A response to Micah’s questions arrived later that afternoon, but no one was in the living room to hear it come in until evening. Zoe was the first to discover it. She had finally fully rid herself of that nagging anxiety and was feeling much more human after a nap. Ready to rejoin the others and face their situation head on, she stepped out into the living room expecting to be greeted by at least one of her companions, but the room was empty and she could only hear the distant sounds of voices from other rooms echoing down the halls.

  As she walked by the heavy metal door, she noticed that the correspondence hatch was slightly ajar and reached inside to find an envelope. She considered waiting until she found the others before opening it, but her curiosity won out. Besides, no one else was sitting around waiting for the response, so none of them were so excited to see it that they could be offended by her taking a look first. At least that’s what she told herself as she broke the seal.

  She found a slip of paper inside along with a folder of other papers. The paper was attached to the folder with a paperclip and read, “Answers withheld until the end of the mandatory transition period. At that time a unanimous vote of Nest occupants is required to release the answers. Until that time, we have enclosed additional details about your contracts with New Life Industries.”

  “What is that?”

  She jumped at the sound of the voice and was dismayed to see Jade standing in the doorway. While she didn’t want to quarrel with anyone, she didn’t feel comfortable with Jade for some reason.

  Moving closer, Jade asked, “Is that the response to Micah’s questions?”

  “Not exactly. I saw it sticking out of the door and pulled it out, but it doesn’t look like they are willing to give us answers right now.”

  Jade crossed her arms over her stomach and the way the muscles in her arms flexed with the motion only made Zoe feel more intimidated by the taller woman. “And when exactly were you going to share this with the rest of us?”

  Unable to keep the edge out of her voice, Zoe, tossed her head to the side, feeling her ponytail swipe over her shoulders. “Like I said, I just picked it up.”

  Olivia and Ethan appeared in the doorway, obviously drawn by their raised voices.

  “What’s going on?” Olivia asked.

  “Zoe here got a response to Micah’s questions,” Jade said in a tone that grated on Zoe’s raw nerves.

  “I just picked it up when Jade walked in,” Zoe protested.

  “It looked to me like you were digging through it already.”

  “Calm down,” Ethan interrupted, crossing the room to Zoe. “You would have been just as eager if you’d been the one to find it first.” Jade huffed in response. “What does it say, Zo?”

  Zoe flushed a bit at Ethan’s shortening of her name, startled that he would feel comfortable enough with her after half a day in this place to give her a nickname. “I only read the top sheet.” She held it out for the others to look at. “And it says we have to wait for answers.”

  “What’s in the folder?” Olivia asked.

  Handing it to her so she didn’t have to be responsible for the contents, Zoe held the empty envelope uselessly while Jade snatched the top sheet from her hands. “Don’t you think we should get Sloane and Micah before looking any closer?” Zoe asked, hoping the hypocrisy would register with Jade.

  But at that moment, the two men appeared in the doorway leading to the rec room. Micah was looking smug and Sloane was asking him for a rematch, but they both froze when they saw everyone else grouped around the metal door. Before Jade could make another snide comment, Zoe explained what had happened.

  “What’s on the contract pages?” Sloane asked after reading the page Jade handed to him.

  “A lot of legalese,” Olivia said, “but from what I can tell at a quick glance, it looks like we signed paperwork specifically requesting that this information not be shared with us. We wanted to forget the answers to those questions so much that we paid…” she looked up from the sheet with a whistle. “We paid a lot of money to make sure no one reminded us of what we had forgotten.”

  “That sounds bad,” Ethan said morosely.

  Jade whistled through her teeth. “There aren’t a lot of good reasons to drop that kind of cash on forgetting.”

  “Regardless, it sounds like we have at least five days to wait,” Micah said. “Until the mandatory transition period is over.”

  “Sounds like it’s time for a rematch,” Sloane said, obviously making every effort to lighten the mood. He slapped Micah on the shoulder so hard that he almost knocked the smaller man over. “Let’s go, pool shark.”

  “In a way, it’s a relief,” Zoe said. “I mean, now we know we can’t do anything for a while anyway.”

  Olivia was still studying the documents and didn’t seem to be listening to the rest of them, but Zoe was tired of the conversation. She started to retreat back into her room, but Ethan caught her arm.

  “I’m going to go workout for a while to try to get rid of the stress of the day. Want to join me?”

  Zoe looked up at him and felt the ice in her chest melt at the kindness in his eyes. “Sure. That sounds good.”

  ///

  A semblance of routine developed over the next several days. While there was no sun to wake them in the morning, the recessed lighting brightened and dimmed on a schedule. The motion sensors that several had feared when they first woke up in their bedrooms never activated in the same way as they had on their arrival, so they didn’t wake anyone in the middle of the night. Still, nights seemed to pass restlessly and everyone began to feel a lingering exhaustion building. They had only the clock to use for reference, and after that first day, Sloane’s watch had stopped working, so even he couldn’t verify the time.

