John was going insane with worry. Wendy had disappeared from the hospital without a trace eight hours ago. The police couldn’t find her, and all the security footage from the hospital had unexpectedly malfunctioned during the time of her disappearance. He knew something had happened. Something really bad. The police had wanted to question him, but as soon as their backs were turned, he’d slipped away and had driven home, quickly formulating a plan.

It was a crazy idea, acting on his gamer’s intuition, but it had worked for him before.

A police car sitting outside his house diverted him to the alley, and he slipped inside through the kitchen window and up to his room, keeping all the lights off. He pulled out his Xbox, and then looked up his buddies and their gamer tags. The last time Wendy had disappeared, she had been with them. What’s to say that it wouldn’t be the same this time? He looked up the high record holders and picked out DoppleGang22, which he knew had to be Ditto’s gamer tag

He needed to figure out where Ditto’s Xbox was located; if he could trace the gamer tag to a credit card account, he should be able to get an address or locate the Wi-Fi to the unit.

After an hour of searching with illegally downloaded software, John had an address. It was something. A place to start. He jumped up and slipped back out the way he’d come in and drove to the address.

He didn’t want to lose the only other person of importance in his life. Even though she wasn’t his blood sister, she was family. And he had to find her. Impatience had him pushing hard on the gas pedal, and in record time, he was pulling up to the address, an old abandoned rambler house in the middle of nowhere. The house needed a new coat of paint, the shutters were falling off, and most of all, the vegetation needed pruning.

John looked at the address on the paper and again at the map on his phone.

“This better not be a meth house,” he mumbled, putting the car into park and locking the door behind him.

He turned and looked back at the long and deserted road that led to the house. The main road was probably half a mile away.

“Great, I’m in a horror game . . . with a cast of one. Chance of dying—very probable. Weapons—none.” He stopped a few feet away from the front step. “Yep, not doing that.” He turned and went back to the trunk of his car and pulled out a baseball bat, muttering under his breath, “Weapon—bat. Strength increased by fifty.” He approached the house, his nerves in an uproar as he stepped up to the front porch.

What he thought was a pile of garbage sitting by the door moved, and John reacted without thinking, swinging the bat, and then screamed in terror as the bat connected with a solid mass. John heard a crunch. His bat had decapitated a homeless vagrant, and the head rolled along the porch to bump against his foot.

His scream became even more high-pitched as he stared at the dead eyes.

“Holy freak! Oh no, oh no, oh no, I killed him!” Sparks flashed, and John finally noticed the wires sticking out of the dismembered head and heard the motor of the machine slowly die down.

“Wait, you’re not real?” He started to laugh in relief, and it wouldn’t stop. He hadn’t committed murder. It took a few minutes for him to settle his nerves. Then, he kneeled down to take a closer look at the homeless man’s computerized spy camera.

“Impressive work. I would love to meet your maker—well, in a nondead sense.” He patted the robot and apologized again. “Sorry, dude.”

He turned to survey the house again and knew that if that was the security system, then he must have alerted its occupants to his whereabouts. Also, it meant that he must be very close. John began to peer into the windows, looking for signs of life.

A shadow passed by the window. “Geez!” John cried, jumping back in surprise. He heard footsteps inside, moving farther away.

“Hey.” He ran around the porch to another window and pressed his forehead to the glass, squinting as he tried to see into the darkened house. “Hey, I don’t want to harm anyone. I’m not looking for trouble.” He looked down at the bat in his hands and groaned. “This isn’t what it looks like. It’s for protection.”

The footsteps continued to go away from him, and then, out of the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of someone scrambling into another room.

“I’m looking for my sister.”

The footsteps stopped. John took it as a good sign. “You may know her. Her name is Wendy. I’m also looking for Ditto . . . er, uh, Doppleganger22.” He moved back to the front door and started knocking on the door. “Please, I just need to know if she’s safe.”

There was no response. He pressed his forehead up against the door and closed his eyes.

“Please. Help me.” His voice became choked up.

The latch on the door opened and surprised green eyes greeted him. “John?”

He was still leaning on the door when it opened inward, his body almost falling on top of her. She shrieked and stepped back as John fell into a heap on the floor. He looked up into a very scary-looking gun.

“Tink?” He groaned and sat up.

“How did you find us?” Tink asked stiffly

“It was easy,” he said. “I hacked into Ditto’s Xbox account and traced the credit card info back to this address.”

Loud, angry bell noises filled the air as Tink’s mouth moved. “I’m gonna kill him. I’m going to murder Ditto. Chop him into little pieces and feed them to the dog,” she said, gesticulating wildly as she described how she was going to dispose of his friend. “You, on the contrary . . .” She shoved a finger into his chest, and her eyes squinted in suspicion. “You’ve got some hacker skills.”

