by Andy Kaiser
“I need your help,” she said. “Because of a friend of mine. Someone else nearby.”
“At Camp Nyhill?”
The shadow of her face nodded at the night.
“There's someone there, Tyler. Someone who's trapped. I can get out, but she can't. I'm strong but I'm not strong enough. I thought that if you... If we worked together, we could do it. We could free her.”
She looked at me and I was close enough to see she meant it. Her face, almost completely hidden in shadow, tilted up to look at me. Her eyes were big. She'd said her piece and was waiting for my response.
I really did want to help her. But something sounded weird about this.
“Hold on,” I said. “If there's a friend of yours at Camp Nyhill who needs help – who's trapped – what does that mean? A kidnapping? Why don't we call the police?”
She nodded. “I know. Maybe I said that wrong. But it's not like that. It's more like how I'm here right now. My friend is trapped at the camp and I want to just take her out for some nighttime fun, you know?” She laughed. “Get her out of that place. I don't think our parents would like it, but...” she shrugged. “We're right here, right now. My parents don't know. Neither do yours.”
There was something she wasn't telling me. Why did she say we had to “free” someone when really we were just talking about her sneaking out of Camp Nyhill? I didn't know why she'd showed me this incredible dreaming power and told me what she did, especially if she wanted to use it for something so... normal.
I wondered if Eena might be holding back something even more important.
“Look, Tyler.” She put a hand on my arm. “You don't have to do anything you don't want to do. Just come with me, okay? Check it out and let me know what you think. Just find out and make the choice. That's all I'm asking.”
Whether I was getting the whole truth or not, she was asking for my help and I wanted to help her.
“Okay,” I said. I shrugged and tried to laugh. “After all, you helped me discover this dreaming power. You had me practice moving the sand. I like how you made the letter T so I'd know what to do.”
She was nodding along until I finished the last sentence. Then she stopped.
“What?”
“The letter in the sand.The T. You separated out the white sand from the rest. It took Zack and me a while to figure out what you did. That was pretty cool.”
I nodded to where the white-smeared sand was barely visible behind her. She whipped around to stare at it.
“I didn't do that,” she said. “I don't even know if I could do that.”
“But if it wasn't you-”
I stared at Eena as she stared back at me. Then I looked again at the sand behind her. Behind that I could see the darkness of the lake and could hear the lapping of the waves as they rolled up to shore. Farther out I could see the lighter color of the swim buoy.
There hadn't been any buoys here before. And why would there be only one of them? You needed a bunch of them to mark off a swim area.
I blinked.
Something was wrong. I squinted and tried to see better.
What I'd mistaken for a buoy was something standing out in the water. It was a person. Tall. Thin, with light hair.
In disbelief I realized that the person wasn't in the water. It was above the water. It stood unmoving as gentle waves danced around it.
Then, with arms and legs dangling, it began to silently float towards us.
Eena looked at me as I stared out in disbelief. As in a nightmare, she turned slowly and faced the water. She gasped and stepped away from me.
“It's Talia. She found us. I didn't think she'd find us.” She took another step back.
“What should we-”
“Tyler, run!” Eena screamed. She sprinted towards the forest.
I ran.
Chapter 19
Eena and I crashed into the forest. She moved way faster than I could and I had no idea how she did it. It was black beyond black. It was a blinded obstacle course packed with uncountable trees with branches that tore at your body anywhere you moved.
I ran too fast. I was too panicked. I didn't see the tree until I had slammed into it. There was an explosion of pain in my forehead. The next moment I was sitting on the ground, confused.
I took a moment to clear my head, then sat back up and tried to look around. When that didn't work, I listened.
Loud crashing and snapping noises receded off to the distance in front of me. I didn't know if it was Eena, Talia, or Talia chasing Eena. All I knew was that I had to get out of here. I had to get somewhere safe.
I stood back up again, touching my bruised head carefully and moving through the darkness with one arm outstretched. I still had Zack's cellphone, but didn't want to use the light in case Talia was nearby and watching.
There had to be a way. How did Eena move so quickly? It was like she could almost...
She could see in the dark.
I stopped. I dropped my hands to my sides. I closed my eyes and took a breath. I reached out with my mind and tried to use the tentacles not to move things, but to just touch them, feel them, like Eena had touched my cheek.
The tentacles reached, stretched and gently bumped against everything nearby. I poked around and practiced, and soon the process was automatic. It became so fast and intuitive, I wasn't even thinking about any individual tentacle.
With my eyes closed, the world around me lit up in a faded black and white line drawing, then slowly solidified. Details erupted around me.
All around me I could 'see' the forest. Trees in front of me were sharper. Outside my line of focus – off in my peripheral vision - the world appeared fuzzy and faded off into blackness. There appeared to be wind blowing, too: I didn't feel anything, but something was slowly moving the dark lines of the branches and leaves on the trees.
I took a tentative step forward. My mental perspective shifted in a blur of motion. Then the scene clarified and resolved as the trees repositioned themselves in my mind, still moving gently from the invisible wind.
I took another step.
I grinned.
