Capsule

by Mel Torrefranca

  Moon.

  11:44:14

  JACKIE RAN.

  She’d woken in a wild panic to a flimsy, low-hanging branch tickling her face. Her location offered no internet, and although her phone still had service, she had no way to contact Peter or Kat. Jackie simply ran and clung to hope that she’d find them.

  Her vision flashed with nothing but trunks of thick trees. Their branches reached around for her as she ran, rocking with the wind and threatening to catch her. She tried to dodge them, but despite her evasive efforts, more appeared like respawning fruits in a never-ending level of Fruit Ninja.

  The energy Jackie didn’t use balancing on the slightly-damp grass beneath her she directed into searching her surroundings. Her original objective had been to find Kat, Peter, or a sign of the capsule, but as more time passed and her panic intensified, she searched for a road, a path—any possible way to escape the foggy labyrinth. The air chilled her bare arms to the point where Jackie believed they were frosted over.

  Where am I?

  She thought back to when Mrs. Mendoza had lost her at the mall when she was five. It hadn’t occurred to her that she’d never felt that same level of fear since then. That unrealistic worry of being lost forever—it impaled Jackie and drained the last few drops of common sense from her veins.

  Is this what it feels like? Jackie rubbed her arms as she ran, but all that did was leave her fingers numb. Is this what it feels like to know the game might kill you?

  Jackie slowed to a stop, head spinning as she rotated in circles, her sneakers pressing softly against the untainted grass. Surrounding her were nothing but trees and the sickening sight of untouched land. For all she knew she was in the middle of nowhere, miles from civilization.

  Jackie staggered to the side, her balance failing her as she leaned against a sturdy tree. Mosquitos swirled around the air in flocks, clouding her vision, but she had no energy left to swat them away. What if Peter and Kat were hours away from her? What if the game had trapped her here to fend for herself?

  Footsteps squished against the damp grass. Jackie took a dizzy step forward, but by the time the trees stood vertically again, two warm hands had rested onto her shoulders from behind.

  “Let go of me!” Jackie tried to pry the palms off her, yelling until the air in her lungs dissipated.

  “Jackie!” A girl’s voice. “Calm down. It’s me.”

  The hands loosened enough for Jackie to slip away from their grasp. She turned around, heart still racing even though she’d already recognized the voice as Kat’s. She needed to see Kat’s face in front of her to verify her assumption—to ensure the forest wasn’t playing mind games with her.

  When Jackie made eye contact with Kat, the shadows on the grass started to look less like skeleton arms.

  I should really stop playing apocalypse games.

  Kat crossed her arms with a slanted grin. “Hello to you too.”

  “Dude.” Jackie steadied her breath as her heart rate slowed to its normal pace. “This is crazy.”

  “Is it really? I couldn’t tell.” Kat turned right and marched between two outstretched branches. “But don’t stress any more than you already have. If the emergency button is anything, it’s a blessing.”

  Jackie used Kat’s yellow backpack as a guide, following her as she weaved between trees. In the distance, a hint of dark gray taunted her. A road.

  “Quasso?” Jackie asked.

  “That’s it.” Kat’s arms hardly swung as she walked. “Took us right to it.”

  Jackie shut her eyes, her last hint of fear washing away. The emergency button had brought her and Kat to Quasso Drive, which meant Peter had to be somewhere close too. Surely they’d run into him at some point, so for now their first priority was to find the Level Four capsule.

  Jackie thought back to the police chase earlier. Her hands rolled into fists at her side, imagining the pressure of her fingertips wrapped tightly around the steering wheel of the SUV, the adrenaline rushing through her veins. It was the first time she understood Kat’s impulsive nature. No, her risks weren’t always justifiable, but Jackie could at least understand the desire to have that feeling again. That feeling of being alive when everything else had lost its color.

  “That drive was something,” Jackie said.

  “Almost as intense as the movies.” Kat yanked at her neon pink scrunchie, and her blond hair fell in waves over her shoulders. “I guess the police officer found nothing but an empty car. I’d pay good money to see the look on his face.” She tucked the scrunchie into the side pocket of her backpack.

