Chapter Text
TW: GRAPHIC VIOLENCE, MURDER (Skip the whole Opening and start at Chapter One)
Opening:
A cacophony of screams and blood splatter echoed in your head as you made a break for the door. It was everywhere. Red was all you could see; red splattered doors, red chairs, red jacket.
They were killing each other. Oh, God, everyone was killing each other.
It didn’t even take much to get it started.
You slipped in a puddle of red and tumbled to the ground. The thump of your body smacking into the linoleum splashed the opaque slime, coating your cheek and soaking your clothes. Your vision blurred as you searched for the door, the pounding getting worse as a flash of movement caught your attention. Another body dropped to the ground, lifeless eyes boring straight into you. The student above them yanked the metal skewer out of them, head whipping back and forth in a frenzy for others.
He locked eyes with you, the whites stretched so large you could see all the way around his crazed iris. You scrambled to get to your feet and away as a hatchet whizzed past your head. Nicking your ear, it lodges into his throat as easily as sliding a knife through soft churned butter.
The muscles in his neck tense as fresh red seeped out around the hatchet, dumping in thick rivulets down his front as he sank to his knees, landing face first only inches from your feet. The metal skewer in his hands rolls aimlessly into the viscous lake of red you were seated in. Your hand lists to muffle a scream with the back of your hand, tasting putrid iron, the resounding nausea reminding you to get up before someone else came along. You desperately wanted to look behind you, but feared what you might find: just another fear driven person looking for their next target. Clumsy, you manage to stagger over the body and past another dying classmate, shoving him to the ground as he bled out. You don't remind yourself how inhuman that simple movement was.
The red door was just ten feet from you now, seconds away, surrounded by a tripwire of dead classmate, dead friends. You sob and choke on the back of your hand as you step on someone's hand, cracking a finger— a hand that had offered you a pencil just minutes prior. Your head swirled, vision blurry with tears and stinging with blood as your hands closed around the metal of the long bar handle. You threw all your weight against it. It doesn't budge. Your heart stammered as you grunt and push again. Again. Again. Next you know, you're sobbing and begging somebody to help you under your breath.
“Pull, don’t push,” a calm voice from your left droned. Your head whipped to the side. Hair matted to the bloody side of your face, the liquid faintly obscuring the person who spoke to you. A boy, his body turned towards the carnage with an almost serene look on his face.
Red eyes.
You yanked on the handle, swaying when the door gave way. It only opened a crack before bumping against the body of a classmate at your feet. Whining, you pulled harder, the body at your feet sliding with ease in the ever growing puddle. Your body slipped through the door the moment there was enough room, shaking your dizziness off and wiping at your sticky skin. There was no thought, only escape. Footsteps slapped against the tile as you sprinted the length of the hall. If you looked for long enough, you'd realise that you were leaving a small red trail behind you as the screaming got quieter. Further. Further still.
You didn’t know if it would ever be far enough.
Chapter One: Emergence
Darkness.
It’s surrounding you, the silence so thick a constant ringing plagued your ears like a scream. The cold from the tile below you seeped into the flesh of your cheek and the palms of your hands. If not for the floor, you’re not quite sure if you’d actually be able to tell up from down.
Where…
Where were you?
Stiff limbs pushed against the floor for you to hoist yourself up a bit, head scanning the pitch black void for something, anything; anything that told you a little bit about the space you were currently occupying. The room could be as big as the back of a semi truck, a bedroom, a barn, even. But there would be no way for you to know until you struck a wall. Your brows pinched together into a frown.
How did you end up here again, anyway? You shut your eyes, trying to block out the shrill ringing. Think. Put the pieces together.
It’s hazy, but you remembered something… a door.
A door? Is that truly it?
Though there was no breeze, a shiver passed through the hairs on the nape of your neck. Your shoulders pulled up and you ducked away from the sensation, squeezing your eyelids a little tighter before allowing them to open again.
An indescribable urge to look over your shoulder tugged at the side of your head, every muscle in your back taut.
Something was behind you now, staring right at you. Whatever it was can see you. Your lips parted, and you slowly pushed the breath from your body. Your heart was beginning to beat against your chest. Preparing yourself for anything, you gave into the urge and turned your head.
At first, you didn’t really see anything; however, the faint outline of a large object sat nearby. You took in another deep breath of oxygen as you fully sat up onto your knees, your eyes glued to the faint outline for fear of losing it. It’s clumsy, but you managed to shamble all the way to your feet.
The outline in the pitch black began to fill in like a few drops of ink in water, a ruddy brown teasing your sight. Was that the door you remembered? You found your legs were mobile enough to move freely, though you took every step with the caution that the floor might not be everything it seemed. After all, there could be objects, holes, or other obstacles in the place you were in, and you would be none the wiser until it was too late.
Once the door was close enough to touch, you stopped. There’s something else you’re forgetting. As if a reflex, you looked back in the direction you’re sure you came from. You could feel the gap in your mind yawning. Think. think. think.
Even though your voice was quiet, the whisper still cuts through like a rock tossed into a pond, “What am I forgetting?”
