The night had grown colder by the passing moments. Oliver was still on the first slab by the wall, just below his window. He was starting to contemplate if this was a good idea; climbing down the wall of the fifty-four feet tall hostel building with essentially one good leg. There were still about three more slabs away, and he hadn't even moved an inch where he was. He knew that as much as this was a really crazy thing to do, it was also worth the risk. He wanted to stick to the mission, and finally unravel the truth by finding out what Jasper was really hiding. He didn't want to be the one to screw things up, now that there was someone else like Xavier that actually believes him, and was willing to join him in uncovering the truth. Oliver wasn't really used to working with others, however, having Xavier seemed to have strangely added a little bit to his courage.
Finally, Oliver took in a deep breath, then slowly going down on his knees, he clenched the edge of the concrete slab firmly on his hands, and then carefully, he slowly put both legs over the slab one at a time. He was now in a hanging position, about to drop onto the next slab which was almost four feet below him. He knew he couldn't escape looking down because it was necessary that he see where he was landing.
"I can do this," he muttered to himself as he looked down at the ground
Taking a deep breath, he let go of his grip and landed on the next slab, but unfortunately, he landed badly on his injured leg and tumbled off the slab, luckily enough, he grabbed the edge of the slab with his arm at the nick of time, escaping what would have been suicide. As he hung on there tightly, his heart kept hammering in a very fast and hard rhythm, he had just witnessed his life flash before his very eyes, and he could only imagine what would have happened if things had happened the other way.
"Oh my god," he muttered to himself in terror, "I am going to die young."
It felt really ironic, that as someone who was a typical reckless daredevil of a person, sometimes he wished to live forever. Right now he was finally starting to see how impossible that was for someone like him.
He managed to land safely on the next lab, and also the other after it, then he finally made it to the ground in one piece. He got up quickly and dusted himself. Now he just had to wait for Xavier to show up so they could progress with the mission. Since Xavier wasn't climbing out the window like him, he knew it would definitely take him not less than thirty minutes to sneak out of the hostel.
He stood very close to the wall now, however, still watching out vigilantly for any sign of movement around the courtyard. It wasn't up to a minute before he suddenly began to hear some noise nearby like someone was approaching. As quick as he could, he hid himself by the plants and stayed still, with his wide hawkish glare searching with unwavering thoroughness. Oliver was very vigilant, he had no clue whatsoever, who or what it was, but he knew that there was just a a slight chance that it might be the werewolf. Suddenly, he felt a touch on his side from behind. Right before the hand could fully suppress his shoulder, he quickly yanked himself away from it, and then he caught the arm of the unidentified figure behind him and twisted it tightly behind the person's back
"Ow! My arm!" cried out the unknown person in pain.
"Xavier?" Oliver called out in surprise, still holding the arm in a twisted state. He recognized the voice at once.
"Yes it's me…It's me!!" Xavier pleaded, tapping rapidly on Oliver's body with his other arm, signaling him to let go.
Oliver freed him at once. Now he was laughing awkwardly while he nursed his arm.
"Seriously, now you're sneaking up on me?" Oliver sounded annoyed.
"Were you expecting someone else?" replied Xavier.
"How the hell did you get out so quick?" Oliver asked.
"I did? Must've been the shortcut," Xavier replied.
"There's a shortcut?" Oliver muttered.
"My God, Oliver, you almost broke my freaking arm!" Xavier jokingly complained, "Where's your sense of humor?"
Oliver scoffed.
"Sense of humor, really? Right now?"
"You know what, this is ridiculous," he added, "I shouldn't have agreed for you to come in the first place."
"Well, if you've forgotten, this was all my idea," replied Xavier, "So apparently, you wouldn't be out here if it weren't for me."
"Okay, just shut up already," Oliver ordered, "No more goofing around."
They moved along the narrow track behind the line of flowers, towards the back door. Oliver realized that was the only possible route anyone could take, so they just had to hide and watch. On his signal command, they came to a stop at a point behind the flowers, meters away from the door.
"Tell me you didn't forget the device," he said to Xavier, who immediately reached into his small knapsack and brought out some odd-looking eye goggles.
"Wouldn't miss that for the world," replied Xavier, imitatively, as he handled Oliver the device.
