9 Ivy

Ivy didn't know how to feel about the file. Angry, frustrated, annoyed, confused - mostly angry and confused. Whoever these people were, they'd ruined a lot of things for her, and now they wanted to control her death, too. She had a feeling that if her death happened sooner than predicted though, they wouldn't really care. She only wished she could've found Ben's file too. What if his death was written down somewhere? Ivy was meant to die on her birthday, August first. That was about one week from now. Was Ben going to die on the same day? Sooner? On his birthday?

"Ivy," Ben suddenly interjected her thoughts sharply. She turned to look at him. He was holding the cards in his hands, staring down at card number two. Where it had been blank before, it was now filled in with a new image.

It displayed the inside of a subway train, but something was wrong. There was a giant, bat-like creature hanging upside down with an evil grin. It's fangs were huge and long and it's bat eyes were a milky red. It seemed to be laughing at them as it spread its wings. A gargoyle. Ivy stared at it in horror and shock. What did this mean?

"Oh no," Ben whispered. His eyes told Ivy that he had figured something out, and it wasn't good.

"What? What is it?" She urged him, desperate to know.

"Ivy, I think I know now why Lily gave us these cards. They're predicting our future. The alleyway, the headquarters - they're telling us what's going to happen. And I think the numbers on the cards are correlated with the ones on our necks," he said a little too loudly. Ivy hushed him.

It made sense, of course. But why? Who would do this? And what was with the numbers?

"Oh my gosh. I get it now," Ben looked up at the bright blue sky, slumping his shoulders slightly as he took a large breath of disbelief.

"Get what? What do you mean?" Ivy fired at him, feeling a pang of jealousy at his brains. For the life of her, she couldn't figure out what was going on.

"Level up," he said like it would answer everything.

"What do you mean 'level up?'" She prompted again, feeling annoyed and hearing it colour her tone.

"Don't you see? The numbers on our necks are levels. We need to get past one hundred levels to get our memories back, and each time we level up, the numbers change," he replied in a giddy tone, pointing at the zero zero one behind his ear, "and these cards tell us what we need to do to level up!" He was nearly shouting now, and Ivy had to slap her hand over his mouth so Lea and Ezra wouldn't hear him. They seemed engrossed in some sort of intense conversation though, so they didn't take notice.

"So all we need to do is follow the cards? And then we can get out of here?" Ivy wanted to know. Ben nodded eagerly, a childish smile lighting up his features.

"Exactly! Whoever designed this is brilliant!" He announced. Ivy gave him a dead stare. Brilliant? How could he think this was brilliant? They were stuck in some sort of strange game. There was nothing brilliant about this.

Ben continued to rave on about it, but Ivy tuned out of whatever he was saying. Frankly, she felt irritated with him. Not only was he a lot smarter than herself, but he couldn't seem to shut up. So instead, Ivy flipped through the pages of the tiny notebook, allowing it to fan her sweaty face. To her surprise, she found some words hastily inked in about the middle of the book.

Get Ben to be quiet. They're listening.

Lily

PS. Don't mention my name!

Ivy quickly smacked Ben in the head with the notebook, silencing him with her finger before he could speak. She shoved the notebook into his hand, watching as his eyes widened in horror. Nodding, he put the cards and the notebook away, looking embarrassed.

Ivy cursed herself slightly. Hadn't Lily warned them about this? They needed to be more careful. Otherwise, their only sources of information could be lost.

"This way, guys!" Lea called over her shoulder as she led the group down a set of stairs.

A familiar scent of cigarette smoke infiltrated Ivy's nose. She wrinkled her face as they made it to the subway platform. She didn't like it here. It was loud, echo-y, and dank. And she was still mildly annoyed with Ben, though she wasn't sure why.

"Don't you find it weird?" Ben suddenly asked her. Ivy sighed.

"What's weird, Ben? You need to actually tell me stuff. Some of us didn't go to brain school or wherever the hell nerds like you end up," she replied sarcastically. Ben frowned a little at her words, which annoyed Ivy even more for some reason.

"I mean Lea and Ezra. They're talking to each other like they've been friends for years. Isn't that strange? I thought they just met last week," he said and nodded towards the two. They did seem awfully close, though Ivy didn't think much of it. After all, she'd only met Ben a day or two ago. Although, they probably had known each other previously. She simply shrugged in response.

Soon, they four of them were on the subway. Ivy found the train oddly familiar, or at least riding one. She must've done this a lot before her memories were wiped. Again, she glanced to her side, expecting someone to be sitting next to her - but again, there was no one there. Ivy shook her head. Why did she keep expecting someone to always be next to her? Her mind hurt thinking about it. There was something... something...

"Oh!" She exclaimed suddenly, sitting upright.

"What?" Ben asked in a startled tone, looking at her curiously.

"I understand now," she started, "I keep glancing to my side as if someone is supposed to be next to me. I keep feeling like there's something missing, you know what I mean?" She said and tapped her left temple with her index finger.

"Missing? Like information or...?"

"No. Missing like a person. I just remembered. Obviously, you and I knew each other before this all began. In fact, I think we were - or are - best friends. But it wasn't always just the two of us. There was someone else. I don't know who, but we were a group of three. That's why I keep expecting someone to be there. We're missing a friend," she replied. It wasn't a lot of information. In fact, it was quite useless. But Ivy was happy with the fact that she understood why she kept expecting someone there.

"Well why aren't they here then?" Ben wondered, scrunching his face up. Ivy suddenly sat bolt upright, pain shooting through her mind as a broken memory sifted through to the other side. It wasn't very clear. Very muddled and the faces were all blurred, but that didn't matter. What mattered were the voices. There was Ben's, her own, and their other friend.

"Lily," Ivy whispered hoarsely and smiled. "Our other friend is Lily. She's my sister."

Ben nodded. He had an odd expression on his face. Perhaps he didn't find the information very useful, or he didn't care, but Ivy did. She had had a feeling that Lily was important, and not some random person trying to help them. They were definitely best friends. Ivy leaned her head against the rumbling wall, trying to cool the ache. At least now she knew.

For a moment, there was blissful silence as Ivy thought of her sister. She couldn't see her sisters face in her mind, which was scary, but Ivy assumed it would come through soon.

A screech broke the silence, making her sit bolt upright once more as her eyes focused on the new threat. Just like the card had predicted, a gargoyle swung from the roof, its evil red eyes focused on Ivy.