Prodigy

and then it makes the tube open.”
    I rush to where he’s pointing.
Is it my imagination, or do I hear the faint sounds of boots pounding against pavement?
“It’s some sort of glass screen,” I say. The word LOCKED stretches across it in red type. I turn back to the boy and knock on the glass. His eyes swivel toward the sound. “Is there a password? How do they type it in?”
    “I don’t know!” The boy throws his hands up; his words contort with a sob. “Please, just—”
    Damn it, he reminds me
so much
of Eden. His tears are making my own eyes water. “Come on,” I coax, fighting to keep my words strong. Gotta stay in control. “
Think.
Any other way this thing opens, aside from the keypad?”
    He shakes his head. “I don’t know. I
don’t know
!”
    I can already imagine what Eden would say, if he was this boy. He’d say something technical, thinking like the little engineer that he is. Something like,
“Do you have a sharp edge? Try finding a manual trigger!”
    Steel yourself.
I pull out the knife that’s always at my belt. I’d seen Eden take gadgets apart before and reconfigure all the inner wires and circuit boards. Maybe I should try the same thing.
    I place the blade against the tiny slit running along the keypad’s edge and carefully apply some pressure. When nothing happens, I push harder until the blade bends. Doesn’t help at all. “It’s too tight,” I mutter. If only June were here. She’d probably figure out how this thing works in half a second. The boy and I share a brief moment of silence. His chin drops to his chest and his eyes close; he knows there’s no way to open it.
    I need to rescue him.
I need to save Eden.
It makes me want to scream.
    It’s not my imagination—I
do
hear the soldiers getting closer. They must be checking the compartments. “Talk to me, Sam,” I say. “Are you still sick? What are they doing to you?”
    The boy wipes his nose. The light of hope has already faded from his face. “Who are you?”
    “Someone who wants to help,” I whisper. “The more you tell me, the easier it will be for me to fix this.”
    “I’m not sick anymore,” Sam replies in a rush, like he knows we’re running out of time, “but they say I’ve got something in my blood. They call it a
dormant virus.
” He stops to think. “They give me medicine to keep me from getting sick again.” He rubs at his blind eyes, wordlessly begging me to save him. “Every time the train stops, they take a blood sample from me.”
    “Any idea what cities you’ve already been to?”
    “Dunno . . . I heard the name Bismarck once . . .” The boy trails off as he thinks. “And Yankton?”
    Both are warfront cities up in Dakota. I think about the transport they’re using for him. It probably maintains a sterile environment, so people can go in and take a blood sample, then mix them with whatever activates the dormant virus. The tubes in his arms might just be for feeding.
    My best guess is that they’re using him as a bioweapon against the Colonies.
He’s been turned into a lab rat.
Just like Eden. The thought of my brother being shipped around like this threatens to drown me. “Where are they taking you next?” I demand.
    “I don’t know! I just . . . I want to go home!”
    Somewhere along the warfront. I can only imagine how many others are being paraded up and down the warfront line. I picture Eden huddled in one of these trains. The boy has started to wail again, but I force myself to cut him off. “Listen to me—do you know of a boy named Eden? Have you heard that name mentioned anywhere?”
    His cries grow louder. “No—I don’t—know who—!”
    I can’t linger anymore. Somehow I manage to tear my eyes away from the boy’s and run to the railcar’s sliding doors. The soldiers’ footsteps are louder now—they can’t be more than five or six cars away. I take one last glance back at the boy. “I’m sorry. I have to go.” It
kills
me to say these words.
    The boy starts to cry again. His hands pound against the cylinder’s thick glass. “No!” His voice breaks. “I told you everything I know—
please don’t leave me here!
”
    I can’t bear to listen anymore. I force myself to step up the side latches of one sliding door and get close enough to the railcar’s ceiling to grab the edge of the top circular seal. I pull myself out into the night air again, back into the sleet that stings my eyes and whips ice against my face, and struggle to