The power still hadn’t come back on when I got home. All our neighbors’ houses were dark and candles flickered inside everyone’s windows. Whatever power A. Gist had used to knock out the whole street was, well, impressive. I didn’t want to know what else he could do.

  “Any luck getting through, Tom?” my mom asked as we got through the door.

  My dad stood in the kitchen, trying to call the electric company on his cell phone. The frustrated look on his face told us no. So much for looking at the disc tonight. Now I’d have to wait.

  My mom set down the Burger Planet bags she’d picked up on the way home. I ate in a hurry in the firelight and rushed to the bathroom, taking one of the big emergency candles with me.

  The A was still there on my arm, bright as ever. I hadn’t showed it to my mom. She’d scream at me and ask where I’d gotten a tattoo, and I wouldn’t have an answer for her. Then she’d make me join dance or something. At least it wasn’t huge or anything—only a couple inches tall. I could hide it by wearing long sleeved shirts without a problem. If it didn’t have anything to do with the Shadow Regime, it would actually look kind of cool.

  But it wasn’t cool. Because A. Gist had put it there with that flying blue light, and that couldn’t mean anything good. I felt like a cow marked for slaughter.

  The A stung when I touched it, like a bruise or a burn. I winced, grabbed a bar of soap, and started scrubbing at it as hard as I could. It burned some more, but it had to come off, pain or not.

  I think I scrubbed at my skin at least eight times. And—you guessed it—the A refused to come off or even fade a little. Once my skin turned bright red around it, I gave up and threw the bar of soap (now much smaller) into the sink. I’d have to settle with hiding it for now. I rolled my sleeve back down over it and prayed that it wasn’t permanent.