to his face and cover it, but the straps held him down and the light got through his skin and his blood all the way underneath his eyelids. He yelled—at least he thought he did, for he felt something rumble in his chest. He felt his shirt sticking to his skin. “Turn it off!” he yelled. “Turn it off!” But still the lights remained. They roasted the skin of his forearms, felt as if he’d stuck his hands into a boiling vat of water. He wanted to claw at his face and twisted around in his chair so that his back was to the ceiling. But it was of no use. The heat penetrated his neck and waist, and he felt beads of sweat make their way down the backs of his legs.

Suddenly the lights shut off, and water shot out of the ceiling. Dev was right—it was a sprinkler system. He tried to open his mouth and drink the cool liquid. He blinked his eyes and licked his lips, thankful for the respite. He was soaking wet; his clothes clung to his body.

“Please be still, Dev. We can’t have you moving. It’s an issue of safety,” Henry said.

Dev looked over to where the door had been, but he could not be sure that he was looking toward the right spot. Even if he was, he was tethered to the chair—what would it matter? He stilled himself, as if any sudden or incorrect movements would result in turning on the lights and water once again.

“Are you ready for question two, Dev?” Henry asked.

“Yes,” Dev said. He tried to bring his arms up to his face.

“Please put your arms down.” Henry’s voice came through the speaker. “It helps with relaxation. The more relaxed you are, the more effective the treatment.”

Dev tried to relax, but he could only think of the stinging lights, his soaked clothing. The way his skin had burned.

“Question two,” Henry said. “To what extent do you feel hopeless, worried, or afraid? All of the time, some of the time, none of the time.”

Dev listened to the drips that now occasionally fell from the sprinklers above. They plopped onto the wet floor—plop, plop—and he felt his soaked shirt stuck to his skin. He tried to sit still, but the seat was now fixed in the recline position, and he kept slipping across the vinyl fabric of the chair.

“Please, Dev,” Henry said over the speaker. “Don’t fight it. It will go quicker if you don’t. Do you need me to repeat question two?”

Dev shook his head quickly, and the water in his hair flew out on all sides. “Some of the time,” he said, loudly, nearly shouting it up toward the direction of Henry’s voice even though he wasn’t sure if the speaker was two way. It was possible that Henry couldn’t even hear him, or that what he said made no difference. The lights came on again. This time they were brighter and hotter than before, and his face and exposed hands burned underneath them. “Stop,” he cried, “Please, Henry, stop!”

But it didn’t stop. There was a buzzing from the lights, a sizzling of water on the floor as it dried up underneath the heat. The droplets that had been on his own skin quickly evaporated, and he felt steam collect in his shirt and pants. The water that had pooled around his chair was hot, and he writhed and thrashed. Suddenly the lights shut off and all he saw was darkness. The sprinklers turned on, and he tilted his mouth up toward the ceiling to try to catch some water in his mouth, let it trickle down his lips and chin.

“It’s best if you try to remain still,” Henry said. “Are you ready for the next question?”

“Henry—I—” he started.

“Do you need me to wait or are you ready?” he asked again.

“Please, wait, hold on,” said Dev. He breathed in sharp and quick, wondering how long he could delay the next treatment. It was possible that it made no difference what he said. “Can you just speak more slowly?”

“Yes, of course,” Henry said. “This is your treatment—we can do it however you’d like. I was only suggesting ways to make it more—more bearable.”

It sounded as if Henry had whispered that last part, as if he had held his lips close to a microphone in hopes no one would overhear him. Dev thought then of his recorder and the way he would hold it out and toward a person, tilted up, the tape reels already spinning around before he even walked through their door. Maybe Dev was being recorded at that moment. Maybe he’d been recorded since—

“Are you ready, Dev?” Henry asked. “Are you fine to move on? I know it can be, well, difficult. The treatment, I mean.”

“Yes,” Dev said. His breath was rapid, and he dug his fingers into the side of the chair.

“Alright, then,” said Henry. “Question number three: to what extent have you felt panic, anxiety, or guilt? All of the time, some of the time, none of the time.”

He couldn’t be sure, but he thought Henry had paused between the last two options. Not even a pause, really, just a tick, a beat. Maybe he was trying to tell Dev something, but he could also have imagined it. The corners of the room shimmered dimly, and he blinked his eyes shut tight. He braced himself for the lights again, and called out, “All of the time!” Because it was true, wasn’t it? Sitting in the car with Shay—she told him to watch out, hadn’t she? She’d said they’d asked about him. Shay.

The lights shone. He cried out, and twisted his body so that it faced the chair. But it didn’t matter. The heat from the bulbs went quickly through his shirt and he watched as the steam rose up off his forearms first, felt the heat at his collar. He bent and shouted for Henry to turn it off. It might’ve lasted a minute, or perhaps it was only ten seconds. Dev could not be sure.

Suddenly the lights shut off, and for a brief moment there was only quiet darkness. Then he heard it—that’s what it had reminded him of—the gas. The sprinklers hissed as the water flowed quickly through the pipes. He’d heard it before in his room, in the walls right before he fell asleep, a high pitched whooshing behind the plaster. He felt the first drops, and then he was soaked again and again grateful for the relief.

When the water shut off again, he heard Henry’s voice. “One last question for today, Dev. Do you need a moment?”

He liked his lips and blinked water out of his eyes. He was soaking wet and steaming.

“Question four, Dev. To what extent do you wish for your past to be different? All of the time, some of the time, none of the time.”

He didn’t even pause, didn’t even take a breath. “None of the time,” he said. The lights stayed off, and Dev, who did not move or make a sound, remained in darkness.

* * *

Dev was first to group the next day. He sat where he’d sat in each and every session—how many was that now, eight? Nine? Time after time he chose the same chair he’d woken in after intake, and though no one had told him and the others explicitly where they could and could not sit, they returned again and again to the same seat. By now the chair felt comfortable and protective, like he was being held by something familiar. He leaned back in the chair and crossed his legs and his arms a few times until it felt just right.

In his peripheral vision he watched June come down the hallway from her room and take her seat next to Dev. He stared at the floor purposefully so that she would not feel awkward or spied upon. As he looked downward, he came up with a plan. He would wait to look at June until Rhona addressed her in group. It’d be acceptable then to turn to her. He would look at her, between the strands of hair that hung over her cheeks, and he’d smile. He liked June, and in some ways he thought she had the same level-headedness that Shay had. Perhaps all Transmitters were like that.

Dev heard the click of Rhona’s heels. She walked up from behind him, having come through the atrium doors. Dev uncrossed his legs and sat up straight against the back of his chair.

“Good afternoon, good afternoon, everyone,” she said as she came into the center of the group. “How are we all doing?” As she spoke, she gestured to the four of them and then out toward the windows with her free hand. “It’s such a lovely day today. I thought we might move to the atrium. It’s quite lovely in there, and I do think it would be good for everyone.”

There was movement and rustling. Albert stood and then sat back down unsure of what to do. Dev turned around to look toward the atrium and when he did he let his eyes drift over to June. He’d meant to just peek at her, to see if she was off alone to the side where he could maybe ask about Shay. But when his eyes landed on her, he saw she was staring right back at him. He nearly jumped, and certainly his heart beat quick, and he tried to compose himself. He immediately looked away and down toward the ground. It had all happened so fast, but it didn’t matter. It had been enough time for him to see the bright red hue of her cheeks. He brought his own hand to his face, his skin, irritated and bright from the light therapy.

“Come, now, everyone,” Rhona said and led the way toward the atrium doors. The four of them followed, their Absorbers close behind. Dev gestured to June that she and her Absorber go before him, and Dev was last in the line with Henry behind him. They snaked through the tables and chairs of the common room and headed toward the atrium doors. One by one they marched after Rhona, and Dev tilted his head off to the left to see around June’s Absorber. He saw June’s forearm which, as it swung back and forth, looked like his own. He wanted to whisper to her, attract her attention, but then what would he say?

