Chapter 12 Adi, The Escape Game

Chapter 12 Adi

Adi

Adi’s phone buzzed multiple times in his jeans pocket while his team waited backstage for filming. He checked the messages.

Symphony: Talked to the tow company. Evidently my entitled, ungrateful son thought he could leave my baby illegally parked.

Symphony: What the hell is wrong with you?

Symphony: You’re lucky the tow truck driver was a fan.

Symphony: But you’re paying me back for the parking ticket.

Symphony: Are you getting these? Don’t ignore me, Aditya Parvesh. I made you and I can unmake you!

Whoa. It had been a long time since she pulled out that particular threat. Adi switched his phone to Do Not Disturb as the teams were called on stage.

On television, the studio backdrop where the eliminations were filmed had a moody, steampunk-inspired vibe. Drapes of burgundy fabric, enormous brass gears like the inner workings of a clock, intricate keys and padlocks hanging like chandeliers from rustic metal pipes.

But in real life, the effect was underwhelming. As an intern set the teams up on a series of two-step risers, Adi saw the dust gathered in the folds of the curtains, the bits of glue and scaffolding barely holding everything together.

His team had been put on the final riser, stage left, farthest from where Fitzy was getting accosted with powder brushes and hair spray. Adi and Sierra—with her enormous boots—stood on the second riser, towering over Carter and Beck in the front.

“Oh my god,” Carter whispered as they waited for filming to begin. “I’m so nervous.”

She was in a white off-the-shoulder knitted top and black leather pants, totally different from the Mathletes sweatshirt she’d been wearing around the villas.

The nerdy glasses were back on, too. The swing in her personality was dizzying and, honestly, a bit annoying.

No one else was trying so hard in front of the cameras.

“They’re just handing out the snags,” Adi said. “No one’s getting eliminated.”

“I know that.” She peeked at him over her bare shoulder. “It’s still terrifying. What if I get turned into a meme?”

Adi lifted an eyebrow. “That’s what you’re afraid of ?” He’d assumed she’d be desperate for attention.

“Being immortalized on the internet for one embarrassing facial expression or ridiculous comment? Yeah, of course I am. Aren’t you?”

Ah. So she couldn’t handle criticism.

“That’s funny,” said Beck. “Being turned into a meme is pretty much my life’s ambition.”

“Been there, done that,” said Sierra.

They looked at her, and it took Adi a moment to remember the memes he’d seen on the Domain’s forums when he’d been researching the show. Jokes about Wednesday Addams. Jokes about goth girlfriends. Jokes about murder.

Adi studied her expression as she stared straight ahead, but it was hard to tell under the thick makeup whether she was sorry, embarrassed, proud, or something else.

The answer would depend on whether she regretted killing her sister. And that, of course, depended on why she did it in the first place.

Adi had read enough books to know the most common motives for murder: jealousy, love, revenge, fear.

Money.

Sierra seemed pretty hell-bent on that cash prize. But surely it was easier to win a round of the show than murder someone.

Fitzy hopped onto the stage, composed, as the director called for action. His sleeves were rolled up, the top buttons of his shirt undone, playing to the fans who cared more about his charisma than any of the Game Master’s puzzles. “It’s time to get to know this season’s roster of brainiacs!”

Fitzy approached Jarius’s team first. They chatted about the snag round—the elements in the jars, the Dmitri Mendeleev quote, the padlock numbers coming from the periodic table of elements.

That damn periodic table. Adi still couldn’t shake the feeling he was missing something.

Jarius claimed the role of team leader, and they’d indeed gone with Dread as their team name. Predictable.

Fitzy moved to the next team. Nadia was chosen as the leader. Their name: Mind Hack.

After that, a team full of people Adi hadn’t bothered to meet yet called themselves the Crown Jewels. Then there was Team Illuminati.

Finally, Fitzy approached Adi’s riser. “Our last team consists of Aditya Parvesh, Beck Matheson, the lovely Carter Kelly”—he turned to the camera—“though that’s Kick It Carter to you.

And for the first time in Escape Game history, the return of a past contestant .

. . the one, the only . . . Alicia Ange—oh!

” Fitzy’s eyes widened. There was a second in which he stared, speechless, into the camera lens. “I mean, Sierra—”

“Cut!” yelled the director in their earpieces.

“I’m sorry,” Fitzy said. “It just came out. I didn’t mean . . .” He turned to Sierra with a wince. “I’m so sorry.”

“Speak her name two more times, Fitzy,” Sierra said, deadpan. “They say it’ll bring her back from beyond the grave.” She wiggled her fingers like a witch over a cauldron.

Beck edged away.

The director ordered Fitzy to start at the top with their introductions.

Sending one more uncomfortable glance at Sierra, Fitzy tried to regain his composure as the cameras started filming again. But this time, Adi didn’t hear their introductions. He stared into midair, the gears in his brain turning faster than the giant fake ones behind him.

Alicia Angelos.

He pictured the letters from the periodic table that had been swirling in his brain for twenty-four hours.

Li Si O Ca Ne Ag Al.

He watched the invisible letters rearrange themselves.

ALICIA ANGELOS.

“It wasn’t a word,” he whispered. “It was a name.”

Carter glanced back at him.

“So, Sierra,” said Fitzy, rocking back on his heels, “is this season about redemption for you?”

