"Such a weak body... The curse of him being your host was too much for him." A man who sat underneath the covers of darkness mumbled as he looked over at the now unconscious Chris. While the man looked at the weakened host, Salem paced around the room with his arms crossed.
"I'm not too surprised that weakling gave out so easily," Salem laughed as he continued to pace around the room, "He's so weak he doesn't even deserve to be healed..."
"We need his body Salem." The man stated in response, "Remember, you're soul bound to him, and if he dies you disappear. We'd need a new host body before we can just get rid of him, and we can't use one of our... subjects or interns, that would defeat the point of this. We need someone unrelated to this." The man stated.
"Eugh," Salem replied, "Damn you and your power." Salem complained, "It makes this so much more difficult."
"Perhaps it does." The man replied, "But that doesn't matter, just heal Chris so we can go about our day as usual..."
Salem groaned as he healed Chris, "There we go, our useless host continues to live."
"Good." The shadowy figure replied as he got up, "After all... we still need him..."
Intro Start
The intro started off with a shot of the prison, but instead of cameras popping out, the shot just went to static and cut over to the prison library.
"..." Inside the prison library, Aztaroth was reading a book but was interrupted when a loud crash came from behind him.
"..." The crash was revealed to have come from Romeo, who accidentally knocked over a bookshelf with his strength.
"..." After another static cut, Jade was seen picking up bits of litter in the courtyard, with a guard threatening to hit her if she didn't.
"..." Off in the distance, Picollo was washing off his makeup, suggesting that he didn't wanna wear it here.
"..." With the screen again turning to static, the shot was now of inside the cafeteria where Deena was eating breakfast for the day.
"..." Also in the cafeteria was Edna, who was eating god knows what.
"..." The shot stayed on Deena and Edna for a bit, before suddenly jumping to George who was looking outside from an old watchtower.
"..." George turned around, to see that a grinning Clover was behind him, causing the athlete to jump in surprise.
"..." With yet another static cut, we now got a shot of Relinda desperately trying to call someone on the prison phone, to no avail.
"..." Also in the phone room was Quinn, who had a chart of all the other contestants in her hand.
"..." Suddenly, the screen changed over to Davy and Rival, who were trying to avoid Chris in the main cell block.
"..." Off to the left side of the cellblock, Jacque and Monica were trying to talk, but for some reason couldn't remember their conversation.
"..." Finally, on the right side of the cellblock was Chef and Salem, with the former looking concerned and the latter grinning evilly.
"...There is no escape…" Instead of the final shot of the intro being of the campers around some sort of campfire, it was of a darkened figure with the dullest and deadest eyes ever…
"...There always is..." The camera zoomed in and pulled back to reveal Ryo, Truthteller, and Lyre, who were sitting in the middle of an office talking about what to do to save the prisoners.
Intro End
While everything in the prison went down, Ryo sat in his office and tapped his fingers together as he thought to himself.
"Ryo, sir?" A secretary of the detective agency asked the detective as he was lost in his thoughts, "The task force that Lyre requested be sent to that prison is almost there, aren't you going to watch their mission with everybody else?" The secretary asked, getting no response from Ryo, "Sir?" The secretary repeated, finally getting Ryo's attention.
"Huh?" Ryo jumped up, "Oh, right, sorry. I was a little caught up in my thoughts... just... thinking about if Deena's in there or not." Ryo replied, "You go on ahead, I just... wanna reminisce about something for a bit..." Ryo told the secretary, who nodded and closed the door. After the secretary left Ryo opened a drawer and unlocked a secret compartment, revealing a few private photos of him, one of them being him on his first day of the job, him playing tennis with another person, him with two other detectives, with one of them kissing him on the cheek in the photo, and a final one of him with and young-looking boy in it.
Ryo pulled the photo out of the drawer and smiled as he looked at it, "Don't you worry Andrius, we're finally gonna get Deena back..."
A slightly younger Ryo walked through the candy and snacks aisle of a supermarket. Ryo stared intently at the candy on the shelf like he was making the biggest choice of his life. "Maybe... no... that'd be too much sugar for too little taste..." Ryo thought to himself as he continued to stare at the candy.
"Umm... do you need help with that sir?" A timid-looking employee walked over to Ryo. He was 4'5" in height and had very pale skin as well as a slightly muscled build to him. He had short black hair and pale green eyes that looked really nervous as he greeted Ryo. He was wearing a very simple cashier uniform, with it being a striped white t-shirt, black dress pants, and black work shoes. He also had a small nametag on his chest that read, 'Hello, my name is Andrius and I'm new to this location!', "Y-you seem to be having trouble."
