The four of us climb the creaky steps of the porch to Maurice's house. A river splashes against itself nearby, the very river we were drowning in days ago.
Just thinking of being pushed further under the dirty water makes my chest constrict, I focus on the door. It's metal, unnaturally so. The whole house is old and homey, but this door is reinforced to withstand anything, the windows are too.
Marcus pushes himself closer into the circle to whisper, "Do you think he'll hear us if we knock?"
"If not, he's got to have some other way to know we're here," Nayan backs up a step and looks the house over from side to side.
As if on cue by our questions, a crackling rings out from... somewhere.
"Hello... uh... kids," a man comes over the intercom with a scratchy voice, "You don't know a Mirella, do you?"
The girl in his file. His daughter.
His dead daughter.
Lola darts her head around, looking for the camera or microphone, "Show yourself!"
The intercom crackles like he's breathing deeply into it, "Mirella Cates, do you know who she is?"
We look at each other with our own separate expressions to show consideration.
"Hello... Sir," I say to the air, "We have a file about you. Your daughter is in it, your wife too. Can we talk to you?"
The steel door shoots open, showing us a frail old man with a tight medical mask and wide eyes, "Where did you find the file?"
We each take a step back with a small jump.
"Was it the E-A-A? Are you with them?"
The what now?
He pulls a pistol from inside and aims it at us, "Answer me! Where the fuck did you get the file?"
Marcus is the first to thrust his open hands in front of him, the rest of us are quick to follow.
"Base," Nayan stutters, "We are with nobody."
I move a hand to my bag slowly to get the file, keeping my eyes trained on the man.
He adjusts the aim to be directed at me specifically, "What is in the bag?"
I quickly put the hand back out in front of me.
Lola cuts ahead of me, "The file, no weapons. None of us are armed."
He looks over us, analyzing our defenseless selves. Like we could be more than just four teenagers inching closer to the steps. Except for Lola, she holds her stance.
He lowers the gun and sets it back down inside, a small sigh releases from all of us.
"I'm sorry for the scare, would you like to come inside?"
Excuse me? What?
He must see our uneasy glance at each other, "You understand, don't you? My reason for caution?"
Even past the mask, it's easy to tell he has a fatherly face that leaves me with a homesick ache.
"Yes, we do," Marcus says.
Even without a gun and seeming far less threatening, I still can't shake the thumping in my ears that filters my thoughts.
He takes a step onto the porch, "Well, you asked to talk to me. Are you coming inside or not?"
I pull the file from my bag and pass it to him, "We are, and thank you."
He eyes at the file while walking in, Lola and Marcus follow after him. I'm just a short step behind Marcus but stop when I see that Nayan is still looking around the porch.
He inspects a rusty porch swing that looks like it could be broken by nothing more than a strong gust of wind. But the damage doesn't seem to be from weathering--at least not entirely, but just from use.
I step back onto the porch, leaving a hand on the interior of the doorframe to dangle off of, "What are you doing?"
He turns back to me quicker than needed, "Looking for anything weird."
I crinkle my nose in a smile, "I'd stop looking now, you're probably going to find something you don't like."
He crosses his arms over each other, "I think I'm more worried about finding something I don't like later--when we can't run for our lives."
I look around the porch, maybe years ago this was a nice place. Maybe in another time his daughter, Mirella, used that porch swing all the time. But just like Avex itself, nothing is left untainted by whoever brought us here.
"Come inside, an old guy with a gun is the second least scary thing we've seen this week. We'll be fine."
He sighs with a smile and follows me in, "You're no fun, Cass."
"I'd say the exact opposite actually, but think what you want."
We walk through a living room and Marcus and Lola are already sitting at a cluttered table built for a family gathering.
Maurice shifts everything on the table into piles, making room for more than one person, "It's been fifteen years since I've had people over, so pardon the mess."
"Fifteen years?" I ask, perched behind Lola's chair.
He stops stacking papers abruptly and looks up, "So, what do you know about this place?"
Damn, how little do we know? Just the way he says it makes it clear how oblivious we are. Not that I was ever under the perception we had a handle on what's going on.
"They have two lives," Lola starts, "We're guessing they have some relation to Avex."
Maurice examines Lola's eyes at her use of 'they' instead of 'we'.
"That's really it," Nayan finishes.
He takes a seat and leans back, even past the mask it's easy to tell how shocked he is, "Those EAA pricks really left you guys oblivious, huh?"
He keeps saying E-A-A. I've heard of EA, but I doubt this guy cares much about video games if he even knows what EA is.
"EAA?" I feel stupid for asking considering that he already seems to know well what he's talking about.
He laughs quietly, "It stands for Earth Against Avexians. Really makes it sound like more people hate us than one group."