The deafening silence didn’t provide any hints or clues to the answer, only a faint reflection of your breath. Before you acknowledged you had done so, the door handle clicked and you were pushing it open. A white so dazzling it blinds you, enveloping you, shocking your eyelids into closing once more. It lasted only a moment, and then you opened your eyes to the new world in front of you as the door shut behind you.
“Another one? That makes us, what, 16 in total now?”
The visual stimulus all felt overwhelming at first. Walls the color of slate met the vinyl flooring that framed the modern classroom. Next to a short stacked set of lockers, a rather colossal deep green chalkboard spanned the majority of the back wall. It was clean of most markings except for the crude doodles a short blonde in high pigtails was currently making. From end to end, the classroom was packed with desks and people your age, though only a select few were electing to actually sit in the desks.
You made eye contact with the girl who had spoken, an anxious silence passing over everyone as all of their heads had turned to look at you. She had crimson hair cut close to her chin, bangs sweeping the middle of her freckled forehead to frame her sharp gaze. Her finger was poked into her cheek, her other hand pinching the pleated dull fabric of her skirt beneath an expensive-looking camera.
“I’m sorry?” You asked, both meeting and not meeting the eyes of those around you.
A sheepish looking girl wearing a pink, bubble sleeved dress and a white apron flinched and her hands flew up to her mouth upon making eye contact with you. “I’m sorry!” She cried out, turning her gaze down to the floor.
“Huh?”
“Who are you?” A different voice questioned with the intensity of the edge of a blade. Some part of you twinged on the inside in recognition, but only for a moment. You met eyes with one of the tallest men in the room. He had his thick arms crossed over his well dressed body, an appropriate shrewd frown on his icy features. Not a single sandy blond piece of hair was out of place on his head. In fact, the only thing that didn’t seem to fit his husky physique were the glasses he was wearing.
They seemed a bit too small.
He cleared his throat, “Ahem. I asked you a question.”
“Uh,” you straightened, not realizing you had spent so long taking in his appearance. “I’m… My name is Y/N.”
A snicker came from the blonde girl in the back as she abandoned her drawing, only to start another.
“Tell me,” came a rich, deep voice from your right, drawing your attention yet again, “Are you also a wayward soul that comes crawling from the depths of the netherworld?” The guy inquired with a completely straight face, a hand gripping the thick looking fabric of a scarf wrapped tightly around his neck, nearly covering the bottom half of his pale face. He had two completely different colored eyes, smudged kohl framing them as they seemed to peer through you.
“Ah, I– I don’t think so?” You weren’t quite sure how you were supposed to respond to that to begin with. You folded your arms close to you, starting to feel the pressure of the onslaught of questions and curious stares.You picked at the oversized puzzle-piece sweater that you were wearing over a white button up, the front of the ensemble tucked into your rolled up pair of corduroy shorts. Even the brown docs on your feet seemed to stare back at you.
“Are you also a freshman?” A graceful, elegant looking blonde girl inquired from just beyond the scarfed guy.
You nodded.
A pleasant smile spread on her face, “I see. That seems to be true for everybody here as well.”
“Well,” The icy boy who had scrutinized you earlier gave you a curt half nod, “You might as well get comfortable, then. You’re going to be the last one, so I can only assume the teacher will be next.”
A guy who you had previously thought asleep lifted his head from a desk, a firm red mark plastered over the top of his face, leaving a bright red streak between the planes of his pink hair. “Last one? How can you be so sure of that?”
“Well, they are the 16th student to arrive, and there are 16 desks,” The boy answered, a condescending smirk on his face, “Or did you not notice something so plain?”
“Hey!” The guy protested, energy bursting forth from him as he shot up to his feet. He pointed an accusatory finger in the cool boy’s direction, “Don’t go talking like you’re smarter than me!”
As they bickered, you took a step forward to slink further into the classroom-
WHAM!
You barely had the chance to register the pain of something hitting the back of your head before you fell forward, through the floor, and into the darkness again.
“Hey,” A gentle, raspy voice pulled you to consciousness, “Hey, can you hear me?”
A voice you recalled belonging to the pigtailed girl called out, “Oh my gosh, do you think he killed them?”
“I didn’t mean to!”
A burst of conversations amongst the group of people filled your ears.
You groaned softly as a sore spot bloomed forth on the back of your head, a dull throbbing of a second bruise on your temple forming from where your head struck the vinyl wood ground. Your eyes drifted open to all the commotion. Above you in a ring were your classmates, all huddled and piling over each other to peer down at you. Closer than everyone else, hovering almost directly over you was a pair of eyes unlike anything you’d ever seen; pale, mint tinged, with near white fracturing through the color like frost on glass. They were peeking out beneath a shock of white fluffy hair that haloed fair skin and his gentle expression of concern.
“They’re awake!” A booming voice came from a guy you weren’t sure was even your age, he looked like he was at least five years older.
Another face that was hovering nearby sighed in relief, the guy you presume had hit you with the door. “Finally. I was starting to worry you weren’t going to wake up.”
