It was perhaps the first instance that week Jane had left school at the proper time, a day after that afternoon in the football field. Victoria and her, bags in tow, joined the slow stream of students as they exited the school premises. The tide of teenagers pooled into the parking lot, and spread out on the street, some lining up in expectation of a bus ride. Jane and Victoria, on the other hand, had another destination in mind.

“Ryder’s really on our side, huh?” Victoria asked, shifting her bag. The piercing on her nose wiggled as she scrunched up her face against the cold air.

Jane nodded. “Kinda. He gave me everything he knows. It’s not the whole picture, but he told me where we might be able to get it.”

Jane’s phone buzzed in her hand, surprising her. She had already been holding it.

[5:19]Unknown number: Are you sure about this?

[5:19]Unknown number: I know you’re good, but what are you going to do with technology like this?

That would be Watson, Jane surmised. Leveraging their earlier agreement, she had asked him to procure a certain form of technology that only law enforcement had access to. It seemed he was having second thoughts.

[5:20]Jane: just trust me

She stared at the screen for a few moments, waiting for a response. Judging by the lack of a reply, Jane assumed Watson had already left the package where she’d asked him to. He had simply been voicing his concerns about her plan. He did trust her enough to obey her requests, it appeared.

“Who’s that?” Victoria was peering over her shoulder, an easy feat considering their height difference.

“The undercover cop I told you about,” Jane replied, pocketing the phone.

Victoria was quiet as she watched Jane’s motions.

Jane glanced back at her. “Let’s go, maybe we can get there before it gets dark.”

As it turned out, they had, in fact, arrived by the time it was dark.

While Beatrice was financially well-off, the location of her home was nowhere near as ostentatious as Ryder’s neighborhood. Two-story homes and white picket fences lined the streets as wrought iron lanterns lit their well-cared-for lawns. Middle range vehicles sat parked along the road, their windows nearly opaque in the dark of the night.

Victoria had opted to carry both bags, hers and Jane’s, in order to allow the smaller girl to keep up. Even so, Jane was huffing from having walked half way across the town.

She should really get in shape, she thought. Maybe when this was all over, Ryder could help her with that.

“Oh, were here,” Jane whispered, ducking behind a roughly maintained line of bushes. Victoria followed suit, the bangles on her wrists clicking together.

It was perhaps the worst maintained home in the long row of houses, with an overgrown expanse of grass and cracked stone pathways. A single dim light glowed from the second story window, diffused through a hazy curtain. A long haired figure moved around behind it, her shadow distorted by the light.

“Is that…?” Victoria asked.

“Beatrice.”

“How’d you even get her address?”

Jane turned to her, lip turned upwards in an sly grin. “Contacts.”

“You? Contacts? I bet it was Ryder, wasn’t it?” Victoria asked with amusement. She glanced back towards Beatrice’s elongated shadow. “But why are we at her address?”

Jane didn’t respond as she peered this way and that, craning her neck around the bushes. It was hard to see in the dark, even with the light of the street lamps, but if Watson had complied with her request- There.

Watson had obviously thrown it from his car window, most likely in an attempt to not be seen. To his credit, the paper wrapping was intact, apart from a few grass stains, and, with any luck, the IMSI catcher would be as well.

Tucking the rectangular package beneath her arm, Jane tugged on Victoria’s sleeve, and pulled her around the side of Beatrice’s house.

They crept along the fence ringing her property, keeping low. Jane’s legs burned as she was forced to crouch-walk beside the fence, keeping herself hidden from view.

The narrow passage between Beatrice’s fence and the adjacent walls of the neighboring house was almost claustrophobic, a thin pathway lined with slick greenery underfoot.

With a muted sigh, they rounded the corner, now immediately behind the building. The windows of the home were placed in such a way that spotting them would be difficult, especially in the dead of night. It was as good a hiding spot as they would be able to find.

“What’re you holding?” Victoria asked, lowering their bags to the ground.

“It’s an IMSI-type cell catcher. If I use this with a customized PI, I should be able to pull off a middle-man attack and intercep-” Jane abruptly cut off as Victoria shot her a comically exaggerated glare.

“In English?” Victoria asked, sarcastically.

“We can lift data off Beatrice’s phone,” Jane said.

