Chapter 71: Sophie
"Wha-?"
The boy sat on the blue carpet, right next to the calendar. He was looking up from his phone, staring at him. Scratching his cheek, he added,
"You looked dazed."
Miles rapidly came up with an excuse.
"Oh, I was just staring at that calendar above you."
Ryan’s eyes narrowed a bit as he turned to look at the wall behind him, staring directly at the calendar.
"Calendar? What calendar?"
It was only then that Miles’s brain fully caught up with him, and he blinked, deactivating [Delusion] at once. The world darkened immediately, leaving the only source of illumination to be two flashlights.
He churned his mind for another excuse.
"Sorry, I meant I was just thinking about the school calendar. We were so close to exams. If this just happened a few weeks later, we might have been at home."
It was the best he could come up with on the spot. Internally, he chided himself for slipping so badly.
’I can’t just be playing around with this stuff recklessly.’
The others would likely start suspecting that he was losing his mind if he let that keep happening. Though he doubted they believed he was completely sane to begin with. He had done some rather stupid, or dangerous, things in just these few days.
Luckily, his excuse seemed to work.
"That’s true, huh. Though I doubt it would’ve made any difference. Who knows, in that timeline, I might’ve been outside when the storm first hit; I would’ve died without even knowing anything."
Ryan’s voice came out a bit wry. Miles just nodded, happy for the shift in conversation. From the side, Mia glanced at them but said nothing, still focused on testing her abilities.
With that out of the way, Miles was in no hurry to activate [Delusion] again, mostly to conserve strength for when they’d start moving again.
Making that room had given him a good idea of what his current strengths were. He had a feeling he could push past it, making delusions even more complex than that had been, but not much further beyond that.
He also wouldn’t have to suffer visualizing the delusions anymore, due to those little sparks he was almost certain were caused by [Beautiful Mind].
His only hope was further upgrades or even getting a new skill that could serve an offensive function.
’Well, I’m not the worst in the lot, at least.’
He glanced once more at Ryan before checking the time. There was still some time left before noon.
Rummaging behind a few crates near his blanket, he pulled out his bat from yesterday. It was crooked now, twisted, dented, and bloodied. Barely usable.
Then again, he shouldn’t have expected more from high school bats, especially from a school as cheap as this.
Still, he pulled it close; there was no other choice.
Rummaging through the spot again, he pulled out a familiar dull knife, the same one he’d stabbed Jayce with. Images of when he later pulled it out yesterday flashed through his mind, but he shook them off.
He’d run it under the tap, so the blade looked clean. He placed it securely in his pocket.
With time still left to kill, he searched through the pink bag for anything of interest. In the process, his hand brushed against the solid body of the camera from yesterday.
He brought it out, along with the pink diary he’d found with it. Glancing between the two items in his hands, he dropped the diary back, choosing to just focus on the camera.
It was a rather compact digi-cam. It had a pink shell on the outside, a single lens in front, and a screen at the back.
Fiddling around with it, he found it to have an unlockable compartment inside. Opening it revealed a place where the film roll was attached, as well as a space for mounting the battery pack.
A tiny slit at the bottom told him where the printed pictures exited from.
Dropping the camera for a moment, he searched the bag again, checking the tiny zips this time. Unsurprisingly, there were two spare battery packs and two more film rolls stored there.
He zipped them up and moved to pick the camera again, only to notice there were a few more eyes on him now.
Mostly done with checking their own abilities, Grimm, Mia, and even Sarah were staring at him now. Ryan had been looking at him from the start.
He gave them all a cursory glance, one Sarah avoided, then turned back to the camera again.
Tracing his finger along its body, he didn’t take long to find a button sticking out. Pressing it did nothing, so he felt around until he found another. The screen blinked to life once he pushed it.
It displayed a grainy view of the room before him, making Miles raise a brow. Tapping the screen made a yellow circle appear around his finger.
’It’s responsive to touch?’
The circle disappeared after removing his hand. It was indeed responsive to touch.
’Why is the footage so bad, then?’
It didn’t look like an old camera, and it didn’t look too cheap either. The only explanation he could come up with was the quality being reduced intentionally for whatever reason.
’That’s stupid.’
"You do photography?"
He raised his head to find Mia asking with interest. It was the first time she’d communicated with him directly. He shook his head before looking back down.
"Not really. I found the camera in this bag."
"Oh... oh."
She ended on a quiet note, realizing the original owner was likely dead. Ryan spoke next, trying to shift the mood.
"The light’s terrible in here, though. Not sure if it’s the best place for pictures."
"Don’t worry. I don’t even know how to use the damn thing."
Miles waved Ryan off, making him chuckle.
Seemingly done with her sulking, Sarah looked like she wanted to say something at that, but only fell silent in the end.
With no one saying anything anymore, he focused back on the screen. At its corner rested a picture icon.
It expanded into an image once he tapped it, showing a picture of a girl with dark hair accented by blond highlights. She had a party hat on and a cake with candles in the shape of ’17’ before her. The warm orange light from the candles illuminated the bright smile on her face and contrasted against her black eyes as they stared, half amused, half annoyed, at the camera.
It looked old, like something taken in the 2000s. But it was likely just effects from the camera itself.
’This was the owner, right?’
A birthday picture. There was an arrow on the edge, likely leading to even more pictures. Before he could press it, though, Ryan’s voice sounded.
"It’s time, guys."