A girl, roughly eighteen years of age, emerged from a slit in the black curtain. Once she fully exited the structure, she proceeded to walk across the floor toward the west-facing wall, while the men and women in lab coats screamed for her to stop. A boy, also roughly eighteen years of age, then appeared in the curtain’s opening. He held a camera in his hand and filmed the scene as it unfolded.
The girl continued walking toward the wall. Just as she was about to meet it, another loud noise sounded, and a bright, blinding light flashed. I was forced to avert my eyes. When the light subsided, the glowing circle in the wall remained, but the girl was gone—and a live pig had appeared.
The scientists broke out into raucous shouting—some seemed pleased, while others were horrified. The SWAT team, disoriented by the light and noise, lowered their guns. The pig ran around the room, squealing.
Another girl, roughly fourteen years of age, appeared in the curtain’s slit. She shoved the boy aside, aimed a gun at the glowing circle, and fired several shots at it.
The circle began to shrink at a steady rate. Within five seconds it closed completely and disappeared.
Taking advantage of the SWAT team’s bewilderment, the people in lab coats broke free from their captors, swept their laptops off the desks, gathered up the rest of their equipment, and fled the building.
Both the boy and the younger girl disappeared back into the curtain’s folds. About a minute later, they, along with four other teenagers, emerged from the boxy structure. The SWAT team hurried them out of the warehouse door, leaving me as the last person inside the building.
When I exited the building, I saw the SWAT team pushing the children into a pair of windowless vans, and a helicopter receding into the distance. The vans drove away.
When I returned to the car, Matt and Kaoru were no longer there.
As I drove off, I noticed a shifty-looking man lingering around the perimeter of the building.
Item: Transcript of audio recording
Source: Dr. Carla Emmy interview [continued]
Intern: That man was Boris, one of DV8’s contracted employees. I believe he set fire to the building shortly thereafter, on Chazz’s orders. So any evidence we could have hoped to recover has been destroyed.
Dr. Emmy: That’s quite a pity.
Intern: Agreed. Though it’s also a blessing, in a way—not long after he set the fire, a group of loosely aligned people called the Fakefinders arrived on-site. Have you heard of them?
Dr. Emmy: I heard them mentioned on the news. They’re the ones who called the fire department, correct?
Intern: Yes, and let’s be thankful that’s all they did. I can’t imagine what kind of new lies and rumors would have been spread if any of that evidence had fallen into their hands.
Dr. Emmy: Indeed.
Intern: And you do know by now that crew members from DV8 found Matt and Kaoru, correct? Apparently Matt had decided to get out of the van and poke around, Kaoru went after him, and then DV8 took them along with the others when they left?
Dr. Emmy: Yes, I heard something to that effect. I hope they’re all right.
Intern: Oh, I’m sure they’ve been rewarded handsomely. Chazz Young takes excellent care of his witnesses.
[pause]
Intern: Doctor, what do you think really happened that night? What do you think that glowing circle was?
[Dr. Emmy clears her throat.]
Dr. Emmy: I’d prefer not to venture a guess, if you don’t mind.
Intern: Why not?
Dr. Emmy: Because what I think doesn’t matter if there’s no proof to back it up.
Intern: Is that why you prefer to remain anonymous in this investigation?
Dr. Emmy: Yes. The things I saw that day—I can’t prove them. Science is rooted in proof. I am a well-respected scholar in my field, and making claims such as these—it wouldn’t look good for me, is all.
Intern: But you maintain that these events did in fact happen.
Dr. Emmy: Yes. And to be fully honest . . . there are a few more points that should be on that list that aren’t. But as a woman of science, I just couldn’t bring myself to type them.
Intern: Can you tell me what they are?
[pause]
Dr. Emmy: Earlier in the account I mentioned that the west-facing wall had bowed inward.
Intern: Right.
Dr. Emmy: When I left the building, after everything had transpired and I was the only one left—aside from the shifty man, who I didn’t notice until later, as I was driving away—I made sure to walk past the west-facing wall once again. And . . .
Intern: Yes?
Dr. Emmy: It was no longer concave at that point.
Intern: I see.
Dr. Emmy: And there were no bullet holes in it. Of course, the absence of bullet holes does not automatically indicate a—a portal of some kind. It’s possible that the gun was firing blanks—
Intern: Though we have reason to believe that it wasn’t, as it previously shot two holes inside the ship.
Dr. Emmy: I see.
Intern: Anything else?
Dr. Emmy: Well, good heavens, where did that pig come from? It made such a racket; if it had been there before the flash of light, I would have noticed it. But it appeared so suddenly, as if out of thin . . .
[She trails off.]
There is . . . one last thing. As I said earlier, I found plenty of footprints in the sand around the other three walls of the building. And—
[pause]
This is the one that keeps me up at night.
[pause]
I will swear to my dying day that I watched that girl walk through that wall. But there wasn’t . . .
[She sighs.]
There wasn’t a single footprint on the other side.
* * *
Only one piece of evidence remains to be parsed: the last minute of footage that Nico recorded with his personal camera.
