Margot’s POV
The whistle hadn’t even stopped ringing in my ears before we were herded into the hallway like cattle.
Everything moved quickly, too quickly for my legs to keep up. Girls whispered nervously around me, clutching one another, brushing shoulders as we all fell into line.
Cara found my arm and looped hers through it, grounding me just enough to stop me from getting swept away in the current of movement and becoming separated from her.
We were arranged in pairs, shoulder to shoulder, and marched out under the sharp watch of three armed guards.
The weight of their guns slung over their chests was no longer something I could pretend not to notice. This was no school field trip. This was a prison transfer and we now looked like a bunch of colorful prisoners.
Outside, the early evening air was warm and sticky, thick with the scent of salt and soil. We followed the dock down to a row of hulking grey transport trucks with mesh windows and steel siding.
The kind you’d see in the background of a war movie…
The guards suddenly barked at us to move faster – “Let’s go ladies, let’s go!” – and the girls obeyed without hesitation, clambering into the open backs of the trucks, shoulders hitting, legs knocking, breaths quickening.
Cara and I fought to stick together, squeezing onto a bench in the back of the third truck. I had just enough space to press my knees together and grip the metal seat beneath me.
The doors slammed shut behind us before, only a moment later, the truck shuddered itself to life.
The low drum of the engine rattled up into my chest, and the sudden lurch forward nearly threw me into Cara’s lap. The girls around us gasped, some laughing nervously, others staying completely silent, staring ahead with wide, unblinking eyes.
I reached for Cara’s hand, finding it without even having to look. Her palm was damp. Mine was ice cold.
Looking outside of the small slits in the reinforced glass, I caught glimpses of the island – dense trees stretching up high into the sky, the thick canopy casting heavy shadows across the uneven dirt path. Everything was surrounded by fences, high, military-grade fences laced with coils of barbed wire, as if the trees themselves were prisoners too.
Armed men jogged alongside the trucks as we moved at a steady pace, shouting commands at each other through radios clipped on to their vests. The entire place thrummed with intensity, like we’d been dropped right into the middle of a military operation.
But I suppose in some ways, we had?
I leaned closer to the window just in time to see the tops of tall security towers ahead in the distance, each one manned by a silhouette holding what was clearly a rifle with the tip poking out.
I swallowed hard, knowing that each of them had the power to end us with a single movement of their finger, if they ever wanted to…
This place wasn’t just shaping itself up to be a prison.
It was a fucking fortress!
“Holy shit,” I whispered under my breath.
Cara squeezed my hand tighter. “Don’t look out there too much. You’ll psych yourself out before we even get in there.”
Too late.
I was already psyching myself out.
I wanted to run for the damn hills…
Not that it would even get me anywhere, considering we were both now on an island in the middle of nowhere!
Luckily, the ride lasted for only around ten minutes all in, as I had worried that time would begin to warp itself if we were to be stuck in the moving steel box for any longer.
But with that, it still felt like ten hours crammed into ten seconds all at once, simply due to my anxiety and racing thoughts on how to escape this…
But it was too late.
When we finally rounded a bend in the road and came to a halt, the sudden stillness made my stomach churn.
The truck doors were yanked open.
“Move out!” a voice barked. “We are already behind schedule girls. Let’s go! Now!” He yelled, increasing my heart rate as we plodded our way towards the exit.
My feet eventually hit the solid ground, and I looked up – instantly freezing in place.
Ahead of us was a huge building that looked like it had been cut from a slab of concrete and dropped down into the dirt.
No windows from what I could see at the front. No personality. Just grey walls, steel doors, and a large sign bolted above the main entrance in bold, black letters:
‘PROJECT COMPOUND’.
Cara leaned in and whispered, “This must be a separate building from the main prison… it has to be. That’s gotta be a good thing, right? Means fewer prisoners. Just the ones in the program.”
I nodded quickly – but the words didn’t soothe me.
The name itself sounded clinical. Cold. Like we were walking into a science experiment more than anything else.
Because we were.
We were the variables.
The guards led us across the gravel and into a clearing in front of the compound’s entrance. A few other trucks were pulling up behind us, and girls were funneling out, all of us gathering into messy lines once again as the guards reestablished control with their raised voices and commanding glares.
We stood in rows – ten across – as a man with a thick folder began calling out names.
My stomach instantly turned to stone.
He had a bullhorn this time, and each name was louder than the last.
“RACHEL LIN. WILLOW FRENCH. HARPER DEVINE. DELILAH ABBOTT. ELOISE MARTIN. MOVE OVER THERE. YOU’RE IN BLOCK A.”
The selected girls peeled off and were guided toward one of the side doors by a new cluster of guards.
‘LEILA ANDERSON. JENNA STARK. ERIN DUPONT. HEATHER BOWLS, NORA JENNINGS, OVER HERE. BLOCK B.” He continued.
Another group gone…
One by one, the girls around us began disappearing into doorways like cattle through a sorting gate.
My heart pounded, waiting for our names, waiting for them to be called together, but the longer the list stretched on without us, the more I began to realize something awful was about to happen.
They weren’t pairing us with our friends.
They were pairing us with our inmates.
The knot in my chest twisted hard. “Cara…” I breathed, turning toward her, but she was already looking at me, her eyes wide, scared, the same realization passing over her face like a shadow.
“They’re splitting us up now,” she said, voice quiet.
“No… no, maybe not. Maybe it’s just-”
“CARA OWENS,” the voice boomed. “BLOCK E.”
“No–wait-” I grabbed her wrist, like holding her would somehow stop the inevitable. But a guard was already stepping up behind her, gesturing for her to move over with him.
Cara’s face turned toward me, eyes locking. “It’s all okay, I’ll see you again soon!” she whispered, though she clearly didn’t believe it. “We’ll see each other on Saturday if we don’t get to see each other before then, remember?”
She stepped backward, hands still gripping mine until the last second.
Then she was gone – led off down the path, her head held high but her shoulders tense.
I stood frozen, the world suddenly louder around me. Girls chattering. Guards shouting. Names being flung through the air like grenades.
And then –
“MARGOT BELLE. BLOCK F.”
That was me.
My turn.
My fate.
A guard motioned. I forced myself forward, legs barely working, heart a rabbit in my chest. My thoughts were too loud.
Block F.
That was where he would be.
Coban Santorelli.