I'm outside, waiting for them to show up. The air is cold, but my concern for everyone's safety is more important to me. I hear footsteps and turn around to see them, and I can already tell that something's up just from the way they walked towards me.
"Hey, you said you wanted to talk to me in private...Is something wrong?" I ask, as they continue to get closer. At this point I am starting to feel concerned for both of us, so I begin to back up.
"W-What's wrong?" I ask again, this time with more anxious inflection, but as I ask that, they stop in their tracks for a moment, only a few feet away from me. Their stance is jagged, uneasy, like they're on the verge of a breakdown, and I had a feeling that they knew about what happened, so I decided to test my luck.
"Where did everyone go?" Are the last words I'm able to say, before they run at me in the brief moment where my guard is down…
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"Rise and shine, Contestants."
Hearing that unrecognizable voice forced me awake. My senses steadily returned to me and with it came a sense of panic. I couldn't see anything at all, due to the current pitch black state of the room. Alongside that, the ground I was sitting on was frigid, and rough, like some kind of slabbed stone. Clearly, I thought to protect my kidneys because at this rate, I was about to lose an organ or two. Strangely though, I couldn't remember being kidnapped or even where I was before-
"Who said that?! Turn on these lights and I'll make you regret messing with me fuckface!" Those were the next words that greeted me, coming from yet another unfamiliar voice. This time, it seemed like an angry and rash guy, like he'd been screaming his whole life. His yelling thankfully alerted me to the fact that I wasn't the only one in here, meaning whoever kidnapped us must want a lot of kidneys or there's something else going on here.
"Oi, could ya pipe it down please? I've already got a horrible headache as is..." Another voice chimed it, a female this time, who had a much more relaxed voice.
"There's more of you?!? You'd better be ready for a fight bitch!"
"Christ, didn't I just ask for ya to pipe down?!" She also had a slight accent, and I couldn't tell if it was fake or not.
"How many of you assholes are there?! I'll fight as many as I have to to make sure I don't get my kidneys stolen!"
"Well, I'm here too, if that makes it better or worse." I spoke, thinking it would be a better idea to announce my presence now instead of having Mr. Grumpy Gills get on my case once the lights come on.
"There's THREE of you!? Well, that's just about fair enough for me!"
"Well, I'm assuming that it's just the three of us, since no one else seems to be talking-"
"I'll take on all of you, just turn on the fucking lights!" Interrupting me, as the guy shouted, the room almost seemed to obey his command. Just like that, lights above us turned on, revealing the two people that were in front of me.
The first of the two on my right was a girl. She had bright orange hair, with a hand holding, likely due to that headache she was talking about. She wore a baggy blue T-shirt, with some form of long undershirt on below, and a small gnome necklace on as well. She had a black skirt on, with leggings underneath. From the way she was sitting, it didn't seem like she cared much about concealing anything under that skirt, and I didn't bother trying to see for myself.
The other person, the loud guy on my right, was standing straight up, fist clenched. He was completely bald, with an angry look on his face. He wore a dark blue trench-coat, with a black T-shirt and black pants on as well. He also wore blue and black shoes, giving me a good insight on his color palate.
We all collectively stared at each other, then glanced around to confirm that we were the only three people in here. The room itself was barren, with metal walls and stone flooring like I assumed. After we all finished looking around, the guy spoke up first.
"GOOD! Now I've got eyes on both of you!" He screeched, "Get ready to die, bitch!" After announcing my 'death', he ran right at me, which led to him tripping and falling flat on his face, causing the girl to burst into laughter.
"The hell?" Once he collected himself after eating shit, the guy checked his foot, and made a discovery for all three of us. "What the fuck, why's my foot chained up!?"
He exclaimed, yanking on the chain around his ankle, and once I checked, I realized that my own foot was chained too, right from my ankle to the wall. We were all chained and trapped in here, forced to wait until our kidnapper comes in here to steal our kidneys or something else equally terrible-
"Maaan, sucks to be y'all," The girl said, as she stood up, and showed off her own foot, "I'm not chained at all!" As she joyfully made her statement, she hopped around mockingly, showing off how not chained she was, causing Bald Guy to get increasingly angry.
