Noah closed out of the image to send his own message.

Noah: Well, shit

May: It fits the theme of what we’ve seen so far, at least

Noah: It says there’s more pendants and that they’re gonna explode. That seems like an escalation to me

Brian: Yeah, sounds like they’re set up as time bombs or smth

Clarissa: Insight is definitely gonna try to find them

Brian: Insight doesn’t know anything about any pendants. We weren’t stupid enough to show off the one we found, so for all they know, the ‘clasp’ could be a metaphor for death or some shit

Leah: And even supposing they figure it out, they can’t just go around desecrating random tombs. They’d piss off a lot of people and probably wouldn’t end up finding anything anyway

Brian: Depends on how many pendants are actually out there

Noah: Not much we can do to stop them. If they decide they want to launch a large-scale scavenger hunt, that’s what they’re going to do

Brian: It would have been nice for the destruction of the vats to be the end of their dust supply

May: Yeah, although I doubt that would have worked. All it takes is one infected person for them to rebuild their whole stock, and who knows how many other patients they’ve got stashed away here. That woman with cancer probably isn’t the only one they’ve offered a cure to.

Noah: If our goal is to leave Insight with no dust, we could just cure them before we leave. There can’t be more than one or two patients, right? You’ve gotta be pretty desperate to accept a deal with Insight

Leah: Maybe. You’re saying we stick a vacuum into their face until they’re cured? If you’re thinking about using the tank from the treatment room, good luck carrying that thing around the building. If it’s even still there. Wouldn’t be surprised if the doctors store it away somewhere when they’re done treating everyone

Noah: I don’t suppose any of you have a portable vacuum currently on your person?

Brian: We’ve already been over this. None of us have a vacuum

Noah: How about this- we get out of the building, buy a nice mini vacuum somewhere nearby, then return and cure everyone. Then we blow all the dust up

Leah: Where the hell are you going to buy a vacuum? And coming back after we get out is a terrible idea

Noah: It’s just a thought

Clarissa: It’s a good idea except for the going off to get a vacuum part

Noah: There might be a vacuum shop next door, how would you know

Elias: There aren’t any. The whole block is office buildings

Noah: Hmmmm

Noah: Okay guys, new plan

Leah: We’re not stealing a vacuum from an office building

Noah: Oh come on

Noah: If we can overcome Insight’s security, we can definitely overcome the comparably pathetic security on a regular old office building

Brian: You have an actual skeleton key for this building. How do you propose we get into a neighboring building without a key? We’re not exactly seasoned burglars

Leah: Also, Insight might deserve to have their property blown up, but the same probably doesn’t stand true for their neighbors. I’d rather not commit theft against an innocent business

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Brian: For now let’s just stick with our current plan and keep our eyes out for any opportunities. Maybe we’ll stumble across a vacuum in a custodial closet somewhere

Noah: Insight has tiled floors, why would they need a vacuum

Elias: Commercial buildings often use vacuums to clean their floors regardless of the material. Although I don’t think it’d be the kind of vacuum we’d need

Clarissa: You know this whole floor of the building is carpeted, right?

Noah: Holy crap you’re right

Noah: We have to check if there’s a maintenance closet on this floor

Leah: Don’t do it now. Too many people around. You don’t want to be caught opening doors you shouldn’t be able to

Noah: Yeah, yeah. We can check tonight.

Brian: Sounds good

When a minute passed without the appearance of any more messages, Noah wearily set his phone aside and shut his eyes. He welcomed the sense of weightlessness, imagining for a wistful moment that he was back in his own bedroom at home and free of any bizarre infections. The past two days had been one unexpected event after another, and Noah had always found any deviation from routine to be extremely draining. He was exhausted, and very ready for everything to go back to normal.

He wondered for a moment if another symptom of the infection might be general tiredness, but upon further consideration of his recent sleep schedule, he decided his current fatigue was entirely to be expected. Of course, the sickness probably wasn’t helping, especially if his body was involuntarily in something analogous to battery saver mode to somehow make his supply of dust last as long as possible.

Hoping that wasn’t the case, and that if it was, it wouldn’t get worse, Noah reluctantly opened his eyes and picked his phone back up. He needed to call his dad.

Anxiety coursed through him as he held his phone. For a long moment he made no move to dial. The last call wasn’t even twenty-four hours ago, he reminded himself. That’s a perfectly reasonable length of time to have passed without checking in.

Even if the last call may have ended on something of a suspenseful note for him. And then the school got mobbed by the military in response to an outbreak of the very same sickness that I currently possess.

He recognized that he was doing quite the poor job of reassuring himself, so he forcibly halted his spiraling thoughts and jabbed the buttons to dial his dad before he could think of a reason to delay further. He decided right then that no matter what questions he was asked, he would be completely honest. Partly because it had worked out pretty well yesterday, but also because he just didn’t have the energy to spin out any lies, let alone maintain them convincingly. And because he would never lie to his father, of course.

“Noah!” His dad picked up within the first ring, his voice heavy with emotion. His tone seemed more relieved than angry.

“Hey, dad.”

“Oh, thank goodness. Are you okay? Did you get off campus? Have you seen the news?”

“Uh, I’m doing pretty good, all things considered. I’m not on campus, and I haven’t seen the news.”

“Where are you now?”

Noah winced. “At Insight.”

An unpleasantly long stretch of silence settled over the line before his dad responded, “What? How?”

“The sickness, it’s, um, a little worse than we thought.”

“What?” he repeated, even more concerned.

“There were a couple late-onset symptoms. Nothing life-threatening, but me and my friends decided our smartest move was to head over to Insight after we heard that the doctors here had come up with a cure. So we got ourselves on a bus to Insight headquarters and got ourselves treated.”

“Oh,” he said uncertainly. “So are you all good now? When will you be back on campus?”

“Er, none of us are actually cured yet. The doctors said the treatment didn’t work, but that’s only because they’re a bunch of selfish, lying, despicable excuses for human beings. We figured out pretty quickly that they deliberately refrained from treating us properly. Well, I guess my friends knew from the get-go that they weren’t being cured, but the doctors definitely lied to me.

“But the good news is that the cure is the most laughably easy process imaginable, so now we’re just waiting for night to fall to run away and do the treatment ourselves. I have a key that should make navigating our way out of the building pretty easy.”

Noah wasn’t aware of it, but his voice pattern was strangely steady, words tumbling out of his mouth like a metronome without pause. He hardly seemed to need to pause for breath.

As a result, despite having just been brought up to date on several worrying bits of information, the first question his dad asked in response was, “What’s wrong with your voice?”

“Um, what?” Noah was genuinely puzzled. None of his friends had mentioned anything about his voice, and he certainly hadn’t noticed anything wrong himself.

“You’re talking oddly. Like you’re trying to get all your words out in a single breath.”

“Well, I’m not really breathing right now, so that could be what seems off to you.”

“You’re not-!”

“Dad, I’m okay. The infection has a lot of scary-sounding symptoms, but I’m not in any danger. Just trust me on this, please.”

His dad sighed. “Can you understand what this is like for me, Noah? I worry enough for you without hearing about these crazy outbreaks, and military intervention, and shady medical corporations- I did some research on Insight last night, and what I learned was enough to make me wish you were attending school in an entirely different city. That place is bad news. I guess you know that, though.”

“Oh, I sure do. When we break out tonight, we’re planning on causing some havoc before we go. Hopefully disrupt whatever plans they have to experiment with our sickness.”

“Where are you going to go once you’re out of the building?”

“We’re… not sure yet, actually.”

“Hmm. Well, my schedule is open tonight. How would you feel about a getaway ride?”