Author's Note: Sorry I don't update this story often! Please vote and comment. I'd love to hear your thoughts :)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The bell for Curfew rang and all of the children were back at their homes. Brodhi made Lynn take a bowl of soup up to their room and he closed the door. Darla was still in the bathroom and Brodhi didn't want her to see when he took her outside. But first he had to dig a grave.

He wasn't supposed to be outside during Curfew, but there was no other time to bury his mother. The children were all at the house during the day and there wasn't enough time to get up early and start digging. Anyways, he needed to get Darla out of the bathroom. The thought of his mother on the cold tiled floor haunted him.

He went outside into their backyard. The large row of houses blocked the view of their small yard from the street. The chain fence had fallen in many years ago, but it still helped conceal him. A small shed sat in the back corner of the yard. Brodhi ran over to it, keeping low to make sure no Officer would see him. He pulled the key out of his pocket and opened up the rusty lock. He opened up the door just a crack so that he didn't make any noise. It would attract attention to his house.

He groped along the wall in the dark. He had trouble seeing, but the cold, sharp metal of the shovel felt familiar to him. He pulled it off the wall and walked back outside. Using the shed to hide him, Brodhi began to dig. The ground was dry and he had to work hard.

Sweat began to break out on his forehead and he could hear the faint sound of Officers talking. He jumped as he heard a gunshot and a scream. He shook his head and continued working, hoping that Lynn didn't hear that and come out to check on him.

After hours of work and many blisters on his hands, he finally had a hole he thought was deep enough to be a grave for Darla. He dropped the shovel on the ground and went back into the house.

He went quickly through the kitchen and up the stairs. The door to his room was closed and he hoped that Lynn was asleep and wouldn't open it anytime soon. He braced himself before he opened the door to the bathroom. He made sure that no one went in all day. He hadn't seen her body since he came home in the morning.

He took a deep breath and opened the door. Darla was still lying on her back. He felt stupid for being shocked that she was lying on the ground in the same position. She couldn't move anymore. The blood was still dried on her face and her grey hair was tangled around her head. Her skin was paler than he had ever seen before.

Getting down onto his knees, Brodhi slipped his arms around his mother and lifted her off the ground. She was frail, but she felt heavier that he expected her to. He hurried down the hallway as quickly as he could, just to make sure Lynn wouldn't see her again. Once he was hurrying, he didn't stop. He carried her out to the hole he had dug and carefully placed her down into her grave.

It was so dark outside that he couldn't see her. A wall of black masked her. It made it easier for him to shovel the dirt back into the hole. He didn't stop and say something about his mother. He didn't talk to that God that was banned a long time ago. He just kept filling the hole knowing that just like his father, he'd never see his mother again.

--

Rolling over onto her back, Shai stretched her arms up over her head. She saw Jasper was lying on his stomach and was facing away from her. From his rhythmic breathing she could tell that he was still asleep.

She got up off the mattress. After coming down the stairs last night, they pushed it into the living room. It was in front of the couch and the coffee table was sitting beside Shai's side of the mattress. It sat on top of the yellowed papers that littered the ground.

Shai walked into the kitchen and opened up the cupboard. They surveyed them last night to find out that there was no food, but Shai decided to check again. They were still empty. She reached her arm in and felt around the corners. There still wasn't anything.

Mikko had food, but she wasn't sure if he would give them any of it. He was odd. She always thought of Todd as being odd, but she could predict what he was going to do. That was impossible with Mikko. Anyways, she wanted her own food. She didn't want to completely rely on him.

The sun was beginning to rise. The large glass doors at the back of the kitchen were cracked and smeared with dirt, but the sun was beginning to light up the kitchen.

Her feet took off from under her and Shai ran and jumped onto the mattress. She landed on top of Jasper's back and he groaned. She rolled off him and got back up onto her feet.

"Get up," she told him.

"No," he mumbled.

"Get up. Get up," she said beginning to jump up and down on the mattress. "Get up!"

"Only if you stop jumpin'," he said.

Shai stopped and sat down beside him on the bed. Jasper rolled over onto his back and rubbed his eyes with the heel of his hands. He stretched his jaw out when he yawned.

"We need food," she said.

"Like I haven't heard that before," Jasper said wryly. "You want me to go to the Drop-Off?"

"Nah, it's not worth it. All of these houses were probably stripped clean of food at the beginnin' of the Outbreak. We can probably steal somethin' at the Market."

"No," he said shaking his head. "You're not riskin' it. You know I don't like you stealing from the Market; I won't let you risk it now. Go to Mikko's. I'll go to the Drop-Off and bring it back."

"You sure?"

"Of course."

"Fine. But don't take too long."

Shai was anxious to get over to Mikko's and start working on his plan, but the Techi didn't seem to like to get up early in the morning. She let an hour pass after the sun had risen to go to his house. Jasper had already left to go to the Drop-Off. If he had any chance of getting any food, he had to leave the house as quickly as he could. There would already be a line up for food and their house was so far away from the City.

When she headed off to Mikko's the air was hot and heavy outside. The warm metal from Todd's pendant caused her hands to sweat, but she continued to grip onto it tightly. She climbed his cracked staircase and rapped on the flimsy metal door.

Instantaneously, the door shook and Mikko popped his head outside. His coarse, dark hair was ruffled and Shai guessed that he always had this look. His lips pressed into a line when he saw her and scanned the area around her.

"Alone?" he asked arching an eyebrow. "No husband with you? Did you have some kind of spat? I know that young people can be so temperamental sometimes. Trust me you can make this thing work. It's all about communication-"

"We're fine," she cut Mikko off. "Jasper went to the Drop-Off to get some food. There ain't nothing wrong."

"You sure you two aren't mad each other?" he asked with a large amount of concern in his voice. It surprised Shai to hear it.

