"Wake up..." 

I feel myself laying against a cold floor.  But I refuse to open my eyes.  I have to believe that this is just a wacky dream, and I'm still at school in detention.  I simply nodded off and am having a vivid nightmare.  There's no way that this is real.

"Wake up!" 

A part of me finally understands that this is very much real.  I bite my lip hard, tears welling up under my eyelids, and I muster up the courage to finally let my eyes flutter open.  I'm in a dark hallway, and standing a few yards ahead of me is a tall figure in a black hoodie that masks their face in shadow.  I have no clue what to do, so I just sit up and stare at the figure as everyone wakes up around me.  Tyler is the first to vocalize his thoughts.

"Where the H*LL are we?!" he yells. "What the F*CK is going on??"

"It'd be nice if you'd let me explain," the figure says dryly, a deep filter distorting their voice.

"Yeah, it would," Gabriella says bitterly as she gets to her feet, dusting herself off and adjusting her belt.

As soon as everyone, even Kat, is awake and on their feet, the figure clears their throat and begins to speak.  And as soon as they do, my heart drops as I process the words that I hear.

"Welcome to a little game I like to call Trivia Murder Party.  You may have known me as Mr. Myrrh, but here you'd be better off calling me [REDACTED].  No, you're not required to pronounce the brackets.  The rules are simple.  Answer my trivia correctly or you die," the figure says.

Tyler snorts. "Alright, who the h*ll put you up to this sick joke?"

Nathan jumps in, "This is ridiculous.  Cut it out or I'm calling the police."

[REDACTED] laughs. "You seriously think I didn't take your phones?  How dumb are you?"

I gulp as I realize that he's right.  I don't have my phone on me.  My legs are shaking, almost threatening to give out beneath me.  I want to cry, but I'm still in too much shock to do so much as say a single word.  Instead, I meet Cody's eyes.  He looks petrified.  

"Anyways, like I said, I'm going to give you a trivia question.  Your job is to write down on one of these little whiteboards the number corresponding with the answer you think is correct.  Get it wrong, and we get to put the 'Murder' in Trivia Murder Party," [REDACTED] explains, handing out mini whiteboards and dry erase markers.  I take mine with shaking hands.

"And what happens if we don't answer?" Sasha challenges.  

"I think you'll want to answer." 

Our kidnapper slides a gun out of his pocket.  He opens it, drops the bullets into his hand for us to see, and then reloads the gun.  My head is spinning, and everything suddenly feels all too real.  I choke back a sob, the tears welling up in my eyes.  We have to get out of here.  I have a life, a family, friends... I can't believe this is happening to me.

"Oh, and did I mention that only one of you will survive?" [REDACTED] adds.  I can feel his eyes on me as he talks.  And sure enough, I begin to sob.  Cody awkwardly puts a hand on my shoulder.

"It's okay, there's no way that he's actually going to kill us," the junior murmurs to me. "It's just a sick, sick joke."

If he didn't sound so unsure of his own words, I might have believed them.  But I don't.  I want to, but I know that he's lying.

"First question!" [REDACTED] says way too cheerfully. "You'll have thirty seconds to answer.  Which of the following is NOT one of Vigo's infamous nicknames according to Egon in Ghostbusters 2?  One, Vigo the Sadist, two, Vigo the Cruel, three, Vigo the Unholy, or four, Vigo the Despised."

I hardly hear what he says.  I stare down at my blank whiteboard, knowing that it's better if I write a random number than nothing at all.  Still, I can't will my hands to uncap my marker and write something.  Cody's finished, though.  He sees that I haven't answered and nudges me gently, handing me his uncapped marker.  I try to give him a grateful smile, but I don't think it ends up as any more than a sad look.  I take a deep breath and write down the number one, hoping that there is some chance that I'm correct.

"Time's up!  Who picked... number one?" My eyes widen as [REDACTED]'s words sink in.  I did.  I picked number one.

The kidnapper approaches my whiteboard, sees my answer, and nods in approval.  He goes down the line, searching for all of the correct answers.  Finally, he says, "Everyone, come with me."  He motions for us to all follow him into a room to our left.  As we enter, I notice that Cody is erasing the number four from his whiteboard.  We make eye contact, and he nods, panic flickering in his eyes.

"Welcome to the Killing Floor," [REDACTED] tells us as he shuts the door behind us.  "Since I'm still technically your substitute teacher, I'm going to have to make the game a little educational, which is why we're doing some math."

Sasha snorts. "This is so stupid.  We have to do math or we die?"

But as I look at her expression, I can tell that she's scared, too.

"Actually, you, her, and them aren't required to participate." [REDACTED] gestures to me and Kat. "The other five will have thirty seconds to answer as many math questions as they can on their devices.  The person who gets the least correct will die." He hands the five participants their phones, but I can see on the screens some sort of weird app pulled up.

"Oh, by the way, phone calls no longer work on your devices.  Not even the emergency calls can help you out here.  Try it, I dare you, but you'll be dead before you can even see that it doesn't work," [REDACTED] says.  Cody's finger hovers over the home button on his phone, but I can tell he knows that the threat is real, and he simply waits for further instruction.

"Alright.  Ready, go." [REDACTED] presses a button on his own phone, and I see the screen on Cody's phone change, revealing a mathematical expression.  He quickly selects the right answer and keeps going as fast as he can.

I turn my attention to Tyler, whose large hands are moving surprisingly fast and gracefully as he selects each answer.  He didn't strike me as a bright type, but his brains clearly went into overdrive at the realization that he might get killed.  Next to him stands Nathan, whose fingers are a blur.  Nathan is someone who certainly strikes me as a bright type.

"This is not happening," Kat says quietly from my left.  I don't think I've ever heard them speak before. 

"You of all people should know if we're dreaming or not," I tell them. 

"I don't think you want to hear my honest answer to that."

They're right- I don't.  I turn my attention back to Cody, and I see that his screen is frozen.  Without even glancing in my direction, he grumbles, "Misclicked."  

"And... time's up!" Every player's screen flashes with their final score.  [REDACTED] takes a look at each before his gaze seems to stop on Cody.

"Well, well, well.  Looks like someone couldn't keep up with the seniors," the kidnapper sneers.

I almost fall because of how badly my legs shake, and my throat is dry as I watch [REDACTED] remove a chubby orange doll from one of his pockets as well as a swiss army knife.  My brain can't comprehend what's happening at the moment.  Why isn't [REDACTED] shooting Cody?  Maybe this is really a cruel joke after all.  These thoughts don't stop me from trembling as a wave of dread suddenly washes over my body as [REDACTED] speaks again.

"Believe it or not, I've got better tricks up my sleeve than a plain old gun." [REDACTED] holds the orange doll against the wall and flicks the blade out of the army knife. "Check this out."

I don't want to watch.  But I have to as [REDACTED], in one simple swipe, slices the doll in half, stuffing spilling onto the floor.  My heart is racing as I try to understand why I'm freaking out so much over a doll getting cut open when I hear Cody let out a strangled cry.  I slowly turn my gaze to see a massive, open wound in his chest, the blood staining his orange shirt a deep crimson.  He winces as he collapses against the wall, trying to steady himself.  Blood drips from the wound into a puddle at his feet, and after a moment, he slides to the ground, his hands leaving a dark red smear on the wall as he falls, and he doesn't move.  I stare at the scene for a long moment, my brain shutting down.  

"Well, that's a wrap.  Let's keep going," [REDACTED] says.

And then I fall to the floor and scream.

(1520 words)

Things escalated real quickly.