23. Carey
Carey
After breakfast the following morning, we were summoned to our fifth game. The gaming room was located in the same hallway where the first two games took place.
The room was dimly lit with flickering lights casting a hazy glow over the space. Posters of bands and bikini-clad women adorned the wood-paneled walls, and four rectangular tables stood in the center, laden with red Solo cups in pyramid formations and ping pong balls. Rock music pulsed from a stereo in the corner, bass thumping so loudly that the floor vibrated beneath our feet.
“I’m guessing this is meant to look like a high school party,” Brooke shouted over the music.
“Looks more like a drug dealer’s basement,” Jasmine replied, upper lip curling with disdain.
The music died down, and the Game Master addressed us from a speaker on the far wall. “Welcome to the party, everyone!” the tinny voice said. “I’m going to let you have a ton of fun with an awesome game of Beer Pong!”
“For fuck’s sake,” Zach muttered, head shaking. “Just tell us the twist, asshole.”
“You’ll play in pairs that I’ll announce in a moment. Obviously, there are nine of you, meaning one lucky player is exempt from today’s game. I used a lottery system to determine that the lucky one is… Brooke!”
Brooke’s shoulders slumped, and she let out a long sigh of relief. Hudson and Jasmine narrowed their eyes at her, obviously pissed about the exemption.
“Here are the rules. In your pairs, you play one round against each other. As with regular Beer Pong, the objective is to throw ping pong balls into your opponent”s cups. However, if you sink one, your opponent doesn’t need to drink from the cup immediately. Instead, they must move the cup to the side of the table and continue the game. At the end, whoever sank the most balls is declared the winner. The loser must then select one of their ten cups to drink from.” The Game Master paused to let out a creepy hollow laugh. “Now, here’s the catch I bet you’re all waiting for. Several of the cups have poison mixed into the beer. You have no way of knowing which ones, so the losers must choose wisely, or else they’ll die. If you draw, both players will have to select a cup to drink from, so keep that in mind. I’ll give you a few minutes to let that sink in, and then I’ll announce the pairings. Ciao for now!”
We all stared at each other with wide eyes.
“Oh my god,” April said. “This isn’t fair! We can’t strategize because it’s based on pure luck!”
“But we could all survive,” Brooke said. “If all the losers just happen to pick cups without poison, we’ll be fine.”
“We? Who’s we?” Jasmine said in a high-pitched tone. “You don’t even have to play! Which, by the way, is totally suspicious. Kinda makes it look like you arranged all of this for your own convenience, doesn’t it?”
Brooke rolled her eyes. “Oh my god, really? We’re still accusing each other of being the Game Master?”
“Um, yes? Of course we are.” Jasmine sneered. “You’re sus as hell, Brooke.”
“If anyone, it’s Maverick,” Courteney interjected. “You all got that text about him being a psychopath, right?”
I instantly opened my mouth to defend Maverick, but then I caught his eye. He slowly shook his head, intense gaze conveying a silent message. Don’t.
“I don’t think he’d let us all know about a sociopathy diagnosis if he’s actually the Game Master,” Zach said smoothly, lifting a palm. “It’s just the same old shit. The real Game Master is trying to turn us all against each other.”
“I agree,” Brooke replied. “Also, that file said 2022, and the school psychologist was fired for being a pedophile that same year, so I don’t know if anything he said about his patients is accurate. I mean, someone like that isn’t exactly trustworthy, are they?”
“Just because the psych was a pedo doesn’t mean he was bad at his job,” Hudson said, glaring at Maverick.
“Oh, of course you’re defending pedos now,” Brooke shot back. “What else would we expect from a predator?”
The Game Master’s robotic voice suddenly piped up again. “Okay, everyone! Here’s the pairings. April versus Zach at table one, Jasmine versus Kiara at table two, Hudson versus Courteney at table three, and Carey versus Maverick at table four. Good luck!”
My eyes shot straight back to Maverick. He dipped his chin in a curt nod and stepped over to me. “Let’s go,” he said, gesturing toward the table at the end.
“Maverick,” I whispered. “I don’t want to pl—”
He put an index finger against his lips to signal for me to be quiet. Then he took another step closer. “We have to play each other,” he muttered. “Let’s just get it over and done with, okay?”
