The USB drive sat on my desk like a ticking bomb.
For days, we hadn't touched the folder labeled RED LIST, only danced around it—Ethan running decryption scripts, me scouring metadata, Henry trying to find any corresponding paper trail in school records. It felt like something bigger than us, and part of me wanted to believe that we'd blown it out of proportion. That the folder was nothing.
But deep down, I knew better.
It wasn't nothing.
It was a ledger.
When the encryption finally broke late one night, Ethan called me—no emotion in his voice, just three words:
"It's open. Come now."
I ran.
We sat huddled in Ethan's room, the blinds drawn, the only light from his laptop screen. Henry slouched in the corner, suddenly quiet. That was the first sign something was wrong. If even Henry wasn't joking, then what we were about to see wasn't just interesting—it was dangerous.
The folder contained four spreadsheets, each marked by a quarter: Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4. Names. Codes. Payment logs. Assigned tags.
Some of the names we recognized—teachers, student council members, even one of the assistant principals. Others we didn't. A few entries were marked with red stars and blank notes.
One column, labeled "C. Compliance," had two statuses: YES or IN PROCESS. Another column had a header we couldn't quite decipher: "Asset Conversion Timeline."
"What the hell is this?" I muttered, scrolling down.
It read like a combination of accounting sheet, psychological profile, and surveillance record.
One student, a third-year we vaguely knew from football, had notes like:
"C. Compliance: YES.Behavior adjusted after social reconditioning.Family payment plan initiated.Asset viable for Tier 2 conversion."
Tier 2 conversion?
I felt cold.
The more we scrolled, the worse it got. It wasn't just tracking students—it was documenting how they were used. Recruited, monitored, pressured. It was like someone had turned the school into a testing ground, where students weren't just learners, but assets. And someone—maybe several people—was profiting from it.
"It's a system," Ethan said quietly. "Someone's running a behavioral conditioning operation through this school. With administrative backing. Maybe higher."
Henry leaned forward. "They're turning students into tools. For what, though? Politics? Money?"
I didn't answer. My eyes had locked on one name at the bottom of the list:
Zane, Geneway.C. Compliance: DEVIATED.Behavioral path unpredictable. Monitoring suspended Q2.Associated risk: HIGH.
That was me.
There it was—in black and white. A confirmation of something I had long suspected but never proved: I had been watched, evaluated, targeted. And then discarded when I didn't play along.
"They knew," I whispered. "They knew everything. They knew what I was doing, what I cared about, what I wanted. They watched me break."
No one said anything for a long time.
Ethan eventually closed the laptop and leaned back in his chair. "This isn't about James Bennett anymore."
Henry nodded grimly. "He wasn't the plan. He was just part of it."
That realization changed everything.
James Bennett wasn't a rogue manipulator. He was a cog—maybe even a sacrifice. The real engine was still running, deeper in the system. Hidden behind school newsletters, well-funded departments, elite scholarships, and glowing alumni records.
We left Ethan's room just before sunrise. None of us said much. The streets were still and empty, the kind of quiet that makes your thoughts sound too loud. As we walked, I looked around the campus—the same buildings, same banners waving in the breeze—and it hit me:
This school wasn't just hiding corruption.
It was built on it.
They didn't just let James Bennett do what he did. They designed it. Trial after trial. Student after student. Everyone disposable if they didn't fit the model.
I should've felt defeated.
But I didn't.
Because for the first time, we had evidence. We weren't just chasing shadows anymore—we were pulling back the veil.
"We go deeper," I said to Henry and Ethan.
Ethan nodded once.
Henry cracked his knuckles. "Let's break this thing open."
And just like that, we were in it. Not out of revenge anymore. Not just for ourselves.
But for everyone else who didn't know they were being watched.
Everyone else still living inside the lie.