by Lily Sparks
!!UPDATE!! Check out Signal’s meltdown in AP Biology, the day of the murder, in Katie Williams’ Instagram!!
I click on the hyperlink to Katie Williams’ Instagram. She has a clip of me, beet red in AP Biology: I’d forgotten a worksheet packet at home and had a small panic attack. I totally forgot about that, but apparently it’s one of many reasons everyone back home thinks I should burn in hell for eternity.
“We should go,” Erik urges.
But I can’t stop scrolling the comments on Katie’s post. Everyone talking about how they could always tell I was a Class A, how I “always creeped them out.”
The only comment that has anything even slightly positive to say is … Jaw Itznicki’s?!
JawsItz: aw she’s not so bad is it for sure she did it?
I click over to Jaw’s Instagram feed. The square that pops up is all blue sky and hot pink bougainvillea. And his location is now Oxnard, in Southern California.
“Erik, look!!” He’s half risen out of his seat, but he gets back down beside me.
“We should go.”
“I know but look, Erik, Jaw’s in California now—”
I scroll through picture after picture until I see one of him leaned up against a front door with the numbers 1227 in frame. All I need now is the street.
“Come on.” Erik takes my hand and almost drags me to my feet, but I can’t put down the tablet.
“Wait, just one more thing—”
At last, a picture with a location attached, a taco shop which Jaw describes as being “Just down the block” on Silver Strand Ave—
SNAP!
The room bursts into color around me, and in the doorway two little blue eyes connect with mine. My heart jerks in my chest at the little boy’s face, peeping around the doorway.
But he’s way more scared than me.
His freckled face goes white as a sheet and he disappears with a gasp, his steps scrambling up the carpeted stairs.
“Time to go!” Erik rushes me toward the playhouse, and gets neatly through the window. I step up onto the playhouse roof, and it buckles under my weight. I let out a cry just as Erik’s hand shoots through the window and grabs mine, so I’m hanging from the basement window.
“Mom! Dad! There’s people downstairs!” the little voice cries as my sneakers rake the wall. Erik grabs my other arm and pulls me until my torso is through the low window. From there I crawl on my elbows onto the cold dirt at the side of the house, frantically wriggling my hips through the small window, all too aware my butt currently says “CHEER.”
I squeeze through just as a sleepy dad’s voice floats out the window above us:
“Garvey, have you been up watching scary movies again?”
We run through the backyard, then up the steep incline into the shelter of the trees. I want to slow down, but Erik keeps sprinting, his flashlight’s circle getting smaller and smaller in front of me.
“Erik!”
He doubles back and links his iron arm through mine, and suddenly I’m pressed tight to his muscled side like we’re in a three-legged race, scrambling and sliding as we thread through the densely packed trees.
I’ve never run this hard, this long, in my life. But it’s a release: all I can think of is how to clear the next obstacle before we meet it headlong, my body burning with the animal joy of escape.
At last the trees open up and I recognize the playground, we’re past the fence, we’re safe. Erik breaks away from me, his grin taking over his entire face as he jumps up and grazes a high branch with his fingertips.
I bend over double, gulping down air, sides burning and cramping.
“You have zero stamina,” Erik says. “That was three quarters of a mile, not even, and I carried you for most of it.”
“I never had … a pentagram … necklace,” I pant. “But Jaw … you were … right, Jaw … was Mr. Moody … after all.” I hang my head for a moment. “Only thing that fits.”
“But you said he had no motive,” Erik reminds me, the sky above us almost lavender. “So what’s his motive?”
“Like what your website said. Some kind of ritualistic murder.”
“If there was going to be a sacrifice that night, why wouldn’t it be you? And not just because you’re the virgin—”
“Obviously, it should have been me,” I say, exasperated. “The only person who would’ve missed me is my mom! And even my mom would’ve been better off with me dead—”
“You never say that again. Ever.” Erik’s voice is so hard it frightens me, his hands gripping my shoulders. “Listen to me, Signal. We’re going to clear your name and get you out of camp, I promise you—”
But his words are drowned out by rhythmic thunder overhead. We look up to see a helicopter pass above us. We watch it descend, the trajectory leading just past the trees to the field in front of the main cabin.