"Well, then get us out of here, asshole! Don't just sit there like a dick!" The dude wasn't making himself look very trustworthy to be let out, and that was made clear by the girl who started mockingly quoting him saying he was gonna kill me a couple minutes ago.
"Yeaaah, if I wanted to let any of y'all go, I wouldn't be hopping! Towards! The! Door!" She exclaimed, emphasizing each word with a hop towards the exit, which was just a normal wooden door. Hanging on a hook beside the door was something that caught my eye. It was a set of twelve keys, all with different initials on them, which the girl didn't notice until she was already at the door.
"Oh, there's actually keys here..." Her tone seemed to change to a more serious one as she realized the potential of how many people could actually be here, wherever here was.
"Look, I get that some of us aren't making a great case to be allowed to get out of here, but please just let me go and I'll help you get out of here." The empty promise that came out of my mouth seemed to make her more suspicious of me.
"So ya know how to get out of here or somethin'?" The girl asked, turning to look at me with a gaze of excited curiosity.
"No, but wouldn't it be safer to try and get out of here with more than just yourself?" Thankfully, my logic seemed to get through to her, since she nodded to herself and held up the keys.
"Well, which one of these is yours then? Gimme your name and I'll find your key." Her entire attention was fully on me, which was a good thing, since I didn't feel like letting her control Mr. Anger Management's fate was the best idea.
"My name's Aka Nishinzu. Initials should be A.N." After giving out my name, the girl fiddled with the keys, until she found one with my initials on it, taking it off the key ring and tossing it at me.
"There ya go AK 47, enjoy." Ignoring her insult(?) towards my name, I used the key on the lock around my ankle, and was relieved to see that it worked. I got myself out of my chains and stood up, stretching a bit before noticing the bald guy's expression.
"H-hey, what about me?" It wasn't anger filled, it was more fearfully panicked. It almost made me feel bad for him, but,
"Don't give him a key." The words fell right out of my mouth without me even considering the consequences, "He's dangerous, and loud. He could hurt either one of us, or alert someone to our location."
"...But that's-" Before the girl could give her own view on the idea, the guy turned right back into his angered state, more feral than before.
"EXCUSE ME?! DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM?! I COULD HAVE YOUR LIFE ENDED IN SECONDS IF I WANTED TO! LET ME OUT OF HERE BEFORE I MAKE YOU REGRET IT ASSHOLE!" His threats made the girl and I back away, right into the door. I looked over to her, and noticed that she was frightened by the guy's new found fury, and I gestured to the exit. The girl glanced from me, to the guy, back to me, then the exit, before looking down, and nodding at my suggestion.
"Look, if you can calm down, We will try and come back for you." Were my last words to this guy, opening the door, letting the girl out, and exiting myself, slowly shutting out all of his obscene curses and screams.
Once the door was shut, I noticed the girl's expression. It was distant, anxious, and worrisome about what had just happened."Hey," I said, walking up and resting a hand on her shoulder, "Don't worry about him. We can come back to get him once we figure out the situation we're in." My words made her seem a bit less anxious, so to help her relax more, I started to walk down the hallway, gesturing for her to come with."What's your name then? I gave you mine, so I think it's fair to reciprocate, right?" My new invitation for her to open up worked, as the girl's face lit up as she followed behind me in our adventure down
"So… What're we gonna do if our kidneynappers are in here with us?" Questioned Akira, as we walked."I already thought of that possibility, and a good answer is to just overpower them five to one." Responded Liam."Wha-What'll we do if there's m-more than one of them?!" Stuttered Jinju."I guess then we'd hafta run away or fight for our lives, simple as that!" Poppy exclaimed positively.
"Don't you find it strange that there arefour keys remaining?"……Shit. I forgot to take the bald guy's key off the ring! My careless mistake caused Mia to stand up and continue."Furthermore, don't you find it quite odd that Nishinzu and Hale weren't with a third person when they came by to free the rest of you?" Everyone collectively turned to look at Poppy and I. The suspicious
"Well, if that's all, then we might as well get a move on folks. We've still gotta find an exit." Akira announced, which caused everyone to head for the exit. Mia silently followed behind everyone, with a confused but determined look on her face, causing me to feel like her suspicions weren't completely gone yet."Hellooo, anybody in there, Ikea?" My thoughts were stopped by Poppy lightly knocking on my forehead, "Everyone's already gone, we gotta go." Pulled out of my thoughts, I nodded and rushed out the door to catch up to everyone, feeling a new found sense of pride in accidentally proving Mia's theory wrong. Once we caught up, everyone was already in the middle of chatting.
