During the Second Civil War, a new U.S. political party called the Family Protection Movement established The Divide, which separates Normal people from those who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender. Seventeen-year old Serenity Blackwater lives in the normal Midwestern town of Mapleville, but she is not normal. She hacks into an illegal gay chat room and meets Dawn, a lesbian who lives in a gay community less than a mile away. Serenity discovers normal people can bribe their way inside the walls and decides to go, both to meet Dawn and check out what may be her future home. Dawn is even more beautiful than Serenity hoped, and the two soon become a couple. But Serenity only has a few months before she must take the Normal Verification Test, and then she’ll be separated from her family forever. So she joins the Human Equality Organization, an underground group working to end The Divide. Dawn thinks the rebellion is too dangerous, and since Dawn’s ex-girlfriend Malaki is also a member, Serenity doesn’t tell Dawn about her involvement. Serenity reveals to the HEO that her parents are leading a campaign to organize attacks on all Gay Communities. With her help, the HEO creates Project Jericho, in which all Gay Communities walls will implode at once. But after too many delays, and when Dawn discovers Serenity has been spending more time with Malaki than her, Serenity knows she has to start the revolution herself. She heads to D.C. to contact a group of senators secretly against The Divide ... or straight into a trap set by the Family Protection Movement.

Uprising

“When you broke up with me…” she says.


Now I’m the one who has to look away. “You’re an amazing person—the rebel I’ve always wanted to be. I care about you a lot, and after what I’ve been through I appreciate everyone and everything in my life so much more.”


“But.” I sigh. “I also realized…even though Dawn hurt me, I still want another chance to work things out with her. I’m sorry.”


“You don’t have to be sorry. After the torture you’ve been through you must think I’m crazy for wanting to keep fighting, and for everything else I ever said.”


I shake my head. “I understand why you wanted to fight to get your mom back. But I don’t want to spend my life at war. Even if we work with HEO, Sol, and all these soldiers, every decision, every action, will take weeks and months of planning. We need to end this, now. You and me.”


Chapter 62