Day three, I made four hundred and thirty-seven pieces. Day four, four hundred and fifty-one. Day five, four hundred and sixty-eight.
Still not quota, but getting closer. The supervisors stopped giving me the disappointed look. 623 stopped having to correct me every other piece. My hands were getting faster, more automatic. Reach, grab, quick assessment, place. Repeat.
The chemical burns on my fingers were getting worse though. Little red welts where the oily residue ate through skin. But everyone had them. Some kids had burns up to their elbows. Some had chemical scars on their faces from when pieces splashed.
"You're learning," 623 said during our break on day six. We were sitting in the usual spot, under the fluorescent lights that made everything look sick.
"Not fast enough," I said. My quota was still thirty-two pieces short from yesterday.
"Fast enough to not get second warning. That's something."
She was right. Other kids had gotten second warnings this week. I'd watched one of them get taken away by supervisors. He hadn't come back yet.
"What's your real name?" I asked.
623 looked at me like I'd asked something dangerous. She glanced around to make sure no supervisors were nearby.
"Why?"
"Just... tired of numbers. You know mine. Sort of."
She was quiet for a long time. Long enough that I thought she wasn't going to answer.
"Lily," she finally said. So quiet I almost didn't hear it over the machinery sounds. "My name used to be Lily."
Lily. It fit her better than 623. Made her seem more like a person and less like a machine.
"Nice name," I said.
"What about you? Your real one, I mean. Before you were Echo."
I thought about it. The name I'd had before Maya gave me Echo. But I couldn't remember it anymore. It had been so long since anyone had used it, since I'd even thought about it. Like it had just... faded away.
"I don't remember," I said. Which was true and also kind of scary.
"Probably better that way," Lily said. "Easier to forget who you used to be."
But I wasn't sure I wanted to forget completely. Not anymore.
Day seven, I made four hundred and seventy-three pieces. Twenty-seven short, but close enough that the supervisor just made a mark on her clipboard and moved on without saying anything.
Day eight, four hundred and eighty-six. Fourteen short.
Day nine, four hundred and ninety-one. Nine pieces short of quota, and the supervisor actually nodded when she counted my containers. Like she was... not proud exactly, but satisfied.
"Good improvement, 847," she said. "Keep it up."
Keep it up. Like maybe I was going to be okay. Like maybe I could actually do this job and not get taken away like the other kids.
Day ten, I made quota. Five hundred exactly.
Lily smiled when the supervisor moved on to the next station. Actually smiled. I'd never seen her smile before and it changed her whole face. Made her look younger. More alive.
"Congratulations," she whispered.
I felt... something. Not happy exactly, because I didn't think I remembered how to be happy. But something. Like maybe things could be okay. Not good, probably never good again, but okay.
That night in the bunks, Lily told me things. Quiet things, whispered in the dark when the supervisors weren't doing their rounds.
She'd been brought here three years ago. Her parents had sold her, just like Maya sold me. But not to traffickers. Just to the facility directly. Like a business transaction.
"They needed money for medicine for my little brother," she said. "He was sick and they couldn't afford treatment and the facility pays good money for kids who can work."
"Do you hate them?" I asked.
She was quiet for a while.
"I used to," she said. "But hating them doesn't change anything. Doesn't get me out of here. Doesn't help my brother. So I stopped."
"Do you think he got better? Your brother?"
Another long quiet.
"I hope so," she said. "I have to hope so, you know? Otherwise this was all for nothing."
Hope. That word still made my chest tight. But not in the bad way it used to. More like... careful way. Like hope was something dangerous but maybe worth the risk.
Day eleven, I made five hundred and seven pieces. Seven over quota.
Day twelve, five hundred and twelve.
Day thirteen, five hundred and eighteen.
I was getting good at this. Actually good. The pieces didn't feel like random chunks of metal and glass anymore. I could tell what they were just by touching them. Could sort them almost without thinking.
Lily started teaching me things during breaks. How to spot the dangerous pieces that would burn through gloves. How to tell which supervisors were having bad days and would look for excuses to write people up. How to make your containers look fuller than they were if you were running behind.
"Survival tricks," she called them.
"Why are you helping me?" I asked.
