ALICE

Chapter 16 - THIRD

Chapter 16: THIRD

 Alice slung her gun over her shoulder, and continued to move after the shadow puppet show's light dimmed to nothing, and the tent and phonograph dissapeared into thin air, as mysteriously as they arrived.

 She walked for hours, stepping over mushrooms that grew on the forest floor, that at one point she considered eating. She decided against it, since there was a chance she would keel over and die from them. She walked for hours in the same directions, ignoring the steps that still stalked her, keeping her weapon ready to fire in case of another soldier.

 Alice thought about the MP5 that she cradled, and considered killing herself. No, that was a bad idea, she had to get home, she needed to talk to her mother again.

 Alice walked and walked, thinking about what Tibbar and Ecila had said. There was no way that they were talking about her, after all, the dialogue was on a pre-recorded record! But there were stranger things happening here then interactive dialogue, and Alice needed to get out of here.

 As the sun went away completley, Alice looked around in her dark surroundings that she had been walking in for more then a half hour. She needed food, she needed sleep. Alice could only satysfie one of those needs. She grabbed a rock off of the ground, and carved an arrow in the ground, pointing in the direction she was going, so she didn't get turned around again. Then she lay down against a tree, with the gun ready to fire, in her lap with her hand on the trigger. She got as comfortable as she could, and closed her eyes, which almost instantly delivered a dreamless sleep. 

 Alice awoke again as the sun was rising, the hunger pangs bouncing around her stoumach and throat. She looked down in front of her, and saw that her gun was gone. So was the arrow she had drawn in the ground, and there were bootprints everywhere. Alice was wearing Converse trainers, and the prints were definetley not hers. She stood up quietly, and heard a whispering voice.

 "She looks like Alice, but she doesn't have the scar, she's in civvie clothes not seen for years, and she's in the middle of the damned forest!"

 "If she is a victim, and we don't take the oppurtunity to kill her, then Alice will kill us herself!"

 "But what if she isn't a victim, and it's Alice? What happens if we kill her?"

 "That's impossible! She was at base yesterday!"

 "Look, let's just take her to the base, figure this out. If she's a victim, we kill her, if not, we go from there."

 "I'm not risking that, you know what happened the last time we tried to capture a victim? She killed eight guys with her bare hands, including Hatter, and he was a friggin legend!"

 "Fine kill her, but I tried to stop you in the report."

 "Whatever..."

 Alice heard the slide of a handgun going back, and knew what she had to do. She got up and silently got behind another closer tree. She pulled her pen out of her pocket, and clicked it open as the man realized that she was no longer there. He spoke to the other guy, 

 "Crap, she's gone." He said to the other man as he pulled the bolt back on a larger weapon.

 The other man joined him, and Alice chose him as her target, as he was slightly behind the other guy. Alice didn't hesitate to whip around the tree, put the tip of the pen to his neck, and pull the handgun out of his vest, aiming it at the other guy.

 "Stop." She said, pulling back the hammer on the handgun. "Drop the gun." He did so, letting his MP5 clatter to the ground, and pulling his handgun out of it's houlster. It fell to the ground, shortly before his knife. "Hands on your head, turn around slowly." He did so, showing a red bandanna over his face, orange tinted tac-glasses, and a brown kevlar helmet with a headlamp on. 

 "Where are we?" Alice yelled at him, straightening her arm that held the gun. 

 "Don't you know?"

 "Don't be smartass, or this asshole dies." She pulled the knife from his belt and put that to his throat instead of the pen. She pushed it in just slightly, making the man gasp and writhe.

 "Okay, okay, just calm down. You're in The Forest."

 "I told you not to get smart with me!" She aimed the gun at his chest.

 "If you kill me, you're not getting anything out of me."

 "Right." She shot him in the leg. A spray of blood flew into the air as he fell over, clutching his leg and screaming in pain.

 "It's a victim, Carpenter! She's a victim! Screamed the man that Alice had hostage.

 "What is this place!?" Alice yelled, screaming viciously over the cries of the two men. "What is going on?! What the hell is a victim?!" She struggled to keep her thoughts together, resisting the primal instict to just kill them both, she needed information. 

 Was that primal instinct? No, it was a voice. 

 (Italics) Kill them both Alice... The show must go on... (Italics) 

 Alice pushed the man she was holding in front of her. He turned around, his hands raised, trying to defuse the situation.

 "That's enough, okay? Just stop, that's enough."

 "You're right, that is enough." She put a round in the second mans head, stopping his moaning instantly. Alice pushed the other man over his body, making him trip onto his back.

 "I want to know everything."