Author's Note:
And the adventure continues! Don't forget to go to my profile and completing the poll and making your guesses as to who's going to make it out of this alive. So far Gwen's in the lead, with a whole mess of other characters tied for second.
Guest: That's an interesting prediction. I'll say this much: you won't have to wait too much longer to see if your prediction of Eva being the first one on this cruise to go.
Despite the comfortable mattress and pillow, Trent found it difficult to sleep. Maybe it was because of how far away from home he was. No, that wasn't it. It was more likely Harold's snoring. No matter what he tried to do, he just couldn't block it out.
Eventually giving up, Trent rolled out of bed with a small groan before grabbing his pillow and heading for the door. The couches in the lounge weren't going to be nearly as comfortable, but at least he wouldn't have to hear Harold snoring all night long.
He left the room quietly before walking over to the couch next to the pool table. The pool game had been abandoned halfway through, mostly due to Eva breaking too many cue sticks and nearly clonking a passing Courtney on the head with a ball.
He settled down on the couch, shifting around slightly before finally getting into a comfortable position. However, his eyes were about to close when he heard a very subtle click.
He opened one eye slightly and peaked out around the couch. To his surprise, it was Gwen. She was looking around the room quickly before tiptoeing to the stairs.
What is she doing? Trent thought, pushing himself up and back onto his feet. They weren't supposed to leave this area until the morning. Why was she going out?
Before he could even think about it, he began to follow her, creeping silently behind her. No point in letting her know he was there; he didn't want to spook her and make her wake the whole ship. Especially if it would get her in trouble.
Trent pursued her to the top deck and along to the back of the ship and down another flight of stairs. According to the signs, this was leading to the very back of the ship, where several boats were being kept. What could she want down here? Trent wondered, again resisting the urge to call out to her.
When she reached the bottom of the stairs and the boat launching area, Trent ducked behind a wall and peaked out. Again, to his surprise, he found not only Gwen down there, but also Duncan.
Trent clenched his fists. Of course it had to be Duncan. He knew the moment he saw him that he was going to be trouble. For some reason, seeing him down here with Gwen made his blood boil. Why was she even talking with him? What were they doing down here?
"You ready?" Duncan whispered.
Gwen nodded. "Just don't make this a waste of time—or try to rape me out there."
"Come on, you know I'd never do a thing like that. Now, let's go so we can get back before dawn."
Get back? Trent wondered. Get back from where?
"Whatcha looking at?"
Trent yelled in alarm, falling back from his hiding spot at the sound of Izzy's voice. This, of course, got Gwen and Duncan's attention too.
"Trent?" Gwen asked, surprised.
"Gwen," Trent replied, getting up and dusting himself off.
"Izzy!" Izzy added with a wild grin.
"What the hell is going on here?" Duncan demanded to know, folding his arms over his chest.
"That's what I'd like to know," Trent shot back, also folding his arms over his chest. "Why are you two sneaking around in the middle of the night? Where are you going?"
"We're just going to explore the nearby Drama Corporation facility," Gwen answered. "We'll be back before the ship starts to move again."
"Are you crazy? You're going to get yourselves caught!"
"We will if you keep blabbing your mouth like that," Duncan told him. "Come on, Gwen, let's get out of here."
"Gwen," Trent said to her. "Don't go with him. Seriously, it's a bad idea."
Gwen gave him a look. "It's better than being stuck doing the same boring things for the next week."
Trent gritted his teeth in frustration. Why was she acting like this?
"Let's set sail, Cap'n!" Izzy did a flying leap, landing in the boat Duncan and Gwen were about to use.
"Get out of here, psycho," Duncan ordered. "You're not invited on this trip."
"Too late! Already going!"
"Actually, that's not a bad idea," Trent found himself saying. "Because I'm coming too."
"Oh, give me a break," Duncan groaned. "I thought you said that we were going to get caught."
"As long as I keep my friend safe, I don't care," Trent told him, following Izzy's lead and getting into the boat. "Face it: you're not going without me, especially since I can alert the ship what you're up to so they can stop you and throw your ass back into juvie."
Duncan let out a ragged sigh. "Fine, you can come. But you gotta do what I say. I'm in charge here."
"Whatever, man. Just do whatever it is you need to do and let's get this over with."
Their journey to the facility didn't take as nearly as long as Trent thought it'd take. In fact, he could still see the Wawanakwa in the distance, reflected by the moonlight.
Duncan pulled the boat to a stop next to a small ladder that led to the top of the platform. "This is it," he announced, tying the rope onto a ladder rung to keep their boat from floating off.
"Great! Let's go!" Before anyone could stop her, Izzy jumped onto the ladder and started climbing it upside down, laughing the entire way up.
"Has she ever gotten checked into a mental hospital or something?" Duncan asked.