I swallowed hard and nodded, knowing he was right. If we refused to play the game, we’d die. The Game Master had made that very clear on our first day here. Also, we couldn’t agree to draw with each other by sinking zero balls each, because then we’d both risk death by poisoning.
I stepped over to the other side of our table and picked up a ball, heart sinking as I looked over at Maverick’s Solo cups. I wasn’t bad at aiming, but I wasn’t particularly good, either, and my hands were shaking like crazy. I’d probably lose this game.
Honestly, part of me wanted to lose. I didn’t want to die, but I didn’t want to lose Maverick, either. All I could really hope for was that whichever of us ended up losing just so happened to pick a cup without poison. As April said earlier, it all came down to luck.
“You can go first,” Maverick said, eyeing me from across the table.
I nodded and took a deep breath before narrowing my gaze on his top cup. Then I sent the ball over with a flick of the wrist. It bounced off the edge of the cup and landed on the floor.
“Close,” Maverick said, giving me an encouraging smile. He picked up a ball, threw it, and missed my top cup by half an inch. As the ball fell to the floor, he shrugged. “First round jitters, huh?”
“I guess so.” I smiled tightly and picked up another ball. With another flick of the wrist, I sent it sailing toward his top cup. This time, it went straight in.
“Perfect.” Maverick grinned. “My turn.”
He tossed another ball. This time, it missed by several inches.
“Maverick,” I hissed. “You aren’t even trying.”
“I don’t need to. You got one in. That makes you the winner, as long as I don’t get any in at all.”
“That’s not fair,” I said, heart pounding. “On you, I mean.”
He shrugged again. “I told you I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”
I snapped my head to the right to see if any of the others had heard him say that. Fortunately, they were all too focused on their own games to be paying attention to our table.
“Please give yourself a chance,” I said, turning my attention back to Maverick. “I want this to be a fair game for both of us. It’s the right thing to do, and you know it.”
His eyes locked right on mine, and he smiled. “Just take your next turn, Carey.”
With a heavy sigh, I tossed another ball at his side of the table, purposely missing by an inch. “Your turn.”
“I know you did that on purpose, but it doesn’t matter,” he said, lifting a brow. “As long as I keep missing, you’ll still win.”
“You’re a real asshole sometimes, you know that?” I muttered.
He grinned. “If it keeps you safe, then I’m willing to be an asshole for as long as it takes.”
The game went exactly as he planned after that, with me winning 1-0.
I watched with bated breath as Maverick carefully removed his cups from the pyramid formation and placed them in a line. I had no idea how many of them were poisoned, but if I had to guess, I’d say half. The Game Master wasn’t nice enough to give us ten-to-one odds.
“Hm.” He grunted and pointed toward the cup on the left end; the one I’d sunk my ball in. “This one seems lucky, huh?”
“Maverick…” My voice caught in my throat as I watched him toss back the beer.
Once he’d swallowed the last drop, he wiped his mouth and slowly tilted his head. Then he grinned. “Pretty sure that was just a regular beer.”
“Some poisons can be tasteless,” I said, heart still jackhammering in my chest.
“Carey, I’m fine. Really.” He motioned toward the other tables. “Let’s watch and hope everyone else is just as lucky as me. Okay?”
I nodded and turned to look. Because Maverick and I hadn’t played ‘properly’ like the others, who were taking their time during each round to make the best shots they possibly could, we’d finished very early.
As I watched, Brooke came up to me and squeezed my arm. “I’m so glad you’re okay,” she said. “I feel really bad that I didn’t have to play. It’s not fair on the rest of you.”
I shook my head. “It’s not your fault. Everything in this game is down to luck, including the exempt player.”
“Well, I’m not so sure about that. That it’s all luck.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, brows puckering.
Brooke lowered her voice. “I know I could be way off-base, so please don’t get mad at me, but… um… is there something going on with you and Maverick?”
My heart began to pound all over again. “Why would you ask that?”
“I was watching you guys play, and he didn’t seem to be trying. Like, at all. Almost like he wanted to lose. But that would mean he was giving you the victory, and that means…”
She trailed off, letting the implication hang silently in the air.
“He didn’t lose on purpose,” I said. “He’s just really bad at Beer Pong. I’m bad too. I only sank one ball.”
