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E X T A N T

CHAPTER 1:

NAUTILUS CHAMBERS

She hadn’t seen the sun in three days. It had abandoned her in perpetual twilight with nothing to do but wait. Seconds stretched into minutes that slipped into hours. In the shadows, Natalie waited. Kindling her hope was proving harder than accepting she couldー

Don’t even think of it. 

Seven days had passed since the first bombing, since the night her parents went missing. There was a decent possibility they were trapped, or captured, or killed. 

No, she refused to believe that. Be positive.

Natalie had not seen her friends since they were taken. She assumed they waited in cells like her own, or they had been moved, or killed.

Stop it. 

Natalie rested her head against the cool, chiseled wall. She had conducted the same circular train of thought for days. She was a prisoner to her captors, her cell, and her own mind.

Moonbeams from the barred skylight high above her illuminated the scratches on the door to her cell. She wiggled her naked toes under the coarse blanket to hide them from the chill. A round clock on the wall opposite her obnoxiously ticked away the time. Tick-tock, tick-tock.

There was just enough light to make out the numbers. An ache churned her stomach. It had been thirteen hours since her last meal.

Ha!

Thirteen hours had passed since she ate, but it had been three days since she had seen a meal. She wondered if the ever-silent Chef would offer her any real food before Nautilus killed her. 

Surely, Nautilus will kill me. I won’t give them what they want. 

Mortem ante cladem. 

Natalie picked absentmindedly at the scabs on her fingertips. Every second she remained a prisoner put her family at risk.

If they’re still alive, and Nautilus doesn’t have them, they’ll search for me. If my parents find me they’ll die, or worse: get caught.  

Mom and Dad, Christopher, Enzi…

She glared at the door to her cell while the clock mocked her, ticking away. Tick-tock, tick-tock.

Natalie was restless. When the door to her cell finally opened again, she wouldn’t hesitate.  

I have to get out.

She traced the intricate white scar swirled across her wrist. 

I missed something. I have to get out.

CHAPTER 2

Natalie Morrigan turned off the car and wiggled her feet back into her high-heeled sandals.

“Seventeen years of these dinners and we still can’t go casual? Ridiculous.”

Natalie let her hair fall forward to hide her grin. Other than a few fleeting seconds of squealing excitement for their night out, Tawney spent the drive complaining about having to wear a dress and any footwear other than sneakers.

“Our parents do love tradition,” Natalie emerged from the car. Her squished toes screamed in protest.

“Tradition is one thing,” Tawney shook her head, bouncing her ringlet curls. “This is torture.” She inspected Natalie’s attire and poked her shoulder. “You don't care because you actually look like a girl! You’re blessed with the goods. I look like a stick-bug wrapped in a leaf.”

Tawney twirled her hips to make the sheer green chiffon of her dress spin. Under five feet tall and skinny as a beanpole, Tawney was tiny.

Natalie grasped Tawney’s shoulders. “You’re gorgeous and you can still kick ass in that outfit, which makes you all the more amazing.”

Tawney curtsied mockingly at her. “I’ll allow it.” She linked her arm with Natalie’s and together they met the lantern lit pathway through the woods.

“Ready?” Natalie asked her.

“Ready to skip to dessert,” her friend snorted.

Natalie’s shoes sank awkwardly in the mulch as the parking lot faded behind them.

“I’ll admit, I am excited to see everyone.” Tawney pulled Natalie a little faster. “It’s going to be terrible when the summer’s done and you leave. You can always go to William and Mary with me instead of moving away.” 

“We’re nearly there,” Natalie noted, ignoring her comment. Tawney had been lobbying for them to attend the local college together since their sophomore year.

Leaving is going to be hard, but it will be good.

The thought of moving an ocean away from her parents made her head spin; however, the opportunity to study at Oxford was not something she would turn away. She could practically smell the aged oak and ancient books that waited for her.

A faint glow flickered between the thin trunks of the pines, grounding her back on Virginia soil. They rounded the last cluster of trees and a grassy glade spread before them. Natalie took in a deep breath. A mixture of honeydew and charcoal greeted her nose and warmth filled her from the inside out.

The large pavilion occupied most of the clearing, with strings of twinkling lights hanging from its rafters. Rustic lanterns illuminated a lengthy, white-cloaked wooden table laden with steaming hot plates of homemade food and sterling silver ice buckets filled with soda cans. Larger than life photographs of their graduation ceremony covered the single brick wall on the far side of the pavilion. Natalie watched one of the fathers carry a plate of food from the quaint kitchen within the brick structure out to the table.

I am going to miss this.

Tawney left her and ran toward a small group gathered beneath the lights. “Hey guys!” She shouted, managing to embrace all three boys at once. “I can’t believe you’re going to your far-off universities this fall! I demand you stay here!”

“Hello to you, too, Tawney,” Leo’s voice rose from somewhere in the mix.

Owen laughed, his black-framed glasses skewed across his face. Natalie spotted his red hair from across the glade.

Brant whistled as he removed his cap and pushed his mop of brown hair aside to appreciate Tawney’s green cocktail dress.

“Oh no,” Natalie hurried to them. As always, Tawney was faster.

Her brown eyes cut from gleaming to glaring. There was a green blur and a loud squeal, and in a matter of seconds Tawney had Brant pinned to the ground.

“You couldn’t make it five minutes, could you?” She snapped at him, her knee digging between his shoulder blades.

“I was giving you a compliment!” Brant yelled into the ground, his hat a few feet away in the dirt.

Leo pulled out his wallet. “I really thought they might last longer this time,” he said, passing Owen a clump of dollar bills.

Owen pocketed his winnings. “Statistics thought otherwise,” he mused.

“Maybe going to different schools will be good for you two,” Natalie rescued Brant’s old hat and joined them.  

“Nerd!” Owen hugged her, his stubble beard tickling her forehead. Tall and gangly, his embrace enveloped her. 

“Hey, nerd,” Natalie returned the greeting. “You look nice.” He averted his gaze and sheepishly touched the gel slicking back his ginger locks.

“He’s practicing for those college girls,” Leo winked at her. His short brown hair had been brushed back for the occasion. His nose was slightly crooked in the middle, a result of years of competitive soccer, yet it managed to make him appear even more attractive.

“You can’t even grow a beard,” Owen muttered, patting his own stubble proudly.

Leo pulled Natalie in for a brief hug, and she caught the faintest scent of cedar.

“No one wants to help me here? Seriously?” Brant complained at their feet.

Tawney let him up and he brushed the dust off his suit.

“Miss Nat, as lovely as always.” Brant, brawny and boisterous, bowed dramatically and kissed her hand.

