The Darkest Minds

Liam is a teenage boy who is Ruby’s romantic interest and the informal leader of the group of Psi young people on the run from the Caledonia camp in Ohio. Liam, who is sometimes called “Lee” by his friends, is described as white, having “light, ashy blond” hair and blue eyes and regularly wearing a leather jacket (109). A Blue, Liam is able to use telepathic abilities to move objects (and occasionally people) around. Liam is originally from Wilmington, North Carolina, and he speaks with a southern accent. He grew up with a younger sister Claire, who it is implied died of IAAN, and a brother, Cole, who became involved in the Children’s League. Liam did not like the violent effect the League had on his brother, and he left the League during training. Eventually, he was picked up by PSFs and brought to Caledonia, where he became one of the leaders of a breakout from the camp.

Liam gravitates toward leadership, which may be why Chubs often refers to him as “the general” (135). He is a charismatic boy who naturally gets along well with other people. According to Chubs, at Caledonia, “Everyone loved him, even some of the PSFs” (328). Liam is extroverted and easygoing with others. When Liam has been at East River for only a few days, Ruby marvels that he is already playing football with other kids, laughing “like they had known each other since preschool” (357), while she and Chubs are more standoffish. Yet he also struggles with the weight of leadership. Because the breakout at Caledonia led to kids being shot by PSFs, Liam worries that he failed, and that those who did manage to escape regret following him. He experiences guilt and self-doubt, as well as a resolve to take on more responsibility in order to make things right. He is motivated to protect Zu and Chubs, to deliver the letter his friend Jack, who died at Caledonia, wrote to his parents, and also, he tells Ruby privately, to free Psi kids in all the camps.

Ruby notices right away how kind-hearted Liam is. He shows compassion to Ruby soon after meeting her, seeing that she has come from a camp, and she observes him “looking at me with all the sympathy and pity required of someone watching a stray puppy being put down” (112). According to both Ruby and Chubs, Liam is an inherently trusting person who can be too unguarded in his interactions with others. Chubs says about him, “He’s so busy looking inside people to find the good that he misses the knife they’re holding in their hand” (256). This can make both Chubs and Ruby feel protective of him.

Liam seems to be attracted to Ruby early in the narrative, being attentive to her distress in Chapter 12 and feeling nervous when offering her a pair of socks. Chubs, noticing Liam’s nervousness, urges Ruby to just “take the damn socks and put the kid out of his misery” (190). Later, when Ruby tells Liam that he doesn’t need to lie with her, that he can “talk or vent or scream” to her, Liam responds powerfully, moving to kiss her (275). He more consistently and seriously expresses his interest in Ruby throughout the novel, and they share more confidences in one another. By the end of the novel, he is determined to stay and continue a relationship with her even in the Children’s League. It is because Ruby can’t bear to see Liam’s kindness warped by the violent actions of the League that she decides to erase herself from his memory so that he will no longer be motivated to stay.

Chubs, whose real name is Charles Carrington Meriwether IV, is a teenage boy who also is on the run from the Psi internment camp in Caledonia, Ohio. Chubs’s nickname, given to him in the camp, does not describe his body, which Ruby observes is “skinny as a stick” (111). He has poor eyesight and wears “thin, silver-framed glasses” (110). Chubs, like Liam, is a Blue, although he uses his telepathic powers much less frequently than Liam does in the novel. Chubs, who is black, spent his childhood in northern Virginia in metropolitan Washington, D.C. His father is a trauma surgeon, and his mother used to work for the Department of Defense, although she lost her job for trying to protect Chubs. His family came up with a system of writing coded online book reviews to send messages after Chubs had to go into hiding, and Ruby describes them as “pretty genius” (260).

Chubs has an anxious, cautious personality, and he has difficulty trusting people. He is the character most worried about skip tracers following Black Betty when the four travelers are on the road. When Ruby first meets Chubs, he does not see any reason to welcome her into their party, and he is concerned she has secrets that could put them in danger. He makes pointed comments questioning why she is there, and he blames Ruby for wasting their time or putting them at risk.

However, Chubs is also a fiercely protective friend. For example, he feels responsible for Zu’s well-being, and when Zu leaves, he is devastated and worried. Early in the novel, Liam explains to Ruby that Chubs’s hostility toward her is really rooted in his fear that something bad will happen to the people he cares about. Liam says about Chubs: “...all of this acid he’s throwing your way? It’s coming from a good place. If you stick it out, I swear you won’t find a more loyal friend” (143). This proves to be true, as after Ruby and Chubs bond, Chubs fully embraces Ruby into his circle, and he takes several actions to protect her throughout the last third of the novel, including using his powers against Clancy Gray.

