We finally got to the campsite and I set up most of the tents with Trent. The guys then went to prepare a suitable place for our late night bon-fire and the girls packed the sleeping bags, luggage and snacks into the tents.
I wasn't at all surprised that the eight other girls who had been invited on the trip hadn't said a word towards me. I never had great relationships with females, so I kept my distance and completed my given tasks. Afterwards I climbed up a bare tree and watched the sunset over a small lake on the far edge of the woods. The sky was a glorious mixture of colours, the palate smoothly transitioning from warm to cool in a spectacular ombre of red, to orange, to pink, purple, navy and blue, there's a few clouds in the sky but they did little to interrupt the artistic placement of earth's work, instead they added more to the already spectacular view with their golden outlines and soft pink glow.
"See anything interesting up there?" I looked down and saw one of the girls looking up the tree. She was a dark-skinned Jamaican by the name of Adanna Smith, born in this city but raised in Jamaica with her mother, Alviti. Her case file said she later returned for educational purposes and currently stayed with both parents a little west off the Northern suburbs. She had pretty decent grades, did quite a lot of sports and was even captain of her basketball team.
I'd taken the courtesy of running background checks on all the people going on this trip to make sure I knew who we were dealing with.
"Just the sunset." I replied.
In a few minutes Adanna was up the tree, sitting next to me. We said nothing for a while. Just watching the sun as it disappeared onto the other side of the world.
"Adanna," she held out her hand as the sun cast its last rays.
"Blayze," I replied shaking it.
"I noticed you have quite the collection of machetes, I'm in love with knives," she began. "Although I'm quite taken with guns. My father taught me how to shoot when I was seven and I've been hunting with him since then."
"That sounds cool," I said then went on to ask what type of guns they used. We had an entire conversation based off of hunting and shooting, and for a while, I forgot I was here on a mission.
"So, when did you start hunting?" Adanna asked.
At first, I was confused until I realised, she thought I hunted animals. "Uhm, pretty much since I was born." I answered with a nod.
"That sounds awesome, who taught to shoot? You dad?" she asked inquisitively.
I remembered the days when I was young and couldn't sleep. Valak would call me down to the yard and we'd shoot targets until I got tired. Then for my tenth birthday she'd given me the Glock. The gun I used to that very day. She was so proud when I completed my first mission alone, she'd taken me out for ice cream for the first time ever. I think I got the longest brain freeze unrecorded.
"My aunt," I answered.
"That must be one bad ass aunt," she replied.
I nodded. "Yeah, she really is."
"Hey guys." One of the other girls yelled up at us. "Do you mind if we come up there and throw water balloons at the guys when they come back?" she asked. Adanna and I smirked.
"We've got a better idea," she replied to her.
"Now." I whispered as the guys came into view. "Fire!"
We shot the balloons so fast the boys had no time to escape. I'd re-made a paintball firearm from one of Adanna' pallet guns and we used it to fire paint bullets three timesfaster than we'd have done with out hands.We watched as the boys groaned in frustration and yelped as the balloons attempted to pierce their skin before bursting against it. When we felt they'd had enough, we got down from the trees, laughing till we ran out of breath.
"Blayze!" Trent screamed as he wiped off paint from his hair. "Look at what you did to my hair?!"
"Made it look better?"
"I will kill you," he seethed furiously.
"I would love to see you try," I shot back and the girls laughed some more.
Soon after the that the guys went to take showers in the buildings to the east of our camp while we made the fire. As it turns out, the girls weren't as uptight and snobby as the girls from the Convent. The more we talked the more I realised we had a lot in common, especially when it came to the emotional sector. There was a certain warmness surrounding the idea of having people to rely on for advice besides a century-year-old assassin named Valak and I genuinely enjoyed it.
When all the guys eventually came back, we sat around the fire that I'd made and played a game.
"Blayze. Your turn."
I blinked away my thoughts and focused on the lit faces, illuminated by the blazing hot fire. "How does this work by the way?"
"It's a twisted game of truth or dare, where instead of volunteering to one person, we all get to ask you to do either a dare, or answer a question honestly."
I nodded in understanding, waiting for the truths and dares to get fired at me. I picked truth for most of them and lied through my teeth, but I'd gotten so used to lying even I started believing my own words. However, the most interesting thing happened that night when I decided to pick dare.
"I dare you to make out with Adanna," Nito said and immediately the whole group giggled with excitement.
