《Game》


 Part One: Attic

    Part one: Attic


    You¡¯re conscious, and yet you are not. You¡¯re aware that you were previously asleep, but your eyes are still shut. Finally opening them up, darkness still surrounds you. A window hangs above you on the ceiling, slanted slightly to indicate that it leads to the roof; that must mean you¡¯re in the attic¡­ Right? The moon graciously illuminates upon you in full body accompanied with a foggy cloud that tries to cover it; but, the stars decided to hide away for the night, thus, giving the night a typical gloomy ambiance. The coolness of the room doesn¡¯t suit you, and so your body almost subconsciously forces you to get up and swift around a little, to get the blood pumping and all. You start to adjust your eyes to the navy blue darkness and begin to see a vague glimpse of shelves around you, as per-usual for an attic. As you scan left to right the very dim light reveals a lamp in front of you, feeling a bit cheerful, you walk over and snatch it. It¡¯s an old fashioned one from the late nineteenth century, of course, so you need some sort of flame in order to ignite the oil.


    A silent noise catches your attention and so you listen closely. It doesn¡¯t sound like it¡¯s in the room with you, but underneath, where the dwelling place of a house should be, the spot where residents hang around. A knocking sound, someone¡¯s knocking at a door, or a wall, that¡¯s what you conclude at least. Who could be causing that knocking sound, and why? Once that inquiry comes to mind, you start to question your entire situation. How did you get up here? Is this your attic? What time is it anyway? Your focus drifts away from the noise slightly until you realize that it suddenly stopped.


    You decide to write it off and bring your attention back to the lamp problem, you still need matches in order for it to be useful. Searching the shelves with more precision, you fail to find any from where you stand, and so you begin to explore the room a little more. Stepping out of the moonlight, you feel around as to not bump into anything and end up hurting yourself. Nothing seems to be obscuring you as your bare feet scuffle on the old wood. Finally, your hands brush against something, another shelf. Feeling for something like a small box, your hands scavenge around the plank. The tips of your fingers bump into something, causing it to rattle; sounds like a match box. You reach your hand out to grab it, and to your relief, it is. Your feet stamper as quickly and safely as they can back towards the window light just to see how much you have now, so far, you can make out about five heads in there, that should do you good until you get out of this place.


    The hollow knocking comes back and catches your attention again. Does it seem closer than before, or did it just get louder? Why does this even have any importance to you? You should be fixated on getting out of this creepy house. Some psycho probably locked you up in here for a sick little experiment or something. Yeah that¡¯s it, that must be the reason you¡¯re here. You¡¯re not going to let this place break you, the sun will shine upon your skin again and you¡¯ll tell the authorities about this incident¡­ No¡­ They¡¯ll put you on needless pills; you should just keep this to yourself, and put it behind you once it¡¯s over.Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    The noise has stopped again and you regain your focus, you need to light the lamp. Your fingers fumble around for a match and you eventually pick one out to take from the box. The head of it scrapes against the wooden floor and a small glimmer emerges with a crack. Acting quickly, you put the match into the lantern and the flame is quick to rivet the oil. Finally, you have some light that doesn¡¯t have a gloomy ambiance to it! With your new and more comforting illumination you begin to explore more delicately around the attic. What lies on the shelves doesn¡¯t really bring a scare to you, just stuff that you would expect a psycho to possess: glass dolls, spooky masks, satanic antiques, charms, and a bunch of other nick-knacks. Looking around for a while, you can already tell that the person has some sort of mental disorder caused by extended isolation, it seems typical, but you won¡¯t let it get to you, you¡¯re strong. A slight scoff passes your lips in order to force will-power over fear, just don¡¯t run into the weirdo and you¡¯ll be fine. Some of the new antiques begin to gross you out as you walk around, like body parts of animals in jars, but none of it is overly disturbing. You then spot a ring of keys and pick it up. Oh what joy, now you can finally leave the attic! Your feet scurry over to where you remember the door chamber to be; but, as small as this place seems, you can¡¯t find the door that would drop you into the base of the house. Where did it go? You could have sworn it was right here! Maybe it was in another place? You walk all around again with your eyes to the floor in case you¡¯ve missed it somehow. Feeling more hopeless than before, you look up so that you don¡¯t get lost, everything looks as it did before and you place a picture of this particular spot in your memory so you look down to continue your narrow search.


