Chapter 20
Brooke
When dawn splits the basement with harsh fluorescent light, the guards storm in. Sarah screams when they grab her ankle, dragging her across the floor. No one helps because no one can.
They haul us like cargo toward the pool room.
The pool room is a white tile nightmare, bright, clean, too mocking for what it is built to contain. The water steams faintly, but the air has that wrong cold, the sterilized kind that seeps into bone.
On the table, a neat fan of laminated cards.
Elliot stands beside them grinning, a host welcoming contestants to their final episode. Sophie stands nearby, smile stretched thin, eyes hungry. She looks like she is ready for someone to bleed immediately.
“Good morning,” Elliot says cheerfully. “I hope you slept well. That luxury is about to expire.”
He takes a slow step forward, hands clasped behind his back. “Today is our card game. A long-standing tradition. One of my personal favorites.”
Miles mutters, “Fuck.”
“Here’s how it works,” he continues, tone still polite. “In a moment, each of you will step forward and draw a card from the deck. When it’s your turn, you’ll reveal your task. And then…” He smiles wider. “You do what the card says.”
He gestures toward the guards stationed at the corners of the room. “Some tasks are physical. Some are… behavioral. Some require endurance. A few may require assistance.”
Sophie’s eyes light up at that.
Elliot keeps going,. “Most tasks are survivable. But not without… modification.”
He lets the silence sit for a moment, then steps in closer, lowering his voice.
“If you refuse your card, you’re flagged for elimination. In case you’ve forgotten, elimination is not symbolic.”
He looks toward Enzo, who remains motionless with the gun raised at his side. Enzo cocks the gun with a slow, deliberate click and raises it without a word. Elliot gestures casually toward him, like presenting a show prop.
“You will complete your task, or you will be eliminated. There are no redraws. There is no opting out.”
His gaze sweeps over them, assessing. “Let’s begin, shall we?”
“First up, Sarah!” Elliot announces cheerfully, as if he is calling roll in a classroom instead of orchestrating a goddamn torture game.
Sarah flinches at the sound of her name. Her entire body trembles as she steps forward, arms wrapped around herself like they might keep her from falling apart. Her fingers barely hold the edge of the card as she turns it over.
A picture of shattered glass, scattered across blood-streaked tile.
She goes pale.
Elliot grins. “Walk it.”
Her lips part, like she might beg or argue, but nothing comes out. Just the shallow rasp of her breathing.
She takes one step toward the strip of jagged glass waiting on the floor.
The first shard pierces the arch of her foot. She gasps, body jolting, blood beading immediately, then spilling down in a hot line. Her toes curl instinctively, but there is no safe place to step.
Another step.
A shard lodges between two toes and slices upward as her weight shifts. Her breath hitches. Her teeth clench so hard her jaw visibly locks. Blood smears across the tile as she keeps going.
By the fourth step, her heel slips in her own blood.
She goes down hard.
Her knees slam into the glass. The crunch is wet and immediate, shards driving through skin and straight into bone, slicing deep until they stick. She screams, the sound bouncing off the cold, concrete walls.
She tries to crawl.
Her hands meet the glass, and it tears straight through the pads of her palms, puncturing the skin until red drips steadily from her fingertips. Her breath comes in panicked bursts as she drags herself forward, sobbing and bleeding.
She doesn’t make it far.
Her arms give out. Her body collapses onto the pile of glass, twitching.
Two guards step forward, grab her by the elbows, and drag her away. Her blood streaks across the tile in long, broken smears. Small shards cling to her skin, embedded too deep to fall free.
Elliot claps once, slow and sarcastic. “Well, she gave it her best shot.”
No one else moves. The silence is heavy. Dread thickens the air like smoke.
“Jared. Come on down,” Elliot says, like he is hosting a game show.
Jared doesn’t move.
Then, trembling, he wipes his nose on his sleeve and steps forward. When he flips the card over, he makes a sound that doesn’t belong in any living human.
Teeth. The number five. Pliers.
His knees give out.
“No,” Jared whispers. “No, no, please—”
Two guards are on him instantly. One slams him onto the tile, pinning his chest with a knee. The other grabs his jaw and forces his head back against the floor.
“Please don’t—please wait—” Emma’s voice cracks as she screams, but another guard shoves her back.
Jared fights, but it doesn’t matter. His hands are wrenched above his head in one violent motion, wrists locked down. His sobs turn frantic. “Don’t do this, please, please—”
Sophie steps forward with a pair of heavy pliers in her hand.
The steel tips catch the light as she kneels beside his head.
Jared screams before the metal even touches him.
The first tooth is one of his front incisors. She grips it tight. The pliers scrape against enamel before locking in place. Then she twists. Not a clean pull. A wrenching, grinding turn that cracks something deep in his jaw before the root tears free.
Blood pours instantly, filling his mouth and spilling down his cheeks as he shrieks.
He thrashes, but the guards hold him steady.
The second tooth comes slower. A canine. She rocks it back and forth first, loosening it, stretching the ligament until his screams turn into choking sobs. Then she yanks. The root tears free in one long, sickening rip, trailing tissue with it.
Blood pools under his head, darkening the grout between the tiles.
By the third, Jared is gagging on his own blood. Sophie shoves her fingers into his mouth, feeling blindly, selecting the next victim. She clamps down on a molar this time.
It doesn'twant to come out.
