A Classy Place to Meet

[Will†]

((Finn Grant continued from Walk the Streets so Mean))

Finn had done what Mara had said. He'd spent the end of day two and the start of day three roaming around the island, trying to stay out of the way of people before finally deciding to make his way back to the hospital.

Once he was there, he didn't waste any time in finding a room and barricading himself in. It was there that he decided to sleep for the rest of the day and then meet Mara at their rendezvous later that night. However, when he awoke, Finn discovered that he had overslept and it was almost mid-day on day four and in response, he quickly left the hospital.

It wasn't a long walk from the hospital to the hotel, but to Finn it seemed like it took hours. He hoped Mara was still there and he hadn't kept her waiting; she'd told him not to stand her up, but it looks like he let her down. On the other hand, he just hoped that she was still alive. After all, he was asleep when the morning announcement came on, for all he knew she could be dead. In fact, even Miranda and Kat could be dead right now and he wouldn't even know, they could have ended up like Stacey did on day two. He was lucky that the hotel didn't turn out to be a danger zone.

As he approached the hotel, he opened the front doors into the lobby and surveyed the room. There was no Mara. However, there was a body in the middle of the room.

Cautiously, Finn took several steps into the building to get a closer look at the body. It seemed to be a girl who was laying on her front facing away from him with a red liquid peeking out from beneath her.

"H-hello?" Finn called to the girl. She was obviously dead, but Finn just wanted to make sure.

He gingerly walked over to the body, stepping around it and crouching down so that he could see the girls face. It was Nina Clarke. The girl who he and Mara had spoken to not even two days ago and now she was dead.

"Oh shit."

Finn stood up and took a couple of steps backward. He looked around the room again just in case whoever killed Nina was still there. Fortunately, he was the only person in the room that was still alive. Dumping his bag in front of him and placing his gun on his lap, Finn took a seat on the sofa that was behind him, opposite the front doors and Nina's body. His eyes continuously switched between the doors and Nina. It was a weird feeling he felt being in a room with a dead body, somewhat unsettling and the smell was horrendous.

Several minutes passed and Mara had still not turned up. He was starting to think that maybe he had turned up too late and Mara was long gone. He hoped that she was just being held up by something. Finn sighed as he turned his attention from Nina to the doors again. He'd give her an hour and if she didn't turn up by then, he'd just have to try and look for her somewhere else.

[Jilly]

((Alexander de Gaulle and Sophie McDowell continued from Falling Slowly))

Alex could never get used to how eerie the hallways of the empty hotel were. Maybe it was just the fact that abandoned places generally were disturbing or if it was the existing loom of doom that came with being in Survival of the Fittest, but from all the times he was up here he found himself moving quicker and quicker to get to where he needed to go. At least this time he didn't need to worry about exploding collars.

The faint smell of iron still permeated through the second hallway and intensified as the duo of Sophie and Alex walked to the stairs and slowly made their descent to the first floor lobby. About halfway down the descent, Alex turned to check on Sophie, who had a visible expression of discomfort painted on her face as she tightly held onto the lead pipe she got from Gavin. Maybe it would have been a better idea to just leave her in the room and just have Alex himself make the trip to the pools, but it was too late. And besides, Sophie pretty much insisted on coming with him. Hopefully it wasn't going to be too bad of a sight.

At the bottom of the stairs that led into the lobby, Alex poked his head out around the sides and scanned the hallway. Of course, right in the middle of the lobby, someone was sitting down on the couch near a corpse. Alex held his arm out to stop Sophie and withdrew his head, lifting his pointer finger to his mouth. Sophie nodded at the gesture, and he poked his head back around.

From the looks of it, it was one of their male classmates, but from this distance Alex couldn't be too sure. More importantly, though, he seemed pretty fixated on the front door. Was he waiting for someone?

In whatever case, he was still an obstacle that made the short walk feel like a trek. How were they going to go about doing this? There was probably enough room to sneak around the couch without getting caught in his peripherals, but if they made any noise he was sure to notice. Then, of course, they could just swarm and attack him... okay, maybe not that one. There was always the option of just casually walking up to him and striking up a short conversation about the weather, but then there was the off chance that he was emotionally too far gone for diplomatic actions. Or, they could just say "screw the whole thing" and retreat to the hotel room again like cowards.

