Miss Quick

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Twelve

The Task

My task is typed on a piece of paper with a yellow sticker on the top. It is short and reads "Walk to the end of the forest. Find the red envelope. You get no help."

"What's yours say?" Evelyn asks.

"It's weird," I say and show it to her.

"Mine says I have to find a key," she says.

"How are these a test of our abilities?" I ask.

"I dunno about yours, but I bet I'm supposed to get help from the animals," Evelyn says.

"Oh. Maybe I have to race there and back."

"But it just said walk."

"True," I say. Turning around, I continue, "I don't know, I guess I'm supposed to go that way?"

Evelyn doesn't hear me, she's talking to a squirrel.

It goes away and she turns to me. "What?"

I laugh. "Never mind. What did it tell you?"

"That yesterday it saw some people going around and hiding keys. He's going to spread the word and the animals are going to look for one."

"That's adorable," I say, picturing a bunch of animals peering under leaves and into trees.

"Anyway, I think I need to go that way."

"Oh. I told the squirrel I'd wait for him here."

"Can't he just find you?"

"No, he won't remember my face unless I'm here!"

I groan. "Fine. I'll just go by myself."

My mind flashes to pictures of Mr. Pulcher's disappointed face. I ignore it and walk.

The forest goes on for a long time, and after a few minutes I start to get impatient that I still don't see the end of it. I begin running.

I feel the speed coming more quickly and easily. In no time at all the trees are flashing by at a quicker rate.

My mind clears. The cold air rushes past my face, but not uncomfortably. I'm vaguely aware of a smile on my face. It feels similar to the first time, years ago, when I first ran this fast.

I go faster. As I go, the trees go by even faster. I count them as I pass, my mind moving in a straight line. I'm amazed that I can count them as fast as I pass them.

Then I look over and see something strange. As I pass a tree I see a leaf in midair, falling much slower than normal things fall. I turn my head to keep watching it but I zoom by it before it moves very far.

I get to the end of the forest in seconds. I slow down and count the last few trees. Four hundred and thirty two.

It takes a minute to sink in, but once it does I'm startled. When did I get to four hundred and thirty two?

Also, I didn't even realize how big a forest this is.

Suddenly the familiar feeling of despair fills me. I choke out a sob and a tear drips down my face.

No. I can't collapse in a fit of emotion here. I have to do this task. What if someone sees?

I shut my eyes and force myself not to cry. My fear of being caught as a crying mess eventually outweighs my sadness and after I can breathe through the lump in my throat, I take a deep breath. I'm okay. I'm not going to cry.

Opening my eyes, I look around a little. I don't see anything out of the ordinary, so I go out of the forest, on the other side is a neighborhood. I can see the backs of a row of red brick houses.

I go back into the forest and notice a red envelope tucked in between two branches. I take it, and behind it is another envelope. This one has my name on it. The second one has Carlos's name on it.

I leave it alone and open my own. On it is one simple sentence:

Don't get hit.

A sentence like that , of course, begs the question: With what?

My reflexes work faster than my mind. I drop the envelope and do a 360, my eyes scan the trees and the ground for anything that could hit me. I don't like how vague and menacing this task seems.

Then I see something; it's small and black, shaped like a torpedo. Flying straight toward me. I can't tell where it's going yet so I wait a split second for it to get closer. Then I move aside as quickly as possible, as I do the dart seems to slow down. I am out of the way in plently of time. When I stop, the dart speeds back up and embeds in the dirt.

I turn around and see two more darts flying toward me. I step aside easily and they land in the ground again.

Even though this task seems easy, I don't like it. What kind of school assignment involves dodging sharp pointy things that could stab me?

I don't realize there's a dart heading straight for my face until it's inches away. I wildly dodge it, and it misses by a foot.

These darts are hard to see. I'm going to have to pay attention.

So I do, for a few minutes, and then wonder when this will be over. My task didn't say anything about how long I'd have to dodge them, so couldn't I just leave now? But I have a feeling I should wait.

That's when I notice a few other people nearby. They seem to be looking for something, maybe they had the same task as Evelyn.

The darts stop eventually, and I just stand there, wondering if I could leave and report to Smith. I feel the presence of someone behind me, and figure it's someone looking for a key.

Only when I turn around do I notice that it's two people. A man in a black hoodie with a black mask on is holding a girl in a headlock. He's dragging her toward the street.

I panic. I turn around behind me, no one else seems to have noticed.

My instincts quickly jump in and I run at both of them at top speed. I have no idea what I'm going to do, but I need to do something.

I had an opportunity to stop, but I didn't take it. Aiming for the man in the mask, I make contact. I feel the breath go out of me for a split second, then everything goes black.