I felt awful for lying to my friend, but I truly believed it was for the best while we were stuck in this godforsaken place. The last thing any of us needed was the added drama of even more wild suspicions and accusations being flung all over the place, and I knew the revelation of my unexpected relationship with Maverick would result in exactly that, even amongst my own friends.
“It’s not just that.” Brooke hesitated for a few seconds, thumb rubbing at her chin. “That text the Game Master sent about you last night. I know you said it was a consequence for being out after the curfew, but…”
I picked up where she trailed off. “The Game Master sent a text about Maverick too. The sociopath one.”
“Yeah. So… were you two breaking the curfew together last night?”
I figured a half-truth was better than an outright lie in this case. “Sort of,” I said, dipping my chin in a brief nod. “It’s like I said at breakfast. I thought the curfew wasn’t in effect because of the late-night game, so I decided to explore. Maverick had the same idea, and I bumped into him out in the hall. We had a quick chat about what we were doing—he was exploring too—but then we got the texts from the Game Master telling us to get back to our rooms. I didn’t mention seeing him when I told you guys about it at breakfast because it was such a quick, non-eventful thing. I was more worried everyone would judge me about that horrible video.”
“Oh, right. So you two aren’t…”
“No.” Guilt churned my stomach as the lie slipped off my tongue. “I’m not hooking up with him, or anything like that.”
Brooke’s face brightened, and her shoulders relaxed. “Oh, thank god. For a minute I was actually worried you and that asshole were—” She stopped abruptly and shuddered. “Ugh, never mind. We don’t need that mental image. Anyway, it’s lucky for you that he sucks so much at Beer Pong.”
“Yeah.” Guilt was still twisting my stomach into knots. “I’m really lucky.”
We turned our attention to the ongoing games. Zach won against April 5-3 a few minutes later, and April immediately looked over at Brooke and me with pure panic flashing in her eyes. “I can’t pick,” she said, voice choked with emotion. “Pick for me. Please.”
“April…” Brooke shook her head. “We can’t do that.”
“Why?”
“If we pick a poisoned cup, it’ll be our fault that you’re gone. We’d never forgive ourselves. It has to be your choice.”
April sighed forlornly and looked down at the table. “You’re right.”
“Maybe go for the very top or bottom-edge ones,” Zach suggested. “The Game Master probably thinks most people will go for the middle ones, so they’re more likely to be poisoned.”
“Maybe, yeah.” April blew out a deep breath and picked the top cup. “Well, here goes nothing.”
She lifted the cup in a sarcastic toast. Then she knocked the beer back in a few gulps and wiped her lips with her sleeve. I watched with wide eyes, silently begging for her to be okay.
“How do you feel?” Brooke asked.
“Fine.” April smiled faintly. “I think it was normal beer.”
Courteney lost to Hudson a moment later, and we all watched as she selected a cup and drank the contents. Thankfully, she was fine too.
“We’re down to the last game, and everyone’s still alive,” Brooke said. “Maybe we’re all going to be okay.”
“Don’t jinx it, you idiot,” Kiara called out. “If I die, it’s totally your fault.”
“You aren’t going to die, babe,” Jasmine said before tossing a ball toward her cups.
She sank it, and Kiara groaned. “How are you so much better than me?”
“It’s only 3-2. I’m not that good,” Jasmine replied.
Kiara missed the rest of her shots, and we all crowded around the table as her eyes darted between the cups in front of her. She twisted her lips for a few seconds. Then she snatched up a cup from the middle of the line, lifted her chin, and tossed it back.
“She sure picked that fast,” Brooke muttered. “Almost as if she knew exactly which cups were safe.”
April nodded slowly. “Yeah, it was a bit—”
Her voice was cut off by a series of choking sounds from Kiara’s mouth. “Oh my god,” she rasped, clutching at her throat. “It… it’s burning. I…”
She fell to her knees, unable to get any more words out. Jasmine screamed and dashed over to her. “Throw it up!” she shrieked, smacking her on the back. “Get it out!”
It was too late. The poison was fast-acting, and within a minute or two, Kiara’s lips had turned blue. She lurched several times, gasping for breath, and then she collapsed all the way to the floor, white foam spilling from her open mouth.
