Kill Team XIV.

Chapter 1.

The sound of static echoed throughout the room, sudden enough to make its occupants sit up sharply, loud enough to reverberate through their teeth. A second later, the static was replaced by a voice, its tone flat but stern.

"Attention, Players. You will be assigned a target. If you do not eliminate the target, you will become one yourself. The game starts in six hours."

The speakers cut out with another static-y noise, making the room's occupants jump. The following silence was deafening, only broken by loud, rapid breathing. Seven people looked at each other, confused and scared, before one of them finally getting up prompted the others to do the same.

Two of them went to the only door of the small, dark room. One of them was a tall blond boy with dark green eyes; the other, a dark-skinned girl with long brown hair and jet black eyes. They found it was locked and started banging on it, screaming for help.

Four of the others stayed where they stood, in front of the clean mattresses on the floor they'd woken up on, yelling at each other over the low table sitting in the middle of the room, demanding answers none of them had. One was tall, wide with muscle, with curly brown hair and light blue eyes. The others were considerably smaller. One boy with round glasses and unruly blond hair hiding his face, one girl with black lines tattooed as chains wrapping around her arms, and another girl with long red hair, trying to make herself even smaller by dropping her shoulders and hugging herself with thin arms.

The last one of them, a boy with tanned skin and dark hair, sat back down on his mattress, his back to the wall it was set against, face bored but body tense.

Incomprehensible words filled the room, shouted from all sides, before the girl trying to break down the door turned and saw the boy lounging on his mattress seemingly carelessly. He leaned to the side to reach the mountain of small water bottles in the corner of the room right within arm's reach from his position on his mattress, grabbing one and opening it before sipping quietly. The others took notice and gradually quieted down until they were all staring at him. He stared back steadily; dark grey eyes dull in the dim light. The girl near the door spoke up.

"Oh, please, do stay seated while the rest of us look for a way to get us out of here", she said, her voice steely and sharp.

"Is that what you were all doing?" he replied, smirk on his lips.

"Still more than what you've done", shot back the blonde standing near the door.

"And how's that?", he leaned forward, his eyes sharpening, boredom gone from his face as his words became more clipped and deliberate, "You two have been trying to open a locked door through sheer force of will while they shouted questions at each other that none of us can answer."

"How are we supposed to know that none of us has the answers if we don't ask?" the muscled boy asked.

At this, the dark haired boy, still seated, leaned back one more and put his hands in his pants pocket.

"Well, the last thing I remember is somebody knocking me out by hitting pretty hard me across the face, then I woke up here with all of you, none of whom appear to know anything judging from the fact that you just spent ten minutes running around like headless chickens. From there, wouldn't be too far-fetched to assume you all got kidnapped as well and therefore have no more information than I do. That", he said, waving his hand in a lazy circle before letting it flop back down to his lap, "is how I know. But if you want to continue pointlessly yelling at each other, please, go right ahead."

He smiled winningly, though his eyes reverted back to their dull, glazed appearance.

"If you know so much, how about you help us find a way out?" the tall blonde boy said, stepping away from the door, glaring at the other boy.