“Oh, thank you, good sir.” Natalie relinquished his faded red hat, the sole casual apparel permitted at Formal Fridays. “Fancy meeting you here, at the weekly march of the penguins.”

Brant adjusted his bowtie as Leo and Owen pretended to smooth wrinkles out of their black suits.

“We do make an impressive flock,” Leo noted, brushing imaginary lint from Owen’s chest.

“We sharpen up in a peck,” Brant snickered.

“Actually, as penguins we would be referred to as a ‘waddle’ not a flock,” Owen corrected. 

“Honestly, Owen,” Tawney rolled her eyes. “Will M.I.T. have anything to teach you?” 

Owen flushed from his neck to his ears. 

“So, my fellow graduates,” Brant finger gunned at each of them. “Are we doing the D.o.G. Street Strut and Coaster Crawl tonight?”

“Oooh, free dessert samples and rollercoasters until we vomit!” Tawney gave Brant an enthusiastic high five.

“On a Friday night in the summer?” Natalie frowned. “The park will be packed.”

“Coaster Crawl, Nat, not Roller Rush,” Leo reminded her.  

“Traditions only stay traditions if you’re committed,” Owen said, earning himself a celebratory fist bump.

Natalie smiled and gave in. Living in Williamsburg has its perks; we can always go again tomorrow.

“Are you all done fooling around? We’re starving!” Mrs. Elizabeth Merrick, Leo’s mom, called out to them from across the clearing.

Tawney pulled them into a tight group hug. Natalie’s head pressed between Leo and Brant’s shoulders.

“I’ve missed you all!” Tawney yelled for their parents’ benefit before dropping her voice. “Have any of you seen what I’ve been talking about? They’re acting weird.”

“Something’s definitely going on,” Leo agreed. “My parents will barely let me go to the grocery store on my own, and this morning I caught my mom going through my E-mail,” he paused and glanced at the table. “Then they insist I drive dad’s ride here while they take the car? It’s more than just weird.”

“Last night my dad asked if anyone odd had been contacting me. Anyone out of the ordinary,” Brant snorted. “What kind of a question is that? It’s college ー no one is ordinary.”  

“We should do this later. Alone,” Natalie suggested, sensing the stares of multiple parents on them now.

This group hug has lasted longer than a presidential handshake.

“Ice cream?” Tawney offered, breaking their embrace. “Before the colonial district and amusement park?” Her bare feet tread silently on the concrete floor of the pavilion as they approached the table. Her shoes swung uselessly at her side.

“Custard.”

“Specifics,” Tawney waved a pointed heel at Brant.

“Important specifics,” Owen noted.

Natalie drifted to the back of their group and braced herself for the onslaught of greetings.

It’s not as if we do this every week or anything, she thought sarcastically.

The people blurred together as they passed Natalie from arm to arm, parent to parent. Mrs. Johnson’s perfume burned Natalie’s nose,

Leo’s mom gawked over her dress pockets, and Mrs. Davis talked so fast all Natalie had to do was smile and nod. Despite attending them her entire life, the gatherings were always overwhelming. Too many people with too many questions. It had all the makings of a family reunion, except they weren’t family.

How can they work together eight hours a day, five days a week, and still want to socialize on the weekends? I only have to see everyone for an hour and that’s exhausting enough.

With some strategic side-stepping, Natalie clutched the back of her usual seat and pulled herself out of the throng of bodies. Relieved, she sat and meticulously folded a navy cloth napkin across her lap as others began to follow her lead.

Eventually, everyone assumed their seats. Owen and his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Johnson, sat at the end closest to Natalie, followed by Mr. and Mrs. Merrick on either side of Leo, Mr. and Mrs. Davis on either side of Tawney, and finally Brant and his father, Mr. Smith, claimed the opposite end of the table. Natalie’s mother and father each kissed her head as they settled on either side of her.

Natalie’s father winked a green eye as he passed the first dish: garlic-roasted red potatoes. Her mouth watered as she put a generous portion on her plate.

“Save some for the rest of us!” Her mother nudged her and Natalie reluctantly passed the dish on.

Tawney’s curls bounced as she swung her feet impatiently beneath the table. When Brant’s father finally finished filling his plate with a heap of Mrs. Merrick’s homemade macaroni and cheese, he gave the nod to dig in. Natalie ate slowly, savoring each bite of the made-from-scratch meal. Finals, graduation, and advanced placement tests had resulted in fast food for the majority of her weekday meals.

Small talk exploded amongst the large group. All the routine questions she had been fielding for months: “Are you excited about Oxford?”

Of course.

“Did you make any new friends at orientation?”

Acquaintances, maybe.

“What’s your major again?”

Philosophy and Modern Languages. Cue blank stare. It’s mostly studying the application of logic and, shockingly, modern languages.  

“Meet any cute college boys yet?”

And here comes the uncontrollable blushing. No comment please.

Seated near the end of the table Natalie kept her head low, hoping to avoid the onslaught of conversation filler as much as possible. Eventually, her interviewers moved on to more willing participants. Leo was kind enough to entertain her mother’s questions regarding his various soccer scholarship offers. Tawney caught Natalie’s eye as she tried to keep pace with the firing squad herself. Natalie did her best to watch and listen as a quiet presence on the fringes.

As plates began to clear and the conversations dwindled, Natalie noticed Mr. Johnson shift in his seat and lean towards her and Leo’s fathers.

“Catch the news report this morning?” Mr. Johnson’s voice was low and he kept his gaze towards his food.

“There’s a bit of a tempest headed our way,” Mr. Michael Merrick said from beside Leo.

“Nothing we weren’t expecting,” Natalie’s father brushed away their concern.

“It’s said to be much stronger than we were expecting, John. And coming fast.”

Natalie pushed her food around her plate. She listened carefully, absorbing every word. 

They are not talking about the weather.

Her foot searched for Leo’s beneath the table. He sat directly opposite her and was engaged in obnoxious conversation with Brant, who sat further down. Finally, finding what she hoped was the correct foot, she pushed her heel hard onto his dress shoes.

Leo dropped his fork and started on Natalie in alarm.

“Ow!” 

Natalie shushed him and nodded towards their fathers. Leo regained composure. He cleared his throat and helped himself to more pudding as Natalie continued making abstract art of her food. 

“We are prepared,” Natalie’s dad insisted. His blonde hair had begun to show flecks of grey over the years. “We’ve been preparing for nearly two decades. Our contact is in positionー” A soft chirp interrupted him and he produced a thin cell phone from his jacket breast pocket.

