The air inside the game feels heavy, humid, like a jungle just waking up after a storm. The trees loom above, their branches intertwining like secrets whispered through time. A faint buzz of insects hums in the background, barely audible over the pounding of her heart. She doesn’t know why her chest feels so tight—maybe it’s the look on Spencer’s face, the way his words hang there, shattering something fragile in the air.

“What…?” Alex stammers, his voice unsteady. She glances at him, her best friend since she was a kid, still looking exactly as he did the last time they’d played—faded flannel shirt, messy hair falling into his eyes.

It doesn’t make sense. Nothing does. Her skin feels clammy. “They’re joking, right?” she says quietly, her voice cracking.

But Spencer doesn’t laugh. None of them do.

Fridge steps forward, his expression gentler than expected. “You guys disappeared 20 years ago. Everyone thought you were gone forever.”

Twenty years. The words echo in her head like the beat of a drum.

She looks at Alex, and for the first time, he doesn’t look like her fearless partner in mischief. There’s a flash of something raw in his eyes—fear, confusion, grief. It tears through her.

The jungle feels suddenly colder. She wraps her arms around herself, as if shielding from the impossible truth. “Alex…” she whispers, needing him to say something, anything.

His throat bobs as he swallows. “It can’t be true,” he mutters. “It can’t.”

And yet, when he turns to her, she sees it—the realization settling into him like an unwelcome guest. She takes a step closer, her hand hovering at his arm. It feels instinctive, like they’re tethered together through this nightmare.