Welcome to my latest piece of interactive fiction. Here's how it works: read the segment below. At the end, you get to vote on key plot points.
Enjoy!
-Lillian James
Q
woke up in a coffin, and her first thought was, Not again. Her second was one of horror, but a frantic search told
her she was alone. Thank God. A
coffin companion was the absolute worst kind of uninvited guest.
The
coffin was dark and warm. Dark suggested she was underground, but warmth
usually meant climate control. Maybe a crypt? Did they have crypts in San José?
Darcy would know.
Where
was Darcy?
Didn’t
matter. Now that Q was awake, she didn’t have long before she ran out of
oxygen. She pressed against the wood above her head. Cheap and rough, it scored
her palms. It was dry, which supported her crypt theory – and meant that there
would be less rot for her to break through.
Nerves
buzzed under her skin, but she ignored them. She would get out. She’d done it
before. And then she hadn’t had Darcy.
Where
the hell was Darcy?
She
shifted to get her knees as close as possible to the center of the coffin. With
the movement, something slashed at the inside of her wrist. She winced and
grabbed the wound, expecting to find a knife-sized splinter. But instead, there
were stitches.
The
cut ran crosswise along her wrist, the stitches jagged and the flesh tender.
Whatever had happened to her, it had been recent.
Her
nerves spiked, and her breath started to hitch. Something was wrong. No Darcy
was bad, but no Darcy and an amateur hatchet job on her body?
This
was no accidental burial.
She
punched against the wood before she knew she intended to move, and it felt
good, it felt right, so she did it
again and again and again. And it was so loud,
and then she realized that she was screaming. Screaming and flailing, panicking
like a child. Hysterical.
Her
mother had taught her better.
She
closed her eyes and forced her body to still. Her battered hands sank; her
knees rested limply against the side of the coffin. Her lungs began to slow.
Of
course it was an accident. It was always an accident. She would get out, she
told herself again. Then she would find Darcy, and everything would be okay.
She repositioned herself and braced to thrust up her knee.
And
something slammed into the wood inches above her face.
She shrank back, her fingers searching desperately
for something she could use as a weapon. But she had nothing. As the lid
creaked open, she rolled away and thrust her arm up and out in blind attack.
“Ow! What the hell, Q?”
“Darcy?” Her old friend was standing over the
coffin, her brown face lit by the glow of her phone. “Darcy, it’s you. Oh,
thank God. Where were you?”
“Shhh!” Darcy glanced over her shoulder as she
helped Q sit. “They could be close.”
“Who? Darcy, what’s going on?”
“The men who took you. I’ll tell you later. We have
to go.”
“Someone took me?”
“Yes. Shut up.”
Q climbed out of the coffin, her unsteady legs
making haste difficult. Not a crypt, she saw. A shed. And she’d been right.
This was not an accidental burial.
Darcy’s phone went dark, and the younger woman
peeked through the open door of the shed at the woods beyond. Then she grabbed Q’s
hand and yanked her into the night.
They ran through woods and moonlight. The ground was
blanketed in pine needles, the lack of undergrowth suggesting that the land was
maintained. Q wondered if they were on private property, and she shuddered.
She weakened with each step, and when they finally
reached Darcy’s car, she leaned gratefully against it. Her lungs wheezing, she
asked, “How did you find me?”
“The chip in your wrist. Get in.”
There was food in the car. Q tore into it, her hands
shaking with hunger. “Guess this was a weird one?”
Darcy laughed grimly. “You have no idea.”
“Thanks, Darce.”
Darcy looked over. Q’s face was even paler than
usual beneath the strobe of the streetlights. “It’s what we do.”
Q pushed a shock of red hair out of her eyes and
glanced around. “This isn’t San José.”
“Nope. Westwego. New Orleans.”
“Jeez. How long was I out this time?”
“You mean your little nap?” Darcy laughed more
easily this time. “Only about three years.”