  After the lights brightened in the morning, everyone gathered in the kitchen for breakfast. They moved through the meal in waves. Olivia and Sloane were usually first and they discovered that they shared a love of pancakes with peanut butter on them, so they quickly agreed to cook some up in the morning together. Zoe usually wandered in and grabbed an apple or banana (they were delivered daily via the delivery chute in the utility room) and left Sloane and Olivia to their morning conversation. Micah didn’t stop in for breakfast, but he usually picked up a mug of coffee on his way to the rec room. Jade and Ethan were usually the last to arrive, and by the time they dragged themselves into the kitchen, everyone was ready to get busy doing something else.

  This morning, Sloane was the one making the pancakes and Olivia was sitting at the table with her knees up to her chest as usual. She had her fork in hand and the jar of peanut butter was already open beside her. Despite her eagerness, she couldn’t help yawning wide enough that her jaw cracked.

  “Did you sleep well?”

  “I don’t remember dreaming or anything, but I always wake up so tired. You?”

  “Same.” He flipped the pancakes and leaned back against the stove turning the spatula slowly in his hand. “I don’t get it. I mean the room is pitch black at night and so quiet. You’d think I’d sleep like a baby, but when I wake up I feel like my head just hit the pillow.”

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  The coffeemaker started to burble and hiss as it began to make its caffeinated magic. As the smell hit her nostrils, Olivia sighed with pleasure. Despite the circumstances, the smell of coffee was still one of her favorite things ever. At least she thought it had always been. It was hard to imagine herself as someone who wouldn’t drink in that smell with joy. Unless she’d gotten sick once on coffee or something. If that had been the case for her, she almost felt grateful to have no memories to ruin it for her. That’s how much she loved the smell of coffee.

  “How many do you want?” Sloane asked, standing over the table with pan and spatula in hand. “One? Two?” A grin spread across his lips, triggering that little dimple on his right cheek that made him look like a little boy with a secret. “Three?” He waggled his brows.

  “Just two today,” she replied, lifting her plate in supplication to the pancake gods. The pancakes he deposited on her plate were perfect specimens of fluffy goodness, a lovely golden tan with only a few tiny bubbles to disrupt the smooth surface. She spread the peanut butter over the top, waiting with the knife in one place long enough for the pancake to warm the peanut butter enough to spread it but not enough to make it sticky. And then she added the second layer, doing the same to it.

  “Damn, girl. How do you not weigh like a thousand pounds?” Sloane asked, sitting down across from her with his own plate of three pancakes. He spread only the thinnest layer of peanut butter on the surface of the top pancake.

  Olivia shrugged, mouth full of pancake. It’s not like she knew the history of her body. Maybe she didn’t usually eat this way and she was going to gain a bunch of weight before she managed to get out of this place. At the moment she couldn’t bring herself to care. “They have jumpsuits of all sizes in the closet,” she said, licking a bit of peanut butter off her fork.

  Sloane only laughed, and the bright warmth of the sound made her start giggling along with him.

  “What’s so funny?” Micah asked, poking his head into the room.

  Olivia and Sloane exchanged a glance and then started laughing again.

  “Maybe I should give this breakfast thing a try if it makes you that happy,” he commented as he grabbed an NLI branded mug from the cabinet and poured himself a mug of black coffee.

  Eyeing the notebook tucked under his arm, Olivia asked, “Anything interesting in the supply drop today?”

  Micah glanced at the notebook and adjusted its position protectively. “I didn’t check. Well, I’m off. Enjoy your breakfast.”

  When he was gone, Sloane gave Olivia a look. “That was pretty dismissive.”

  “Yeah. He seemed distracted,” Olivia agreed, frowning as she dragged a piece of pancake around her plate absently. “I wonder what is in his notebook?”

  Sloane grinned. “Maybe it’s his diary.”

  Making a face, Olivia shook her head. “Micah doesn’t strike me as the type to keep a diary.”

  “How well do any of us really know each other anyway?”

  “Or ourselves?” Olivia echoed quietly. It was still enough to make her stomach roil when she thought of how much she had forgotten, and it was only in these moments of almost remembering something that the loss felt truly real and raw.

  “On that note...I’m heading for the fitness room. Unlike some people, I have to work off all these calories if I’m going to keep my figure.” Polishing off his pancakes, he pushed the plate away and leaned back in his chair, dabbing at his mouth with a napkin in such a proper way that she started laughing.

  The laughter eased her worries, and she felt the lump in her throat dissolving by the time he left the room.

