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let’s think about this for a—”
    But Mom’s phone bleeped an alert. She reached past Mel to pick it up off the side table. A second later my phone bleeped too. I was still digging my phone out of my pocket when the house phone rang. I stared at the unfamiliar number on the Message screen and the first line of the text: Congratulations! You have been allocated—
    Our home phone rolled over to voice mail and a second later a cheerful prerecorded voice rang through the living room. “Congratulations! A resident or residents of this household have been allocated spots at a Farm facility near you. Please log on to the NPDCO’s website for further information. Your designation is”—the voice switched to a computerized voice—“Melanie Ellen Price. Designation: 923-684. Lily Renee Price. Designation: 923-685. Transportation hub: Dallas/Fort Worth International airport.”

Chapter Eight
     
    Lily
     
    “I can’t believe you’re sending us to one of these concentration camps.”
    “Let’s not be overly dramatic, okay?” my mom said. She didn’t even look up from the stack of clothes she was folding. It was a small stack. Then again, the suitcases we would be allowed to bring with us were also small.
    In the hours since Mel and I had been issued designation numbers, Mom had switched gears completely. She’d gone from frazzled space-cadet mom to frenetically efficient mom so quickly I didn’t know what to think. This get-it-done version was much more the mom I was used to dealing with. I just didn’t like what she was doing.
    “They’re not concentration camps,” Mom said, her tone only hinting at any frustration she might be feeling. They’re protective facilities.”
    I nearly snorted in disgust. “Protective facilities? They’re internment camps.”
    Or maybe the frustration was all on my part. We’d been going around and around on this for the past hour.
    “Lily—” my mother began, her tone distracted. Exasperated.
    “All these gullible parents are shipping off their kids.” I sucked in a breath and rephrased my words. “ You are sending Mel and me off to one of these Farm facilities—”
    “It’s for your protection. It’s going to keep you safe.”
    “Right.” I tried to sneer, but even I couldn’t stir up enough sarcasm, because, frankly, protection sounded pretty good right about now. It was just that safe was seeming more and more like a thing of the past. And the protection the government was offering seemed to come at a pretty steep price. “Mom, I don’t think we should go.”
    She threw down the T-shirt she’d been clutching in exasperation. “Well, then, what do you think we should do? Just hide in our houses like those people in Houston? Should we do that? Should we wait for the Ticks to come and attack our city? Those things are targeting teens and—”
    Just like that, she crumpled. Her voice broke, her shoulders slumped over, her hands barely seemed to have the strength to cradle her head.
    “Mom, I—”
    But she pushed herself up. “I can’t just stand by and let those things have you and Mel. Don’t ask me to do that. And I am out of ideas about how to protect you on my own.”
    “I don’t—” But I broke off, because I didn’t know what to say.
    “Those monsters are out there. And if that wasn’t bad enough, Houston is basically gone. The people who did make it out are going to be refugees and some of them are going to come here. Dallas doesn’t have the infrastructure or the resources to absorb that many people. There could be looting. Riots. Violence. And there’s a cop parked fifteen feet from our doorstep who has basically made it his goal in life to harass you.”
    “Shit,” I muttered. I’d been hoping she hadn’t seen the patrol car this morning.
    “Did you think I didn’t notice he was still there? Did you think I didn’t notice that you snuck out this morning but couldn’t have made it very far because you were back eight minutes