“Redemption can bite me,” said Sierra, and the vitriol in her tone shook Adi from his daze. “This season is about winning.”

“I’ve missed your spirit,” said Fitzy, seemingly genuine. “If you’re in it to win it this time, who’s the leader that’s going to take your team to the finale?”

“I am, obviously,” said Sierra.

Carter tensed, almost imperceptibly. Her mouth puckered as if she tasted something sour and, a moment later, smoothed out. So fast even the editors weren’t likely to pick up on it.

But Adi did.

She was a big-time Solve Specialist. He hadn’t even thought to ask if she wanted to be leader—just agreed when Beck suggested Sierra. No pissing off the psychopath. It was a smart play.

But Carter must’ve been irked to be shoved out of the limelight.

“So let’s hear it,” said Fitzy. “What’s your team name?”

Sierra leaned closer to the microphone and said in an ominous voice, “Helsing.”

“Helsing? Sounds . . . familiar. Where do I know that from?”

Adi scoffed quietly as Sierra drawled, “People who have the slightest knowledge of classic literature will recognize the name from Bram Stoker’s Dracula. But Escape Game fans will appreciate that we drew inspiration from a certain vampire-themed room. Season four. The finale.”

Fitzy’s eyebrows shot upward.

“Roll with it,” said the director’s voice in their earpieces.

Fitzy made a sound that was part cough, part laugh. “All right, Team . . . Helsing. Great. So now that we’ve met our teams, let’s see how they did in the snag round.”

Footage played on a large screen, a montage of the five teams in their colorful lab coats and significant moments from the round interspersed with “getting to know you” snippets they’d filmed in their greenlights.

Adi watched the teams solve the puzzle for their combination locks, kicking himself for not realizing sooner that the abbreviations spelled out Alicia’s name.

The footage ended and the lights came back up. It was impossible to tell how the teams had fared. The editors were good at their jobs.

“Wow,” said Fitzy. “That snag round was a real sizzler, wasn’t it?

” He beamed. “Sizzler? Get it? Because ‘snags’ is an Aussie word for ‘sausages’?” When a few of the contestants groaned, he waved his arm at them.

“That joke gets funnier every season.” Then he faced the cameras.

“Let’s find out who’ll be entering into round one with some coveted snags, and who’s about to be at a severe disadvantage. ”

A scoreboard appeared on the giant screen, listing the new team names, each with a zeroed-out clock to their right.

“The first snag of season five,” continued Fitzy, “will be awarded to the team who was fastest in figuring out the quote.”

The words “No one nor anything can silence me. —Dmitri Mendeleev” appeared on the screen, and the clocks began to tick upward—numbers blinking and flashing, until . . .

“Team Mind Hack!” shouted Fitzy.

Nadia whooped, pulling her teammates in for a hug.

“Having worked out the quote a full thirty-seven seconds faster than the second-fastest team,” continued Fitzy, “you will receive the chance to add thirty-seven seconds to an opponent’s final time during a round of your choice.”

Adi kept his gaze on the board, ignoring the looks burning into him from his teammates. Yeah, he knew he had held them up for that puzzle. There was nothing he could do about it now.

“Next, let’s see which team first put together the element numbers from the periodic table.”

The clocks on the board ticked again, this time landing on—

“Team Dread!”

Adi could hear Carter take in a long, slow breath in front of him.

“For this victory, you can add an error penalty to any opponent’s escape room. If they make a mistake during the round, they’ll gain one whole minute on their final time.”

Team Dread shoved each other on the shoulders. Gabriela flashed a peace sign at the other teams, while Delphi raised her middle finger—to which the director barked into their earpieces to knock it off; this was a family show.

“Our third snag,” Fitzy went on, “will go to the team who made it out of their storage closets the fastest. Who was it?”

Adi had a bad feeling about this . . . which was confirmed when Fitzy shouted, “Team Dread again! Your second snag can be used to plunge an opposing team into pitch blackness for one full minute during a round.”

“It’s okay,” Beck whispered. “We’re still good.”

Sierra gave a bitter laugh. “We sucked.”

Adi kept his gaze on the scoreboard. Come on. Come on.

“Our fourth snag,” said Fitzy, “is for the team that solved the room’s final puzzle and correctly completed Dr. Adam Theery’s colorful formula in the shortest amount of time. That team is . . . Helsing!”

Adi’s spine straightened.

Beck cheered. “I knew that kid’s chemistry set I had would be worth more than making slime someday.”

“You didn’t actually do any chemistry,” Adi pointed out.

“Okay, that watercolor set then.”

“Your snag,” said Fitzy, “will grant you the power to force two members of an opposing team to start their round wearing . . . handcuffs! Although, our Game Master might hide a couple of keys for them to find.”

“Oh, that’s a good one,” said Carter. “They’ve been doing the handcuff snag since the first season. Probably the best thing to come out of that season, actually. The puzzles themselves were pretty meh back then, but this can make or break a team.”

Adi didn’t want to admit it, but in that moment, he was grateful for Beck and his watercolor set, too.

“And now,” said Fitzy, “it’s time for our final snag—this one to be awarded to the team with the fastest overall time.”

The clocks began to tick again. The team names shifted up and down.

It felt like hours passed before the ticking slowed, the team names stopped, and the results were revealed.

Dread