“How can we be certain when we’ve heard nothing from them in months? Not a word,” Mr. Merrick swallowed hard before continuing. “Thomas and I were thinking...it may be time to reinstate Coelacanth.”

Natalie’s dad stared at the screen of his phone; its pale glow underlined his frown. He shook his head and declined the call. As he returned the phone to his pocket, Natalie was just able to make out the name of the caller.

That’s odd.

“John?” Michael Merrick tried to salvage her father’s focus. Leo had his athletic build, but his father’s face was more rounded and topped with short, jet black hair. “Your thoughts on proceeding with Coelacanth?”

“No,” John snapped back to the conversation. “Absolutely not.”

“This organization is a democracy, John. You’re outvoted,” Thomas said softly from the corner of the table. His hair was more auburn than Owen’s and curled tight around his head.

“No,” her father’s fist slammed on the table.

Natalie jumped in alarm, her oblivious charade shattered. She had never seen him so angry. She looked up from her plate and accidentally made eye contact with Brant’s father, Robert Smith. He seemed unwell, even more so than usual. His dark eyes were sunken and his skin appeared nearly translucent.

Like Brant’s mom before…

Natalie glanced at the empty chair beside Brant. It had been seven years since her death, but the chair remained at the table. The empty seat stood vigil as a solemn reminder.

“Coelacanth will sacrifice all we’ve worked for; it will have been for nothing,” Robert Smith’s voice was monotone and low.

“Maybe this isn’t the time,” Sam Davis, Tawney’s heavy-set, reserved father spoke up.

Natalie realized the table had fallen silent as all other conversations had ceased. The entire table fixated on her father. Though she knew no one focused on her, cold sweat beaded on the back of Natalie’s neck from their stares. The silence simply made it worse.

“Honey,” her mother’s voice was velvet soft as she reached across and touched her father’s forearm. Her gaze, on the other hand, was stern.

“They started it,” John muttered indignantly.

Natalie gasped as her cool-headed father threw back his chair and paced behind her mother. He pressed two fingers to his temples.

“Why don’t you all go have some fun,” Patricia Davis suggested. The excitement in her voice fell short of genuine. Her long blonde hair was a stark contrast to Tawney’s head of brown curls.   

“Ice cream!” Tawney leapt boldly from her seat.

“Custard!” Brant stood and tossed his cloth napkin onto his plate.

Natalie folded her own napkin and stood to leave. Her farewell to her mother was interrupted by several high-pitched beeps from around the table. Each parent produced a tiny black box with a narrow screen across one end. Natalie’s mother rose to stand with her dad.   

“You all have pagers?” Owen asked incredulously, adjusting his glasses as though it would change the impossible sight before him.

Mr. Smith hurried to the brick wall of the pavilion and ripped down a black and white photograph of Tawney receiving her diploma. He pushed on the wall and an entire section of brick slid in. A panel floated upwards, filling the vacant space with a wide television.

“We’ve had a T.V. this whole time?” Tawney’s mouth fell open. “I’ve missed so many football games for these dinners! For no reason!”

“Pagers?” Owen pointed at one of the black boxes in disbelief.  

“What is this?” Leo managed to verbalize the question burning through Natalie’s mind.

Her stomach knotted on itself until she couldn’t move, let alone speak.

“Not sure,” Natalie’s father loosened his tie. “The pagers inform us if there’s an emergency.”

“I guess this happens a lot for your job?” Brant probed.

“No,” John Morrigan scowled. “This is the first time.”

The knot in Natalie’s stomach tightened. The television blinked to life on the local news station. A young woman was reporting on a new therapy to reduce the number of lives claimed annually by lung cancer.

“While no vaccine offers 100% protection, the immune response produced by this new vaccine could significantly reduce the rate of growth and metastasis of lungー”

An alarm interrupted the report while a red banner across the screen read “Breaking News.” Images of billowing smoke and fire replaced the tidy, quiet newsroom.

“I’m coming to you from the Naval Station in Norfolk, Virginia, where an explosion occurred moments ago.” The reporter yelled over car alarms, screaming, and the sirens of emergency response vehicles. The camera panned over the rubble of a collapsed building.

Natalie moved around her parents to get a better view of the screen. Smoke filled most of the image. Out of it rose masses of warped metal and crumbled concrete. People stumbled into the street hurt, confused, and covered in blood-streaked soot. Brave souls ran into the smoke, following the screams of victims trapped inside.

“One building has been nearly demolished. Reports of any casualties or injuries have not yet come through. Local Fire and Rescue have arrived on the sceneー” 

The image on the screen trembled and an enormous roaring sounded through the speakers. The camera captured the ground. A pair of brown sneakers flit in and out of the screen as the camera operator ran. The image blurred and cut out. Silence rang through the clearing for a moment before the television station returned to the anchor. She stood with her mouth hanging open in shock.

“Another explosion just occurred at the Norfolk Naval Station,” her voice trembled as she read off the teleprompter. “According to base police they’re…they’re being bombed.”

CHAPTER 3

Mr. Smith clicked off the television and stared at its blank screen.

“Bombs?” Leo asked in disbelief. “Bombs in Virginia? Are they sure?”

“Isn’t your office in Norfolk?” Owen asked his parents.

They exchanged a silent look, ignoring his question.

“Who is it?” Tawney’s hands balled into fists. “The U.S.S.R, North Korea, Syria, or one of the other countries we constantly bicker with?”

“There’s an equal chance it’s an extremist from our own country,” Mr. Johnson replied, scratching his chin as his mind worked.

“It’s actually the Russian Federation now,” Owen corrected Tawney quietly. “You’re thinking of Stalin.”

“Who’s Stalin?” Tawney asked, exasperated.  

Owen puffed out his cheeks and gawked at Natalie in alarm.   

“Humanitarian,” Leo snorted, patting Tawney’s back to calm her.

Owen let out a tiny squeak and pulled at his hair.

“Even I know who Stalin is,” Brant muttered.  

“Hardly the time,” Natalie hissed, ending their conversation.

She glanced from parent to parent. Fear was plain on each of their faces. She had never seen her father scared before. His skin blanched and beads of sweat glistened on his forehead. It was more real than the news report, more real than the smoke, more real than the sirens and the people screaming.

The ground suddenly felt unreliable beneath her feet. Natalie gripped the end of the table for support. A lifelong perception shattered; she studied her mother and father as though seeing them for the first time. Her entire life they had stood on a pedestal: invincible, infallible, constant. This bombing wasn’t a world away; it was in their backyard. In a second, it changed everything. She could see her parents clearly now. Their fear and their confusion. Their raw humanity. 