I ran.
I moved hard, powered by adrenaline and the excitement of learning a new, unique, awesome skill. I ran at sprinting speed – nowhere near Zack's level, but it was the best I could do. I shot between trees, ducked under grasping branches and jumped over logs and overgrowth. My eyes were closed the whole time. The feeling was amazing, letting go of physical sight but still being able to see this faded-color image in my mind. It was blurry and continually shifting and changing, but I could see.
This felt different than when I'd struggled to move things. That had been an aggressive act, requiring a high-effort mental shove. Here, I realized I didn't have to be so forceful. I didn't have to reach out and find every tree, branch and bush. I instead extended the tentacles into a mesh in front of me, like running while keeping hands out and extended. Unlike my hands, though, the tentacles gave me a lot more warning. It was a passive, relaxed act, and didn't seem to use as much energy as it did to move things. I ran and watched the world as it moved by.
The experiment was a success, but I had more to do.
I had to find Eena.
The noise from her and Talia had moved away from me. I couldn't hear anything more from them. Either they'd stopped - and I didn't want to think about what might've happened - or they had moved far beyond where I could find them.
But maybe I could still see them.
Gasping for breath from my run through the woods, I propped myself against a tree and tried to rest. I could feel the additional toll that the dreaming had taken on my body. I was way out of shape and never liked to run anyway, but now I felt really bad. I felt sick, like when you exercise too hard and your body knows that too much more will make you puke.
My heart rate dropped from chest-shaking thuds to just a fast pounding. That had to be good enough.
I kept my eyes closed and reached out with my mind. I tried
to push beyond the blurry, gray-colored trees, leaves and forest around me. I extended the tentacles out as far as I could. I touched and prodded and tried to find anything that wasn't part of the forest. Like a person.
Nothing.
The farther out the tentacles got, the blurrier of an image I saw. After just a few dozen feet, all I could “see” was a choppy, shapeless, billowing, gray fog. Whatever this power was, it was great for running through the woods in the dark, but bad for finding people who were running away.
I had lost her. Eena needed me, now more than before, especially being chased by Talia, who also had some kind of weird power beyond Eena's. Eena needed me and I had to help her. I had to save her, and save her friend.
I changed direction and headed back to follow the edge of the forest. I had to go back to my family's cabin at Lone Wolf Lodge. I needed Zack's help. All this sneaking and running was something he'd be way better at than me. I'd tell him what I knew and we'd come up with a plan to rescue Eena. After that, I knew exactly where we had to go next.
We had to find Camp Nyhill.
Chapter 20
I kept quiet as I sneaked back in to my family's cabin. I padded from the door through the kitchen and back into the room Zack and I shared. I closed the bedroom door so I wouldn't wake up my mom. I flicked on Zack's phone long enough to check the time. 1:33 AM. My mom usually slept in. My dad was an early riser, but early was still like six or seven. Zack and I had plenty of time before my parents would wake up.
“Zack,” I whispered.
He didn't move.
“Zack,” I tried again, a little louder.
He made a sleepy snorting noise.
I reached out and shook his shoulder. Still sleeping, he said something about dinosaur jets and turned away from me.
I might have plenty of time, assuming I could manage to wake Zack up.
I didn't have time for this. Eena needed my help now.
I moved quietly out of the room into the bathroom. There we had a stack of paper cups used for nighttime drinks and brushing our teeth. I filled one, making sure the water was cold. I went back to Zack.
I dipped my fingers in the water then flicked droplets at his face.
Nothing.
I leaned over and poured the rest of the water into Zack's ear.
That did the trick. Mere seconds later, Zack was chasing me out of the cabin.
We headed back towards the woods.
Chapter 21
“You didn't have to do that, you know,” Zack said. He wiggled a pinkie finger around in his ear. “There's still water in there. I was just about to get up.”
“Right.” I moved through the woods. I didn't know where Eena or Talia had gone. But I had a rough idea of where they were headed. As I had trailed behind, they moved deeper into the forest, back the way Eena had come from when we'd first met her. I hoped if we headed that way too, we might find them.
“Hey, are you even listening to me? Can't I go back to sleep so you can be with your girlfriend?”
“Zack.”
Zack stopped in his tracks and looked at me with a weird expression on his face. I was mad and scared and serious. I'd never sounded like that before.
“We don't have time to mess around,” I said. “Eena is out there. Somewhere. And Talia's chasing her.”
“Talia?The camp counselor?”
“She's not a camp counselor.” I thought back to the vision I'd just seen, of the tall, slender woman as she floated eerily over the lake towards Eena and me, arms and legs just dangling like a flying insect's.
“What is she then?”
“I have no idea. But she's after Eena. If Eena got away, then we still need to help her. There's someone else trapped at Camp Nyhill and whoever it is needs us. That's why Eena taught me about dreaming, about how to move things. She can't save this person alone. And if Eena didn't get away from Talia... then we have to save Eena.”
“So you have all the answers, then,” he said it sarcastically, but I knew I was right. It all fit so perfectly. The plan was obvious.
“Yeah,” I nodded.