"Hmm?" Ryo looked over at Andrius, "Oh, I'm not having trouble, I'm just very indecisive, you see. Like should I get a box of 'chocodiles' or should I get some 'Polish Salmon'? I know for a fact I'm not getting any 'Yum Yum Happy Go Time Fish', that's a disgrace to the secret food group that is known as the sugar group." Ryo joked.
"W-well, you'll have to decide soon, s-sir..." Andrius replied, "W-we're c-cc-closing soon." Andrius pointed over to a sign that said the closing time, where another employee was taking down some decorations.
Ryo nodded, "I promise, I won't be too long."
"O-Ok..." Andrius nervously responded as he walked away from Ryo, leaving the detective to continue his mental battle of choosing what to buy.
While Ryo sat and pondered what he should get, another man wearing a large coat entered the supermarket and approached the cash register.
"O-h! D-do you need something sir?" Andrius asked as the man gave him a very serious look in response.
"You can start by giving me everything in the cash register." The man opened his coat to reveal he was keeping a pistol in its pocket.
Andrius instinctively held his arms up in complete fear as the man pointed the firearm at him, another employee walked over to see what the commotion was about, only to stop dead in his tracks when he saw the scene.
"Hurry up!" The man ordered as Andrius froze in fear.
"R-right!" Andrius hurriedly opened the cash register and began to give everything to the man, "Just please don't hurt me!" Andrius begged as the man gave a satisfied smirk.
"It's your lucky day kid." The robber laughed as he put all of the money into a bag, "Just give me the rest of the money in the other registers and we won't have any other problems."
"O-o-of course sir!" Andrius gulped as he rushed over to another register to meet the robber's demands.
Ryo looked out from the aisle to see the scene of the robber threatening Andrius and did a quick analysis on what to do. After noticing a small detail, Ryo began to approach the two.
The robber turned around to see Ryo walking over to him, causing him to turn and point his gun at him, "Hey! You stay back now!" The robber threatened, "You try anything funny and I will end you!"
Ryo completely ignored the man's threat and kept walking toward him.
"What the hell?" The robber let out as he began to shake nervously, "This is your final warning! Back up!"
Again, Ryo ignored the threat and continued walking toward the man. Not too long after, Ryo was less than a foot away from the barrel of the gun, Ryo calmly looked down the barrel and stated 'Pull the trigger.'
Andrius and a few employees who were watching in fear turned away to not see the gruesome sight, but instead of a gunshot being sounded off, the only sound that came from the gun was a click.
Before the robber could say anything to react, Ryo grabbed a nearby glass bowl that contained some free samples of a product and hit the robber across the face with it, knocking him out easily. Ryo rolled his eyes in response, "If you're gonna rob a store, at least remember to turn the safety off." Ryo stated as he dusted off his shirt and looked over at Andrius, "Are you alright kid? That had to have been a serious fright."
"Thank you!" Andrius ran over and hugged Ryo, before pulling back in embarrassment, "S-sorry! I shouldn't have done that!" Andrius apologized.
"Eh it's nothing kid," Ryo shrugged it off, "Can someone call the police?" Ryo yelled out, which caused an employee to rush to the back room so he could call the police. "By the way..." Ryo looked at Andrius' name tag, "Andrius, Never do what I just did, that was extremely dangerous, I only did it because I was absolutely certain the gun had safety on."
"O-Ok." Andrius nodded in response.
The two waited outside the supermarket for the police to show up. Andrius awkwardly had his arms crossed as he tapped his feet on the ground.
"So..." Ryo chimed in, wanting to move the subject to something lighter, "Do you have any hobbies?"
"Umm..." Andrius looked at the ground, "I like to watch cartoons and anime with my girlfriend... and playing with puppets..."
Ryo shrugged, "That's neat to hear, personally, I find myself to be a person attracted to all the mysterious parts of the world."
"L-like the supernatural?" Andrius tapped his fingers together.
"Oh no, there's no way ghosts and the like actually exist." Ryo waved his hand, "I mean like detective stories and things like that. You know, cold cases that don't get solved for decades until one person comes along and cracks the code?"
"O-oh, s-sorry, I've never been interested in things like that... it's too dark for me." Andrius nervously rubbed his arms.
Ryo shrugged, "That's alright, it's not for the weak-hearted."
"W-What?" Andrius asked, assuming Ryo was insulting him.