    You jump at the sound of the knocking noise stationed so close and loud. This time it came from within the attic, where you are currently. The hearts within your own chest pumps your blood at an alarming rate for a few seconds and then stabilizes again. There was probably a few knocks, but that couldn¡¯t of been from the same thing that caused it earlier¡­ Right? That would be impossible since you didn¡¯t hear any doors open, especially the one that connects the attic to the rest of the house. Forgetting the matter, you continue your search for that opening. There it is again! It was closer this time! Where is it coming from?! Dear God, please don¡¯t let it be that psycho who stuck you in here! He better not be in this exact room with you! A third disturbing chime of the knocking fills your entire being with fear. Move-Your-Feet! One foot after the other and you take a few steps backwards away from where the clatter came from last. Finally regaining enough courage, you turn around and start to scurry all over the place in hopes of hiding from whatever it is that¡¯s making that noise. The chamber door comes into the dim light for your eyes to spot. Another sense of relief flushes into you while your knees bend so you can put your lamp down and shove the key into the lock to get this over with. Before the key goes into the hole one loud knock bangs directly from behind and startles you. In a panic, you turn just to make sure nothing is behind you, but nothing is within the darkness, at least, so you tell yourself. You go back to the key and put it in the lock. The click gives you hope again and the door opens up. Your careful to place your hands near the hole as a gripping mechanism as you lower yourself as much as you can into the base of the house.


    Finally, out of that place! You let go of the opening hole and land as softly as you can onto the floor, once again surrounded by the darkness of the night.

 Part Two: Hallways

    Part Two: Hallways


    Darkness consumes you once more as you land on the wooden floor of a hallway with a great thump. Quickly, you search around in the still of the night, wondering if there¡¯s anyone else and if they heard you. Based on your assumption of no noise other than the nature outside, you figure that you¡¯re in the clear for now, but it would be best to stay quiet and leave the lamp behind. The creep could well be in the house asleep, hopefully. You take this chance to sneak around for a way out, and surprisingly, the place seems to be in decent shape from what you can tell in the darkness. According to history, usually creeps who are messed up enough to kidnap someone for their own bazar fetishes tend to live in abandoned houses that don¡¯t exist to society and lack in the aspect of being cared for. Your feet do their best to slowly and gently take you around the area without alarming the culprit with a loud squeak from one of the floor boards. Of course, you ended up in the upstairs of the house considering that you just came from the attic, that would make sense. The house is relatively large, like a mansion almost, so getting around as quietly as possible is a bit of a challenge on your energy and collectivity. Each room you pass by you make extra precautions and effort into making less noise than a mouse in case anyone is sleeping there. You made it this far, so it would be a tragedy if that psycho caught you now. A majority of the doors are closed so worrying about anyone seeing you from their bed is the lesser of your obstacles.


    Suddenly, your heart drops at the sound of a door closing. You become stone as you listen for the sound of footsteps in order to locate the other living body in the house. It¡¯s faint, but you can hear the silent squeals of wood moving beneath bare feet that aren¡¯t yours. They¡¯re coming closer. Quick, hide somewhere in one of the rooms! As quickly and silently as you can, you make it to the closest opened room and crawl underneath the bed frame. Now you lay there in the coliginosity, awaiting your fate on if the mad-man will find you, or you get to live longer for your next trial to come. The moon shines in through a window that hangs over the bed and the blue light dimly illuminates the door leading to your very room. This setting of the resting area could be an advantage to you, if you weren¡¯t playing the psycho¡¯s version of hide-and-seek. The footsteps come closer and closer to your direction. Did you duck and cover just in time for the person to miss you, or did you give your position away by running and making more noise? You hold your breath as the gentle creaking of floorboards become eminent to your ears. The moment of the feet passing your room finally comes into play, but you don¡¯t see them. You¡¯re pretty sure that the noise of someone walking passes the door frame that¡¯s right in front of you, but not even a silhouette of a person comes into view. This confuses you to the point where movement isn¡¯t an option any more. A pit in your stomach forms and screams at you to stay put underneath that bed. Maybe you can wait here until morning, when the guy leaves or something. It¡¯s not like he¡¯ll think to check under all of the mattresses in the middle of the night. How did you get here in the first place anyway? You try to recollect your latest memory that could potentially lead you to this situation, but nothing comes to mind.


