She presses an icepack to my bruised skin and begins to run her scans. Knox sticks around, which comforts me.
The other girl is being overseen by another medic, but I don’t want to be left alone in a room with her. Even though she’s worse off than me, I don’t want to be put through another fight so soon.
“We don’t have our doctor in today,” she says. “You’ll have to rely on good old medicine.”
All doctors are Gifted who can fix wounds, seal broken skin, and mend bones with just a touch of their hand. Medics are Commons who practice traditional medicine, and aides are doctors-in-training who are also Gifted and are doing their mandatory placement.
It would be nice to be patched up good as new by the doctor, but it looks like I’ll have to choke back pills instead.
“You’re lucky,” the medic says finally. “No fractures. You’ll feel worse tomorrow.”
“Great,” I mumble.
She hands me a small packet of pain suppressants and a wrap for my ribs.
“Don’t overdo it,” she advises.
When we step back into the corridor, Knox slows his pace.
“You should know that Ender doesn’t pick people for Black Star to kill them,” he says.
“He wants to see if they’ll break,” Knox continues. “The rebels are strong. The Untamed have powers that are outlawed for a reason. We need to be the best to win.”
We reach the junction where the corridor splits, and he leads me up the stairs to the fourth floor. Knox taps his badge, and the sealed doors open. Everything is gray and metallic here. Thereare no windows. Just blank walls that stretch on for ages. It’s kind of an eyesore.
There are five doors lined up on either side.
“Yours is the last one on the left,” he says. “Lock your door. Don’t trust the others. And if Spider offers to ‘help’—”
“I’ll stab him in the heart,” I finish.
“See? You’re learning.”
Knox shows me the temporary code to unlock my door. Once my badge comes in, the code will reset, and only I will be able to access my bedroom. That information comforts me.
“Good night,” Knox says.
I take a step forward when his voice stops me in my tracks.
“Mercy.”
I glance back. It’ll never get any easier hearing my sister’s name.
“For what it’s worth, I think you killed it out there,” Knox says. “You really held your own.”
“Thanks, I guess.”
Every step sends pain flaring through my ribs, but I push forward. The door seals shut behind me with a soft hiss.
The room is nothing like the shared dormitory.
It’s large and spacious. I press the button by the wall, hearing the satisfying click of the lock. The walls are made of a hard gray stone. A double bed is built into the far wall, neatly made with crisp sheets, and a single fleece blanket folded with military precision lies on the foot. A low desk sits beneath a barred window that looks out over the inner courtyard of Block A.
To the right, a compact washroom is partially concealed behind a sliding panel. Marble sink. Oval mirror. A shower stall barely wide enough to turn around in, but it’s a lot better than the communal bathroom with the grime-stained floors and tangled hair that choked the drains like a wiry rat.
I could get used to this.
There’s a locker beside the bed, tall and narrow, with a biometric lock already keyed to my fingerprint. There are some training clothes and nightwear inside. I eye the wall and am unsurprised to see a camera. Of course, there are cameras. So, much for privacy.
