“That was Lucas.” I pause. Let it sink in before I go on. “Did you hear Mr. Walker?”
She nods slowly, lips thin. “I was excited at first. I thought he was coming to check on us. I almost opened the tent, but then I heard the bears again, so I stayed quiet.”
“I almost thought I’d imagined hearing him,” I say. “I heard him say ‘hello,’ but then the bears walked close to his tent. That’s when Lucas and I ran. The cub was getting close to us too.”
She shakes her head, lips downturned. “No.”
“No?”
“I heard all that, but I heard him after you left. He came outside.”
Something slithers in my belly. “Wait a minute. He came outside of his tent? Are you sure?”
“I heard his tent unzip. It was loud. As loud as ours was when you left. I thought I heard footsteps, so I figured it was him, but then the bears were sniffing all around.” She flushes, like she’s embarrassed to continue. “It freaked me out, so I didn’t leave. But his tent is zipped back up now, so he must have gone back to sleep.”
“Or maybe you just imagined it. Maybe it was the bears making noise.”
Her eyes lock onto mine. “I know what I heard.”
I can barely muster a nod before I’m back up on my feet and heading out of our tent. If Mr. Walker was awake enough to walk, he was awake enough to help. He’ll know what to do, how to get us out of here. I’m fizzy with hope as I make my way across our camp.
Jude opens his tent and sticks his head out. His eyes are squinty, and his hair is mashed on one side. “What’s going on?”
“There were bears in camp last night,” I say.
He startles and looks around, then scrubs a hand over his face. “I didn’t even hear them.”
I don’t answer. I just stop in front of Mr. Walker’s tent, listening to the quiet.
Jude is stretching, and birds are waking up in the trees. They chitter softly in the murky canopy. I clench my fists and swallow my fear.
“Mr. Walker?” I call out. No answer. I say his name again, louder.
By now, Jude is with me, brow arched. “Did you hit your head last night? Mr. Walker is in a coma, remember?”
My mouth thins to a hard line when I look at him. “He woke up last night. We heard him moving around and talking.”
“We? You mean Lucas and you?” He quirks his lips in a way that insinuates loads of filthy things.
My eyes narrow. “Everyone here but you, actually.”
His expression shifts at once, gaze drifting to Mr. Walker’s tent. He calls his name next, and I stare at the Deceptive on his arm. Well, I know one of his secrets. As cool and collected as he acts, Jude isn’t any different from the rest of us. He’s scared, and he wants the teacher back in charge. He wants someone else making the decisions.
I lean in and start tugging the zipper up to open the tent. It’s still dark inside, and the smell wafting out nearly knocks me over. Vomit. Jude backs away cursing, but I try to push that odor into a teeny-tiny corner of my mind. I have to wake Mr. Walker up. If he was awake last night, he can be awake again.
He’s in the corner, slumped over sideways, but he was conscious at some point. Long enough to pull on a black long-sleeved shirt and to be sick all over his sleeping bag. My eyes drift to another mostly empty bottle of water I know I didn’t leave inside this tent. It’s not one of the new water bottles. It’s like the old ones.
He was awake long enough to get drugged again too.
“The son of a bitch came back,” Jude says. “He was here again, wasn’t he? He did something to him.”
I cover my nose with my sleeve and ignore Jude, calling Mr. Walker’s name. I move close enough to nudge him. Nothing. His breathing seems fine, but when I prod at his neck, it’s hard to find his pulse. I’m not a doctor, and it’s dark in here, but I don’t think his color is good.
Emily slips in next with zero reaction to the potpourri of sweat and puke that’s about to make my eyes bleed. It must not bother her the way it does us. After a fleeting glance at the mess on the sleeping bag, she moves much closer.
“That bottle wasn’t here,” she says simply, indicating an empty water bottle next to him. “I zipped his tent closed last night. It wasn’t in here, unless it was stuffed down inside his sleeping bag.”
“Seems more likely someone decided to pay another visit,” I say.
Emily holds up the bottle and frowns, trying to examine the dregs of water left.
“So they drugged him again and just left?” I ask. “In the middle of a bear visit? What is the point of this?”
My hands are shaking, and I have too much saliva in my mouth. The smell is getting to me. I tip my head up, but there’s no fresh air to be found, just the cool musty tent smell.
“We should look for bottles or pill casings,” Emily says. “Maybe we can figure out what he’s taking or what they’re giving him. And we obviously can’t leave him alone again.”