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She craved the trees and hills where she grew up, the wetlands and smell of pluff mud and rank odor of the paper mill on wet days. She missed home, a place where she belonged.
    If she went back there, she still wouldn't find it. Home was gone. Gone, gone, gone.
    "Better get go-ing ..." Avery sang from the back seat.
    Cali looked in the rearview. Her eyes—ringed as if with soot, capillaries showing where the whites were supposed to be—looked back. She pushed the hair out of her face and took a drag before adjusting the mirror. Avery was strapped into the backseat watching her iPod. Her backpack was next to her holding all the essentials: water bottle, change of clothes and Pogo, the stuffed rhinoceros.
    "You'll get in trouble if they come out here, Mama. They won't let you see Nix."
    "I know, honey. I just need a moment."
    The little girl hummed like she'd heard that excuse before. She dragged her finger across the screen and sang, "Better get go-ing ..."
    Cali smiled. What would she have in this world if that little girl wasn't with her? God had taken everything else but Nix.
    There was nothing left to take.
    She sucked on the filtered end and hung her hand out the door. Cali put the car in gear. A white dust cloud followed her to the stop sign where she turned right and passed a tan truck. The truck turned around at the intersection and followed her to the gate.
    Avery was still humming.
     
     
     
     
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    "Your turn."
    George sat on the other side of a transparent door. The collar on his uniform was open, his neck unshaven. He tipped back on the chair and dropped his boot on the corner of a small table. The chess pieces rattled, slightly. A smile was hidden beneath a mustache bush.
    Nix stood in the center of his cell. His room . It wasn't a cell, he was reminded often, it was a room. He wasn't a prisoner, he was a ward of the United States under the Halfskin Laws. Nix was under watch, 24 hours a day and had been for the past six months and would be as long as he registered above 40%. In the history of biomites, no one’s population had ever decreased. It was likely he’d have a room for awhile.
    At least until he hit halfskin.
    The walls were white and barren. There was a bed and a toilet and a sink and a desk and a chair. All white. The desk wasn't for writing since pens and pencils weren't allowed. Recent studies proved certain biomites could spread through liquids, even ink. Seeding usually required specialized equipment, but some of the new breeds of biomites could simply be inhaled as vapor or liquid. No one wanted to be seeded against their will, so Observation and Detainment Centers banned them and desks became more for stacking things than writing. They'd bring him a laptop, if he asked, but it was quarantined and couldn't remain in the room. It was too dangerous. They hadn't explained why.
    Currently, there was just the stack of papers that was in the middle of the desk—the only thing on the surface—crisp and colorful drawings from a 10-year girl. Cali brought him one every week from Avery. If he were allowed tape or anything sticky, he'd put them on the wall. Sometimes he spaced them out on the floor and walked through a labyrinth of blue skies and green grass and yellow, smiling suns and brown ponies; he always picked them up and stacked them neatly when he was done.
    Time went so slow in the room.
    At least it was comfortable. At least it was safe.
    Nix stared at the monitor over the sink. It was not his reflection that looked back—mirrors weren't allowed—but a monitor. He was dressed in (what else) white. He had no hair. None. Not on his head or brows, under his arms or anywhere south of that. All of that fell out after wearing the suppression ring for six months.
    Everyone reacted differently to the ring. It was only supposed to suppress the biomites to slow their replication and activity. There's some dangerous redlines out there , George the Guard used to say. Got the strength of a