"I murdered her," Harri stated. "What do you mean how and why she died?"

"Harriet Beckham! I am literally three interruptions away from just killing you all here and now! Just let me explain what happened. This is why I told you to sit down. The longer you stand, the more impatient you get." He huffed, glaring at them all before continuing. "While we were figuring out the whole plan to kill Melody, we all quickly realised that I was the only one who actually wanted to kill anyone but for the plan to work we needed at least two murderers. That's when Aira suggested using Harri. Bare in mind, at this point we had all figured out that Mel wasn't a Joker and Aira just wanted her dead for her own reasons. Seungmin, Aaron and Kayleigh were all trying to find a way to get themselves out of it when we all got a message from the creators: there's no physical escape. Only one of us will have to survive for someone to escape and so we figured it would hurt us to kill Mel and all of the Hearts. But none of us wanted to do it so Aira suggested tricking Harri into doing it. Now, I should have figured out Aira was the other Joker at this point considering how experienced she was at manipulating Harri but I was too young and dumb to notice."

"I only suggested Harri because I knew she was the Joker and wanted her to prove it to the rest of you," Aira interrupted.

"Lies. Anyway, so devised a way to plant the idea of killing the Hearts into Harri's head. Every day for two months we would casually slip the words 'killing', 'death' and 'murder' into conversations and then we slowly began to add 'hearts', 'sing' and 'melody' in conversations as well. It's a skill we learnt from the creators. And then our next step was to make sure Harri trusted Aira enough to do anything and everything for her so we made sure Aira was always there at Harri's worst to cheer her up. The final detail was making sure Aira was the only one who remembered Harri's sixteenth birthday which also happened to be the day we invaded Pen 5A96. What a crazy day that was! That day, while Aira and Harri were talking to each other, Aira explained our plan to invade the Pen and nudged Harri a little to make her think of killing them. And Harri did eventually imply that was what she was going to do. To the naked eye, it seemed like our plan was a complete success but on closer inspection, you start to notice ulterior motives."

"To the naked eye?" Kayleigh asked. "Our plan was a complete success. Harri fell for it. That's why Mel died."

"I'm going to ignore that considering you only interrupted me to get me to give up on continuing the story. But our plan wasn't a complete success because the Hearts were already two steps ahead of us. You see, Harri didn't really want to kill anyone, especially not her teammates even though she didn't know them. This is because of the kind-hearted nature of Hearts. She quickly noticed how we began to incorporate specific words into every conversation and immediately understood what we were trying to do. She didn't want to involve herself with any of us anymore but, once again, because of her kind-hearted nature, she couldn't just ditch us so she began to arrive back at the cave later and sleep in longer to avoid us as best she could. Now, this is when things get a bit... confusing."

"Was the rest of this not supposed to be confusing?" Seungmin asked. "Wait, no ignore that. This is the third interruption."

"First interruption, actually. Kayleigh and Aira's don't count because they are doing it on purpose. You still have two more interruptions before I kill you all. So, as I was saying, this is where it gets slightly more confusing than the rest. While all of this was taking place, the Hearts remembered one key personality trait of Aira, she's persistent. So Mel began to get in contact with the creators, asking them questions about her until the Hearts were able to piece a puzzle together, a puzzle the creators never wanted anyone to figure out. They found a way to hack the escape." He paused, glancing around with a confident smile. "Tell me, Kayleigh, what are the diamonds' strengths?"

"We are smart and witty, why?"

"Exactly, Diamonds are the most intelligent out of all of us in this world. So if being smart and witty are your strengths, what are your powers?"

"We can vividly imagine objects and know all their dimensions, materials needed to make them and so on."

"And what is your power as the Ace of Diamonds?"

"I can speak said objects into existence."

"Perfect. Clubs excell in teamwork, their special power is persuasion, they can anyone believe anything. The Ace of Clubs can read minds. Now Seungmin, your turn."

"I'm not completely certain because I'm still learning them but I believe spades are good at fighting and... I don't know of any powers."