The boy sitting closest to your face tilted his head, drawing your gaze back to him, “Are you okay?”
Hesitantly, you nodded, wincing as the throbbing in your skull worsened, “I think so,” you croaked. A hand appeared in front of you, offering assistance.
“That’s good, we’ll just take it slow then,” he encouraged, waving his hand a little. You slipped your palm against his. His hand was cool and soft against yours as he tugged you up a little. Using the leverage, you heaved your body up until you were sitting, and then again until you were on your feet. Some of the faces around you dispersed to retreat back to other sides of the room, while others still held their gaze on you..
“So, what happened, exactly?” You slowly crane your head back behind you, where the door sat still in its frame. The boy with green eyes took a couple of steps back to merge with everyone else.
You locked eyes with the newest face in the room, a boy with neat brown hair and hazel eyes that didn't want to hold eye contact with you or anybody else. “I may have been a little careless when opening the door, and then you fell and hit your head.”
“A little careless?” The redhead girl put her hands on her hips, a pinch forming in between her sharp eyebrows, “They practically went flying.”
“Jeez, I said sorry!” His hand rubbed at the back of his neck, his cheeks flushing a brilliant red.
“He did say sorry, so we should forgive him! It’s not good to hold grudges!” The voice drew everyone’s attention to the front of the class.
The absolute freight train of a man bellowed, “Who’s there?! Where are you?!”
A quiet girl in a pink backpack answered in a monotone voice, “It sounds like it came from behind the teacher’s desk.”
“Alright! I see everybody has arrived! Let’s begin!”
Following a couple beats of silence, a swirl of glitter appeared out of thin air, following right behind the weirdest thing you’d ever seen.
“...” Your jaw was all but on the floor, eyes practically bugging out of your head as you watched this stuffed bunny in a magical girl outfit twirl into sight. “Must have hit my head harder than I thought,” you mumbled.
The boy who had knocked you out followed your gaze, “Uh, no, it’s real; we all see it too, anyway.”
“Seriously,” A tall woman with brown skin and wild hair cocked her head, “What’s with the talkin’ chihuahua?”
“Eh!? That’s a chihuahua?”
“I am Usami,” She twirled again, waving a wand with a winged heart at the end, “And I am your squeezable soft teacher!”
“H-Hold on,” A short boy with a pompadour was already sweating, “Let me process this, I’ve never seen a walking, talking stuffed animal before.”
As rounds of your classmates all reacted to the talking stuffed animal, you turned to look at the boy who had helped you up. He had his hands tucked into a long green jacket that both seemed like it was made for him, and didn’t fit him at all. It was tattered at the bottom, but still managed to cover the white t-shirt he had on underneath. His perplexed gaze was pointedly fixated on the front of the classroom until he noticed your stare. You fought the urge to flinch upon making eye contact, opting to shrug and shake your head in bewilderment. His lips tightened into a line before turning his eyes back to the front of the classroom, your eyes following just behind him.
“Now, let’s depart for the fun school trip!” Usami exclaimed in a sing-song manner.
School what?
The floor beneath your feet rumbled as if drawn from slumber, the sensation shooting straight through the soles of your shoes and tickling your feet. “An earthquake?” You muttered to yourself. The ground shook gently, though you had the feeling that something was building. The trembling ground grew in intensity at an exponential rate until items started falling off the walls. The noise was so loud that you could vaguely hear your classmates shouting, but no actual words stuck. Your arms reached out to steady yourself, and the graceful looking blonde girl took one of your wrists in her own hand to steady her own balance. A straight, thin beam of warm light cracked through the middle of the ceiling. You couldn’t move your legs without falling, so your eyes stared directly overhead as the gap of light widened and widened and widened.
And then you were submerged in white and warmth and the color blue.
The walls all fell away like flat pieces of a stage set, landing in the sand with a muffled thump. A warm, salty breeze swirled around you and your peers. Palm trees waved gently in the wind, the light, soft looking sand adorned with lush green and pink flowers. Beyond you, you could make out faint traces of a path and buildings in the distance. In front of you was nothing but crystalline waters that leisurely lapped at the shore. It was completely quiet as the lot of you took in the beautiful tropical paradise you had found yourselves in.
But weren’t you in the dark before you came here? You were sure you’d remember this.
Weird didn’t even begin to describe it.
The oppressive quiet shattered as the majority of the people around you began to panic, frantically asking where they were and how they got here. You screwed your mouth shut, eyes still scanning the horizon, as if you could sense where you were in the world if you just tried hard enough. Your trail of gaze halted when you locked your eyes with the same green pair that had you transfixed earlier.
You couldn’t find a suitable reaction to give him; how could you, when the world had stopped making sense? You had shown up to your first day of school, and then darkness, and now this? As your teacher spoke up to address you all and calm you down, you tore your eyes away from his, but your mind still hovered elsewhere as you desperately tried to make sense of it all.
Did your aunt know about this? She never would have signed off on a school trip without at least telling you first, right?
What was going to become of you?