“No!” Jasmine screamed, crouching to shake Kiara’s shoulders. “Wake up!”
She repeated this process for several minutes, shrieking and violently shaking her friend. Nothing happened. Kiara’s body remained limp, her eyes glassy and unseeing.
“Jasmine…” Maverick gently pulled her away. “I think she’s gone. I’m sorry.”
Jasmine struggled against him for a moment, screeching and shouting, but then her eyes fell on Kiara’s lifeless body, and she sank to the ground and burst into tears. “It’s my fault,” she choked out between sobs. “I should’ve let her win.”
Courteney joined Maverick in trying to comfort her. I turned to my friends, lips compressed in a thin line. Their expressions told me they were thinking the exact same thing as me.
“We were wrong about Kiara,” I muttered.
“Yup,” Brooke said, nodding grimly. “Dead wrong.”
“Wait.” Zach lifted a trembling hand. “What if she faked it?”
“Faked it?” April said, brows shooting up. “How the hell could she do that?”
“Maybe all her cups contained sedatives so she could feign death. That way she could trick us into thinking she isn’t the mastermind behind all this shit.”
“Zach…” Brooke shook her head. “Look at her. She’s not just unconscious from a sedative. She’s dead.”
Zach glanced over at Kiara’s limp form and winced. Then he turned back to face us, head shaking. “I just… I really thought it was her behind all this shit,” he muttered. “Now I have no fucking clue what to think. I feel like I’m going crazy.”
“Me too,” I said, rubbing my forehead. “This is exactly what the Game Master wants. For us to lose our minds before we die.”
Before anyone could reply, the speaker on the wall crackled back to life. “The fifth game is now over. This room will be closing in five minutes for cleaning and maintenance,” the voice said. “Please proceed to Gaming Room 6 down the hall. The next game begins in ten minutes.”
“What?” Courteney shrieked. “We have to go straight into another game?”
“This is fucking bullshit!” Hudson added, glaring up at the nearest surveillance camera. “We need a break!”
Courteney started sucking down deep breaths, which rapidly turned into full-on hyperventilation. “I… I can’t,” she choked out between ragged breaths. “I can’t do this. No more. No… more. I can’t.”
Zach raced over to comfort her as she sank to her knees, sobbing her heart out. April watched the interaction with her lips pressed into a thin line. “Can’t blame her for having a total meltdown,” she muttered. “I’m not sure how much longer I can do this shit either. I don’t think I’ve slept more than two hours in the last three days.”
“Me neither.” Brooke sighed and rubbed her forehead. “How the fuck are we supposed to concentrate on playing these bullshit games when we can barely function from lack of sleep?”
“That beer we just drank didn’t help either,” April said, slowly shaking her head. “But what are we supposed to do? Petition the Game Master for a player’s union that gives us some sort of rights?”
I snorted at her sarcastic jibe. “I wish.”
Once Zach and Maverick had managed to coax Courteney and Jasmine into slightly calmer states, we reluctantly traipsed out of the room and headed farther down the passage to the next gaming room. The door was unlocked, but it slammed shut behind us and automatically locked as soon as we were all present.
As I peered around the cold, dimly lit room, shivers cascaded down my spine. The space was cloaked with shadows, and the air was heavy with the scent of musty old books and a faint odor of decay. In the center lay a giant chessboard, its checkered pattern stretching across most of the floor.
All the playing pieces were present, looming like sentinels from seemingly random squares all over the board. They were carved from weathered stone and looked to weigh several hundred pounds, if not more. I hoped we didn’t have to move them as part of the game, because there was no way in hell most of us could manage that.
“I’m guessing there are landmines under some of the squares,” Hudson speculated, stroking the stubble on his chin. “If we step on the wrong ones, we get—”
“Shut the fuck up, Hudson,” Brooke hissed, cutting him off. “Courteney is already scared enough, and Jasmine is barely functioning after what happened to Kiara. So just save it, okay?”
He rolled his eyes and opened his mouth to reply, but at that exact moment, a nearby speaker made a loud clicking sound, and the Game Master’s robotic voice echoed through the room.