"Nope. We're just hungry."

"Okay, good to hear."

Mikko opened the door wider and let Shai walk into his house. She slipped Todd's pendant into her pocket. They walked down the cluttered hallway. He stopped before they got to the kitchen and opened a door she hadn't entered yet. Shai followed Mikko as he walked in.

She noticed that the walls were like a dark mirror. She could see her reflection in the black shiny walls. A ratty chair sat alone in the middle of the room and Mikko fell back into it. The dark walls twisted into an array of colours flying across the walls. Shai stared at it in amazement and couldn't help but reach her hand up and touch it. The video of the waves crashing onto the shore of the beach faded away and a photo of Pangella's flag showed up. Zimmer's face was large and it made her stomach turn as she thought back to what Riley had told her. She knew that she couldn't just sit and watch them try to eliminate all the Rats.

"What's this?" she asked him. Her eyes were fixed on the bright screen and she didn't bother to turn around to talk to him.

"It's called a flag," he told her.

"Not that," she snapped. "What is this? All of this?"

She looked around the room to see the moving colours surrounded her. Photos of people, mostly Brighties, and videos of multiple palaces in Bright were around her. Words were everywhere, but she couldn't figure out what they said.

"Technology. That's a screen," Mikko said. "This is what's going to help us find Tegan."

"And Todd," she added.

"Yeah, him too."

Shai reached out again and touched Zimmer's face on the flag. The flag disappeared and another photo of Zimmer showed up. He was posed on a chair wearing a rich suit of blue and white silk. Many words were beside him and Shai ignored them.

"Try not to touch the screen," Mikko said dryly from his chair. "It'll make this all more difficult."

Shai brought her hand down to control her urge to touch the wall. Mikko had the small black box in his hands again and as he swiped his finger across it the photos on the walls changed. A large grey building was up. It looked pale, especially compared to the colours of Bright that were up.

"Do you know what happens at the camps?" Mikko asked her.

"Not really," she said. "We're told they kill Rats or work 'em to death."

"That's true. No doubt about that."

The photo of the building dropped. It reminded Shai of how when she was little and she would throw rocks up into the air, trying to get theirs to go the highest. The photo dropped down like the stones that would plummet back down to the ground. It continued to go forward and through the doors of the building.

Large machines were lined up across the large open inside. Many people were working on them and the video scanned over everyone working. Metal tables sat in the back of the room and small children were placing tiny stones into pieces of jewellery. Shai thought about that bracelet Jasper had bought her and her heart jumped. She left the bracelet in her room in her and Todd's apartment. She knew she had to leave early and get it before someone else did. It was worth enough to feed her and Jasper for a while.

"Tegan and Todd are here?" she asked.

"Not sure," Mikko said. "It's a possibility. It's one of the biggest camps and if he's not in this one he's probably in one that is very similar. Although, there is farms some Rats are sent to. I wanted you to know what really went on in these camps. Fill your husband in on this later; I don't want to be repeating myself. It's a waste of breath."

"Okay," she agreed. "So what's your plan?"

"Don't really have one."

"What?" she snapped.

She turned her head sharply to stare at him. Mikko was slung across the chair; his legs were up over the arms of the chair. The little black box was still in his hands and he was flicking his finger across it.

"Tegan has always been an idea, not a plan," he told her coolly. "I never thought some Rat would tell me they wanted to break people out of the camps. Officers have been successful in what their initial plans for those camps are. All of you Rats fear them. It just happened to be convenient that working them provided for a Brighties needs."

"You thinkin' of a plan now?" she asked.

"If I wasn't, explaining all of this to you would be a little redundant," he said wryly.

"Redundant?" Shai said trying out the foreign word on her tongue.

"Doesn't matter," Mikko said taking his hand off the box and waving it in the air. It looked to Shai like he was swatting at a fly. "What matters is that this is a working progress. I know the basics. I have the programs to block the security cameras. I have created a gas that could knock out any Officer in seconds. I just need to work out the kinks and bugs."

"How long do you think that'll take?"

"Normally, it would take someone weeks or even months. But for me it'll be a couple days."

"You can't go any faster?"

"Wow, you're eager," he said letting a smirk grow across his lips. "I like that."

"I need to get Todd out of this place," she said gesturing towards the screen.

"What is it with this guy? Why is he so special to you? Have you two been doing the rompy-hompy?"

"What?" Shai said furrowing her eyebrows together.

"Friends never stay. Hell, family doesn't even mean anything in the Slums. Why should it? It is just blood."

"What are you sayin'?" she asked him with anger growing in her voice.

"I think that you two are more than friends," Mikko said in a whisper. "You just don't want your husband to know and I can't blame you. Adultery tends to ruin marriages."

The metal of Mikko's flimsy front door squeaked as Jasper walked into the house. Mikko curled his lips and raised his finger up to them. Shai continued to stare at this man oddly. She just hoped he never used the word "rompy-hompy" again.

"This will be our little secret," Mikko whispered and ended it with a wink. "Don't worry about it.

Shai could hear Jasper walking down the hallway and she heard his loud footsteps as he passed the door. Mikko opened up the door and poked his head out.

"In here, Buddy!" he shouted.

He pulled his head back into the room and Jasper came in.

"Buddy?" he asked knitting his eyebrows. Shai realized that this expression was going to be on both of their faces quite often. As Jasper looked around the room at the walls with their twisting colours and words, his jaw began to drop open. "What is all this?"

"Wow, does every Rat ask that question? Shea fill him in," Mikko told her.

"It's Shai," she corrected him.

"Shai. Bye. Fly. Guy. My," he said sitting back down in his chair. He leaned back and pulled the black box out of his pocket. "It's all the same. It doesn't matter. Just fill your hubby there in on everything I told you."

And she did.