A devilish grin was spreading over Victoria’s face. “I hope she says something embarrassing. Let’s play it over the school intercom.”

Jane laughed at the thought.

“We’re here to try and take down the syndicate,” she reminded Victoria.

“I know, I know. I just hate that prissy little queen so much.”

Jane reached out and bumped Victoria in the shoulder. “We’ll get her.”

The mischievous grin on her friend’s face turned to a genuine one. “Yeah. We’ll get her”

Jane unzipped her bag and withdrew her laptop from within, propping her back against the fence. The screen would be visible in the dark, and so she did her best to obscure it with her own body.

The particular article of police tech that Watson had given Jane resembled a miniature mobile radio, sans a receiver. A pair of dials adorned the front, one of which was simply labeled ‘Power’. It was as simplistic a device as one could get.

What was not as simplistic on the other hand was the customized computer Jane had spent much of the previous night working on. The dark circles beneath her eyes weighed heavily as she wirelessly connected the green computer-board to the fake cell tower. Almost immediately, her laptop screen recognized the new device, and began reporting various statistics about its operation.

Victoria was watching in fascination beside her, though she did not seem to understand what she was looking at. A single blinking light on the board indicated that everything was going smoothly. Well, almost everything.

Jane frowned. “Huh.”

“Something wrong?” Victoria asked.

“There’s two signals coming from the house.”

Victoria glanced over her shoulder, up at the once-impressive home. “Maybe she has two phones or something?”

Jane gave a half-hearted shrug in response, and chose one phone signal to intrude on at random.

She brought her headphones closer to her ear, the familiar sound of distorted audio buzzing from them.

“-and the investigation?” Ryder’s father sounded as intimidating as ever, his deep voice taking on a digitized hiss as the tower intercepted the call. Evidently, Jane had broken into the middle of their private conversation.

“Couldn’t find nothing much. I still think it’s that Mackenzie girl. You know, I caught her listening to me and Ryd last week. Maybe her parents are the mole. It would, like, make total sense.”

“Unlikely,” Mr. Jackson replied, “her father is deceased, and I have spoken to the mother. Degenerate alcoholic. Though, the daughter appears to have unusual talents.”

Jane felt a flash of rage. Jackson’s voice positively dripped with judgment and superiority, as if her mother were nothing more than an addict.

She wanted to interrupt them and give the older Jackson a piece of her mind.

“Nonetheless, it is in our best interests to remain vigilant. It is likely that the Mackenzie girl has an inkling about our operations, thanks to your inaction.”

“Inaction? Dude, I gave her the old back-off hazing. It never fails.”

“Obviously, Beatrice, your hazing was ineffective. We have recovered camera footage of Victoria Allyson and her breaking into the school. They retrieved your file from the servers. As far as we know, that was the only thing they were after.”

There was a long pause as Beatrice seemed to process this information. Jane could hear her sigh on the other end of the call.

“The freak and the beanstalk are working together. Huh,” Beatrice said.

“I’m sorry?” Jackson seemed confused at the monikers Beatrice had given them.

“Nothing. Just…” Beatrice trailed off a for a moment, “how bad is it?”

“I’m unsure of Mackenzie’s capabilities, but its possible she already knows about the situation with your parents. I suggest you notify them that they may be compromised.”

Beatrice immediately launched into a heated string of curses, directed at both herself and Jane.

A flush of mirth filled Jane’s chest at the distress she was causing the girl. Thought I would back off, huh, Beatrice?

“Calm down. The situation is still salvageable. So long as we retain operational security, we should be able-”

Beatrice didn’t seem to have heard him as she continued her rant. “And you know, Ryd won’t tell me, but I know he’s dating her. She’s such a little twerp. I can pretty much smell her gross bean-”

“That was under my orders. You are under no circumstances to interfere with that.”

Jane blinked, her heart dropping into her stomach. It had been so unexpected that she did not even register it at first.

What? His orders? What did he mean his orders?

Victoria was looking at Jane with concern, noting the expression of shock on her face. “Jane?”

No. No, no no. Ryder had been honest with her. She’d established that. She’d ensured that she could trust him.

