by Daka Hermon
Hyde hesitates and his eyes scan over us. It’s clear he’s choosing his words carefully—slowly luring us in.
“The Seeker needed help with his game. Needed more kids to play, possibly break rules. It offered me a deal. If I helped, I could come home.”
“So, you’re a traitor?” Lyric spits out.
“If that’s the way you want to think about it,” says Hyde with a dismissive wave of his hand.
“That’s literally the only way to think about it,” yells Nia.
“You don’t understand what it’s like there!” says Hyde. “I would have done anything to leave. If given the choice, you will, too.”
Lyric shakes his head. “No, dude. We’d never betray each other or another kid. That’s not how we roll.”
Hyde laughs. It’s sad. “Just wait until you’re there a year, two, three, four.” He gestures at his face and holds up his gloved hand. “When you’re not fast enough to outrun your fears. When there’s nowhere to hide.”
“We won’t be there that long,” Lyric says.
“She thought that, too. They all think that.” Hyde glances away.
I throw up my hands. I don’t understand who he’s talking about. “Who is she?”
Hyde runs a gloved finger down his scar. “No one.”
Nia crosses her arms. “Zee escaped.”
“Did he?” Hyde says quietly.
“What does that mean?” I ask.
“Just a question,” he says cryptically.
“Why did you deliver that ice cream for Zee’s party?” Lyric asks.
Hyde shrugs. “Because his mom called our store and requested a cart. We cater lots of kid events.”
Nia gasps so loudly I jump. Her hand flies up to cover her mouth.
“What?” I ask.
She stares at Hyde with wide eyes, then slowly lowers her hand. “He works for the Seeker. Remember those ice cream wrappers. They were all about Hide and Seek.”
It takes a moment before I get what she’s saying. My jaw drops.
“It was all a setup?” Lyric cries. “You deliver ice cream with all kinds of info about the game, hoping, like, what? We play the game and do something to get taken by the Seeker?”
Hyde doesn’t respond. He doesn’t have to.
I swallow the sour taste in my mouth. “We talked about the game, and Shae arrived and wanted to play …”
Nia tugs at the end of her long braids. “But how was it Shae? She was supposedly miles away and wasn’t even invited to the party.”
Hyde jumps to his feet, startling Butch. “What did you say? What about Shae?”
“You have her picture up on your creepy wall, so you know she’s missing,” I say. “She supposedly disappeared from Lake Winnepesaukah campgrounds, but she was at Zee’s party.”
All the color drains from Hyde’s face. He staggers back, falling against the side of the house. “Oh no.”
Nia, Lyric, and I exchange a glance. What now?
“The Seeker … It must have been the Seeker.” Hyde’s eyes flutter closed and he trembles. “I didn’t know it planned to—”
“Wait, you’re saying the monster was pretending to be Shae?” Lyric asks. “It can do that?”
Hyde’s eyes fly open. They’re bright with terror. “As far as I know it’s never physically left Nowhere. It needed help to capture more kids, that’s why it sent me. It feeds off the fear of the kids in Nowhere and it’s all about increasing the numbers. Its power is growing, but I didn’t think …”
“Isn’t that what you want? You work for it,” I spit out.
Hyde shakes his head. “You don’t understand! What if it decides that I’m failing? That I’m not completing my mission?”
“That’s what you’re worried about?” Lyric asks with disgust.
Hyde clutches his head with both hands. “What am I gonna do? I can’t go back there.”
I gawk. The selfishness oozing out of him makes me nauseous. He doesn’t care about the kids he helped kidnap or us. It’s all about him. “You don’t want to go back, but it’s okay we’re being dragged there?!”
“Leave. Now! I don’t care what you do with that video,” he yells. “It won’t matter anyway.”
“You have to help us,” Lyric says. “Tell us about Nowhere. How can we defeat this monster?”
We can’t leave with nothing. No plan, no way to help Nia, to help everyone.
“Please.” I’m willing to beg. “There has to be something we can do.”