"So those are the fucks who brought us here?" Lola says.
"Not to undermine how shitty it was for what they did to you, but you guys are the least of the damage they caused."
"What did they do?" I ask.
His blue rimmed eyes widen, "Did you think Avex was always like this?"
Marcus nibbles at the corner of his lip, If I wasn't so intreigued I'd be worried too.
"We were the closest you could get to a utopia once," His gaze darkens, "Until they killed everyone."
I choke on my spit and break into a fit of coughs, "Wh-What! They killed everyone?"
"Well, no, but they got damned close to it."
My cough begins to settle, letting my thoughts sink in and a gape comes over my lips.
"But they missed us..." Nayan whispers, "If it was fifteen years ago we would've just been babies. How are we alive?"
He smiles, "My wife was a part of that. The program was able to get some of you onto the Earth dimension, though it looks like the EAA wasn't going to let you guys go without a fight."
"But I don't get it," Lola tilts her head quizzically, "If the EAA is dedicated enough to track them down from all around the world, why bother with letting them live? God knows they could've killed us all fairly easily."
I deadpan at her, "Thanks, Lola."
"I watched them technically kill you once, you put up a good fight but they could've done it again."
Marcus looks down at the table uneasily, "Who knows."
I can't help but wonder if this isn't really the end of their plan. Lola brings up a good point, I think I put up a half decent fight against those well trained jerks, but it's clear they could've done it again if they wanted to.
So why bother with throwing us in this crap shute like caged animals if they don't plan to do anything? They obviously don't have anything against murder--a lot of it. But Whittle said it himself, they just plan to close the portal.
What if Whittle is in the same darkness we are to their real plan?
"The quiet kid is right, I have no clue. But from what I knew before everything went down, They don't do anything for no reason."
He flips open the file and pages through, he seems to stop breathing a moment when he flips to the pages with his daughter and wife.
"You know, If the EAA already knows where I am. Surely they know where you are too," he says without taking an eye off the image of his daughter.
"Maybe they-" I start hopefully but he cuts me off.
"Don't even start, if you guys are going to track them down..." He flips the file shut and stares at me dead in the eyes, "Don't rely on their mercy, they killed you once and they can do it again. In Avex, there are second chances, nothing more-nothing less."
He seems like a good, friendly person. Maybe that's why a breath hitches in my throat. Why the coldness of his tone strikes a nerve. Or maybe it's because I don't want him to be right. They won't kill us.
Nayan must see my fear and offers a small nod, "We don't want to be here forever."
I don't know if it's the fact that I couldn't agree with him more, or the nod. But it keeps my fear at bay.
Maurice shakes of what Nayan says, "I'll be long gone by tomorrow night, Come back after and take what you want. I'm not sticking around to get myself killed."
"You're not going to tell us more?" Lola pushes herself out of the chair in front of me.
He stands up, "I need to get packing, so no," He seems to laugh at this, "Look at me, I haven't talked to anyone in fifteen years and I'm asking you to leave."
"Wait!" I say, he pauses at the door, "You know who the EAA is, why are they so horrible? Why do they hate us for being Avexian?"
He fully turns back around with a solemn expression, "By technicality, they don't hate that you for being Avexian," He smiles sadly, "You know? My daughter is the one who figured this out. I tried to keep my Mirrie out of it all and she's the one who was able to figure it out, not me."
I take a small step towards him, itching for an answer.
"They aren't doing this because they hate you for... you know... being Avexian. In fact, this isn't even because they hate y-"
Glass shatters from somewhere, I whip my head around to try and find it. Nayan rushes to the front door to see what it was. Maurice doesn't finish his sentence and runs off to the kitchen. In the fear of the moment, the question I was so invested in the answer of slips my mind.
"Did-"
The door slams open followed by a rumble of yelling and the walls seem to close in around the three of us still here. But it's not walls, it's an army.
Nayan, he's by the door!
They are coming in from everywhere, they wear military grade gear, but without any kind of logo on the uniforms it's easy to tell they are affiliated with no government.
EAA.
My breath quickens, "Nayan is at the door!"
Marcus' eyes widen, "Run, we need to run right now!"
Another glass shatters from somewhere else around the house and footsteps stomp around on the floorboards above us.
Lola snatches up my wrist and jerks me behind her, Marcus, and Maurice, "Cassie, we'll get him on the way out!"
With a final glance back at a rifle bearing soldier entering the room, I scramble forward.
I'm the last into a windowless kitchen, Maurice is digging under the sink for something. Lola is grabbing a charred frying pan off the gas stovetop.
I open up random cabinets looking for a weapon but it's just stockpiled rice and air sealed food.