Beatrice and Ryder’s father were continuing their conversation, but Jane’s mind tuned it out as the blood rushed through her ears. There was a splinter in her chest, and it was growing. She wanted to do nothing more than run. Run and possibly slap Ryder in the face.

Victoria reached out and, slowly, lifted the headphones from Jane’s head. Her eyes widened as she listened in to the conversation, the reality of Alexander township’s mayor being a criminal enterpriser fully sinking in.

Victoria’s expression tightened as she began slipping the headphones off in a hurry. “Jane.”

Jane had only dimly heard her, so far was she inside her own head that Victoria’s voice barely registered to her. Self-defeating questions seemed to float freely through her mind, drowning out any voice of reason she may have.

What was the point of doing any of this? Why did she even get herself into this situation in the first place? Stupid. She’s been so stupid.

Victoria’s hands were gripping her shoulders, shaking her. “Jane!”

“What?” Jane frowned, looking around in confusion.

“We have to go. Now.”

Jane shook her head, one hand pressed against her temple. A headache was building within her skull, and she could already tell it was going to be a bad one. “Hang on…”

Victoria was hurriedly stuffing Jane’s laptop into her bag, and doing the same with the IMSI catcher. “Jane, Beatrice knows were here. I heard her say it.”

This startled Jane from her downward spiral of defeatism. She rose to her feet, supporting herself with the fence. It creaked as she leaned against it, her legs wobbling.

Behind the pair, the light within Beatrice’s house had been extinguished. It stood still and dark, apparently empty. Under the faint moonlight, it seemed almost sinister with its cracked paint and dusty windows. Beauty that had long since lost its luster.

Victoria slung both bags over either shoulder, and began sprinting back the way they came. “Come on!”

Jane inhaled forcefully, willing her shaky body to obey her. Their footsteps were muted by the dirt and grass, though their breath steamed ahead of their faces in the cold air.

Victoria’s legs were pounding the ground, both bags swinging rhythmically from her shoulders. She glanced back at Jane, face set in determination, and quickened her pace. “I don’t think she’s alone, I heard someone else in there.”

Jane nearly slammed into Victoria’s back as the taller girl came to an abrupt halt. “Vicky? What’s up? Why’d you stop?”

The reason became apparent very quickly as she peered around her friend. Beatrice stood before them, hair mussed in such a way that Jane knew she had been lying in bed. Without her usual outfits and makeup, she almost seemed to be a normal teenage girl, her limbs awkward and her frame skinny.

The baseball bat in her hands, however, was anything but normal. Judging from the way its owner held it, Beatrice knew how to use it.

“Oh, wow,” Beatrice said, mockingly. “It’s beanstalk and the freak.”

Victoria straightened, though her shoulders were weighed down from the weight of two bags and the heavy IMSI catcher. “Okay, Ruth. You got us. You caught us. We were just gonna TP your ho-”

“Shut up!” Beatrice shouted, gesturing violently with the tip of the bat.

Jane was overcome with a sudden urge to hide behind her taller friend. A flush of shame filled her gut.

Victoria glanced back at Jane, eyes narrowed. She seemed to be coming to some sort of decision.

“When I say go, run, okay?” Victoria whispered, just quiet enough that Beatrice couldn’t hear her.

Jane’s eyes widened. “What are you gonna do?”

“Hey! What are you two talking about?” Beatrice demanded from ahead of them.

Jane already had an idea of what Victoria intended to do, and she didn’t like it. Jane didn’t want any part in violence, even if an enraged Beatrice was blocking their only way out.

But it seemed Victoria held none of those reservations. In one smooth motion, she dropped both bags, and raised her fists in a practiced stance.

“Now,” Victoria hissed through gritted teeth. Her shoulders were taut as she squared them up, her boots planting themselves firmly in the dirt.

Beatrice’s confidence faltered for a moment at Victoria’s display of competence. She glanced around them, apparently checking their surroundings. A smug glimmer appeared in her eyes.

“Get ‘em!” Beatrice said.

“What-” was all Victoria managed to say before Joss’s large form came barreling into her.

It was as if a starting pistol had gone off in the garden. All at once, Jane’s nervousness broke into an instinctual dash for the street. Beatrice moved to intercept her, bat raised high above her head. Victoria began shouting wordlessly as Joss threw her to her back and they tumbled around in the dirt, a wild mess of grappling limbs.

