Kiss, Kill, Marry

Chapter 1

Gala opened her eyes. Her eyelids were heavy, so heavy, like little men were pressing down on them. Begging her to close them again. It was tempting, certainly.

She forced her eyes open with a start. Her surroundings were a blur of different shades of grey. And those damn fluorescent lights were giving her a migraine. Her room didn't have fluorescent lights. The greyness started spinning and her mouth tasted stale. She was so close to falling back asleep...

She woke again to an alarm which left ringing in her ears long after it stopped blaring. She was certainly awake now. She was sat in a grey room she didn't recognize. Just as she was starting to panic, she heard a monotone voice. She spun around in confusion. It felt like the voice was everywhere, trapping her, with no way to escape. There was no ignoring this voice.

"Hello, subject 323. In exactly 10 minutes, you will choose. Await further instructions. Failure to comply will result in severe punishment for yourself and the other subjects. Choose carefully."

The room finally stopped talking. She felt like she was being crushed. Her head was pounding and her throat was raspy. What did the voice mean, subject 323? What type of sick experiment was this? And what did it mean she had to choose? Choose what? Who were the other subjects? Why were her memories all blurred? Like she could see the general gist of her life before this damned room but individual memories were out of focus and distant. She could remember people though. Clear as day. It was as if her brain had made a catalogue of each person's interactions with her and their personality, their looks, everything.

She began to cry, more out of pure bewilderment than anything. She wished she hadn't taken her life for granted now. She was about to start looking for a way out when suddenly a hole appeared in the wall out of seemingly nowhere. She looked up and there it was. There was a thick layer of clear glass filling up her slight hope of a way to escape. A chair had also appeared under the glass window.

Through the window, she could see three people. Three people she knew, actually. There was her old friend, Alex, a swim coach she was friendly with and a friend of her mum's.

Written on the glass was "instructions". Were they written with marker? She touched it but it wasn't wet. It was written a while ago.

"Welcome to the first round of Kiss, Kill, Marry. We're going to play the game, 323. Remember that if you fail to comply, there will be severe consequences for you and your three fellows. The process is simple. Select the person you would most like to marry out of the three, the person who you would most like to kiss out of three, and the person you would most like to kill out of the three."

Below the glass there was a screen that seemed to be built into the wall. As far as she could tell, you clicked the person and one of the three options.  She glanced up at the three people. They were motionless and unsmiling, staring directly at nothing. She noticed that on the screen it did not say their name exactly, but more how she thought of them. The swim coach was called "swim coach", Alex was called "Alex" and the friend of her mum's was called "family friend". What type of sick fuckery was this. According to sci-fi novels, she should really not follow those instructions or terrible things were going to happen. But she didn't like the idea of severe punishment. Though she could feel that this was more than a game, she thought that she had better take the safer option. The option that made sure the least amount of people were going to possibly get hurt.

She sat down and looked at each person for what felt like hours. Who would she most like to marry. Who would she kiss. Who would she kill...

Marrying Alex would make the most sense out of all them. She trusted him and had a good relationship with him. Better than with these practical strangers. So for Alex, she picked the Marry option. The screen turned green when she selected the option.

She had always rather fancied the swim coach. She'd rather kiss her than someone just as old as her mother. She pressed the options before she could think about it too much.

"Congratulations, number 323. You have completed round 1. You will be provided with food and water as a reward for your obedience"

Obedience. She shuddered. Why was she being obedient in this loony place. Maybe she was mad and having delusions. Maybe this was a dream. But she knew that it wasn't. She could feel that this was real.

It was more real than she could ever imagine.