When they went through the atrium doors, Dev saw that there were five chairs in a circle underneath the tallest birches. He smelled the earthiness of the damp soil, heard the rush of water coming from the fountain in the middle of the room. He was close to the other set of double doors—the ones he’d went through the night he looked for Shay. If he were to go through those doors now, what would he see? He looked to the others, to see if they, too, noticed the flickering light above the doors. But they either did not notice or care, for they kept their heads down toward the ground.

“Over here,” Rhona was saying. “Yes, that’s right. Take a seat wherever you’d like. That’s it. Come into the circle.”

When Dev saw June heading toward a chair to his left, he followed. As they were sitting down, he said to her quietly and under his breath, “I’m sorry, I apologize, but your arms—”

She looked at him through her hair, her eyes wide in surprise that someone had spoken to her, held up her arms, and looked at them. She lowered them and then crossed them across her chest and then stomach as if suddenly uncomfortable.

“I’m sorry,” Dev said again. “It’s just—” He pushed up the sleeves of his sweatshirt to show her the redness still visible from the treatment. “So you had the same—”

“Dev!” called Rhona from the other side of the group. “Henry, could you please attend?” She gestured toward Henry who had been quietly speaking to June’s Absorber. Henry became flustered and embarrassed, his face a deep red.

“Yes, of course,” Henry said. “Dev, please.” He leaned over and grasped Dev by his wrist and slid the sweatshirt back down his forearm. He shook his head ever so slightly and smiled. “Perhaps you don’t remember— after all, I imagine it’s all still a little blurry, but there are a couple of rules that—”

“Rules, Dev,” Rhona said, suddenly turning and walking back toward Henry and Dev. “For your own good, for the good of the group, for the good of society. It was, is, the first rule: you must not discuss your treatments. We will talk about this after group. Everyone, follow along.”

Dev turned to Henry as if to appeal to him. “But Henry,” he said. “All I wanted to know—I mean, I think it would help if we could talk about it.”

“Talk about what?” he asked.

“About what’s happening.”

“Why, what’s happening?”

Dev opened his mouth to answer, but Henry looked away.

“Say it with me,” Rhona was saying. “I’m getting better.”

* * *

Dev stared at the television. It was the only light in the room, as the sun had gone down. The evening broadcast was beginning. The anthem had just finished playing, and he hummed the tune quietly to himself. The clocktower on the screen faded to the reporters—two people sitting side by side behind a desk. They smiled into the cameras, their teeth straight and bright, their manner welcoming and authoritative. The woman on the left began speaking, and her saccharine voice hit Dev’s ears; he had forgotten what they sounded like and wanted to turn the television off. But there was no remote control, no power button on the television itself. Dev had no control of when it came on or when it turned off, and so he rolled over on his side and pressed his ear deep into his pillow. It mattered not, he could still hear their voices reporting the numbers of Resets that day.

There was a knock at the door and it opened. Henry popped his head through the crack in the door. “Dev? Oh, good, you’re still awake.”

He pushed the door open all the way and came into the room. “Sorry to bother,” he said. “But we need just a minute or two.”

Dev realized that Rhona was right behind Henry. When he saw her, he felt the panic shoot through him; he never saw her outside of breakfast and group. He’d wondered where she went, what she did—did she return home? Did she have a room somewhere in the Sanitarium? But now here she was standing in his room. All Dev could hear was the talking of the reporters. He looked from Rhona and Henry to the television and back again. Rhona moved closer to Dev’s bed. Her green blouse stood out against the yellow walls. She had in her hands a folder. It was no doubt his.

“Good evening, Dev,” she said.

“Good evening, hello,” he said.

“I see you’re catching up on the day, so I’ll make this quick. Let you get back to things,” she said. She took two steps closer, so close, in fact, that he could smell her perfume. He glanced at the folder in her hands and noticed that she had painted fingernails. He’d never noticed that before, but they were red and longer than he remembered.

“Dev, today—I didn’t want to say anything in front of the others, but as you know, we have certain expectations of you. In case you don’t remember, I told you what they were at our first group meeting. Didn’t I, Henry?”

“Yes, you did. And, of course, you signed the papers. The expectations were listed on that as well.”

“The expectations?” Dev asked.

“The rules, Dev,” Rhona said. “The rules.”

She spoke harshly and hurriedly and then broke into a smile. She shook her head slightly and smiled. “Rule number one: you must never discuss your treatments. Like Henry said, we have your signature. I’m sure the Bureau would be upset to discover that their star employee has gone rogue.”

“I haven’t gone—” he began. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You approached June today,” Rhona said. “You asked her those questions.”

“But I never got to actually ask,” Dev said quickly. And then, “I mean, June, she didn’t say anything—”

“She didn’t need to. It was evident during the session she was unfocused. And I think that you’re the reason why.”

“I won’t do it again,” Dev said. “I’m sorry—I was trying to make conversation—”

“Yes, well, we know you won’t do it again. That’s why we’re here. I’ve spoken to Lt. Rogers and Lt. Dunlop— and we believe that you risk contaminating the group.”

“Contaminating the group?” Dev asked. He looked back and forth between Rhona and Henry. Both of them looked at him. Henry spoke.

“Yes, Dev. Contamination can happen, but if we mitigate the threat immediately, you shouldn’t have to worry. About your influence, that is.”

“What Henry is trying to say is that you have a certain responsibility here. It’s not that different from what you had out there,” she said, and brought her thumb over her shoulder toward the window. “At the Bureau, I mean. Much like the Absorbers, your responsibility is to stay calm, to diffuse situations, not to contribute to them. I think we need to alter your course a bit.”

She looked at Henry and took one step closer to Dev’s bed. She was now pressed up against the mattress. She tucked the folder underneath her left arm and leaned over to Dev’s right ear. “It’s imperative we don’t talk about our treatments. Like I said, rule number one.”

There was a warm rush from the top of his head and all the way down into his body. For just a moment, he could not understand where he was. But then it was clear again and he was looking at Rhona in her green blouse standing in front of the yellow wall. Henry stood to her left right in front of the door. They both seemed to be trying to use their bodies in such a way that should Dev make a run for it, they’d be able to easily block him and subdue him.

“Dev,” Rhona was saying, “Dev, are you listening? We must remove you from group.”

“So I’ll be able to leave then?” he asked.

“No,” Rhona said. “You’ll be taking all future group meetings—along with your meals—in the confines of your room. We just simply can’t risk cross-contamination. We know you don’t mean anything by it, by having questions that is, but still. It’s not a risk we can take here. I do hope you understand.”

“I cannot leave my room?” Dev asked.

“Not for the rest of your stay,” she said.

He glanced over at the book on the side table. He thought it had been two weeks—so he had four more— but maybe it had been longer. As Rhona spoke—she gave directives to both Dev and Henry—a weight pressed down on him. He realized that he enjoyed going to breakfast—to lunch and dinner—and that he looked forward to seeing June. On one hand it didn’t make any sense, as the two of them had barely exchanged any words. But he felt a lifeline to her, and he chided himself for not having the strength to just ask her his questions that morning. Yes, the questions. That was strange. When he tried to remember what, besides the treatments, he’d wanted to ask June about, he could think of nothing but a big, wide open space.

* * *

Dev sat in his bed waiting for group to begin. He’d done his midday exercises—toe touches and running in place, his knees high and chin up. He had to admit that he felt at least well-rested. The regular meals and supplements restored what had been depleted, but still there was a lowness, and though he tried to push it out of his mind, it sat there waiting at the edges of his sight. It was like a large circle, but misshapen and dripping, and in group it remained next to him. The further away he tried to get from it, the closer and more familiar it became. Once he’d woken up in his bed, his fists clenched, trying to choke it in a dream. But it bent and sagged and slipped right through his fingers. The thing was that he wanted to be better. He did. He didn’t like feeling—what was it? Foolish. Yes, that was it.

