Free 6 Digit Passcode by Abigail Collins

by someone. Is it possible that humans , the very beings that the Digits now rule, were responsible for the creation of their own masters?
    What Miss L. asks makes me wonder what I would answer, were the question directed at me. Do I wish that the Digits didn’t exist? If they didn’t, my parents would still be alive. But I don’t know what kind of life they would be living, and I don’t know if I would ever want to risk finding out.
    “O-of course not,” Terry answers, and the rest of the class nods in agreement.
    Miss L. smiles smugly and looks right at me. I stare back nervously, and I answer her silent question with the shake of my head.
    Why do I feel like I’ve already started a war?
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter eight
     
     
    Nearly two weeks have passed since I last saw Cyrus, Tesla, and the other Digits in the lab. I would be lying if I said I didn’t expect Cyrus to be waiting for me on the doorstep the next morning, but I’m surprised to find Roma cooking breakfast and not a single intruder on our stoop. I even open the door and peek outside, but Cyrus is nowhere to be seen.
    My life has gone back to normal – or as close as it can be, given everything that has happened to me recently – since then. Miss L. is back to talking about the Digital War, and from the way she acts it’s like she never mentioned the Divisions at all. But every so often I’ll catch her watching me, and her gaze sends a prickle down my spine. I wonder if Tesla has told her something about me, but what is there to tell? I didn’t do anything wrong. At least, not that I know of.
    On my first day back at work I am assigned the duty of stitching up holes and mending split seams in the clothing of the people in our neighborhood. I’m not very good at sewing, but Roma is teaching me, and I take this as a good opportunity for me to ask her what she’s not telling me about Cyrus and the other Digits.
    She responds with the same look on her face as the day Cyrus came to her house looking for me: a mixture of shock, confusion, and pity.
    “Everly…”
    “Please, Roma,” I press. “I need to know. I’m… I’m scared. You know what they want, don’t you?”
    I’m trying to sew a patch over a hole in the knee of a pair of khaki pants, but every time I try to tie the end of my thread I accidentally end up breaking it. Roma is putting new buttons down the front of a plaid shirt, and she’s already finished several other projects in the time it’s taken me to complete my first.
    Roma sighs and pulls a new spool of white thread. She shakes her head slowly and smoothes out the fabric in her hands.
    “Not exactly, no,” she begins. “I have an idea, yes, but I didn’t want to tell you until I was certain.”
    “What is it? Why can’t you just tell me now?”
    Roma looks worried. I feel worried.
    “I don’t want you to fret over something that may not even come to pass.” She finishes sewing the final button on and folds the shirt neatly before laying it in the laundry basket on the floor beside her; we will have to wash these clothes before we return them, and iron them if necessary.
    “But what if it does?” I feel like she’s not going to tell me. Maybe if I push just a little farther…
    “Then we’ll deal with it then.”
    “Roma, you know that’s not – ”
    She cuts me off before I can finish. “Your mother…,” she begins, and I shut my mouth so hard I can hear my teeth clack together; “Your mother didn’t want this to happen. She did everything she could to stop it. But she also made me promise to keep it from you for as long as I could. You don’t need that kind of burden on your shoulders.”
    My heart flutters and my hands start sweating so badly I can hardly keep hold of my needle. I try to finish my sewing, but every time I make a stitch it ends up being crooked and I have to pull it out and start over.
    My mind is