They didn't sleep at all that night, whatever happened the night before might happen again. They took turns staying awake, making sure nothing disturbs them while the others sleep. Gamma took the first turn, his mind wandering over to the mansion for a few times. Whenever he thought of the place, his heartbeat fastened. Gamma didn't know exactly how long he was up thinking about something that could've been avoided if they just didn't force Kuosu in there in the first place.
"Gamma, get some sleep." Alpha said as he shook Gamma lightly and pointed to the bed.
Gamma snapped out of his thoughts and looked around, he was still in his dorm, still by his friends. Instead of sleeping in his own bed, he decided maybe resting with one of his friends was a better option. He laid down beside Kuosu, who was currently sleeping peacefully, for the first time since the incident, and tried to sleep. However, the more he tried to sleep, the more he saw the image of the woman. Eventually, he abandoned the thought of sleep and sat up on the side he was on. Grabbing his laptop from his bag, he then proceeded to search about the woman and the daughter.
Inputting 'Hide and seek daughter' into the search bar, he hit enter and saw several results. Rolling his eyes at the top result, he scrolled to the bottom and began clicking into less popular sites.
"Why don't you click the first site that pops up?" Gamma would be lying if he said he didn't jump at Beta's question.
"Because the top results are a bunch of baloney people make up just to get page views. It usually is nothing but falsehood they claim to be true." Gamma managed out after calming his heart.
Beta didn't believe it and Gamma knew it. He scrolled back up to the top result and clicked the site just to prove her wrong. Sure enough, the site contained of several people claiming to be 'survivors' of the game. The more he read, the more upset he was. All the people there were very disrespectful towards the mother and the daughter. Calling them 'stupid' or 'slow' or even 'not worth their time'.
"Forget it." Gamma whispered and closed the website, he has had enough of their false claims.
Finally feeling drowsy, he lay back down on the bed and let sleep claim his mind. Beta looked at Gamma and recalled the last time he had actually been like this. It was when there was a suicide in their class. It was found out that whoever took their own life was bullied.
The victim of bullying was then later identified as one of Gamma's childhood friend. Whoever it was, they were not leaving the world until the truth was out. For weeks, Gamma had claimed seeing and hearing things. Of course no one believed him until things started moving on their own in their class. It wasn't something that wasn't easily forgotten.
Students then began claiming they saw and experience the same thing whenever they were near the victim's place.
o0o0o0o0o0o0o
The next morning wasn't anymore calming for any of them, even though it was their favourite day of the week. One reason, one place and one purpose they held an emotionless face most of the time. Tonight, was the night. The night they return to the mansion and try to finish what they had started. If they were to say they weren't nervous, to say they weren't scared, they would be lying to everyone.
"Tell me you slept at least for an hour last night..." Dorimu said as he sat down near Gamma.
"About 50 minutes before I woke..." Gamma replied.
It wasn't a lie, Gamma had fallen asleep for only 50 minutes before he sat upright in his bed, still startled of what they were going to do today. It was on his mind almost the whole night and he finds it hard to sleep with all the stress.
The thought of returning to the place where his best friend was almost killed was killing him. He would blame himself if he couldn't do anything to save his friend.
"You know he doesn't blame you right?" Gamma's head shot up as he heard Dorimu's question.
"What?" Dorimu looked over to the boy beside him.
"He doesn't blame you for any of this, told me it was his own fault he got involved in this mess. If he just had the courage to turn down whatever was dared for him to do, he wouldn't be in this mess. Honestly, no one knew it would've gone this far." Gamma let out a sigh as Dorimu finished.
He remembered that day clearly, there were rumours of the house being haunted but they didn't believe it. They wanted to prove everyone wrong. Kuosu had followed them for the sake of wanting to be part of a group. To be part of a circle of friends that actually cared for others.
It wasn't Kuosu's fault, it was theirs. No matter how hard people had told them it wasn't their fault, how they couldn't have known. Gamma still blames himself, Alpha and Beta for putting Kuosu in this situation. They pushed him into this, they forced him into something unknown and lied to him.
"It should've been me." he said.
"It should've been me who was cursed. We pushed him to do something we didn't even dare and lied to him by saying it's some stupid initiation." Gamma didn't realize he was crying until he felt the tears running.
The two boys didn't realize but someone else was listening. That person however, didn't blame Gamma for what ever happened to him. He blamed himself for being weak whenever he was dared to do something. He blamed himself for not standing up for himself.
0o0o0o0o0o0
"You're going to what?!" Gamma was quite surprised at Zanark's reaction.
He had explained his plan to Zanark and how he was going to go back to the mansion. Zanark had no reaction at first, but then he looked as if he had been hit by a car, twice.
"It's the only way for them to leave Kuosu alone." Gamma explained yet again.
Zanark was on board with helping Kuosu but even he wasn't brave enough to visit the place where people actually die.
"You do know what happens if he loses, right?" Gamma shuddered and nodded.
Whoever loses the game has two choices, they either die, or they take the little girl's place. The people before all chose to die. It was believed that they think dying is better than having to wander the place all eternity and being alone.
"So, you in or not?" Gamma needed an answer and he needed the answer now.
After thinking over his choices, Zanark let out a sigh and nodded.
"I'm in, I may not be a friend of Kuosu's but I know how much he means to you."
Seeing Gamma smile had brightened up the rest of Zanark's day.
If Kuosu was going to go down with this, it might as well be with his friends.
