Mind Games

Truth is the cry of all, but game of the few.

George Berkeley
1744

Earth has its boundaries, but human stupidity is limitless.

Gustave Flaubert

1

A school shouldn’t be this quiet. I slip down the stairs, Hex a shadow behind me, matching my exaggerated careful, slow steps. Sound or sudden movement trigger the cameras, and I fight to breathe slowly, in and out, silent as I can, though my heart is thudding so loud I’m sure it will set the cameras off all on its own. But they stay still.

We pass the final year students’ rooms, one by one. They are silent as graves with a red light over each door marking them as occupied. I glance back at Hex, an eyebrow raised, and can see he is worried. Could we be that unlucky that this is the one day of the year that every single student is in attendance? But at last there is an empty room. Hex pulls a face: it’s Jezzamine’s. If they trace the hack to here, retribution will be harsh. But as good as his word, he fiddles the lock and is inside and plugged in within seconds.

Now it’s up to me.
Come on, Luna, you can do this
. I continue my slow progress to the next corridor, and wait. Through the window in the door I can just see the green light of the camera. Security is higher through here, cameras on all the time and not just sound and motion. There is no point in continuing if Hex can’t—

And the green light goes out.

I grin, and remember just in time to move slowly until I’m through the door and out of range of the hall detectors. Once the door shuts I dash across the room to the next door just as the lock clicks open.
Hex, you are brilliant.

Remembering he wasn’t sure he could keep it unlocked for long, I look around the office for something to jam in the door, then end up shoving one of my shoes in it. I step into the room.

So this is the centre of evil.

It looks much like any other PIP, but hooked into this Plug In Point is the Bag herself – Beatrice Annabel Goodwin OBE, Head of Learning and Chief Torturer of Students. Her usually disdainful face is blank; her body is here on the PIP sofa, the rest of her in virtual assembly. We picked the one moment of the week that every single one of the regular students and teachers would be there, occupied and unable to unplug.

Nervous to be this close to her, I can’t stop myself from waving a hand in front of her face: no reaction.
Don’t be an idiot, Luna. You’re wasting time.

I pull the gloves and paint out of my backpack, and get to work.

When I’m done, I back out of the room. The camera light is still off. I stoop to pull my shoe out of the doorway; the door clicks to and locks. I hesitate, staring at the shoe in my hand. They’re purple, and I hand-painted the butterflies on them myself. The only pair quite like them.

I push the shoe just out of sight behind a plant in the outer office. This time, there will be no escape.

Rachel raises an eyebrow as I slip into my seat next to hers. ‘Where’ve you been?’

‘Nowhere.’ But I can’t stop myself from grinning. Our minder, Anderson, is still slumped on his desk asleep, and our class of Refuser misfits in its usual chaos.

She shakes her head. ‘That look means trouble is in the air, and
nowhere
is somewhere you weren’t supposed to be. And where is your shoe?’

I glance down: one purple butterfly shoe on the left, barefoot on the right. ‘I seem to have misplaced it.’ Good idea, bad idea? Time will tell, but my stomach is clenching in knots. I didn’t really think that through, did I?

Hex slips through the classroom door a few minutes later as planned, and sits at the back. I turn and glance at him, like I’m not supposed to do. He’s all nonchalant, but
he
didn’t leave a shoe behind.

‘I don’t suppose you’ve got spare shoes with you?’ I whisper to Rachel.

She shakes her head. ‘Even if I did…’ She shrugs, no need to finish the sentence. Rachel is an RE: a Refuser on Religious Exemption. Her church refuses technology, and fashion: her plain chunky black shoes would scream
wrong
on my feet. ‘How about your gym shoes?’ she says.

Can I get out to the lockers and back again before—

The door opens. No. I can’t.

It’s Mrs Goodwin, but not like we’ve seen her before. Her face is serene, unaware. As serene as you can be with elaborate face paint: a clown face, but not just any clown. A nightmare clown. A giant, manic red smile and red nose are stark against chalk-white cheeks, and even better: snakes reach down from her hair, like some sort of mad Medusa. Somehow they add up on her face to pure evil.
Genius
. At last: her exterior matches her interior.

When Rachel looks up she draws in a sharp gasp, and I can feel Hex’s eyes burning into the back of my skull. All we’d talked about was spray-painting a few comments about the school around her office. But semi-permanent body paint is a much better way to get a point across, isn’t it?

Careful to show no movement above the desk, I kick my other shoe off, and tuck it and my feet under my backpack.

Goodwin turns to the teacher’s desk at the front, and raps her hands down loudly on it. Anderson jumps out of his nap, starts to apologise, then looks at her. His words die away.

‘What is it?’ she snaps, but he just stares at her, mouth opening and closing like he can’t breathe. When he doesn’t instantly answer, she shakes her head and turns away from him. His face is baffled – he probably thinks he is still in a sleep dust-induced dream. Not that he knew there was sleep dust in his tea. Even though he often naps through the morning after giving us our assignments for the day, this time I couldn’t take any chances.

She faces us. The more familiar long-suffering contempt with a veneer of gentle condescension takes over under the clown face.

‘Good morning, class. As you’ve missed assembly
again
, and we don’t want you to miss out on anything important, here I am.
In person
. No matter
how
busy I am, every student’s learning is important to us.’