"I mean, it's not for people who aren't interested in unfortunate events." Ryo corrected himself, "Anyways, I don't believe I've introduced myself to you." Ryo held out a hand, "My name is Harry Iltons." Ryo lied, "Nice to meet you."
"N-nice to meet you too..." Andrius shook his hand, "You already know my name is A-Andrius."
Ryo chuckled, "Well, I'm sure you're gonna need someone to talk to after today's events," Ryo pulled out a small business card and handed it to the timid boy, "Feel free to call me later today if you're feeling anxious about what happened today, I don't assume you've ever had to be a witness for the police, have you?"
"N-no." Andrius answered honestly as he took the card. Andrius looked down at the card and raised an eyebrow, "Why does your business card say Ryo Doe on it?" Andrius asked.
"That's a business name!" Ryo suddenly answered.
"Uh... ok..." Andrius put the card in his pocket as the police finally showed up at the supermarket, "O-Oh, they're finally here..."
"Yeah." Ryo stretched his arms out before immediately going into a slouching stance, "Let's get this over with..."
Ryo kept thinking about the day he and Andrius met as he heard the door to his office open.
"Ryo, sir," The secretary entered the room, "The team has finally reached Hope's Lament, it's time to see what happens!"
"Oh." Ryo hid the photo of him and Andrius and nodded, "I'll be right there..." Ryo responded as the secretary left the room. Ryo took one last look at the photo before he too left the room.
"Captain Edwards to command, do you copy?" A 6'5" tall man wearing a soldier uniform radioed as he and his squad of seven other people made it to the island where Hope's Lament lay, "We have just reached the prison where we believe the missing prisoners are being held captive, I repeat, we have just reached the prison where we believe the missing prisoners are being held captive."
Lyre sat in an office watching the mission unfold through the body cams on each soldier. Also in the room were a few other detectives, including Ryo, who had just arrived, and Truthteller, with Truthteller standing in the corner of the room all by himself. Lyre radioed back to Edwards, "We copy, approach with caution Captain, we don't know just how many people are keeping these prisoners here if there's anyone here at all still."
While the soldiers prepared to sneak into the prison, all of them failed to notice Salem watching them from the top of the prison, "This'll be fun..." Salem gave an ear-to-ear grin as he watched the soldiers stand outside of the prison.
"We have everything, correct?" Edwards asked another soldier, who nodded in response, "Good. We're preparing to enter the prison, please respond with any info you've found on the location."
"If our drone from yesterday is anything to go off of, there seems to be a lot of people here, but we haven't spotted anyone armed yet. This means if we attack at the right moment, we should be able to take them all out before they can go to wherever they keep their weapons." Lyre replied to Edwards, before looking around the room at the other detectives, "It looks like this case is about to be closed." Lyre sighed with relief as Ryo gave a nervous nod.
"This feels too easy." Truthteller observed as the soldiers snuck over to the walls of the prison, "This is an illegal operation, so why don't they have any guards? I suppose it'll be interesting to see what counters they'll have for a surprise attack." Truthteller laughed as Ryo glared at him in response.
"Well, this is it." Edwards looked over at the rest of his squad, "I want everyone to follow what we practiced unless given orders to do otherwise, we're up against an enemy we don't entirely know, and taking any more risks has a high possibility of leading us all to death."
The rest of the squad members nodded as Edwards turned around, "Alright, just like we practiced." Edwards signaled over to a soldier with a sniper rifle, "Hawkeye, remember what we practiced, we need you to stay back on the watchtowers to stay as lookout."
"Sir yes sir." Hawkeye saluted in response to the command.
"Then let's go..." Edwards prepared to scale the wall of the prison, "See you all on the other side."
The detectives watched anxiously as the squad carefully scaled up the wall of the prison. Instead of immediately rushing down to the ground level of the prison, the squad checked around the courtyard of the prison to make sure nobody was straggling around outside of the prison, still unaware of Salem watching them from above
"This is Edwards, as you can see, we've determined nobody is guarding the exterior of the prison... but we still need to check the interior." Edwards spoke to the detectives with his radio.
"Move cautiously Captain." Lyre replied, "We still don't know what we're up against."
"I understand sir." Edwards replied as he and his squad, excluding Hawkeye, scaled down the walls of the prison. As Edwards and his squad made it to where the front entrance was, Edwards began to give signals of directions for specific people in his squad to go. "Got that everyone?" Edwards turned over to the rest of his squadmates, who all nodded in response, "Good, now let's-" Edwards was cut off by a sharp pain coming from his chest. Edwards looked down only to see a red stain start to appear through his bulletproof vest.
