Page 113 of Captured Immune

“Yes, ma’am.” I salute her like she’s my drill sergeant.

For a while, I follow Arella wherever she goes as she scours the woods. When she finds nothing, as I’ve been telling her, she says, “We took a hundred adult steps. Where do you usually end up when you take a hundred kid steps?”

“About twenty paces back.” Hand in hand, I lead her there as my fireball follows us.

“Next to this tree?” She places a hand against the bark of a skinny box elder.

“Yep, and I’ve looked everywhere around this tree. There’s nothing here. My parents’ message saidinside and underground. You see all these dirt patches? I’ve dug almost fifteen feet down starting from the base of this tree and all around it. I’ve even drilled into the trunk to see if there’s anything inside it. It’s a regular tree.”

Arella steps around the trunk, running her hand along the rough bark. I move my flames to follow her gaze.

She tilts her head back and squints her eyes. “Have you ever looked for anything up in the branches?”

“No. The safe house isunderground, remember?”

“And your mom’s song says to ‘look to the sky when you feel down.’ Haven’t you ever done an escape room?”

“A what?”

“An escape room,” she says as if saying it again means I’ll suddenly know exactly what she means. “Seriously? Javina and I love them. It’s a fun place where someone locks you and your friends in a room, and you have to solve puzzles in under an hour to get out. I think your mom is hinting for you to look up. Can you move your fireball that way so I can see better?”

I do as I’m told, even though there’s no way in hell my mom would have given me a hard puzzle to solve. I was a kid when she died. Still, I float my fireball up the trunk and stop once the flames get too close to the leaves. “Any higher and I’ll light this thing up.”

“That’s close enough. Walk around the tree with me.”

Again, I do as I’m told, even though—I gasp. Right there, way up in the bark of one of the thick branches, is a carving.

“What?” Arella asks.

“There’s something carved into the bark.”

“Where?”

I point up. “Right there.”

She squints. “I don’t see anything.”

“Babe, it’s right—” I slap a palm against my forehead. “Oh, did you know that Zordi eyes are different from Ordi eyes?”

“How so?”

“Zordis can see things farther out than Ordinaries can. It’s like our eyes have the zoom and focus function of a camera. Maybe I can see it but you can’t.”

“Well, what’s the carving of?”

I bring my fireball down. “212E.”

“What’s that mean?”

“No fucking clue. You’re the escape-room genius here. You tell me.”

From her pocket, Arella pulls out the two receipts she wrote on the back of. “Look to the sky when you feel down. Know that things will turn around. Work twice as hard to the finish line. Now it’s your time to shine.” She taps the receipts against her thigh as she thinks to herself. “Turn around. Twice as hard to the finish line.”

“Are you thinkin’ we need to turn around?”

She nods. “Toward the east. Four hundred and twenty-four steps.”

“Why four hund—Oh! Twice the steps! Wow. Maybe my mom’s songwasa hint. This whole time, I just thought it was her way of telling me to keep my head up because things will turn around as long as I work hard.”

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