Free The Revealed by Jessica Hickam

way that crinkles his cheeks and tosses the keys over the car. I get in, and he pushes the button on his phone, reprogramming the cameras back to normal. I can’t help the gawk that surely covers my face. “How do you—” I gesture to the phone.
    “There’s an app for that,” he says and shrugs, chuckling. “I like programming, so I just modified an existing software. You know how you can use devices to sync with your lights and music?” He waits until I nod before he continues, “Same idea, just with a camera. I hacked into your property’s security system and then applied the setting to the specific camera.”
    My face is blank with confusion. If I didn’t know what Kai looked like, I’d say the boy talking right now would be wearing suspenders, a white button-down shirt, and a pocket protector, all while pushing his round-rimmed glasses up his nose as he spoke. But I can see the sinewy muscles out of the corner of my eye and watch as he smoothly flicks that trademark dark hair from his face.
    “Who are you?” I ask.
    He laughs. “Your worst enemy.”
    I don’t laugh, because according to the press and the rest of the nation, that’s kind of an accurate statement. Our fathers are now the biggest rivals in the country, if not the world.
    He seems to catch on to my train of thought but breezes past it. “Being good at technology definitely comes in handy. So where are we going?” he asks, staring out at the road around me.
    “Hold on.” This time I do allow a smirk and press the pedal to the ground. The car revs to life. I breeze past a billboard featuring my father’s face, huge and centered. It reads, “For a better tomorrow. Mark Atwood for president.” It makes me feel like I’m being followed. In fact, I most likely am.
    “Security will probably still track us down,” I tell Kai, glancing again in the rearview mirror.
    “I’m sure they will if they’re anything like my father’s. You’ll have to lose them. If you can.”
    “Challenge accepted,” I say, running a yellow light and turning onto the freeway.
    The surprise of freedom lurches through my veins.
    It’s been over six months since I’ve been on the road like this, and I was never allowed to be in the driver’s seat. It feels so freeing to be in control. If I wanted, I could keep the car in drive for as far as it would take me. It’s liberating, though I’m not planning on going to the end of the Earth. Instead, I pull along the road heading down a familiar path until the houses thin and all that remains around us is empty land.
    There are large fields on the outskirts of town, run by the state as part of reconstruction. Some of the genetically modified crops—corn, sunflowers, and wheat, among others—are almost as tall as houses. The taller the crop, the more produce they yield and the more mouths the country can feed. The harvest is only a few weeks away.
    That is where I drive.
    I remember when I was a young girl—twelve or thirteen—going out to these fields with my father after the first planting. As a symbolic reflection of new beginnings, representatives from across the colonies came to help sow the seeds. These crops now sustain the population, making it possible for our new nation to rebuild. My father helped oversee the process. I was even allowed to plant my own seed. Now there are so many fields stretching out across the acres that I can’t remember where it was. It doesn’t matter. The point is that we all had a part in getting to this place.
    I park the car on the grass, and we get out. A few people work around us. I can see small silhouettes for miles on end. They will lose the light soon enough, and their day will be done. They don’t pay any attention to us, though. The fields are open for anyone to visit any time. It isn’t uncommon to find people here just enjoying the sun.
    I run through the blades, hitting the shoots at full sprint. The stalks reach out to me, gently slapping my arms. It’s like