The door to his room opened four times a day He knew it would be Henry who came into his room as it was always Henry. Each time he knocked once and walked through the door: breakfast, lunch, group, dinner. He stayed approximately one hour each time, or so Dev thought. Once Dev had tried to engage him in conversation and had asked him what he did in the evenings, where he went after his job was done. But Henry had only smiled and said something about the weather.

He’d not received any more treatments since the light therapy, and while Dev was grateful for this, each morning that he woke, as he gathered his bearings and rose from his slumber, anxiety churned in him. Would Henry come in asking questions? Would he say Dev wasn’t responding well enough? Announce there was another treatment? Would Rhona come in behind him, folder in hand?

But that was not all he wondered after. When he’d woken that morning and turned over the corner of another page he thought of Shay and of the letter they’d let him write. There’d been no mention of any of it— not the letter, not what would happen to him when his stay was done. And Dev—who was feeling better, wasn’t he?—did not ask.

Dev stared at the door. When nothing happened, he began to count. If he made it to thirty, he’d get up and peek out of the window. He’d pretend that he was looking for Henry, but really he was hoping for a glance at June, or even Albert or Cathy. Maybe he might catch them going to group in the common room. Though what would he do then?

The door to Dev’s room opened, and Henry came in. He quickly turned and pushed the door shut behind him and stood for a moment. “Good afternoon, Dev!” he said with his back turned. “Good afternoon!”

“Hello,” Dev said, but then he looked at Henry closely. He appeared flustered, out of breath. His shoulders seemed to bulge in his shirt, and one of his pant legs was uncuffed. His hair, which was usually combed back and to the side, was tangled on top of his head. Dev thought he held himself strangely, stiffly, as though trying to keep something hidden from sight. He did not move away from the door, and Dev heard the click of the lock.

“They’ll be meeting in the atrium today,” Henry was saying. But Dev, whose alarm rose quickly, was instead watching Henry as he walked over to the sink in the room and turned on the faucet. Dev listened to the rush of the water and watched Henry wash his hands and forearms. “It’s just beautiful outside!” Henry said. And then, turning his chin toward Dev, “Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean—you’ll be outside soon enough, though.”

“I’ll be outside?” Dev asked.

But Henry didn’t answer him. Instead he turned off the faucet and grabbed a towel from the dispenser on the wall. Dev watched as he dried his arms, his hands, wiped his face. He turned around and threw the towel in the trash and as he did, Dev thought he saw that the towel, which had been white, was dotted red.

“Are you alright?” Dev asked.

“Yes, yes, of course. Sorry. Didn’t mean to alarm—I should’ve—”

There was a sudden loud bang on the door, and they both jumped. Neither one of them spoke, and Dev held his breath so that he could better hear. There were voices, yes, maybe two or three. Though Henry’s job was to protect, Dev was vulnerable there in his bed. The door was locked, but all it needed was a key. Dev looked at Henry’s belt, at the keys which hung at his hip.

After a moment, Henry spoke. “It’s alright, Dev. Someone’s just acclimating out there. Nothing to worry about.”

Just then the television turned on with a click and a high-pitched sound. Dev looked at it and then back to Henry and waited for him to say more, but Henry simply took his place on the chair next to the door and stayed silent. He held his left forearm with his right hand. Dev wanted to stare at him, wanted to inspect him for other signs of—what, a struggle? But he kept his eyes on the television and watched Henry in his periphery. Henry did not do anything, though, and as the television warmed up, Dev saw Albert, June, and Cathy on the screen as he always did. They sat in chairs next to each other, the three of them like ducks in a row. Dev had watched them, had studied them, during his time in isolation. He knew that Albert ran his fingers through his hair each time he was asked a question and that Cathy spoke only when prompted. But neither of them were as interesting to Dev as June. When she discussed work, he wanted to rise and move toward the television in hopes he might hear something. A clue. He’d close his eyes and listen the way Shay had talked about. He’d try to guess whose movement he heard, where in the room it was coming from. Sometimes he’d guess right.

“Good afternoon, everyone,” Rhona was saying somewhere unseen. Dev watched as Cathy and Albert and June lifted their heads and eyes up.

“Good afternoon,” they replied.

“And hello, Dev.”

“Hello,” he said automatically as he had each afternoon. But they could not hear him—at least they’d never reacted to his responses. Neither had Henry, who sat now with his arms crossed over his chest. Cathy looked at the floor. Albert had his hands clasped on his lap. June stared just past the camera. Dev could not see above the waists of the Absorbers behind them but he saw their keys, their belts.

Rhona said, “Let’s begin today with a short meditation. That’s it, everyone. Let’s sit up straight, feet flat on the floor. You can rest your hands palms up or palms down for this—it’s up to you. You too, Dev.”

At the mention of his name, he startled and placed his palms down as he always did. There on the television screen were the others; they sat upright, their shoulders relaxed, eyes closed. Rhona led them—breathe in, breathe out to the count of four—and Dev counted along. He closed his eyes, too. But he held his breath. He held it until his head felt full and his heart raced. And then he gasped for the air, he drank it in.

“I thought today we might talk about manifestation. About making your intentions your reality. You see, we used to think that only we ourselves were responsible for creating the life that we wish for; now we know that in order for there to truly be a shift in your path, you must also listen to others. Sometimes—yes Cathy, I can see you understand—sometimes we just don’t know what’s best for us or what it is that will make us happy. And that’s where the Bureau steps in, to give you a little nudge in the right direction. But although the Bureau can help to motivate you, it is you who must dedicate time every day to practice gratitude and happiness; only you can do this. Let go of overthinking, let go of your sadness, have confidence that the Bureau will ensure your happiness. Let’s take another breath in, and out. Good.”

As Rhona was talking, as she was guiding them through their meditation, Dev opened his eyes just enough to see through his lashes. He saw the three of them—Cathy, June, Albert—with their eyes closed. He wasn’t sure if Henry also had his eyes closed; he could not turn to look without making noise. But then there was a flash on the screen, and Dev opened his eyes wide. It looked like the camera was on its side. He saw a tangle of bodies, hands and feet, and then Shay’s face in front of the camera, her hair waving in front of her. An Absorber had her by each arm. She was lunging toward the camera, screaming and thrashing, “Dev, Dev it’s me! Dev, don’t listen to them, don’t lis—” and then the screen went black. Two small, pixelated boxes appeared in the upper right corner, and the television shut off altogether.

Dev threw the covers off his body and jumped out of his bed. He nearly knocked into Henry as he did, and he ran to the television. He touched the sides, ran his fingers along the edges and the bottom looking for some way to turn it back on.

“Dev,” Henry said. “Dev, what are you doing?”

“Didn’t you see?” Dev asked and spun around on his heels. “There, that was Shay. That was Shay!”

But Henry was staring straight ahead at some imaginary mark on the wall over Dev’s shoulder. He blinked several times and then focused on Dev. “What’s that now?” he asked.

“Did you see that?” Dev asked. “Henry? What was that?” He was breathing hard, his hands sweating and shaking.

“What was what?”

“That, on the television, before it turned off.”

“But the television is on.”

Dev looked back at the television and saw June, Cathy, and Albert sitting in their chairs, palms down, their eyes closed. “Henry. I saw—”

“What, Dev? What is it?”

Henry reached up and smoothed his hair back and off of his forehead. It was only then that Dev thought to look. There, on Henry’s arm, was a long, red scratch.

“What did you see, Dev?”

“I—uh,” Dev started. But something inside of him told him to quiet.

“What, Dev. What was it?”

“Nothing,” he said. “I guess it was nothing.”

And Henry, who covered his forearm again with his hand, smiled.

