Wicked Hungry

We arrive at a chain link fence, which is about ten feet tall with razor wire around the top. I’m running so quickly that the fence seems to rush up to my face and crash into it. Rewsin must have already jumped across; I can’t see or hear him.

“Hold on,” Blaine says, and he pulls out this big silver key out of his pocket. He waves it in front of us, and suddenly there’s a huge opening in the fence.

“Sick,” Jonathan says.

“Sweet,” Enrique says.

Then we’re walking through the opening. There’s a big pit on the other side. I look down into darkness. All I can see is a faint green glow.

Now there are several of us standing on the ledge.

“Where’s the gateway, Blaine?” I ask, and he points straight down.

“Dude,” Jonathan says. “How are we going to get down there? Fly?”

I just look at him. He can fly, the idiot. But the rest of us?

“There’s a road that leads down. Turn off your lights and follow me closely.”

Our flashlights off, my night vision adjusts, and I can see Blaine, ahead of me. We follow him down a narrow path and we come to the main road, where we find a locked gate. But this isn’t the gate we’re looking for.

I pull out my phone and look at the time. If the text message can be trusted, we have less than fifteen minutes.

Blaine glances back at me and sees me looking at my phone. “We have to hurry now,” he says, and starts to run down the dirt road, taking great leaps and strides. Connor, Jonathan, Enrique, and I follow him, Nye right behind us. I’m afraid we’ve lost the brothers, but we don’t have time to go back and check.

Where is Meredith?

I can smell her scent trail here, and it’s fresh. I can only hope we get to this gateway in time.

I hear a cry of rage from ahead of us. Rewsin.

“Still blocked!” he shouts. “Hurry or I will be locked in this dogskin forever!”

We’re all rushing forward now because we can see where we’re headed: a great green circle on the ground, a great opening in the rock.

“Something smells wrong,” Blaine says, sniffing.

There are lots of conflicting smells, but I can smell Meredith strongly, even over Rewsin’s stink. Her scent trail goes all the way up to this gateway, and then it...stops.

“Home,” Rewsin growls. “I want to go home.”

“That’s just where we’re going to send you,” Blaine says, raising the big silver key in his hand. He moves it against the green gateway, and the gateway pulses.

“There,” Blaine says, putting the key away. “It’s open.”

Rewsin jumps forward, crashes into the gateway, and screams with rage. “Closed! You think I’m an idiot?”

Blaine shakes his head, frowning. He holds up his hand. “It was open a moment ago — I don’t understand.”

“Hold the gate open, Blaine, and we’ll go in,” I say.

Nye nods, but Enrique grabs my shoulder. “You can’t go in there.”

Jonathan is shaking his head. “Dude, no way.”

“There’s no time to argue,” I say. “I can’t leave Meredith in there.”

I see a flash of red in my peripheral vision. Karen.