Before Edwards could even react to the sudden wound, the sound of a sniper being fired echoed out through the area, catching the squad members off guard.
"Hawkeye!?" A soldier looked up, seeing the sniper now aiming his rifle at the rest of them...
Jacque, Deena, and Davy all sat down at a table in the cafeteria, mostly just to discuss whatever, "I have to wonder what Chris has in store for us next challenge," Jacque told Davy as Deena kept her head down on the table.
"Who cares what that prick wants?" Davy shrugged, "It's probably just another type of torture meant to ruin everyone's day or something."
"Fair enough." Jacque replied, "But it's still pretty nice to know ahead of time."
"Davy guesses, but-" Davy started, but his voice was cut off by the sound of Hawkeye's rifle firing, "The hell!?" The three of them all jumped up as they heard another shot being fired not too long after.
"The hell is going on?" Jacque jumped back as another shot rang out, "Is that a gun being fired?"
"I think so..." Deena's eyes widened as more shots being fired began to be heard.
"Bloody hell..." Davy slowly moved back, "We should get out of here befo-"
Before Davy could even finish his sentence, he was cut off by Salem teleporting into the room, "Sorry about the sudden noises, we're just having a little incident we need to take care of."
Deena scowled, "What's going on!?"
Salem grinned as he titled his head, "It's of no concern to you, so stay put." Salem stated before teleporting away.
Jacque stared off as Salem went away, with one thought racing through his mind, "What the hell is happening?"
Clover sat in her cell while she drew a picture of Picollo and Birsha being tortured before she suddenly heard the sounds of gunfire. The despair-obsessed girl looked up from her bed as the sounds of shots rang out through the prison. "Oh my... something big is happening now..." Clover grinned as the gunfire continued.
"What the fuck?" George shot up from his bed as he rubbed his head in confusion, "What's with all the noise? I'm trying to sleep!" George asked at first, only for it to click that what he was hearing was bullets being fired, which caused the cheater to grow a look of fear, "Oh fuck! I'm not gonna die here right!?" George began to freak out.
"Perfect despair..." Clover smiled as she began to added George to her drawing of Picollo and Birsha.
Edna pranced into the cellblock, "Edna wonder what's that loud noise? Edna feels like she knows it from something."
"Oh, it's nothing Edna." Clover nonchalantly stated, "Just a little ruckus, that's all..."
"Yeah right!" George got up, "The police are probably here to take us all back to jail or something! I'm getting out of here!" George tried to run out of the cellblock, only for him to be stopped by Salem teleporting in front of him.
"What's the rush for?" Salem asked the quarterback, "We're just having a minor inconvenience, really, nothing to get all worked up about."
"Oh yeah, gunshots are nothing!" George sarcastically replied in anger, "Come on man, you gotta let us go, I can't go back to jail!" George begged.
Salem shook his head, "You worry too much, trust me... it'll be over soon..."
The detectives all stood in complete shock as Hawkeye finally stopped firing at the squad, with the exception of Truthteller, who was sitting off in the corner with a grin on his face.
"What..." Lyre shook with complete fear, "Hawkeye... you..."
"He's been against us this whole time?" Ryo's eyes widened, "How? I should've picked up on that!"
Hawkeye ignored the detectives' shocked statements as he scaled down the wall and walked over to the lifeless squad, well, Edwards was still barely clinging to life. Hawkeye grabbed Edwards by the neck and lifted him up.
"Why..." Edwards choked out as Hawkeye gave a blank stare in response.
Hawkeye didn't bother explaining himself, instead choosing to hit Edwards in the head with the butt of his rifle. After Edwards was knocked out, Hawkeye began to destroy each body cam on the soldiers, making sure that nobody could catch onto him. After Hawkeye finished destroying the body cams, he turned his attention to his own camera. Hawkeye ripped the camera off his vest and looked straight at it.
"This is a warning, detectives." Hawkeye stated with no emotion in his voice, "Try anything like this again, and you'll all end up dead." Hawkeye threatened before he suddenly dropped the camera onto the ground and crushed it with his foot.
The detectives sat in pure silence for a minute as they contemplated on what to do next.
Lyre was the first person to break the silence, "How... how did Hawkeye fool all of us... that ruthlessness seems so unlike him."
