I don't usually sleep through Spanish. It's my second class, so I'm not as groggy as I am in my first class, and not yet ready for my nap. But today was just one of those days, you know?

So when I heard the name "Marco" said in impatience, my head snapped off my desk and I looked at the teacher who was glaring at me.

I think she was from Columbia. Some Spanish-speaking country in South America, anyways, but it might have been Peru. Her accent was too thick, but her English was good. Infinitely better than my Spanish, anyway.

"Uh, yeah, ustedes," I muttered. She pursed her lips for a moment.

"The 'yo' form of 'tener,'" she said in her "I hate repeating myself" voice.

"Oh, the yo form!" I thought quick. Weren't you supposed to just take away the vowel and r and add an o? Teno? Wait, wasn't that Spanish for ten?

I tried to think back to my childhood. My mom spoke Spanish to me sometimes, but only if she was either really mad or really excited. But all I remembered her saying in Spanish was "ay, chico," when I got on her nerves. And I knew "ay, chico" was definitely not the yo form of tener.

"Ten...o," I finally said.

"Tengo," she replied, with quite a bit of venom.

Oh yeah, that's right, I remembered that one. "Tengo una pena en la espalda." (I have a pain in my side.) No, that wasn't it. It was "Eres una pena en la espalda." (You're a pain in my side.)

When she stopped glaring at me, I glanced at Cassie. Cassie sat two rows ahead of me, and one to my left. She was the only person I really knew in class. Other people I randomly knew the names of, but I didn't know them in the sense of knowing who they really were. But, the fact that I knew Cassie was supposed to be a bit of a secret, at least here at school. It didn't matter if my dad knew I was hanging out with her... he didn't really know her, and he didn't know my friends. But people at school would think it was odd if we were suddenly best buds.

So, while at school, I was pretty limited to Jake. Sometimes I'd see Rachel, but only if both of us were talking to Jake at the same time. Cassie was a rarity.

Which is why I had to pretend like I didn't care too much when I saw Alex Harris, first-string football running back, number 37, hand her a fairly lengthy note.

"Fairly lengthy," meaning it was more than just a "do you like me? Check yes or no" kind of note. This note was maybe half a page of notebook paper. I wanted to read it over her shoulder, but she was just too far away. One thing I did notice was that her face went pale.

You probably already know, Cassie is black. Well, half-black, but still, she's dark-skinned. So when I say Cassie went pale, I mean she went pale.

I don't know why I assumed it was Yeerk-related. I guess because I figured if the note said anything that mattered in the "real world," it wouldn't get that kind of reaction from her. If she was reacting that way, it had to be very, very serious.

"Cassie," I whispered. She didn't answer. She kept on reading her note. "Cassie," I said, a little louder.

The girl behind her looked at me, then turned back to her and tapped her on the shoulder. It took her a while to respond, but when she finally did, the girl pointed back to me. Cassie stared at me, her eyes wide.

I don't know what I expected from her, but I wanted to know everything was okay... which is probably why I shouldn't have said her name. Her huge eyes scared me as much as her ghost-white face. I nodded towards the note in her hand. She slowly shook her head, then turned back to the note.

What was it? It was driving me crazy. I brainstormed ideas during the remainder of the class... why in the world would Alex be passing her notes? I thought briefly about some kind of joke I could tell Jake, but it wasn't the time. What was it?

When the bell rang, Alex leapt out of his seat and gunned it for the door. He obviously didn't feel like talking. Funny, neither did Cassie. She sat in her seat dumbfounded while the rest of the normal students stood up and grabbed their backpacks.

I approached her. I didn't care about the image, the whole "don't fraternize with Cassie" code. It didn't matter anymore.

"Are you okay?" I asked her. She turned her head slowly to look at me.

"Marco... we're... dead."

"What?" I demanded.

She just shook her head and stood up, like she'd seen a ghost. "He knows," she said.

I didn't ask what he knew. I didn't want to make her say it, but it was kind of obvious. If he knew to give the letter to her, he must've known our identities. Or, at least hers.

I tried to get some information out of her, but she wouldn't talk. She walked out of the room like a zombie. Honestly, I lost the feeling in my hands and I felt some kind of lump in my throat. It was hard to swallow, hard to breathe. Just thinking about the fact that the war was over and that we, humanity's last hope, were done.

No, we weren't just done. We were worse than done. "Done" could mean dead. But we were worse than dead. We were going to be slaves of the worst possible type. Not slaves in our own country, not even slaves in our own homes. Slaves in our own minds.

I'd never been a controller before. Jake had, and so had Cassie, so they knew what it was like, but not me. I had only heard stories... and I didn't want to imagine.

When I walked out of the Spanish room I saw Chapman and jumped approximately five feet in the air. He frowned and looked at me like something was wrong. Everything was wrong.

I was sure he was going to grab me by the collar and drag me down, through the janitor's closet, right into the Yeerk pool. But he just stared at me for a moment and then said, "did I startle you, Marco?"

"Uh, yeah, a little," I replied with a smirk. I gave a little nervous laughter and walked past him, trying to stay out of arms reach in case he actually did decide to grab me.

I had to get out of here. We all did. If the Yeerks knew who we were, they knew where we went to school, and they knew our schedules. We had to get out before they got to us. But why would Alex give a warning? Was he part of the Yeerk Peace Movement? Wouldn't Cassie have said something?

My head was spinning.

I don't know how I made it to my locker, but the bell rang when I opened it and I realized nobody was in the hallway anymore. I sighed and rolled my eyes. Like on top of possibly becoming a controller, I was also late for class. Great.

"So are you going to get out of here?" I asked myself as I threw some books into my locker. "Or are you going to go to class and be a sitting duck?"

I paused. Stared into my locker for a few moments while considering. If they knew our identities, we had to get out. But, wouldn't Cassie have told me we had to leave if that were the case? The fact that she didn't tell me to bail made me think we would be okay in class. And yet, the words "we're dead" sounded uncomfortable, and some kind of survival instinct kicked in. I didn't want to be dead.

While considering all of this, a blur of grey swooshed behind me. Controller? I whirled around, ready for battle, when I found... Shannon. She reached the garbage bin at the end of the hall and shoved her face into it. And threw up.

Even if I had been interested in her before, I definitely wasn't now.

"Uh... are you okay?" I asked slowly as she recovered. She looked over at me, her own face rather pale. Like Cassie's.

"Oh, man, that's... embarrassing," she said. Oh yeah, that's right, she liked me. "I just... that turkey gravy in the cafeteria, you know..."

"Yeah, I know," I assured her. "Do you feel any better?"

She nodded. "A little, yeah. I'll bounce back."

"Are you... do you have class?"

"Actually, I was about to leave. I'm..." She looked uncomfortable, and I was guessing there was some information she didn't want to tell me about. "I have to leave early today."

"Ah." I nodded. Not the most brilliant response, but it was seriously difficult for me to communicate with any girl who I wasn't interested in, or hadn't been in life-or-death situations with me.

"What about you?"

I turned and looked around. Her and I were the only people in the entire hallway. "I'm... just running late."

"You were staring at your locker, not moving an inch," she noted.

I smirked. "Uh, yeah, I have a lot on my mind."

"Do you wanna come with me? If you want to skip school, that is."

"Where are you going?"

She shifted her weight a little and some hair fell into her face as she looked down. "Well, remember that kid at the mall yesterday?"

"The baby?" I asked.

"Yeah, in the stroller? He's mine."

"Oh, really?" It was probably obvious I'd already guessed.

"He has a doctor's appointment today. But I just thought, if you wanted to get out of here..."

I don't even know what I said next, but I ended up in her car.