  Jackie caught up to her side, walking next to her at a matched pace. She was about to ask Kat about where she’d woken up after the emergency button, but Kat spoke first.

  “I’ve been wondering something.” Kat’s hair tumbled over her shoulders with every step, reminding Jackie of Emmeline’s calming presence in the Level Two Memory. “Why are you doing this?”

  “Doing what?” Jackie asked.

  “Helping us. You definitely don’t have a reason to.”

  Jackie faced her muddied sneakers. Mrs. Mendoza had yelled at her before she’d started the countdown. She’d played to prove that she wasn’t the person her mom made her out to be. That she wasn’t the kind of person to see someone hanging from a cliff and refuse to lend a hand. But once she’d gone back in time, had it really been her mom’s words that kept her going?

  Jackie glued her lips together. No response was better than a false one.

  Quasso Drive glowed in contrast to the dark shadows of the woods. The gray sky illuminated the sacred asphalt in a spotlight.

  They stopped and stood at the edge of the road in silence.

  “By the way,” Kat said, accepting Jackie’s empty response, “I think I’m starting to understand why Peter didn’t want you in the ocean earlier.”

  “Because he was scared?” Jackie took a step forward onto the asphalt. It was slightly warmer out from under the shade. “After what happened to Nicholas, I wouldn’t be surprised if he had a fear of the ocean.”

  “I doubt that. Peter’s not the type of guy to have such a simple fear.” Kat made a sharp left turn, passing behind Jackie and stopping in front of a sturdy tree. “ I think he was scared of Level Three.”

  “Why’s that?” Jackie caught up to Kat’s side and followed her gaze to a thick wooden board nailed to the tree’s trunk, a yellow zinnia lying delicately on top. On the wooden plaque was the phrase In honor of Emmeline Pike.

  A tree. A single yellow flower.

  “Your brother had a crush on Emmeline Pike at the absolute worst time. The Emmeline Pike,” Peter had told her earlier.

  Jackie finally understood the magnitude of the impact Emmeline’s death had left on Brookwood High. Two and a half years ago, Emmeline had crashed into a tree—that’s what the plaque and flower implied.

  “Because I’m scared of Level Four.” Kat plucked the yellow flower from the plaque and spun the petals by rolling her fingers along the stem. “Peter knew that if the level took place at Pelle Cove it probably had something to do with his uncle’s death. So let me warn you—what I think you’re about to see probably won’t be my proudest moment.”

  The zinnia fluttered to the ground as Kat faced her.

  Jackie wasn’t sure what to say. She searched Kat for a sign of fear—of anything—but nothing was there. She didn’t panic like Peter had before Level Three. She didn’t try to get out of searching for the capsule. Instead, she watched Jackie as though she were testing her.

  Leaves rustled above them. In a jolt Jackie brought her chin to the sky, eyes narrowing on a hint of silver between a few branches. She took a step to her left, catching a clear sight of the fourth capsule. It danced in the air, following the swaying motion of the tree as the wind bullied its branches. Like the third capsule at Pelle Cove, it shook before shooting
higher, tucking itself into a network of thinner branches, nothing but a few silver specks remaining in sight.

  Kat’s chin joined her in pointing at the fourth capsule. “I’m not great with heights.”

  “Me neither.” Jackie took a step back to assess the problem. “But one of us is gonna have to be.”

  The main issue was the opening span of flat trunk leading up to the abundance of branches. As long as Jackie could get herself onto the lowest branch, she’d have an easy time climbing.

  When Jackie reached for the phone in her back pocket, Kat already had her palm out, waiting for Jackie to hand it to her. She knew what Jackie needed without having to say a word, and as Jackie placed her phone in Kat’s hand, she thought about her games of Mystery Bullets with Eugene. Sometimes in the middle of battle they’d have to take action faster than they could communicate through words. Their teamwork was strong enough to connect them through nothing but a digital screen, and she recognized a similar connection forming between her and Kat.