    It seems quiet, the air has been hushed for now. Maybe this is your chance. Carefully, you slide out from underneath the bed and stand to your feet. Another moment of stillness passes through you before moving onward. There must be a stair case somewhere for you to reach the living area and head out the front door away from this dreadful place. Your feet glide you over the floor again and you make your way out of the room to anywhere, hoping to reach some kind of door that will lead you into the woods. Thank God for the dim moonlight from the windows in the rooms or using your sight to navigate through this hall would be awful! You finally see a window that faces you at the end of the corridor, that should give you a better clue to your exact placement in this house. It should also help with the location of where this house is. As you peek out the window, the moonlight does help with seeing how the house is in the center of a clearing in the middle of the woods. If you honestly had to choose between the wild and being stuck in here, you would go with the previous option. At least you can make up a general idea of what could happen out there, but staying in here with a psycho could mean torcher for you on all sorts of levels.The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    Enough of contemplating, you need to pick a direction to go from here. You decide to take the hallway on your right and begin walking through the darkness. The absence of light reminds your body that it¡¯s cold from the lack of heat in the night. The goosebumps on your bare arms come into your attention as you realize how much tension you¡¯ve been going through since you woke up in this absurd house. It would be nice to take a break from all of this just for one moment, however, the sudden darkness that you¡¯ve put yourself in does not help with that necessity. Your hands lean on the wall that¡¯s keeping you from the outside so that you can feel around to walk straight ahead. Now your senses are focused on your hands and feet to be extra careful and to not disturb anything that could make noise and alarm the psycho of your whereabouts. Instead of using your sight, as usual, you have to use your ligaments to see. It is important that you don¡¯t nothing but the wall and floor so that you don¡¯t knock over something or trip. Remember, you also have to take it slowly, that¡¯ll give you a better chance of detecting an object and getting around it instead of giving yourself away.


    After making a pitter patter with all four of your limbs for a while, your pace starts to quicken with the skill and repetition for roaming in such a way. The sound of faint scratching forces you to stop. You try listening for where it could be coming from. Standing still in the blackness is all you can do, that¡¯s your only way of hiding now. It seems that the scratching has stopped and so you advance forward with playing the blind person. A few steps in and it comes back, the clawing sound. It¡¯s closer this time, you can feel it. Not only is it louder, but you can sense that whatever is scratching, has also made its way closer to you. What happened to all the windows? You slowly turn around to see if the light from the window is still visible. There¡¯s nothing, or at least, you can¡¯t see anything there. How far have you gone? How big is this place? The scraping is moving from one place to another, you can tell from how it echoes differently every few seconds or so. Is it moving closer to you? You decide that it would be better for you to start walking to your destination again instead of waiting around to find the answer to that question. As you go even deeper into the shadows, you notice that the scratching truly is creeping up to you. Stopping where you are again, you hope that this will also make the unnerving noise stop as well, but it doesn¡¯t. It doesn¡¯t seem to be moving anymore, though, but it¡¯s still playing that creepy tune of screeching. Is this the psycho messing with you? You do your best in pushing your fear away in hopes of running into a wall or something with the noise continuing to follow you.


    Your hand finally feels a wooden structure in front of you. The material feels different from the wall. Your hands stroke to wood until you feel a vertical crack with a cold breeze blowing in and a metal knob. You¡¯ve found a door! Can you open it? Your fingers wrap around the handle and your wrist turns. The sound of the metal turning inside the door to complete the mechanism fills you with hope and curiosity for what awaits you on the other side. Still being cautious, you slowly open the door and pray that it doesn¡¯t decide to make a horrid creak. A set of stairs descend into more abyss with one single light handing above them with a flickering pattern. With fear of the unknown setting in again, you hesitate and simply stare at the nothingness before you. Suddenly, the scratching transfers into one continuous scrape along the wall, heading towards you! You turn around to see light illuminating from a window on your favorite wall, and hear footsteps stomping their way to you with the scrape. It¡¯s running at you! In a panic, you get to the stairs and shut the door. Something slams into it on the other side and starts banging on it to get through. You have to run and hide! You make your way down the steps as quickly as you can to get away from whatever the hell that thing is. You¡¯re hoping that the door got jammed or something, either way, you can¡¯t be captured by that psycho!