When the windowless vans returned to Los Angeles, Chazz Young released all the Spacetronauts—except for Nico. Nico, he interrogated for several hours. That interview, regrettably for Nico and fortunately for DV8, was not recorded.
When DV8 finally let him go, Nico headed straight for the media—but DV8 got there first, preemptively releasing the news that Nico had applied to the show under false pretenses, and that any statements he would try to make on the matter should be considered too libelous and inflammatory to confirm as true.
From that point on, Nico refused to talk to DV8, the media, or anyone else—not about the show, not about the other cast members, and not about the contents of his recording. He was not willing to cooperate with any of DV8’s requests and did not accept any of DV8’s super-generous offers.
And so they disowned him, dragged his name through the mud, and threw him under the bus.
* * *
Item: Transcript of audio recording
Source: Nico interview
Date: June 30, 2016
Intern: Do you mind if I record this?
Nico: Kind of. It’s nothing personal. I’m just more careful about that stuff now.
Intern: Understandable. Tell you what—if you’re uncomfortable with anything that’s said, I’ll delete the recording once we’re done chatting. Promise. You can watch me do it.
Nico: Okay.
Intern: So I wanted to start by asking—
Nico: Hang on. You look familiar. Were you—do you work for DV8?
Intern: I did. But I don’t anymore.
Nico: You gave me a bottle of water right before they taped the promo interviews, when I was all nervous and sweaty.
Intern: [uneasy laugh] Yes, that was me. I was hoping you didn’t remember.
Nico: It’s okay. You were only doing your job. I remember you because you seemed nice. You didn’t seem like anyone else at DV8.
Intern: Thank you. You have no idea how much of a compliment that is.
Nico: Weren’t you also the one who convinced them to let me bring my camera onboard?
&nbs
p; Intern: Yes.
Nico: Thanks for that.
Intern: You’re welcome. And thank you for agreeing to talk to me. None of the other cast members would.
Nico: That doesn’t surprise me.
Intern: It didn’t surprise me, either. The deals that Chazz struck with them must have encompassed the harshest nondisclosure agreements DV8’s lawyers could devise.
[pause]
Intern: You must be pissed about that.
Nico: I’m not, actually. I don’t resent them at all. We went through hell out there, all in the name of entertainment and product placement and ratings—seems the least DV8 could do is give them everything they ever wanted.
Intern: You didn’t take any deals.
Nico: I already got what I wanted.
Intern: Must have taken some serious balls to reject Chazz like that.
Nico: I guess.
Intern: What about Hibiscus? You know that part was untrue, right? Chazz never recruited her or the Fakefinders to track Titania down. The opposite, in fact—he gave them an enormous sum of money not to look for her, and to keep their mouths shut.
Nico: Yeah, I know.
Intern: That doesn’t bother you either?
Nico: No.
Intern: [letting out a noise of disbelief] I gotta say, Nico—you’re a saint.
Nico: Nah. I just think the other cast members are good people, more or less.
Intern: Less, in the case of Clayton.
Nico: But even Clayton was in search of something bigger than himself. Louise too. Who would have guessed she’d be right about underground organizations developing wormholes? I mean, except for the lizard-people thing.
Intern: [laughing] Technically, we can’t rule that out, since we still can’t find any traces of NASAW’s existence. They wiped themselves clean. They’ve got a lot to answer for too.
Nico: I’m not mad at them, either. Louise, Clayton, NASAW—none of them were the enemy. DV8 was the enemy. Chazz Young was the enemy. They’re the ones I’m mad at. The rest—I’m happy for them. Honestly.
[pause]
Intern: How are you doing, Nico?
Nico: I’m okay.
Intern: Really, though? It just seems like it’d be such a tough transition back to civilian life.
Nico: [small laugh] Once the hype finally died down, things got better. The world moved on, and so did I. Things are better at home, even. I worked hard to make sure of that. So yes, really. I really am okay.
Intern: That’s remarkable, given what you’ve been through.
Nico: I guess it gave me a new perspective on things.
Intern: Oh?
Nico: Yeah. As awful as it was, and how it ended, and what happened to—[He breaks off, then clears his throat.] It was still a thing that I decided to do. I did it on my own, I powered through, and I came out the other side. I hadn’t ever—
That was a big deal for me. I was always so scared of everything. Now, not so much. Now, I feel more . . .
More.
[pause]
But . . . I’m scared about this. What you’re proposing, this book idea. No one’s going to believe me.
Intern: I do. And I’m going to make the rest of the world believe too.
Nico: How? All the evidence is gone. Everything burned up in the fire.
Intern: Everything did burn up in the fire. Except for the server, the one that stored all the video files recorded on the ship—before and after the signal loss.
Nico: What?
Intern: Remember: Chazz Young is an exceedingly insecure, exceedingly paranoid man, with backup plans and bargaining chips always at the ready. He’d never give up all that footage, not when he could use it as leverage at some point in the future.
Nico: [incredulous] Chazz took the server?
