Games Seem So Easy

Ch. 25

::Delilah's POV::

Pushing open the front door of the house, I breathed in the outside air. It smelled like dirt and flowers. I wasn't a huge outdoors person, but the fresh air was nice after being in the stale house.

I walked around the side of the house, brushing my fingers along the peely-paint siding. The cat flexed his paws from his perch on my shoulders, stretching his front legs and letting out a yawn.

In the back, there was one of those iron-metalwork arches that was laced with all kinds of flowers. There were a few stone benches, and mismatched pots and troughs of all shapes and sizes were overflowing with vegetation. The plant life in this garden looked like it might once have been all neat and trim, but was now overgrown.

Beams of distorted sunlight peeked through the leaves of the forest overhead, casting streaks of brightness on the neglected garden, and allowing shadows to lurk unexplored and secretive at the treeline. As the leaves rustled in a breeze up high, the light made something glint underneath the nearest bench.

I set the cat down on the grass and walked over to the bench. Bending down so that my head was near the ground, I peered beneath the seat. There, right within my reach and causing me so little trouble that it was almost frightening for this game, were the shears. Rusty, but there.

"Bingo!" I exclaimed, pulling them out into the light. With minimal effort, I could clean them up again.

"Mission success, clearly." The cat agreed.

"Indeed."

::Cry's POV::

If I knew anything, I knew that Delilah wasn't really going to get food. I had wanted to believe it, but as the hours passed my suspicions were confirmed. She lied to us.

As it got later, Stephano suggested we get ready for bed. We could search for Delilah during the day. Since everyone was emotionally stressed and exhausted, we all agreed. But I didn't go to sleep. I waited till everyone else seemed long gone and then got up and made my way out into the hall. Just as I reached the staircase, a hand caught my uninjured shoulder. I turned around abruptly. It was Dan.

"I see we're clearly on the same page about Delilah. I left the guys a note telling them we were setting off to look for her. You need me because you're all fucked up from the zombie, and I need you because you know this game, so despite the fact we haven't really associated all that much since this whole game and especially after the mess with the zombie, I think we better help each other and make nice. For Delilah's sake." He spoke quickly and quietly. I nodded in agreement.

"I figure we should try to look around downstairs, because I'm pretty sure she's somewhere down there." We slunk down the staircase, hunched, peeking in every shadow for some sort of hint.

In the kitchen, there was no sign of life. Even the invisible chef was gone. We searched every cupboard and found nothing.

Just when I was feeling like there was no chance of us moving forward, I noticed something glimmering inside the pot on the counter.

'I put this in here in case you guys tried to follow me... This is Delilah, by the way. Chillax, guys, I'm gonna be fine. I found a way to speed up this escape process, and I'm working on it. Please let me handle this, alright? Thank you for respecting my wishes. I put a shit ton of food in the dining room, take it back up to library and enjoy. Adios!'

After reading the little note, I passed it over to Dan. He read it and then threw it on the ground.

"Fuck. This is great." He muttered sarcastically, squeezing the bridge of his nose.

"Let's gather some of the food for ourselves, drop the rest off in the library, and then continue on. My guess is that she's looking for resources, things that'd be useful for survival. Armor, shields, weapons. Video game life insurance, basically." I told him, scooping the note from off of the floor and dropping it in my pocket. Dan nodded.

"We need to catch up with her and stop her from trying to do this alone." He replied, pushing the door to the dining room open. I followed.

"I don't get why she thinks we can't or won't help her..." I contemplated that it might be because I didn't thank her enough for saving my life. Then I thought, 'maybe it's Dan's fault for blaming everything on her'. Shaking my head and refocusing, I began to search the room. It was gonna be a long night.