Book 1
After a virus hits, all children are affected (because the virus affects the hormones linked to puberty). When children reach age 10, they either die (like the majority of kids do), or they develop powers in one of the 5 categories:
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Red = Create fire
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Orange = Cause hypnosis
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Yellow = Spark electricity
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Blue = Move things with their mind
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Green = Solve puzzles with a photographic memory
On the night that Ruby turned 10, she kissed both of her parents while they were sleeping, and this contact unknowingly erased their memories of Ruby with her new Orange powers. When they woke up, they were alarmed that a mysterious child was in their house, so they called her in to the police. A PSF officer showed up instead and took her to a “rehabilitation” camp.
These camps claimed to be helping kids get rid of their powers, but instead they were more like labor camps. The officials kept the kids in line from using their powers by enforcing strict punishments otherwise.
Ruby noticed that Greens were viewed by the officials as the least threat, so when Ruby was taking her classification test, she used her Orange powers to convincingly tell the sorter that she was a Green. Good thing, because later all Oranges killed, all the Yellows were taken away to who-knows-where, and all the Reds were taken into the President’s “Project Jubilee” to become a special military unit. But because Ruby never gets training on her powers, she accidentally erased memories of her from her only friend at the camp, Sam, just by a simple touch, which devastates Ruby.
A rebel group named the Children’s League (which claims to be helping kids, but really they have their own agenda) planted a secret frequency in the White Noise that the camp played one day to weed out secret Oranges. Only Ruby and a guy named Martin (who had switched places with a Green) reacted extra badly, so a Children’s League official (Cate) who was posing as a volunteer camp nurse snuck them out.
When Cate, Ruby, and Martin meet up with Cate’s boyfriend at an abandoned gas station, Cate’s boyfriend says that he wasn’t successful with breaking out the Oranges at a different camp. But when Ruby brushes arms with him, she sees that he killed those Oranges in an alleyway instead, so Ruby no longer feels safe. While she was supposed to be taking a bathroom break, she comes across a group of kids who broke out of a different camp:
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Suzume = 11-year-old Asian Yellow, who became mute after the trauma at the camp
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Liam = Blue, who is the group’s leader, who eventually develops feelings for Ruby
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Chubs = Blue, who is very reluctant about becoming friends with new people and is fiercely loyal to his existing friends
The four of them seek out the infamous “Slip Kid”, who is an Orange who has snuck out of camp a record 4 times. He is supposedly the only leader who actually provides a safe haven for the children. The only clue that they get about the Slip Kid’s location is “Edo”, which they figure out translates to “5-4-oh”, as in radio station 540AM. On this station, there is white noise plus the added frequency of someone saying the safe haven’s location, which only children with powers can hear.
Ruby is initially eager to talk to the Slip Kid (Clancy, who is also the President’s son) since he is the only other Orange she knows of (besides Martin). But he gives off some creepy vibes, so Ruby becomes hesitant, but she eventually agrees to have lessons with him on how to use Orange powers. A month later, Clancy asks Ruby to see her memories surrounding how she erased memories from her parents and from Sam. She agrees, but even after she passes out from how overwhelming it is, Clancy takes advantage and explores the rest of her thoughts anyways without consent and potentially rapes her. Clancy’s selfishness is further exposed when he leaks the location of their safe haven so that his dad will send his army of Reds, which Clancy plans to hypnotize and recruit to his side to then take down the White House together. Instead, somehow the President is tipped off that his son was manipulating him, so a group of armed PSFs are sent instead. Luckily Zu left a day earlier with a group to seek their families in California, and Ruby, Liam, and Chubs survive the attack through hiding.
Chubs, finally having access to Clancy’s laptop, tracks down the location of his friend Jack’s father (with Jack being a guy from his old camp who took a bullet for him). He then arranges a meeting place with his own parents, but before going there, he is intent on dropping off Jack’s letter to his dad. But Jack’s dad views kids with abilities as freaks and devastatingly shoots Chubs (which could have been avoided if they read Jack’s letter first to know that his dad thought of him as a monster). Desperate, Ruby pushes the panic button that the Children’s League gifted her. They capture the three of them, but Ruby convinces them to let Liam go if she cooperates. They agree, and for his safety, she intentionally erases his memories of her.
By the end, we are left wondering:
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Will Zu’s group make it safely to California?
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Will Chubs be ok? (The Children’s League supposedly took him to a hospital, but he was in critical condition)
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Will Liam be safe on his own?
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What will the Children’s League ask Ruby to do?
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Where did Clancy go, assuming he escaped the PSF raid?