"Basically, you are all going to kill each other, one way or another."…Those were the clear words coming from the loudspeakers. It filled the room with silence afterwards for a few moments, before someone finally spoke up."What?" It was Mia, who had finally spoken up again, looking extremely concerned."K-Killing each other...Why would we ever consider doing such a vial thing?" Next to speak
……… It's all a jumbled mess. A jumbled mess of sounds, all from different people..."-A̵k̷a̴.̵""B̵o̶o̵k̷w̶o̸r̸m̷-"...All of them feel so familiar, but I can't think of where I've heard all of these voices...
…Once it was about to be 9 AM, and five cups of coffee had been consumed, I could tell I wasn't the only one waiting. Everyone has quieted down, or kept to themselves instead of openly chatting amongst each other, probably due to everyone getting tired of being in such a large group, which I could understand."Are we officially allowed to go down our own paths for the day now? I would enjoy some much deserved solitude." Liam asked, breaking the silence."Yes, you can leave now if you wan
Who should be the next person I spend time with?. . .After I gave it some thought, I decided to check up on Poppy, to see how her body guarding was going. I finished up my lunch, cleaned up, and headed over to the room she was guarding. As expected, I found her pacing back and forth at the door like a toy soldier. She had accumulated another tray of food, making a small pile of said trays in the corner."Oh, heya Shiznit!" She called out, waving dramatically as I approached.
With that, we all exited the cafeteria, with me leading the way as usual. Most of the team followed, while people like chefs and most of the cleaning crew stayed behind to clean up everything so that no evidence would be left behind. Amber was the only exception, following us as I needed her to clean up specific areas.As we neared the crossroads for the different hallways, I made sure to inquire about something important to her.“Yo, Amber, you made sure you guys cleaned all of thefingerprints
…The hallways were finally silent.The only thing I could hear were my own footsteps, as I made my way through his familiar prison, on my way to the cafeteria.I was trying to keep my composure, walking in stride, and proper composition, but occasionally a small snicker or bounce escaped me as I neared the room closer and closer, thinking back on everything that had happened. Turning the corner, I could see the door to the cafeteria, and felt my excitement growing exponentially.&n
“...Congratulations!” The Loudspeaker called out in celebration,“You voted incorrectly!”… …
“I think that I might have theone piece of evidencewe need to convictour culprit.” I responded, feeling a sudden boost in confidence as the words started to form in my head, and the face of a culprit started to come into view. All we needed was one more push, and I had it.“Please do tell then.” Liam allowed, sounding a bit worried and excited at th
“Are you saying that she…sacrificed herselfto let us progress?” Urkstin questioned, seeming to get increasingly upset at the idea. Personally I was feeling the same way, but for a much different reason.“That… would explain why the handwriting does not match.” Liam responded, solemnly. Everyone seemed to be getting on board with the idea, which just infuriated me more, to the point where I couldn’t hold back.“B
“That means that it must be one of the two who were out during that period, which would beyou two.” Liam spoke, pointing at bothMia and Akira.… …… …Once again, the room fell silent, with a new ominous aura looming ove
“However, this also brings with ittroubling news.” Liam spoke, readying himself for this next phase of the trial.“Troubling? How so?” Akira asked. I most likely knew where Liam was going with this, but let him speak in his own words first.“Well, the more uplifting news is that we now have a
"Akira and I discovered somethin’ a bitstrange.”“Strange how so?” Liam prompted me to answer, while Akira sat back and let me explain away.“Well, this might sound a little gross, but I noticed somethin’ strange inside of Aka’s mouth, so I had Akira put a finger in there to find out what it was.” I explained, getting some varied looks from everyone in the room.
"I was looking for aweapon.” Mia responded, getting some questionable glares from her answer as to why she went towards the bathrooms, “Alongside that, I saw Natsumi heading down the bathrooms’ hallway at10:15 PM, so I followed her at10:20 PMand after seeing her in the bathrooms, got myself a weapon from ther