It was decided that they should split into two groups, Hoody and Toby in one and Nico and Jay in the other. Toby didn't want Nico to go with Jay, but Nico pointed out that even though he was the smallest he was still the only one with powers so really he was the best choice to keep Jay under control. Not to mention that he and Hoody knew the woods best, so it made sense that each group have one of them in it. So why couldn't Nico go with Hoody? Back to the first reason, Nico was the one with powers that could stop Jay from running without killing him.
In the end Toby relented but he still didn't seem happy about it. Hoody pointed out that when Masky was gone he had seniority and therefore he was in charge. Hoody and Toby started towards the abandoned house Alex had apparently taken Jay and someone called Jessica to. He had tried to kill them before Masky stopped him, while Nico and Jay started towards the old hospital.
"So how did you get involved with these people?" Jay asked after he and Nico had been walking for about five minutes. Nico would have been happy to walk quietly the entire way, but it seemed Jay couldn't stand the silence. Nico sighed in annoyance.
"With the way I travel if I don't have a specific destination in mind. I end up in random places. Usually it's somewhere in Asia but once about a month ago it was near where they live. Toby came to try and... remove me. They thought I was human but when they realized that I wasn't and what I could do, they thought I would fit in well with the crowed they walk amongst now. So far they've been right."
"How do you know you won't end up in a volcano if you're taken random places?" Jay asked swatting a spider web away from his face sputtering.
"I'm taken where I'm needed usually. Don't ask me who needed me in Asia it's not part of your world." Nico said redirecting Jay before he could ask anything else Nico was getting tired of answering. "How did you get mixed up in all of this? You seem like an ordinary mortal."
"Thanks." Jay muttered making Nico chuckle. "Ya I am, I was just a university student but Alex, who was my friend at the time was working on this film called Marble Hornets. Tim and Brian were the main actors but since I didn't have anything better to do I figured I'd help. We just didn't know that the Operator attaches to people like a disease and Tim had been, 'infected' I guess, since he was seven. And it spread to the rest of us, Brian first making him into Hoody. It affected the rest of us differently. Alex became homicidal instead, I don't know how it affected Jessica and I started losing months worth of memory and got really paranoid and sick.
I think I knew the Operator was back way before I saw Alex, because I stopped sleeping again. I don't think I ever got the other personality thing like Brian and Tim though."
"Yes you did." Nico objected and Jay looked at him in confused shock. "The mask that I wear now used to be yours, they said you only wore it a few times though."
"Huh, I guess that's where part of the time that went missing went." Jay said sighing. "I wonder why it only happened to me a few times and then so often and I guess permanently for Brian." Nico shrugged, he had no idea and he didn't really care very much, he wasn't a very curious person anymore. "Shouldn't you be wearing your mask now?"
"Why? Even if I'm seen doing something by the mortal police they don't have any records of me. Even if they're given my name the only records of me they'll find will say I died with my entire family in the first round of bombings in Italy during the Second World War. That's the sort of thing mortal authorities like to ignore." Jay refused to look at Nico.
"So you're a lot older then you look huh?" Jay said his voice forcibly casual to the point that it cracked slightly.
"Yep time isn't nearly as consistent as humans like to think."