Intern: Boris took the server. Chazz instructed him to retrieve it before setting the fire, as his final assignment as an employee of DV8. Boris didn’t take too well to getting fired again, and three months later the server arrived at my house, along with a few personal dashboard camera video files and a note that said, “Chazz thinks it’s better to be dead than look bad. So make him look real bad.”
Nico: Wow.
Intern: Which, it turns out, isn’t hard to do when you’re dealing with a guy who records all his cell phone conversations and takes no precautions to protect them from hackers. All I had to do was call in a favor to Bacardi, and, long story short, I’m now in the possession of every conversation Chazz had on that phone. Add that to the couple of videos Titania recorded on her own cell—which we confiscated and never gave back—and I’ve got everything I need. Everything but the very last piece of the puzzle.
[pause]
Intern: I know this is a lot to ask, but . . . let me see what’s on your camera, Nico. Let me watch the footage you shot onboard the Laika. Combined with the other evidence I’ve been compiling over the past four months, it should be enough to convince the skeptics that what happened that day was real.
[Nico swallows.]
Nico: How do I know I can trust you?
Intern: Because I’m scared too. And I bet Titania was scared when she did what she did.
The truth is, Nico: everyone is scared of everything. All the time. But we do what we have to do anyway. And what you and I have to do is tell the world about what she did.
[pause]
[rustling noises as Nico reaches into his bag]
Nico: Okay. Take it. Everything’s on there. From my audition to the . . . end.
Intern: Thank you, Nico. I hope—
[pause]
Intern: I hope you really did get what you wanted.
[He thinks about this.]
Nico: She was all about escape, you know? For her, it was forward. But for me, it was back. Back home, to make things better. So, yeah. I got what I wanted.
Intern: Do you think she did?
Nico: I know she did.
[pause]
Intern: Maybe she’ll come back. Like Colonel Bacon.
Nico: Yeah. Maybe.
[background noise as he starts to leave—then a sudden backtracking of steps]
Nico: Wait—there’s another message to my Mom and Dad on there that I recorded after everything, when I got back home to New York. Don’t use that. It’s too weird, and private, and . . .
[pause]
You know what? Never mind. Use that too, if you want.
Intern: You sure?
Nico: Yeah. [with a small laugh] Catchphrase forever.
As of this writing, Maddie “Titania” Pearce has been missing for 144 days. Despite several attempts to find her, no trace has been found. She has not made any attempts at communication, with her family or anyone else. Her case is listed as active by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. In public matters, DV8 has maintained the position that Chazz Young stated on The Perky Paisley Show, that Titania absconded in an escape pod. In legal matters, the official stance of DV8 is that in the confusion of the SWAT team raid, she simply ran away.
It is my opinion that she did not.
I now leave it to you to decide for yourself.
Item: Transcript of video recording
Source: Nico’s camera
Battery charge: 100%
Date: March 1, 2016
[Nico is looking directly into the camera.]
Hi Mom. Hi Dad.
I’m home.
A lot happened since my last video to you, right before the nosebleeds. Too much to describe. I’ll do it someday, I promise.
Long story short, she’s gone.
[He exhales.]
Part of me wishes I’d said, out loud, how much she meant to me. But the other part of me knows I didn’t have to.
She told me, though. Right before the end, the last time we were both in the Confessional Closet together. When it seemed like she had given up. She told me that I mattered to her.
I grabbed her hand just then. I couldn’t help it. Not in an I-love-you way—thou
gh I probably did love her—but in a you-are-not-alone way. A we-are-both-alive-at-the-same-time-and-here-is-the-proof way.
It was my favorite part. Out of everything.
So I think she knew.
[He takes a deep breath.]
The last time I saw her—the footage doesn’t do it justice. That split second of video, right before it cuts out—it’s bad. The light is too bright. The image is blown out. All you can make out is her figure walking into a circle of white light.
Even though we were all looking at the same thing, I don’t think anyone saw what I saw, except for her. What we both saw on the other side of that wall.
And even when Chazz was grilling me about what happened, even though I told him where she went—I haven’t told anyone about what else I saw. It feels wrong to. Like I’m betraying her trust.
But on the other hand, I can’t let her be remembered like that. A runaway, a missing person. A liar, a coward. Especially when none of it’s true.
Maybe one day I’ll tell the rest of the world. But I don’t think they’ll believe me. So for now, you’re the only ones who get to know what I saw.
What I saw was:
Blue.
A whole planet of it.
Blue snow blanketing the ground.
Blue flakes falling from the sky.
Blue above, blue below.
A gentle wind blowing through the trees.
A little girl in the distance.
And quiet.
Pure, still, absolute quiet.
I hope she’s happy there.
I hope you are too.
THE TOWN OF PARAFFIN SMELLED OF ROT.
And apples and oranges. Cranberries and peaches. Ginger and cinnamon, coconut and honeysuckle. Roses, lilies, lavender, and freshly cut grass. Chocolate chip cookies, banana splits, vanilla beans, and snickerdoodles.
It smelled of Citrus Dreams, Tahiti Sunsets, The Night Before Christmas, and New Car Leather. Babbling Brooks, Sun-Kissed Linens, Ocean Breezes, and Stolen Midnights.