They’re as scared as I am.

“What do you do?” Natalie demanded the truth from her mother. “Why do you get called when bombs go off?”

“You know I can’t tell you,” Mrs. Morrigan tucked a brown curl behind her ear.

“Because you’ve sworn not to or because you’re scared to?”

“I’ve found out more in the past hour than I have my entire life,” Tawney chimed in, defiantly facing her own parents. “What is going on?”

“It risks your safety to divulgeー”

Brant threw back his chair, cutting off Natalie’s father. “Our safety? A bomb goes off, what, an hour away at most? In the same city as your office? And you’re called? You, of all people. Are you honestly convinced we feel safe right now?”

“Enough,” Mr. Smith gripped Brant’s arm with more strength than he appeared capable of. “That is enough.”

“All of you go on and get your ice creamー”

“Ice cream?” Leo interrupted Mrs. Davis. “I’m not going anywhere until you tell us what’s going on.”

“We deserve the truth,” Owen added, his gaze flicking from the pagers to the hidden television screen.

Natalie’s father scowled and dark circles shadowed his eyes. She wondered how she had missed it before, the evidence of stress etched into his skin.

I didn’t want to see.

After a long moment, he faced Natalie and slowly closed his eyes. When they opened again, they brimmed with tears. The knot twisting in Natalie’s abdomen fell into oblivion. She wanted to hold him, to take away his pain, but the thought terrified her.

He’s my father. The strongest person I’ve ever known. I can be strong enough to rise up, to console him.

She couldn’t. She settled for returning the slow blink. When Natalie opened her eyes, his tears were gone. The curtain of fearlessness cloaked him once again, but it was too late. She had seen the truth.

He blinked...he promised.

“We have to call the office,” Natalie’s mother gave her hand a tight squeeze.

“Good, do it now,” Leo offered his own phone.

Natalie saw the silent plea in her mother’s stare, the way she barely squinted at her.

He promised.

“Let them do their job,” Natalie conceded. “Let’s go.”

“What?” Owen and Brant cried out, confused. Brant slipped out of reach of his father.

“Now is the time to get answers!” Tawney yelled, standing on her chair.

“No, it’s time for them to do their jobs,” Natalie corrected her friend quietly. “People were probably just killed, Tawney. Our questions can wait a few more hours.”

Leo stayed silent. He leaned forward on the table, his mouth set as he tried to read her. Tawney unleashed a string of obscenities and jumped down from her perch.

“Come on,” Leo said over her foul language. “Dessert is on me.”

Mrs. Davis kissed Tawney on her forehead and dismissed them with a wave. A heavy hand fell on Natalie’s back. Her father managed a half-hearted smile as he guided her a few paces away from the table.

“We’ll be waiting for you,” he tucked her hair behind her ears. “Don’t be scared, little bilby.”

“You blinked,” Natalie hissed under her breath. “You blinked, so you promised.”

“Yes,” he sighed. “I know. Your mother and I will explain when we get home.”

“Everything?”

He hesitated. “Okay. Everything.” He slipped away, not giving her the opportunity to press for more information or to ask why he called her a bilby or what a bilby even was.

“Come on, Nat,” Tawney pulled her towards the pathway, her shoes slung over her shoulder. “We have tons to discuss already.”

Natalie let Tawney convince her to traverse the two blocks to the ice cream parlor on foot while the boys drove separately. It was a silent trek other than Tawney’s occasional hissing after stepping on a rock or pinecone. The cobblestone path was interrupted every hundred feet or so by a tall lamppost.

Natalie tried to shake the image of the rubble from her mind. She feared for the people caught in the blast and in the aftermath. She worried for her parents who were, for some reason, called in to help.

Voices drifted to them on a cool breeze.

“Is that coming from the parlor?” Tawney asked.

Natalie groaned when they turned the corner. The typically desolate ice cream stand was packed. The parlor was quaint. It was a cement block with purple paint and a single counter for ordering. Giant plastic scoops of custard adorned the corners of the roof and molded sugar cones supported the counter. The surrounding outdoor space was fair game for seating, and almost entirely occupied. People spanned the grounds and the line for orders wrapped around the building.

“Alright, who spread the news about Colonial Custards?” Leo asked as he, Brant, and Owen ran to join them from the parking lot.

“Nothing like a threat to our national security to remind us of what really matters in life,” Owen nodded solemnly. “Frozen desserts.”

“You know,” Brant chimed in, “they say violence increases proportionately to ice cream sales in a given area.”

“Yeah, I’m sure it’s the sugar high and not the summer heat making everyone irritable,” Leo smirked.

Tawney held Natalie’s arm to keep from losing each other as they elbowed their way along the crushed oyster shell path to the counter. Every conversation Natalie passed through involved the bombing. Even the two televisions above the counter broadcasted the breaking news report.

Who was behind it? Why did they target Norfolk? How many were injured or dead? Was another attack imminent?

A final strategic shift through the crowd and Tawney claimed the counter. As her friend placed a sampler order for the group, Natalie stared at the T.V., barely able to make out the report over the chatter of the other guests.

“Sixteen reported injuries and climbing…no known fatalities…Naval Station expected to remain closed for several days…essential personnel only.”

Someone bumped against her. Leo stood transfixed by the report as well. Brant bumbled past them, desperate to add some final toppings to Tawney’s order.

“Let’s find seats,” Owen shifted uncomfortably in the large group of people.

As they surveyed the limited seating options, Natalie saw many of the other ice cream goers staring back at them. Her cheeks flushed.

“I guess we’re a bit overdressed,” Leo observed, casually slipping his jacket over her shoulders as though it would disguise the shimmering purple dress beneath it.

Natalie pulled the jacket tighter and the scent of cedar engulfed her. It was utterly intoxicating. Her cheeks blushed harder.

What in the world?

Owen pointed to a solitary picnic table beneath an old oak tree where a family of four packed their trash to leave.

“On it!” Brant dove into the crowd.

Natalie caught brief glances of his red cap bobbing between tables. Reaching his goal, Brant stood on the seat and thrust his fist in the air in victory.

“The only way out is through,” Leo said before squeezing between customers.

“Encouraging,” Natalie muttered, tucking in close behind him. It seemed to take forever to reach Brant. Natalie was elbowed and jostled by people in the crowd and had her hair pulled more than once by bored, hip-riding toddlers.

“That wasn’t so bad,” Leo noted as he and Brant took their seats.

Natalie sat opposite them and shook her head. “We have different definitions for what qualifies as ‘bad.’”

