Witchhunt • Prequel ✓

oedipus tyrannus.

[ONE YEAR BEFORE]

Jonah's hands itched to open his laptop as the prof passed out discussion topics. He wasn't in a horrible group, but anything was preferable to talking about whatever dumbass conspiracy theory Professor Donovan had scraped from the bowels of the internet.

The paper hit his desk and Jonah nearly groaned out loud. What are the ecological ramifications of deadwater's spread?

Katie snatched it from him the moment he registered the question. She squinted through her red-rimmed glasses. "It doesn't exist."

"Of course it doesn't exist," Jonah said. "We'd all be dead if it did."

Adam looked up from his phone. "What doesn't exist?"

"Keep up, dumbass. Deadwater."

He crossed his arms over his broad chest and made a mock-thinking face. Adam dwarfed Jonah in every aspect except academically, despite them being the same age. While Jonah liked to think he was smarter than Adam, they had decided early on that Adam's main issue was that he didn't give a shit. Ever. It fit his 'cool Chinese punk' aesthetic. 

"And why do you think it doesn't exist?" Jonah jumped as Donovan appeared over his shoulder. Donovan was ridiculously tall and lanky, with a long face and a shark's wide grin.

Jonah swallowed, stumbling on his own tongue. "Lethal seawater would have killed us all by now through seafood and rainfall."

"Deadwater only kills things it physically touches, though," Donovan's brows were raised in that inscrutable way of his. He seemed to be enjoying watching Jonah flounder. Jonah looked to his teammates in desperation.

"That still doesn't make sense," God bless Katie, that Type-A overachiever, "no known element behaves that way. And if it did, it would happen in freshwater."

Donovan smiled. "That wasn't the question."

"The ecological ramifications are that we'd all be dead," Adam said, "burned to a crisp from the inside out or starving to death."

Jonah snorted. 

[TEN MONTHS BEFORE]

Katie's family left for vacation early, almost immediately after her last exam. They were going to the Bahamas for the first time.

They were all dead before winter.

December wound down in a blaze of snowless sunlight when Professor Donovan sent out emails asking for volunteers to provide relief at the US' shores. Jonah accepted immediately, then called his sister.

"Hello?" her voice was groggy and a little irritated.

"It's me."

"Oh, hey J. What's up?" Her interest was obviously feigned, and her voice was still low. She wasn't sleeping alone, then.

"I'm headed up to help. Just wondering where you are."

"Maine. We're going to be here for a while."

"We?" Jonah smiled as he imagined what new boy-toy she'd collected. 

"Me and my fiancé."

His gut sank a little. They'd fallen out of touch the past few months, since Abby had gone off on her world-trip and then decided to spend the rest of her time and money helping the needy. He hadn't imagined she would change enough to get engaged. "Oh. What's he like?"

She sighed, sending bolts of static through the phone. "I can't talk right now J. I'll call you tomorrow."

She hung up without saying goodbye. Jonah swallowed and stared at his suitcase. Adam was still sound asleep in the bed across the dorm, reeking of alcohol and sex. Jonah sighed and tossed his phone aside. 

"Adam." Nothing. "Adam Jing, wake your ass up."

A brown eye opened and glared at him. "What?"

"We're volunteering with Donovan."

"We?"

"Yep. Pack your shit, we're going."

Adam squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his face into his pillow, letting out a drawn-out groan. "I don't wanna."

Jonah leaned over and shoved him, avoiding the retaliatory kick with a grin. He couldn't stop the bubbling laugh that escaped his lips as Adam sat up and revealed the full extend of his bed head.

"Shut up."

"Come on, let's go save the world."