Oliver laid down flat on the ground and put on the goggles. It was a tightly fitting hi-tech optical device with enhanced night vision features and motion sensors. Oliver wanted to know when there was movement around the door area, and there was no better device for that, than the one he had.
"Look at you with the ninja spirit," Xavier teased, "You are really good at this."
"Shhh… Your voice is loud," Oliver whispered.
"It is?" Xavier replied, "Well, that's weird, 'cause I'm pretty confident I'm being the most stealthy I've ever been."
Oliver sighed, at Xavier's nonchalant attitude towards the mission. It was clear Xavier didn't seem to take anything seriously, but Oliver knew he must endure him, after all, like he said earlier, this whole mission was his idea, and he deserved a little bit of credit still.
It was almost getting to be an hour since they started waiting for someone to come through the door, yet there was still no sign of anyone. Xavier was starting to feel impatient and skeptical about the whole idea of the mission.
"Hey, uh, don't you think we've waited long enough?" Xavier whispered, "I'm starting to get quite dozy. I guess they aren't coming out today, after all."
"Or maybe they had already come out a bit earlier before us, and we've been staring in the wrong direction all along," Oliver muttered thoughtfully, shifting his gaze from the back door area. He was still very positive about the mission.
"Aren't you listening at all," Xavier grumbled, "we've got to…"
"Shhh…" Oliver quickly interrupted, totally fixated on whatever he seemed to be staring at.
"Oh my…" he gasped with open-mouthed wonder.
"I'm picking up odd heat signals from the woods, and the motion detector is detecting animate movements too," he explained, "Someone's out there."
"So…so what now?" Xavier asked.
"Now we have a lead," answered Oliver.
"More like death sentence," replied Xavier.
Without wasting any more time, Oliver and Xavier set out from their hiding spot, towards the woods across the courtyard.
"I don't like this, Logan. I don't like this at all," Xavier grumbled as they went.
Oliver ignored his complaints, his whole focus was on the mission. At this point, they were already halfway across the courtyard.
"Oh come on, don't you feel this is a bad idea? We're just walking to some heat signal in the woods, with certainly no idea who or what it is," Xavier said.
"It's funny how much you complain about this when this was actually your idea," Oliver replied.
"My idea? No no no… this was never my idea, this was never the plan," he protested, "The plan was to lay low and find out if it's Jasper that comes out the door, and whoever it is, follow at a distance and find out their intentions, simple as that. This, on the other hand, is suicide."
"I live suicide," Oliver replied simply.
Finally, they were at the outer border of the woods.
"Finally…" Oliver gasped, as he stopped at the border, "Moment of truth."
"Um, s…so I'm guessing we're to enter the really scary forest with the horrible history," Xavier said, keeping his distance from the border, with his voice edging with fright.
"Yes," Oliver answered in his casual tone.
"Thanks for clearing that up," Xavier replied, sarcastically.
"You claimed you were brave enough to come along," Oliver said to him, "Yet look at you, you linger at the face of danger, like a little girl, all frightened to the bones."
"That's not true, I'm not scared," Xavier protested, "for real, I'm not."
"Okay, maybe I am a little scared, hell, maybe I'm losing it!" he said, his panic doubling up by the moment, "I mean, what's not to fear? I'm out here in the middle of the night, following an overconfident defenseless kid towards what might possibly be a gut-tearing, eight-foot-tall carnivorous beast."
Oliver slowly turned his gaze towards Xavier, on hearing the words he had just said.
"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that, for now," he replied
"Try to keep up, we're burning moonlight," he added.
"Change of thoughts!…" Xavier quickly blurted, rather strenuously, "How about I wait out here, you know, s…safe and sound, I mean, stand in guard…"
"Why am I not surprised?" Oliver scoffed.
"You can do whatever the hell you want, you're just a deadweight, after all," he said to him, "Tonight, I end this for good."
Having said that, he grabbed the knapsack Xavier was carrying, strapped on his goggles, and headed right into the woods. He could still spot the heat signatures of the mysterious person, and from the readings, he was close. As he got closer, he moved more slowly and quietly. He took off his goggles, so as to be more alert of his surroundings since he already knew what direction to take, and how close he was.
"Who are you?" he whispered.