People like Anna?”
“In instances like that, it makes even more sense for us to try to get something useful from them,” her mom answered. “Those dissidents usually can’t even give us the names of any others. Either way, we have to remove them from society. By using them this way, we can do some good as well as eliminating the harm they cause.”
That was what she was now. That was what these thoughts made her. A dissident, no different from any other dissident in Processing. Somebody to get rid of. Somebody to use.
If she hated what her mom was doing, she was a dissident.
If she was a dissident, she was one of the people her mom was talking about.
“But how are you strengthening society by getting people to confess to things they haven’t done?”
Her mom moved back up to the couch. “The first question you asked was about people who haven’t done anything you would consider serious,” she said. “That’s exactly why what we’re doing is necessary.” She leaned toward Becca. “Most people think the way you do. If you heard someone say the country was better off under the old regime, what would you do?”
“I’d report them,” she said immediately. But was that even true anymore?
Just how far gone was she?
“Why?” asked her mom.
“Because only a dissident would think something like that.” She didn’t see how closely her words echoed Heather’s until she heard herself speak.
“But what makes that dissident dangerous?” her mom pressed.
Becca hesitated, not sure how to answer.
“Right,” said her mom. “You wouldn’t be able to say. One person, making an offhand comment about the government, doesn’t look like a threat. A conspiracy to overthrow the government—that’s the kind of threat people understand.”
“The kind of threat you create.”
Her mom nodded. “And because people believe that those conspiracies exist, they understand the danger that dissidents present, even if they understand it for the wrong reasons. It becomes automatic. When they hear someone saying the country was better off with the former government, they know that person is a danger to society, even if they don’t consciously think about why.”
“But what makes those people dangerous to begin with?” If she could find what made even the minor dissidents dangerous, maybe she could find the thing that separated her from them.
“A thousand tiny drops of poison will kill somebody as easily as a giant spoonful,” her mom answered. “But those tiny drops are harder to see. If people become complacent toward dissidents who don’t appear to pose any immediate threat, soon they’ll start ignoring them. If the dissidents are ignored instead of stopped, they’ll have a chance to gain enough power that people will stop ignoring them and start listening. And the more people listen to them, the more powerful they’ll become. Before you know it, with no conspiracy necessary, we’ll have exactly what we had before. Chaos, corruption, a world built on ignorance and fear.”
Becca wanted to believe her. She wanted to believe that what Internal was doing—what her mom was doing—was right, no matter how many lies were involved, no matter what her mom had to do to get dissidents to say what she needed them to say. If she could just make herself believe it, she could have her mom back. She could have her mind back. She could have her life back.
Heather had done it. She had blocked out all her grief, blocked out everything Becca had told her. She had convinced herself that her parents had deserved to die. Why couldn’t Becca convince herself that her mom was doing the right thing?
Her mom’s neutral mask slipped a little more, revealing the fear underneath, with every second she waited for Becca’s response.
“I think I get it,” said Becca slowly. “You have to do what you’re doing, so people will understand that dissidents are dangerous. Otherwise they won’t see the danger until it’s too late.”
Her mom sagged against the back of the couch, letting all her muscles relax at once. “Exactly.”
“I think I need some time to think about this,” said Becca. “It’s a lot to absorb.” She swallowed. “Thanks for explaining. I should have asked you when I first found out.”
She escaped to her room before her mom could look past her relief to wonder whether Becca meant what she had said.
Sometime around midnight, Becca’s mom answered the call from work after all. From behind her bedroom door, Becca assured her that it was fine for her to leave, that she didn’t need to talk anymore. After the apartment door closed behind her mom, she waited five minutes before she left the apartment herself.
She hadn’t ever gone to the playground this late before. Stepping away from the lighted parking lot and onto the dark road, she was reminded of the time she had walked to 117 to find Heather. The night that had started all this.
That night, she’d had a purpose. Find Heather. Help her. Tonight she didn’t know what she was looking for. She used to be able to escape her problems at the playground, but this time she carried the problem with her. Where could she go to escape her own mind?
Dissidents were dangerous. Becca knew that. She had known it all her life.
Becca thought like them. She talked like them. She acted like them. Was she dangerous?
Becca sped up, trying to outrun her thoughts.
Dissidents would destroy the government if Internal didn’t stop them. They would replace justice and order with chaos and corruption.
What did that even mean?
Did a world built on justice and order, the world her mom had taught her to believe in, involve people like Anna being arrested? People like Jake’s mom being tortured to death? People who said one wrong thing forced to confess to trying to overthrow the government?
She felt like she had run straight off a cliff. Her feet hit the solid pavement with every stride, but she could still feel herself falling.
She couldn’t start thinking like this. She had to stop this somehow.
She slowed as she reached the playground. At night, it looked downright sinister. Elongated shadows stretched out from the swing set poles and reached for her along the ground. The playhouse had transformed into a black hole ready to suck her in.
A shrill warble, too close to be a bird, cut through the silence.
Her heart nearly exploded out of her chest.
The noise came again, but this time she recognized it. Her phone. Right. Glad nobody was around to witness her moment of panic, she answered. “Hello?”
“Hey.” It was Jake, sounding more subdued than she had heard him since the day he’d told her about his past. “I know it’s late, but… I need to talk to you. Or just hang out. Or something.” His voice wavered. “Do you think you could meet me at the old playground by your building?”
She stopped walking. Jake never sounded like this when he called her. Ever since he had explained his history to her, they had kept their conversations almost obsessively casual. He never called her sounding upset, or asked her to come hang out this late at night. Something had to be wrong.
But with her mom’s explanation circling through her head, with her desperate denials no longer working, she had no room for talking to Jake, for forcing what her mom had said about him out of her mind.
Fighting her guilt, she opened her mouth to tell him she couldn’t make it.
A figure stepped out of the playhouse. He waved as he walked toward her.
Jake was already here. And now he knew she was here too.
At first he was only a vague shadow. As she got closer, his features resolved. His familiar face, minus his usual smile. The tears that glittered in his eyes.
The ring of bruises around his neck.