* * *

Dev waited for his dinner to arrive. He’d spent the rest of the day replaying what he’d seen on the television— maybe Henry really hadn’t seen it. Maybe he was distracted or daydreaming, maybe he really had his eyes closed when he should have been watching. But Dev had seen it. He knew what he saw. And if what he had seen was real—and it had been real—then that meant that Shay was in there somewhere, in the Sanitarium. Hope pulsed through him at the thought of it. If he could see her, if he could get to her—

There was a knock, and the door opened. Rhona ducked her head in. “Dev,” she said. “Oh good, just wanted to make sure you weren’t sleeping. We have your meal!”

She came all the way into the room. At the sight of her, Dev grew small and tried to quickly tuck the covers in and around his legs. In her hands she held a folder. Henry followed close behind. He had Dev’s dinner tray in one hand and a case in the other.

“Dev, it’s so good to see you,” Rhona said. She walked up to the side of the bed. “How have you been doing?”

“I’m fine,” Dev said. He looked over to Henry who first placed the dinner tray next to a water glass on the side table and then went back and closed the door behind him softly. Dev watched him walk along the wall of the room and stand next to the tank. He put the case on top of the tank. Then he approached Dev and picked up one of the supplement cups from the tray and handed it to him.

“Dev,” Rhona began. And then she smiled. “Please, go ahead.” She nodded toward Dev and the cup he was holding. He glanced down. Pink and green. He tipped the pills back into his mouth and took the glass of water from the side table. He swallowed it and then looked at his food. He wasn’t hungry.

Rhona opened the folder she held in front of her and took out a folded piece of paper. There did not seem to be anything else in the folder from what Dev could see, and she closed it and held the paper in her hand as she spoke. It waved gently in the space between them.

“Dev,” she said. “We think that you have done a marvelous job recovering, just marvelous. Don’t we, Henry? But we feel that adding a layer of treatment might be—well, today, for example, Henry said you had an episode. Would you care to talk about that?”

Dev clenched his teeth, ground them together until he could hear it in his ears. “I—I,” he began. “It was—” But just then there was a shadow at the bottom of the door. He saw it out of the corner of his eye. The shadow moved side to side and then stilled, as if there was a person, two people, right outside the door. Dev swallowed and let his eyes travel up to the window. There was nothing there. “I thought I saw something— but I must’ve dozed off, dreamt what I saw.”

“Ah, yes,” Rhona said. “Some supplements make us more tired than others. Henry, could you see to that?”

Dev looked to Henry who handed him another cup of supplements. This time blue and yellow. Henry nodded firmly, assuredly. “Absolutely,” he said.

“Thank you. Now Dev, that’s not the only reason why I’m here. Why we’re here.” She held up the piece of paper in her hand. “No one else knows, and I wouldn’t want the others to think you are receiving any kind of special treatment just because of your Collector of the Year status. But here, this came for you. I suppose there’s no harm in letting you see it, now that you are separate from the group.”

She walked up to Dev’s bed and handed him the folded piece of paper. At first he did not move, did not lift a hand to take it. But she gestured forward and raised an eyebrow. “Go on,” she said. “It’s alright.”

He took it and opened it slowly, carefully, as if something were going to jump out at him. He saw typed lettering, paragraphs, and the first line: Dear Dev. He quickly glanced to the bottom of the page: Thinking of you, Shay. He turned the paper over and back again.

“Go ahead,” Rhona said. “Read it. We’ll need to take it with us.”

Dev stared at Rhona and Henry, but they did not move. He glanced down at the paper in his hand, felt a stinging in his eyes, and the words blurred and bent. He read.

Dear Dev,

I’m so glad to hear that you’re getting the help you need. I guess deep down I knew—you’d been sad for a while, it was only a matter of time until someone besides me noticed. Thank you for writing to let me know that you are alright. I know you are worried and nervous, but you’re in a good place. That I’m sure of. It’s exactly what you need—and Collector of the Year again! Despite how you feel you should know how valued you are, how important you and your work are. About the tape—it’s okay, I know you did what you thought you had to do. Don’t worry about me, I’m fine. I reported it right away, so nothing else came of it. I’ll be here at the end. I always am.

Thinking of you,

Shay

As Dev read the words—and he did so several times—a wave came over him, a heat that started at the base of his neck and worked its way up and over his scalp. His eyes itched and tingled, and there was a swelling in his chest. Rhona looked at him and crossed her arms. Henry went over by the tank. The room was still, and Dev, who was acutely aware that he was not alone, felt the shift inside of him. He tried to contain it. Tried to blink it back, talk it down. But then the levee broke and all that he’d held in, the worry, the loneliness, the hanging bodies and the Feats and the stick and the blood, all of it came tumbling out then and there in the room with Rhona and Henry looking on. He opened and closed his fist.

Rhona looked at him as he cried noiselessly. “There, there, Dev. That’s right—Henry, you help him—just give into it. It’s alright. A perfectly expected response. It’s just, well, we really agonize over seeing you this way. We all do. Such a weight you’ve been carrying. There, there,” she said again. “The thing is while this is expected—in this case, this crying—it’s not wanted— sorry, that’s not the right word,” Rhona said. “It’s not productive. This kind of outpouring, Dev, what good is it serving you right now? You’re only becoming more upset by the moment.”

“What do you want from me?” Dev asked.

“I don’t want anything, Dev, except for you to be better so that you may return to your daily life. So that you may best serve the Bureau.”

He looked at the letter that he still held in his hands. “But I do feel better. I have been feeling better. Ask Henry—” Dev said. But Rhona did not ask Henry. She did not even look over at him. But Dev did. He saw him there in the corner, near the tank by the wall. His back was to Dev, and then Rhona came up to Dev and held out her right hand. He instinctively put his left hand into hers, but she pulled away quickly.

“The letter,” she said, extending her arm again, slowly. “You must give it back to me.”

“Oh,” he said. He reached down to his lap and lifted up the piece of paper. He looked at the words again: Thinking of you, Shay. He handed it over, but as he let it go from his fingers, he felt a sudden loss. Shay wasn’t there, or was there, but Dev could not ask. If he could just get out, just to see if there was any trace of her. Maybe June knew something. A shame rose in him. He’d had the chance to ask her, and he hadn’t acted quickly enough.

“The thing is, Dev, we know it’s been difficult for you, as it is difficult for everyone who comes here to the Sanitarium. You need to trust us that we know how best to treat you. But you need to be honest.”

“I have been honest,” Dev said weakly. As he spoke, though, he watched Henry from behind. His arms were moving, taking something out of the case he had placed upon the tank. As he did, his leg touched the chain attached to the wall and it jangled before falling still.

“Have you, Dev?” Rhona asked.

“Yes,” he said again. “I’ve been—” He thought and shook his head, but the words wouldn’t, couldn’t come. His head was heavy, and a dimness gathered at the edges of his eyes. He looked at Henry again and saw that he was now next to Dev’s bed. He held a mask in his hand. “Henry,” Dev said or thought he said. And Dev watched the buttons on Henry’s shirt as the mask slipped over his head and nose and mouth. He heard the air, the hiss, and he realized he wasn’t struggling. For just a moment, a blip, he wondered if this wasn’t what he’d wished for all along.

* * *

When Dev opened his eyes, he was sitting up in a bed. It was bright, and he quickly closed his eyes again. He felt heavy, tired, like he’d been running for a very long time. His calves ached and his biceps pinched. He opened his eyes again, blinking quickly. Dev’s head, the back of it at least, felt full. He was in a room, but it was not his room. As he looked around trying to get his bearings, Henry came into focus next to him.

“Hi, Dev,” Henry said, and Dev saw that he had a large metal box in his hands. Henry held the box by the sides and not by the handle, though there was one. Dev tried to point, to ask what it was, but he could only twitch his finger. The spit in his throat caught and garbled. His head lolled and rolled to his right. Henry placed the box on the foot of the bed, and cupped Dev’s head with his hands and pushed it back upright. “There you go,” he said. “Don’t worry. It’ll wear off soon.”

