The Dark Room / The Box

039 entered through the door to her left, entering it to see a familiar sight of a white room. She made her way to the center of the room, taking note there was no monitor raising from the ground. She was a player this round, a task much harder than that of an administrator for her. She sat down in the center, conserving her energy until the game would begin.

“Welcome 039, this game will be a dark game, a game played in the dark! In a moment the walls to your left and behind you will open, in total this game will be played across 6 total rooms! No light and no way to see you and 5 others will fight it out! Survivor is declared the winner! Fun right!“, a peppy sounding female voice said.

039 nodded looking up, she took a deep breath, this would be quite a pain. This game wasn’t really a game, more like a blood bath. Quite stupid.

“Oh I almost forgot! There is one other way to win! Just make it to the opposite side! Each of the 6 rooms will have a small glowing green number, find the one assigned to you and you will move on out of the room!“, the voice said.

Of course there was another way to win. Perfect, now that was more her speed. The lights went off, she could see a tiny flicker of light from behind her, a tiny 9 on the corner of her wall. So since she hadn’t been given another number to look for, perhaps it was a matching number she was looking for? It’s stupid to jump to conclusions, but what else could she do? A metal noise could be heard from the walls, they must have been rising, turning the small room into a much larger room made of 6 rooms. There was no real time to think, she just had to go for it.

Quietly she began walking forward through the darkness, she could hear the rustling of clothing coming from the darkness. She looked around her as she walked, and noticed something off. She had most definitely entered another room, yet she couldn’t make out any glow from the room’s number. This meant that someone was blocking her view of it. Were they covering it on purpose? Or was it that they were standing near her!?

She couldn’t panic, if they were close then making noise wouldn’t help her. She calmed herself and began walking forward again. She stopped, listening for any sounds, nothing. Quietly she slipped off her shoes, pulling them into her hand by their laces. She flung a shoe in the direction she had thought there should have been a number, listening for the sound of it hitting the ground. A thump sounded, had she not thrown it far enough? “BANG” echoed through the room, a gun shot had gone off. Had someone shot at the shoe, or tried to hit her? Or it could have been something else all together. Where had they gotten a gun? Were there weapons included with this game? Move forward, that’s all she could do.

Another gunshot would go off somewhere in the room, realistically there were most likely fewer players in the room now then when they started. Not everyone seemed to be going for a “no kill” win. Still holding her other shoe she thrust it forward as hard as she could behind her. It flew through the air and hit the wall where she might have started. As it hit the wall she let out a ” Augh! ” as if she had hurt herself. There was a rustle of someone or multiple players moving towards it. “Yes, move out of my way“, she thought to herself. Continuing forward then knocked into something or someone.

She dropped to the ground and rolled to her right where a wall should be. She rolled for a few seconds before hitting the wall. Worse she could now see the glow of a 5, which had been covered only moments before. Had the other person jumped and ran as well? Not wanting to fully get up 039 decided to crawl for a bit. As she crawled she passed a glowing 7, making sure at no point to block it. Including her own she had now seen 3, half of the total number of glowing numbers. Poor luck she hadn’t found her number yet. She continued crawling, suddenly jumping when she suddenly touched something cold. Not letting out a scream she carefully inspected it, it was a knife, she slid it down her side and continued on.

The sounds of quiet grunts and movement continued as she crawled. She eventually bumped into a wall in front of her, she had made it to the other side. Now all that was left was to hopefully find her number 9 as quick as possible. 039 stood up and with one hand on the wall quietly began walking beside it. At some point she would have to hit another wall, or the 9. As she walked she started to truly realize how quiet it had become, the sounds of fighting were now nonexistent. Even the sounds of people moving around had now disappeared. It appears only the stealthiest remain.

039 spoked the 9, she continued at her normal calm pace towards it. A hand grabbed her suddenly, it pulled her down and towards the ground. The small light reigniting from the 9 revealed the shape of a man as her attacker. His hand covered her mouth, not that she had any plan to scream and alert any other attackers. He pulled her into his lap, with one arm around her neck, and the other around her waist. He said nothing as his arm moved up her chest, 039 had to think quickly and remove herself from this room. He began breathing heavily on the back of her neck, sounding as if he had run a marathon just before this.

