Chapter #4Tanya by: Unknown "Wow Tanya, you're as damp as me! I hope you saved some energy for the rest of the evening." You said, observing your sweat soaked friend as she gulped down half a thermos of ice water in a single pull. While you'd been showering for the last half hour, it seemed as though Tanya had spent every minute of it sprinting on the rickety old treadmill the four of you had unearthed in the basement while 'just looking around' (and certainly not looking for the other blade, because that would be meta-gaming!) Her thin and slightly too tight workout clothes had been all but rendered transparent, though to your slight surprise and disappointment Tanya was wearing a full set of undergarments beneath them. You suppose that, assuming the Head Hunter was watching them through hidden cameras or something, she wanted to tease him a little more subtly than you were. You had no idea why, this was a fetish retreat after all and you'd all paid a lot of money to cut loose here, but whatever floated her boat.
"You kidding me? I'm fresh as ever!" Tanya flexing her bicep and smirking. Her smile faltered when she caught a whiff of her own pit stench, but she recovered well enough. "Trust me, I can go the distance tonight. Just need a quick little soak to cool off."
"Oh, you take cold showers? That's convenient, because I used up all the hot water." You said, motioning toward the nearly impenetrable haze of steam behind you. Tanya rolled her eyes and playfully punched you in the bicep, nearly throwing you off your feet. While you'd certainly been hit harder, hell you'd asked people to hit you harder than that, you couldn't help but rub the spot sorely as Tanya stepped past you, scooting you into the hall and closing the door behind you. You frown, realizing you'd missed your opportunity to ask if Tanya wanted any company. Oh well, the night was young and the opportunities for sexual misadventure were abundant.
While your room, and by extension your clothes, was directly to your right on the second floor, you decided to wait a few minutes more before you got dressed. The early bird got the worm, as it were, and if the Head Hunter were ballsy enough to strike within the first few minutes of the game then why not reward his worm with... wait, reward the bird with a naked worm... uh... whatever. You knew what you were trying to think. Strutting downstairs in nothing but your towel, you saw Jane and Ramona together in the living room, the former staring out a window into the cold, dark, ominous woods, and the later hunched over a table with some sort of...
"What the hell is that?" You asked, pointing to the scroll looking thing Ramona was studying.
"Hey, watch it!" Ramona said, swatting away your damp finger. Several drops of lemon scented water (not the scent you would've chosen for your soap, but that's what was provided) had already landed on the scroll thing, though it didn't look like any real damage had been caused.
"Wow, touchy much?" You asked, rubbing your hand and frowning.
"You're touchy! Don't touchy!" Ramona said, waving a hand to shoo you away.
"Don't take it personally." Jane said, not looking away from her window. "She found some old parchment with cryptic shit written all over and now she's convinced it's a pirate treasure map. Spent the last fifteen minutes staring at it. Won't let me or Tanya help, says we'd just distract her."
"I'm sorry, do you know Latin? Because last time I asked you didn't and neither did Tanya." Ramona demanded. "And I never said it was pirate treasure! All I said was that I think the painting has a map hidden in it, and the Latin on the back is some kind of riddle that could decipher the map." She flipped the parchment over, revealing the painting that had been previously hanging over the fireplace. It looked to just be a bowl of fruit, some oranges and melons, however the longer you looked at it, the more it looked... wrong. The fruit was arranged in a weird layout, the bowl had many strangely shaped cracks and floral patterns in it, and a lot of the outlines bled into one another in a very suspicious way that drew the eye to certain seemingly inconsequential spots.
"I think you just want all the doubloons to yourself." Jane joked.
"Shush! I need to focus." Ramona said, not bothering to disagree with Jane's assertion as she flipped the painting back over and continued to analyze the writing on the back.
While you were pretty sure you knew exactly what treasure the map led to, and knew that Jane was also probably sure about what lay at its end, you didn't want to break character quite yet. Speaking of characters, you were really hoping that Ramona was just playing the stock bitchy smart girl for this game, and that she hadn't turned into an actual bitchy smart girl mere minutes into this retreat. You knew she could be a bit anal about details and planning things, but this was supposed to be a fun game with friends (soon to be friends with benefits). There was no need for her to be so up tight and rude. Plus, you did know Latin! And she didn't even bother to ask you! She knew you went to college too, right?
Taking a deep breath to relax, you decide to...   indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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