The room was cold and gray. The walls and floor and ceiling were made of concrete, and there wasn't anything in it except for her. The lights were on now, glaringly bright, extremely white, so bright the light hurt her eyes. The color was shivery and sharp as a blade. Olive clenched her eyes shut, but she could still see the light through her eyelids. The light hurt, but it was better than the darkness. When the lights went out, it was black, so dark her eyes couldn't adjust to it, and it was disorientating. The darkness was suffocating.
They were supposed to recite the Numbers, and that was the only thing they were supposed to do. The isolation was part of their training, because when they were Soldiers they might get caught, even though Olive didn't think there was anyone that could catch them. They might get caught, and the people who caught them would try to trick them into talking, and the tricks wouldn't be nice ones. The tricks would be like this, to make them afraid, and they had to learn to not be afraid. They had to learn to be Soldiers now, because the War was coming and they had to be prepared. They had to pass the Tests, because if they didn't, they couldn't be Soldiers.
She said the Numbers and tried to keep her mind blank. The Tests had a new rule, and she and Nick weren't supposed to help each other now. The punishment last time had been running for miles, then pull-ups, then sparing against the older kids, then being sent to bed hungry and hurting. And even though she had been the one that reached out, grabbed at the comfort of Nick's mind along their link, he'd been punished too. She would't mess up again, because she had to protect Nick. She knew that they used Nick against her, and she against him, to make them do what they were supposed to do, but it didn't matter if she knew or not, because she couldn't help wanting to protect him. She wouldn't let them hurt him.
The floor was cold under her bare feet, and she pulled them back, closer to her body. She was crouched in a corner, shoulder blades pressed against the wall. The wall was cold too, but she'd been there long enough that the concrete had warmed slightly. She hugged her arms around her knees. The gray pants and t-shirt were thin, no protection against the chilly of the air in the room. They'd cut her hair short again, and her head and neck were cold. It was as short as Nick's, to make it easier to attach the sensors.
When she was big enough to stand up to them, she'd make them stop doing that. She'd never cut her hair again and they wouldn't be able to make her. She bit her lower lip against the flood of anger and said the Numbers again. She said them out loud and her voice sounded dull as it bounced off the cold walls.
Olive drew her thoughts back in, forced them away from Nick, but it was like when a tooth was missing and her tongue wanted to be in the space constantly, feeling around where something that was gone should be. They'd see if she reached for him, the little sensors stuck to her head made sure of that, the bundle of cables that snaked down her neck before arching up to the wall. They watched her mind, her connection to Nick. They watched her with the cameras she could feel around the edges of the cell, the wires running back to the observation room, the mass of circuitry there. She edged along the circuits before pulling back. She wasn't supposed to tamper with the equipment during Tests.
Olive muttered the Numbers again, barely moving her lips. Her stomach growled and it sounded ridiculously loud in the cold, gray room. She was hungry enough to think that nearly a day had passed. Not hungry enough for it to be more than two days.
When these particular Tests first started she'd tried to keep track of time, but she couldn't, and that was part of the point, she supposed. She tried to count the seconds to keep track, and this time she'd gotten up to 64,834 before she lost count. Sometimes she started over anyway, even though it didn't help track time, because counting helped keep her from thinking about Nick. She liked counting things better than just counting, but there wasn't much in the room to count. The walls were featureless, the door a faint outline and nothing more. There was a drain in the floor in the opposite corner. There were fifty two openings in the grate over top of it. She knew they kept her here longer each time.
She dropped her head onto her folded arms and whispered the Numbers. Her eyes stung with tears that she fought back. Soldiers weren't supposed to cry, and even though they were Recruits, they weren't like the other kids who would maybe be Soldiers, or maybe they wouldn't and they'd get to go home instead. She and Nick would be Soldiers, and not anything else. They'd always be Soldiers and there wasn't any home for them to go to, anyway. This was home, and if she remembered anything else from before, it didn't matter now, because she couldn't go back there because it was gone. This was her home, and Nick was her family, and they would always be Soldiers.
She sniffled and raised her head, scrubbed a fist against one damp cheek. Olive glared up at one of the cameras, stared at it long a while before she dropped her eyes back down to the wall across from her. She relaxed, uncoiled the tension in her shoulders and let her face go blank again. She slowed her breathing, and focused her thoughts inward, focused on being calm, and quiet, and unbreakable. She was a Recruit, and she would be a Soldier, and she said the Numbers and her voice was steady.