“What is the Program?” I had trouble maintaining eye contact. Maybe he really could tell when I was being insincere. When we were little, he always called me on my lies. “How do I start?”

He smiled, small and quick, but it betrayed actual happiness. “Leave that to me.”

The good thing about Mitch not being Mitch was that he seemed to have lost his ability to see my tells—the way I started shifting in bed, the way I pulled my lips tight. Even Miig knew those. I had to pull myself together, to get past the ache in my head and visions of my dead mother and terror for my family, for Rose, Chi Boy, Slopper, Tree, Zheegwon, Wab, and Miig. I had to get it all the way together if I was to have even a hope in hell of pulling this off. So I laced my fingers and forced myself to meet his gaze. I had to be even: no sudden changes, nothing he could doubt.

“I’m not actually interested, you know. I’d rather die than convert.”

He smiled again, this one more perfunctory than the last; no more reveals for now. “I’ll do you the favor of not repeating that.”

He bent down to pick up a black binder he’d left beside the bed. On the front was a small white label that said, 656987: 17-year-old metis, male. That was me. That’s all I was right now. But better that the label was on a binder than a vial of marrow.

“Okay, then, first things first. I’ll go talk to the supervisor, and you get some rest so we can get you out of here.” He wagged his finger in front of my nose like an old lady. “And no more smart mouth.”

That one cut. Oh man, I wanted to pop him in the jaw. Instead I just rolled my eyes. He scurried out of the room, binder under his arm. I closed my eyes, but sleep wouldn’t come. Instead, I ran through the building again and again in my mind, memorizing each corner and counting the doors. It was obvious there were no classrooms. This place was as unlike a school as you could get. There was nothing here but medical gear, offices, and Indigenous bodies in locked rooms. It was a prison. I had to get out. And now Mitch had given me a small sliver of light to chase.

But could I pull it off? Could I convince not only my asshole brother but the people who pulled his strings that I had “turned”? I pictured myself in my own nerdy suit with a tie I couldn’t stop fidgeting with. I could do that. Then I pictured myself with a binder under my arm, detailing all the specifics of some other poor sap on a bed. I imagined walking past suffering prisoners, whistling “Amazing Grace” like I hadn’t a care in the world. I thought of singing in the staff choir while kids cried for their moms. I couldn’t do that. But I had to try to make it look like I could. There was too much at stake.