Reached by Ally Condie Read Free Book Online Page A

consciousness and fallen against the wall without putting his hands out to catch himself. He hits the floor hard.
    Within moments, the medics are at the door and inside the cell, masks and gloves on. They lift him up and take him out of the cell and then out of the Hall and, presumably, to the medical center. Some kind of liquid sheets down the walls and a chemical-laced steam boils up from the floor. They’re sanitizing the cell to get it ready for the next person.
    The poor kid. I wish I could have helped him.
    I stretch out my arms again and press against the walls, pushing back so that I can feel the muscles extend all along my arms. I won’t have to feel helpless much longer.

CHAPTER 5
    CASSIA
    A girl sits near me on the air train, wearing a beautiful full-skirted gown. But she doesn’t look happy. The confused expression on her face mirrors the way I feel. I know I’m coming home from work, but why so late? My mind is foggy and very tired. And I’m nervous, on edge. Something feels the way it did in the Borough the morning they took Ky away. There’s a sharpness in the air, an echo of a scream on the wind.
    “Did you get Matched tonight?” I ask the girl, and the moment the words come out of my mouth I think,
What a stupid question.
Of course she did. There’s no other occasion besides a Banquet where someone would wear a dress like this. Her dress is yellow, the same color my friend Em wore for her Banquet back home.
    The girl looks at me, her expression uncertain, and then she glances down at her hands to see if the answer is there. It is, in the form of a little silver box. “Yes,” she says, her eyes lighting up. “Of course.”
    “You couldn’t have the Banquet at Central Hall,” I say to the girl, remembering something else. “Because it’s being renovated.”
    “That’s right,” she says, and her father turns to look at me, an expression of concern on his face.
    “So where did you have it?” I ask.
    She doesn’t answer me; she snaps the silver box open and shut. “It all happened so fast,” she says. “I’m going to have to look at the microcard again when I get home.”
    I smile at her. “I remember that feeling,” I say, and I do.
    Remember
.
    Oh no.
    I slip my hand inside my sleeve and feel a tiny scrap of paper there, one that’s too small to be a poem. I don’t dare take it out on the air train in front of so many eyes, but I think I know what’s happened.
    Back in the Borough, when the rest of my family took the tablet and I didn’t, they all seemed like I do now. Confused, but not completely at sea. They knew who they were and understood most of what they were doing.
    The air train slides to a stop. The girl and her family get off. At the last moment, I stand up and slip through the doors. This isn’t my station but I can’t sit any longer.
    The air in Central feels moist and cold. It’s not quite dark yet, but I see a hook of moon tipped in the dark blue water of the evening sky. Breathing deeply, I walk down to the bottom of the metal steps and stand off to the side, letting the others pass. I pull out the slip of paper from my sleeve, hiding my hands and their movements in the shadows under the stairs the best I can.
    The paper says
remember
.
    I’ve taken the red tablet. And it worked.
    I’m not immune.
    Some part of me, some hope and belief in what I am, dissolves and disappears.
    “No,”
I whisper.
    This can’t be true. I
am
immune. I have to be.
    Deep down, I believed in my immunity. I thought I would be like Ky, like Xander and Indie. After all, I have conquered the other two tablets. I walked through the blue tablet in the Carving, even though it was supposed to stop me cold. And I’ve never once taken the green.
    The sorting part of my mind tells me:
You were wrong. You are not immune. Now you know.
    If I’m not immune, then what have I forgotten? Lost forever?
    My mouth tastes like tears. I run my tongue over my teeth, feeling to see if there’s any