A female detective looked away from the screen as she bit at her fingernail, "This is worse than any of us could imagine, isn't it? This is some sort of terrorist group that's managed to stay completely off the grid... who knows who else they have in cahoots with them?"
"Who cares anymore?" Truthteller nonchalantly stated as he got up, "This settles it, we have to bomb this prison, clearly they're prepared for a quick ambush, but if we use a remote missile, they're bound to fall."
"We can't bomb the prison!" An older detective got up, "Have you completely forgotten that there are possibly innocent people being kept in that prison? We can't just blow them up!"
"Well look where trying to save them got us, seven dead soldiers," Truthteller shook his head, "If you want to actually end this, you'd better be willing to sacrifice the few for the many."
The old detective scowled as Truthteller spoke, "Ryo, you were also against the bombing idea right? You have to tell him why we can't do something like that!"
Ryo simply got up with a blank expression on his face, "Do whatever you want..." Ryo shook, "...I give up."
"What?" Lyre raised an eyebrow, "You were the one who started this case, and now you're done?"
"You heard me." Ryo began to leave the room, "I give up."
"I..." One of the other detectives chimed in, but Ryo ignored him as he left the room.
Ryo walked through the halls of the agency before he made it to his own office. The detective rubbed his hair as he picked up a phone that was set on the table. Ryo searched through his contacts on the phone before he eventually landed on one 'Andrius'. Ryo waited for the boy to pick up, but he was instead directed to a voicemail.
Ryo sighed as stood completely still for a moment. After a while of waiting, Ryo eventually decided to speak into the phone, "Andrius..." Ryo choked, "I'm sorry... I failed..."
Rival sat in the library after the gunshot incident, wanting to take his mind off of what he had heard not too long ago. "Ok Rival, calm down... it was just a wild animal or something... and the interns had to put it down... just an animal..." Rival gripped his head as he backed up and hit a bookshelf, "Dammit, I can't take my mind off of this."
Rival took a deep breath as he moved away from the bookshelf, causing a book to fall onto the floor. Rival turned around to put the book back in it's place. only to see that the book had no title on it, it was just a blank cover with some sort of gem in the middle of it. "What the?" Rival looked at the book in pure confusion, "I've never seen anything like this..."
"Someone found it." A voice echoed through the library, causing Rival to turn around in response.
"Who said that!?" Rival called out.
Another voice echoed through the library, "Thank goodness, Picollo made a good choice hiding it in plain sight... the spawn of Asmodeus never saw it..."
"I said, who said that!?" Rival yelled out nervously as he formed a sword with his electricity, "Show yourself!"
The purple light that Picollo had seen not so long ago suddenly appeared in front of the guitarist, "Be not afraid Rival Seizon. We are not here to hurt you." The light comforted me.
The other two lights appeared after the purple light, "Indeed, we are here to try and help you in some regard... you just have to trust us..."
"T-trust you..." Rival gulped, "I don't even know who or what you are! Why should I trust you!?" Rival yelled at the lights.
The blue light let out a soft sigh in response to Rival, "We can explain to you why you should trust us but... it will put you into more danger than you're already in... are you sure you want to know why?"
"Yes!" Rival yelled without even thinking it over.
The green light floated forward, "Very well... let's start with why this prison is here in the first place, alright? As you can see, this prison is a sort of supernatural rift in this world, one so powerful that humans are able to do what was previously considered impossible and demons are able to be summoned at this specific area."
"What are you trying to say?" Rival asked, "That this is a portal to hell or something?"
"Hell?" The purple light butted in, "No, nothing quite like that, actually. Rival, how familiar are you with history?"
"Uh..." Rival raised an eyebrow, "Not much..."
"Hmm... do you at least know what the garden of Eden used to be? Whether you believe in it or not?" The purple light asked.
"Yeah... the place where the first two people on earth used to live, right? It was a paradise?" Rival guessed.
The blue light floated upwards, "Correct, but you see, something that was never discovered by humans was the fact that there were other 'gardens' placed along the earth. These gardens allowed us to go down to the human world to protect its inhabitants, and we still use most of them to this day..."
"Protect?" Rival began to realize what the lights were, "But if you're here to protect that would make you-"
"Angels." The green light finished, "Yes, that is indeed what we are. But this garden became corrupted by Lucifer himself back when Jesus walked the earth, something that still prevents us from directly being able to go down to this section of the world, only leaving us as our avatar forms. What also doesn't help is the powerful demon you know as Salem is currently residing here. So we're unable to go down and save you all."
