Pulse

it had felt leaving her hands that it was going to be a massive throw, maybe even a new world record. She was thinking about how happy this would make her, how she would rub Clara’s face in it while she was simultaneously choking her to death, when she saw the hammer veer off course.
    “No, that’s not possible,” Fleet said, words that were barely audible to anyone else around her. The hammer was drifting dangerously out of bounds as if it had been picked up on a sharp wind. Later, people would testify to just that, though it had been a perfectly calm day.
    “Oh no, there was a big wind,” one attending fan would say. “You could feel it, up in the stands. A gust like you wouldn’t believe. Damn near blew me out of my seat. It was there and then gone. Poof! Just like that.”
    It was true about the wind; Clara was smart enough to throw in at least the hint of a reason why a hammer might change course so dramatically. Physics aside, the hand of God is always a good direction to place blame. Who could say for sure? The hammer spun on a chain in the air, maybe a big gust could send it flying like a Frisbee fifty yards off course. Either way, it had been the longest throw by any man or woman in the history of the Field Games. Not that it would matter, since, of course, it was way out of bounds.
    The people who sat close enough to the victim said that it sounded like a tree being broken in two when it hit. But then, the sound of an iron ball slamming into a skull was something that couldn’t adequately be described. And what it had done to the head was something out of a horror movie. There was only the one victim; no one else was hurt. But the one person was demolished. It was impossible to fix what had gone terribly wrong.
    The president of the Western State, who sat center stage at the events, looked on in horrified amazement just like everyone else. He was directly across the field from the carnage and had a pretty good view of what would later be described as the worst disaster in the history of the Field Games. The president would never have guessed the truth of the matter, that the hammer had been meant for him. It had long been planned that he would be the first of many State officials to fall. And it would have been completely untraceable. No one could have connected the flying hammer to the person who was really controlling it. If not for Clara’s growing hatred for Faith Daniels, she would have followed the plan. It was true she disliked being controlled by her stepmother, but it was Faith who had pushed her over the edge. She would have done what she was told; she would have killed the president with the power of a hammer. He was lucky to get off the field alive.
    Clara didn’t bother looking in the direction of the catastrophe. She just walked away in the opposite direction. She knew the news would never reach outside the State, nothing negative ever did. But she had a special plan for sharing the information out there. A plan she rolled over in her head as she came up short in front of her brother.
    “Welcome to the club,” Wade said. “Any reason why you decided to go rogue? That’s usually my job.”
    “Figured I’d take the lead there for once in my life,” Clara said. “Killing the president was Gretchen’s insane idea. It would have put the whole world on high alert. It would have been a mistake.”
    Wade looked off in the direction of the incident, then across the field, where the president was being evacuated.
    “She’s going to be pissed. You ready for that?”
    Clara’s lips curled into a half smile as she started walking away. She was still on board with the plan, but she was also a born leader. She was tired of following Gretchen’s orders.
    “I’ve been ready for a while.”

Chapter 17
How Deep Does This Rabbit Hole Go?
    Faith felt off, like everything she’d learned from Dylan had found a way to escape into the open air and fly away. She’d been feeling that way all day, a tragic sadness welling up in her chest that made her want to cry. She didn’t know why this was so; but as she walked in the darkness toward the old mall, she tried to think of all the reasons for her depression.
    Life at Old Park Hill was finished. She’d left schools before, lots of times. But this was different, because she knew in her heart of hearts that whatever school had been, it was over now. There would be no more classrooms, no hallways, no teachers in the flesh. All the desperate