Johanna awoke suddenly, like she was trying to get out of a bad nightmare. She took a quick look around. It was dark and cold. This wasn't her room. She felt around, trying to find the light, but her hand hit the wall quicker than she thought it would. "Glass?" She looked up, feeling the four walls surrounding her. The back wall was the only true wall, and it was made with tile, and had three shower heads pointed down at her. She looked down. No drain. There was a bench along that wall, with a tape recorder and tape on it. Her eyes were slowly dialating, taking in the low light. She could make out a figure past the glass wall, laying on a circular patch. She didn't say anything, instead went to the bench and sat down, starting the tape recorder.
"Hello Johanna. You have stepped on everyone to get where you are right now." Who was this? How did he know her name? Flashbacks of people she had to fire and rumors she started were coming back to her. Is this why she was here? Was it one of her angry colleagues, trying to pull a prank? She clenched her teeth and continued to listen. "Your attitude toward people has caused you to believe that the rest of the world is full of sharks like you." She shook her head. What was that supposed to mean? It was true, she thought that everyone in the world would sacrifice her for a job, just as she had done to so many of her "friends". "That woman in front of you will decide whether you live or die today." She looked at the limp body laying in the middle of the floor. This wasn't happening. Someone she had never met would have to save her. This couldn't be happening. "Win her over, or you'll be the only shark who can't swim."
Johanna whimpered. This wasn't happening. This was some kind of nightmare. Soon, she would wake up in her warm bed, and go back to her successful career. She closed her eyes and started rocking back and forth in a fetal position on the bench. Suddenly, the lights came on. Johanna watched as the girl in front of her began to wake up.
Margaret woke with a strange pain in her back. The lights had woken her up. Why were they so bright? She felt slightly dizzy as her eyes adjusted and she was greeted by a woman in a shower type cell glaring at her. She looked around. She was sitting on a bright red dot in the middle of the room. She saw a similar red button in front of the other woman's cell. She held her head like she had a headache until she noticed the tape recorder next to her. She picked it up and examined it for a few minutes before she pressed play.
"Hello Margaret." She dropped the tape recorder and it made a strange noise, making the voice on the tape squeal before returning back to normal. "You boast about taking a bullet for a stranger, let's put that to the test." All she could do was sit and stare at the tape recorder. "See where you're sitting? Don't move." She took a second look around the room and noticed another circle surrounding her, with the red button just out of it. From an aerial view, it would almost look like a target. "If you move off that spot..." it skipped a bit, "...out of the ground and put holes in your neck." She grabbed her neck reflexively, and moved to a sitting position in the middle of the red circle. "In front of you there is another woman trapped. Her name is Johanna and you have never met before today. Within three hours, she will drown." Tears sprung to Margaret's eyes. How could she save her? Why was she being told this? "Unless you press that button in front of her." Margaret stared at the button, causing Johanna to stare at it too. The volume was low enough so that Johanna couldn't hear, but she knew something was happening. Margaret stared at the button as tears fell from her eyes. "If in three hours that button is not pressed, then you will go free, and she will be dead. It's time for you to make a choice. Let the game begin." The showers in Johanna's cell began pouring, and she screamed.
"Don't move." Margaret could hear the voice of the man ringing in her ears. "...put holes in your neck." She began to cry. Three hours. She tried to logical decipher where she was and what was going on. She remembered seeing "games" like this on the local news, and had even joked about things like this with her other nurse friends at the hospital. Now she was here. She dropped her face in her hands.
Johanna stared at the woman in the middle as the cold water hit her. "What are you waiting for!" She wanted to scream but didn't. She had heard the girl start her own tape but couldn't make out what it had said. As the floor underneath her began to fill she thought about her own tape recorder. She sat on her feet, keeping them off the soaked ground and grabbed the tape recorder, ripping the batteries out of it. She threw them into the growing puddle on the floor, and smashed the tape recorder into the glass. It broke into pieces. But why didn't the glass? "NO!" She started pounding on the walls with her fists.
"Do you have family?" Margaret shouted into the room, hoping Johanna could hear her.
She turned from her bruised hands and stared at her, not understanding what she had meant by it.
"I said, do you have any family?" She dropped her head back into her hands. What was she supposed to do? Save the life of a woman probably twenty years older than her, or save herself?
"Just help me!" She screamed. Johanna didn't have time for this. She didn't have time to talk about her cancer ridden mother, or her missing father, or her ex-fiancé she had left at the alter. She had gone into full panic mode, despite the slow pace of the showers. She had beaten her hands into the tile and plexi-glass for over 20 minutes, until her knuckles bled.
Time passed by, and Margaret could only think about her family. "My name is Margaret Vinard, I'm 27 years old, just had my baby girl, Abigail, about 5 months ago. She's wonderful. My husband's name is Phil, and he's wonderful. More ready to be a parent than I am, that's for sure." She started sobbing. "I'm a nurse.. And he's a teacher. I took a leave of absence for my baby and.. and..."
"HELP ME!" Cut Margaret off. Johanna was shaking from her soaked clothes and now huddled on the bench for warmth. The water was sitting just under the bench. It had been about an hour now. Johanna had given up on getting herself out of her cell, and now just waited for Margaret to make her move. She wasn't ready to die, just ready to put her life in someone else's hands. She wailed and screamed at Margaret, unable to say anything that wasn't a cry for help.
Margaret watched as the water rose higher and higher,washing the blood off the walls, and forcing Johanna to stand on the bench. Johanna had exhausted her voice by screaming for the past two hours, and could now only stare at Margaret. Looking into Johanna's tired, sad eyes, Margaret finally decided what she had to do.
She took a deep breath and looked at the circles on the floor. Her husband was strong. Her daughter would be strong. Her patients she watched at the hospital were strong. They could handle it. But she knew nothing about Johanna. Maybe she had a husband, a child. Maybe she didn't. But she wouldn't be responsible for the loss of another human being. Margaret wiped away her tears and threw herself at the red button, waiting for the ground to swallow her whole.
Nothing happened.
The showers had stopped, one of the side glass walls had fallen over, and all the water ran out, but Margaret was left untouched. An unnoticed TV set in the corner turned itself on, showing a disturbing puppet. Johanna helped Margaret up as the puppet began to speak, then looked for a door.
"You've made the right choice, Margaret. Now it's time for Johanna to make the same choice." A door in the wall opened up to reveal a shadowed figure holding a strange object. Margaret closed her eyes and hoped for the best.
"Choice? What goddam choice? Get me the fuck out of here!" Johanna shrieked at the TV, which then turned itself off.
The shadowed figure, in a low voice, then said, "Is that your final choice?"
Johanna could only scream. "LET ME OUT!"
A gunshot was heard and Johanna fell to the ground. Margaret's hands flew to her face and she sobbed with no tears. The shadowed figure turned to her and said, "She wasn't grateful for the gift you gave her."
Margaret pushed the figure out of the way and ran. She didn't know if she was being followed, but she could swear she heard someone in the background congratulating her as she stepped into the sunlight.