Austin stood attentive as Irina and Gray took off in search of their goals, and as he was left behind with Justin and Cleo. The room from which he emerged stood behind him: with his goods and some others already being stored inside. Justin was putting him on the spot, but if he was being honest that was almost a little more reassuring.

 Heck, the way he took charge like that was pretty impressive. With the girls gone, Austin needed to step into some kind of role, and if that meant taking a leadership position then by all means he was going to take it. Priority number one was still surviving this situation through any means necessary. Staying in a group seemed like the best way to accomplish that goal at this time.

 Even so, there were personal goals that needed to be accomplished. Based on how Justin’s goal was achieved by “making friends”; he doubted that any of the challenges were impossible.

 This meant there was one or more people still in this building they hadn’t located. To be fair, there was still a large portion of this place that had yet to have been explored. Already they were an eclectic group. Austin knew his priorities but was also aware that keeping track of people’s personalities was a little neurotic and strange, and Justin didn’t seem to like surprises. But with that passed, he seemed to have fallen calmly into his own skin, but he was quick to shirk the leadership role.

 Did he really think that Austin was the most reliable person for that position? Or did he simply want to avoid stepping into a role that was guaranteed to be stressful?

 Austin read too many novels featuring similar situations to believe that they’d make it out of this unscathed. The problem was that Austin spent so much time trying to be more open and emotional that it might have made him vulnerable.

 Or would it be easy to become as cold as his bones once again?

 Then there was Irina, who seemed nervous and timid, but likely not a threat as of yet, nor an obvious victim. Typically, horror novels liked to eradicate the most reliable and self-confident person first.

 Based on who he’d met, that was probably either Gray or Cleo.

 He ignored the voice in his head that told him this wasn’t a novel.

 But if they needed a leader at the moment, he could fulfill this role. He could keep the group comfortable in their own skin and find ways to divvy things up and organize their forces so they could all make it out alive. He’d spent his life trying to create perfect relationships. That should help, right?

 Or had it just made him better at manipulating people to suit his own purposes. If he could keep it going, he could probably make it out of this with minimal damage.

 The others… well. Austin couldn’t control everything.

 He placed his hand on the doorknob and looked around the door on both sides, searching for some locking mechanism. Once he discovered the answer, he turned back to Justin.

[color=magenta] “You two need to figure out what kind of ‘gift’ this voice is talking about. You guys go find the place and I’ll stick around here. That way when the others get back or others show up maybe we can find a way to get things organized. I’ll just stick around in this hallway, and we can organize everything else once we’re all here to talk about it.” [/color]

 With that, he took a breath and leaned against the doorway, manipulating his body language once more to try and appear as casual as possible. 

 So be it. He’ll take the role in stride.