Henry steadied Dev’s head, and as he did, Dev happened to see the swirl of one of Henry’s tattoos— they were snakes, weren’t they? He saw the hairs on Henry’s arm, a faint streak of red, the bulge of muscle as he withdrew and placed his hand on the metal box. Dev watched him unlatch the lid and open it. He thought of another box. Of a bird lying still.

“I just need to get this set up,” Henry said to Dev as he pulled out something that looked like a film projector. There were metal tubes, radiator-like and spindly, which coiled from one end to the other. He lifted the object with both hands, and Dev could tell that it was heavy. There was a table at the end of the bed, and Henry picked up the projector and placed it on the table, then pushed the table to the head of the bed. Dev watched as he reached back into the metal box on the bed and pulled out a long rod of sorts, maybe the length of a ruler. At the tip of the rod was something that looked like a trigger. No, not a trigger, a flint. Dev stared at the items on the table and moved to reach for one. But his hand, heavy and cumbersome, stayed where it was. He could feel the weight of it in his lap, but his skin was numb. He tried to press his fingernails into his palm; he felt nothing but a strange pressure. He realized it wasn’t just his palms. He felt his body—but the sensation was dulled like he was moving through water. He tried moving his hand again and thought he felt something, but perhaps it was only the idea of touching that he thought he felt.

“You with me, Dev? Sorry about that—again. It seems as if you are overly sensitive to the gas. We gave you just a little bit—we had to get you here to the treatment room, you understand—just, well, now we know, right?”

Dev tried to lift his hand again, but even though he was looking at it and telling his brain to do it, it stayed in his lap. He moved his lips, tried to move his lips to say Henry’s name, but only a throaty breath came out.

“There, there, Dev. It’s okay. We gave you a little numbing agent. Nothing that won’t wear off in a bit. It’s just that we can’t have you moving around for this. The equipment is sensitive.”

Dev tried to focus on Henry and the projector on the small table. He watched as Henry righted it and clicked a button or a lever into place. Dev heard a sound, like the snapping in half of plastic, and he turned his head toward it. He saw Henry wrapping a thin piece of material around a metal disk.

“Sorry,” Henry said. “Someone didn’t put this away the way they were supposed to.” He finished wrapping the material around the disk and then stuck it by its side to a small rod that stuck out of the projector near the top. Then he picked up another disk—reels, that’s what they were—and attached it on one end. He fed the material through a small opening and fed it out through the other end. He wound it on the opposite reel a few times by cranking a handle that Dev only just noticed.

“There we go,” Henry said. “You okay, Dev? You with me?”

“I’m okay,” he said. He heard himself say it, but he could not feel his voice in his own chest. “I’m okay,” he said again. He sounded tinny. Far off.

“Have you ever seen a kinetoscope before?” Henry asked.

“No,” Dev said.

“Well, you look through it here,” Henry said and pointed to a small lens on top of the projector. “And there’s a picture inside.”

He turned the projector around on the table so that the small piece of glass was nearest to Dev. “I’m going to ask you a series of questions,” Henry said.

Although Dev could not move much, inside he felt his own skeleton; he could tell which way his blood was pumping and how many times his heart thumped. He tried to push himself back, lift his legs off the bed and try to stand. But his body betrayed him, and he remained where he was.

“Dev, it’s alright.” Henry came around the table and put his hand on Dev’s shoulder. “Listen, I’ll be here for the whole thing. You’ve got nothing to worry about. Just answer honestly, like Rhona said okay? Okay, Dev?” Henry reached under Dev’s back and helped him into a seated position.

“Okay,” Dev said.

“Now I’m going to have you look through the lens.” Henry gently tipped Dev forward and aligned one eye in line with the lens. Close your other eye,” Henry said. “That’s it. Tell me what you see.”

Dev looked. At first he saw only a yellow haze. It reminded him of a sunset reflected on water, frozen maybe. It was inviting, comfortable, and he stared into the blur. He blinked once, two times, and the blur grew clearer, sharper still, and what was first just a shadow in the middle of his vision now turned into a large block that expanded upwards. The image rendered and focused, and Dev realized that he was looking at the clocktower. A black silhouette against a muted yellow backdrop.

“It’s the clocktower,” he said.

“Very good,” said Henry. “Now just look at it. Notice the hands of the clock, the edges and lines of the building. That’s it. Just breathe.”

Dev blinked a few times, his eyes dry and scratchy. And then he stared at the clocktower and waited. Nothing happened and he thought the clocktower went out of focus for just an instant, and then Dev felt something press up against the back of his head. He heard a click and then another, and he started to bring his head away from the glass lens. But there was something there at his hair and then his scalp, and though he could not feel it in its entirety, he knew that it was metal. Cold. “What is that?” he asked.

“Just a precaution,” Henry replied. “Like I said. The equipment is sensitive. Are you ready, Dev? We can begin if you are ready.”

Dev, who thought only of the blinding light, the water from above, the electricity that had coursed through him. “Henry,” he started. “Please—I don’t— please just wait.”

“We should really get on with it. You don’t want the numbing agent to wear off.”

Dev, who had been staring into the lens, blinked. He did it again and again, blinking hard, opening his eyes once, twice, three times. “Okay,” he said. “I’m ready.”

“Question one: to what extent have you had difficulty concentrating? All of the time, some of the time, none of the time.”

Dev opened his mouth to speak but could not feel his tongue. “I—some of the time,” he said, though he was not sure if it was actually true. It was what came out, what flew out of him instinctively and quick. He could have answered any other thing and it might’ve also been true.

Slowly, the yellow background turned dark. Black seeped in from the edges of the frame until the silhouette of the clocktower was absorbed and Dev could see nothing at all. He yanked his head back quickly as if to tell Henry of his discovery, but again the restraints held.

“Question two: to what extent have you felt sad? All of the time, some of the time, none of the time.”

Dev, who at the moment could feel nearly nothing at all, knew how to answer it. But when he tried to say it— none of the time—his throat swelled and his voice stuck in his throat. He thought of something—what was it? A person, maybe. He jerked his head back involuntarily.

“Dev? To what extent have you felt sad?”

“Some—some of the time,” he stammered.

“Very good. Now I’m going to need you to hold still, Dev,” Henry said. “Just bear with me.”

Suddenly there was a small, bright light. He couldn’t make it out clearly and he squinted his eye up against the glass lens. The light grew brighter, bigger, and Dev thought he could feel the heat of it as it drew nearer. He heard Henry say something, but he couldn’t catch it. Dev held still like Henry had said. His eye burned.

“Last question. To what extent do you wish for things to be different? None of the time, some of the time, all of the time.”

But then the heat, the white hot heat, was on his face and he felt his skin flare and tighten. “All of the time!” he cried out. “I wish, I wish—”

There was pressure at his temple, Henry’s hand on his forehead. “Yes?” he asked. “What do you wish for?” But as Henry spoke, Dev felt his eyelid being pulled back and the light hit his eye, a pinching, the smell of singed meat and he yanked his head to the left but the restraints held him, and Henry, who yelled at him stop thrashing and just relax and we’re almost done, but then everything went dim once, twice, and Dev who could not, did not feel his body, slipped into unconsciousness.

* * *

Dev woke to the sound of something, but when he opened his eyes he saw only darkness. There were voices—two, three of them at once, but he could not make any sense out of what he heard. His eyes burned, and he shut them tight. He brought his hand to his face and touched his neck, his cheek, his head with his fingertips. Over his eyes was some kind of cloth, some material. It was taped to his skin. He blinked and tried to open his eyes again, but the material was coarse and scratchy, and so he closed them again.

“Henry,” Dev said quietly. Then again: “Henry.”

“Yes, yes, Dev. I’m right here.”