“Definitions, no. Perceptions, maybe.”

Natalie raised her eyebrows.

“This is awesome!” Tawney declared as she plopped the buffet of frozen treats on the table. One of the strangers closest to them shot her a condescending glare. “I’m talking about the ice cream, honestly,” Tawney stuck her tongue out at them.

Owen emerged close behind her and passed out spoons.

“So,” Brant spoke through a mouthful of brownie sundae, “hidden televisions and super-secret pagers...definitely spies.”

Owen pointed his spoon at him. “We ruled out spies years ago, Brant. Did you not notice the tech our parents were using? Pagers. No spy is using a pager.”

“And no spy can work regular business hours. Our parents are always home for dinner. Don’t forget the basics,” Tawney cut in.

“Fine,” Brant caved. “Maybe they aren’t the spies in the field using fancy tech, but every spy organization has a home base! Maybe they’re secretaries or something.” 

“That’s idiotic!” Tawney insisted.

“It’s much more likely they’re with the Department of Defense,” Owen reached for a miniature banana split.

“You would agree with her,” Brant sneered, grinning around his spoon. Owen’s ears burned red.

“Or we could all be wrong,” Leo shrugged.

“There’s some positivity,” Brant chuckled.

“We probably are,” Natalie agreed with Leo, pushing away her chocolate custard. Her nerves made her too nauseous to eat. When she was a child, her parents told her they were whatever she wanted them to be: an astronaut, the President, a firefighter. As she grew older, their responses changed.

“Don’t you worry about it dear. We work hard each day like everyone else.”

It was not until she started high school that the most recent piece of information had surfaced.

“We don’t have clearance to share our duties with you, but trust we are keeping you safe.”

It was this statement that solidified the idea their parents were some kind of secret agents. Brant was completely convinced once they discovered all of their parents had fed them the same lines, word for word. However, reality soon dampened the theory.

Our parents work normal business hours and never take any odd leaves of absence.

Most days Natalie didn’t bother with the fact she had no idea what her parents did when they left home each morning. She had never known anything different. Even though her parents had never told her the truth about their jobs, she loved them for never actually lying about it. It had always been an open secret, a known unknown. Normally, she didn’t have a problem with it.

That was before they were the first point of contact after a bombing.

“Did anyone else hear them talking about the tempest tonight? A tempest refers to a storm and there’s been nothing on the weather reports to suggest anything of that magnitude,” Leo’s question drew Natalie out of her thoughts. “And I doubt they were quoting Shakespeare.”

“Could be anything,” Brant adopted Natalie’s abandoned ice cream.

“Does anyone know what a bilby is? Or Coelacanth?” Natalie asked, digging her phone out of her dress pocket.

“What’s this gibberish? Seals can’t what? Is the sugar getting to your brain?” Brant placed his palm on her forehead as though to check for a fever.

“Seel-uh-kanth, not ‘seals can’t’,” Natalie pushed him away and focused on her internet search. “A bilby isー” She stopped herself, distracted by the description of the small creature. “Do you guys think I have big ears?” Natalie pulled on a lobe, concerned.

“You’ve never noticed?” Leo smiled.

“Ha, ha, very funny. I guess I’m as blind to them as you are to deadlines. Have you decided on a college yet?”

Leo shrugged as he spooned chocolate syrup into his mouth.

“I figured it would be easy for you.”

“That’s what everyone keeps telling me. And yet,” Leo shrugged again.

Concerned she had touched on a sensitive subject, Natalie returned to her original question. “This says bilbies have extensive tunnelー”

“Nat, please, we’re discussing adult things here,” Brant cut her off.

“Unfortunately, he’s right,” Tawney nodded solemnly, as though that fact alone was a sacred occurrence.

Natalie shoved her phone back into her pocket. The tiny marsupial with gigantic ears scampered frantically about her brain, searching for its niche within the precariously stacked shelves of stored information.

“After seventeen years of silence, how are we going to get our parents to suddenly open up?” Owen twisted a particularly long strand of beard hair.

“It has to be something different,” Leo said.

“I might have something,” Natalie remembered the call her father received moments before their pagers had gone off.

“What’s that, dear?” Tawney slid into the seat next to her.

“We ask Uncle Chris.”

Silence. After a few awkward seconds, Brant cleared his throat.

“Um...what?”

“No,” Tawney crossed her arms. “We haven’t heard from him in years, Nat. Years. No visits, no phone calls, no birthday cards. Next option?”

“He tried calling my dad right before the bombing was broadcast.”

Tawney’s big brown eyes somehow got wider. “You’re lying,” she accused.

Natalie scoffed. “Since when do I lie to you?”

“Let’s call him now!” Brant shoveled in the last of his dessert and stood. “We also have to find a new ice cream parlor. The commoners have invaded.”

“Yes, God save us from the plebeians,” Leo nodded, gathering their trash.

Brant dropped his bowl onto the food tray and the rest of the plastic bowls trembled. Green acorns rained from the branches of the oak tree above.

“What theー” Brant backed away from the table in alarm. The crowd surrounding the ice cream parlor grew eerily silent as a low rumbling filled the air. The trembling continued for a minute, then everything was still. 

“Earthquake!” Someone shouted nearby.

A terrified murmur swept through the crowd. Above the tree line, a few streets towards the darkening horizon, a cloud of smoke rose towards the first twinkling stars.

“That wasn’t an earthquake,” Owen said quietly, pointing to the billowing cloud of ash. “It was an explosion.”

CHAPTER 4

The parlor erupted with chaos. People shouted as they abandoned their custard and ran for their vehicles. 

“It was an earthquake, Owen,” Tawney argued, her voice unsteady. She stared at the rising smoke in the distance.

The television screens flickered. The news report from the Naval Station switched to a man sitting behind a large glass desk. Natalie struggled to catch sound bites over the noise of the crowd.

“Reports are coming...another explosion...Williamsburg…” The man nodded at something beyond the camera before continuing. “Residential...continuation...in Norfolk earlier this evening.”

“Explosion,” Owen nodded, also fixed on the television.

“How did they get a report so fast?” Natalie asked, watching people flood the parking lot. “It just happened.”

That was near instantaneous.

Owen squinted at her. She imagined the gears in his brain working. “That was too fast,” he agreed.

“We need to get home,” Leo said, rising from the table.

Smoke swirled above the trees and dissipated, lost in the night sky.

Home. Natalie’s head spun as she pictured the worst: her house in flames with her mother and father caught in the blast. She took out her phone and tried to call her mother’s cell. The call transferred straight to voicemail.

“Residential,” Natalie muttered, repeating the newscaster’s words. She tried calling her father’s phone.

