I walk into the strange room seeing three people. There are various machines and devices all over the place. You could even describe it as a torture chamber. The odd part is that this one has three doors and not the usual two. Maybe the rooms and hallways aren’t entirely linear and some merge paths?

One is that bitch Claire lying lifeless on the ground some distance away, while two other girls are near the wall. One of the girls is crying while holding the other gently.

I walk up to the girls slowly so that I don’t startle them and ask what happened.

“We were looking at this plaque when this bitch came out of nowhere and stabbed my friend!” The red-haired girl spoke in-between sobs while looking down at the other girl with dark blue hair. The blood is pooling under her with each passing second until finally the dark blue-haired girl’s body relaxes and slowly slumps down.

“No no no no no! CHRISTINA! Please you can’t leave…you can’t…”

I look at them carefully, trying to find something inside them that is usually invisible. There it is…but wait…how is this possible?

I stare at them for a second and see the red orbs chained with a pure white bond that attaches to their souls. They actually suppressed their demons and are ruling over them…well I suppose it wouldn’t hurt if they took control of their possessions I guess.

I walk up to Claire's corpse and pat her pockets, eventually finding the pink vial. I open it with my teeth and take all of the liquid in my mouth. Forgive me for this girl… Then I kiss Christina and force her to drink it.

The elixir as it is known in my world is the epitome of magic itself. Known to bring the dead and fallen back to life. Some of the legendary elixirs are even capable of granting eternal youth and immortality…but this one looks like a regular elixir so it should do the trick with no after effects.

After she drinks the entirety of the elixir I get up and walk away knowing that they will be fine. I was about to leave when the red-haired one barrages me with questions.

“What did you do? Why did you do that? Who are you? Where did you...” I cut her off by telling her to shut up.

“One, I saved her. Two, because I wanted to. As for three…” My voice trails off as I think about how to answer that third question. Jake will probably come back sometime…eventually…I hope.

“I’m Jake.” I finally answer. I am only taking control until he wants to come back anyway. I reason with myself.

“Four, don’t bother because there was only one I found… So, which door did you enter from?”

The red-haired girl was about to say something when a soft “Uggghhhh Jessica? Where are we?” came from Christina.

“Are you alright Christina?” Jessica asks her with a big smile on her face.

“No…not really…I feel awful. Like there is a jack-hammer in my head.” Guess it was one of the lower quality ones then…

I wait for a few minutes so that I don’t interrupt their reunion. After a short time, I ask, “Which room Jessica?”.

She points to the door on the left side. I came in from the door behind me, so that only leaves the door straight ahead huh.

I walk towards the door and open it. A soft voice echoes behind me as I leave. “Thank you, Jake…”

Continuing down another hall, I look ahead with my eyes and mind wandering wherever. So many things have happened to Jake… he is young enough to be my son back in my world, the son I never had. I will protect him from anything that would cause him harm from now on. I solemnly swear to myself.

With renewed determination, I advance down the hall as it winds, turns and drops. Where is this hallway leading me? I wonder to myself.

After what seems like only a few minutes of walking, on one side of the hallway, there is a door labeled ‘SECURITY’ on it. I push it open with my left hand and it seems locked. I was about to keep on walking, my bracelet tapped against the door and I heard a ‘CLINK’ sound. I tried opening it again and met no resistance.

Thinking about various things, I see numerous monitors on a wall. Looking at the monitors, I eventually see one showing a boy at a table with a feast laid out. It looks like he fell off of his chair while clutching his chest. So, that is where the fifth key came from, he literally ate himself to death…well at least I don’t have to worry about a demon chasing me anymore. “Death awaits all who cannot complete the challenges.” I recalled solemnly.

Looking at the other monitors, I see other groups in various rooms. Some are lying in beds while others are eating and fighting each other. Many are lying face down or up without a single motion. Many of the rooms have what looks like blood all over the place and people slumped down against the walls. There are two more more monitors that read “Audio Room” and “Exit”. The “Audio room looks pretty modern with no traces of a fight. It seems safe enough… The other one named “Exit” is only a view of some forest and another has an image of a log cabin somewhere in that forest.

I exit the security room and see two figures walking towards me. When the girls see me they immediately start running. I turned around and was about to leave when I heard, “Wait up!”. A little curious, I turned back around and waited for them to catch up.

“So why are you following me?” I ask, only to realize that this is the only route to go. After internally face-palming myself, I change my question. “Err, what do you want?”

“Let’s go together Jake.” Jessica said with a smile while holding onto Christina.

