Connie turned towards me with a smile creeping up on his face as if I had caught something here. He had been acting suspiciously since he found me here in the forest. I had my doubts and one way to clear them was for him to show his task completion strip, which would be coloured white since our team colour was White. It was only fair that I ask him to show it to me in the face of doubt.

“Sure,” came his polite reply, as his smile formed crinkles around his eyes. His hand went into his pocket and my mine formed a fist, ready for anything unusual to come out.

My breath held itself totally prepared, as every second weighed on me. If this was not Connie, I was in big trouble. As his hand came out of the pocket, a white strip that looked exactly like I had in red colour followed it. The engraving in the golden letter of ‘task white successfully completed’ looked exactly like what I had on my red strip.

I sighed relieved, “great, I actually got the Red one and just wanted to see how the White one looked”

It was a lie, as my suspicion was not yet evaded. Although he had proved it, there were chances that the real Connie had been attacked and his task completion strip taken away from him. This was a competition and Stage one was not only about teamwork but also about taking other teams down so one of them could win. For now, I should probably stop thinking too much about Connie.

Connie returned a smile to my smile that was to hide the fact that I had doubted him. “You had a handicapped task, the strip was bound to be red. Where is it? Can I see the Red strip?”

“Huh?” I pretended as though I did not register his words.

“Your task completion slip, can I see it?” Connie asked again, and I nodded. At any cost, I did not want to hand my task completion strip to a man who was acting odd. My head simply nodded and I raised my leg to show it to him and said,

“It took me some time to tie it around my foot. I don’t want to let it lose as we will only waste more time if I sit here to tie it again”

“That’s okay.” He waved his hand and picked up the pace, “Let’s hurry and find others”

I hummed and strode beside him. Going along the path observing my surroundings for anything suspicious, my gut feeling was not wrong and if Connie was fine, then there had to be something wrong with the surroundings. While my eyes were scanning every detail, my feet wobbled on the uneven terrain until I eventually fell on my knees.

“Are you okay?” Came Connie’s concerned voice as he immediately headed to offer me a hand which I took gratefully.

“Thank you, just a little slip,” I smiled as my hands dusted my jeans.

“Be careful walking through the forest,” Connie said, and I nodded in agreement as my lips pursed awkwardly. It was an embarrassing fall but there was something that I realised. The tree where I fell beside was the very tree whose support I had used while tying the red strip around my foot. The faint mark of my handprint over its dusty bark was evident, and I immediately realised we were going in circles.

There was no way I would ask it directly to Connie, as my first source of mistrust was him. After a small walk, I stirred up a casual conversation in an environment that was tensing up for me, “So what is your most favourite thing to do during free time?”

Connie turned to me with brows creased. “What? Are we killing time now?” He giggled.

“Yeah, I mean it is better to get to know the members every chance I get,” there were different intentions behind it but if I were to ask it directly, he would know something is up. “After all, I am new here and should know my pack,” I continued, seeing him unresponsive.

“Yeah, that’s only fair,” He said looking forward. As we walked ahead a few steps in silence, he took a turn, as if he knew where we were going and I complied with his actions. When the path was straight again his eyes glanced at me, “I Sleep, love to do that a lot during free time. How about you?”

Of course, everyone knew how Connie loved to sleep, and the answer only made me chuckle. Not because of how obvious it was, but because I remembered what Connie had told me about his special ability. He had not just mentioned his own ability then and that entire conversation played through my mind, making me realise everything fishy that was going on right now.

“Did I crack a joke or something?” This fake, Connie said, scratching the back of his head, a little weirded out by my laughter.

I suppressed it finally to let out a sigh. “No, you have an enjoyable hobby for free time. To answer your previous question, I love to decode stupid games that people play with me thinking I would fall for the trick”

He simply smiled at me, one that looked genuine but was not. “That’s an interesting hobby.”

He was trying to deny the fact that I had caught up on his little game, but I wasn’t leaving it at that. I could have played with him a little more, but I had no time to spare. Even if my task was completed way before time, I had to head where everyone from my team would be meeting. This certainly was wasting my time. “Where are we headed to?”

My question had the man beside me frown. “To our teammates, of course. Aren’t we supposed to unite after finishing the tasks?”

I turned to him and saw little droplets of sweat form on his forehead. It only made me smile more. He paced a little faster, and I fell back coming to a halt and breaking it to him I had caught up on his game emphasising his real name as I talked from behind him, “I don’t see a reason for me to be uniting with the team Blue. Ain’t I right, ‘Donnie’?”