 Part Three: Basement

    Part Three: Basement


    Your bare feet stomp down the stares as quickly as they can for you to escape whatever the hell is after you. The bashing echoes behind you as you reach the end of the wooden stares and search for a place to hide. You notice, though, that once your feet touch the cold concrete the creature behind the door has stopped slamming on it. With dread and anxiety building up inside of you, your body turns back to the door to fill a deadly curiosity. The rapid beating of your heart pounds in your chest and throat. Adrenaline is rushing through your body and ready for any other surprise that this cursed house has for you. A lump slides down your dry esophagus and your breathing begins to slow down. Your logical senses come back to you for your thoughts to stroll back in so that you can remain calm. Taking back your logical side, you turn away from the door and face the darkness before you. The light above you still flickers in its intermittent routine as if it didn¡¯t care about your high blood pressure. Your only companions in this tenebrific part of the house are the twinkling lights above you who barely do their job in making sure you see where you¡¯re going. Swallowing up another fear in your throat, you force your body to take small steps down the hall. The lay out of the basement seems a bit strange to you: A hallway just like before with rows of closed doors laid out and waiting for you. You, of course, don¡¯t care much about the mysteries of the place anymore, you just wish to escape and hope to live another day.


    As your bare feet contact the cold floor with each step, you can sense that something is behind you. Something is watching you from behind. Something is following you. You dare not look back as a lesson you learned from before. That might provoke the monster that¡¯s stalking you again. The feeling welds up inside of you as your back stiffens and curls with each passing second. You know it¡¯s coming closer, you can sense it. It¡¯s strange to think how this ¡°trial,¡± or whatever it¡¯s called, is different from the past two. This one isn¡¯t a noise like the others were, but a sense of someone¡¯s presence. Is this some sort of experiment that you were thrust into? What is the strange monster testing for? Is the monster just playing prey and predator with you? Is this all just a game?


    Your thoughts come back to the present of where you are. You¡¯ve noticed that you have stopped walking. You¡¯re simply standing in the hallway, staring down the blinking lights and doors that stare back impatiently. You begin to wonder what lies behind all these doors. Do they hide more inconceivable monsters, past participants of this experiment, puzzles to a dark past of the one who kidnapped you, or a secret of reality that no one should ever know; the truth of death.


    Eager to find the way out of this hell, your feet march forward to what you hope is the end of the corridor. The freezing chill of this basement slowly seeps into your skin and activates your body¡¯s natural way of keeping warm. You curl up your back even more and shiver as your feet continue their ambulating habit of your endurance. Thankfully, your eyes are now beginning to adjust to the lighting and you can now notice more details of the surroundings from the poor illumination. There¡¯s not much to speculate over other than what you¡¯ve already concluded. You suppose that the doors look older, more worn and aged, but nothing more. The sight of these doors and never-ending hallway starts to actually comfort you, like being able to predict it. You know that with one more step, there will be another set of doors awaiting your presence. You know what will happen and this somehow soothes you, just a little bit. You may not be able to see the end of the corridor, but at least you can guess that there will be more doors and another light above your head. You mustn¡¯t become too complacent, though, or you¡¯ll be stuck here forever.


    A foggy breath huffs air around you and the lights go out. You¡¯re in the dark again with that monster. The heartbeat in your chest picks up speed again. You hear the huff again with no designable location, it¡¯s all around you. What do you do now? Would groping your way around with the walls help? It would mean the end for you if you were to run into that creature again. At least you know for certain that this thing is having fun with you, otherwise, you¡¯d be dead now. Perhaps you can use this to your advantage. Play along with it¡¯s game, and then strike when you see an opening. You may have a chance to leave this place. You¡¯re not going to let this thing out-smart you.


    You stretch your arms out and start to lean one way until you bump into a wall on your left and begin your blind navigation once more. As your feet take small steps to what you hope is onward, one of them taps on something. Sensing the need to bend down and touch it, you feel the basic shape of a torch. Hope swells inside if you as you straighten up with it in your grasp. You feel around for the switch and turn it on. At first, the torch flickers from a dying battery, but after a few smacks it starts to function properly, but barely. You point it forward to see nothing new of the hallway. Hopefully, the flashlight doesn¡¯t give your position away to the monster who stalks you. The feet you wield continue down the hall as you expect an exit at the end, if it has an end.This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.


    As you slowly ambulate forward, a quiet breath sluggishly exhales on your shoulder. It¡¯s gentle enough to keep you from being surprised by it, but still creeps you out. You refuse to stop and turn around to see what¡¯s behind you. The fear of it killing you from its sight terrifies you enough to impede your walking. No matter how much air you try to breathe in, it doesn¡¯t satisfy your shot lungs from the fear that is developing within you again. Its breath gradually becomes heavier until grunts come from its exhaling. The voice is deep and demonic, too deep for a person. The appearance begins to form in your mind. Its groans are slow and heavy, only giant creatures like bears or lions have breaths this deep. You then start to hope that it¡¯s just a bear instead of an unknown monster. Bears exist, bear attacks happen, and having a common creature stalk you is better than a monster. There are classes that educate people on what to do about bears. However, these are too long even for an awesome creature like a grizzly. A tiger, or lion maybe? If that¡¯s the case, then why has it not pounced on you yet? Your feet refuse to go any further in fear of encouraging whatever the hell is behind you to strike.


