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I almost can’t believe it, that it’s the first reaction I have, that it’s still there after everything that’s happened this

It’s because you’ve been alone, it’s because everyone is gone and you can’t admit to yourself you’re scared, and because it feels like hoed I know all of it is true, but I also know, on a very basic, human level, hers is the most beautiful face I’ve ever seen They must have created art specifically for people like her, to try and fail forever to capture these sles and the colors of her , and I wonderI wonder if she’s thinking about the sa down to ain It doesn’t make sense She’s in pain, we are in actual hell, and none of it seems to matter

But isn’t this how it alith us? When ere together, the world shrank around us Nothing else existed outside of that space between us We took Greenith us wherever the two of us were together

"Lucas," she says again, "it’sthis isn’twere you here? Before?"

I shake my head "No--I don’t knohere the Facility is, but I was never here Mia, though--I overheard the PSFs say they’d bring her here" I almost can’t ask "Have you seen her?"

"No What color is she? Do you know?"

For a moment, I can’t speak at all I want to look at Sam’s face, the curve of her cheek, her eyes, until the blistering pain leaves Sometimes I am suffocated by the et her away from the PSFs I had fire, but they had Calm Control trapped in a little device "I don’t know They took her before shebefore she changed I had already gone through it, but they wanted to take her as a precaution They kept saying that Precaution I overheard one of them say she would be taken here, but--" It’s the first time I’ve admitted this out loud, and it feels just as horrible and bitter as I kneould "I don’t know if she lived through the change When it happened What she is"

Saives me a sharp look "No She survived She would have Mia was strong"

"Strong doesn’t have anything to do with it"

Still, she continues on, undaunted, and I love her for it "She’s not Green I would have seen her by now There’s a chance she could be Blue There are so many of them, and unless we have the same shift in the Garden If she was Yellow--"

I don’t like the catch in her voice "If she’s Yellohat? There aren’t any Yellows here"

"They took thee and Red kids," she says "She ht have been here and then taken out--moved I don’t think they would have killed theht If the Red et to live, then everyone else should be fine"