Chapter 4

The world came back into focus with the smell of gasoline and the sound of someone groaning.

The van was a wreck, crumpled against the concrete barrier. The front was destroyed. The driver was slumped over the steering wheel, unconscious. His partner was trying to get up, clutching a leg that was bent at a sickeningly wrong angle.

The other students were crying, dazed and terrified.

I shook the stars from my vision. Adrenaline surged through me. There was no time for shock.

The partner looked at me, his face a mixture of pain and pure hatred. "You... you crazy bastard..."

I didn't say a word. I moved with cold precision. I kicked his injured leg, hard. He screamed, a raw, agonizing sound, and collapsed back into his seat, incapacitated.

I turned to the other students. Jennifer was staring at me, her eyes wide with a terrifying question.

"They're not recruiters," I said, my voice hoarse but clear. "They're criminals. They were going to sell us. We have to run. Now."

For a second, they just stared, paralyzed by fear.

"Go!" I yelled, kicking the side door open. "Get into the woods! Call the police! Tell them everything!"

That broke the spell. They scrambled out of the ruined van, disappearing into the dark, rain-soaked trees that lined the highway.

I followed them, but not in the same direction. I had my own path.

Once I was deep enough in the woods, shielded by the darkness, I pulled out the burner phone. A cheap, untraceable device I'd bought for cash weeks ago, with a prepaid SIM card. I had it hidden in the lining of my jacket.

My fingers flew across the keypad. I didn't call 911. I sent a series of anonymous, detailed text messages. One to the FBI's national tip line, another to the state police.

I gave them everything. The locations of the processing centers, the names of key players like Barney, the routes their transport vans used, their methods of communication. I laid out their entire operation, information a high school kid could never possibly know.

Then, I opened a simple coding app I had loaded onto the phone. I connected to a public Wi-Fi hotspot I knew was in range from a nearby truck stop. I found their internal communication network-it was laughably insecure-and unleashed a simple but effective virus.

It wouldn't destroy their network, but it would disrupt it, creating a communications blackout for this local cell. It would isolate them from the main organization, making them blind and deaf.

My final act was to activate the GPS tracker on the burner phone itself. I set a timer for one hour. Then I tossed the phone into a thick bush near the crash site.

They would find it. They wouldn't be able to unlock it. And in one hour, it would broadcast its location, leading the FBI right to them. And to me.

I pulled my hood up, the cold rain soaking through my clothes, and started walking. I needed to find a place to hide. The game wasn't over yet.