Sunlight beat down on the roof of the car as we drove along, the heat feeling like it was trying to boil us alive. Air blasted in my face from the vents, but even though the air conditioner was turned up all the way it felt more like it was just moving the already-present air around rather than blowing cooler air. The leather seats did not help matters, as they just absorbed the heat and sunlight to become even warmer, the sweat on my bare skin making them feel sticky and gross.

  
     To put it bluntly, I hated riding in this car. Shifting uncomfortably in my seat, I tried to roll down the window once again, but like before it didn't budge even a single millimeter. "Okay, this car is officially junk," I grumbled.

     "Agreed," Tim sighed, keeping his gaze on the road. "But we've got to put up with it for now until we can find some kind of town."

     "Doesn't your phone have a GPS built into it?"

     "It does, but apparently I turned it off, and I'm not too keen turning it back on in this situation."

     "Of course you aren't," I grumbled, glancing out the window sullenly. An hour had passed since we'd woken up with no memory of anything that happened, and so far we were just driving around aimlessly trying to figure out where the heck we were. Trees and fields surrounded us on either side, the lone stretch of road we were on stretching ahead of us as far as the eye could see. Road signs were also conspicuously absent, offering no answers to where we were. All we could do was keep driving in this moving oven.

     "Speaking of phones," Tim said, breaking me from my thoughts, "Did you crack yours yet?"

     "Oh, I wish." Rolling my eyes, I shot a disgusted look at what was apparently my cell phone as it rested on the dashboard. So far I had tried every password I could think of: my birthday, my birth year, 1-2-3-4, 0-0-0-0... Literally everything that came to mind, even random numbers. The result? "I'm locked out."

     "Should've figured," Tim muttered, and sighed. "Today's just not our lucky day, huh?" A sudden urge to laugh hit me at his words, forcing me to bite my lip before the first snort could escape.

     Luck. It always came down to that for me, didn't it? I'd had some awful days, but this? This took the cake. Even my first encounter with Hoody felt trivial compared to today, and we'd only been awake for an hour. Smirking ruefully, I just turned my head and looked out the window, watching the unfamiliar scenery roll by. Then something caught my eye in the distance.

     "Hey, I think there's a sign over there!" I exclaimed, bolting upright in my seat. Startled by my outburst, Tim quickly changed gear and slowed the car a bit as we approached it. Sure enough, there was a large sign planted off the side of the road, hidden in a mess of bushes. Ivy and leaves obscured the sign's message, the paint faded and hard to read, but even so I could still make out large, bold letters.


     'ASHTON, ONE MILE'

     "Ashton," Tim murmured as he squinted at the sign. "I think I recognize that name..."

     "You do?" I looked at him in surprise, while he just slowly nodded, his expression thoughtful.

     "Yeah... I'm pretty sure I stopped there for lunch a long time ago, on my way out of the state."

     "Wait... out of the state?" A sense of dread settled over me once more as I looked at him, my stomach sinking. "You don't mean...?" I trailed off and let the sentence hang, and he gave a small nod.

     "Yeah, I'm talking about when I ditched town after the whole Marble Hornets thing. This place is actually pretty close to the college where I had the last showdown with Alex, only about an hour out." His tone was grim as he spoke, matching the increasingly heavy atmosphere in the car. Great, just great. If I still had any doubts about the severity of the situation, they were gone now.

     "Let's just go," I muttered, sinking further into my seat. Tim obliged in silence, and soon enough we came upon Ashton. As we entered, my impression of the town wasn't overly good or bad. Shops and restaurants lined the main street, the buildings close together with barely any space between them. The streets were surprisingly bare despite it being a perfectly good sunny summer day, no one wandering around shopping or chatting. All the other cars we saw were parked by stores and such, meaning our moving oven on wheels had the monopoly on the road.

     As we drove along Tim glanced around, slowly nodding as he appraised the street. "Yeah, I do remember this place. This is it alright." Gesturing to a cafe with a cat logo in the window, he smirked as he said, "That's where I went for lunch. Really weird place, everything is cat-themed. I think a crazy cat lady owns it. Good seafood though."

     "That's cool and all, but we aren't here to sight-see," I reminded him. "We kinda need to figure out what's going on."

     "I know, I know," he sighed, his smirk fading as he turned his attention back to the road. "If I remember right, there should be a hotel up here. We can stop there and take the rest of the day to figure things out." Sure enough a hotel soon came into sight, one of those chain hotels you see in most cities and towns. Nothing fancy, but still a pretty decent place.

     Pulling into the empty parking lot, we opened the doors and sweet fresh air flowed into the car, much to my relief. Sure, it was still pretty hot outside, but compared to the broiling interior it was perfectly refreshing. The hotel lobby was even better. Frigid air blasted us the second we opened the glass doors, the difference in temperature so startling that I was momentarily stunned and unable to move.

     While I basked in the cool majesty of working air conditioning, Tim went to the front desk. From my vantage point I could see the clerk look at him in surprise and frown, and after a brief conversation Tim returned with an equally puzzled expression on his face. "What's up?" I asked.

