Free Contaminated by Em Garner Page B

she’ll always have to wear. The collar takes a dual battery-pack system that has to be recharged at regular intervals. Two batteries guarantees that one will always be working while the other recharges, or in case it needs to be replaced. There’s no information on how long the batteries last or how much they cost to replace. But you do get the charger included, “for free.”
    The movie demonstrates with diagrams and close-ups of someone’s hand on how to replace the batteries. The explanation is painfully slow, and I’m sort of afraid to think what sorts of doctors and nurses were so stupid, they weren’t considered smart enough to get this. I’m only seventeen and I figured it out before they even got halfway through the explanation.
    The narrator is something else, too. Perky, bubbly, entirely annoying. “Bathing the patient can be accomplished through the use of sponge baths or limited showering. Though the StayCalm collar is waterproof and water-resistant up to four feet, it’s not recommended it be submerged.”
    Another diagram. I wonder if the collar will simply stop working underwater, no longer sending its electrical pulses to the parts of the brain they want to damage on purpose to counteract the ones ruined by the disease. The next diagram shows me what happens instead.
    “If the collar is submerged in water for more than seven minutes, the unit will be sent into Mercy Mode.”
    The diagram shows a Connie underwater with X’s for eyes and lightning bolts shooting out from the collar.
    “Likewise,” the narrator says in soothing tones, “Mercy Mode will also be triggered if the collar is removed by anyone other than a licensed technician, if the battery power fails for longer than seven minutes, or if the unit is triggered to fire more than thirty-two times in a twenty-minute time span. Mercy Mode is announced by a single beep from the unit, followed by color-coded lights. Steady green means the unit is functioning appropriately. Flashing green indicates extraneous activity. Yellow indicates unexpected surging, while flashing red indicates the introduction of Mercy Mode.”
    The movie demonstrates with a collar not attached to a human, just held in someone’s hand. The narrator’s voice turns from calm to menacing.
    “Constant red indicates Mercy Mode has been fully activated.”
    I press pause on the remote and go to the door. “Jean?”
    “Yes?” She looks up from her desk. She’s put on reading glasses, and the light’s reflected on them so I can’t really see her eyes.
    “Can you explain something to me?”
    “Sure.” She gets up, comes over.
    “Mercy Mode?”
    Jean slips off her glasses as her face falls. She looks over her shoulder and then closes the door to the closet where she was showing me the training movie. “You won’t have to worry about it, hon. Your mom’s a good one. She’ll be fine.”
    “What do you mean, a good one?”
    “I mean she hasn’t given us any trouble, even before she was fitted with her collar. Well, not any more than I’d have expected. She’s a good one. It means she won’t need Mercy Mode.”
    “Mercy Mode … kills them?”
    Something ripples over her face. “Yes.”
    I grip the back of a chair. “Oh, God.”
    “It’s the only way we’re allowed to release them. You know what they’ve done, most of them. I mean, not the ones in here. At least not anything anyone knows of.” Jean gives me a serious look. “You know the ones they find that’ve done … things … don’t even get released to the kennels. Mercy Mode’s a way of assuring everyone thatwhen you take your loved one home, they won’t be able to harm themselves, or you. Or anyone else.”
    “What if something goes wrong with the collar?” I gesture at the TV, where the diagram is frozen. “What if the battery packs both die? What if she falls in the tub or a swimming pool? What if it just … breaks?”
    “They’re all tested, hon. The battery backup system is