Chubs is highly intelligent, and he regrets not having the opportunity to receive a high school or college education. He reads constantly in Black Betty, and his favorite book is Watership Down, also a childhood favorite of Ruby’s. Analytical by nature, he often shows insight in his thoughts on other characters. He employs sarcasm and verbal humor to make points. When the teens have survived a risky car chase, after Liam asks if Zu is all right, Chubs responds, “Well, I’m fine, thanks for asking,” to highlight both Liam’s apparent lack of concern for him as well as to emphasize the unreasonable danger of the situation (121). Chubs also shows a tendency to lash out in anger and regret his actions later.

Zu, whose full name is Suzume, is an 11-year old girl on the run from the Psi camp in Caledonia, Ohio, traveling with Liam and Chubs. Throughout the novel, Zu does not speak, communicating entirely through writing or gestures. Zu is a Yellow, meaning that she has the ability to manipulate electricity, and for most of the novel, she wears rubber gloves out of an apparent fear of hurting someone with her ability, something Ruby relates to. Zu is Japanese American, physically small for her age—Ruby initially believes she is only eight or nine years old—and has very short hair because her head was shaved in the camps due to a lice outbreak. Ruby describes her face as “so pretty she might have been a doll” (100). Although Chubs’s and Liam’s parents tried to hide them from the PSFs, Liam tells Ruby that Zu’s parents actually turned her in, as they were afraid of her abilities (209). She does, however, have a Psi cousin, Hina, with whom she has a good relationship at Caledonia and who she finds later at East River.

Zu is the first of the Black Betty travelers Ruby meets, and when she first gets to know Zu, she is tentative, shy, and shows signs of having been traumatized. She is troubled by regular nightmares of the breakout from Caledonia. Ruby wonders why she doesn’t speak and speculates whether it is the result of something done at Caledonia, or whether it’s Zu’s choice. Liam responds, “it has everything to do with what they did, and it’s not a choice” (210). Zu also has powerful abilities, and when she uses them to inflict violence to protect the group, she cries. But throughout the novel, especially as she interacts with Ruby, who encourages her and offers her female friendship, she becomes more confident and self-assured. When she makes the decision to leave East River with her cousin to go to California and find family in chapter 24, Ruby is amazed that her face is “so different from the girl I had met only a few weeks ago” (401).

One motivation for Zu seems to be female companionship and identity. She is the one who first decides to allow Ruby to enter Black Betty when Ruby is on the run from Martin, Cate and Rob, and she seems eager for Ruby’s friendship. Although Zu’s hair has been cut short at the camp, Ruby observes Zu gesturing absent-mindedly at long hair that is no longer there, as though her hair were an important part of her identity. She also seems to find meaning in putting together outfits with Ruby in the ruined Walmart, feeling more confident by what clothing she chooses to wear. When Zu gets to East River, she also seems to benefit from having an intimate bond with her cousin Hina, who also is able to communicate with her and speak for her.

Clancy Gray is one of the antagonists in The Darkest Minds, a teenage boy who is also an Orange, like Ruby. Clancy, also known as the “Slip Kid,” is the leader of the East River community. He is described by Ruby as having “thick, wavy black hair” and dark eyes (334). He is not as tall as Liam or Chubs, and Ruby says he is attractive, although there is reason to wonder whether he may be manipulating her perception of him. Clancy is the son of President Gray, and he was one of the first Psi kids sent to Thurmond, supposedly to be cured of their powers.

Clancy appears to have positive qualities. Clancy seems to be a capable leader who runs a community where Psi kids are relatively safe and happy. Ruby observes him arbitrating disputes between kids and is impressed by his skills. He offers to help Ruby learn to manage her powers, and he expresses superficial empathy with what Ruby has gone through. Clancy is charismatic and winning, and Ruby is drawn to him. Because he is an Orange, Ruby also finds sharing Clancy’s memories to be much easier and less stressful than sharing other people’s; there is “nothing frightening about Clancy’s mind” (360). She compares the experience to being led around by the hand.

Yet as the narrative unfolds, we learn that Clancy uses his Orange abilities to manipulate others’ impressions of him to an extent that even Ruby’s descriptions of him may at times be unreliable narration. Chubs, who seems to be exempt to Orange abilities, notices that Clancy does little of the work of running East River. He is revealed as having significant control over his father, President Gray, and using East River for his own purposes. Clancy also violates Ruby’s boundaries in multiple ways, distorting her feelings toward him, paralyzing her body, assaulting her, and entering her memories without consent. Chubs compares Clancy’s leadership to that of Liam and Jack, noting that Clancy “just liked being in control,” and that although he acted like a leader, he was “only ever thinking of himself” (456). Clancy does, however, claim to care enough about Ruby to “run” if she were injured (457).