Beatrice’s bat swung downwards with a rushing sound, narrowly missing Jane’s torso by a handsbreadth. The smaller girl cringed away. She would not be able to escape so long as Beatrice was guarding the way to the road. They were boxed in.

Behind her, Victoria was clawing viciously at Joss’s face as he pinned her to the ground. He leaned backwards, shielding himself from her swiping nails.

“Get off me!” Victoria screamed wildly. Her chest heaved under the weight of Beatrice’s goon.

Jane was frozen, trapped between a bat-wielding Beatrice and Joss. Her heart was pounding, both from terror and the sudden exertion of running for her life. She felt like curling up and crying. What could she possibly do?

“I knew it,” Beatrice said, her voice as level as it had ever been. “There really was something off about you. Didn’t think miss freak over there was in on it, though.”

“Beatrice, just let us go,” Jane pleaded. “We we’re just planning to prank you, nothing else. I swear.”

“Don’t give me that. We know it was you that broke into the school that night. We know you’ve been snooping around. No clue why, but we’ll find out soon enough.”

Jane swallowed. She truly did not want to know how Beatrice planned to ‘find out’.

“Jane, run!” Victoria cried out. She roared once more, redoubling her efforts. Joss, despite his apparent physical advantage, was having trouble keeping the girl under control. His face bled from multiple scratches around his cheeks, and his lower lip was swelling. It seemed Victoria had given as good as she’d got.

“Shut her up,” Beatrice ordered, keeping her eyes on Jane.

Her glare was boring into Jane’s very soul, and she took an involuntary step back, but she had done it unthinkingly, and tripped over their bags. With a gasp, Jane fell backwards, her head cushioned by the grass.

“Gladly,” hissed Joss.

From her spot on the ground, Jane watched Joss draw his hand back and strike Victoria across the jaw. Her friend grew limp beneath the boy as her hands fell to the ground.

Beatrice stood above Jane, bat pointed menacingly in her direction. “Get up, beanstalk.”

The reality of what was happening was quickly sinking in. Victoria was unconscious, and now Jane was outnumbered, outmatched, and outsmarted. She had nothing up her sleeve, and no more moves to make.

A pair of hands roughly pulled Jane up, shoving her back into a standing position. Beatrice was looking at her appraisingly, much like that traumatic day in the lunch room. Like a predator sizing its prey up. “Joss, bring the freak. Let’s lock them in the basement, then call the guys.”

Joss, as inarticulate as ever, simply grunted. The back of Victoria’s head made a soft hissing noise as it slipped over the grass, the boy pulling her by her feet.

“And you,” Beatrice turned back to Jane, “come with me. Don’t even try to run.”

Jane didn’t think she had the wits to run. She followed the pair numbly, a ball of ice in her stomach. This wasn’t good. She cursed herself, over and over. She should have been more careful. She should’ve seen this coming.

Jane’s mind glossed over any possible chances she had to escape before entering Beatrice’s house. Perhaps she could somehow, catch Beatrice by surprise and run?

She glanced back at Joss and Victoria. No, she couldn’t leave her friend behind.

The inside of Beatrice’s house was, much like the outside, poorly kept. Stains and warps in the floorboards littered the ground, and bits of trash could be found on nearly every surface. It stunk, and Jane found her eyes watering at the smell.

Thankfully, Joss had chosen to carry Victoria’s body. He hauled her into the living room, and shut the front door with a growl of effort. The various cuts around his face and arms had stopped bleeding, though his lip still swelled beneath his nose.

Beatrice nodded, and heaved open what must have been the most foreboding door Jane had ever seen. It creaked and squealed on its hinges, revealing a dark staircase leading downward, far beneath the ground.

“Wait- hang on…” Jane sputtered out, stopping in her tracks. She very much did not want to go down there.

Joss, both hands occupied with Victoria’s body, nudged her in the back with a knee. Jane started forward, intensely uncomfortable from the physical contact.

The steps seemed to groan like a living thing beneath her feet, whatever was left of the paint peeling to reveal off-pink insulation and cracked brick. If the house above the basement smelled awful, the basement itself was far worse. The air was heavy with a dank stink that clung to the inside of Jane’s lungs.

