Dear Jim,

We set out last night in complete darkness. There were clouds in the sky and it was rather cold. Barbara's wrist pad had been located about an hour away to the south, close to the lakeshore. We met half an hour after my alert at Peter's and Frode's pod, as it was closest to the way we had to go. We, that was Peter, Loreley, Tom, Gerald (and Ryker of course), Yang and Ingrid. Candy and Dough were coming along to get on our nerves and make exciting videos. Each of us carried a backpack of essentials and Ingrid had her med-pack in case anything happened to Barbara. We knew that we had to be prepared for everything. As Frode's foot prevented him from coming along, he promised to be on standby and make any necessary preparations in the doctors' cubicle in the tent.

Our way was lit by the light drones we had set to hover next to us. Candy had three. For the footage. While this made our surroundings considerably brighter it also meant that we could see nothing at all out of this bubble of light we walked in. Everything was pitch black. If anything was there, we could not see it. Our white and orange uniforms on the other hand were reflecting off the light. I felt very visible, which made me even more tense, although I wasn't sure what would actually see us. Ryker seemed alert but not worried about anything in particular. He had no idea what was going on and why everyone was taking such an unusual walk at night with him.

Everyone was walking quietly, listening to the sounds of our boots in the grass. When someone talked it was in a muted voice, there was no unnecessary chatting. The only exception to this was Candy, who was walking at the back with Dough and kept up a running commentary with her camera about how dreadful it was that someone was missing, how tense the atmosphere was, and how anxious everyone was feeling. At this, Peter glanced at me with a deep frown.

'I grab her arms, you take her legs. We throw her into the lake. What do you say?' he whispered before he had to cough.

I chuckled, which made me cough, too. Then someone else started coughing heavily, then another. Finally, it stopped.

We went on walking in silence, even Candy kept her mouth shut for a while. I listened to the darkness, something rustled in the grass. It was probably a group of rodents, but in my mind, it was something large and dangerous. I strained my ears to hear more, but our footsteps were too loud. I stopped for a few seconds to listen, but it was no use, I hurried to catch up with Peter again. A sudden sneeze from Ryker almost gave me a heart attack. He stopped and stood there sneezing for almost a minute, shaking his head as dogs do. Everyone waited. Gerald petted him gently and we were about to set out again when Tom suddenly looked around.

'Did anyone notice how quiet it is?' he asked.

Loreley looked up.

'Wait. Where are Dough and Candy?' she said axiously.

'Be careful what you wish for,' Peter sighed.

Yang meanwhile did something productive and checked his wrist pad. He determined that Dough and Candy's pads were about twenty minutes behind us. Ingrid meanwhile did something even more productive and tried to call them. At first she got no answer, but then heard Dough yelling. It sounded more scared than angry. We couldn't tell exactly what exactly he was saying, but it sounded like they needed help. We debated splitting up: Loreley pointed out that this always seemed to cause trouble in stories. So we all set out together, going back the way we came. I worried that we would lose precious time in searching for Barbara, but what else could we do?

If we hadn't been able to localize their wrist pads, we would easily have spotted Dough and Candy by the bright camera lights their drones cast on the surrounding area. Even our own lights could not outshine them. When we arrived on the spot, Candy was lying in the grass, her eyes closed, Dough stood over her, looking down. He was muttering to himself about how he screwed up. Until Ingrid bent down to have a look at Candy, Dough seemed to be oblivious to our coming.

'Do something!' he shouted. 'Mum will be furious if something happens to her and I was there!'

After some questioning, Dough gave the confusing explanation that Candy hadn't been able to keep up, and that they had fallen behind the rest of us. Suddenly Candy started to cough. She seemed to have trouble breathing. Suddenly she collapsed – and hadn't moved since. He had tried to drag her away, back to the cluster, but failed. He looked at us helplessly. Tom went over and patted Dough's back. He told him it would all be alright: Ingrid would figure it out. We all murmured something in vague agreement.

Ingrid had meanwhile done her thing and called Frode to warn him a patient was coming in.

'She is breathing, but barely. I gave her 20 ccs of Aldavyrex, which should help. Right here and now I can't tell you exactly what happened, but we will find out. I need some of you to bring her to Frode as soon as possible. And hurry,' she said in a rather commanding tone, which made Yang and Loreley immediately spring to action. When he saw that, Tom wanted to follow their example, but it was decided that he should stay with us as we would probably have to take turns in carrying Barbara back to the cluster. This meant we were splitting up after all.

All this made me even more worried about Barbara. A few minutes later, Gerald, Peter, Ingrid, Tom and I set out again. And Ryker of course. By the time we had passed the spot where we were before (that's what the map said: it wasn't like I could recognise the spot) It was still dark and I regretted not bringing gloves. I had my hands tucked firmly into the pockets of my jacket. At least I had had the foresight to put on one of these orange wool hats. Without the others' lights our way was considerably darker, but our surroundings were still a black void. Sometimes a pair of eyes reflected our lights back at us and then hurried away. Ryker looked after it with some tension and repeatedly turned around as we walked on. I started feeling really uncomfortable. I also noticed that we all started to cough even more frequently. This could not be a good sign.

'Whatever Candy has, we've got it, too, right?' I asked, directed at Ingrid, who was walking in front of me.

She sighed and hesitated before giving me an answer. 'I can't say for certain, of course. But yes, I would guess so.'

'Oh great,' Peter muttered. 'Now we all get an unexplained illness and that's the end of our story.'

'Thanks for being positive as ever, Peter,' I responded. 'Just what I need at the moment.'

As we walked on, Peter rummaged in his pocket. He handed me a candy. I think it was some kind of apology. I took it. We walked on in silence.

[To Be Continued]

Tavaron

22.07.24 Front Page

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