Betrayal

Chapter 5

Chapter 5 – The First Task of the Deadly Games

Adela picked up the gun reluctantly. She looked at it. Her father taught her how to use a gun since she was a child. She had won various world records and championships.

Two guards stood ahead, guarding a door. They moved sideways as to indicate her to enter. Adela walked pass them and the door opened up on its own. Adela walked in slowly and took a glimpse of the surroundings. It was a black room. This meant that the ceilings, floor and the walls were all black. There was no furniture in the room. Adela held her gun near her head.

"Welcome, to the first task," Thea's voice boomed.

"Oh, shut it. I am not a game, Thea."

Thea just merrily laughed. In front of Adela was a glass pane. Opposite the pane was a horrible sight.

Three men wore masks and were tied to chairs. The room was green. Chlorine, Adela thought. She is poisoning them.

"As you can tell, dear best friend, this is a highly toxic gas-filled room. Chlorine. But do not worry. The concentration is four hundred ppm, which takes about thirty minutes to do the job. Now, I will be giving you clues. This is a mystery. A game. You have ten minutes, Ada. They are all brothers. One of them killed their sister. Find out who it was." Thea said. "Also, you would want to hurry up. The concentration will be increases over time," she added.

"This is inhumane," Adela shrieked.

"Isn't that why we are here. I told you Ada. The hell is empty and the devils are here. Work with them and you get what you truly deserve."

"SHUT UP," Adela screamed. "You don't need the devils. There is God. He sees all."

"Of course, you and your beliefs. Nine minutes, Ada."

A guard came in and handed her a folder. She saw the masks being taken off the three men from the corner of her eyes. She had to do this. She opened the folder and took out the photos and the documents. She went through them one by one. There were four photos. One with all three of the brothers with their sister. The rest three were their photos after the killing.

She looked at them closely and then looked at the files. There were two documents. The first one had the date and the place of the killing. The second one held the details of the type of gun she was killed with.

"Eight minutes, Ada." It was Margaret. She was there too.

Adela looked at the gun. 454 Casull. The gun that could knock down an entire bear and similar creatures. It had a tendency to kickback a lot. She sat down and examined the files.

"Seven minutes," Thea yawned.

The gun. Why would Thea provide her with the information of the gun? Think Adela. She remembered her as a child doing the best among all the kids in the riddles her dad gave them all. She felt a flow of blood rising to her temples.

"You seem lost, Adela. Come back to the last five minutes," Thea mocked.

She glanced at the middle brother. She instantly knew it wasn't him. He wore glasses. If the gun had a large tendency for kickback, his glasses should have shattered and damaged his eyes. It was surely not him because in the photos after killing, his eyes were perfectly well.

She examined the eldest and the youngest brothers. They were both well-built to handle the gun.

"Four minutes."

Adela shuffled the files and cold sweat streamed down her face. She panted heavily.

"Three minutes."

It was then, when a small piece of information caught her eye. The place where their sister died was near the outskirts of town. The eldest brother was wearing a dress suit in the photo just after the killing while the youngest one wore a casual beach shirt with slippers.

"It's the youngest one!" Adela said at the top of her voice.

"Well done, Ada," Thea said slowly. "Now condemn him."

"What? You're going nuts."

"Do it or not," Thea whispered. A blank screen opened in front of her which made Adela squint her eyes. Margaret had a knife on Eurus's neck.

"STOP," Adela shrieked.

Adela pulled the trigger and took a shaky breath. She raised the gun like her father taught her. She aimed it at the youngest brother through the glass pane. A second later, there was a gun shot and a hole through the glass pane. Blood poured out of the man's head. Adela took a step back. She just killed somebody. She didn't even feel bad about it. She was a sociopath. She did not care.

"Well done," Thea cheered. "However, don't you think it's just ridiculous that the other two live too? Family is always together. Also, there is no point of them anyway. Who cares if a grain of sand goes missing, what do you say, Ada?"

"What do you mean?" Ada asked.

"This," Margaret said lazily and the next moment, two more gunshots killed the other two men. The guards motioned Adela to move through the next door.

Adela shook her head. This was insanity. However, she instinctively shifted, as though irresistibly drawn towards it. She leaned on a guard who did not budge and moved to the door. Who knows what horrors awaited ahead.

As she entered the door, she appeared on a road. A car was parked ahead. The guard held out a hand and opened the rear door. Adela entered the car and just as the door closed, the car started moving at once.

"Where are we going?" she asked the driver.

"Somewhere I was instructed," he replied.

"Thea and Margaret," Adela presumed.

The driver did not say anything. The windows of the car were tinted black from both inside and out. Adela could not make out where they were going. The only way was to peek in from the small hole which connected the driver's seat to the rear end of the car from which Adela spoke to him. Adela tried peeping from the gap but the driver simply shut it on her face.

"Scum," Adela cursed.

The car pulled over and the door beside Adela opened without a warning. She stepped out of the car and at least ten guards blocked her view from all directions. One of them stepped forward.

"I request you to move while blindfolded," the guard said, presenting a thick cloth.

"More like an order," Adela hissed.

"As you prefer to conceptualize it," the guard said stoically.

Adela reached for the cloth but the guard shuffled behind her and started doing it himself.

"I have hands, you know," Adela offered.

She was taken to what seemed like a tower. It took at least fifteen minutes to move up the stairs. It made her realize having eyes was such a big blessing. The guards did not seem to care of her stumbling and tripping over and over but hurried her even more.

"Here we are," announced Thea's voice.

VOTE!

(Chapter 6 --->)