MasukBLAYNE"The boys are still searching, but so far, there's been no progress."I poured some wine into my glass, the quantity a little more than was required. I drank clumsily and the wine sluiced over the lip, running down my white turtleneck."Damn it!" I hurled the bottle at the wall and the last of the wine fanned out and stippled the paint.My fingers dug through my hair as I turned around to face the bunch of losers that had the nerves to breathe in the room with me."And you're here because? I thought I gave strict instructions not to return until she's found?" God, I was trying. Trying so fucking hard not to lose it and grab the gun that had been itching for attention."We're sorry. I promise you, we searched all night. We really don't understand how she managed to get past us."I turned to the window and let the laugh happen, raking my fingers through the mess on my head."So, you're telling me my girl suddenly vanished into thin air?"I tucked my hands in my pant pocket as
For the first time, I got to understand what it meant to 'lose track of time.'Because I did.I couldn't tell you how long I'd been buried under that tile. Hours? Days? Only that when the church finally quieted, I knew it had been long enough. I even felt the instant the church emptied, indicating the men were out.The hole had been a safe space. Another set of people had come into this very room after the first ones left. They searched again, turned over tables and ended up with nothing."I don't think she's in the building. She might've gotten away before we arrived," one of them had grunted before they left.I knew it was safe to come out now, but I couldn't find the spine for it. It was too dark, and the air out there must be thick with blood and the coppery rot of bodies.Josephine. The thought pressed like a fist against my ribs. Where could she be? She must've gotten a good place to hide, or better still, found a way to leave the church.I was so suddenly grateful she wasn't th
The night took our side, drawing the blinds across the sky, and as if the world had taken our side, we came across an isolated abandoned church.We stopped running, everyone panting like we'd run the year out of the calendar."I don't know about y'all, but I think I'm hiding in there. Can't run no more," one girl wheezed, bent double.No one disagreed. We made our way into the building through one of the broken windows and hoped the guards would run past it.The inside was dark. One of the girls suggested we check around for anything that could be of help, maybe an abandoned cellphone or something. That was hard to do, considering the darkness, but we managed. In the end, nothing."We should spread out and hide. Give it some time. When we sure the guards must've passed through, we'll keep—"Gunfire cut her words in half. Windows shattered, glass raining down in furious applause. We dropped to the floor while covering our ears as the holy place choked on bullets.They found us. Even th
Two other girls were suddenly pinned, their masks slipping as they attempted to fight back, and that was when I realized it—five of us had made it out of our rooms. All five.Everyone else was busy clawing and thrashing, trying to salvage order from chaos, and me? I just sat there, mouth wide open, eyes glassing over, helplessly watching the scene in horror.The driver barked something in a foreign tongue that was too furious to be anything but curses and yanked the wheel into a brutal turn. One of our girls reached for him, wrapped a hand around his throat and tried to stab him in the neck. But that was unsuccessful. Next thing I knew, our car was screeching off the road.I clamped my eyes shut and screamed into the sound of everything crumpling.It was noisy one minute, then quiet the next. The silence was so thick I thought it would crush me.My eyes stayed closed, too scared to open.Dead.Dead.Dead .Everyone was dead.The cleaner in my room was dead.The three in the van with u
I made it to the utility closet where eight cleaners were already assembled. The total number of cleaners that did come to clean the place were eight. If every one of us was successful from our various rooms, then there were only three original cleaners here.I glanced at the faces of the girls as I discharged the things from my cart. It was hard telling who was who as the masks covered from the nose to the mouth, revealing just the eyes. The bonnet covering the hair didn't make it any easier.Josephine had blue eyes, but there were two girls here with that eye color. God, please tell me she made it. We'd be leaving any moment.I'd just finished emptying my cart when a shimmer snagged my eye. It was the back of a shelf door. Instead of wood, it was designed with glass.It definitely wasn't designed to be a mirror, but right now it was one.I stood rooted, caught by the eyes staring back at me above the mask. They were black. Not green.My fingers itched to touch the reflection, to fee
She looked mean. I could also tell she'd be calling for help any moment if I didn't return to the floor."I—I need to pee." My nails picked at a loose thread on my sleeve."What do I care? You know the rules, bitch. Get down on the floor and hold that clit till I'm done."I trapped my shaking hand under its twin so she wouldn't notice. I dropped back to the floor under the window and counted the seconds until she turned back around to continue mopping.My heart was no longer beating; it was sprinting, tripping, crashing into the walls of my ribs like it wanted out.I closed my eyes, stacked breath upon breath, and let the voices argue me into action. Then I rose, this time not giving myself space to think.Not with the knife—hell no. I already came to terms with the fact that I couldn't do that.I picked up a rickety bedside lamp that hadn't worked a day since I came here, inched toward her, and brought it down on her head with a bone-thick crack.She lurched sideways, knocking into t







