Vik:

"Now that's what I call a swan dive! GG, man, G-freaking-G." There's a moment of silence as Brandon uses his horrible redstone contraption to decide who is going to die next. I don't think any of us are going to get out of here alive. Lachlan was the one with all of the luck, and Jerome and Preston were the only ones who had the ability to just power through it. Mitch and me... We aren't strong like them. We aren't sure of ourselves like they were. We aren't hopeful idealists like Rob and Lachlan were. We see the truth and we can't run away from it.

Damn it, Lachlan. Why did I tell you to go? Maybe if I would've stepped up and taken your turn, someone might have been able to make it out of here to reveal Brandon as the demented, deluded nutcase he is. After seeing him... After seeing the flesh just melt off of his face... After seeing something like that, how are we supposed to keep going? How are we supposed to have any hope at all? The answer is: there is no hope. There's nothing to hold onto now as we take the same graceful, screaming swan dive that Preston did. He was our last viable player. Mitch looks at least as defeated as I feel, and we both know that, even if we do somehow make it out of here, there's no one waiting for us on the other side. Merome was destroyed. Poofless just doesn't exist anymore. Any chance Vikklan ever had of being a thing... Well, that's gone down the drain. It trickled right down the drain, right along with Jerome's and Preston's blood, and soon our blood, too.

"Vik?" I jump at the touch and I look over to see Mitch looking at me, his eyes full of helplessness and pain.

"Are you going to play, Vik, or are we going to have to do this the hard way?" I don't answer; I just step up to the iron table that had appeared in the middle of the room. On top of it are six identical guns with a Roman numeral printed beneath each, and there is an instruction sheet taped down on the right hand side. "I call this 'Texan Roulette.' All but one of these guns is loaded, just like in Texas. You have five minutes to pick a gun and pull the trigger on yourself before both of you join Preston in the ball pit. You can guess if you want to play with odds, but you don't seem like a gambling man to me. Are you ready to start the clock?" I just ignore him and start reading the note, hoping to find some way out of this.

One, two, three, you're the star,

But three lines won't get you very far.

No one wants to be alone,

But four are already still as stone.

If you want to win, don't pick five,

But do you really want to stay alive?

He planned this down to the second. He planned the order, he planned the games, he planned the deaths. He rigged the whole game, and this proves it. How else would he have known that four people had already died? There was never any chance for us to win against him, was there? He knew it would end this way and, honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if all six guns were loaded. What's the point of playing his game if there's next to no chance of Mitch and me walking out of here even if we win? What can I realistically do but pretend to play along until he kills me, anyway?

For now, I would like to keep my options open, so what are my options? I can either choose a gun with a bullet, or I can choose a gun without a bullet. I have to solve his little riddle to figure out which one has the empty chamber, so that's the first step in the plan.

Let's go back to the note. It sounds like it's one of the first three, so for now I'll count four, five, and six out of the game. Three lines... I'm not sure of that yet. I'll come back to that. 'No one wants to be alone' sounds like one is definitely out of the game, so number one is the answer to my first choice. 'Four are already still as stone' might just be there to throw me off and get into my head, but the fourth gun might be loaded. And he explicitly says not to choose the fifth gun, so that one is ruled out, one hundred percent. 'But do you really...' Do I really want to stay alive? I honestly don't know anymore. Without the others, without Lachlan... What is life going to be like without them? What will it be like to know that I'm still here, but I'm only here because they're dead? They had to play the game to keep Brandon from killing all of us at once. I sacrificed Lachlan for a chance to live. I should have died with him, and I'll never forgive myself for that.

"Three minutes left, Vik." Let's get back to work. The only part I didn't get was the one about lines. I've already ruled out numbers one, four, five, and six. That just leaves two and three. Three lines could obviously mean three, but it could also be referring to the Roman numerals for four and six. That means that number two isn't loaded.

I have my options now, but what is my answer going to be? Do I go with number one, or number two? Do I join my friends, or do I walk out of here today?

Was it ever really a choice at all? You only have free will if you have more than one option to choose from and if you are free to choose between those alternatives. I have no freedom here.

"The answer is two," I say as steadily as I can, and Pete nods in agreement as I grab the correct gun from the table and point it at my temple, watching the amazement on his face through the glass. I pull the trigger and make my choice.

I choose gun number one.

The Casino doesn't always win.