“Then did Eena tell you how she knew your name before she ever spoke to you?”
I didn't answer him and tried not to think about what that could mean. My answer was to push faster through the forest.
“Ty.”
Zack sounded oddly intense. This time it was my turn to stop.
“What?” I said.
“Doesn't this whole thing seem a little too weird to you?”
“No.”
“Oh, really?” Zack laughed, not believing me. “Some mysterious girl visits us from the camp next door, meets you at midnight, teaches you how to move things with your mind, then disappears after some floating lady starts chasing her?”
“Okay,” I shrugged. “It's a little weird.”
“We shouldn't be doing this.”
“You know, you were the one who told me to meet her,” I said.
“Yeah!” Zack yelled. “That was when things were safe! I thought the worst that could happen would be you coming back with a hickey and your shirt on backwards. Look at what's happening, Ty! This is way over our heads. I don't think you should trust Eena. We should be calling the cops.”
Could I trust Eena? Back before Talia chased her away, I felt Eena was hiding something. She'd sounded a little too carefree and relaxed about her “friend” trapped at Camp Nyhill. But even if she was hiding something, I still felt I could trust her.
“No,” I said. “She needs me.”
“I think she's using you.”
I was so shocked, I couldn't answer.
“She's just making you do stuff. Can't you see that? Even if you can help her, it doesn't mean that you should.”
I turned slowly and faced Zack. I took a step towards him. He didn't move.
“Zack,” I said through clenched teeth.
“What?”
“I'm not like you!” I exploded. “You're so sure of yourself. You can talk to people. You can do all your cool jumps and stuff-” I gestured vaguely at his body. “You go to dances and play sports. Everybody likes you. You know how to kiss a girl. But what about me?”
“Well, you're-”
“I've got nothing!” I said. “I can't do anything. I want to be like you but I can't! Or I couldn't, not until now. Eena picked me for a reason. I have this dreaming power for a reason. I trust her. There's something big going on here, but for the important stuff – the really important stuff – Eena's telling the truth and she needs my help. I feel like I can actually do something. I can be somebody. I think I can help her. I have to at least try!”
I was so mad I was out of breath. I glared at Zack as I seethed.
He shrugged.
“Then let's do it,” he said. “Lead the way, Ty.”
I looked at him a second longer, then glanced away embarrassed.
“I don't actually know where we're going,” I muttered.
“Huh?”
“I know the direction Eena headed, but that's all. I've never been to Camp Nyhill. Can you look it up on your phone?” I asked meekly.
Zack laughed. “Happy to help.”
He turned on his phone and started a search. He looked up and grimaced at the forest above us. “Crappy signal we get out here. Internet goes way slow.”
The light from his phone lit his face up from beneath. When he looked up at me quickly it was startling.
“What?” I said.
“I just did a search for Camp Nyhill.”
“I know. So where is it? Which way?”
Zack just stared at me, the light from below changing from startling to creepy. He shrugged slowly.
“Zack, which way?”
“Nowhere.”
“I don't get it.”
“There is no 'Camp Nyhill'. It's not here. Not anywhere. It doesn't exist. I tried different spellings. All I could find was one thing.”
“What?”
“I tried spelling it N-I-H
-I-L.”
“So?”
“The search result. It says the word is Latin.” He paused, then looked at me. “It says the word 'nihil' means 'nothing'.”
We stood in the middle of the woods, in the middle of nowhere, literally looking for nothing. For some reason, Eena had lied to us. There was no Camp Nyhill. Talia was definitely not a camp counselor. For all we knew, there was no trapped friend. For the first time, I felt like I was in danger. Claws of fear climbed up my spine.
The most important part about this whole situation was also the worst: Eena could be anywhere.
We had lost her.
Chapter 22
Zack and I stared at each other. I shook my head and broke eye contact. I turned in a slow circle and stared around at the silent forest. With the tiny light shining from Zack's cellphone, the darkness seemed to press in on us. The trees looked like they were leaning our way, waiting, ready for us to walk just a little bit closer, or for Zack's light to turn off.
I was breathing fast and I felt my heart racing. I was very, very close to freaking out. I looked over to Zack, hoping to see him the same way, but I was disappointed.
He was hunched back over his cellphone, stabbing wildly at the screen.
“Come on, come on,” he muttered. “There's got to be something around here. Stupid forest and stupid weird girl with her stupid incredible body...”
I shook my head and turned away. Zack's way of freaking out was a little different than mine. I turned back when I heard him exclaim behind me. He was staring at the phone.
“What is it?” I said. In answer, he angled the screen at me. I approached and looked at it.
While I was busy trying to find the best way to have a mental breakdown, Zack had kept searching on his phone, and he'd found something. On the screen was an overhead satellite map, a terrain view of what looked like a dark, square-shaped building in the middle of a forest.
I didn't realize what it meant until I zoomed in the image at the top of the screen.
“Nyhill Industries,” Zack said. “It's a company. Says here,” he looked at the phone. “That 'Nyhill Industries is your supply of synergistic solutions meeting the demands of the next century'.”