Fun decisions.

Alex took a deep breath, signaled Sophie to follow his lead, and took the plunge. Casual diplomacy it was.

Alex raised and exposed his palms over his chest as he made his way to the lobby. "Uhm... are you looking for someone?"

[Laurels]

Sophie followed Alex down the halls of the hotel, trying to stay close to him while keeping a tight grip on the pipe. Part of her was feeling intensely nervous about their plan. Sure, she could fake optimism to encourage her friend, but now that they were actually close to looking at bodies, she began to feel dread at seeing her former classmates. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad, but the thought of seeing the horrifying remains of her peers made her upset.

I guess I never did see Dave's body after he fell from that cliff. These kids didn't get swallowed up by the ocean like he did.

Suddenly, Alex held out his arm to stop her. She froze in place. What was out there? He wanted her to be quiet. She remained where she was and kept silent, keeping her pipe close to her chest.

Finally, Alex did motion to move. She trusted his judgement and hoped that they were about to meet someone friendly. She followed him into the open and saw that there was a boy sitting on a couch. She couldn't immediately recognize who he was, but she hoped Alex did.

[Will†]

Finn broke his gaze from the front doors and looked down at his lap. Out of boredom, he started toying with his fingers. How long would he have to wait here? He wanted to get out of this shit hole of a hotel as quickly as possible; he couldn't stand being in the same room with the mess that used to be Nina Clarke any longer.

As his eyes locked onto the doors once more, he saw movement in the corner of his vision, followed by the sound of a man's voice. Finn made a muffled squealing sound as his body violently lurched off of the couch. Consequently, his gun jolted off of his lap and landed with a loud bang in front of him. Frantically, Finn got onto all fours and scrambled after the gun, gripping it tightly with one hand and pointing it at where he'd seen movement.

"Don't move!" Finn screeched.

With crazed eyes, Finn looked up at the figure as another person followed him into the room. His eyes darted between the two of them as he examined their faces. He recognized them both from school, but couldn't put a name to their faces. Finn's gaze then switched to their hands. The girl was holding some sort of pipe, and from what he could tell, the boy didn't have any sort of weapon on him, that didn't mean that he couldn't be hiding something though. Could they have been the people that killed Nina?

Finn continued to stare hard faced at the duo, his gun pointing somewhere in the middle of them both. With his eyes fixated on the pair, Finn used his spare hand to locate the couch and push himself up off of the floor. Once up, Finn gripped the gun with both hands and started to regain his breath. The two of them didn't look too dangerous, but anyone had the potential to be on this island.

"You're going end up getting shot if you keep sneaking up on people." Finn said bluntly. "And yes, I'm waiting for someone."

[Jilly]

Alex was not expecting to be held up at gunpoint by a gun today. Then again, he wasn't expecting much to happen other than robbing from a mass grave. At least it was going to be an interesting experience.

Now that he got a better look, Alex didn't really know who this kid was. He was probably one of the sports people that were practically on the other side of the universe from who Alex usually hanged out with.

"S-sorry!" Alex took a step back with his hands still raised. "We could have just run by, if you would have liked that instead."

This guy seemed kind of unstable, but maybe he was just scared from being alone. Or from beingstanding right next to a day-old corpse. Or he was a player and thought Alex and Sophie knew who he was and thought they were going to take him down by bringing sanitizing wipes and a lead pipe to a gunfight. All three reasons seemed pretty well justified for shooting at two complete strangers, but maybe if Alex told the truth he would just leave them be.

Alex pointed his finger at the pools entrance on the other side of the lounge. "We're, uh, just passing by on the way to the pools. If you could kindly put your revolver down and let us go, that would be swell; there's no need to get mad at the two of us just because you got stood up by your date."

[Laurels]

Sophie looked at the guy on the couch as Alex called out. Suddenly, the guy fell to the floor. Sophie felt a bit surprised by that.