"They've tried," Gwen told him. "But there's no doctor on Earth that can figure out what exactly is wrong with her."
"Well, we'd better get up there before she gets herself hurt," Trent spoke up, grabbing the ladder and starting to climb.
When he reached the top, he saw Izzy hanging from the rotors of a helicopter parked on top of the facility. "Hey guys, look at me!" she yelled, swinging back and forth with her legs.
"Izzy, get down from there," Trent hissed. Then he had another thought. "Wait a minute," he said as Gwen and Trent joined them. "This helicopter doesn't look like any sort of shipping vehicle. It looks almost military."
"It's probably nothing," Duncan told him. "Now let's get inside and see what we can find."
It didn't take them long to find a door. When Gwen tried the handle, she found it surprisingly unlocked. "Odd," she commented. "You'd think that a place like this would remember to lock the door.
Trent nodded in agreement. Something definitely didn't seem right about this place.
The group entered through the door, finding a large, dimly lit hallway leading deeper into the place. There were several large glass enclosures lining each of the two walls. As they walked, Trent peered into one and found it empty.
"Looks like some sort of holding cell," Duncan commented, looking at another cell, which was also empty.
"You would know, wouldn't you," Trent snorted. "Being cooped up in one most your life."
"Watch it, guitar boy."
"Guys," Gwen interrupted their squabbling, pointing to a cell at the end of the hall, next to the far door. "Look at that one."
The others followed her gaze and went to the indicated cell. Unlike the others, this cell's glass had been shattered into pieces on the floor around them. And there were bloodstains on the inside of the cell, along with several human bones.
Trent gagged. Gwen went even paler than normal. Even Duncan seemed a little spooked.
"What the hell is this place?" Gwen breathed.
"Whatever it is, I'd don't think it's where the Drama Corporation store TV cameras," Duncan answered.
"Ooo, a human skull." Izzy reached into the cell and picked up a skull that was in the room. "Alas, poor Yorick. I knew him well," she intoned, making the skull's mouth move with her hands.
"Izzy, put that down," Trent hissed. "Those are human bones."
Izzy waved him off. "I know that. That's what makes this so cool."
"What about this is cool?" Gwen asked. "Something horrible happened here."
"Maybe we'll find answers in the next room," Duncan suggested, pointing to the door. He reached out and gently opened it, peaking inside. "Woah," he said after a moment. "You guys are going to want to see this."
The others followed him, also looking through the door. What he saw inside made Trent's jaw drop.
It was some sort of lab, with several giant tanks, chairs, and computer monitors lining the place. The tables were filled with vials and scattered pieces of paper.
And there were men there to. Almost a dozen of them. All of them wearing black leather armor and full-face helmets. Their rifles were slung on their backs and their pistols were in holsters on their waists.
"Who are these guys?" Trent breathed.
Gwen squinted. "Their shoulder patches…isn't that the Drama Corporation logo?"
Trent focused on the closest soldier, noticing the shoulder patch. "I think you're right," he realized. "But the Drama Corporation doesn't have soldiers on their payroll. What the hell is going on?"
"Whatever it is, they're gathering up all the stuff they can," Izzy noted. Indeed, the soldiers were stuffing folders into bags and taking hard drives from computers.
"They're cleaning the place out," Gwen realized. "But why?"
"Let's find out." Duncan suddenly began to slide into the room, keeping low behind a table.
"Duncan! Get back here," Gwen hissed. But the delinquent ignored her, creeping over to another table that had several folders on it.
"This is why you don't follow delinquents like this," Trent muttered under his breath. Gwen shot him a dirty look before glancing back at Duncan, who was reaching out from behind the table, his hand going for one of the folders on the table.
"Captain!" Another soldier ran through another door, sounding panicked. Duncan jerked his hand back down.
"What is it, Lieutenant?" one of the other soldiers asked.
"We lost contact with McNally and Fisher. I heard screams and gunshots."
"Intruders?"
"No, sir…I think it's here."
"You're certain?"
The soldier nodded. The captain cursed. "Everyone on alert," he ordered, drawing his rifle and causing the other soldiers to do the same. "Project Fang is somewhere on site. Let's finish getting what we need and get the hell out of here."
Project Fang? Trent thought. What's Project Fang?
The captain pointed at the soldier he was talking to. "You go find McNally and Fisher. See if they're still alive."
"But sir—"
"The Drama Corporation doesn't like disobedience, soldier. Now, move it."
"Y-yes sir." The soldier turned and started out the door he had come in. The minute he was out of the doorway something grabbed him and yanked him out of sight. His scream was cut short by a loud SQUISH and a splatter of blood.
Trent gasped in shock as the other soldiers quickly raised their weapons to the doorway. There was a long moment of silence. Then a hulking creature stepped through the doorway and into the light.
