1 THE OUTSIDE. IT WAS A PLACE WHERE THINGS were alive, where forests grew, where your friends weren’t trying to kill you, and the air didn’t taste like dust. The door to the outside was now open. Hissing torches filled the dark hallway with red. Will held Lucy’s hand. They ran like mad down the hall, trailing the rest of the Loners. They’d gone back to get their gang when those gun-toting kids from the outside had opened the doors. Will watched the Loners ahead of him dash around the corner and pour into the front foyer. He heard happy screams. Will and Lucy burst into the foyer. Bright light streamed in from the mysterious white room beyond the steel graduation doors. The rest of the Loners were already crowded at the doorway, fighting each other to get through first. Half of them were in tears. Sunburned kids from the outside stood at the edges of the foyer, leaning on their rifles and waving the Loners forward. Will and Lucy charged toward the light. Will wanted inside that room so badly, but the rest of the Loners were ahead of him. He and Lucy pushed against the backs of the Loner mob. The approaching thunder of running feet filled the halls behind him. The other gangs were coming. All of them. “Faster!” Will shouted at the Loners in front of him, who were