In my dreams I'm beautiful.

In my dreams I can fly.

In my dreams I'm free.

But dreams never last.

When the 6:30 alarm goes off, everything fades away and I open my eyes to the same white ceiling I've seen for most of my life.

These moments, with my head still full of lingering dreams, are the hardest, when I remember that none of it is real, and my only reality is here in the Control Centre.

Sitting up, I swing my legs out of bed. The linoleum floor is cool against my bare feet. There is only one window in this room, between the wall and the metal-framed bunk-beds that I share with Taffy, and through it I can see the sun rising over the distant London skyline. The skyscrapers and high-rise buildings are greyish blocks against a golden-pink dawn, like teeth in the yawning mouth of the world.

Not for the first time I wonder what the rest of the country is doing right now. Taffy says that people on the outside can choose what time they get up in the morning, but I just can't imagine that kind of freedom.

Taffy herself is still curled under the covers, and I reach up to shake her shoulder. Even after seven years in this place, she still has trouble getting up sometimes, but we only get one opportunity to shower a day, and we can't be late.

"Come on, Taff. Time to get up," I say.

On my bed, Boots uncurls from his little ball, stretching out his paws and eyeing me hopefully. He's slept with me every single night since I rescued him as a kitten, nearly three years ago, and I assume he's fully grown now, but I don't know how big cats are supposed to be. Taffy says that Boots is small for a cat, but that's good because it makes him easier to hide.

I reach out to him and he butts his head against my hand, purring.

"I guess you want your breakfast?" I say, and he blinks his big eyes at me.

Last night I smuggled up some chicken from dinner and hid it in our tiny bathroom, and I fetch it for him now, putting it under my bed so he's hidden when he eats it.

Pets are strictly forbidden in the CC, and I don't want to think what the Handlers would do if they found him here.

While I'm feeding the cat, Taffy finally drags herself out of bed, her blonde hair bushier than ever, puffing out around her head like a dandelion clock in the sun.

"Caia, I hate mornings," she mutters.

I look at her, concerned. She seems groggier than usual, her face haggard and drawn.

"Didn't you sleep?"

She shakes her head, trying to tuck her mass of hair behind her ears.

"Another nightmare?" I say.

Taffy ducks her head, but I can hear her swallow. "Yeah," she whispers.

"That's the third one this week. Maybe you should think about going back on the sleeping pills."

"I'll be okay."

"Are you sure?"

She gives me a tired smile. "Yeah. Now come on, I need a shower."

Before we leave the room, I glance once more out of the window, at the world I've never known, and something flashes by the perimeter fence that surrounds the CC grounds. It almost looks like a person, but it's gone in a blink.

"What is it?" Taffy asks, joining me at the window.

"I thought I saw someone."

Taffy's mouth makes a bitter shape. "More people coming to stare at the freaks, I expect."

She touches the shiny, twisted burn scars that make up so much of her face, and my heart clenches.

"We are not freaks," I remind her.

But she doesn't look at me, and I know why. It's because my words are hollow, empty. I can barely stand to look at my own scarred face. I catch a glimpse of it in the mirror on the wall, and immediately look away. Sometimes, when I dream of being beautiful, I try to cling to that feeling when I wake up, but it blows away like smoke on the wind every time I see myself, every time I see what he did.

"We should go," I say, and Taffy just nods.

People in Britain used to be allowed as many children as they wanted, but that changed thirty years after a huge baby boom stretched the country to breaking point. There weren't enough homes, there weren't enough jobs, there wasn't enough money, and so in desperation the government introduced the Firstborn Act, stipulating that couples were only allowed to have one child. Initially people defied the order, so large fines were introduced, which did reduce the number of births, but not enough to curb rising overpopulation. So, inspired by other countries that had imposed similar measures, a more extreme version of the Act was passed – any couple who had a second child was forced to hand that child over as property to the government.

That's what happened to me.

My parents handed me over, in accordance with the law, and I was raised here in the CC, along with all the other Seconds who had no rights in society. I have no memory of them at all, but I think about them often, even when I don't want to.

Taffy and I make our way down the long hallway outside, joining the other Seconds coming out of their rooms. There are one hundred tiny bedrooms per floor, and though they aren't all currently occupied, sixty-five people still live here on the fifth and final floor of the CC. Thirty-seven of them are girls, which is a lot of people trying to get into one room in the morning.