“We need to get home now,” Leo insisted. “Natalie, where’s your car?”

The call went to voicemail again.

“They aren’t answering,” Natalie told him.

Leo lifted her chin so she saw nothing but his face. “Are you with me? Where is your car?” His brown hair fell into his face, but he didn’t seem to care.  

“The pavilion,” Natalie answered. Her mind sank into fog. Her thoughts lost their way from one synapse to the next.

“I’ll take you home,” Leo insisted. “Brant, take Owen and Tawney home. They’re both on your way.”

Natalie put her phone away and hugged Tawney tight. “Call me when you’re home.”

Tawney nodded and hurried after Brant and Owen. Her shoes laid on the seat of the picnic table, forgotten.

By the time they got moving, the parlor grounds were completely trashed. Trays full of frozen treats lay abandoned in the grass. People cried as they watched the news report, talked loudly on their phones, or scrambled towards their cars.

“Come on,” Leo had to shout over the noise. “You’re going to have to sit close, and be careful with your legs.”

Certain she had misheard him, Natalie followed Leo away from the parlor. People shoved against her in the madness. Leo held her wrist and pulled her behind him as he navigated the panicked mass of bodies. Still strapped in high heels, her feet throbbed by the time they reached the parking lot.  

Ridiculously impractical footwear, she thought, cursing Formal Fridays.

Natalie stood patiently next to a four-door sedan, waiting for Leo to unlock the doors. Instead, he tossed her a shiny black helmet.

“Whatー” Natalie had turned to ask what the helmet was for but stopped short when she caught sight of him straddling a motorcycle. Every inch of it was flat black: the seats, the handlebars, the bags, even the chrome.

Natalie realized her mouth was hanging open and cleared her throat. “Leo, I couldn’t possibly.”

“You can and you will,” he offered a hand to help her get on.

She stared at it, hesitating. Natalie adjusted his jacket and pulled the sleeves above her wrists. 

Of all the nights…

“Isn’t this your dad’s?”

“He suggested I take it tonight. Crazy, right?”

Not as crazy as me getting on it.

Natalie awkwardly climbed on behind him, trying to be as ladylike as possible in her dress. She reluctantly slipped the helmet onto her head.

Leo chuckled when he peered back to check on her. “You look terrified. You’re going to be fine.”

“Yes, you and your imaginary motorcycle license are so reassuring.”

“Hey, I can drive.”

“Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.”

“I thought that was the goal of humanity: push the envelope, do the impossible.”

Natalie frowned at him.

“Okay, okay,” he conceded. “I’ll take you to your car.”

The motorcycle rumbled to life. Though quieter than most bikes, she still jumped at the sound. Natalie stared back at the now abandoned ice cream parlor. Two employees in powder blue shirts stood in the clearing, surrounded by a sea of strewn cups, spoons, and half-eaten waffle cones.

My car is two blocks in the wrong direction, a complete waste of time.

Smoke continued to rise against the blackening sky.

I want to see my parents.

“Take me home.”

“You sure?” He asked, flipping down the faceguard on his helmet.

Natalie hesitantly held on to his shoulders to brace herself. “Positive,” she replied, not positive at all. She tried to imagine the motorcycle equated to riding a rollercoaster, but the logic won out.

No tracks, no safety checks, no control. Natalie chewed her lip. Oh, and no license.

“Okay then,” he sounded surprised. “The pipes on this bike don’t get as hot as most, but still be mindful where your legs are. I don’t want you to get burned. Keep your calves on mine.”

Natalie was suddenly grateful for the helmet as her entire face flushed pink.

“And hold on,” Leo wrapped her arms tight around his waist.

Thankfully, he did not wait for her to respond. He pulled smoothly away from the curb and confronted a long line of cars waiting to get out of the parking lot. Natalie tapped her toes impatiently on the foot stand. It would take ages to get home through the traffic.

Without warning, Natalie lurched backwards as Leo popped the front end of the bike onto the sidewalk. She yelped and squeezed him tighter to keep from falling off. They leveled out as the back wheel cleared the curb, and then they were racing along the cobblestone path.

“This is so illegal,” Natalie said as she buried her head into Leo’s back. Trees blurred past them, streaks of brown and green. A few moments later she yelped again as they dropped back onto the road.

Leo gained speed on the pavement. They bobbed in and out between cars and cruised through stop signs. Natalie tried to focus instead on how the wind whipped Leo’s white dress shirt into rippling waves across his back.

Sooner than she expected, they began to slow. Natalie summoned enough courage to watch the familiar houses flitting past them. Brick ranchers on spacious, manicured lawns lined either side of the road, each with a lit lamppost at the end of the driveway.

“Doing okay?” He called back.

Natalie hit his arm and pointed ahead of them. She lived in one of the few two-story houses in the neighborhood, and its windows glowed bright a few lots ahead.

“They’re home!” Natalie said, relief flowing through her.

They’re home. They’re safe.

She felt Leo relax beneath her grip.

“I’m going to drop you off at the door and head home to my folks,” he explained as they rolled off the asphalt and into the gravel driveway.

They reached the narrow cement path leading to the front door and Leo flipped up his faceguard. His mouth was set in a thin line as he surveyed the lot. Natalie was pondering how best to dismount when Leo interrupted her thoughts.

“Where is your parents’ car?”

Natalie examined the yard. The driveway was empty, but light spilled from every window of the house. The front door swung back and forth a few inches with the breeze.

“The door’s open…”

Natalie heard the concern in his voice. A shadow moved across one of the windows on the second floor.

“They are home!” She exclaimed. “My dad promised to tell me the truth. I’ll fill you in after.”

“When did he say that?” Leo asked, skeptical.

“Right after the bombing; he gave me a slow blink.”

“Slow blink?” Leo shook his head. “Is that a millennial form of winking?”

Natalie shifted impatiently. “No. It’s rumored animals can communicate their intent through eye contact and blinking speed. Staring suggests they’re asserting dominance. A slow blink is them saying ‘trust me, I come in peace.’”

“You truly believe that?” Leo arched an eyebrow.

“Of course not, Leo,” Natalie shook her head. “It’s something we discussed years ago, but he knew I would remember.”

“So, you expect your dad to divulge our parents’ deepest secret because he slowly blinked at you?”

“Yes.”

Leo stared at her for a long moment. “Uh-huh. Nat, this doesn’t feel right. We’re leaving,” Leo snapped his faceguard and whipped the bike around, flinging gravel into the yard.

“What are you doing?” Natalie yelled at him, barely able to stay on.

