A few days ago, Sophie got a text from this weird number. All it said was ‘Give it to me, or die’. As soon as she read the text, she turned pale and trembled so much she nearly dropped her phone.
The next morning, Sophie’s eyes were bloodshot and there were dark circles. I knew something was wrong. Sophie always seemed carefree, even when she wasn’t. Throughout the day, all I got from her was ‘must find’ in a daze, like she was under some kind of spell. It stung -we used to tell each other everything-. From there, it only got worse. I had to support her when she walked and she kept dropping things.I’d never known people could change so fast but I didn’t pry. And this morning, she was gone.
I told Maya -the third in our trio- that the text and the disappearance were linked. But she just laughed like I was talking about nothing more than a hamster. I felt my fists ball and my breathing get heavy. I’d never really liked Maya. Her confidence often turned into arrogance. When Sophie wasn’t there, we never talked and got the impression that my feeling of dislike was mutual. But this, this was the last straw. I’m determined to find Sophie, and prove everybody wrong.
A few hours later…
I’ve found nothing out of the ordinary or missing in Sophie’s room. As much as I hate the thought, the only person I can think of to help me is…Maya. There I said it. I have no leads whatsoever, and Maya has had lots of experience with this stuff. Or so she says. I’ve always suspected that most of the things she tells us are lies, but Sophie just complimented her for all her achievements and the things she said she knew. Maya had a lot of faults, but so did I. My main one was pride. But I had to swallow it, put all my ego at the back of my head, and go talk to Maya if I wanted to save my best friend. At first she was haughty about it, saying things like ‘why would someone like me help someone like you?’. The only helpless response I could give was ‘for Sophie’. But she didn’t like it. The only way I could get her on my side was to bribe her. I feel horrible, I bribed someone. But it wasn’t important to me at the time.
We went to Sophie’s house again, and Maya dusted for fingerprints. I was still suspicious but I kept asking myself ‘what’s the worst she can do?’. The worst she could do was jeopardise the entire mission. I have trust issues.
We were progressing, slowly. Or maybe that was just me. We had nothing on the fingerprints, they were all Sophie’s. But I found a way to track the address from the text. Genius. I was all prepared to go find Sophie, when Maya bailed. I knew she wasn’t going to be much help. All that humbling to go beg of her, and she just leaves without doing anything. Just my luck.
The address led to an old, neglected, warehouse. It just had to be dark. The very one thing I’m deathly afraid of. I managed to summon bits of my courage from the dark corners and caves that they had hidden themselves in. I was suddenly freezing cold, and had the weird sensation that I was being watched. I quickened my pace, but every step I took, I turned around, paranoid, twice as fast. I finally reached what seemed to be the main part of the warehouse. The first thing I saw was a man, blood on his clothes, and a twisted smile on his face. Maya was there too, the traitor, looking smug. I glanced down and stopped in my tracks, all the colour rushing out of my face, all my courage and hope draining out and going into hiding again. Tears streaked my face, I crumpled to the ground. Lying on the floor, pierced with a knife, was the motionless body of Sophie.
