Tick Tock Part Four - The Mouse Fell Down

The Choice

His throat ached as he swallowed. The flesh of his neck was tender, as if his Adam's apple had been bruised. He coughed, wincing and pushing himself up to look around. This room was very much like his own, which begged the question, just how big was this fucking basement? He was pretty sure from the thickness of the walls and lack of windows, that's what it was. His eyes ached from having his oxygen cut off. Being choked out sucked. It left his head throbbing behind his eyes and his vision fuzzy. He noticed, as he shook his head, that he wasn't alone in the dimly lit room, which was about as big as his current bedroom.

He frowned as he looked at the two men, each one tied to a chair. The first was older, maybe early forties, and clearly the country type. He was wearing a dirty white vest that was tight around his sagging gut and dusty jeans that suggested he'd been walking through bogland recently. His walking boots had once been tan like his own, but were currently caked with dry mud. He had long greying brown hair tied in a low tail, not even bothering to hide his receding hairline. There was greying stubble on his chin and down his neck, suggesting he didn't bother with upkeep, but shaved fairly often. Grey eyes stared at him with a sense of raw indignation, which made Gavin think he probably didn't know who'd brought him here.

The second man was younger, maybe late twenties. Unlike the first, his pale blue eyes were wide in terror, head darting this way and that as he squirmed and tried to slip free. He had wisps of hair on his pale, gaunt cheeks, unable to grow a proper beard. His hair was thin and sandy, fairly short but untrimmed. He was wearing worn jeans and a denim jacket that was a little too big, making him look even more feeble than he actually was. Both men were gagged, hands tied behind their backs with their ankles tied to the uncomfortable metal chairs to stop them breaking free.

Perhaps if the first man hadn't been so large and clearly angry, Gavin might have untied them, but something felt off. Even the slimmer of the two, weedy as he was, set off his danger sense. He didn't feel safe, as if he'd been left in a cage with an angry gorilla, or maybe something worse. Rather than going towards them, he stumbled further away to get his bearings from a safe distance. His head was still foggy as he rubbed his face and leaned on the wall, noticing a small table over to the right. He frowned as he noticed a gun on it. The phck?

He approached cautiously, lifting it to find it was his own make and model. It wasn't his. That was impossible. He'd left his gun in the-He didn't have his gun. Popping the clip, he found one bullet inside, an icy feeling trickling down his spine as he realised the name of the game. Shooting himself was out of the question. No way could he do that to...to anyone. Even Hank wouldn't want to find him like that. The bullet clearly wasn't meant for him to use on himself, and there were only two other people in the room. Two people he knew nothing about.

There was no way he was just going to shoot one of them for no reason. He was an officer of the law, and he took that duty seriously. Putting the gun down, he skirted the walls instead, ignoring the two men as they hummed and grunted around the grubby white gags for attention. He wouldn't kill them, but he wasn't about to let them loose, either. If the rules were that one person had to die, then he knew for a fact they wouldn't hesitate to play the game. If they're even allowed to play. The chairs didn't move or scrape, so he could only guess they'd been bolted to the floor.

Circling the square room told him nothing he didn't already know. It was a comfortably large space, a little bigger than the interrogation rooms at the DPD. The walls were painted white, thick and cold to the touch. The floor was white cement, dirty but not stained. He could only guess this wasn't usually a kill room. The only door in or out was, unsurprisingly, locked. It was heavier than the one in his bedroom, made of metal, like the old cell doors in a few of the older prisons. There was a window that could slide open and close, and a flap for trays and small items to be passed through. No windows, no vents that he could see, and no air conditioning.