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some of us to bring
people to the Institution.”
    There was a pause while I digested this.
“What for?” By now I had completely abandoned the puzzle.
    He shrugged. “I don’t know. That’s the thing.
I’m sure they have a reason, though. They always do.”
    “Oh,” I replied, but my mind was
whirling.
    Yvonne jumped into the conversation as though
we’d never had the earlier disagreement. “Yeah, they just give you
a name of someone at the school and you have to bring them back
with you.” She hated being left out of anything, and since her
exclusion of me hadn’t worked, she had probably just decided to go
along with it.
    “Huh ... I wonder why they want them,” I
murmured.
    Yvonne gave me a bored look. “Doesn’t matter,
really.” Her nonchalance was back, the polar opposite of her
earlier excitement.
    “Hmm,” I said and went back to finishing the
puzzle.
     

Chapter Nine

    “Drew,” Glen said, greeting me as I walked
through the doors of his study. He was sitting behind his desk, as
usual, doing paperwork. He leaned back in his chair, one elbow
propped on the armrest, holding the book open to review.
    “You wanted to see me?”
    He nodded. “You can sit.” He gestured to the
chair and I sat down. “You’ve been doing well on your mission,” he
said, his expression truthful. He leaned forward to set down his
papers.
    I watched him closely, hoping to hear what I
was expecting. My mind whirled to the possible conclusions,
stopping on the one I calculated was the most probable and the most
inviting.
    “And I want to ask you to do something else
for me, as well.”
    I nearly sighed in relief. This was it. He
was going to ask me to start bringing people in like Yvonne and
Jeremy were doing. Finally, I wouldn’t be behind anymore. I
wouldn’t be the lesser android.
    “There’s an android that ran away from the
Institution,” Glen said.
    My mind balked. What was he talking
about?
    “She’s ... not the same anymore. She’s
confused and we need you to bring her back.”
    I tried to hold back my puzzled expression.
This couldn’t be right. An android? They wanted me to fetch a
runaway android for them? A simple rebel they couldn’t control?
    “She’s been wounded and will be easy to bring
back. Her name is Marian. We just got word a few hours ago that
she’s hiding out at a hotel downtown. Here’s the address.” He
handed me a piece of paper.
    I reached out and took it numbly. I couldn’t
believe he was deploying me on such an unimportant mission while
Yvonne and Jeremy were doing things significant for the creators.
But I nodded to Glen anyway, even though my insides burned with
disappointment. You never doubted the creators. I took the slip of
paper and left his study.
    I hurried on my way to find Marian. I ran all
the way downtown and by the time the hotel came into sight, I was
calm again and had accepted the mission Glen had given me. He must
have had a good reason for assigning this to me. Maybe this smaller
mission would lead to something bigger.
    But I couldn’t smother the feeling inside
that I wasn’t valued as much as some of the other androids
were.
    I hurried to the hotel and walked through the
glass doors into the lobby and wasted no time approaching the lady
at the counter. “Is there a Marian staying here?”“Last name?” she
asked.
    “I don’t know,” I said, scrambling for an
excuse. “I just met her this morning...”
    The woman started clicking away on her
computer until she finally seemed to find something that satisfied
her. “Yes, there’s a Marian Jacobson staying here.” She looked up.
“Did you want me to call her for you?”
    “Is there any chance I could have her room
number so I could go talk to her?”
    The woman pursed her lips and shook her head.
“Sorry, can’t give you that information.”
    I stood there for a second, thinking. I was
partially irritated that this wasn’t going as easy as I'd initially
expected, and now not wanting to