Hyde hurries across the porch toward the front door. Butch jumps up and trots after him, his leash trailing behind him. “Haven’t you been listening? There’s no way to stop it. The only way out is to work for the Seeker, and even then you suffer.”
“What does that mean?” I ask.
Hyde hesitates, his hand on the doorknob.
“Please!” I cry again.
He flinches. After a long moment, his shoulders slump and he spins around. “You don’t age in Nowhere. When the Seeker released me, I didn’t know … Everything suddenly changes. The world was new, different. I was different. A teenager, but still a kid inside. A kid who’d spent years in a very bad place.”
“I don’t understand,” Lyric says.
“I was ten when I was taken. I was there for seven years and didn’t age, but the moment I returned I was instantly seventeen.” Hyde visibly swallows. I see the ghosts of what he’s experienced in his eyes. “Some of the kids in Nowhere have been there a very, very long time.”
“Wh-what?” Nia asks, her voice shaky.
It’s too horrible to comprehend.
I see the moment it truly hits Lyric. His jaw drops and his eyes grow as big as baseballs. “We could die. If we’re there too long we could come back and die.”
Hyde is lost in his thoughts. “All that time gone. I came back alone and my dad never forgave me. She never forgave me,” he mumbles.
Nonsense. He’s talking nonsense.
“There has to be a way to defeat the Seeker,” I say.
Hyde shakes his head. “There’s not. It is Hide and Seek. That’s all it does. It has one mission, one goal to fulfill, and it won’t stop until it does.”
“What does that mean?!” Nia cries.
“You’ve got to help us stop this thing. You owe it to all the kids you helped kidnap.”
I grab his arm and he jerks away so violently he stumbles back and almost falls.
“Don’t touch me! Never touch.”
“Sorry.” I hold up my hands as if surrendering. “Sorry.”
Tears fill his haunted eyes and for a brief moment I see that scared ten-year-old kid. He blinks and cold, calculating Hyde returns.
“You’re on your own.” He stomps inside the house with Butch and slams the door.
Lyric leaps onto the porch and bangs on the door. “Hyde! Hyde!”
I sink down on the steps and bury my head in my hands. Nia sits next to me.
“Open up! You have to talk to us,” Lyric says.
From inside the house, Butch barks and growls. That’s the only response we get.
“Lyric, stop.” I turn to look at him. “He’s not going to help.” The weight of everything that has happened presses me down. The adrenaline seeps out, leaving me an empty shell. So tired—mentally and physically.
“He can’t do this,” says Lyric. “Nia, post that video. If the news shows up, I bet he’ll start talking again.”
“It won’t stop what’s happening,” she says with a heavy sigh.
“Yeah, but …” Lyric swallows hard. “We can’t … You heard what he said about that place. That thing is gonna take us. What if we’re separated? What if we can’t find each other?”
We fall silent. The shock of what we’ve learned doesn’t wear off; instead it burrows deep, infecting us like an incurable virus. How do we recover from this? How do we survive?
“Even though we’re down one member, we’re still the Fantastic Four,” Nia says.
Her eyes ar
e bright with fear, but there’s also something else. Determination. “The monster won’t give up, but neither will we.” She looks from me to Lyric. “Did you know everyone is born with the capacity to be brave? The key is to prepare yourself before the challenging situation.”
I want to curl up somewhere and hide, but she’s so Nia right now I can’t help but smile.
“We can figure this out, right?” she asks.
She needs me to be strong. I can do that for her. I climb to my feet and extend my fist. “Together. Yeah, we can.”
Lyric glances at Hyde’s front door, then walks down the steps. He touches his fist with ours. “Count me in. I’m down for some monster butt-kicking.”
This moment feels wrong, but also right. For now, I have Lyric and Nia, and I almost believe we can figure out a way to defeat the Seeker and survive. And maybe “almost” is enough.
I peek over my shoulder and see the blinds on a window flip closed. He’ll never escape what he’s done. He’ll never be free of his guilt. It’ll haunt him forever. What I saw in Zee, I see in him. But I want to help Zee. I believe there’s hope for Zee. There’s none for Hyde.
