Page 59 of Winterveil

When Nadiya tuned back into the conversation, the boy’s voice was peaking with desperation. “Just put them on, please. I don’t want to get in trouble.”

Another first year was walking among the stands, handing out node cases to everyone in the audience. She watched as Dr. Iver put his on, and Giselle, too.

Nadiya relented and took the plastic case from him. She removed the nodes and fixed them to her temples, her skin prickling as they came online.

“Thanks,” the boy said gratefully. Then he scuttled off.

In another moment, the intercom buzzed. The name of the first student was called out. He grabbed one of the assault rifles from the weapons rack, squared his shoulders, and then stepped into the amphitheater.

As he walked to the center of the field, something began to materialize in front of him. It was not like any hologram or projection Nadiya had ever seen, translucent and glitching at the edges. It looked like a solid, breathing human being, clad in all black.

The nodes hummed against her temples. The audience glanced questioningly among themselves. Was Matteo right? Were they all experiencing some kind of mass hallucination, fed into their brains by the nodes? Nadiya looked to Dr. Iver, hoping that his face would reveal something, but his expression was as inscrutable as ever.

Just as shocked as the audience, the boy briefly stumbled back. The man—the hologram?—darted forward. The boy fell, and a gasp of mild horror rose from the crowd.

Nadiya glanced once more at Dr. Iver and the rep from the Farm. Behind his dark sunglasses, the man’s face was impossible to read. But he certainly didn’t look impressed.

Matteo made a disgruntled sound. “If they wanted a good show, they should’ve conscripted you and me alone.”

“Double trouble,” Nadiya murmured.

“Actually, if they really wanted a show, they should’ve sent me out there shirtless.”

Nadiya rolled her eyes.

In the arena, the boy struggled to his feet. He grasped for his gun and got off a shot, pinging the hologram in the shoulder. The hologram looked so real that Nadiya flinched, bracing herself for a spurt of blood, a grunt of pain, but instead it simply vanished. Dissolved, as if nothing had ever been there at all.

The audience gasped. The skin on Nadiya’s neck rose.

Moments later the boy returned to the holding room, sweaty and panting, his eyes wide. The other students crowded around him, murmuring with concern and rising panic. Even Matteo was tense, and as he turned to Nadiya, he said in a low voice, “What the fuck is going on?”

Nadiya couldn’t answer.

The intercom buzzed. The student whose name was called out jolted upright. But instead of taking his weapon, he froze in place. Fear hung heavily in the air of the holding room.

It was pure instinct, or maybe pity, that made Nadiya speak at last.

“I’ll go,” she said. “Don’t worry. I’ll go instead.”

The boy deflated visibly, mumbling his gratitude. She walked forward, as if in a trance, and took one of the guns from the rack. The new targets were unsettlingly real, but Nadiya knew she could hit them. As long as there was no blood.

“Nadiya—” Matteo started.

“It’s fine.” Her voice sounded distant, even to her own ears. “I’ll be fine.”

As Nadiya slid the gun against her hip, she realized it wasn’t pity that had propelled her. It was an odd, simmering sense of anger. She was so tired of secrets, so tired of unanswered questions and confusion and fear. It wasn’t a hologram she wanted to face down. It was—

Dr. Iver’s ice-blue eyes narrowed as she stepped into the arena.

The slanting sunlight nearly blinded her, and Nadiya put up a hand to her forehead. The dust that had been kicked up by the previous student clogged her throat. She waited for the hologram to shudder to life in front of her, but something else emerged instead.

Professor Blanchard, striding from the side door to the center of the arena. His lab coat billowed out behind him and his glasses flashed in the sun.

The audience tittered. Nadiya looked in confusion to Dr. Iver, but before she could read his expression, Professor Blanchard had grasped her by the arm, and not too gently.

“This is off script,” he said in a low voice, covering the mic on his chest.

Nadiya jerked her arm free. “What are you talking about? What’s going on?”