Stranded In Salem

The Escape

Norma's POV:

Knowing none of them would be able to go back to sleep, the three of them carried on down the hallway. Even just thinking about Mateo's corpse made Norma feel sick. It had only been about a week since she & everyone else had been trapped in this experiment, but it had felt like an eternity. She could barely even remember the other people who had died.

On the topic of death, Norma had wondered: were they actually dead? The answer to that, she was unsure, but Ollie had mentioned before Bennie's execution that this whole "game" was just an experiment. With that circling around in her mind, Norma had hope that everyone who had passed would still be alive, somewhere.

Thinking about everyone else made Norma feel a little determined to get out of here. However, that determination quickly faded away when the group came across 2 doors.

On the left was a door labeled "Security." The door on the right was labeled "Main Office."

"Guess this is the end of the hallway." Luca sighed.
"What do we do from here?"

As Norma racked her brain thinking about what the group could do, Ollie spoke up. "I.. think I have an idea," they said, fidgeting with something in their pocket. "but it might be risky."

"Can't be as risky as anything we've done in the past 2 hours." Luca shrugged. "What have you got for us?"

Ollie pointed toward the Main Office door. "He's in there." they mumbled. "That's where he usually is. Go in there & try to distract him."
"Distract him?" Norma questioned.
"Yes." they nodded. "Buy me a little bit of time."
"& what will you be doing?" Luca asked.

Ollie said nothing, approaching the Security door & opening it up. Why that door was unlocked, Norma had no idea. Ollie walked inside without another word.

Norma & Luca looked at each other.

"You ready, Norma?" Luca asked.
"Ready as I'll ever be." Norma responded.

Luca's POV:

Busting down the door, Luca & Norma entered the Main Office only to be greeted by a man already standing in front of them. He had light brown hair that went just a little bit past his shoulders, along with a little tophat that was half-&-half, black & white. His suit was the same. It was like he had no skin at all; he was made entirely out of almost raw-looking meat. He appeared to be wearing a green, fuzzy mask that covered the upper half of his face.

"Ah, Luca Warner & Norma Hart," he said, in the exact same voice they had heard over the intercom everyday. "What a pleasure to finally meet you in person, despite the dire situation we're in."
"Cut the small talk." Norma crossed her arms. "Who are you?"
"I am known simply as The Grunch. For the past 20 years, I have been working here in my laboratory, testing out many experiments. For fun."
"For fun?" Luca raised an eyebrow, unconvinced.
"Yes, for fun!" The Grunch grinned. "Now, normally, I hate working with actual humans, but my ASM - short for Artificial Subject Maker - was already in permanent sleep mode, so I had to make do."

Artificial Subject Maker? What did he mean by that? Frankly, Luca was confused.

"The look of confusion on your face tells me you have no idea what that means, huh?" he asked. "I wouldn't expect you to. In a nutshell, the ASM used to make subjects for me to test on. Simple as that."
"It used to? Why would you shut it down?"

The Grunch rolled his eyes. "You two are a curious sort, aren't you? Always asking questions.. Luckily, I love to over-explain. One day, roughly 16 years ago, the ASM had made a most marvelous subject: Test Subject 0LL13."