“We’re kinda on the clock,” Lyric says as we walk down the driveway. “So, what’s the plan?”
I stare at Quincy’s bike. He’s gone. The panic I’ve fought back claws up to the surface.
“We need to break down everything Hyde told us. Everything we heard from Zee and Rodrigo, too.” We pedal away from Hyde’s place.
The wind whistles past me. We’re traveling fast, but there’s no outrunning this doom I sense closing in.
“Let’s recap what we know,” says Nia. We whip around a corner and swerve past some parked cars. “There’s a Hide and Seek monster hunting kids who break the rules.”
“Which we all did,” interjects Lyric. He rides standing. His hair blows back off his face.
“It marks us before we’re kidnapped and tormented with our worst fears,” I say.
“And there’s no way to stop the monster, so we need to figure out how to defeat it in Nowhere,” Nia says.
We ride awhile in silence. Each of us lost in our thoughts.
“The backpack!” Nia yells suddenly.
She startles me and I fight to keep my balance on the bike. A car honks as I stray too far into the street. We cut across a park as we head toward our neighborhood.
“What are you talking about?” asks Lyric.
“When Quincy disappeared, he was wearing his backpack. It went with him,” says Nia.
My eyes dart to her then back to the path. “That means there’s a chance we can sneak stuff inside with us. Stuff that could help us defeat the monster!”
“That’s genius,” says Lyric.
“Whoa!”
I glance over at Nia. She wobbles on her bike. The pedals spin at a blinding rate. Her legs are outstretched to avoid being cut. “What’s happening?!” She zooms forward, swerving around bushes and trees.
“Nia!” Lyric and I race to catch up with her.
The bike tilts. She tumbles off into a thick patch of grass. I jump off my bike and run over to where she lies. “Are you okay?” I reach for her hand and my fingers pass through her. She’s blurry, ghostlike.
I gasp. “No.”
Lyric runs up beside me. He attempts to pick her up, but only grabs air. “What—?”
“The Seeker,” I whisper.
“Justin?” Nia stretches her arm out toward me.
I extend my trembling arm. My fingers tingle as they sweep through her rippling image. Not yet! I’m not ready.
Lyric runs one way, then darts back. “We need help! Help!”
There’s nothing we can do, nothing anyone can do. My heavy arms drop to my side.
Nia starts to fade. Tears trail down her cheeks and her chin trembles. “Find me.”
I nod and blink my blurry eyes. “I p-promise.”
Behind Nia, a large shadow creeps across the grass. A deep, growly voice says, “One by one you’ll disappear. I steal your souls and consume your fear.”
Lyric cries out. He staggers back, loses his balance, and falls to the ground.
The shadow slowly morphs into that grotesque drawing from Zee’s wall. Different body parts appear—the insect-like legs, the scaly thin arms, the claws, the wings with spikes, the oversized head with the red eyes. One by one they connect, until the horrifying creature stands before us.
I’m frozen in place.
The Seeker reaches for Nia. She’s a blurry version of herself. Transparent. I can see right through her.
One claw hand tugs Nia into its body. The Seeker’s black wings wrap around her, hiding her from my view. “And then there were only two,” it growls.
Nia screams. She and the Seeker disappear.
Terror and pain rip through me. My legs buckle. “Noooooo!”
My knees hit the ground hard and I fall forward, bracing myself on my hands. There’s pain all over my body, but it’s strongest around my heart. Nia is gone.
I grab my chest, my hands twitching. Nia needs me. I promised I’d find her. I can’t let my promise turn into a lie. Breathe! Inhale. Exhale.
“Justin?!”
Lyric’s voice sounds like it’s underwater. My vision fades in and out. I’m on fire and freezing at the same time—sweating and numb.
Panic attack. A bad one.
Nia.
Quincy. Carla. Shae.
Zee.
Mom.
Everybody leaves. I can’t stop it. Sweat trickles down into my eyes, mixing with the tears already there.
Soul hurts.
“Justin! I got you.” Lyric crawls over to me.