Dev felt a hand on his shoulder and, startled, he flinched.

“It’s alright,” Henry said. “You did marvelously. Really, truly great. Couldn’t have gotten better results.” From behind the bandages, Dev could sense movement. Henry removed his hand from Dev’s shoulder and said, “Those bandages won’t be on but for a couple of days.”

“Am I—” Dev started, panicking. “Am I blind?”

“Oh, no, not at all,” Henry said. “We just sealed the glands in your eyes is all. So you won’t cry. It’s proven to be an effective treatment.”

Dev did not understand. “You’ve what?” he asked.

“The crying that you did—over the letter and during the last treatment. You’ll find you won’t do that anymore. You’ve been cured. Of that, at least.”

Dev heard Henry walk toward him and the clink of a metal tray onto the veneer top of a table. He smelled food.

“Anyway, I’m glad you’re up. Group is on right now. We can catch the last bit of it. I thought you could eat during. I’ll be helping to feed you of course. If you need it, that is. Some people have no problem going about their activities with the bandages on and—”

Rhona’s voice cut in. “Henry,” she said. Dev’s heart raced at the sound of her voice. Was she just there standing in the room and staring at him? “Henry, could you sit him up all the way?”

“Oh, yes, of course,” Henry said and then his hands were on Dev. They hoisted his upper body, slid his lower half back. Dev felt the bed move and suddenly he was upright. “There,” Henry said. “That’s better.”

“We’re all here, Dev,” he heard Rhona say. It sounded as if she were in the room, but then Dev realized he also heard the high pitch of the television’s power. “It’s good to see you. We’ve missed you.”

He turned his head in the direction of Rhona’s voice. Or at least he thought he did, for when Rhona spoke again, it sounded as if she had moved.

“But I—” Dev began. “Henry,” he said. “Henry, what day is it?”

“It’s Wednesday,” Henry said.

Dev tried to count backwards in his mind, but he only got a few days back when everything became foggy and blurred. He reached up to touch the bandages on his eyes, but Henry clasped his hands around both of Dev’s and gently lowered them down.

“You’re going to want to leave those on,” Henry said.

“Henry? Is everything alright in there?” Rhona asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said. “He’s just acclimating.”

“Very good,” Rhona said. “Shall we get started then? June, do you want to begin today?”

“Sure, I guess,” June said.

When Dev heard her voice, he held his breath. She had the same cadence as Shay—that’s what it was. He could hear it acutely now that he was not distracted by her person, and he wondered if they’d all sounded like that. All the Transmitters. He’d never really listened, had he? It wasn’t dull, that wasn’t how he would describe June’s way of talking. More like matter of fact.

“Okay, then. On a scale from one to ten, where would you rate yourself in your recovery?”

Dev strained to hear. Henry stood next to him, he could feel it in his periphery. The television buzzed with electricity.

“I think maybe a seven, maybe even an eight,” she said.

“Oh, well that’s very good!” Rhona said. “And what do you think has contributed to your improvement?”

“These group meetings. Talking with you, with the others. With Albert and Cathy and Dev.”

Dev stilled himself. Could June see him there in his bed with his eyes bandaged up? He reached down and grasped the sheets, pulled them up around his body. But he pulled them too far and felt his feet stick out.

“Yes, of course. Many benefit from the group,” Rhona said. “Let’s go around now. We can each give ourselves a rating. How does that sound? Cathy, Albert, Dev—on a scale from one to ten where would you rate yourself? Where on the road to recovery are you?”

Dev suddenly saw in his mind’s eye a bridge crumbling, pieces of it falling down into the sea. He felt a nudge at his shoulder—it was Henry. “Go on, Dev,” he said. “Where are you?”

“I’m—” he said. And then he fell silent. He did not know where he was.

* * *

Dev lay in bed and watched the colored flashes and streaks dance before his eyes. They itched, and Dev brought his fingers to one of the bandages and pressed down gently, rubbing in a clockwise motion. There was only some relief and then the rubbing started to hurt, so he put his hand down. He’d thought about taking the bandages off, but he could not bring himself to do it. Henry had told him the bandages would be on for a few days, and Dev worried about the consequences that might follow taking matters into his own hands. If Shay were there, she’d tell him to leave it be. To listen to Henry.

Dev thought of Shay’s letter—and he had seen the letter. He’d held it in his own hands, seen it with his own eyes. He tried to remember what she had said—he’d read it quickly, thirstily, and with all the supplements they’d given him he had trouble recalling it all. He saw the typed words in his mind there in his room, but every time he put a sentence together, it vanished again. He knew there was something about getting well, something about not resisting, the tape, but he could not see it clearly. If he got to it, found the letter and read it again, then maybe he could see for himself.

The thought suddenly occurred to him that the letter might not have even been from Shay. If she was in this place—they wouldn’t let her communicate with him, would they? Or maybe they would; maybe they thought that the writing of the letters would help them recover in some way. Or—and at this thought Dev sat up in bed—or maybe Shay herself was only there because the Bureau said so. Now that he thought of it, she was always there, always reassuring, checking in on him, making sure that he was okay. What if— what if Shay was—he rolled over onto his side and tried to focus on sleep, but the bits of color and flashes he saw quickly gave way to a body swaying. He saw it as clearly there in that moment in his room with his eyes bandaged as he had when he discovered it. He felt the weight of it, the still-warm limberness of the man’s feet. His black, shiny shoes. The Collector’s crest attached to his lapel. Dev had grabbed him by the waist and hoisted him up while trying to untie the electrical cord with one hand. Once undone, the man’s body slipped from Dev’s grip and fell loudly to the floor with a thump. Dev, convinced that he had heard the same sound out in the hallway just then, sat up in bed, strained his ear, and held his breath. But after a moment or two there was nothing but the quiet hum of the ventilation system.

He lay back down and stared with his eyes open. He swallowed, or tried to swallow rather, but his mouth was dry, and he felt hot prickling at the back of his neck. In the darkness he saw little white dots. He tried to count how many there were; he made it to nine, or ten perhaps, before his body betrayed him, and he slipped into sleep. He dreamt of crying, his head in his hands.

* * *

When Dev opened his eyes, he was looking at the door. The bandages were off of his eyes, and he threw the covers back and slipped off the bed quickly. He rushed to the window in the door, but the light was on in the hallway, and he couldn’t see his reflection. He touched his face, his eyes. They were sore, a little scratchy, but he could see just fine. He looked around the room and saw the darkened television. He went over to it and just barely he could see himself against the screen. His eyes seemed fine, and he brought his hand to his chin. It was smooth.

He looked around the room. There was his bed, the side table—his book! He rushed over to the table and picked up the book. He flipped through the pages, but found none folded over. He flipped through it again, this time more slowly, but he could not even find a crease or a bend in the paper. He looked at the cover of the book to make sure it was the same one—yes, the one about sailing—but there was no evidence of the book ever being handled. It looked brand new. Dev sat down on the bed and thought. Maybe it was a different book. When he tried to remember why he had chosen the book on sailing, he couldn’t. And when he tried to recall how many pages he’d marked, the numbers seemed irrelevant. Three was as many as nine, and however long he’d been in the Sanitarium, he could not tell.

* * *

He’d thought about it during his waking hours when he was not eating with Henry nearby or watching group from his bed. In between his exercises, his intentions, the folded and refolded pages of his book—eleven, last he counted, since the bandages came off—he thought of out there, beyond the common room and the atrium. He thought of Shay—if he could find her, just to see her. That was all he wanted.

There was a flash and he saw himself underneath the birches, the atrium’s glass ceiling far above him. There was the dirt, the peaty dirt, seeds in his hand. But when he looked closely they resembled something else, some kind of trifle he’d had as a child. He thought of a carcass on a table, arm and arm creates no harm, and something hidden under a pillow. He brought his hands to his head, touched the middle of his forehead with his fingertips, and felt his warm, soft skin give. He was burning up.