Her voice drones on with school news and equipment upgrades, and I cast a careful glance about at the other students. In our high school of over 600, the class of Refusers has dwindled down to about twenty, covering all year groups. Others have been browbeaten over time to accept Virtual Education. There are a few, like Hex, here involuntarily – excluded for a short time for virtual misdemeanours. In his case he hacked into eighteen-plus games and bypassed the password net; the whole school was into virtual worlds that parents and teachers most definitely did
not
approve of. Most of the rest are REs like Rachel, and now that the initial shock of Goodwin’s appearance has passed, they are composed, gazing back at Evil Clown with equanimity – the same way they react to anything interesting. The danger points are the MEs, six of them in a cluster across the room. The Medical Exemptions are unpredictable. Most of them are staring at her with fearful wide eyes, but worse: a few of the younger ones are whispering and struggling not to laugh.

‘Quiet!’ she suddenly snaps at them, and all noise in the room ceases. ‘I insist on your full attention.’ She moves further into the room, staring every student in the eye in turn. She stops by my desk.

‘Luna, you’re looking pleased with yourself today,’ she says, and raises an eyebrow. One of the snakes painted across her forehead splits with the movement. She hates all Refusers, but especially me because, in her own words, I have no excuse for it – no religious or medical grounds that preclude me from Virtual Education. No matter that it is part of NUN’s International Bill of Rights of the Child that anyone can decline educational feed Implants. That students can insist on an old-fashioned non-virtual education. Even she can’t ignore New United Nations directives, but she makes sure the standard is as low as is legal, and torments us every chance she gets. Especially me, as she is convinced I Refuse just to spite her, to waste time and resources.

That’d be a good reason. If only it were true.

She won’t lay into me with this many witnesses, but I manage to say nothing, to return her gaze calmly. Careful to keep myself from looking either too angry or too happy, the two expressions she can’t bear to see on my face.

Eventually she breaks gaze, and looks around the room. ‘I’m required by New United Nations directive NUN-92 to emphasise that your continuing refusal of PareCo’s Virtual Education opportunities doesn’t bar you from entry to the PareCo tests.’ Her teeth are gritted, as if saying the words causes her physical pain. ‘All final year students were entered by the school, and those successful at obtaining Test appointments will be notified by school feed tomorrow morning.’

The two boys at the front are giggling again, hands over faces, trying to stop.

She spins round, leans forward and puts a hand on each of their desks. ‘What. Is. It. Already?’ she demands, voice raised.

One of them looks across the room for guidance, and she smacks a hand down on the desktop in front of him.

‘
You
: answer me!’

He swallows. ‘You…you’ve got something on your f-f-f-face,’ he answers.

‘What?’ She backs away, and nervously brushes at imaginary crumbs. Then Mr Anderson stands up. Convinced he isn’t seeing things now because of what the boy said? He pulls a mirror out of a locker of science equipment, and hands it to her.

At first I think she won’t look; she’ll smash it on the floor or fling it back at him. But curiosity gets the better of her, and she holds it up. The room is so silent I can hear my heart beating for the second time today.

She wordlessly puts the mirror down on the desk, and leaves the room.

Everyone breathes out at the same time when the door swings shut. The lunch bell goes seconds later: she won’t make it back to her office in time.
Everyone
will emerge into the halls and see her.

Anderson faces the class. Is that a smile twitching behind his moustache? ‘Well, now. I don’t suppose anyone here knows anything about that?’ The room stays silent. ‘No? Well, if you do, I expect you’ll be hearing about it soon. Go. Off to lunch.’

My gym trainers don’t go with the purple dress I modified, but being a Refuser has its advantages: you can wear what you want. Even if it is always wrong. The final year students’ lunchroom is crammed with seventeen-year-olds in jeans and red tops. There is no uniform in test year, but apart from Hackers who do their own thing, somehow the rest of them always dress the same. I used to be mystified until Hex told me they confer in Realtime before school.

By tradition Refusers have our own section of the lunchroom, and despite the crowded room none of the jeans-and-red-shirted others venture too close. Hex comes in late, but instead of heading straight for his Hacker friends as usual, he pauses next to Rachel and me. He raises an eyebrow over his tattoo-encircled left eye: has an extra black swirl been added? That was quick. ‘So. Is art one of your best subjects?’ he asks.

Rachel gets up. ‘Somehow I don’t think I should be listening to this conversation.’

She goes to fill a water glass, and I shrug.

‘You should have told me,’ he chides.

‘Angry?’

‘No.’ He grins. ‘Considering that wasn’t virtual, it was brilliant.’

I smile back. We’d been arguing that very point. So used to spending his life plugged in, he didn’t get the power of the personal touch in the real world. Hex had been convinced virtual means were the only way to get revenge for his exclusion.

‘But she will be trying very, very hard to find someone to blame,’ he says.

‘Are your tracks covered?’

‘Oh, yes. She won’t be able to prove anything. That doesn’t mean she won’t work it out. She’ll know somebody hacked the cameras and door, and there aren’t many here who could do that.’

‘Modest, aren’t you? What if she notices the new mark by your eye?’

‘Damn. You noticed? I thought it was subtle.’ He grins, clearly pleased he earned another Hacker’s mark – the Hacker equivalent of bragging about something that cannot be admitted to without risk of prosecution. ‘Anyhow, she’ll know it was more than one person. So are
your
tracks covered?’

I stare back at him, a shoe-sized knot of guilt uncomfortable in my stomach. ‘The deal was if one of us gets caught the other says nothing, and I never will. So you have nothing to worry about. Now push off before anyone notices you’re slumming it.’

Rachel returns to her seat. Conversations echo around me: the whole year saw Goodwin’s face, and it is all they can talk about. I push my lunch about a plate, unable to even think about eating. Will my plan work?

Lunch is nearly over when it finally happens. Rachel nudges my arm. I look up, and her eyes are fixed on the door. Conversation dies away.

Robson, head of school security, marches across the room, and stops behind me. A meaty hand clamps onto my shoulder, and pulls me out of my seat.