I struggle to lift my heavy head. He’s pale, and his eyes are bright with tears. “Nia.” My voice is so hoarse, I don’t sound like myself.
“I know, man. She …” He wipes his eyes with the back of his hand. “She’s gone.”
I flinch. The words sting.
My muscles are wet noodles. I flop around before steadying myself, turning so I’m sitting on my butt. I wrap my trembling arms around my bent legs and rest my head on my knees. One. Two. Three. Four. I count my breaths as the python slowly loosens its hold around my heart.
“It’s going to be okay,” Lyric says.
I would scoff but I don’t have the energy. How is anything okay? Look at me. What if I have a panic attack when we get to Nowhere, when we’re fighting the Seeker? No one should depend on me. I can’t depend on me. If we fail, it’ll be all my fault.
I tilt to the side, lifting my butt so I can reach the puzzle piece in my back pocket. My fingers clench it tightly; the cardboard bites into my palm. It only calms me a little.
Minutes ticktock by. As I inhale and exhale, air begins to smoothly circulate through my lungs. My eyes cross as I stare at the cracks in the speckled concrete. Red ants play peekaboo, crawling in and out of the gaps.
A lawn mower sputters to life in the distance. Birds tweet, annoyingly, above. The buzz of voices and laughter from nearby houses taunt me. Children laugh as they run around the park. The world goes on like nothing’s happened, just like after my mom died. It’s not fair.
“I bet when you woke up this morning, this isn’t how you thought the day would go down, huh?” he says. “Me either. I keep thinking, if I were a superhero, what would I do right now?”
I slowly lift my head and turn to Lyric. He’s staring off in the distance. He looks tired, but somehow calm despite everything that has happened.
He faces me. “We’re gonna get her back, everybody else, too.”
I snort out a laugh. “What’s wrong with you? Have we been living the same day? All we’ve done is lose. And now with Nia …” I swallow hard. “How are you holding it together?”
He tugs at the rip in his jeans near his knee. “I’m not gonna lie. I’m freaked out, like mentally in a corner rocking back and forth and crying right now.”
Okay, that’s something, I guess.
His should
ers slump. “It’s just … with everything that happened with my dad, I’ve learned that bad stuff happens all the time. Sometimes you cause it, sometimes it just happens.” He shoves a hand through his hair. “You kinda have to roll with it and trust in the people close to you to have your back. We’re in this together. We’ll figure it out.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Fixing stuff and helping people is your thing,” he says with an easy shrug.
“Uh, no, it’s not.” What is he talking about?
“In third grade, who took down that kid who stuffed Zee in a dumpster? Who made math study cards for Nia last year when she was worried she wouldn’t pass?”
“Lyric, that stuff—”
“Who collects recycling and cuts grass to help Victoria pay the bills? Who put up flyers when Zee disappeared?”
“Stop.”
“Who slept at the hospital with his mom when she was real bad? Who goes with me to visit my dad in jail? Not just once. Or twice.”
“Lyric—”
“You’ve gone every time. Even after your mom died. You had other stuff to do, more important stuff. You didn’t have to come with me, but you did!” He’s yelling now and breathing hard.
My eyes sting. “You don’t understand.”
“You always find a way to make stuff better,” he says as if he didn’t hear me. “You’re always there for me.”
Anger whips through me. I surge to my feet. “You’re wrong. Stop believin’ in me.”
Lyric gawks at me as he slowly stands. “Wow. Dude … Wow. That was stupidest demand in the history of demands.” He shakes his head like he’s disappointed. “I’m kinda embarrassed for you right now.”
I wince.
“You don’t want people to believe in you? Man, you’re one of my best friends because I can believe in you, because I can trust you. All day, every day. You got me. And I got you.” He crosses his arms. “You get a pass ’cause we’re dealing with some seriously bad stuff, but don’t ever say something stupid like that again.”
I stare at him. He doesn’t understand. I try to force words out to defend myself, but they won’t climb out of my tight, dry throat.
He holds my gaze, not backing down. “Take the pass and let’s move on. We got things to figure out before it’s too late.”