She thought of turning back and bolting for it, or even somehow attacking Joss while he was occupied with Victoria, but realized she most likely wouldn’t be successful.

Reaching the bottom of the steps, Jane turned the corner and found herself in a scene from a slasher movie. The lone source of light hung by a thin chain from the ceiling, swaying slightly. The floor was some sort of rough stone, with patches of mold springing up wherever moisture had accumulated. Pipes jutted out at strange angles from the ceiling and walls, rusted and leaking.

Jane’s throat was nearly sealed shut from fear, but she spoke nonetheless. “Beatrice. Don’t- don’t try anything. I swear I’ll…”

Jane trailed off, unsure of what exactly it was that she intended to threaten her with. Beatrice turned and scowled, unimpressed.

“You’ll do what? Run off and cry again? Steal my boyfriend from me?”

Jane blinked in confusion. “What?”

“You and Ryder. I know everything. He can’t hide it from me. I’m the only one that gets him. He’s mine.” As she spoke, Beatrice looked more enraged than Jane had ever seen her. Her words built to a furious crescendo, each louder than the last.

“He said you two broke up.” Jane couldn’t believe that she was talking about something as ridiculous as boys at a time like this.

“So what?! It was just a matter of time until he fell in love with me again, obviously!” Beatrice’s shouting echoed through the basement, shaking the pipes overhead. Droplets of water pattered to the ground.

Jane took a step back, shocked at the ferocity of emotion from the bat-wielding girl. Here she was, trapped underground with an unstable teenage girl, and Victoria unconscious. It was as untenable a situation as you could get.

“Look- it wasn’t- we just went on one date-”

“Do you really think you’re good enough to beat me? That he would love you more than he loves me? Huh, beanstalk? Do you?” Beatrice took a step forward, the baseball bat scraping against the stone floor. It made a grating sound that vibrated into Jane’s bones.

“Beatrice…” The cold metal of a pipe pressed against Jane’s spine. She was backed into the wall.

The steps groaned out the telltale sound of someone descending through them. Jane and Beatrice turned towards the entryway as Joss rounded the corner, a handful of ice pressed against his face. Jane found herself strangely glad at the boys presence, his sudden entry acting as a moment of pause.

“Where’s Vicky?” Jane demanded, concerned.

“Tied up,” Joss grunted, his words slurring through the swelling.

“Answer the question, Jane,” Beatrice ordered.

Jane became abruptly aware of her own breathing as Beatrice pressed the tip of the bat against her chest, essentially sandwiching her between the pipe and the makeshift weapon. Her eyes flew to Beatrice’s crazed expression, skin flushed from the shouting.

“We both know it was his dad, Beatrice! He told him to do it! Ryder doesn’t feel anything for me!” Jane hadn’t realized she was shouting until the sentence was over. The stress was getting to her, and she felt the familiar wetness of tears trailing down her cheeks.

The bat lowered, Beatrice’s fury dissipating in an instant, instead replaced by the same predatory smile she always seemed to wear. “Now how would you know that?”

“-What?”

“How would you know the boss ordered it? Ryder obviously didn’t tell you, and I only just learned about it now. How is it possible that you know things that the rest of us don’t?”

Jane glanced at Joss’s stone cold expression, then back to Beatrice. Bat in hand, she seemed to be enjoying herself, taking pleasure at catching Jane in a lie. The light swayed from its chain, shifting the shadows around. From behind her, the cold of the pipe seemed to seep into Jane’s bones.

She didn’t know what to say. It was checkmate. Beatrice would, inevitably, realize what Jane’s secret was. That she had her claws in nearly every computer in the town.

It seemed that she already had realized it, in fact. “Joss.”

“Yeah, B?”

“Victoria had bags on her. Check them for spy stuff.”

“Spy stuff? Like what?” Joss was scratching his head.

“I don’t know! Spy stuff!” Beatrice groaned, exasperated. “Just go get the bags, I’ll do it.”

Jane swallowed.

Joss motioned towards her with his chin. “What about her?”

Beatrice’s eyes, once more, bored into Jane’s with an unmatched intensity. Jane knew what was coming next. She flinched, breath catching.

The bat seemed to flash in the dark as it flew through the air. With a whistle, the world turned dark, and Jane collapsed.