"I'll tell you then. All spades excel in fighting and their special power is having an advanced understanding about how both the human body and the creatures' bodies work. They know where to stab to kill a panther instantly and where to slit to prolong a wolf's death," Hyunjin smirked at Kayleigh. "Sounds familiar, doesn't it? Your special power as an Ace, Seungmin, is being able to slow down and speed up time during attacks."

"Wait, wait, wait," the Ace of Diamonds shook her head. "You must be mistaken. 'Hearts have an advanced understanding about how both the human body and the creatures' bodies work. I know where to stab to kill a panther instantly and where to slit to prolong a wolf's death' those are Mel's exact words. I remember her telling me that."

"Do you remember saying that, Melody?" Hyunjin asked.

She nodded, "I did."

"But that's not true, is it?"

"But it is true..." Her voice trailed off before her eyes widened upon remembering her real power. "No, it isn't. It isn't that at all." She shook her head, hand coming up to cover her mouth in shock. "This is insane. This is absolutely mental. There's no way-"

Hyunjin scoffed, "it was hard for me to wrap my head around it at first but once I did, it all made so much sense. All hearts possess the power to resurrect themselves. All of them can die and come back to life but only if they are killed by a fellow heart. No one except Mel and the creators know the power the Ace of Hearts has so I can't tell you what it is but it has to be linked to resurrection somehow."

"So, so sorry to interrupt but you said they can resurrect themselves if killed by a fellow heart, right?" Brea asked. "Does that mean-"

"Going back to what I was saying before, the Hearts hacked the escape. They needed a way to trick the Jokers into thinking we won, they needed a heart that was working them. They needed Harri."

"Wait, so I really am a heart? Not a Joker? At all?" Harri grinned.

"Man, you are slow. The whole background I gave you hinted at who the real female Joker is. Or do you want me to tell you plainly that Aira is the Joker? Because if so, there it is. Aira is the Joker and you are the Heart's Jack card. Aira took that title as her own to fool you into thinking you are the Joker. So yes, you really are a heart and the other hearts tracked you down one night to tell you their plan to have you kill all of them to hack the escape."

"So if Harri killed them all," Kayleigh furrowed her eyebrows. "How come Mel was the only one who resurrected herself? Where are the rest?"

"Brilliant question, Kayleigh. Now answer me this, what's the name of the creator you've been communicating with?"

"Why does that matter?"

"Just tell us."

"Fine. Her name is Esther."

"Aira, what's the name of the creator you've been communicating with?"

The shock on her face was evident as she muttered, "Bethany."

"Now, Brea, how did you figure out Aira is the Joker two months ago?"

"A creator told me."

"And what is her name?"

"...Heidi."

"You see," Hyunjin explained. "The hack the Hearts discovered was that if they die, there's a 'transition' state between their death and resurrection. If the system is overwhelmed, the transition state will fail and they will wake up in the real world instead of returning to this virtual world. And how do you think they overwhelmed the system?"

"We all died at the same time," Melody smirked, remembering the original plan. "That overwhelmed the system so all of us woke up and when we did, we met one of the real creators named Lisette. She hated the idea of putting us in a virtual world but none of her other workers would listen to her so she helped us hack the system and when we did, she gave us lab coats and basic information about the outside world. Then she introduced us to the other scientists, saying we were teen interns. We became part of the creators that day."

"At least, she introduced everyone except you," Hyunjin continued. "Because said your face was too recognisable and would give it all away so she put you back to sleep and that's how you returned."

"No," Mel shook her head. "There was more. Someone walked in while Lisette was trying to put me back to sleep. They got into a pretty intense fight which quickly turned physical. The person that had walked in... gosh, what was her name again? Avery! Yes, Avery. She grabbed the injection Lisette was going to give me and stabbed her with it. Next thing I knew, Lisette's body lay limp on the floor. Whether she was dead or alive, I haven't got a clue. All I know is that Avery panicked and made me promise not to ever mention a thing. I refused so she gave me a new injection that made me fall asleep. Last thing I heard her say? That she will make sure I never tell anyone."