“Welcome to Chess Club, everyone!” the voice said. “Don’t worry if you’ve never played chess before. This game is only loosely based on the real thing. You’ll find your player details and instructions on the wall to your right. There’s no time limit on this game, so make sure you think carefully about every move. Good luck!”
Maverick stepped over to the wall and peered at a weathered-looking piece of paper that had been taped to the exposed brick. “We’ve all been given certain chess pieces to play as,” he said, looking back at the rest of us over his shoulder. “Courteney and Hudson are rooks, April, Zach, and I are knights, Brooke and Jasmine are bishops, and Carey is a queen.”
“No pawns or a king?” Brooke asked, tipping her head.
“Nope. I’m guessing there would’ve been more pieces available if we had more players,” Maverick replied in a low voice. “But they’re dead.”
“So how does the game work?” April asked, rubbing her forehead. Her eyes were ringed with dark circles, and she looked as if she were going to fall asleep at any second.
“We’ve all been assigned an empty square to start on,” Maverick said, eyes back on the paper. “April is B1, Courteney is A3, Zach is E3, Carey is C3, Jasmine is D2, Brooke is F3, Hudson is H1, and I’m G3. Everyone got theirs?”
There was a collective murmur of assent, and Maverick continued.
“The goal is for all of us to make it to the other side of the board. Once you’re on the last row, you can step off the board entirely, and you cannot return after that. We all get one turn each, and they must be taken one at a time. We can’t make any moves that cause us to collide with another player or any of the stone pieces that are already on the board. We also have to follow the rules of our particular playing piece. So for the rooks, that means you can move horizontally or vertically. Knights move in L shapes—two squares in one direction, either horizontally or vertically, and then one square perpendicular to that. Bishops move diagonally, and the queen can move vertically, diagonally, or horizontally.”
“So Carey can just move wherever the fuck she wants?” Hudson spat, eyes narrowing. “How the fuck is that fair?”
“It’s not. But these games are never fair,” Jasmine said in a ragged voice, wiping her red-rimmed eyes. “I mean, Brooke was given a free pass to skip the last game while the rest of us had to risk drinking poison.”
Maverick raised his voice and continued. “I’m not done, guys. There’s another rule. If anyone accidentally steps on a square that’s outside the range of their movement, they lose.”
“You mean they die,” Courteney muttered.
“Yeah, presumably,” he replied in a grim tone. “So we all have to be very careful. For example, the bishops among us need to be sure to only move diagonally. If you accidentally move straight, you’re gone.”
“Can you repeat the rules for each piece?” April asked. “I haven’t played chess in years and I’m tired as hell, so my brain isn’t exactly going at full steam.”
Maverick rattled off the rules again. “Everyone memorized theirs?” he asked, glancing around the group. There was a collective nod, and he went on. “I think we can all survive this one easily enough, as long as we’re slow, careful, and help each other out. Once we’re all on the board in our assigned spots, we need to take a lot of time to strategize our exact moves. Some of us will probably have to wait for others to take their turns so that certain players will be out of the way. But we won’t know exactly what things will look like until we’re all there. So let’s go.”
We trudged over to the board in silence. The tension in the room was palpable. Despite the supposed simplicity of the game, we were all exhausted, meaning it was easier than usual for any of us to make a mistake. One silly slipup or miscalculated move was all it would take for another life to be lost.
Once we were all standing on our assigned spots, Maverick snapped his fingers. “Okay, the game is supposed to start once we’re all in place, so I guess that’s right now. I think Carey should go first, because she can move any way she wants, and she’s currently in the way of a few other players. So if we get her off the board, that makes things easier for the rest of us.”
The group murmured their agreement. I took a deep breath and slowly began my journey across the board. My heart raced the whole time, and my breaths came in shallow, halting bursts. I knew I couldn’t die from stepping on an incorrect empty square like the other players, because of my queen status, but I was still terrified of tripping and falling or accidentally putting the edge of my foot on a square that had a stone piece on it.
My last move was two diagonal steps to avoid several pieces that stood to the left and in front of me. I stepped onto D8 and released the breath I’d been holding. “That’s it, right?” I called out to the others. “I can step off the board now?”
“Yup,” Maverick called back. “You’re done. Now you can help us plot out courses for the rest of us.”
I stepped off the board and turned to face it, slowly scanning each square, player, and stone piece. “Brooke, you’re a bishop, right?”
