The House of Midnight

Chapter Three

The Ringmasters First Game

I found May, Izzy and Marcus at the pool table, Becca was sitting on a single chair, watching them through her thick fringe that covered one side of her face. Marcus invited me to be in his team up against Izzy and May. All the players were really good, but for some reason I felt like I couldn't concentrate. Too many questions swirled through my mind, and when I missed a third shot Marcus tutted.
"Come on, Lillian. I know you can do better then that!"
"I've never played pool before." I grumbled, handing the pool stick to Izzy.
"You're not going too bad." Izzy said.
"Yeah, maybe you did it in your other life."
I watched Izzy line her stick up with the white ball and a red ball. She shot the white one, and it hit the red ball into a socket. May highfived her teammate, and Marcus sighed.
"Other life?" I asked.
May rolled her eyes and gave the stick to Marcus.
"Here we go again with the questions.."
"The other life," Becca spoke up, "was the life you had before the House of Midnight."
"On the tape when I first got here it said that I 'had done something terrible.' Is this place like a punishment field or something?"
Marcus shrugged. "Most likely, yes."
He drew back the stick and hit the white ball, sending it hurtling towards a blue ball. The ball bounced off one of the sideboards and shot back into a pocket.
"The longer you stay here, the more memories of your other life come back." Becca said. She then frowned. "How many days have we been here now?"
"Eighteen." May said.
"Fifteen." Izzy sighed.
"About ten or twelve." Marcus shrugged.
He handed me the stick, but froze when a crackling sound was heard up above. We all looked up, and I saw a set of speakers that I didn't notice before.
"It's 10.30 everyone!" Chimed a sickly gleeful voice. "It's game time for all!"
"Shit." May cursed, looking at the ground.
Becca suddenly looked fearful, and Izzy and Marcus looked like the were going to be sick.
"I want Corridor No.1 to head to Game Room No.2 and Corridor 2 to head to Lounge Room No.2. Hurry, hurry!" Everyone in the lounge moaned, some people cried, others yelled out in anger.
"What's Game Time?" I whispered.
"You're going to find out" May muttered.
Izzy and Becca headed to Lounge Room No.2, and May led me to a new room that I hadn't been to yet. Marcus followed. And as I walked through to it, I regretted wanting to see what it was. The Game Room was a relatively large room, with rusted and bloody, sharp instruments hung up on the walls. In the middle of the room were 20 chairs, and above each chair hung a noose rope. I gulped, and noticed that each chair had a name on it.
As more people filled the room, supposedly people who slept in the same corridor as me, I saw someone who made my stomach drop.
White strode into the room, people rushing around him, avoiding him, trying not to brush against him and when someone did he glared at them and they yelped, begging him not to stab them or rip their eyes out with forks. The voice of Ring Master rung over the speakers again.
"Welcome, Corridor No.1, to this weeks Game. As you see, there is a chair and noose for each of you. The objective of the Game is simple: all you must do is stand on the chair with the noose around your neck, and don't fall off and hang yourself. Very simple. The rules are simple too: try not to move or your chair may collapse, other players can try to knock each other off their chairs, and you must stand on the chair with one leg for approximately 1 hour."
"One whole hour?" May hissed between her teeth.
"Yes, Miss May. One entire hour."
She shuddered, and so did I. I looked around, and there were no cameras or peepholes anywhere.
"Players, get on your chairs that you are assigned to!"
Hesitantly, the other people went to their chairs, and climbed on. I found my chair, and then looked at the chair to my right. A boy named Cooper was going to stand there. I looked to my left and I internally screamed with terror. White was going to stand there.
I climbed onto my chair, and it creaked, making me tense up. I turned around and put the noose around my neck. Cooper did the same.
He was a tall kid, with dirty blond hair and brown eyes. He looked rather relaxed, and he smirked at me when White climbed onto his chair. We were positioned at the end of the row. I was the only one beside him, and everyone KNEW that he was going to go for me.
