35. Say Hello To Your Future Killer

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So this is it.

The big reveal.

You finally get to know who the betrayer is!

Yay!

But, I warn you.

It's not pretty.

I give you...

-

THE TIED UP SQUAD

-

Isabel is going to die.

Katrina is going to die.

Josie is going to die.

Kala is going to die.

Zoe is going to die.

Bettie is going to die.

Miss Smith is going to die.

Tannin is going to die.

I'm going to die.

That was all Ali could think of, that was all that was going through her mind. She knew they were going to die, she knew that from her head to her little pinky toe, down to the bone.

She didn't believe it though.

She didn't believe they'd be dead in an hour, she didn't believe they wouldn't be alive to tell jokes, to laugh, to play in orchestra. She didn't believe that in an hour, she wouldn't be on the earth anymore, waiting for the next One Direction album to come out or yelling at her annoying little sister. She didn't believe that, because she couldn't. She couldn't comprehend that she had been hypnotized by bad people, then tied up to wait for her doom. She couldn't comprehend the spiel that Katrina and Josie told her about what was going on. She couldn't comprehend what it meant to be dead, to be unloving, unbreathing, unmoving, unthinking. The thought was foreign and strange. Not even Google had the answers to it.

Plus, Ali was against anything that would ruin her pedicure, which death would.

She sat there, tied to a chair, thinking. Only thinking.

She didn't understand how Tannin and she got out of the hypnotism. Heck, Ali didn't remember being hypnotized! One second she was watching a Scotsman perform a horrid song on bagpipes and the next she was being dragged by the arm towards a stage! She didn't understand anything that was going on. Nothing. At. All.

"Ali," Tannin said from the chair next to her, her lips barely moving.

When Ali looked over to Tannin, she was frightened. Her friend's skin was pale, very pale. She looked more like a ghost than a person. Her lips were a tint of blue, her skin covered in a layer of sweat, and her eyes were dragging down. It was clear that she was sick, very sick. She needed medical attention and soon.

"I don't..." Tannin said, sucking in a big breath of air. "I don't feel good, my head," she licked her lips. "It hurts. Ali, my head really hurts."

Ali wanted to comfort her friend. She wanted to tell her everything would be alright, that they'd go to the nurse and she'd send her home. But they were tied to chairs, bad guys all around them, the nurse under the bad guy's spell, and there wasn't much hope left. There wasn't much of anything left. How could Ali help her friend when she was in desperate need of help herself?

Ali sighed. "Hang in there, Tan. Just... just hang in there."

Tannin nodded, closing her eyes. Her body temperature was off the charts it was so high. It was hard for her to breathe because air was more suffocating than it was oxygenating. The girl felt like she was drowning the air was so thick. Her head was pounding against her skull in a way that made her think it would explode. Not that she thought about it for too long because everything made it hurt more. The light. The noise. The smell. She could barely stand it.

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