“Yes,” she replied, eyes wide and fearful.
“If you move two steps diagonally to your left, then one diagonally to the right, one to the left, and one more to the right, you can get to F8 without hitting any players or stones. Then you’ll be out of the way for the others to start their turns.”
Brooke nodded slowly, eyes tracing the path over the board. “Two left, one right, one left, one right. All diagonal.”
“You’ve got it.” I smiled encouragingly. “Just go slowly.”
She made it across safely. Maverick ordered Zach to take his turn next, getting him off the board so that Jasmine would have an easier time moving afterwards. Once she’d reached the last row, she stepped off the board and crumpled into a heap on the floor, covering her face with her hands as sobs racked her body.
“Sorry about Kiara,” I murmured, crouching to lay a hand on her shoulder. “I know she was your best friend. I can’t even imagine how terrible you must feel right now.”
“Fuck off, Carey,” she spluttered through her hands. “I don’t need sympathy from you.”
My lips thinned. “Got it,” I said, rising to my feet so I could return my focus to the board. The others were still analyzing potential paths for the remaining players.
“April, I think I see a way across for you, now that Jasmine’s off the board,” Brooke called out.
“I think I see it too,” she replied, pointing directly ahead. “If I go to A3 and then B3, I can then go to D3 and D4. From there, uhh… I can go to D6 and C6. Then… C8 to D8. Right?”
Brooke frowned as she calculated the path from the other side. Then she nodded. “That all sounds right. Ready?”
“No.” April glumly shook her head and stifled a yawn. “Honestly, I feel like I’m about to faint. I really need you guys to help me as I go.”
“We will,” I said. “We’ll call out the exact directions for you as you go. Okay? The first move is this: two steps forward and one right.”
She nodded and took a tentative step. “Two forward, one right,” she said, wearily rubbing her forehead. “Two forward, one right.”
“That’s it. You’ve got this,” Maverick called out.
She made it to B3 and covered her mouth to stifle another yawn. “It was D4 next, right?”
Maverick nodded. “That’s right. So two steps to your right, then one step forward. Okay?”
April blinked rapidly. Then she nodded and started moving. “Two steps right, one step forward,” she said as she went. “Two steps right, two steps forward.”
“No!” I screamed as she lifted her left foot to take an extra step onto D5. “One step forward!”
It was too late. Her foot had already come down on the wrong square. She stared across the board blankly, and then her eyes filled with horror as the gut-wrenching realization dawned on her. “Oh my god. I thought—”
She didn’t get a chance to finish her sentence. A deafening crack split the air, followed by a sharp gasp from April. She staggered backward, clutching at the right side of her abdomen. Blood was seeping through her fingers, staining her pale gray sweatshirt crimson.
“April!” I screamed, dashing forward. If I could just get to her in time, apply enough pressure to the wound, she could survive this.
Zach grabbed me by the shoulder and yanked me backward a split-second before my feet touched the edge of the board. “You can’t!” he said. “Once we’re off the board, we can’t return. Remember?”
He was right. If I’d actually taken that final step back onto the board, I’d be in the exact same boat as April right now.
As I looked on in horror, time seemed to slow to a crawl. April staggered backward again, almost bumping into Courteney, who was frozen in terror on her starting square. Then she lurched forward and fell to her knees, eyes filling with naked fear as they met mine.
“April!” I choked out, desperation and helplessness surging through me. “Stay with us! Please!”
Another sharp, agonized gasp escaped her lips, and she collapsed to the ground, blood pooling around her side.
I fell to my knees and let out a strangled cry, tears flooding my face. Everything seemed to blur as my mind struggled to process what had just happened. April couldn’t be dead. She was just here a few seconds ago. She couldn’t really be gone.
Brooke fell to her knees beside me, clinging to my shoulder. She tried to say something, but only a broken sob ended up spilling out.
“What the hell just happened?” Jasmine said from somewhere behind us. “Did she get shot?”
“Yes,” Zach replied, voice thick with emotion. “There’s either a sniper somewhere behind the wall, or some sort of automated sniping system. I don’t know. But that was definitely a gunshot.”