“This isn’t good,” Erik says, tense. “Can you handle more running?”
“Try to keep up,” I gasp, and slip my arm through his.
* * *
But by the time we get to the obstacle course field I’m flailing with exhaustion; my foot catches under the edge of the staked-down tarp and I go sprawling into the middle of the sleeping bags with a wild cry.
Nobody leaps up, poised to attack, Troy and Jada’s sleeping bags jerk apart, and Dennis is scrambling for his glasses as I roll onto my side, panting.
Javier sits up, his puzzled gaze going from me to Erik, and before I can say anything, everyone else gets in the way.
“Where were you guys?”
“Did you hear the helicopter?”
“Kate and Dave weren’t here so this whole time Troy and Jada’ve been making ou—”
“Shut UP, Kurt!” Troy pounces on his brother, who laughs hysterically.
The talk cuts off as we all hear it: a car engine. Driving up to the field.
“Everybody get back in bed!” Javier bellows. “Lay down, lay down!”
I race over to the bedroll next to him, but Javier doesn’t look at me. I start to speak but he turns away on his side. I freeze, curled up next to him, bathed in cold sweat from running arm in arm with Erik, the headlights arcing over us as the car chugs to a stop.
What’s going on? Did Kate and Dave see me and Erik cross the fence? Did that family call the police, and they’ve tracked us down? Is Javier upset? Is he going to break up with me?
The tarp is flooded with light as the driver switches on the high beams; a car door slams and we try to see who’s rushing toward us, but we’re blinded by the glare.
“GET UP! ALL OF YOU, GET UP!” a strange male voice yells.
“I’m sorry, who are you? You work with Dave and Kate?” Javier calls, shielding his face with one hand.
“I said GET UP!” the stranger yells, and kicks the nearest sleeping bag. Jada yelps in pain.
“What the hell, man?!” Troy moves to shield her.
The stranger holds up a fob and clicks it at Troy.
“NO!” Kurt screams.
But Troy is already on his knees, frozen in the beam of the headlights. His skin turns a neon red, like the worst sort of sunburn, burning him from the inside out. Within seconds it’s deepened to purple, bruises blooming out across his skin as corrosive acid dissolves his veins. His eyes, fixed on the man, go crimson and then he collapses forward onto the cold blue tarp.
He didn’t even get a last breath.
Chapter Seventeen
The Director
“Troy!” Kurt screams.
Jada curls over Troy’s body. “No no no no …”
The stranger levels the fob at Kurt, who freezes in place.
“I am the Director of this camp.” The stranger’s cold tone cuts through Jada’s sobs. “We have some developments to discuss at the main cabin. You will proceed there in a single file line, without talking.”
Numb, I climb out of my bedroll and fall into line with everyone else. I can’t look at the poor figure huddled below the headlights, t
he thing that used to be Troy.
As we walk the familiar trail to the main cabin, I’m vaguely aware of Kurt crying and Jada sobbing far behind me, but too afraid to turn and comfort them. None of us do. None of us want to be next.
When I surface from the shock, we’re all in a line across from the Director in the main cabin as he addresses us. He’s tall, spare, white-haired, and looks so … reasonable. So relaxed.
“Training is over,” the Director says calmly. “You will leave on your first mission in twenty-three hours.”
What?
“I don’t have the time,” the Director goes on, “to deal with the Class A sense of entitlement.” He shoots a look at Kate and Dave, who stand in the far corner of the room. “There’s a clean-up back on the obstacle course.”
