Chapter 3 #4
I glanced around, but right as I did, the wall next to me suddenly opened up to reveal a small, circular room.
The room was completely empty, but on the floor was what looked like a large, metal pressure plate of some sort.
That had to be what the voice was talking about.
I reluctantly moved into the room and stepped onto the metal pad, and I could feel the others following my lead.
Once we were all standing on the metal plate, the voice continued.
“Transport will begin in twenty seconds.”
I counted down the seconds in my head and waited for something to happen. I expected it to be similar to how we got on the ship the first time, but instead of a blue light, weightlessness, or a loss of consciousness, I felt my entire body start to hum and vibrate.
There was a flash of bright blue light that temporarily blinded me, and then the vibrating suddenly stopped.
It took a moment to recover my vision, and I really needed to start closing my eyes for these sorts of things, otherwise I’d end up permanently blind.
When my vision returned, I found myself in the middle of what looked like… a small café.
Wait, what the hell?
I glanced around.
It was indeed a coffee shop, though it wasn’t one I’d ever seen before.
The wall attached to the front door was entirely made of windows, and outside I could see the city… or at least, a city.
There were trees, roads, and buildings everywhere outside, and yet I couldn’t see any people out there. Nor did I actually recognize any of the buildings or street names.
If it was our city, then it was a part I’d never been to before. I checked again for any movement outside, but our group seemed to be the only people inside the coffee shop or even in the general area.
Everything looked deserted.
I couldn’t even hear any other signs of life, no vehicles, car horns, talking, or anything. Besides the low, pop music that drifted through the speakers in the café, everything was completely silent.
Where exactly were we?
Were we actually in a shop somewhere, or were we on a different section of the ship? Everything seemed so lifelike, was it even possible to project something like this?
But if it wasn’t a projection, then why was everything so… lifeless?
I studied the rest of the shop.
There were small tables everywhere and a few large booths. A large counter with a register sat near the back wall, and a menu was printed in big letters behind it.
Unlike the bedrooms and lounge area on the ship, this place felt more man-made, more human.
The only thing that seemed out of place was a robot positioned behind the counter instead of a barista.
The robot was built similar to the two little ones who had given us our collars, except this one was about three feet taller than they had been, and this robot also wore a little hat and apron with the café’s name printed across it.
What were we doing here?
Certainly we weren’t just here to get coffee, right?
I’d been tense since I woke up, and I was still tense now as I glanced around and waited for danger to appear.
We were in a game set up by aliens, so what was the punchline here?
There certainly didn’t seem to be any danger.
All of the other contestants had been studying their surroundings as well, and one of the women began to freak out when she looked out the windows.
“Oh, my god!” she gasped. “We’re off the ship.”
She stumbled closer to the windows and peered outside.
“We made it back.” There was an almost hysterical note in her tone, and her breathing grew more rapid as tears welled in her eyes.
She moved toward the door, and the others backed away from her as if she had a bomb strapped to her chest.
“We can leave,” she sobbed and gripped the door handle.
“Wait,” I interjected as I held out my hand to stop her, even though I wasn’t anywhere near her. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Why not?” she demanded through the tears, and she had an almost crazed look in her blue eyes. “The outside world is right there! Why shouldn’t I leave?”
How could I explain to her the gnawing feeling I had in the pit of my stomach, the dreaded sense of danger, or the alarm bells that went off in my head the moment her hand came in contact with the door?
“I just don’t think it’s a good idea,” I finally said. “We were brought here for a reason, and I don’t think any of us should just go running off.”
“I don’t give a s-shit.” Her voice cracked on the last word. “I can’t do this.”
A few of the other contestants began to voice their concerns about her leaving as well, but she ignored them, opened the door, and ran out.
I lunged forward in an attempt to stop her, but I knew there wasn’t realistically anything I could do.
The glass door swung shut behind her, and for a brief moment, all we saw was her blue dress billowing and her dark curls bouncing as she ran away from the café.
For a brief moment, I thought she’d be fine, too.
But then a pulse of light flashed down from the sky, and just like the male contestant who had been late, the woman outside was reduced to nothing but scorch marks and a pile of ash.