Woah, was that too startling?

However, that feeling of shock was soon replaced by fear as the boy raised a gun at them. Sophie let out a cry and held the pipe close to her chest as she stepped back a little. The guy was waiting for someone, and clearly he was on edge. Sophie remained in place, afraid that the slightest movement would cause him to open fire.

Alex tried to explain that they were passing through.

"Y-y-yeah!" Sophie replied, her voice loud and wavering. "We're just passing by! N-nothing to worry about!"

Sophie bit her lip and looked at Alex. She really hoped this boy would calm down after that explanation. If anything, she just hoped they came across as harmless.

[Will†]

"She's not my date." Finn replied coldly.

He lowered his gun and let it hang by his side. They only wanted to go to the pools and they didn't seem to be that much of a threat.  Finn doubted that this was some sort of plan of theirs for him to lower his guard so that they could attack him. Even if it was, they didn't look like the type of people that would be able to overpower him, especially since he had a gun.

Finn slumped back down onto the sofa and positioned himself so that he was facing the duo. He rested the gun on his lap, keeping his hand on the handle just in case they tried anything funny.

"Hmm." Finn cocked his head slightly. "You two don't look like the kind of people that could kill someone. So if you guys didn't kill her, who did?" While keeping eye contact, Finn nodded his head towards the corpse of Nina Clarke.

If he was going to survive on this island, Finn needed to know who to and who not to trust. After all, he missed the morning announcement, which meant that there could be a whole new list of verified killers that he didn't know about, so he needed to get as much information as possible.

[Jilly]

Alex felt his body relax as the gunman lowered the gun. Crisis averted... kind of. This guy seemed to think they were the ones that killed Nina or something, but maybe he just didn't hear the announcements?

"You... you didn't hear? It was Mad-" Alex glanced at Sophie before continuing on, " ...Max. Mad Max. Sawyer. I think he was on the golf team or something like that? He mowed down about four people yesterday, Nina included. Poor girl never had a chance."

A little white lie wouldn't hurt anyone, would it?

[Laurels]

Sophie sighed in relief as the boy lowered his gun. She wondered if something had happened to him to make him so worried about seeing anyone else. Perhaps he had seen some tragedy earlier.

Still, he wasn't going to hurt them, so they could get on with the scavenger hunt. However, that would have to wait. The guy wanted to know who killed Nina. Alex began to respond before giving her a quick look. It looked like he was about to say something, but then switched to Max Sawyer. Sophie raised an eyebrow.

Wait, I thought it was someone else who killed Nina. Why did Alex lie?

Sophie didn't say anything else. She just wanted to get this search over with so they could go back to hiding. Alex probably had his reason for lying, and she could ask him when they were safe.

[Will†]

Finn raised his eyebrows. Four people in one day? This Max Sawyer guy seemed to be a real contender; he'd apparently even earned himself a nickname: Mad Max. Finn was pretty sure he'd heard Max's name on one of the previous announcements, which would mean he'd killed at least five people.

"Oh wow." Finn responded in a perplexed tone.

Pausing for a brief moment, Finn looked towards the door, then back at the couple. There was still no sign of Mara.

"So... I've seen you guys before, back at school I mean. What're your names?"

As reluctant as he was to start up a conversation with the pair, Finn hadn't had contact with anyone in almost two days. He was starting to feel lonely and didn't want them rushing off and leaving him too quickly. Plus he didn't want to be left on his own with a rotting corpse any longer than he had to.

Finn pretty much had the social skills of a potato, at least when he wasn't with his friends. Hopefully he'd be able to keep up a conversation with them until Mara arrived and not do anything that would cause them to run off. He'd already held them at gunpoint and they didn't leave, so there wasn't much else he could do wrong.

[Jilly]

Alex's breathing calmed as the atmosphere became less tense in the lobby, save for the corpse decaying in the middle of the lobby. Alex and Sophie didn't get shot and he got away with the little lie, so that's all that really mattered for now.

This guy asked for their names, which was simple enough. "Oh, sure, how... rude of us. I'm Alex," he pressed his hand against his chest, "and this lady with the pipe is the lovely Sophie. How about you?"