Kate and Dave exit at his command, to “clean up” Troy. Troy, who held my wrists so tight under Dog Mask’s body and hadn’t gotten a chance to eat his M&Ms and let Jada Sharpie his throat just because he wanted to see her win. I will never hear his laugh again. And all I can do is stare at the wood grain of the floor between my wet, grass-stained sneakers.
The Director casually holds up a stack of folders, like a high school English teacher going through examples of a book report they assign every year.
“As this is your first mission, you’ll be sent out in pairs to help each other with execution and concealment of four high-priority targets, targets you have been matched with based on the strengths you’ve displayed.”
This is how they plan to keep us from striking out on our own once we’re past the fence? The buddy system?
I’m going to be free. I’m going to be free in twenty-three hours. The relief is so intense I have to choke back a sob.
“So. First pair: Jada and Erik.”
Erik is expressionless. Jada walks behind him like a zombie. The Director hands them each a folder.
“Javier and Lark.” Lark?
Javier and Nobody walk up to the Director to take their folders. If Nobody is angry he used her real name, she doesn’t show it.
“Troy and Kurt.”
Kurt walks up alone.
“Dennis and Signal.”
I can’t bring myself to look into the Director’s face, I just take the folder and follow Dennis into the dining area, the room so much emptier without the usual rowdy laughter.
“Read over your briefings in silence, please.”
I look up to see Javier staring at me from across the room. I offer a minuscule smile, but he looks away as Nobody, beside him, raises her hand.
The Director stares at her for a beat, but she doesn’t drop her arm.
“Yes?”
“I’ve been assigned a primary target, but it seems like there’s also a lot of … potential casualties.”
“Yes,” the Director says. “Casualties may be required to escape from the Ojai compound.”
Ojai? That sounds so familiar. Some kind of celebrity got married there … Because it was close to Los Angeles, in Southern California. Where Oxnard is.
Where Jaw is.
“It seems like the potential casualties would be teenage girls,” Nobody continues, her raspy voice firm. “So I can’t do that.”
“You’re refusing your mission?”
“I’m not going to be any good to you on this one,” Nobody insists, and the air goes electric. What is she thinking? He’ll kill her.
“You don’t have a choice in the matter.” The Director’s voice is a warning. Nobody is about to respond when I swing my arm into the air. I force myself to meet the Director’s eyes, flat dark holes in a thin pink face, shielded by thick glasses.
“I’ll trade with her.” I can barely get the words out.
“Trade?” The Director’s upper lip curls, revealing teeth the color of old piano keys.
At last Javier looks at me, and almost imperceptibly shakes his head: Don’t.
“Your targets have been assigned to your skill level.” The Director walks slowly toward my table. Dennis, next to me, shrinks into himself. “You’re Lark’s inferior. If you trade, you dramatically reduce your odds of getting back to camp alive.”
I hold his gaze. “Okay. I’ll still do it.”
There’s a long moment, and the Director flicks his wrist so the fob lands in his palm. He moves the pad of his thumb over the button.
“Very well,” the Director shrugs at last, letting the fob slip from his hand and rattle around his bony wrist. My teeth unclench. “Leave your folder at your table and exchange seats. But there will be no more trades. And this one is final.”
I push back my chair, the scraping sound harsh in the silence. Nobody reaches out and squeezes my hand quickly as we pass by each other, and then I’m next to Javier.
I look over at him, long enough that he should be able to tell, but he won’t look back at me. He stares down at his folder deliberately instead, so I open mine and see the face of the man we’re supposed to murder.
Angel CHILDS: 30, 5’8”, brown hair, brown eyes.
First noted in Santa Cruz two years ago, in a small camper van with glow-in-the-dark stickers adhered to its side.
Angel spent approx. last two years traveling the California coast, playing his guitar in coffee shops and tourist spots. He met a freshmen co-ed who subsequently dropped out to join Angel on his tour of the PCH and help recruit others. Within four months six college drop-outs were living in Childs’ van.