She twists harder. The cracking sound echoes. The crown shatters under pressure, and she has to reposition, digging the metal deeper into the broken stump.
When it finally tears free, he screams so hard his voice gives out mid-cry.
The fourth and fifth come in brutal succession. Another incisor. Another molar. Each one wrenched loose with a violent jerk, each one accompanied by that same sickening pop and a spray of blood that coats Sophie’s fingers and the front of Jared’s shirt.
His jaw hangs slack by the end of it. Blood runs in thick streams down his chin and neck. When the guards let go, he doesn’t sit up. He just lies there, hands twitching, mouth flooding red.
Sophie stands, expression calm, then drops the pliers onto the cart beside her.
Jared sobs so hard his whole body shudders. Blood bubbles at his lips.
Elliot claps once, cheerful.
“Look at that. A brand-new smile.”
Emma makes a broken sound beside me and folds in on herself, arms wrapped tight around her knees.
I stare straight ahead, nails digging into my palms until my hands ache.
Elliot claps once, the sound sharp and pleased. “Wonderful. Emma.”
Emma breaks before the name even finishes leaving his mouth. Her hands shake as she grabs the card, nearly dropping it. When she flips it over, she freezes.
A metal plate. A hand. Flames carved into it.
Her breath stutters. “No. No—no.”
Elliot watches her, head slightly tilted, like he’s working something out.
Then he almost smiles. “You know what, Emma,” he says, voice calm, almost reassuring.
“It’s actually not that bad after a bit.
First part’s rough, yeah. But give it a few seconds…
” He shrugs lightly. “Your nerves die. Stops you from feeling all of it.”
She shakes her head harder, panic spilling over. “Please—don’t—please—”
He meets her eyes, steady. “You just have to get through the beginning.”
The guards grab her before she can pull away. They drag her across the floor toward the wall. The plate glows orange-yellow, heat rolling off it in waves that warp the air. Sweat breaks across Emma’s skin instantly, dampening her hair, streaking down her neck.
She fights them, heels scraping, sobbing so hard she chokes on it. They wrench her arm straight and slam it against the metal.
The sound hits first. A wet, violent sizzle.
Then the smell.
Burnt flesh, thick and choking, sinking into the back of my throat.
Emma screams.
It tears through the room, high and jagged, loud enough to make my ears ring. Her skin blisters on contact, swelling and stretching before splitting open. Clear fluid spills down her arm, hissing as it hits the plate. Parts of her skin stick there, pulled tight against the metal.
Elliot doesn’t look away. “Very good, Emma. That’s probably the worst of it.”
Beside him, Sophie inhales slowly, like she’s savoring it.
“Mmm,” she murmurs, a faint smile pulling at her mouth. “Smells like Beth in here.”
Emma thrashes, howling, her voice cracking raw.
When the guards finally tear her away, her arm does not come free cleanly. Strips of skin peel off and stay behind, stretched and torn. Patches of raw muscle glisten beneath, red and exposed, trembling as air hits it.
Emma collapses to the floor, sobbing and rocking on her knees. She clutches what is left of her hand and forearm against her chest, fingers curled around something no longer recognizable as her own.
The smoke drifts upward.
Elliot finally turns his attention to Miles.
“Miles,” he says with enthusiasm. “You’re next.”
Miles steps forward, but he moves like his body is on a delay, like whatever keeps him anchored has already slipped loose. His hand shakes as he draws his card and turns it over.
An eye. A needle.
A broken sound escapes him before he can stop it.
The guards grab him immediately. One yanks his arms back and locks them high behind him.
Another clamps a hand around his jaw and forces his head still, thumb grinding into the side of his skull until his face angles just right.
Miles kicks and twists, breath coming apart in short bursts, but the hold is firm.
He is positioned for precision, not mercy.
Elliot steps forward. He takes the needle himself.
Miles sees it coming and starts to sob, a thin, frantic sound that shakes through his whole body.
“No. Please. Please!” he yells, words slurring together.
Elliot brings the needle to the inner corner of Miles’s eye.
The tip presses in slowly. The surface gives under the pressure, bowing inward before it finally breaks with a soft, wet pop.
Miles screams.
The sound tears out of him, loud enough to scrape along the walls.
Elliot keeps pushing. The needle slides farther in, forcing its way deeper as blood spills instantly, running hot and fast down Miles’s cheek.
Clear fluid follows, dripping and streaking as his eye shifts helplessly around the metal.
Miles thrashes harder, legs buckling as his scream cracks into choking sobs. His voice fails him, breaking down into breathless, animal sounds as Elliot continues unbothered and unhurried.
When the needle finally comes free, it is slick and dark.
Elliot steps back and hands it off without comment.
The guards release him.
Miles collapses immediately, curling onto his side. He clutches his face, fingers pressing uselessly against an eye that leaks and bleeds between them. His body shakes in sharp, uncontrollable spasms while small, broken noises slip out of him.
Elliot looks down at him for a moment.
Then he lifts his gaze.
“Next.”
Then he smiles at me.
“Brooke.”
My legs feel boneless, but I force them forward.
My card flips over.
Blue water. Lungs. 120 seconds.
Sophie actually bounces on her heels.
“Ohhhh,” she croons. “This is going to be fun.”
Elliot gestures to the pool.
“Let’s see how long you can keep that pretty head under.”
The water ripples like it knows exactly what it is about to take from me.