Play@YSDC

The alarm screeches a radio song in the background, flashing red numerals in the darkness of his bedroom, a darkness caused by the thick curtains hanging shut on his bedroom window. The numerals are saying its 7:00AM. The advertisement for "Hidden Places" sits on his dresser. He's written the details of the appointment on the clipping and as he awakens, bleary-eyed, he can't remember the details.

OOC: Go through your morning routine. Appointments at nine.

He gets up and turns on the light. He staggers to the bathroom adjacent to his bedroom, takes a shower and washes his hair. He goes to his closet and looks at his clothes. "How formal do I want to be," He thinks, "I don't wanna wear a tux, I'll go with just a nice button up white shirt, tie, dress shoes, and some black slacks." He gets dressed, checks the time, and picks up the ad and reads it and his notes.

As he pulls on his socks, and before he can pick up the advertisement, his home mobile phone rings out in the lounge room. The glowing red numerals say that it is now 7:54.

OOC: Please give a description of your home - no matter how brief - is it an apartment or a flat? Or a hotel room? Are you on the ground floor, basement level, near the roof top? Also, who does your character think might call him at this hour?

He goes and answers the phone. "Hello?"

OCC: Charles lives in a middle class hotel with a bedroom, bathroom, and Living room with TV, microwave, and mini-frige. It's on the 4th out of 10 floors in the complex. As for calling, his dad probably would, since he's concerned about his son's dry spell of work since Charles sold his house and moved into a hotel.

There is a crackling noise over the telephone and beneath it all is a masculine voice he can hardly hear (i). It seems like someone's trying to call him on an old mobile phone from an area with very bad reception.

He checks his phone's caller ID, hoping that the problem is on the other end and his two year old phone is okay.

The number registered seems to be his own mobile phone number. Perhaps the fault does lie with his own mobile phone. It (i) shouldn't be making that kind of noise, anyway. The static seems to clear, or perhaps his ears (i) simply get used to the sound enough to start focusing on the voices.

A male voice: "...a package for Room 408. Why did it get delivered here?"
A female voice: "I don't know. Open it! I want to see what's inside."
A male voice: "But it isn't ours to open."
A female voice: "Well, they should have delivered it correctly. No one would figure out we took it."

Through it all, a little boy sings "Happy birthday to you" in a familiar voice that (i) reminded him of his own voice when he was a little boy. He remembered hearing himself sing a familiar tune while watching old home videos.

He (i) can't quite recognize the man and woman talking, though they are obviously talking about his room, and he's not sure what device his mobile phone must be tapping into, although that is mostly because what tales he has had of accidentally picking up the wrong frequency, was to do with radios. So either his mobile phone was (i)somehow picking up on a radio frequency, like a baby monitor - which was impossible, or they had dialed his number by mistake and it was somehow registering as his own because his phone had a fault. OOC: Though feel free to make your own guesses if you can come up with ideas.

Still, those two people were talking about a package that had been meant to be delivered to his room. They were obviously unsure about sending it to the right room.

He puts the phone on speaker, sets it on his bed and puts on his shoes. "Of course something is gonna go wrong today," He mumbles to himself. He listens, hoping to get a hint to where that snoop and her jellyfish of a partner are.

A female voice: "It's quite large and heavy, wouldn't you say? I wonder what could be inside."
A male voice: "We really shouldn't check."
A female voice: "Oh come on, he's right next door. We can say we didn't realize it was for us and then hand it straight back. He won't even know what we did with it."

The little boy's voice dies down from his song.

A female voice: "Or we could just keep it."
A male voice: "The hotel staff might remember which room they mis-delivered it to."

"Gotcha," He thinks. He rushes out of his apartment with his phone and knocks loudly on the door to the left of his.

The door opens and an old lady blinks at him. "Hello?" she croaks, sounding ill. She smells like sickness and pee. Behind her he can see a room filled with photo frames. The pictures within them are those black & white pictures that seem to have come with the frames.

"Nice one, Charles," He thinks to himself. He tries to look overly surprised, and says, 'Oh my god, I'm so sorry. I thought this was my friend's room." He takes a step back, hoping not to get drawn in to the time devouring trap that was an old lady's home.

She nods and closes the door, seeming confused, leaving him to stare at the pale wood of the doors that stick out against the grey-and-green sickly wallpaper of the corridor walls. As he steps back on the mud brown carpet and looks around he notes that there's another door on the right side of his room and a further door in front of it. 410 and 407 were both options for whoever had taken his package.

He goes to room 407, hoping to have better luck. He knocks quickly on the door, getting rather annoyed that this little adventure is getting in the way of getting prepared to what will keep him from moving back in with his parents. He puts the phone to his ear, trying to know the latest actions of the would-be thief.

Over the phone:
Male voice: "Shit! Perhaps they figured out they delivered it to the wrong apartment."
Female voice: "Who cares? We'll just say we didn't know!"

He can hear their footsteps approaching over the phone. The sound of a door knob turning, the door opening. Yet the door in front of him stays shut.

Another male voice: "Is this Room 407?"

He reaches out and tries to touch the door, wondering why this had to happen today."Ya, I believe so," He says.

OOC:Is the voice still coming from the phone or the door?

OOC: All of the voices are coming in over the phone.

The door is quite solid. It seems to give a little under his fingers - as though the last person to enter this room didn't shut the door properly.

The New Male Voice: "Thank you."
Female Voice (confused): "Hey, what are you doing? Get out of our room."
There's a sharp sound. Then a woman's voice cries out.
Male Voice (panicked): "What the hell are...?"
The New Male Voice: "I wouldn't talk much more if I were you, sir."

He (i) can hear nothing coming from inside of the hotel room or the corridor though he can't be certain there is no sound coming from inside. Still, the volume on the mobile phone of their voices would indicate that if he were near them, he should be hearing something from outside the phone - particularly as the door is a quarter inch open.

Knowing already what he was going to do, he thinks to him self, "Ah hell, here we go.' He slowly open the door and says, "Room service, anyone get a miss-sent package?"

The hotel room is empty. The coffee table sits on its side (he can hear the sound of a heavy thud of something heavy knocking against flesh), the television set lays face down on the carpet (a crash follows suit)...

Man's voice (hurt, panicked): "What are you doing? Help! Help!"
Another Man's voice: "Looking for something..."

...dried blood is splattered across the cream-colored couch...

Man's voice (agony): "Ohmigod, ow, ow, ow, hel..." <gasping sounds, pants>"

...with drag marks across the cream-colored carpet as though someone were pulling themselves behind the couch and toward the phone...

Strange Man's voice: "No." <sound of something being yanked loose>

...that hangs from the receiver...

Man's voice (panting): "Don't hu ... her."
Woman's voice (sobbing): "Please, please, don't..."

...thick smears of blood on the dining table near the little kitchenette. Smears of blood and other stains...

Strange Man's voice: "I can take the time." <sound of cloth ripping>
Woman's voice (sobbing): "No, don't!"
Strange Man's voice: "Needs more lube." <sounds of cutting, screams follow>

...a child's whimpering. He (i) can hear it coming from the bedroom. The sound isn't coming over the phone. It's coming from the place he's standing in.

"Police, freeze," He yells as he runs into the room with the TV, looking for a weapon and the people he keeps hearing.