Man Hunt

Chapter Nineteen - The Hunt Begins

I move with determination and with meaning. I am ready for whatever this island is going to throw at me; be it Alex, the psychopathic monster that started the killing, be it Niamh, my ex-best friend that so easily turned her back on me, or be it Aaron, the boy I loved that betrayed us. I am ready. I am ready.

The spherical LIS building comes into view, and we reduce our pace, just in case. Despite how cautious I am of meeting any of the other people left on this island, a small part of me wants to. I am going to have to face my problems sooner or later, so preferably sooner.

‘’Slow down Alice,’’ warns Kate.

‘’Ally,’’ I correct, ‘’I told you that you can call me Ally.’’

‘’Sorry, it’s just weird considering it’s been Alice since the beginning,’’ she explains.

‘’We should approach carefully, just in case we have company waiting for us inside,’’ I suggest.

‘’It wouldn’t be the first time,’’ she adds.

 I think back to the day she is referring to – the day things got much darker, the day Robbie died. We had been inside the LIS building, Robbie was on watch outside. The other team somehow managed to sneak up on him and they took him. They tortured him for his letter and he made the mistake of giving it up.

That was before any of us understood the consequences of doing so however. When he gave up his letter, the bracelet around his arm that we had assumed was for tracking purposes – as we had been told – electrocuted him, presumably. He was dead before any of us realised it. That was when everything changed.

That was when we went from kidnapping and torture, to outright murder. As barbaric as it sounds, it was the more humane thing to do. Instead of torturing the opposing team which would take an awfully long time and result in their death anyway, both teams seemingly mutually decided to skip the first step. By simply murdering, it was a lot quicker and the end result was the same.

‘’Let’s go, it seems clear,’’ whispers Kate as we ascend the stairs of the LIS building.

Cautiously and silently, the two of us make our way up the stairs into the spherical building, thankfully it is empty. As we enter, the monotonous robotic voice greets us, as usual;

‘’Welcome candidates, to the letter input station.’’

Kate does a quick scan of the perimeter and once we are assured of our safety – for now – we examine the input stations for each team. I notice that an extra letter has been added to each of the stations.

‘’Aaron’s been here,’’ I say, ‘’Niamh and Alex too.’’

I step up to the blue stand which is designated for our team, the screen contains just two blank boxes and the other four contain letters. I notice that the letter ‘Y’ has been added, it joins the letters ‘C’,’H’ and ‘O’.

‘’That girl’s letter was ‘Y’,’’ I explain.

‘’They added ‘R’, Jack’s letter,’’ she says.

‘’So they have three now?’’ I ask.

She nods her head, ‘’they have ‘R’,’E’ and ‘Y’.’’

‘’We could end this now you know,’’ I say, ‘’if we try think of what the word is, we have four letters.’’

‘’No Alice, er Ally. Don’t you remember what it said in our instructions? They penalise guessing, and from what we know of them already, I’m going to assume that the penalty is pretty extreme.’’