When faced with a choice between cuddling a cute girl, broaching the question of joining the Anport Rescues, and investigating the strongest lead we have that there's something suspicious going on here, I'm relieved to find that I can still choose the latter option without losing my head. Such an investigation will also require Patrick and I to put our heads together properly, which means we're both faced with extracting ourselves from our respective beds without waking our bedmates. That's a steeper ask for Patrick than me, but he still manages to beat me to freedom. He's slipperier than I think we give him credit for.

Patrick brings his sleeping bag to a spot beneath the window and hops back into it before sitting down. I confirm that I locked the door last night, then copy him and lean in for a better view as he pulls up the phone.

Vix's home screen background is a photo of a young woman and a young man with a strong family resemblance posing together, tongues out and arms around each other's necks. A pang rings sharp in my chest. They look like siblings, and it hurts in every way. Nothing better to remind me about Brooklyn or the rest of my family, asleep somewhere in Venberg county, two states over. Then a second stab usurps even that one as Patrick scrolls left to clear the icons from the screen. That's when I realize the woman in the photo is Vix.

Patrick clicks the message icon at the bottom of the screen, and Vix's texts leap up blessedly to wipe out the photo. I was expecting all thirty-six unread texts to be from Oreo, but that assumption is proven false with a glance down the screen. I take stock of the time stamps. They've all been reduced to day-month format now, but it's October twenty-third, and a lot has happened on Vix's phone in the last few days.

I motion for Patrick to scroll down until we find the obvious break between texts received before and after Red Thursday. Vix did what Calico J did, and texted several dozen names and numbers in search of other people. It takes Patrick a while to scroll past them all, then back again. The first name I recognize is Triptych. That's one of the Anport Rescues that Ember mentioned yesterday. She's the one Vix reached first, and a quick investigation reveals that she pointed Vix to Oreo instead. The exchange is otherwise mundane.

After Triptych's number, Vix texts her mother, then two more names I don't recognize. Neither ever replied. Patrick returns to the texting mainscreen and scrolls to the next message thread up from there. My heart stops dead.

Seven

"That one."

Patrick gives me a questioning look. I can't explain this without the journal, so I retrieve it and flip it open as I drop back beside him. Patrick's hands sink to his lap as he reads the page I show him: the half-coherent one that mentions Seven's name no fewer than eight times. Without a word, he returns to the phone and opens the text exchange.

In the journal, Vix alluded to Seven being her little brother, but the text thread confirms it. Besides having more than six thousand messages, it dates back to well before Red Thursday, and the way the two speak to one another is sibling banter at its finest. Before Red Thursday, that is. After, they take on a mutual-survival tone. We find the moment Vix told her brother about finding the Anport Rescues, then coordination about obtaining a car. Their trepidation is already evident. I spot all the same concerns I had with Oreo's early communications: the lack of clear information, multiple allusions to screening, and a refusal to say what for. I check the timestamps. This was three weeks ago.

Patrick points me to a text from Seven.

How many people did they say they have?

I read it before my brain catches up with me, and nearly choke at the reply.

27

That has to be a typo. Seventeen, maybe; they were down to fifteen when they lost Vix, which leaves room for her and her brother's losses. We need to cross-check this against Oreo's texts. I point Patrick there, but he's one step ahead of me. He just searches 27 in the messaging app as a whole, turning up a list of texts containing the number. The corroborating one from Oreo is third on the list.

The Anport Rescues have somehow lost eleven members in the last three weeks. Twelve counting Vix herself, and thirteen if we also count Seven. Goosebumps prickle my skin. This is something Oreo never told us, and that just makes it worse. It also rouses a memory from my sleep-fogged mind of last night. Ember said something about this group being gone in a month if they don't find a solution to whatever's killing their members. The texts seem to zoom into sharper focus as the urgency of this investigation ratchets up several notches.

Patrick continues to scroll. Vix and Seven's texting frequency drops sharply after they join the Anport group. I don't realize we've reached the end of it until the scrolling stops abruptly at the bottom of the message thread. The last two texts were exchanged four days after the ones before them.

I'm going to the river, messages Seven. Don't tell Oreo. If anything happens, I love you.

Vix replies almost immediately. I'll cover you. Stay safe. Love you, too.

I open the journal again.

Everything is raining in the rivers, and nothing important lies in the rivers, you said while Cassie shoots apples like organizing makes any sense. Is nothing important nothing at all? What did Seven see?

Seven wanted the truth and you're running away. You can't and it doesn't make sense but it's not silent anymore and the sense is running away, lies down on the riverbed and drains all the life out of my little brother.

Oil and water is good for you, Oreo, you need to burn.

"He went to the river," says Patrick. He curls down into his sleeping bag, scrolling up and down through the other texts, then runs another search with keywords related to the river. A few pop up from Oreo, but we need to investigate that conversation next in its entirety.

"Went to the river looking for something," I say.

"For the truth. He probably found what you did."

He looks about to say more on that, but reconsiders and shuts his mouth again. He stares at the texts, unseeing.

"And it killed him," I say, touching the line in the journal. "But we're still fine, right? And why does she say Oreo needs to burn?" When Patrick doesn't reply, I contemplate it myself. "She says whoever she's speaking to is running away. Probably from the truth. And she's talking to Oreo right after, so I assume this is all directed at him? He's hiding from the truth somehow, and she's angry with however that's happening. Or that it's happening at all."