     "Well, I just asked about the nightly rates, and apparently we're already renting two rooms." At this point I didn't even bother to respond, just stared at him with a blank look. "...Yeah, I know. Let's just roll with it, I'm too tired to question it anymore."

     With that we headed to the elevator and headed to the rooms. Opening the door to the first room, I saw my backpack sitting on the bed and perked up. Finally, something familiar! Rushing over, I quickly unzipped the largest pocket and found it full of new-looking clothing I didn't recognize. On top of the pile was an unfamiliar pair of sandals with (f/c) straps, and with one glance I knew they were my size.

     "Why the hell did I leaves these here in the backpack?" I muttered as I pulled them out. "Seriously, these would've been useful earlier."

     "Don't ask me," Tim said with a shrug. "Anything else in the other pockets?"

     "Hold on, I'm getting to them." Setting the sandals on the floor, I then moved on to the next pocket only to pause. A padlock hung between the two zippers on the next pocket, firmly holding them together. "What the hell? It's locked!"

     "Locked?" Tim frowned and walked over to take a look for himself. "Why the hell is there a lock?"

      "I don't know! I never even had a lock!" Checking the front pocket, I found a water bottle, snacks and the usual necessary feminine products. However, even after pulling everything out of it, I found no key inside for either this lock or the glove box. Of course it wouldn't be that easy. It seemed that with every find we made, more questions rose. Or at least, we kept finding locked stuff.

     "Know what? Forget it." Tim sighed as I dug around. "Let's just go over what we know." It didn't take long to get through that though, because at the moment all our knowledge mounted to pretty much nothing. We were in Ashton. We couldn't remember the past two and a half months. We apparently had a junker car with a locked glove box. Hoody was also in the car for some reason. I had a cell phone.

     That was it. That was all we knew about our current situation.

      Frustrated at our lack of progress in figuring anything out, Tim got up and started wandering around the room. "Come on, there has to be something," he muttered, checking the drawers and closet.

      "I wouldn't count on it," I mumbled glumly, trying new passwords on my phone. "With the way today's going, we'll be lucky if we even find your wallet to buy dinner." My pessimistic ramblings were soon interrupted by a quick "Aha!" from Tim, though.

     "There's a safe in the closet!" he proclaimed triumphantly, grinning at me as he stepped aside to show off the tiny safe. Eyes widening, for a brief moment I felt excitement surge through me, a glimmer of hope finally appearing. In Marble Hornets, Jay had stored several tapes in a hotel safe before his amnesia kicked in. Why wouldn't we do the same? However, my excitement quickly faded though, reality crashing back down on me.

      "Okay, that's cool and all. But do you even know the code?" Immediately his triumphant grin faded, and he quickly tried entering a code. After several tries, he turned to me, shaking his head.

      "Nope..."

     "Didn't think so," I muttered, and turned my attention back to the phone. First my phone, then the glove box, then my backpack and now a freaking safe. So many small glimmers of hope kept appearing around us, teasing us with the prospect of finding an answer if we could only open it, but each time they were kept just out of our reach by locks or codes. It was pretty frustrating, to say the least.

      Cursing under my breath as I tried another password on my phone, I dropped it on the bed and flopped onto my back. "Stupid phone..." Tim shot me a curious glance, seeming to be deep in thought.

      "Hey, what are the passwords you've tried so far?"

      "Everything."

      "Be more specific." Sighing, I closed my eyes and began reciting off every number combination I'd tried so far. As I recited my birth year, though, I suddenly heard a click and loud clunk from across the room. Startled, I bolted upright just in time to see Tim opening the safe, a giant grin on his face.

      "That was the passcode?" I asked incredulously, while he smirked.

     "Apparently." Reaching inside, he pulled out a digital camera and a clear plastic bag filled with memory cards. My heart began pounding as I quickly jumped off the bed and raced over to get a closer look at it. As I did, a smile slowly spread across my face. At long last, a chance for answers finally appeared.

     "Jackpot," I whispered as I took the camera, while Tim practically ripped the bag open to look at the SD cards. Sucking in a sharp breath, I pressed the power button, and... nothing happened. Frowning, I tried a couple more times before sighing. "Crap, I think the battery's dead..."

     "Great," Tim grumbled, frowning as he held up a series of cards to the light for a better look. His expression became more and more frustrated with each one, and he practically threw them to the ground as he dug around the bag for more cards.

      "What's wrong? Is it the wrong one?"

     "I don't know," he replied flatly as he looked at another card, scowling. "None of them are labeled." I looked at him in surprise.

     "They aren't?"

     "Nope." A bitter smirk crossed his face. "You think I'd have learned to label these things after that freaking treasure hunt with all those tapes, but no. Apparently I just kept using up card after card and didn't even bother labeling them." I frowned, realization slowly setting in.

     "...We're gonna have to watch every single one, aren't we?" I asked reluctantly, and he just snorted ruefully.

     "Oh, yeah."