Get Out If You Can

Hunter | I Don't Care If The World Knows What My Secrets Are

"This one's yours, Diego," Alison says, carefully running her thumb along the edges of the fateful card. This is seriously beginning to look like someone has done their homework — though I'm not sure how any of us are actually involved in Tejada's death. I mean, Matt might be. He's weird. Diego too — he's a genius. But Alison and Emilie? I'm not too sure about Emilie, but I know for a fact that Alison isn't the kind who goes croak at night.

I really hope whoever's playing this game will realize that before it's too late for us to explain anything.

I quickly steal a glance at Diego, who isn't even trembling. Man, unless he's some ultra-supervillain, I'm not sure how he's managed to be so un-stressed all this while. He's just calmly waiting for her to pronounce his judgement, though I do suspect that his hands, which are in his pockets, are balled into fists.

That won't work. You can't keep your fists — your most powerful, easily controllable and extremely effective weapon — in your pocket. Danger doesn't warn you before it strikes. In the time you take to get your hands out of your pockets, you could be killed. I'm starting to think he's not that smart.

"Diego Alejandro Torrez," Alison reads, pronouncing his middle name so carefully I can almost see a light red shade creep on Diego's cheeks. Well, whatever it is, that guy has a hands-down awesome middle name. I didn't know that until now.

I didn't know any of these people till now. True, I knew Alison, but that was five hundred years ago. If I'm allowed to make a comparison, well...she's much better now. She's sprightly and bright and she knows how to handle stuff.

She's nothing like me.

"T'is hath said yond blood runs thick'r than wat'r;
yet thee nev'r kneweth of yond;
in toweth'r one 't is yond thee shalt seeth—
what becameth of thy bond."

Alison folds the card back and looks up at us. More specifically, at Diego.

Diego's expression is — interesting, to say the least. There's a flash of understanding in his eyes, and a nervous twitch right below his jawline. He rakes a hand through his caramel hair, that's helplessly falling into his face.

I think that might be a blessing for him. His eyes are a total giveaway.

"That," he says, looking down at his black Nike sneakers, "was the most bullshit I've ever heard in my life."

He looks back up at us, his face saying the exact same thing he just did. But less convincingly.

"That's...that's weird, agreed," Matt says, now literally doing the ballet. He can't seem to stop moving those feet of his. "Yeah, it's all nonsense, isn't it? Why on Earth are they going all Shakespeare? I mean, I understood nothing."

"That isn't really a surprise," I say, gesturing at Alison to get the next card out. The next pronouncement, if that is what it is. "We'll think about what it might mean when we're done reading everyone's cards."

Matt grunts. Everyone ignores him.

Alison gently picks up the next card, holding it as though it's a highly sensitive World War Two bomb that would explode if not treated well. She skims the contents, then begins to read :

"Hunter Jeremy Mason.
Did deny s'rvice wast what thee didst,
and thee couldst changeth but ev'rything:
yet thee did remain and didst not leaveth—
thy answ'r lies in toweth'r three."

"So I'm tower Three then, wherever the hell that may be," I say, turning the words over in my head. I don't understand a thing. Whoever's plotting this must be some I-have-a-fancy-degree dude, and that does not comfort me in the slightest.