That seems to bring the paragraphs into a little more coherence. The first one talks about someone saying there's nothing important in the rivers; the second, running away from the truth. If I was to extrapolate wildly from this, I would guess that Seven knew something was in the rivers, and that it might hold the key to understanding the Redding. The Sleeping Sickness. He went looking for it behind Oreo's back, and it killed him.

But Vix blames Oreo.

I deflate as the gaps in what we know yawn too wide for further speculation. I still believe my theories. Kind of. I want them to make sense because I want this journal to make sense, because that means staying alive, making the right decision about staying here, and not admitting that what we're reading is gibberish, and that we're back to square one as a result. I want Patrick to chime in again, but even when I nudge him, he remains silent. It's probably the reminder of the river.

"Let's check the other texts," I say instead.

That's enough to stir Patrick from his non-responsiveness. We return to the messaging homepage and find that there are only two more text threads between Seven's and Oreo's, which sits at the top of the pile. One has one text. The other has two. Neither contact is named. I pause Patrick with a frown as I read the phone number that the solitary text was sent to. It's familiar, but only vaguely so, like I've seen it recently. I leap to my feet as the realization stings me.

"One sec," I whisper as I dart to my bag again. My discarded pants from yesterday lie beside it. In those is the slip of paper with a phone number that I found in Vix's back pocket. I bring it back to Patrick and compare it to the one Vix contacted. They match.

"Check that one first," I say. I can see the start of the text, but I can't tell yet who it's from or what all it says. Opening the text, though, only answers one of those questions. Vix sent it. But the only three words in it are the three I could see in the preview: Hello? Anybody home?

There's no indication of who the number belongs to, whether they're alive, or why Vix sent the text. Or what it was doing scribbled on a slip of paper in her back pocket, for that matter. Especially if it was also in her phone. Ditzy identified the area code as being from several states away when we first found this paper, but the lack of contact info and nature of the texts means it likely wasn't anyone Vix knew. I have never wished so strongly for the convenience of the internet.

We've got two text threads left to investigate. The first of those sets the tone. It's me, says the first text, from Vix. The other person doesn't reply. Probably just trading numbers, then, but the timestamp is what grabs my attention. It's only a week and a half old. That's not just within the timeframe that Vix and Seven spent with this group. It's not long before Vix herself left, and right around the time that Seven visited the river. Which means it's probably around the time that Seven died.

The second text comes from the other person, and dates to just a day before we found Vix's body. It has only one word.

Run

"Someone warned her," whispers Patrick. I can only nod. That's the only explanation I can think of, either. Unless it was a threat. The tone of Oreo's final text could go either way. It still sits visible in preview on the messaging main page: Vix, if it got you, I swear I'll...

Before we can click it, a knock on the door makes Patrick jump so hard, he drops the phone into his sleeping bag. I slither out of mine as Calico J stirs. It's just after nine, but we were told we wouldn't be served breakfast. I have no idea what anyone wants with us.

When I swing open the door, I find Ember standing on the other side with her brow furrowed in a half-suspicious frown. I am suddenly, acutely aware of Patrick against the wall behind me. I make sure I'm blocking the doorway enough that Ember will have to go through me if she wants to get into the room.

She bobs sideways to see past me, still frowning. "Psy's not in here, is he?"

I stare at her for a moment as the name processes. I think I've heard it before, but I have no idea who it is.

"It's just us in here," I say. "Why?"

"I sent him to lock up the shed yesterday when we were bringing you guys in. As far as the night guard knows, he never came in again. He never came to bed, at least, and he hasn't shown up for breakfast. We've already searched the rest of the house."

My brain jumps to weird places when it's not sure what to do with itself. I've been focusing too much on Vix and Seven, that's for sure; my first thought is that Psy went to the river, too, but that's stupid. My second thought is that I'm pretty sure the guy who locked up the shed last night is the same one who stayed to investigate Vix's body after Oreo found us.

Ember pulls away with a curse. "Alright," she says. "I guess we're implementing a missing person's watch." She pauses, and for a moment I find myself pinned by her hard-eyed stare.

"What?" I say.

"Nothing." She begins to turn away, then pauses. "Actually..."

I already don't like where this is going, and I don't even know what it is.

"I think Oreo and I might want to talk to you," finishes Ember. "Meet us downstairs in fifteen minutes."

It's an order, not a request. My skin prickles. "Just me?"

"Any of you who were in that motel room when Oreo and the others found you."

"Can the others come, too?"

I say it before I realize it's a bad idea. Patrick and Calico J need to stay back and look through the rest of Oreo's texts. Ditzy and I were the only two who had anything to do with the motel room and Vix's body anyway. But Ditzy's been unusually quiet since we found that body, and I don't want to be the one answering questions. Or at least not the only one.

Ember takes the suggestion before I can retract it anyway. "Actually, that's not a bad idea. All of you. Be there or be square."

With that final dismissal, she spins away and marches off down the hallway, calling to others as she goes. I shut the door again, hover for a moment, then lock it. When I turn around, Calico J and Ditzy are both awake and watching me. They're all watching me.

"Sorry," I say, but I know from the moment it leaves my mouth that it's not genuine.

"No you're not," says Calico J.

I don't know what that means. Before I can ask, he too turns away. I don't ask. I don't want to know. 

Like this chapter if you think Vix's journal might actually make sense...

Comment what you think might be happening to this survivor group's members  🥶