“Could she…” Jasmine paused and cleared her throat. “Could she survive that? Like, maybe she’s just injured, and we can somehow get her off the board?”
Zach stood stock-still, staring at all the blood seeping across the black and white squares. “Courteney,” he said in a hollow voice. “Is she… is she gone?”
Courteney looked down at April’s motionless form and nodded listlessly. “I don’t think she’s breathing.”
“Maverick, Hudson… what can you guys see?” Zach asked. His pitch had risen, adding a frantic air to his question. Clearly, he was hoping for a miracle. I was hoping, too. Praying, begging, clinging to the fragile thread of hope that Jasmine was right and April was only injured.
Maverick looked over at April’s limp body. “I think Courteney’s right,” he said. “It looks like she’s not breathing.”
“She looks dead to me,” Hudson bluntly added.
In that moment, the room seemed to fall silent. Brooke’s sobs faded away along with my own, and all I could focus on was April’s long blonde hair splayed out around her pale face.
That hair was the first thing I ever noticed about her when she waved me over to her desk in English class and took me under her wing. Beautiful and light, just like her soul. She was the first person at Babylon to show me any kindness, and she’d quickly become the best friend I ever made. Now that beautiful soul had been ripped away in a sick, twisted game, and the grief of it was threatening to consume me whole.
It was so cruel. So heartless. So unfair.
Anger suddenly boiled up beneath my sorrow, directed not only at the game that had stolen April from me, but at the senseless randomness of it all. What had she done to deserve this? What had any of us done to deserve it?
I didn’t see or hear the rest of the game. I was too devastated, too blinded with heartache and guilt. I kept replaying April’s final moments over and over in my mind, wishing I’d noticed her mistake a split-second earlier. If I had, I could’ve called out to her sooner, just before her foot came down on D5, and the whole thing could’ve been a narrow miss.
“Hey, Carey.” Maverick’s voice drifted into my ear, soft and soothing. “It’s over. Courteney, Hudson, and I made it across.”
I snapped out of my reverie and looked up at him. “Oh,” was all I managed to get out.
“We have to leave.”
I shook my head and returned my gaze to April’s blonde head. “No,” I whispered. “I want to stay here. With April.”
“You can’t. I’m sorry. The Game Master just announced that the room is closing in five minutes. We’re supposed to go to the drawing room for lunch now. Not that any of us feel like eating.”
“Oh,” I murmured again. I didn’t know what else to say. Which words existed that could possibly convey the scale of the misery inside me?
“Let me help you up.” Maverick hooked an arm under my shoulder and pulled me to my feet. At the same time, he used his other arm to help Brooke up. “Zach, do you want to help Brooke walk? I’ll help Carey.”
“Sure.” Zach slung an arm around Brooke’s trembling shoulder. His other arm went around Courteney.
Jasmine walked alone, arms wrapped around herself. Behind her, Hudson trudged with his hands in his pockets, eyes cast to the floor.
Maverick leaned down and murmured in my ear. “Ready?”
“No,” I said listlessly. “I really don’t want to leave April here.”
“I get it.” His voice had turned husky. “I’m so sorry, baby. I wish I could’ve stopped it.”
“Me too.” My voice cracked. “I should’ve told her to stop sooner.”
“Hey.” Maverick cradled my chin in one hand, forcing me to look up at his face. “It wasn’t your fault. You can’t let yourself get into that guilt spiral. Take it from a guy who’s been there.” He hesitated and went on. “I was there right up until the other night with you. You really helped me, just by talking to me and listening to me. That’s so rare, you know? Having someone really listen to you instead of just waiting for their turn to speak. Someone who isn’t being paid to do it.”
“I guess.”
“It’s true. Now let me help you the way you’ve helped me.”
I sniffed back a fresh set of tears. “I don’t know if I can ever get over this,” I said, voice scarcely above a whisper.
“You don’t have to get over it. You just have to get through it.” Maverick’s jaw clenched, and his eyes turned steely. “And you will. I promised you before. I’m going to keep you safe. You’ll make it out of here.”
Part of me wanted to believe him, but another morbid part of me was slowly beginning to realize the dark truth. I desperately wanted to make it out of this hellish place, along with all the others, but it seemed increasingly likely that April’s fearful prediction from yesterday was correct.
We were all going to die here.