Vicious Memories

Chapter 68

Stay or go? I asked myself. Stay or go?

I sat cross-legged next to an anxious Box, my cave blessedly cool and quiet.

The morning light picked out every single mote of dust and dirt floating lazily through the air. A sliver of blue sky was visible beyond the overhang that sheltered three-quarts of the floor like the outstretched hand of a giant.

The tense conversation from the clearing couldn't reach me here. The pervading sense of anguish and desperation couldn't be felt. The only things present were my few meager possessions, Box, and the walls around us.

I breathed deeply, pondering the question again. Stay or go?

If I chose to stay I gave myself - and the rest of the village - the best chance to catch the killer and put an end to this ordeal once and for all. I could avoid the failure I was so terribly afraid of. At the same time, I would open someone else up to the danger of being murdered, though there was no way to say whether that would happen anyway.

If I chose to leave I might help the village avoid the immediate threat, assuming the killer could actually make good on their promise. That would mean I would be out in the jungle, alone, vulnerable to whoever or whatever waited there. It also meant the villagers would have a worse chance of finding the killer, and if they started killing people despite the fact that I'd left, there would be one less person to defend them.

There was no option that didn't come with its own form regret.

This endless circle of thoughts began to drive me mad. I had to get up and move, but the only thing I could think to do was plan for the eventuality of my departure. Box wagged his tail as I picked my way through the cave.

"Not going anywhere yet, buddy." I reached down to stroke the soft fur on his ears. He lifted a paw and placed it gently on my knee. "But if I go, I won't be able to take you. You know that, right? It'll be hard enough taking care of myself out there. You'll be safer here."

He tilted his head one way, then the other, and barked softly.

"I know," I said regretfully. "I know."

I went t through my belongings.

A red-covered spiral notebook with my investigation notes, the pen I'd used, still half-full of deep black ink, a paperback that Neema had lent me (Along Came A Spider, I hadn't read it yet, no time), two t-shirts, two pairs of socks, an extra pair of shorts, the pants I'd arrived in, never washed - everything looked up at me with a sense of dingy accusation, as if unsure whether to be angry at their own sense of disuse or their impending abandonment.

I picked up the notebook and fingered the dirty pages, flipping them slowly, the words scrawled there written by a man who seemed so different from who I was now. The pen pirouetted around my fingers like a tiny ballerina. Box padded forward to sniff the pants. He certainly wasn't a possession - more of a responsibility, or a friend. But, I reminded myself, it wouldn't be safe for him out in the jungle.

I ran my hand through my hair in frustration, surprised at how shaggy it felt. Scissors were sometimes passed around so people could cut their hair; it was something Jessica had apparently loved to do for the villagers, chatting away happily as she tried to style their hair to suit the lines of their faces. Who would cut their hair now?

"I don't know," I said to Box, bending down to scratch his ears again. "Maybe Mads will cut their hair. She seems stylish."

He huffed. I shook my head.

"Maybe not."

Box returned his attention to the folded pants on the ground, nosing through the folds in the fabric. I hadn't washed them since my arrival. I hadn't thought to. He poked his nose into a specific fold of the waistband, pawing at the area like he was trying to dig a hole, looking up at me occasionally to let out a whine.

I took them in my hands and shook them out, perplexed.

The material in my fingers was too thick to be properly comfortable in this heat, but they would probably provide good protection from bugs and sharp underbrush. I kneaded the material thoughtfully—

—And stopped when my fingers encountered something hard.

Box barked when I withdrew the plain white keycard.

It felt thick in my hands as I turned it over, catching several beige stains on the surface. The face was blank except for a series of tiny numbers running along the top. They swam in my vision like a line of ants marching across a field.

I remembered finding the card in my waistband shortly after waking up on the beach, then stuffing it in my pocket as Arun had charged me from the treeline. I'd completely forgotten about it.

"Holy shit."

An implacable series of connections spiraled outward like a ball twirling on a rope that rapidly lengthened and stretched. Each time a new distance was achieved a new connection was made.

The black squiggles trooped on: 4-6-17-89-4.

The numbers themselves didn't mean anything to me, but I had seen them before. A night spent fleeing through the rain, chased by Strangers, finding a black briefcase under inexplicable wreckage. A silver rectangle stamped in the center of the briefcase's inner cover. A serial number.

Another memory. Another briefcase. Another serial number.

A hiss escaped my lips and the day turned hot. My mind shook, a computer whose fan couldn't keep up with the heat radiating from its processor.

The plastic rectangle was a shock, reminding me that real life existed outside of our island. Such was the power of the human mind that, despite the fact that everything I did was an attempt to figure out why I was stuck here, I still never managed to think too much about what was actually going on beyond these shores. It was a concept too difficult to contemplate when I was trapped here like this, terror at being imprisoned that could break a person and destroy their will to go on. So my mind had protected me from it.

Now the nightmare was real again, and it stared at me from the front of a white plastic keycard.

Why would I have a card with the same serial number as the briefcases? How did I fit into this?

If you were part of everything from the start, an encouraging voice whispered, maybe you aren't as outmatched as you think. Maybe you have the tools and skills you need to protect your friends.

I sat down heavily, thinking.

How could I leave now?