They traded up to a decommissioned school bus, which they drove to musical festivals throughout SoCal until they arrived at a collective in Ojai, called Owl’s Nest.
Once an active commune in the 1960s, Owl’s Nest was home to three older artists who had lived there continuously for over fifty years. They reportedly invited the newcomers to stay.
By spring, all three artists had disappeared. Childs claimed they left after signing the property over to his first recruit, called “Compass” by his group, who refer to themselves as “The Constellation.”
Since the disappearance of the original owners, the population of Owl’s Nest has risen to approx. fifty adults between the ages of eighteen and twenty-four.
Neighbors have reported hearing gunshots, as well as sightings of Childs driving down horse trails on an ATV while wearing a holster. Members of a prominent California biker gang known as the Death Heads have been seen going in and out of Owl’s Nest at night.
Childs himself never leaves.
Ergo, this target must be dispatched from within the compound, which will take considerable strategy to infiltrate. They are highly selective in deciding which guests may enter, and within their own hierarchy access to Childs is highly limited.
Furthermore, if The Constellation detects Angel Childs’ assassination before agents leave the compound, the agents will almost certainly be terminated.
A picture paper-clipped to his profile, taken from social media, shows him sun-soaked and square-jawed, long dark hair cascading over his shoulders, strumming a guitar and smiling a large, toothy smile.
* * *
Once we’ve finished reading, the Director tells us to make our way over to the Arts and Crafts table to meet with Dave, and we all flee.
With a small, shared glance of understanding, Javier and I sprint ahead, running off the path and into the trees, out of the sight of the others.
Once we’re hidden in the cool shadow of the woods, the sparkling blue of the lake breaking through in pinpoints between the pine needles, Javier turns on me.
“Why would you trade with Nobody?” he cries. “What were you thinking?! This is a suicide mission!”
“Javier, I didn’t have a choice.”
“You chose to trade!”
“Because the mission is in Ojai,” I confess. “I need to investigate a guy in Southern California. This way I’ll have the whole trip down as a head start before they realize I’ve taken off.”
“Whoa, investigate? Investigate him for what?” He blinks at me. “What are you talking about?”
/> “Javier, last night I found out the guy who killed Rose lives in California.”
He stares at me for a long moment. “The guy who killed your victim, Rose?”
My stomach starts to sink.
“Wait … so, what, you’re innocent?” There’s a panicked note in his voice, something between a laugh and a sob. “Like, you’ve never killed anyone?”
“I’m sorry, is that a bad thing?” My voice comes out high, brittle. “Didn’t you … couldn’t you tell? All that stuff about being mislabeled, ‘flower for sure,’ I thought …” I reach for his hand.
He flinches away. “So that’s where you and Erik were? Off ‘investigating’ all night? You told him you were innocent, but you didn’t tell me?”
“I didn’t tell him, he guessed! He guessed the first day he met me.”
“I really don’t know what to say.” Javier shakes his head. “I thought we were on the same page. I thought you were someone who’d messed up and was trying to do better. But you’re nothing like me.” His jaw is set, his nostrils flaring, his eyes won’t meet mine. “Signal, you might be an innocent, but I’m not. I killed a guy with my bare hands.”
My eyes go to his scars. He sees me look, and he draws himself up straighter.
“You know something else?” Javier says, lifting his chin so he looms almost a head taller than me. “I don’t regret it. When I let myself look back on that day I feel … satisfaction. Yes. Satisfaction. If I could go back to that moment? I’d do it again. Only thing different, I’d make it last longer. Try and enjoy it.”
I feel sick.
“So now what, you want to make out?” He takes a sudden step toward me and I step back involuntarily. “Didn’t think so,” Javier says quietly, and walks stiffly past me down the field.
* * *
Dave blows the whistle in front of the Arts and Crafts table as I stumble down the hill and join the stunned group of campers facing him.
“Well, campers, we’re going to be really busy for the next twenty or so hours—”