  Maybe Eugene’s right. Jackie took a few solid steps back before running and launching her right foot off the ground. Maybe there are people out there who could understand me like he does.

  Jackie’s left hand locked around the lowest branch. The tree wasn’t at all slippery, but it was hard to get a solid grip.

  Kat grabbed the bottom of Jackie’s sneakers and extended her arms to give her a boost.

  “Hurry!” Kat shouted.

  “Fine, okay.” With a deep breath, Jackie pressed her palms against the branch and pulled her knees forward, slamming them onto the bark. She nearly tumbled over, her heart backflipping inside of her, but she reached for a higher branch to steady herself.

  With both hands now wrapped around a secondary branch for support, Jackie pulled herself to her feet and stood.

  The thought hadn’t struck Jackie until she’d started navigating through the next layer of branches that she was climbing the same tree that had killed Emmeline Pike two and a half years prior. The news sent chills down her spine. Or maybe it was the temperature of the air. Hard to tell.

  “What the hell?” Kat said. “What’s Jay doing here?”

  Jackie looked down at Kat for the first time. She’d climbed no more than seven feet off the ground, but her stomach sank at the mere thought of falling. “What’s wrong?” She tightened her fingers around the branches.

  “Jay pulled up with Peter in his car.” Kat ripped her focus away from Quasso Drive and looked up at Jackie. “But forget about that—just hurry up and open it!”

  “Kat? You’re here too?”

  Jackie’s eyes widened. Kat hadn’t lied—that was definitely Jay’s voice.

  “Do you think you could get a ride home?” Jay had asked on the phone earlier. “I’m planning to visit a friend.”

  That friend. Jackie held her breath as she scaled the next few branches. Did he mean Emmeline?

  The levels hadn’t brought anything good so far, but Jackie wasn’t worried for a change. All she could think about was that opening this capsule meant they’d be one step closer to fixing the disaster this game had created. She’d seen the outcome of a world where Peter and Kat had disappeared, and she didn’t want to go back to it.

  “Are you crazy?” Peter shouted. “Get down from there!”

  Jackie balanced herself on a branch within an arm’s reach from the capsule. When she looked down for the second time, there were three chins facing her. She didn’t know why Peter wanted her to come down, but she didn’t have time to bother with his melodrama anymore.

  “Jackie?” Jay’s face grew pale as he ran his fingers over the buttons of his flannel. “What are you doing up there?”

  Jackie redirected her attention away from them. Careful to hold her balance, she moved her steady hands from the branches to the capsule. Her fingers met the abstract surface for the fourth time.

  “Don’t twist it!” Peter warned.

  But he was too late.

  LEVEL FOUR

  DEAR STRANGER,

  Kat sat cross-legged on her bed, five papers spread out over her duvet cover. The lights in her bedroom were off, and she held a warm flashlight in her hand to light up the words. Over the past few weeks, reading the poems had become an evening ritual of hers, but she’d made no progress on deciphering the code.

  Her eyes hopped between the pages, reading the lines at random in hopes that it’d form something meaningful.

  But they can’t resist the smooth paint

  When the love I pursue is stolen from you

  I wonder if you ever get homesick

  Oh, how I wish I could do something right

  Sometimes I forget my own face

  The door popped open, and Mr. Pike’s nose stuck through the gap. “There’s a boy at the door.” A moment passed before he burst into the room completely, his stiff voice softening. Kat couldn’t see his figure in the dark room—only the reflection of light in his floating eyes. “What’s wrong?”

  Illuminated by the golden lights of the flashlight in her hand, Kat’s tears trickled off her chin and dissolved into her blood-orange corduroy skirt. She waited for that feeling of sickness to kick in. Or fear, sadness, anger—she’d welcome absolutely anything with open doors. But the tears were forced, like usual.

  Fake.

  Kat gathered the papers, layering them on top of each other in no particular order and folding the stack into quarters. She wiped the tears on her oversized black sweater and tucked the papers into the palm of her hand.

  “Kat?” Mr. Pike said.

