Young Writers Society

Queenie shrugged, "How about the rest of you? Would you rather sleep on the streets or in a three-thousand-dollar hotel suite?"

He took a deep breath.

He needed to approach this maturely. He had to be the oldest here out of all parties present, and it was his responsibility to make sure everyone was as safe as they could be. If that meant letting Queenie - and whoever she won over - leave, then so be it.

He pushed back his hood to reveal his spiky black hair and mismatched eyes.

"We must have been brought here from different places," he said, "because I'm sure someone was going to recognize my name by now. I'm the leader of the resistance against Notch. I know how to hide - we have to be covert."

He looked at the faces of everyone in their makeshift group.

"I can't stop you if you decide to leave," he continued, "and a fancy hotel room does sound nice. But I know how things like this work, and I think you're making a mistake if you choose to go there instead of staying with me."

His piece concluded, he walked over to the alleyway's wall and sat down against it, waiting for the sky to change from its warm hues to darkness.

Queenie crossed her arms and dropped down beside him, "Then enlighten me 'leader of the resistance', how do things like this work?" Even though she maintained a cocky tone, there was a bit of something else beneath it, maybe curiosity? Fear?

Whatever it was, she didn't let on outwardly.

Taber sat down beside Ryder, on the opposite side as Queenie. He gestured for Kendrik and Lunis to follow, but they kept on standing up and scowling. Agh - they were more than justified in being frustrated and confused, because he kinda was too, but he wouldn't have felt as alone in this argument if they sat with him. "I mean, what's stopping us from hanging around to see if there's anything left, then going to the hotel in the morning? I don't think they'll be super grumpy if we pay them for it."

Queenie frowned, "What's their deal?" She shifted so she was leaning back against the wall, or tried to. Halfway through the motion she hissed and sat straight up, placing her hands in her lap in a poor attempt at disguising her obvious discomfort.

"There isn't," he agreed. He felt uneasy at the thought of spending a time in a place like a high class hotel, but he knew it was just his paranoia kicking in.

He looked over at Queenie, admittedly surprised that she had sat down next to him. "Well, first we wait," he said. He leaned his head up against the wall and glanced upwards at the sky. "When we know it's safe, or as safe as it'll ever be, we leave where we're hiding and do whatever we came to a place to do. In this case, it would be check out the streets for anything that gives us an idea on why we were brought here."

He was silent for a moment.

"Whatever we find, it'll likely take us by surprise." He closed his eyes. "But we'll know what it is when we see it, because 'sometimes trusting your gut is smarter than trusting your brain'."

Queenie nodded along as he spoke, a little distracted, but listening.

"How will we-" she winced, "-know that it's safe?" her cocky tone was more toned-down than usual, "I mean," she regained some of her sarcasm, "I'm fairly certain we haven't been attacked yet."

Meryl peeked out of the alley before plopping down beside Taber. "Not yet, and maybe not ever. Wouldn't it be pointless for someone to send us here, and then attack us? It sounds more like we've been sent here for a mission."

Her old school counselor Keiko had ever told her that supernatural events happened just like real-life events, often propelled by the invisible hands of an influential being. As a teen sitting in her cozy office, Meryl was unfazed, but now the idea that she might be a pawn made her shiver.

"Queenie," she asked, "Did you go into the hotel? How was it?"

Queenie shrugs, blinks hard as if trying not to wince, and says, "It's not nearly as 'high-end' as most of the ones I usually stay at, but something tells me you guys won't be bothered. Their security's outdated, though, or maybe that's just me being from a year in the future apparently. There are security cameras in the lobby, I believe that they're the model with motion detectors, but I didn't get a close enough look to be sure. All the locks on the rooms are electronic, easy to hack on the lower-level rooms, but more difficult with the suites. I'd say it's a level eighteen out of twenty for those of you unfamiliar with security stuff. The door on the suit is alarmed, but if someone brought a backup team and didn't care about the cops knowing they were trying to get in, then it could potentially be cut through with a handsaw."

She takes a breath, looking to the sky as she tries to remember more details, "If anyone-" she glanced pointedly at Ryder, "-is still paranoid about the place, I've played bodyguard before. I know how to secure a room, I know how to use a gun, and I know how to take a hit. Unless, of course, you guys don't trust me with that, in which case you can defend yourselves against whatever BS brought us here."

Lunis pointed to Queenie. "As an assassin, I'm pretty sure I can say she knows what she's talking about," he said. "Don't we need a base of operations anyways? And wouldn't a hotel be a good place for it?"

Queenie's detailed explanation impressed her. Meryl had little to no experience in Queenie's (probably) area of expertise. Although something just felt...off about the girl, Meryl decided that it would be better off to trust her in that matter. They were in the same boat, after all.

"That's true. A hotel would be good gathering place. But what I'm most concerned about is if there's someone powerful enough to send us here, given that this isn't mere chance," Meryl said, pulling the ribbon off her locks and retying her ponytail, "then will this hotel be safe enough? Queenie, I have another question: how did the hotel feel for you? Did it feel safe, or off, or something else?"

Queenie's explanation did make the hotel sound like a better option than it had sounded like before, but he still couldn't trust a place that she had picked. Their group was as ragtag as the resistance was, but he was more than a little shocked that no one else had picked up on Queenie feeling off.

Were his instincts just that good after everything he had been through?

Or was he jumping to conclusions-

No, he was sure of it. His first assessment of her had been right, and he wasn't just going to give in to the suggestion because everyone else was jumping on the bandwagon.

As their discussion continued, night fell on the city.

People still filled the streets, but there was far less than before. Ryder took the opportunity to check out the street. Getting back up to his feet and pulling his hood up, he peeked out from the alleyway.

Their side of the apparent road was less packed than the other one. He didn't know what they needed to be looking for, but he let his gaze travel across the towering buildings and the lingering people.

"No," Queenie said in response to Meryl's question, "There was nothing 'off' about the place so far as I can tell." She climbed to her feet, not standing quite straight up as she had been before, "Is it decided then? We're going?" the cockiness that had previously saturated her tone melted away like candle wax.