Although the man’s arm confined her left arm, her right was able to reach into her pocket to retrieve her best option of escape, the knife. She slowly pulled it from her side, making sure not to make any sudden movements that would alert her captor. The man seemed preoccupied by his own desires, his face close to her head smelling her hair. When she attacked him would he scream? Most likely, so she needed to knock him off her then get to the 9. Knife in hand she jumped upward, her head slamming into the bottom of the man’s chin, he let out a yelp as his mouth closed suddenly. He released his grip around her neck letting her push off of him. He made a grab at her legs, grabbing onto her left leg. He pulled at her trying to pull her down, 039 thrust the knife into where the man’s hand should be, piercing through it and a bit into her own leg. He screamed and pulled back, she kicked at him knocking him back. She dove for the small green 9 on the ground, her fingertips just barely reaching it.

The floor under her dropped and she fell downward into the unknown. Her fall was brief as she landed onto a floor she had come to know quite well. Now inside a new room with light her eyes had to adjust. She squinted as she tried to see if there was anything off about this new room. The room was clear, the basic white variety.

A young male voice spoke, “Way to go 039! You showed that creep who was boss! Boy was that short little fight more exciting than any other in that room! Wanna know what is happening to that creep right now? Huh? Well his scream kind of let everyone else know where he was, boy he isn’t looking too good right now! Scratch that I think he’s dead actually! Yup dead. Serves him right.“

039 walked to the center of the room and lay down. Man she could really use a break right now, but it seemed she was going to be a player once again.

“Okay this game is pretty much a cakewalk compared to the last! All you’ve got to do is stab a box!”

“Stab a box?“, 039 asked, looking confused.

“Yes. We are gonna give you a sword and you just need to stab that sword into a provided box a few dozen times.“.

“What’s in the box?“, 039 asked, although she could throw out a few guesses.

“Not important. Now here they come!“, the young male boy’s voice said.

As he said one of the tiles of the floor lowered down as a sword slowly came up through the hole. Then a wall slowly turned bringing a large box from wherever was on the other side of the wall. She pulled up the sword and walked over to the box. She reached down to examine it, it was wrapped heavily in tape and looked to be big enough to put a small animal in. She reached to pull off the tape when the young voice stopped her.

“Please do not remove any of the tape or open the box. Opening the box will result in your loss. Understand? Good, now stab it.“

039 sighed, this wasn’t a game either, it was just a test. She really wanted to play a more exciting game, but why? She hadn’t until now asked herself that? She was trapped who knows where, so why had she been disappointed whenever a room game didn’t live up to her expectations? No time to think, must win the game.

She raised the sword and prepared to slam it into the box. She stopped with the sword above it, thinking this over one more time.

“Stab the box 039.”, the male voice asked softly.

“If I stab it, will it result in anyone dying?“, 039 asked, worried what the answer might be.

“I am not allowed to answer. I will tell you that stabbing the box is the only way to win the room game. Stab the box 039.“, he said coldly.

There was no point in asking any more questions, she was basically being forced to do this. If in the event she hurt someone it wasn’t really her fault, it was whoever is forcing her to play these games fault for making her do it. She slammed the sword into the box, slicing through the box and hitting the floor.

“Now that wasn’t so hard was it? Again.“, the voice commanded.

She hadn’t felt anything, maybe the box was empty? If only things were that easy. Whatever was under the box had avoided the sword, or maybe the sword had missed them. She raised it once more and brought it down on the box.

“Again”

She did as told. This time feeling something as it went through the box. She stopped.

“Do not remove the sword please. We will provide you another.”

A new sword raised from the ground, it seems they didn’t want her to be able to see if the end of the blade was red or not.

“Stab the box 039.”

She had no hesitation anymore, raising the sword and slamming it into the box. Again she felt the sword hit something, but was instructed to leave the sword in. She continued this process until there were 5 swords left in the box. At this point the bottom of the box had turned darker, something was leaking inside. It must be blood, 039 knew it. Something had been stabbed 5 times now with a sword, so it must be dead or severely wounded. She felt sorry, but she was just doing what she was told.

“Congratulations 039 you have won the game! To move on to the next room please push the box with the swords in it into the hole which will open in a moment.” , the voice instructed.

As it said a hole in the floor opened, dark and empty with no end in sight. She pushed on the box, now feeling how heavy it was. As she slowly moved it she could see the box was leaving a trail of red marks, her fears were coming to fruition. No time to stop and think about it now, what’s done is done. She continued pushing the box until he came to the edge of the hole. As she pushed it over the edge she swore she could hear the noise of crying coming from the box, but it was too late. It flew quickly down the hole, and the door to her next room opened.

“I wonder what was in that box.”, she thought as she walked into the next room.