“You’re coming home with me. Something’s off.” He had nearly reached the end of the driveway when Natalie made up her mind.

She let go of Leo’s waist, put her arms around her face, and rolled off the back of the bike. The ground rose up around her much faster than she expected. She cried out as searing pain exploded where she landed on her shoulder. Her head bounced off the ground hard as she rolled to a stop.

Natalie lay stunned for a moment. Her body quickly gave her an itemized summary of her injuries and she groaned. Her shoulder burned as though someone pushed an iron poker into it and her legs stung where the gravel cut into her exposed skin. Every muscle protested as she pushed off the cracked helmet and forced herself to her feet.

She took a few uneasy steps towards the house, holding her left shoulder gingerly. The helmet and Leo’s jacket had saved her a lot of damage. She scratched a tickle on her leg and her fingers came away wet with blood. Long, shallow cuts wrapped around her thighs and calves. Somehow, the abrasions stung more after she saw them.

“Nat!” Leo called out. He spun the bike around and sped next to her. “What the hell!”

Natalie strode stronger with every step, determined to get inside.

Leo’s helmet hit the ground and the motorcycle fell silent. “You’re insane!” He said incredulously. “You jumped off a freaking motorcycle!” Leo skirted around to confront her.

“They’re here, Leo.”

“I don’t think so.”

“What if you’re wrong?”

“Then I’m wrong,” Leo shrugged. “But process what you’re seeing, Nat.”

She tried. She saw her home. She saw the dark painted shutters that merely framed the windows for aesthetics. She drank in the scent of the freshly mulched flower bed and watched its garden flag, embroidered with a cursive ‘M’ for Morrigan, sway in the warm breeze. She saw Leo with his thin black tie hanging loose around his neck, standing between her and the porch.

His athleticism showed. Soccer had made him strong; his shirt fit snug around his shoulders and biceps. Soccer had made him analytical; his brown-green eyes focused intensely on hers, flicking briefly to her arms and feet, waiting for movement. However, most inconveniently, soccer had made Leo fast.

I’ll never make it around him to the door.

Natalie watched a shadow move across the glowing window above them.

I have to get inside.

She advanced towards Leo. Before she took another step, he cleared the distance between them and took hold of her wrist. Natalie winced and gasped. He dropped his hold and she gingerly clutched her wrist against her side.

“I’m so sorry! Did you hurt it on the gravel?” He frowned with genuine concern, giving Natalie the slightest twinge of guilt. While he fussed over her feigned injury, she took two strategic steps and positioned herself between Leo and her house.

“No, Leo, I’m sorry.”

She saw his confusion before she turned and ran. Her pointed heels sank awkwardly in the grass on her first step, but her second landed on the solid stone sidewalk. She pushed off hard. He had speed and training on his side. All she had was surprise.

Natalie leapt over the porch stairs and ran through the open door.

Home.

She had lived her entire life in the one house. The foyer opened to the living room and kitchen, and reached up high to a balcony on the second floor. An ornate atom-structured chandelier hung from the ceiling, illuminating the family photographs adorning the walls. Despite having bookcases in nearly every room, stacks of novels spilled onto end tables and windowsills. Hanging green plants crept their way across the ceiling to the tall French doors that led to the back yard. The kitchen shone with stainless steel appliances and black granite countertops. A large white lantern sheltered three pillar candles on the center island. In the evening, their flickering glow would find the mirrored flecks in the granite and make them sparkle. Aside from the occasional change in paint color, the house had remained the same her entire life.

Natalie stopped short a few paces into the foyer. It looked as though a tornado had blown through her home. Mail littered the floor and stuffing cascaded out from the brown couches, forming snowdrifts in her living room. Photographs that normally hung on the walls were smashed, reduced to glass shards that crunched under Natalie’s feet. The kitchen cabinets had been emptied and their contents strewn across the floor. Broken china made the kitchen practically impossible to navigate.

“We should leave,” Leo glowered at her from the doorway.  

The floor above them creaked.

Natalie’s head whipped around to the stairs. Bloody paw prints trailed down them, through the wrecked kitchen, and out the back door.

Enzi.

“Someone is here,” Leo hissed.

“Yes, my parents.”

“Or maybe someone else. There’s no way they didn’t hear the bike. We need toー” 

Darkness engulfed them. Natalie stood frozen, incapable of movement, incapable of breathing. Her mind struggled to adapt to the sudden absence of light. It invented ominous shapes in her vision, setting her imagination on fire.

Don’t move. Your eyes will adjust, she told herself.

Trying to compensate for the sudden blindness, her ears amplified every sound. Her shallow breaths seemed to reverberate off the walls. Her heart bellowed its beats like a gong. After an eternity, she made out the faint outline of the front door.   

Natalie jumped as a soft touch traced her arm until it found her fingers. Leo led her towards the door. She was nearly there when glass shattered in the kitchen.

We’re not alone.

Abandoning all attempts of hiding, Leo ran full pelt for the door. Natalie scrambled desperately behind him. She slipped on a pile of glass and fell. Every time she tried to stand, her ankle rolled or more glass slipped out from under her. Leo continued to pull her as she struggled to find her feet.  

The stranger grumbled loudly, his voice much closer than Natalie expected. Two burly hands took hold of her waist. She screamed as she rose into the air, plucked from Leo’s grasp.

CHAPTER 5:

NAUTILUS CHAMBERS

Despite their narcotic concoction, Natalie was certain she remembered more than her captors intended her to.

Kidnap Palooza, Natalie thought bitterly. They ambushed us. They had us in seconds. We missed something.

They wouldn’t hunt us simply because we canー

No. Focus on the facts. How did Nautilus find us so fast?

Natalie closed her eyes and tried to recall the events of her capture as clearly as possible. Natalie had offered herself up. She promised to go willingly if Nautilus let her friends go.

What a joke.

She remembered a sharp pinch in her neck as they injected something into her. Nearly instantaneously, the world fell away. Brief

glimpses of consciousness interrupted her sleep. A hard bump in the road jolted her in a van and she recalled the loud engines of a plane. It was not until she had been poked again Natalie truly started to wake.

A painful prick on the inside of each elbow told her they were drawing blood. Her head was heavy and her thoughts traveled agonizingly slow. Peering through her eyelashes, she saw her wrists were bound to a chair by thick leather straps. She tried to pull against the restraints, but her body refused to listen. Her left pinky managed a single pitiful twitch. Avoiding the vials of blood, Natalie listed her head to the side to locate her friends.

She found herself in a white, circular room lit with long fluorescent bulbs humming on the ceiling. White tile floors reflected the light off stainless steel lamps and tables strategically arranged around several padded reclining chairs.