The communal showers are at each end of the floor – one for the boys and one for the girls. They're big open spaces, tiled in white, with showerheads in neat rows in the ceiling and drains in the floor, and shower-gels and shampoos mounted on the walls.

We're supervised each day by one of the four Handlers who operate on this floor. Today, it's Ripley on duty. While I'm sure she has to answer to someone outside this building, inside it she's in charge of everything.

She's a tall, stout woman, with dark hair that she wears scraped back in a knot at the base of her skull. It makes her face look severe, unapproachable, and sharp as a blade.

We form a queue outside the room, and as each girl goes inside she strips off her CC-issued grey pyjamas and places them in the huge laundry basket. By the end of the day, they will be washed and dried and available for collection from the laundry room.

When it's my turn, I quickly undress, sling my pyjamas in the basket and make my way to the nearest available shower. But Taffy, as always, is slower, shuffling into the room, with her eyes fixed on the floor.

"Get a move on, Taffy," Ripley orders.

Taffy's hands tremble as she undresses, and she quickly crosses her arms over her chest, trying to hide herself from the rest of us. Her body bears the same scars as her face – tight, shiny ropes of scar tissue – but it's the nakedness as much as the scars that bothers her.

Unlike most of us, Taffy is a firstborn child and lived for nine years on the outside. But when a fire broke out in her family home, her parents were both killed, and Taffy was left horribly scarred. By the time she was allowed out of hospital, she had thought that her aunt and uncle would take her in, but they had chosen instead to hold out for their own biological child, and so Taffy had been shipped off to the CC. There's no room on the outside for unwanted kids, even firstborn ones.

Apparently communal showering isn't common on the outside and even after so many years here, Taffy is still uncomfortable being naked around the rest of us.

I've never known anything different; for me it's just skin.

Taffy scurries over to me, not looking at anyone else, and activates her shower-head by pressing a button on the wall.

"Don't make it too hot. You're already melted enough," says a mocking voice from the other side of the room.

Taffy stiffens, her shoulders hunching as if she's trying to curl in on herself.

Anger sparks in my chest like a lit match.

I turn around.

"Screw you, Cole," I say, loud enough for everyone to hear.

Cole stands opposite me, smirking. Her hair usually looks like it can't decide between blonde and brown, but under the steady stream of water, it's coloured dark and plastered flat against her skull. She's still beautiful. Cole is always beautiful.

"Frankenstein sticking up for Igor? How sweet," she says.

"Frankenstein was the scientist, not the monster," I say, rolling my eyes.

The CC provides us with reading material to keep us entertained during recreational hours, and Frankenstein is one that I've read cover to cover several times.

Cole's expression sharpens, her eyes turning hard. "Freak," she says, deliberately running her eyes over my scars.

I stare her down and refuse to let her see how much her words affect me, how much they reflect what I feel inside. It hurts, but I can handle it better than Taffy can.

Cole smirks once more and then turns back to her shower. I glance at Ripley; she's been watching the exchange, but she says nothing. The Handlers never do.

If any of us were to become aggressive or abusive to them, then they are authorised to use the batons that are always strapped to their belts, but they've never seemed to care much about the bullies among us.

Cole isn't the only one.

Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be a firstborn, to have parents who love me, but I try not to think about it for too long because what's the point?

No one cares about Seconds.

After showering, we return to our rooms to dress in the CC uniform – loose-fitting grey trousers and long-sleeved grey jumpers, with dark running shoes.

I hate the shoes.

They seem like a constant, cruel reminder that none of us can run. Even if we could escape this place, where would we go? The world outside is not welcoming to Seconds.

Once we're dressed, we head down five flights of stairs to the ground floor, where the mess hall is, for breakfast. There are two staircases leading down, so the boys and girls can each take one without overcrowding, and on either side of each staircase is a small bank of lifts. We're not allowed to use them. Seconds were once, but that was before my time; now we're told that it's better for us to use the stairs.

Each floor of the CC houses kids of different ages – from three to sixteen, with kids under three living in the nursery behind the CC – but we don't all have breakfast together. There are several hundred of us living here and we can't all fit in the mess hall at once.

The fourth and fifth floor – Seconds aged thirteen to sixteen – are up earliest and have to eat first. As soon as we're finished, it's time for the second and third floors – Seconds aged six to twelve – to eat. Finally, it's the turn of the first floor Seconds – the kids aged three to six. They get to sleep in longer than the rest of us.