  ///

  Ethan paused when he noticed Micah standing in the living room again and staring at the metal door with a pensive expression. This was the third or fourth time he’d caught Micah doing something weird. Other than staring at the door, Ethan had found him wandering around the nest with a pen and notebook and studying things, making notes as he went. He studied the toaster, the coffeemaker, the clothes iron, the washer and dryer. He even pulled out a hair dryer in the bathroom to inspect it. His strange investigation puzzled Ethan, but he also wasn’t sure he cared enough to ask what Micah was doing. It appeared almost as if he was taking an inventory of all the appliances in the nest, but for what purpose Ethan had no idea.

  “Waiting for a message?” Ethan asked, deciding to finally confront Micah about his weird behavior.

  He’d expected Micah to jump in surprise at the sound of his voice given how lost in thought he appeared to be, but he was calm when he turned to face Ethan, flipping the cover on his notebook closed to hide whatever he had written there. “What’s the point of sending messages?”

  Micah’s defeatist tone made Ethan pause, uncertain how to respond.

  “It’s not like they’re going to answer us until we’ve passed this transition period or whatever.”

  “I guess that’s true.” Ethan frowned at Micah’s notebook. “So what are you writing?”

  “My theories,” Micah replied, hugging the notebook to his chest. “So I don’t forget. Who knows how these memory suppression drugs work? What if we start losing our memories from our time here, too?”

  In spite of his desire to focus on the positives, Ethan had to admit that was a disturbing and all too feasible concern. “Even if that’s the case, I think I’d rather forget than realize I’ve forgotten.”

  Eyes widening, Micah sat up straighter. “Are you serious? You’d rather just put your head in the sand?’

  Ethan shrugged. “There’s only so much I can do about the situation. I’d rather focus on things I can control.”

  “I just don’t get you, man.” Micah shook his head and looked away.

  Deciding to leave things at that, Ethan shrugged again and walked away.

  ///

  Jade wrote a simple question on the slip of paper before slipping it through the correspondence slot. “Can we vote to end the mandatory transition period early?”

  Three days had passed since their arrival in the Nest, and while she was comfortable enough and even beginning to get along fairly well with her roommates, she had no desire to stay there. Even if she had decided to come there of her own free will—which she doubted—she no longer agreed with her decision and she wanted nothing more than to walk outside and feel the sunlight on her face. Being cooped up inside like this was killing her spirit, not to mention her creative drive. And creativity was the only thing that seemed to give her energy. Without a creative outlet, the world felt like it was made entirely of shades of gray and every minute seemed to drag like an hour.

  She paced around the living room while she waited for a response, hoping they wouldn’t take as long as they had to respond to Micah questions a few days ago. She didn’t know if she could wait that long before she started to come out of her skin.

  “What’s up?” Ethan asked, nearly colliding with her when he entered the room.

  “Just doing laps,” she said, starting to jog in an exaggerated way as if moving through water. “Gotta get a little exercise in this place, you know.”

  He looked at her askance. “You do know there’s a gym down the hall.”

  “I’ve never been one for fitness equipment. Too predictable”

  “And running in a circle isn’t predictable?”

  “Not when I do this!” She darted to one side and then hopped over the couch, nearly tripping over the coffee table before righting herself and weaving around the other couch on her way back around the room. Punching him lightly in the side as she passed, she continued her circuit and then proceeded to do jumping jacks. He simply watched her with furrowed brows as if he was beginning to suspect that she had lost her mind. Seven jumping jacks in she began to get winded and decided to stop, leaning against the back of the couch to catch her breath.

  Just then, the delivery slot clicked and a paper slid through the opening and into the tray below. Ethan immediately turned to look at it in surprise, but she stood in front of the door.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” she replied. “I just asked if they would send me some better shampoo.” Still standing with her back to the door, she reached back and plucked the paper from the tray.

  Folding his arms over his chest, he gave her a skeptical look. “And what did they say?”

  She opened the paper and felt her heart sink when she saw the single word on the page: no.

  “No shampoo?” he asked, moving closer.

  Crushing the paper in her hand, she shook her head. “Nope. Bastards. I guess they’re too cheap to get anything other than the cheap stuff. Oh well. It was worth a try!” Bounding off, she headed back to her room to do some more painting.

  She didn’t know why she kept the truth from him. Maybe because she was embarrassed to admit how badly she had wanted to hear that they could leave soon if they wanted to. Everyone else seemed to be enjoying their stay and getting to know each other. Jade, on the other hand, was abrasive even when she was trying to be nice, and had managed to push most of them away within the first day. Only Sloane checked in on her from time to time.

  As she closed the door to her room, she noticed Ethan knocking on Zoe’s door and tried to ignore the spark of jealousy that erupted in her chest. She didn’t know why, but she really hated that girl.