The panic grew in him. He listened to the ventilation system, the low vibration of it, and he imagined unscrewing the panel near the floor and squeezing himself in, shoving himself deeper and deeper until his body and toes disappeared. He looked at the vent, above at the thin grates that ran the length of the room. He tried to remember which direction he’d faced when he’d taken his meals with the others, when he sat next to the wired window that overlooked the fields beyond. Had the sun risen or set over the ridge? It had risen. Yes. If he followed the sunrise up and over the hill, what would he find?

He slipped out of bed and went to the door. He crept quietly, and his knees and ankles and toes popped and cracked. The floor was slippery under his socked feet, and as he neared the door, he held his breath. He was sore, achy.

He opened the door to his room and looked to his right. He saw the darkened common room, the tables and chairs, the doors that lined the hallway. Everything was silent. Only one dim light at the end of the hall shone. He had expected the hall to look different than he remembered, and maybe it did, but he couldn’t tell. He let the door close softly behind him, and he waited in the hallway for a moment before taking a step.

He avoided the windows in the doors he passed. At each one, he ducked down so that his head, his shadow, could not be seen by anyone who happened to be up at that time. As he crept past the tables and chairs he was careful to not knock into them. He looked over to the table he’d sat at, but he could not see the hill beyond.

He looked in the window of the doors to the atrium before he opened them and stepped through. It was dark, though the stars that shone down, the moonlight that beamed its way through the glass, painted the tops of the leaves white. Shadows lined the floor. He smelled the damp dirt, the vegetation that grew around him and he thought of the sea—he’d gone there as a child, hadn’t he? He remembered suddenly the barnacles on the underside of a dock, their bumpy shells on his palm.

He made his way in the dark moonlight. He wasn’t sure what he was walking toward, but he still made sure that his right shoulder was nearest the wall. Out of the corner of his eye he saw something move on the other side of the atrium. There was a creak and a clicking shut of metal. Dev stopped walking, the heat on the back of his neck itchy. He waited a moment and then a moment more, and when he heard nothing else, he turned toward the noise.

He wound his way through the planters, past the tall birches and banana plants that spilled over the edges. He did so silently, his socked feet quiet on the floor beneath him. When he went past the last planter, he found himself looking at a small door which he had never seen before. He looked above it; there was no light bulb. The door was free of any other markings, and it had no window. Dev turned around and looked back at where he’d come from, and he could distinctly see the double doors that led back to the common room and his hallway beyond. He looked back at the door in front of him, and he turned the handle slowly, quietly. He felt it give and click, and he pushed it open. There was a tunnel in front of him, sloped down a bit before leveling out. Lights on the walls shone bright, and Dev slowly made his way further in, letting the door close quietly behind him. He began to count his paces—if there were a fork or other adjacent tunnels, he could keep track of where he was. But before he got to twenty, the floor sloped upwards and he saw another small door. This one was wood, not metal and glass. It had no handle and no window and was more like a partition than a door. Just as Dev pushed it open, a breeze hit him, and he smelled the briny sea. He breathed in long and wide and gulped the fresh air noisily and quick. He took a step across the threshold but held the door with his back foot. He looked left, right, and in the moonlight he saw the hill. He was facing east, that he knew, but how far east he was he did not know. He took another step outside and now held the door with his outstretched hand, and the stars blanketed the sky. He felt his socks dampen in the dewy grass, and then he let the door close. There was no handle on the outside either.

He began to walk up the hill—toward what he did not know. His home, perhaps. The Bureau. Shay, wherever she was. He walked up toward the stars, toward the bright moonlight, faster and faster until he was nearly running. The hill grew steep, and he fell once, twice, and clawed at the wet grass under his fingers. He reached the top of the hill, and he froze. A long descent was before him. There, below, was a building. He turned around and looked at where he’d come from. The same building—at least it looked the same—was behind him.

He walked down the hill slowly, looking around and behind him for any clues as to where he might be. But it was a hill like any other, and by the time he got to the bottom, his socks were soaking wet. His feet were cold, his arms were cold, but it didn’t matter. He approached the building—there was a small door, but there was no handle. He looked to his left and right and tried to stick his fingers in the crack of the door to see if he might be able to open it. But he could barely fit a fingernail in it and the door, heavy and closed, did not budge. But then the door opened, and Dev, who did not know what to do with himself, stood there, his hands at his sides.

“Hello Dev,” he heard. It took him a moment to realize what he was looking at. Rhona stood there, Henry just behind her. He saw the folder in her hand, her red lipstick in the moonlight. “I see you’ve found your way outside.”

Dev burned with panic. “I—I was only trying to find—to find—” But he could not think of what to say. He turned around and saw behind him the hill he’d just walked down. He was sure of it. He’d gone up, his socks had gotten soaked, he’d nearly had to crawl on his hands it was so steep and slippery, and when he’d reached the top he’d seen two buildings. One in front of him and one behind him. He knew he’d walked down the hill toward the far building. He remembered feeling in his thighs the burn of muscle. And then he was here and in front of him were Rhona and Henry.

“Come, Dev. This way,” Rhona said and stepped to the side. Dev took a step forward.

“You should’ve known better. Rule number two after all,” she said and touched him at his elbow. She guided him, walking next to him so close that he was almost pinned against the wall. Henry followed behind them, and Rhona led them forward through the atrium and into the common room. But instead of going back towards his room she pulled him toward the treatment hallway. A red light above them flickered and buzzed. He’d been there—yes, he’d been through there and though he couldn’t clearly see it, he remembered light, burning light, and a rush of water. He passed one door after another and he looked back and the hallway lengthened and shrunk and widened and narrowed and he heard Rhona saying his name and he felt Henry’s hands upon him, upon his face, the soft smell of leather.

PART THREE

TEN

Dev drove over the bridge on his way to the award ceremony. The horizon was pink and hazy, the clouds wispy and scattered across the sky. Up ahead was a checkpoint, and Dev slowed and came to a stop. He sat in the silence of his car and looked at his hands. They seemed different somehow, bigger, and there on his right hand were three small marks. He dragged his other finger over them, felt the tender skin underneath. The marks were fresh, though he could not remember what had caused them. Maybe they were small paper cuts; he had, just that morning, finally gone through the stack of mail he’d let pile up. Standing out from the other letters and advertisements was a large white envelope with the Bureau’s crest stamped in the upper left corner. He had turned it over in his hands two times before he opened it. Inside was a small yellow notebook and a single piece of paper. He’d pulled out the notebook and flipped through it. Then he’d examined the letter.

Lt. Dev Singh,

Congratulations on being named Collector of the Year! Your politeness and can-do attitude are reflective of the Bureau’s values at its core! Furthermore, your patience, professionalism, and helpfulness are most appreciated by those struck, as well as their families.

Your success means a lot to the Bureau as it is a prerequisite for achieving our own goal of a happy and productive society. As you know, we’ve asked the entire team of Collectors about who made the biggest contribution to your department’s goals and achievements. Well—it’s you! Your colleagues said your creativity and tenacity made a real difference. Therefore, we are honoring your success by naming you once again Collector of the Year! Congratulations!

Warmest regards,

The Bureau

A horn beeped behind him, and he looked up to see a figure motioning for him to pull forward. As he did, the figure approached his car and held their hand out, motioning for him to roll down his window. But Dev could not see their face clearly as it was obscured by a reflective plastic covering made bright by the morning sun. Dev rolled down the window.

“Good morning,” they said. The voice was gentle and soft, and Dev felt a sudden sadness that he could not place. It was a woman’s voice, and it had sounded— what was it? Slightly familiar, yes, but also—

“Identification?” she asked and held out her gloved hand. The gloves were big, bulky, and made her seem bigger than she was, Dev guessed.