"Oh c'mon, really?" I rolled my eyes in the assumption that it was a joke.
"Yeah really," he smirked smugly before chugging the alcoholic punch they'd mixed earlier on.
Since I met him, Nito had been nothing short of perverse, I'd been mistaken to think he'd be anything more than that. I looked at Adanna and she cocked an eyebrow. I glanced at Trent who nodded fervently before staring back at Adanna. Noting how hesitant I was, she rolled her eyes, grabbed my face and planted her lips against mine. The sensation was odd, the feeling quite foreign. It was something I'd do again, just not with her. When I finally pulled back, the howling decreased and she smiled at me.
"Done," Adanna shrugged as she took a few gulps of the concoction as well. When she handed me the bottle this time I decided a sip wouldn't hurt; and that sip turned into a couple more before the night was done.
Restless couldn't begin to describe how I felt as I twisted and turned in my sleeping back. The tipsy feeling -which was very much different from the weed one, had finally subsided and I was back to my fully functional sober self. Part of me wished I'd chugged more of the concoction to knock myself out, that way I wouldn't have had to hear the loud moaning coming from my neighbouring tents but I figured I'd just take a walk to help clear my mind instead.
The thick bushes and tall, tightly clung trees made it almost impossible for slivers of the moon to seep through. One would have expected it to be spooky and bewildering but it was actually quite the opposite. Aside from the darkness the atmosphere itself felt warm and welcoming, as though nature was inviting me to explore it further. I kept moving until I felt I was far enough from the camp to be considered lost if I didn't have a photographic memory.
Upon arriving at the clearing, I saw Xenon sitting facing the lake. There was no mistaking that tight posture anywhere, even in the midst of darkness.
"Can't sleep either?" I asked as I came up to him.
He gasped from the startle move I'd made before returning to what I presumed was a previous glum mood.
"I was, until Nito and his girl woke me up."
"You too huh?"
"Yup." There seemed more on his mind than just his friends sex noises.
"What's on your mind?"
He didn't answer for a while. In fact, right before he did I was convinced he'd completely ignored my question. "Can I trust you?"
"Uhm..." Could he? "Yes?"
"I need to tell you something... it's a really big deal to me and it's... extremely important that no one else find out because then my life is ruined and I can never look myself in the eye and I'm only telling you this because I feel so depressed right now and I just need to talk to someone and even though you're new I still feel like I can trust you..."
"Dude. Relax!" I calmed him by touching his shoulder. "Just spit it out." I encouraged. He groaned disapprovingly. "Rip the Band-Aid." I went on.
"I'm gay," he stated.
"What?"
"Did I stutter?" He asked in frustration. "I'm gay."
I stared at him for a second before blinking and sniffing awkwardly. "Okay, so?"
"So, the other guys don't know, and I don't know how they'll take it," he explained. "I feel like I'm hiding a huge part of who I am and I'm tired of it but I'm terrified once they know, they won't want to be friends with me."
I didn't reply for a moment; I didn't know how to. How could I possibly have a solution for him when I was doing the exact same thing? Hiding a huge part of myself from everyone else. "They're your best friends," I finally said. "You can't possibly think they'd stop being friends with you cause of your sexual preference, do you?"
"But my father was so disappointed," he carried on. "I can't have more people look at me the way he did when he found out."
"Fathers are like that, yes, but he'll learn to accept it. He loves you and so do your friends. I think you should tell the guys you're gay instead of holding it in because it's clearly killing you," That was some good advice I'd just given and all from a blood thirsty assassin.
"Woah, you're gay!" exclaimed Darwin as he plunged out of a tree.
"Darwin, what the hell!" Xenon yelled getting up to go help him pull his jacket off the branches.
"I'm so happy for you," he cried. "You finally came out." Darwin was drunk and he stumbled and fell with an oomph before picking himself up again. "Woah, does this mean you'll be taking it in the..." he gestured at Xenon's behind, "cause that's a disturbing thought," he said with a disoriented face.
"That's your question?" I asked.
"Yeah," he scoffed. "Unless you're a top in which case you'll be the one..."
"Okay, okay let's get back to the camp and stop talking about this," Xenon advised.
"Can we make s'mores?" Darwin begged and Xenon agreed, pushing him towards camp. As he did, he dropped his phone.
And it landed right into my sneaky fingers.
**********
p.s Valak is not actually a century years old.
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