    The breathing and snarling stopped. You don¡¯t recall hearing heavy paws thumping away or the sound of its breathing fading, but it has stopped. The courage slowly comes back inside your stomach and you brave to start walking again in the blackness with your torch. The desire of forever leaving this place swells inside of you, almost to the point of being unbearable. It doesn¡¯t matter to you if amnesia has cursed your mind or that it¡¯s possible you didn¡¯t have a life before this, but what you do care about is getting out of here and forgetting that this place ever existed. You then start to imagine what you want your life to be like in the real world. You hope for a family that is anxious to see you again. They would joyfully embrace you in their arms after your long absence. Perhaps you have a lover, or you¡¯re even married. Your friends would be ecstatic to see you again as well. It¡¯s almost certain that you have loved ones who are waiting for you, hoping that you¡¯re alright. Why else would you be so compelled to escape? The hall has not changed its form and continues to lead you in a single direction. That¡¯s a good thing, it means that you don¡¯t have to worry about getting lost. It also implies that the beast can appear in front of you and become a dangerous obstacle, though, so escaping must be quick before that happens. You can sense that you¡¯re getting closer to the end, you must be, you¡¯ve been trekking for a while now.


    The feeling of something stalking you then starts to tingle your spine again. You psause for a moment and twirl around to see if anything is following you. There¡¯s nothing from the shadows that you can distinguish. Nothing is following you, not directly, at least. There¡¯s still that giant beast you have to worry about and chances are that it never left you alone at all. Another noise then catches your attention. It barely echoes from a distance, but you can still hear it. Could it be the same monster? It¡¯s coming from the direction you¡¯ve past and that¡¯s where the beast approached, from behind you. You can hear it getting louder, coming closer, and becoming more distinctive as heavy paws with blades for claws. Two large eyes emerge from the darkness just outside your torch¡¯s reach. The yellow glow they give off exemplifies the beast¡¯s prowess as its slit-pupils lock on you. A wide grin full of white and sharp teeth grows under the eyes and span the width of the corridor. That same deep and low grunt-growl slips from the creature¡¯s fangs and greets you with all its sinister pleasure.


    Wasting no time, your body immediately turns back to the direction you were heading and bolt straight ahead. An awful roar explodes from behind you and causes your heart to beat even faster. Your feet plap against the cold concrete floor in a quick and consistent pace. It doesn¡¯t matter if there will be any new obstacles in front of you now, you can¡¯t let that thing catch you! Nothing about the hall changes, it continues its loop of dead lights and a row of doors on each side. Finally, a spec of light blinks into existence in the distance. As you advance your sprinting, the blimp gradually brightens up. You¡¯ve found the exit! Thank God, you can finally escape! Your pace quickens as the hope builds up inside of you. You can finally go home! The details of the light at the end become more distinctive as you come closer at an incredible rate. Its an old wooden door with a glass window replacing its top half to let in the light of day. Not wanting to stop for a second with the monster behind you, your arm shields your front and you brace for impact. The door breaks and splinters from your successful ramming and you burst out to the other side. You look back for a second with the flashlight in your good hand to see if the beast is still pursuing you. A nerve-wrecking howl reverberates not too far behind you. Not taking the chance, you continue your running and head off into the woods. A sharp pain shoots through the arm you used to break down the door. For now, you do your best to ignore it and focus on out running the beast. Nothing besides out running that thing matters right now.


    The fog in this forest thickens and makes it more difficult to see, but that still doesn¡¯t force you to slow down, nothing will. The adrenaline in your body keeps you to speed as you move further away from that horrible hell-hole. The brume thickens even more with a crisp coldness to keep the sweat on your body frozen. It thickens to the point where you can¡¯t even see in front of yourself anymore, yet you advance blindly forward with the same quick momentum. You keep running, and running, and running.


    And running, and running, and running¡­


    .   .   .


    ------------------


    You are conscious, and yet you are not. You¡¯re aware that you were previously asleep, but your eyes are still shut. Finally opening them up, darkness still surrounds you. A window hangs above you on the ceiling, tilting to indicate that it leads to the roof. That means you¡¯re in the attic.


    Right?


    END