There are one hundred and thirteen Seconds living on the fourth and fifth floors, and when we're packed into one room, it makes breakfast a noisy affair.

Except when Ripley makes her daily speech.

"Take this time to be thankful for the roof over your heads and the food on your plates. Be thankful that you are housed and cared for. Seconds are worthless. The world does not want or need you, but because of us you have a place here, and you must not ever forget it." Her eyes linger on the table where I sit, along with the other kids from my floor. "The Trials draw nearer every day. Your chance to prove whether or not you have any value to society draws nearer every day."

The Trials.

My pulse flutters with excitement.

Nobody knows exactly what they are, but they are what we all dream of. We know that we are worthless, that the world hates us, but if we can prove ourselves in the Trials, then we can prove we belong out there, in the real world. We will still be property of the British government, but they will provide us with jobs and a purpose, and since Seconds aren't allowed to choose careers or get married or have kids, the Trials are the best any of us can hope for.

My floor comprises the oldest Seconds in the CC, and it won't be long before we take our Trials. If we pass this test, we can return to the world. If we fail . . . well, no one talks about that because no one will accept that failure is an option.

Speech made, Ripley sits down with the other Handlers, and breakfast commences.

Two of my other friends shuffle up next to me and Taffy on the bench, and I suck in a breath when I get a good look at Sonny's face. A dark-purple bruise circles his eye, looking like a storm-cloud against his pale, freckled face.

"Who did that?" I demand.

Sonny shrugs. He's one of the oldest kids on our floor, but he doesn't seem to have grown into his body yet. He's tall and gangly, all beanpole arms and legs, like someone stretched him out.

I repeat my question.

"It was Gavin," Sonny mutters, shooting a quick look at the boy in question.

Of course Gavin is sitting with Cole, both of them laughing, and even though they're probably not laughing about us, my blood still boils.

I have half an urge to throw my breakfast at the back of his head. But that won't fix anything, and it's not worth being punished with Isolation.

"The Handlers just let him do that?" I say.

They never care much about verbal bullying, but even they draw the line at physical fighting.

Usually.

Sonny shrugs again, hunching over his plate of scrambled eggs. Sunlight, coming through the windows high on the walls, dances through his bright red mop of curls.

"Don't worry about it, Caia," he says.

I try to swallow my anger, but I can still feel it inside me, a restless ball of dark energy.

Isn't it enough that the world outside hates us? Why can't we have peace and fairness inside these walls? Maybe such things don't exist anywhere.

Next to Sonny, Priya slips me some pieces of sausage, wrapped in a paper napkin, and I slide them into my pocket when I know the Handlers aren't looking. No food is allowed to be taken outside the mess hall, but there aren't many ways of feeding a secret cat. Sonny, Priya, and Taffy are the only people I trust in the CC, the only people who know about Boots, and they all help me sneak food out for him.

"Gavin's a bastard," she says, then quickly looks around as if someone is going to scold her for swearing.

No one cares about that, but Priya, like Taffy, was once a firstborn child, raised with a family who wanted her. Tragically, like Taffy, she lost her parents – to a car crash – and with no relatives to take her in, she became property of the CC. She doesn't talk about her family much; the crash was only two and a half years ago, and it's still too raw for her, but I do know that her parents were very strict on what they viewed as bad language.

It strikes me as strange that we have so little freedom in the CC, nothing compared to what we would have on the outside, and yet this is one tiny freedom that Priya has actually gained by coming here.

"Do you think the date of the Trials will be announced soon?" Taffy says.

"Depends what you mean by soon. In the next few days? Probably not. In the next few weeks? Quite likely," Sonny says.

Priya puts down her fork. "I wish we didn't have to take them," she mutters.

"But we do."

"I know. But I don't have to like it. I live most of my life as a firstborn, but my parents die in a random accident and suddenly I lose all rights and have to take some test to prove that I'm good enough to exist in the world? That's not right."

"But . . . don't you want to get out of here?" Sonny says.

Priya doesn't reply.

None of us do.

I can't wait for the day I no longer have to live in this bland white building, allowed to wear nothing but this drab grey uniform, every hour of every day dictated to us by the Handlers, but at the same time, I'm almost afraid of the future because I can't imagine what shape it will take.

It is a vast, unknowable thing, and that's both exciting and terrifying.

There's a feeling in my chest like beating wings, like there's a bird there, hiding behind my ribcage.