  She turned her flashlight off and watched her dad’s wide eyes fade into the shadows, but his concerned presence lingered in the doorway. Mr. Pike felt sorry for his daughter. His daughter who was still grieving the loss of her older sister. His daughter who cried every night in her dark bedroom in a pit of despair. Emmeline had died, and Kat was struggling to move on. But that was only the story he wanted to believe—what everyone wanted to believe.

  Kat tossed the flashlight onto the duvet cover. “Tell him to go away.”

  “Sweetie.” Mr. Pike’s soothing voice filled the pitch-black room with a comforting warmth. “He was one of her friends, wasn’t he?”

  Kat pursed her lips and nodded. She thanked the darkness for cloaking her. She didn’t want to disappoint Mr. Pike by allowing him to see her eyes. All dead. Nothing there. As much as she knew her dad didn’t like seeing her in pain, she also knew that seeing her without it would leave him more hurt than ever.

  Kat was the girl who didn’t cry when she heard the news.

  Who didn’t cry at her own sister’s funeral.

  Kat was the girl who didn’t care. And she was trying to fix that. She was trying to cry. Trying to feel. Trying to be normal, but nothing worked. Every emotion was self-inflicted. Contrived. Unreal.

  “You should at least talk to him,” Mr. Pike said.

  What he didn’t know was that she’d already done that. She had sat in the passenger seat of Jay’s Honda three times with the false hope that he could help her find answers.

  Ever since Emmeline passed away, Kat had been overwhelmed with a million messages. All it took was a dead sister to make the whole world cater to her emotional state. Friends, classmates, strangers—they all told her how sorry they were and checked in with her on a frequent basis. They all tried to empathize with someone who apparently had no empathy in the first place, but Jay—he wanted answers, and that was something he and Kat had in common.

  It was Jay’s Instagram DM that had stood out to her the most. Among the swarm of emotional messages, his was the only one with enough logic to catch her eye. I know you don’t have answers, Jay had written, but maybe we can find them. He’d sent this message exactly six months after Emmeline’s death.

  Kat slid her feet off the bed to find that Mr. Pike had already disappeared
from her room. She stepped into the hallway, squinting under the bright lights and clutching the paper in her hands. As she walked between the walls of family portraits—many of which featured Emmeline’s smiling face—she braced herself for another hopeless meeting with Jay.

  Kat entered the dining room, where Jay stood on the patio behind the open front door. When he finally raised his chin and made eye contact with her, the face Kat saw was nothing like the one she’d seen when he’d first appeared at the Pike household to talk to Emmeline that day. He wasn’t confused anymore. Now he was nothing but a shell. Not fully there. Incomplete. He was the same as Kat—dying for something to fill the void. Dying for answers.

  But why him? Why did this random high school boy care so much about finding answers when it was absolutely not his problem? Why did he experience the same emptiness as Kat when he and Emmeline had hardly been a part of each other’s lives?

  Kat and Jay had known each other through Emmeline, only for a moment, and that was all. Yet that brief overlap had brought them together four extra times.

  Today—their fourth meeting—would be the last.

  As Kat approached the front door, Jay’s hands reached for the edges of his flannel as though it were instinctive. He grinned with that hopeful glimmer on his teeth. “We’ll figure this out.”

  Too lazy to put on any shoes, Kat stepped forward onto the patio wearing her lemon-colored knee socks pulled over her dotted tights. Jay didn’t bother questioning her fashion choice. He rushed down the front steps, fingers rustling through his front pocket for the keys to his car.

  The pair sat in Jay’s Honda alone that Saturday afternoon. Jay had his hands on the steering wheel, and the key waited patiently in the lock, but he refused to start the car.

  Kat suffocated the folded papers in her left hand. “We haven’t found anything since the first time we went to Quasso.”

  Jay and Kat had found the papers three weeks ago by the tree Emmeline had struck that night. They’d been resting under a baby-blue hydrangea, and judging by the sticky end of the stem, the flower had been freshly cut. They hadn’t found anything new since then. No poems. No clues. No more blue flowers.