It was a shark. A large shark. A large shark that had legs.
"Oh no," Gwen breathed.
"Open fire!" the captain ordered. The room exploded into gunfire, making Trent's ears ring. The shark, on the other hand, didn't seemed fazed. Bullets hit it as it charged the soldiers, but he showed no signs of slowing down despite small flecks of blood that were leaking from the bullet wounds.
It reached the closest soldier, which happened to be the captain, and opened its mouth, chomping down on the man's upper torso. Another blood splatter spilled out as the captain died instantly, his legs all that were left of him.
Another soldier leaped onto the shark's back, drawing a knife. But the shark threw him off it, sending him slamming to a wall with a sickening CRACK! The shark then grabbed a soldier, who started screaming, "NO! PLEASE N—" before his head was torn off and the shark popped it into his mouth. He then tossed the blood spewing corpse aside, leaping at another one of the soldiers.
"Duncan!" Gwen yelled to be heard over the gunfire as the soldiers desperately tried to take the shark down to no avail. "Come on!"
Duncan, not bothering to hide anymore, stood up and grabbed a folder before running back to the door. As he did, the shark bit another soldier in half before throwing two more soldiers into walls and eating yet another soldier.
The moment Duncan was through the door, Trent slammed it closed. "Run!" he yelled, starting to run back towards the door outside. His heart pounded with shock and terror.
A shark with legs. He never would've believed it if he hadn't seen it with his own eyes. Gwen was right all along.
The four exploded out the exit door, with Trent slamming that one close too. "Get to the boat!" he cried, running after the others, who hadn't stopped running at all.
Izzy, instead of using the ladder, dived headfirst off the platform and into the ocean, laughing psychotically as she dove.
"That's gotta be a thousand-foot drop," Gwen gasped.
"No way it's that high," Duncan told her, "Now get down the ladder! We need to go before that shark comes for us!"
"Maybe it'll eat all those other guys and be full!" Izzy called from down below as she climbed back into the boat.
"I wouldn't count on that!" Gwen told her as she slid down the ladder and landed in the boat. Duncan soon followed her down.
As Trent gripped the ladder, about to follow them down, the door burst open and the shark ran out, the corpses of two of the soldiers still hanging from his mouth. Upon seeing him, he started making a run for him.
Trent swore and slid down the ladder. "Go! Go! Go! He's right behind me!" he screamed at Duncan.
Duncan throttled the engine, starting it instantly. Briefly, Trent thought about how, if this was a horror movie, the engine would've stalled and they would've been caught right then and there by the shark.
Luckily, this wasn't a horror movie.
The engine roared as Duncan started to gun it. "The rope!" Gwen cried, pointing to where the rope was still attached to the ladder.
Duncan whipped out a knife and slashed the rope, setting them free and letting the speed off back towards the Wawanakwa just as the shark dove into the water, turning the area that he had dived into red with blood.
"Gun it, gun it, gun it!" Trent yelled to Duncan, looking back to where the shark had been. It was now poking its head up to glare angrily at them, but made no moves to follow them.
"Is he…letting us go?" Trent asked.
"Looks like it," Izzy agreed.
The group sailed on in silence. Trent's heart eventually started to calm down.
The danger had passed. At least for now. But deep down, Trent knew that this was the only beginning. First it was on Boney Island. Now out here, eating soldiers that apparently worked for the Drama Corporation that were trying to clean out a lab. None of it made any sense—especially not the shark
But he had the nasty feeling in the pit of his stomach that the monster would show up to kill again. Soon.
Alive: Alejandro, Beth, Blaineley, Bridgette, Chef Hatchet, Chris McLean, Cody, Courtney, DJ, Duncan, Eva, Fang, Geoff, Gwen, Harold, Heather, Izzy, Justin, Leshawna, Lindsey, MacArthur, Noah, Owen, Sanders, Sierra, Trent, Tyler
Dead: Katie, Sadie
And there you have it! As promised, this was my longest chapter yet for this story. I hope to have other chapters be at around this length, but we'll see how things go! It definitely helped this chapter that I had a lot of character action in this. Funnily enough, Izzy wasn't even supposed to be in this chapter; it was only going to be Duncan, Gwen, and Trent going to the Drama Corporation facility. I literally added her in on a whim.
This event really starts off the action and the chaos of the rest of the story. It'll only be a few more chapters (3 at the very most) before our favorite TD characters start getting offed. Who will live? Who will die? Will your favorite make it to the end? To find out, make sure you hit that favorite/follow button to stay informed on future updates, and don't forget to drop a review to let me know how I'm doing. Until next time, this is Guest 1138, reminding you to never mess with exploding teddy bears. Ciao!