When she gets back to her room, America’s maids start fucking applauding for her.  Because, yeah, it’s just so awesome what she did, right?  She STATED THE FUCKING OBVIOUS, STUFF THAT EVERY NON-LOBOTOMIZED PERSON IN THE COUNTRY SHOULD ALREADY KNOW, and that makes her special.

I guess there’s a lack of non-lobotomized people in this country.

She decides that genuflecting is just so hard to deal with, so she’s going to go walking in the rebel-infested gardens.  On the way, she runs into Maxon coming out of the hospital wing, and he seems to be hiding some injury, so chalk one up for parental abuse.  Considering we’re over 85% into the second book and this is the first hint of it, I’m less inclined to call this a twist and inclined to call it an asspull.

Maxon points out that America was very stupid, that that isn’t the way to effect change, and that grandstanding just makes people mad.  He points out that he’s trying to change things little bits at a time, on the sly, so that people don’t freak out and send him to the hospital wing.

Oh, and he’s got a metal box with him.  Whatever that thing is.

Suddenly, another attack!  I think the author just throws these in like a NaNoWriMo plot ninja every time she doesn’t know what to do next.

And then, like bees intent on landing, small, quick things buzzed into the hall.  A guard was struck and fell back, his head hitting the marble with a disturbing crack.

…Bees?  Really?  Fucking BEES?

I know it’s not real bees, but what the fuck is it?  That’s so strange a description.  I mean, bees aren’t particularly fast.  Are we talking about future tech of some sort, a projectile that sort of just lazily wanders in and hits you on the head?  Because now I’m just imagining bullets that sort of wander around, land on people, and then the people fall over.  It’s quite silly and not the least bit frightening.

Maxon can’t run because of whatever was done to him, so he and America hide in a wall.  It turns out their hiding place is a small panic room and—

Alright, what the fuck?  There’s panic rooms and secret passages all over the place.  Was this palace built expecting that the people in it would frequently need to hide at a moment’s notice?

Well.  Probably.

Maxon mentions that these rooms are used for servants who are too far away from the downstairs safe rooms, and also that now that they’re in it the door won’t open.  So…any servants who were running for that room are just fucked now.

Turns out that you need a key to open it from the inside or outside, otherwise you’re stuck in there for two days, which sounds like nothing more than an excuse to get the two of them stuck together for two days.  Why the fuck would you need a key to get out from the inside?

Maxon’s still in pain, and finally he “can’t take it anymore” and starts stripping down.  Despite the whole grimacing and pained expression thing, all America can think about is “bow chicka bow” while helping him get his shirt off.  By the way, he’s got the same perfect chest as every other male love interest in these kinds of books.

But enough of his front, his back is covered in blood and scars.  Clearly Clarkson whips him or has him whipped.  The real question I’m asking is…he just came out of the hospital wing.  Who let him out of there without even putting a bandage on that shit?

He casually talks about how this has been going on for a while and only he, his dad, and the doctor knows.  The doctor that…didn’t do anything to fix him up…

There’s a lot of page time dedicated to America cleaning him up and putting bandages on.

And the end of the chapter is Maxon asking

“Don’t you want me to explain Kriss and Celeste?  Don’t you think you deserve that?”

I’d rather have you explain a whole list of problems I got before I even begin to care about Kriss and Celeste.