The effect was blinding.

Natalie squinted at the petite figure strapped in the chair to her right. A sharp beeping blared in her ears and unfamiliar faces in white surgical masks swam before her. They spoke quickly to each other, and one shone an annoying penlight in her face.

The beeping is my heart rate!

They’re going to drug me again.  

Closing her eyes, Natalie rested her head against the padded chair and forced herself to remain calm.

Deep breath in…long breath out.

Don’t panic.

The beeping slowed and the penlight faded away.

Regain control.  

Finally, the needles were removed from her arms and a bandage applied to each puncture. Her bindings were undone and two people pulled her into a slumped standing position. Natalie wondered if it was the drugs or the loss of blood making her head swim. She tried to search for her friends, but the room was dancing and morphing in a blur of white and light.

Natalie’s captors adjusted their grip and dragged her between them. Their fingers dug painfully into her biceps, sending blood trickling down her forearms around the bandages they had placed. She looked up in time to see her friends being taken away from her. Their heads hung heavy on their chests, still sedated.

Natalie yelled for them. She screamed so loud her throat threatened to rip apart. She took in the deepest breath possible and bellowed until her chest ached, but what escaped her mouth was barely louder than a whisper.

The blinding white room faded away as they dragged her into a dim passageway. Her bare feet bumped along the cool, unfinished floor. Even her escorts tripped occasionally, dropping her roughly into the dirt. Soon the glow of the clinic was gone. Instead of fluorescent bulbs, red beacons illuminated the floor every few hundred feet. They ascended a gentle upwards slope with several turns and countless branching passages. Natalie would never remember the way.

They may have lugged me around in circles and I would never know.

Unexpectedly, her captors dropped their hold on her and she sank to the floor. She was able to push herself onto one of her elbows as a huge wooden door closed off the passageway. It slid left out of the wall, sealing her in.

Natalie collapsed in the dead-end where they left her. A soft ticking alerted her to the clock. She stared at it. A quarter after three. She assumed it was three fifteen in the morning, since the skylight high above her showed a twinkling starry sky. Natalie let the exhaustion take her and rested her cheek in the dirt.

When she woke later that day, the fog of the sedative had gone. Natalie got to her feet as panic hit her hard, making cold sweat bead on her forehead.

I’m trapped.

She traced along each wall of the cell. Solid, cold stone. She traced the seam of the door to find it was flush with the wall. Natalie clawed at the wood, scratching and screaming until she lost the ability to speak. She opened her mouth and no sound came out. Blood dripped from her fingertips, staining everything she touched. 

There has to be another way out.

The cot on the far wall did not move no matter how hard she pulled or kicked. She stood on the mattress and reached stupidly for the skylight still at least ten feet above her. The night sky glowed with a rare ribbon of color.

It’s still dark?

Natalie scowled at the clock on the wall. It was exactly six. Whether it was six at night or six in the morning, there must be daylight at some point.

Where am I?

Defeated, Natalie slumped against the wall and sank to the cot.

I have to get out.

She stared around her cell, working the problem in her mind. Four stone walls, a door without hinges, an unreachable skylight, a loathsome ticking clock, a thin cot with a thin blanket, and a cold dirt floor. That’s all she had. After hours of analyzing the same variables, she reached the simple, crushing truth.

The only way out is through that door.

After establishing that the door to her cell was the sole way in and out, it was by far the most interesting part of her room. It opened at least twice a day, sliding left into the wall itself, revealing a short dark passageway to a bathroom with a frigid shower. More interesting still, was the door could also slide to the right, leading to a much longer passageway. The passageway that brought her to the cell. The passageway that led to freedom.  

She sat in purgatory, tending the door, willing it to slide to the right.

I have to get out.

When she became tired of sitting, Natalie paced restlessly.

Convinced she had missed something, something important. Nautilus must have figured out how to find them beyond tracking tacking signatures. She touched the shining white scar on her right arm and scoffed at herself.

We were reckless. 

Natalie had finally grown accustomed to the silence when a metallic grinding made her leap off the cot in alarm. She held her fists high in front of her and faced the door, prepared to fight whatever stood between her and freedom. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears as she waited. The screeching continued, but the door had yet to budge.

A blur of movement caught her eye along the baseboard beside her cot. Natalie watched apprehensively as a square of wall revolved and a bowl of soup and a cup of water appeared. The panel shuddered to a stop and silence enveloped her again, thicker than before.  

“Hello?” Natalie croaked, still hoarse from her screaming. “Who’s there? What are you going to do with me?”

Silence.

She stared at the food, her stomach grumbling. Steam swirled up from the soup, carrying a mixture of spices that made Natalie’s mouth water. She tried to lift the bowl, but it was stuck to the revolving panel.

Natalie had briefly entertained the idea it was poisoned. She shook her head at the thought. It made no sense to go through the trouble of kidnapping her simply to poison her. The fact she was imprisoned meant they knew who she was. What she was.

No, definitely not poisoned.  

Her internal debate lasted too long, and the offering revolved back beyond the wall, untouched. Natalie cramped with hunger as she slumped against the cot. 

She nearly lost her mind that first day. She was certain Nautilus would come to question her, but no one came. Ever.  The next food offering arrived several hours later and she devoured it without question.

Officially not poisoned.   

“Thanks Chef,” Natalie had said to the panel half-sarcastic, half-serious.  

It had been three days since she was dragged into her cell. Three days of darkness and silence. Natalie never saw her nicknamed ‘Chef’ who brought her rations of food, and there was never any sound of their approach. She was not sure anyone brought it at all. For all Natalie knew, Chef didn’t exist. Perhaps the panel connected to a magical, automated food dispenser and her rations materialized with the push of a button. If there was one thing she had learned in the past few days, it was that anything is possible.

Question everything.

Natalie stared at the purple and green bands of light flickering far beyond the window. She feared for her friends. If their captors were not torturing her, they must have started with one of the others. The idea made her cringe. She wished they would take her out and get whatever they were going to do over with. She wondered if she was strong enough to endure torture and not tell what little information she had managed to gather between the bombing and their capture. She touched the healing scabs on her legs.

Probably not.

For what was probably the millionth time, Natalie kicked the cot and flung the tattered blanket to the ground.

Then there were the bombings.

How are we supposed to protect the world if we can’t even manage to free ourselves?

The question mocked her as the hours continued to tick by. Tick-tock, tick-tock.

Her stomach grumbled, but she ignored its complaints. She began to go through her capture again. She must have missed something.

I have to get out.