It wants to fly free.

But it doesn't know how.

After breakfast, we are permitted an hour of reading time in one of the rec rooms, followed by two hours of physical exercise, and then we're herded back into the mess hall for a midmorning snack, followed by meditation. Then there's lunch, and after lunch is my favourite part of the day, the two hours of recreation – the only time we're free to do as we please. Within reason of course. We can roam the grounds if we wish, although most people don't bother – after a lifetime here most kids have decided there's not much worth seeing – or we can do more exercise, or we can play games.

Sonny, Priya and Taffy normally spend this time together, but it's the one time of day that I get to be by myself, and I take advantage of that whenever I can. My friends are used to it by now.

Besides, we didn't manage to collect much food for Boots at breakfast, so I need to check my homemade mousetrap.

Outside the CC is a rectangular strip of land, sloping slightly downhill, and ringed with a chain-link fence, topped with gleaming twists of barbed wire. Mounted cameras monitor everything, just as they do inside the buildings, but right down at the bottom of the compound is a wild little space where the countryside has started to creep in. Fir trees on both sides of the fence have grown tall, jostling for space with thick clumps of shrubs and bushes, and when I push through those bushes, I'm in a decent-sized patch of grassy ground between the trees and the fence.

When the CC was first built, when this fence was first put up, the cameras would have been able to see everything, but now that this little patch has grown so out of control, the trees have created a blind spot, one of the only places in the whole place that the cameras can't see.

This is where I hide my trap, in the bushes, away from the eyes of the CC. But even if I didn't have Boots to feed, I would come here.

Beyond the fence we are surrounded by woodland, which is supposed to be private property – though people do sometimes trespass – and I can't see any of London through those trees. I don't know how far away the city is from here

This is my favourite place in the world, the one place where I can be completely alone with nothing but the thoughts inside my head. The one place I can almost pretend that I don't live in the CC.

I check my mousetrap first. I made it myself after reading about it in a book, and it sits alongside the sundial I made from a stick and some stones. It's a simple trap, made from a small plastic bucket, a piece of string, and an old tin can – all things that have been thrown over the fence at some point. I used a stone to form a hole in the side of the bucket, and then positioned a broken branch between that hole and the ground, forming a ramp that mice can run up. Below the hole, the bucket is full of water. Above it is the can, held in place lengthwise by the string. I put scraps of food on the far end of the can, and when mice come to investigate the smell, they step on the can which then rolls on the string and drops the mouse into the water below, where they eventually drown. I wish there was a quicker way of killing them, but this is all I can manage.

A couple of sodden bodies lie at the bottom of the bucket, but I leave them there for now. I'll smuggle them back inside once rec time is over.

Then I approach the chain-link fence, the barrier between the world I know and the one I want to know. If I pass the Trials, then I will finally be free of the place I have lived all my life – this dreary, regimented place of grey and white, where no colour exists.

Out here, in my secluded little place between bush and fence, the colours are all mine. I kick off my shoes, feel the springy grass beneath my feet, and reach up a hand to the sky, as if I can catch shards of sunlight and squeeze the colour from them, let it run down my arms like gold.

Above me, the sky is brilliant blue and cloudless, marked only by the dark shapes of birds, twisting and turning in rapid formation. My heart soars in my chest. I want to fly up into that blue sky, fly with the birds, rise with the sun.

But the birds are free.

And I am in a cage.

I close my eyes.

What no one else knows about this place is that there is a weak part in the fence, right where I'm standing. A whole section of chain-link can be pulled away from the main frame, leaving enough of a gap for a person to fit through.

I could run.

But I wouldn't get far.

From an early age, every Second is implanted with a tracking device, in the back of our necks. Escaping through the fence probably wouldn't even buy me an hour of freedom, and then, once I'd been caught, I would never be allowed near my private little spot again.

I can't do that.

I close my eyes and grip the fence with both hands, feeling the cold wire bite into my fingers. Suddenly that damaged area feels like a cruel joke, taunting me with the possibility of a freedom that I can't have.

I want to fly away, but I'm trapped here on the ground, and my heart is a caged bird, fluttering angrily in my chest.

A pair of hands grip mine, and my heart shoots into my throat as my eyes fly open.

A boy is standing on the other side of the fence.

Hi there, and welcome to my story. I update every Tuesday and Friday, so you'll never wait too long for a chapter.

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