Chapter 16 - X marks the Spot

They climb up the stairs to Monster HQ.

Logan walks over and closes the curtains and then faces the others. Rolling up his sleeves Logan shows Al and Johnny the tattoos. I found a picture of Ramon at the nursing home. In it he had these tattoos on his arms. I had a drawing of them, but the birds attacked me and stole it. Logan shows the new scratches on his arms as proof.

"Oh wow, so you think these are what kept the grim reaper away from Ramon?", Al asks. "Maybe you can draw them on our arms as well. But only after we made the new map and got the birds to steal it!"

Pretty sweet set-up, Logan. Johnny liked around, admiring the space devoted to monster hunting. Your house is enormous! He picked through the things Logan had on display from earlier escapades.
Alana may be right. Did you have a copy of those "tattoos" on your arm when you were attacked? he asked. That guy that runs the weird store might know if it takes more than just the design to work.. Johnny put down the trinket he'd been looking at to face the others. I mean, like, back in the day my people used to use tattoos a lot but they had to be applied in a certain way, with certain kinds of ink, on special days and by certain people to mean anything. If it's a "magic tattoo" maybe that's the case, maybe not, but I'd feel better if we had a BB gun or a tennis racket to help ward off those birds.
He shrugged, Either way, it's worth finding out if Ramon's trick will work. I can draw the design on you two if one of you'll draw it on my arms. Now, we just need to figure out where to fake the location and draw it in our new "map"...

No, the original drawing was on a scrap of paper. When the birds attacked they took the paper with them. So I figured to draw them on my arms this time. Logan says as he answers Johnny.

Looking at Johnny as he looks around, L9gan pointed to the folders on his desk. If you like that stuff, you'll like my file system. One set of folders details the cases we've done. The other set is filled with monster lore. I've been working on the Lore set for a while.

Once Johnny is done inspecting the monster HQ, Al spreads out the map on the table. "We should cover the windows so the birds can't see us!" Then she draws the one sword that they know Solomon knows about. "Now, we need to come up with some point along that blade that we want to lure him to!"
She points to one point on the map. "Look, the line goes almost right through this house? What's in there? Maybe we can make him think that's where he has to go!"

The other ends of the sword have to be somewhere believable. We don't know that he hasn't seen us before the bridge and the cemetery... Johnny traced the points on the map looking for interesting entries along the line. The Ferris wheel should be right here.and it should be the first point.since that's where we first found a map. Let's find the second point...

He stopped when Alan noticed the line running through Logan's house, We'd be on familiar ground but I'd hate for this guy to wreck Logan's house because we brought him here unnecessarily. I think another, unoccupied, public space would be better.

If one were to mark a new axis on the map so that it connected the [Ferris Wheel suggested by Johnny] to the [house that Al is pointing at], this new axis (in blue) would run like this:



Along this blue axis, there is a church landmark to the North of town that could act as a 'fake clue'. So the fake sword to triangulate to Alana's house of choice would connect [Ferris Wheel] to [North Church].

As they are discussing clues and map locations, they hear a knock at the Monster HQ door. His Mom's voice calls in.

"You OK in there, Loey? Just wanted to check on you... People are reporting some... crazy birds attacks in town?"

"See, that works out perfectly! A church is totally a believable place for this clue!"

That'd work. Johnny agreed. A church hits all the marks we'd need for a fake place to find a fake treasure.. The sudden appearance of Logan's mom startles Johnny for a second before he realizes who it was. He put his hand over his chest, feeling his heart thump, Oh? What kind of bird attacks? he asked, partly to cover his jumpiness and partly out of curiosity.

"Mrs. Logan's mom," Al says to the woman, ignoring her question. She points at the house on the map. "Do you know what this is?"

Logan stands there with his friends as his mom walks in. Do you know who was injured...Will they be all right? We've noticed birds pretty much everywhere.