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aren’t a threat to me now, and whatever’s really going on with them, let’s just . . . let’s just sleep on it, okay?”
    Erin frowned. Then she nodded.
    “Say okay.”
    “Okay,” she said. She was looking at her reflection in the spoon. It was upside down.
    Erin smiled as she and Logan stood up from the booth. But when they went out to meet Mr. Arbitor on the sidewalk, she walked to her father without looking back, and the two of them left without saying good-bye.

TWELVE

PLEDGE
    1
    T HE MORNING OF LOGAN’S PLEDGE, THERE WAS no cake, no extended family gathered around the table, and no celebration.
    Logan ate a piece of toast, and his mom sat next to him silently.
    “Big day,” Dad said, coming into the room. “You, uh . . . you want me to walk you there, or anything?” It was the most his dad had said to him in a month.
    “I’ll be fine,” Logan said. “I know the way.”
    “You know . . .” His dad was clearly trying his hardest. “It’s really going to be great for us. For your mother. And maybe a nice, steady, after-school job would . . . would do you some good.”
    “I know.” Logan finished his breakfast. “I know all that.”
    And still, Mom didn’t say a word. She just stared at Logan’s plate, at the crumbs he’d left on it, sitting perfectly upright, hands at her lap, vapid . . .
    “Oh, I know, I know,” Dad said. “I’m just . . . just excited for us. A new start and all. Today’s a good day.” He placed his hands on Mom’s shoulders, and it was only the faintest glimmer in his eyes that said anything different.
    “Well, I’ll be off, then,” Logan said, not making a longer moment out of any of it than he needed to. And as he entered the elevator, he wondered when, or if, he’d see either of them again.

    Logan stood in front of the Center for almost an hour before going in. He watched Pledges come and go, he watched staffers punch in for the day, even watched some leave again for lunch. He wondered which were Markers. And he knew there was only one way to find out. He watched the sun move a good ways across the sky, until the large spire of the DOME Umbrella cast him in shadow, and the windows of the Center to its side reflected bright, painful spots of sunlight into his eyes. Logan breathed the air and stood, calm and still, less frightened than he’d been in as long as he could remember, because today would be the end of all of that. His dad was right. Today would be the start of something altogether new.
    2
    “Just complete these two forms, please.” Logan took the tablet and stylus from the lady at the desk. “Last ones you’ll ever need to fill out,” she said with a wink, and Logan thought of that unmistakable standard-issue Government Smile.
    “You’ll call me in?” Logan asked, finding a seat in the waiting area.
    “Oh yes. Your reservation’s in our system, so it won’t be long.”
    Logan went to work on the forms.
    The room surrounding him was dotted with nervous kids fidgeting on felt seat benches, half a dozen in total. Each celebrating his or her birthday, like Logan, alone in the sterile, white room among the chatterbox televisions of the DOME Center for Pledging and Treatment. One frame projected a woman talking excitedly about all the many daily uses of the Mark—access to shopping, banking, health services, transit services, worker’s eligibility, no-hassle security clearance, voter registration . . . the list went on and on. Another frame projected a man discussing outreach to those who didn’t yet have the Mark, and welcoming those Markless who had finally decided to make The Right Choice and Pledge Today.
    Those words flashed across the screen as the man said them: “The Right Choice” and “Pledge Today.”
    And indeed, perhaps as many as twenty Markless sat in the waiting room at this very moment, men and women of every age, all of them filthy, hungry, putrid, scratching themselves and jittery, antsy, looking constantly around the room as though any moment someone would sneak up behind them, whisper, “Gotcha! Ya filthy, stinkin’ skinflint!” and clasp an industrial-grade pair of electro-magnecuffs around their abhorrent, Unmarked wrists.
    “Logan Paul Langly?” a nurse called from halfway behind a swinging door.
    Logan stood, head held high, and went in for his Pledge.
    3
    The nurse led Logan through a labyrinth of hallways and stairways and elevators, and he tried to count the turns. Left, right, straight, left,