She shrugged. "Because nobody helped me when I got here. Took me six months to figure out what you learned in two weeks."
"What happened in those six months?"
She showed me a scar on her shoulder I hadn't noticed before. Bigger than the chemical burns. Different shape.
"Third warning," she said. "I don't recommend it."
I was getting stronger too. The work was making my arms and shoulders bigger. My hands were tough now, less sensitive to the chemical residue. I could work faster and longer without getting tired.
More importantly, I was starting to care again. About making quota. About not getting warnings. About Lily.
Caring was dangerous. I knew that. Maya had taught me that caring about someone just gave them power to hurt you. But maybe... maybe it was different with someone who was stuck in the same place as you. Someone who couldn't sell you or leave you or pretend to be something they weren't.
Maybe caring about someone who was as broken as you were was safe.
Day fifteen, Lily got sick.
I could tell something was wrong as soon as I got to our station. She was moving too slowly, stopping to lean against the containers, her face pale and sweaty.
"You okay?" I asked.
"Fine," she said, but her voice sounded thick and wrong.
By the first break, she'd only sorted two hundred pieces. Way behind where she needed to be.
"Lily, you need to tell a supervisor you're sick. Get sent to medical."
"No." She shook her head. "Medical means missed shift. Missed shift means automatic warning. I can't afford another warning."
"But if you can't make quota because you're sick..."
"Same result. Warning. Maybe worse."
She was right. There was no good option. Get help and get punished for missing work, or don't get help and get punished for poor performance.
The second half of the shift was worse. Lily kept having to stop to catch her breath. Kept making mistakes, putting pieces in the wrong containers. By the time there was an hour left, she'd only sorted three hundred and twenty pieces.
She needed one hundred and eighty more pieces in one hour.
Impossible.
"Let me help," I said.
"How?"
I looked around. The supervisors were at the other end of the floor, checking on a problem with one of the machines. Our station was in the middle of a row, mostly blocked from their view.
"Work on my quota," I said. "I'll work on yours."
"Echo, no. What happens to you?"
For the last hour, we worked like that. Me doing most of the sorting while she tried to keep up with whatever pieces she could manage. It was harder than working alone, but not impossible.
With ten minutes left in the shift, Lily had four hundred and sixty pieces sorted.
Forty short.
I looked at my own containers. Four hundred and sixty pieces too. I'd been so focused on helping her that I'd fallen behind on my own work.
We needed eighty pieces between us in ten minutes. But there wasn't time for both of us to make quota.
"What about you?" Lily whispered, seeing me grab pieces for her containers instead of mine.
"Don't worry," I said, sorting as fast as I could. "I could meet my quota as well."
I was lying and we both knew it. But the lie let her accept the help instead of trying to stop me.
Seven minutes left. Lily had four hundred and eighty. Five minutes left. Four hundred and ninety-two. Two minutes left. Four hundred and ninety-eight.
I grabbed two more pieces, sorted them into her containers.
Five hundred exactly.
My own containers had four hundred and three pieces. Almost a hundred short.
The supervisors were already starting their counts at the other end of the floor, working their way toward us.
Lily looked at my containers, then at me. Her face went pale.
"Echo..."
"It's okay," I said. "Really."
But it wasn't okay and we both knew that too.
The supervisor reached our station. Counted Lily's containers first.
"623. Five hundred. Good."
Then she counted mine.
"847. Four hundred and three." She looked up from her clipboard, eyes cold. "Ninety-seven short."
I nodded. There wasn't anything to say.
"Second warning," she said, making a mark. Then she gestured to two other supervisors near the exit. "Processing."
Processing. That's what they called it when they took you away to fix your attitude problem.
Two supervisors came over. Big men with dead eyes, like the ones who'd brought me here from Maya.
"Time to go, 847," one of them said.
As they grabbed my arms, I looked back at Lily. Her eyes were wide and scared and guilty.
I mouthed the words: "Don't worry. I'll be back."
Even though I wasn't sure that was true.
Even though I was pretty sure it wasn't.
But the lie made her face relax just a little. Made her nod like she believed me.
That was worth something, I thought as they led me away.
That was worth whatever was about to happen to me.