Dev reached into his pocket and took out his wallet. He flipped it open and showed his card and his badge. “What’s all this about?” he asked.

As the worker looked and examined his credentials, she said, “There’s been another incident.”

“Oh,” Dev said. And then, “Like the last one?”

“Worse,” she replied. “Between you and me, that is.”

She handed Dev back his identification and nodded toward the other side of the road where the bridge gave way to the sweeping sea. Dev saw there were other people in hazmat suits by the guardrail. Some were leaning on it with their arms, others just standing, turned toward no direction in particular. There at their feet, burned into the asphalt, were dark marks. They spread in a line up the road to where the bridge peaked before gently giving way back to the land. He squinted his eyes in the bright light and saw that some of the workers carried sticks in their hands. Others were stacking them in a pile.

“You’re free to go,” the woman said from inside of her suit. “Just careful on up ahead.”

Dev rolled up his window and drove on, creeping past the workers so as to not startle them. He was being careful, but he was glad he had to slow. He wanted to look, wanted to see what had happened. As he neared the marks on the road, he craned his neck to see over the hood of the car. The marks, dark and shadowy and lifelike. Some were dusty with ash and others were swept clean. As Dev drove, he realized they were burn marks, and suddenly he smelled the smoky thickness that came in through the vents on his dashboard. It was only when he finally went past the last worker and looked that he saw what they carried in their hands were not sticks, but bones, blackened and charred.

* * *

When Dev walked through the Bureau doors, he found himself surrounded by people gathered in groups of three or four, huddled together on a bench or underneath the beech trees. Their backs were to the door, and only a few turned their heads at the noise of the door sliding open and closed. He quickly lifted his wrist to look at his watch; the incident on the bridge had delayed him, and the ceremony had already begun. They were still on Reporters, though, and so Dev relaxed his shoulders and walked along the edge of the atrium to the far side of the crowd. He stood next to a planter, an arm’s width from anyone else.

There was a man talking up near the front of the atrium where the reception desk was. He was old, his gray and white hair slicked back. Dev couldn’t help but think he knew him. He squinted through the crowd and stood up once on his toes to try and get a better look, but he was too far away. It was just someone from Surveillance, someone who worked up on the top floor. To Dev, they were nearly all the same. There was a tingling in Dev’s fingertips, as if he’d just remembered he’d forgotten to do something important.

The man spoke into a small microphone he held in one hand. In the other, he held a plaque. Dev knew that the plaques were engraved. All departments—and everyone in them—had a chance at the award, and Dev had won it, what was it? Eight times now? It meant little. As Dev stood and stared up into the leaves of the beech tree next to him, he knew that the thing he was winning was not really a prize. It just meant that he’d gotten lucky again, that his cases weren’t as difficult as those of others. It just meant he’d made it a year without finding a body stashed away in some corner of an apartment, the head blown apart, the gun still in hand.

“And let me remind all of you,” the man was saying, “that this has no doubt been a difficult cycle. And now, what with the incident this morning, it’s only going to get worse. We will see a rise in cases, but we at the Bureau have faith in all of you. Which brings me to the first award of the year. Clarence McGuire! Come on down!”

All at once the people in the atrium began to clap and cheer. A short man in the gray suit of Reporting took position near the reception desk. The man with the microphone cleared his throat. “Lt. McGuire, congratulations. You filed the most reports, and to those of you who are new to the Bureau or in other departments, let me say that is quite something. The citizens have a choice of which Reporter to go to; that you were chosen again and again is evidence of your disposition and merit.”

The crowd clapped again, and Lt. McGuire took the plaque in his hands and held it above his head. He leaned his head toward the microphone. “Thank you, thank you,” he said. “Always a pleasure to serve the Bureau.”

Dev watched as the other department winners were called—Surveilling was up, and as the man spoke of the difference of see and watch and notice, Dev looked at the people in black suits. He knew most of them by name only, and when each was announced, he clapped along with everyone else. But he was not paying attention, not really, and he caught perhaps only half of what was said. Instead, he was preoccupied with the thought of his drive to work, of the bridge. He thought of the ash and the marks seared onto the road. They’d have to pave it over.

Suddenly he heard his name. It sounded far off, a bit like an echo; it was his turn. He smiled automatically and wove through the crowd to the front with the other Collectors. Once near the reception desk, he looked out into the crowd of people. He tried to smile at them, at this one or that one, but every time he focused in on anyone he felt a pounding in his chest. They smiled back at him, but really, what was it all for?

The man with the microphone turned toward Dev and held out the award. There on the plaque was his name and the year. It read Collector of the Year and was engraved with the Bureau’s crest. As Dev took it into his own hands, he happened to glance down. The man had a ring on his middle finger. A sudden swoosh went through Dev. It was the most curious thing.

“On behalf of the Bureau,” the man said, “I would like to present Dev Singh with the Collector of the Year award.” There was some clapping, and he paused for a moment before continuing on. “As you all know, collections are difficult at best. Each one presents its own unique challenge. One must be quickly decisive, disarming. Affirming. And while all Collectors have that exact disposition, it is you, Dev, that have had the most collections without incident. Congratulations!”

At this everyone clapped, and Dev smiled and bowed his head. He did not say anything into the microphone, but he mouthed thank you toward the crowd. With his plaque tucked underneath his arm, he walked back through the crowd, and as he did, people reached out to shake his hand or put their hands on his shoulder. He didn’t like the attention. He wished only to be at home, at his kitchen table. His new notebook open to the first clean page. Perhaps he’d write about the bridge, or the man with the ring on his middle finger, or of the lowness that had been in him since he had woken that morning.

As the man called out the other department winners— Transmitting, Resetting—Dev only half listened. He thought he heard something there in the plants under the beech tree where he stood. Without being too obvious, he moved closer and peered down. He thought he saw—yes—it was really there—a tiny red dot in between the leaves. It was a light, a little glowing light. It flickered once, then again, and Dev stared and tried not to look away from the spot. But then he blinked, and the red light vanished.

“Lt. Dev Singh?”

He heard his name from behind, and he turned around. In front of him stood a woman. She was dressed in a navy suit, and Dev looked quickly at her lapel. He saw her pin, the sun and the lines of the echograph. He straightened his shoulders.

“I wanted to introduce myself. I’m Shay Robinson. I was just assigned to you for the cycle—congratulations by the way,” she said and nodded toward the plaque he now held in his hands.

“Thank you,” Dev said.

“I’ve heard nothing but great things about you. I’m excited to work together,” she said and stuck her hand out.

Dev smiled as he knew he should, but inside he felt—what was it? It was familiar, a kind of heaviness that coursed through him. There was something in her voice—he thought suddenly of the Home, of a boy he once knew but hated, and of a bird flying up into the sky. He pictured it, its wings flapping hurriedly, and Dev, who had been pressing his teeth into his tongue just enough to be uncomfortable, spoke.

“Hello,” he said. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I’d like to thank the Reverend John Delore for giving me the space to nurture both sadness and truth. To my fantastic editor, Sophie Robinson, thank you for understanding what I set out to do and helping me get there. To James McGowan and the folks at BookEnds Literary Agency, thank you for your tenacity and support.

If you or someone you know is in crisis, call 988 to reach the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline in the United States.

You can also call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255, text HOME to 741741 or visit SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resource

In the UK, call the Samaritans on 116 123, text SHOUT to 85258 or visit samaritans.org

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Laura Kat Young is a writer and high school English teacher. She lives in Chicago with her children.

The 2019–2021 Writer-in-Residence at the Ernest Hemingway Foundation, her works have appeared in The Blood Pudding, Shoreline of Infinity, The Lindenwood Review, and others. She is also the author of The Butcher.

www.laurakatyoung.com

@writerlylaura

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Table of Contents

Cover

Leave us a review

Copyright

Dedication

Part One

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Part Two

Nine

Part Three

Ten

Acknowledgements

About the Author