John could feel his cheeks grow warm. “A bit.”

All things considered, things were going fairly well, but then she saw the headless robot. “You killed Homer! You soulless beast.”

“Hey, it startled me. I’m sorry. I’ll help you build another one. But you . . . what are you doing here?” He looked around the abandoned house. His imagination roamed wild as he tried to picture his sister there, sleeping on a dirty mattress in some moldy crumbly room in the back. “You don’t live here, do you?”

She snorted. “Gads no. Gross.” She paused and gave him a look. “Were you followed?”

He shook his head. “No, I wasn’t followed. Tink, is Wendy here?”

Tink didn’t answer. She studied him, and he could almost see her mind reeling as she tried to decide how to answer him.

“Fine, maybe, you can’t tell me if she is, but can you at least tell me if she’s all right? I just need to know if she’s alive.”

“Follow me,” Tink said, interrupting him, and spun on her heel. John followed her to the living room, where she stopped next to a stone fireplace. Pulling a picture frame from the wall, she punched in a secret code on a keypad, and the back of the fireplace opened inward, revealing a long tunnel.

The tunnel was dark, lit with stringed lights, and after following it for a hundred yards or so, they entered through another set of doors into an immaculate mansion filled with stairs and hallways. Boys were coming and going, carrying various books and backpacks. He didn’t see any girls other than Tink. He couldn’t help but wonder why she would be there. “Is this an all-boys school?”

“Yep, well except for me. I’m special.” She grinned and winked at him.

The way she said it made his heart flip.

They came to a hallway with heavy wooden doors, each carved with a different design. Tink stopped at one with a squirrel and knocked. When no one answered it, she pounded a little harder. Tink muttered under her breath and tried to open the door. It was locked.

“Spastastic.” Tink reached up and pulled out a hair clip with a jagged-looking bobby pin. She pulled it apart and kneeled down in front of the door, inserting the lock pick into the lock. A few seconds later, he heard a click and a sigh of satisfaction from her.

“Finally.” She pushed the door inward, and it opened silently.

John entered the darkened room and saw his sister sleeping in an overstuffed chair by an open window.

“Wendy!” John exclaimed and rushed forward, kneeling by her. He touched her hand, and it was cold. He would have thought she was dead except he could feel the slow and steady beat of her pulse in her wrist. He noticed the slight bruising on her face, and he looked at Tink accusingly, shaking his head in anger.

It was hard not to let his emotions overtake him. He was disappointed that she hadn’t called him. That she had been there . . . safe and alive, and he’d been worried sick. He would have tried to contact her.

She opened her eyes and searched the room. “John, am I dreaming? You’re here?”

He could hear the heartache in her voice, and he immediately forgave her.

“Wendy, I’m here.” He grabbed her hand.

Wendy sat up and leaned forward to pull him into a hug. Then, she turned to look at Tink. “Thank you for bringing him here.”

Tink shook her head and raised her hand, palm out. “That wasn’t me. Your brother tracked you down like a hound dog.”

“Really? How?”

“The how is not important,” she said defensively. “And that reminds me that I need to have a talk with someone about online purchases and credit cards. I’ll be back,” Tink said as she slowly backed out of the room. As soon as she closed the door behind her, they both heard her loud screeching voice scream, “Ditto! Get your boot-scootin’ boogie butt down here! Now!”

Wendy laughed, and John shook his head in surprise. “That girl never ceases to amaze me.”

“She’s in a league all of her own.” She paused and studied him out of the corner of her eye. “But she has a fan, I think.”

“Really? Who?” John couldn’t help but feel a flutter of jealousy. In a school full of boys, Tink could have her pick of any one of them. He never stood a chance.

“You, silly,” Wendy teased.

John coughed loudly. “I, uh. I’m not.”

“It’s okay. I’m your sister—I can tell. And besides, I won’t tell anyone.”

John sighed and sat on the chair arm, next to Wendy. “Now, tell me what happened. Where did you go?”

Wendy gripped the blanket on her lap, then pulled at a string before taking a deep breath and nodding. “They came for me again, but I escaped. I couldn’t bear to let them find you. So, to protect you, I didn’t contact you. I can’t lose you too.”

“That’s not a decision you get to make alone. Remember, we’re family. We stick together.”

The door to her bedroom creaked open, and Tink peeked her head back in. “I bet you can go for a pint right about now?” She stepped into the room with a pint of mint chip ice cream and two spoons.

“Is that for me?” John asked, reaching for one of the spoons.

Tink pulled the silverware out of his reach. “As if, go get your own pint.”