What now? she wonders, scratching her head as she makes her way home. It is only after taking another look at the door when she sees her older brother walk inside. Oh good!

“Hey Andrew—wait!” she cries, making her way over from Martin’s.

“Oh hi,” he replies with a yawn. “How’d school go today?”

“Funny you mention that,” she chuckles. “I actually wanted to see if you could help me with a project I’m doing for school right now.”

As Jocelyn explains everything, she follows him all around the house to wherever it is he needs to drop his things. Though while this is going on, Andrew hardly seems like he’s listening to his little sister’s words. He acknowledges that there’s a project and that she needs his help—but little else registers until he makes it to his office area and asks, “So—what was it you needed?”

“I need you to come with me so we can find a rock for me to study.”

He raises an eyebrow. “In the wilderness?”

Resisting the urge to roll her eyes, she replies, “Yes, Andrew—the wilderness. Outside.” Part of her legitimately wants to grab him by the arm and yank him up so they can get on their way.

“Do we really have to go right now?” He yawns again. “I’ve been up since four in the morning and I just want to get to bed soon.”

Hearing that, Jocelyn can’t help but purse her lips. She takes a look out the nearest window and sees the sun is already beginning its path downward. Feeling as the air around her suddenly becomes crisp and cool, she mumbles, “Well, I guess not right now, but—”

“Sorry,” her brother interrupts. “Maybe tomorrow, but not right now, okay?”

She nods. “Okay.” Without further argument, she exits the room and goes to the backyard: a cactus-infested playground that shares a close space to the fence forming part of Los Abismos’ border. For a few hours of the day, her family’s house sits under the shadow of the canyon on the other side of the fence—a canyon which hosts one of the main tunnels into the Majorana Research Facility.

There’s gotta be a rock I can examine out here somewhere, she tells herself as she glances at all the dirt around her. Alas, all she can really find are a few generic stones—which themselves are probably synthetic in some way.

Y’know what would be nice? she asks herself. Diamonds. Just—diamonds would be nice.

But instead of diamonds, much of what she finds looks more like broken-up concrete leftover from when the fence was being built. She wrinkles her nose in frustration—though honestly, she should have expected this; leave it to the human race to leave very few of the interesting rocks behind.

Just when she’s about to pick up and throw one of these generic rocks at the ground, Jocelyn finds herself startled when somebody shouts “Get that kid!” from the other side of the fence. As her rock drops by her foot, the intercom’s voice comes blaring into existence.

“Attention ladies and gentlemen: our researchers have told city hall to put the town on an intruder watch. City hall recommends all citizens head indoors if they have not done so already. We will keep you updated on the situation.”

Yet as these words resound in her ears, Jocelyn is distracted by the strange boy running out of the researchers’ tunnel. It takes a moment for the stranger to realize he has come to a dead end. Meanwhile, a handful of security guards are on their way out of the tunnel as well, slowed down by their equipment and aging bodies. Funny enough, the slowpoke men don’t seem too keen on shooting the boy.

Jocelyn—squatting behind one of the cacti along the fence—feels like she’s watching a cop chase—only up until now, she’s never seen one in real life; only in videos. Completely new to this kind of chase, she almost feels like she should be rooting for somebody, even though her shouting “run, man, run!” or “kick his ass!” would raise a few eyebrows—that is, if there were anyone outside at the moment.

It doesn’t take long for Jocelyn to realize that the boy is cornered and there’s no way out for him now. Am I the only one seeing this? she wonders, looking over her shoulder as she sinks lower behind the cacti. As far as she can tell, there isn’t a single other non-scientist spectator—though perhaps that’s because most other people have heeded the intercom’s warning.

Before she can look back, the squatting teen loses her balance and ends up falling over. She gasps as her knee comes into contact with a cactus spine, pulls herself back before it can go any deeper into her skin. Such imbalance leads to her landing on her rear again—as if it weren’t dirty enough.

She feels like kicking the cactus, but instead opts to revert her attention back to the chase—only to find that the boy has disappeared from view. The security guards—now right outside her back yard—look here and there, but find nothing. If they squint hard at the ground, they can see his footprints—which abruptly stop at one of the canyon’s walls.

It takes Jocelyn a moment to realize that in the boy’s absence, a part of the canyon’s stone wall has gone discolored—much to the security guards’ bewilderment. “Don’t be ridiculous!” Jocelyn hears one of them say. “The kid couldn’t have disappeared. Come on; he’s gotta be closer to the fence now.” And with that, the group of guards make their way closer to town, failing to notice the teenage girl as she stands by, dumbfounded.