When the Clock Strikes Midnight

6:00 p.m

I gasp, sitting straight up. I look around, trying to catch my breath. Everyone is laying on the ground. The ground with the maroon carpet. Which must mean that we are back at the study. I take deep breaths, trying to calm myself down. Tears spring to my eyes as I remember what happened back at the barn. I look around, trying to find Brady or Brittany. Suddenly my eyes fall on two people laying side by side with their arms crossed over their chests. I quickly scramble over to them then stop short. That's when I realize that those people are Brittany and Brady. I cover my mouth, stumbling backwards. I quickly turn away, not ready to have to look at their bodies. I hear someone start groaning and I turn to the source of the sound. It's Jack, who is just now waking up. I ran over to him, tears rolling down my face. He sits up, rubbing his eyes. I quickly jumped onto him, wrapping my arms around his shoulders. He wraps his arms around me and squeezes, whispering soothing things into my ears. I hear other people start waking up but I don't leave Jack. I don't know if I can. He suddenly pulls back and looks at me.

"What was that guy telling you earlier? I saw him pull you in and talk to you. I thought that you were in danger. I thought that he was gonna do something bad to you." I smile weakly, grabbing his hand.

"I was asking how we got there. Because it was daytime there. And he said that each competition thing was gonna be every hour. So it couldn't be daytime. So he explained things to me. But I'm guessing he didn't want anyone else to hear me. Because he pulled me in really close. I was scared, but I knew that he wasn't going to hurt me." Jack sighs, clearly relieved that I wasn't in danger.

"Well what did he tell you? You should tell all of us. That way we know a little bit more about this. Unless you don't want to. It's ok. You don't have to." I smile, rubbing his thumb with my hand.

"It's fine. I don't mind telling everyone." I stand up, pulling Jack up with me. I turn around and see Anthony crying on the ground beside Brittany. Jack tears up but walks over to him, kneeling beside him. Jackson is on the ground beside Brady, trying to hold back his tears. I walk over to him, putting my hand on his shoulder. He flinches and turns towards me, a tear rolling down his face. I kneel down and put my arms around him, pulling him into a hug. He wraps his arms around me and we fall to the ground as he starts sobbing. I hold him tightly, tears rolling down my face slowly. After a couple of minutes he sits up, wiping his eyes. He looks me in the eyes, still crying softly.

"Why is this happening to us? What did we do?" I smile, grabbing his hand.

"I don't know. But we have to be strong. We have to get through this together." He smiles, tears still rolling down his face. I stand up, pulling him with me. I walk by the fireplace, scanning the room. Once I see that everyone has woken up I start to talk.

"I know that everyone is grieving right now, but we have to stay strong. Now I have a piece of information that I need to share. So everyone needs to listen." Everyone sniffles but turns their attention to me, grabbing the hands of their loved ones.

"So when I was being held at knife point by the guy in the ski mask earlier I realized something. The guy over the TV said that these challenges would be held every hour. So there is no way that it could have been light outside. So I asked the guy about it and he told me that we weren't actually there. Every time we are "teleported" to a different place, we aren't actually going there. They had us all connected to a machine that made us think that we were actually there. So when the ski mask guy actually went to kill Brittany and Brady he would do something strange. Which I'm not sure all of you noticed. I saw both of their deaths and I saw that he couldn't actually kill them. He would just place his finger on their chest and a gunshot would appear there. So he can't actually kill us there. So we could find a way to cheat the system. We need to." Everyone stands there for a second, processing the information. Then Theo comes up towards me. He stands beside me, grabbing my hand.