"Think fast!" Lola shouts in my direction, I whip around barely fast enough to catch the knife, thankfully with a plastic cover over the blade.
I hold it out at a distance from me and keep it aimed at the ground, "I'm not going to stab someone, knives are for killing!"
Maybe with a pocket knife it would be different but this is a butcher's knife, a knife that does far more damage.
Maurice pulls off his basic medical mask and puts a much higher degree gas mask built for war over his whole face.
Marcus puts himself as far back from both doors as possible, pushed against a cabinet and holding a baking pan in front of him defiantly. Even though nobody has invaded the room...yet.
"If you don't like the knife use something else!" She yells while peeking out the door.
I stuff the knife into my bag and pull a blue ceramic plate out of a cabinet.
This'll do.
I inch towards the door we came out of next to Lola. Steps of an army pound closer, or is that my heartbeat?
"Wrong way," Maurice's gas mask makes everything he says hissy, "Bunker is downstairs."
"Smart to have a bunker, but our friend is still out there," Marcus says like he's a character in a kids show, though buried past the uncalled for cheeriness his eyebrows knit together.
"Agreed," I say.
Maurice glances between us and the door at the opposite end of the room, he groans, "You guys can stay here to kill yourselves, but I'm not dying today."
His gaze centers on Lola and then he hurries over, "Do you guys know where he is?"
"By the door, I-" In the time it takes to blink a soldier puts himself in front of me and pushes the cold barrel of a gun against my temple.
I take a step back with palms raised, and even with the white noise, I can only hear my ragged breaths as I look down the barrel.
"Please don't shoot," I mumble.
His eyes narrow and I pinch my eyes shut. Maybe I'll open my eyes again and this will all just be a dream. I'll wake up in a cold sweat and spend the next half hour wandering around, then everything will be fine.
Bam.
I slowly open my eyes again and the soldier is gone, I catch Lola smirking at the ground while spinning the pan between the two hands.
"We should fight more often," She says with a toothy grin, "That was fun."
"That... no. Let's not do that more often."
A bruise is already forming on the soldier's hairline and his chest rises and falls evenly. Good, he's not dead.
I shake off the heebie jeebies from... that, and step back into the living room. But it isn't filled with agents as I expected, the rumbling is from somewhere else in the house. None of them are here and it leaves me wondering if that guy was just a diversion from something.
"Nayan!" I yell, "Where are you?"
"Shhh!" Marcus says, "We don't need to draw their attention to us, and we'd be better off looking outside."
We make our way to the front door which hangs open with Nayan hitting a soldier's arm with a thin wooden end table. The gun tumbles from the soldier's hand and Nayan lunches for it on the wooden ground.
Once the soldier sees the place he's in now, with the enemy wielding his own lethal weapon, he makes a run for it off the porch and out of our line of sight.
I rush over, "Are you ok?"
He nods quickly, keeping himself alert, "The guy called for backup, there's more coming."
A crowd hurries up a staircase nearby, and we all look at each other with wide eyes knowing exactly what a crowd means.
More soldiers. None of which we are equipped to fight.
As if by one mind--a logical one, we run off the porch but don't try to make it far. Instead, we hide behind a wall of dying bushes pushed up against the porch. The woodchips scrape against my knees, something I barely take notice of when listening for any and every hint to what's going on inside.
Marcus is the last of us squished in behind the plants, "Think they won't find us here?"
"It won't be the first place they look," Lola whispers from next to me, trying to get a look past the small yellowing leaves of the plant.
There's a rumbling followed by Maurice's hissy yelling through his mask. The porch squeaks wildly like a stampede of horses are running over it. I clamp my mouth shut, though I don't think I could force myself to say anything regardless.
Nor do I think they would be able to hear me if I did.
Eventually, everyone must be outside because the creaking has ceased and its only a crowd in the street. Though I can't see Maurice, the way they are crowding assures me he's there.
Or maybe it's just someone who sounds like him in the middle of the circle.
Or they stole his mask.
I press my face closer into the greenery, letting the branches and leaves poke at my face. It barely improves my sight, but with the cock of a gun I begin debating if I even want to see.
The person wearing the mask keeps blubbering pleas, this person isn't Maurice. It can't be him. He had a bunker and everything.
An ear splitting crack fills the air, and even when it's gone it's echo lingers through this vacant place. This horrible, empty place.
The yelling falls to a quiet and so do the soldiers for a split second where all I can hear is the crunching of woodchips beneath us. But soon, too soon, the soldiers seem to carry on with their lives as if nothing happened.
As if they didn't kill anyone.
Maurice's warning comes back to me, They killed you once and they can do it again. In Avex, there are second chances, nothing more nothing less.
We're on our last chance, and I don't intend to waste it.