"Ready players?" Ring Master cooed. "The time starts now!"
A chime sounded, and the room fell silent. The first ten minutes were easy. Small talk was exchanged between players. Some chairs creaked, and everyone held their breath. Luckily, no ones chair broke. Until the 30 minute mark, were one girl, who was positioned beside May on the other end of the line. The chairs legs broke, and May screamed as the girl fell, her neck instantly snapping.
Everyone froze, some people cried, others almost threw up. The girl, who's name was Lauren, hung there, her neck starting to swell, her eyes bulging and her tongue hanging out of her mouth.
I felt bad for May. She was crying silently, tears streaming down her face. I felt bad for poor Lauren as well. But mostly, I felt angry. Even if we HAD committed horrible crimes in the past, why did we have to be put through this?
I glanced to my left and looked at White. His face was completely calm, and he was fiddling with his hands. I looked at Cooper, who must of saw White move before I did. Sweat trickled down his face, and I turned in horror as White leaned towards me.
His hands reached out, and I waited for him to push me off, and for the strangling feeling that was to come to when he did.
But he brushed past me, and pushed Cooper off instead. The boy cried out before he fell, and hung from the rope by his neck. For 10 minutes, Cooper thrashed around, making horrible, terrifying gurgling sounds that I knew would haunt me that night.
Three other people's chairs broke, and all of them ended up dead.
"Aaaand that's time!" Ring Master crowed. "Oh, only five fatalities. Oh well. What a shame. Well done to those who didn't die! You may now un noose yourselves and step off the chair."
I took the noose off and jumped off the chair, only for it to collapse as soon as I landed on the ground. Most of the chairs of the other players broke too, including Mays.
She ran to me and threw her arms around me, sobbing into my shoulder.
"I knew her, Lillian, I KNEW her!" She sobbed.
I patted her back, unable to rip my eyes off Lauren's dangling corpse. As quickly as we could, we turned and left the awful Game Room.
We went to Lounge room No.2, only to find a decapitated body. May sobbed even harder, and I steered her away into the Lounge room No.1. We sat down on the big couch, and Izzy, Becca and Marcus joined us.
"That Game was intense." Marcus muttered, sitting down next to me.
"Our Game was awful." Izzy shuddered, and Becca nodded.
"I'm guessing these 'Games' happen every week at 10.30." I said grimly.
Marcus nodded. Then May spoke up.
"When White leaned towards you during our Game, I was sure you were going to die."
She looked at me, her sky eyes turned watery.
"Why hasn't he killed you yet? He normally targets newbies like you."
I stared off at a wall, thinking. Why HADN'T he killed me yet? Apparently, to everyone else, I had broken some major boundaries with him: I talked to him while he was eating, I tried to stop him from killing someone and I made contact with him. The thought kept crossing my mind. I shook it off.
"You must be something special then." Marcus said, trying to lighten the mood. "He must have a crush on you!"
Izzy and Becca laughed weakly, and I smiled.
"Yes, that would be SO nice." I said sarcastically. "Because having a psychopath as a boyfriend is AWESOME."
Everyone laughed again, and so did I. Then, something caught my attention.
White was standing in the archway to the corridor, frowning. He met my gaze, and his frown faded to his usual, expressionless monotone face. Now that I thought about it, he was rather handsome. He was pale, and his skin was smooth and clear. The shirt he was wearing looked tight across his chest. His face was nice to look at too. And his eyes. Although they were the eyes of a brutal killer, there was a somewhat... old, forgotten kindness in them.
I frowned at myself at the thought, and he walked across the Lounge to the kitchen. I then wondered why this house even HAD a kitchen. The kitchen was just that single table, the marble bench and sink with running water and the cupboard above the sink with a few cups in them. And yet it had knives and scissors and forks and spoons in its drawers. 'Maybe,' I thought, 'the kitchens are there as a great big weapon storage. Yeah, that's probably it.'