It then crossed Alex's mind that he might as well tell this guy the rest of the announcements. It was only fair enough, since it wasn't like Alex or Sophie would gain from withholding any other valuable information. "Oh, I guess we should go ahead and tell you who else was in the announcements."

Without waiting for a response Alex began to name off the other mentioned killers in that day's announcement, striking his fingers for every name he recalled. "Let's see... there actually weren't that many besides Max. The only repeat offenders were him, that Joachim guy, and Hansel. That girl with the really Polynesian name (Maka-something?) killed a couple of people, too. Rosemary Michaels... I think that's about it."

Alex turned to Sophie and continued, "Help me out here, Sophie. Do you remember anyone else?"

[Laurels]

Sophie smiled and gave a small wave when Alex introduced her to the boy. It felt strange to hear Alex call her lovely, but then again, being "the lady with the pipe" was as strange a name to be called. But hopefully the boy would recognize their names from being passed around in the halls of school. She and Alex probably had good reputations, so there was little reason to not trust them.

The boy wanted to know about the announcements and who had been listed as killers. Alex could remember a few of the names, and asked if Sophie remembered anyone else.

"Uh....let me think..." Sophie said, tapping her finger on her chin.

"I'm not sure. I know a lot of people died in accidents or suicides this time. I'm sure I'll remember who else was listed if they're mentioned."

[Will†]

The boy introduced himself and the girl who were apparently called Alex and Sophie. The girl, now known as Sophie, waved at Finn when she was introduced, and in response, Finn gave her a slight nod. Alex's introduction slightly jogged his memory of who they were. Finn was pretty sure that Sophie's last name was McDowell and Alex had some kind of foreign name he couldn't remember.

"I'm Finn. Finn Grant"

If they happened to recognise him, it would more than likely have been bad things they'd heard about him. He wasn't exactly known as the nicest person at school, but they probably would have gathered that by now.

Alex started to list off the killers from the morning announcement. Finn nodded his head, acknowledging that he'd heard as Alex went through the list. As the list went on, Finn's attention slowly went away from Alex and Sophie until he finally found himself looking at the door again. No Mara.

It was then that Finn suddenly remembered that the whole reason why he was still sat here was out of hope that Mara was still alive. He'd completely forgotten that there was a possibility that she could have been killed at some point yesterday and he hadn't of heard as a result of missing the announcement. Finn took in a sharp breath through his nose and quickly turned back to Alex and Sophie.

"Do you remember hearing Mara Montalvo's name on the death list? Or Miranda Millers and Kat Tolstoff's names?"

[Jilly]

Finn Grant...

Oh...

Ohh...

Well... it wasn't like past reputations really mattered anymore. Sophie and Alex were standing right there, and Finn had ample time to pull the trigger on both of them without a word. Even if he was one of the mean kids, that didn't necessarily make him a killer too.

Finn asked about two names, whom Alex could only assume were the people he kept looking back at the front door for. Alex crossed his arms and tried to think back, but neither of the two he could recall from the announcements. "...No. I don't believe any of those names were called today."

...Wait a minute, weren't Mara and Miranda confirmed killers? Was that today or yesterday? ...No, it must have been yesterday, right? All of these announcements were really starting to blur into one another.

Alex glanced at the pools entrance and back several times while biting his lip. He really didn't want to stick around for someone who was listed to show up. But, at the same time, was it moral to just leave Finn all alone in the lobby?

[Laurels]

Finn Grant. Sophie was sure she had heard the name around the halls of Aurora. There were four years where he might have been a classmate of hers in some class, but she couldn't recall at the moment. She didn't remember hearing his name on the announcements, so he wasn't someone she had to show a ton of fear around. Well, aside from him pointing a gun at her and Alex.

Well, he did put it away. I guess we could just stay out of his way.

Finn then asked if they heard Mara Montalvo, Miranda Millers, or Kat Tolstoff on the recent announcements. Sophie pondered, as Alex responded.

"I didn't hear their names either," Sophie said to Finn. "Why, are they your friends?"