“Yea I agree with her, we shouldn’t split up seeing as how we and you are still alive. Survivors should stick, together right?” Christina says with no hint of emotion.

Seeing no flaws in their logic and unable to counter, I simply say ‘alright’ and continue walking. After a few steps, sure enough, the pitter patter of two sets of feet follow behind me.

We keep walking through the winding plain hallway as we pass by many doors with each one having a different plaque. “Mess”, “Lab”, “Quarters” are just to name a few.

Coming to the end of the hall, we see another wooden door that reads “Audio Room”. We open the door and go inside to see a completely modern recording studio. I look around for a bit to try and find any clues to where the well-built man could have gone.

“This might have been where he was talking to us while we were in that octagonal room.” Christina said as if putting pieces of a puzzle together.

I agreed with her and continued to look around without finding anything useful except the glowing red “EXIT” sign for an emergency exit. I walk to the emergency exit and try to open it, but to no avail.

“There has to be an unlocking mechanism somewhere around here. Help me find it.” Jessica says to Christina and Me. I begin to look around again but still don’t see anything useful, until I accidentally drop something and get under the recording studio desk to pick it back up.

A small rectangular piece of metal with five dimmed red lights is built into the wall under the desk.

“Hey I think I found something.” I tell the other two.

I think for a moment before putting my bracelet against the piece of metal. Suddenly five lights dim on my bracelet as five lights turn green on the piece of metal. With a final ‘DING’ and ‘CLICK’ my bracelet comes off in two halves while the piece of metal on the wall returns to five dimmed lights. I rub my wrist, glad to finally have that annoying piece of technology off of me.

“This is the thing that takes off our bracelets!” Jessica shouts with excitement.

“No wonder the exit was locked, those bracelets act as a marker for who to not let out. Get close to an exit and the door automatically locks when you are near and unlocks when you aren’t.” Cristina says to complete the thought and fill in the gaps in Jessica’s statement.

Jessica and Christina each put their bracelets to the metal piece but only make three lights and two lights turn on respectively. Puzzled, they try to take turns over and over again. They every try putting both of them on the metal object with no luck. While figuring out what to do, another quote hits me.

“As long as one person or group has the needed keys and arrive at the end, all participants in that group may leave.” Eric’s plaque rang out in my mind. What if you have to put them together first and have them make a group?

“Try putting your bracelets together for a minute.” I tell Jessica.

She looks at me quizzically for a few minutes and then realizes something and looks at Clair’s bracelet

An idea forming in her head, she puts hers near Christina’s bracelet and waits for a few minutes. After what seems like forever, a ‘DING’ resounds and their bracelets have five lights each. One is five amber lights while the other is five green lights. One by one they both get their bracelets off and we head toward the door.

“How did that work?” Jessica asks me.

“The rules said that you had to be in a group, right? So how would the devices know if you are in a group unless they synchronize somehow?”

“Ah that makes sense. When they sync, all keys are shared between the group hence the red lights on the bracelet turning amber.” Christina chimes in.

I push on the emergency exit door again and it swings open with some effort due to the rusted hinges. The door opens into a brick staircase that winds upward somewhere. Being cautious, we slowly walk up the brick steps floor by floor until we hear an extremely loud voice.

“PROJECT HAS BEEN BREACHED. INITIATING FAIL-SAFE PROCEDURE. T MINUS FIVE MINUTES UNTIL DETONATION. I REPEAT- “

Throwing caution to the wolves, we immediately sprint up the stairs floor by floor. Floor numbers zoom past us, ranging from B-10 to B-6 as we give it everything we have to get out of this god-forsaken place alive. Four minutes…three minutes…two minutes…

We arrive at the door with just one minute to spare, so we immediately throw the door open and run into a forest. We keep running until a low deep “Booooom, boom, boom, boom, boom” Echoes beneath our feet.

The ground becomes unsteady as large parts of the earth cave inwards and outwards making cracks and spikes everywhere. We keep running while trying not to stumble and fall on any of the cracks or craters being formed by the multitude of explosions. “BOOM BOOM” The noise is amplified when we are near the cracks and tremors ripple across the surface of the grass making many birds take flight and animals flee for their lives.

We run farther and farther until we see an old wooden cabin with an open door and dive in. Explosions continue to ring out into the forest as we all huddle in a corner. After some time, the explosions fade away and the forest becomes still once again yet forever changed.

We look around the cabin and see an old house telephone. I dial nine-one-one on the rotator and hear a voice that I never thought I would hear again.

"Nine-one-one operator. What is your emergency..."