"Save us?" Rival scoffed, "We're all criminals. Why would you want to save any of us?" Rival doubted.
"There are two simple reasons, Rival," The green light continued, "The first is that we are sworn to redeem all humans, no matter how evil or sinful they may be. The second is something you had figured out on your own not too long ago, you just don't remember it."
"What's that?" Rival clenched his fist.
The purple light moved forward, "Everyone in this prison is innocent of their crimes... all of you were either framed or got mixed up in someone else's act."
"What!?" Rival moved back, "B-but... that's..."
The blue light chimed in, "It may seem illogical to you, but it is the truth. You're all being tortured for a horrid man's amusement."
"Chris..." Rival's eyes grew serious, "That scumbag..."
"It's not Chris." The blue light replied, "It's someone who was wronged before in his life, and now he wants his own cruel form of justice for his pain to be soothed."
Rival grew a look of worry at the thought of someone else being in the prison without him realizing it, "Who? Who is it?"
"I'm afraid we cannot tell you directly..." The purple light softly spoke, "He would immediately end you if he found out that you know about him... but... we can try something very risky if you truly want to know the truth... but do be warned, it is extremely dangerous."
"I don't care!" Rival shouted, "Do it!"
The three lights began to glow bright, "If you insist." The purple light stated as Rival glowed for a split second, "Prepare yourself Rival, this will feel odd..."
"Odd? What do yo-" Rival was suddenly cut off by two beams of light emerging from his eyes, everything that had happened in this prison and he had forgotten had flooded back into his head. Jade's insults... him discovering the skeleton... his strange trance... and him figuring this show was fake out... it all returned to him. Rival fell to the floor dizzily as he tried to speak his mind, "I... how... who..." Rival tried to form sentences but was too preoccupied with his memories returning to him.
The lights stopped glowing heavily and returned to their regular illumination, "That seemed strange, didn't it? Allow us to explain, we've returned everything you've ever forgotten to your brain. But that isn't all we've done for you, you'll never have to worry about forgetting anything ever again... we've granted you protection from his power..."
Rival panted heavily, "His... power?"
The purple light moved up and down, "What is his power? It's very complicated, but to simplify it for you, he had full control over your mind and body. Did you ever see something happen only for it to not end up being real? That was him... tormenting you mentally just for fun, and when he wasn't doing that he was going into your head whenever you caught onto him and erased your thoughts, in an attempt to bring you back to square one."
"That's..." Rival's eyes widened, "Holy shit..."
"Language Rival," The green light stated before moving back onto topic, "But yes, it was an ability so potent that none of you could counter it... but now you're immune to being controlled, at the price of putting yourself in danger..."
"Well... you can do this to the rest of the people here, right?" Rival asked.
"Unfortunately, we can't do that. Not that it's impossible for us to do so, but it's because he'll catch on and he'll kill everyone here because of it... even if we blessed you like we had done with Picollo to prevent Salem from hurting him prior to his escape, that blessing would eventually break thanks to Salem's sheer power. That is why we are waiting for our plan to work out..."
"What's the plan exactly?" Rival responded, "Let us all be picked off one by one?"
"No... it all involves the book you hold in your hands right now." The blue light responded, "It has the answers on how to defeat these two... but that won't be enough on its own, of course. That's where we come in... you see, there is a ritual in this very book that will allow us to... possess you in a sort of way... but only two of us will be able to do it as another one of us needs to stay in case something goes wrong... but it's no worry, as we already know what two people will be there if we do it all goes according to plan."
Rival looked up, "And who's that?"
"I'm afraid we can't risk telling that to you Rival, for your own protection." The light flickered, "But please... just stay safe now that you know all of this information..."
"I'll try..." Rival replied nervously, "I'm just worried I'm not gonna be good enough now..." As Rival began the blue light looked over at the other two lights and did what appeared to be a nod, "What if I fail like I failed-"
"Me?" Rival was cut off by a boy suddenly appearing in front of him. The boy stood at 5'7" and had a very pale and slim build to himself. He had very spiky medium-length hair that was white with one red strand near his right ear. The boy wore a black jacket that was missing a zipper, blue skinny jeans, black shoes with red laces, and a white undershirt. "Rival... you never failed me..." The boy assured Rival.
"Ally!?" Rival rushed over to his brother and gave him a big hug, "You're ok!? Oh thank god!"
"Rival you need to listen..." Ally commanded, "You have to stop focusing on what happened with me... you need to push yourself forward so that you can save yourself from this nightmare... do it for my sake..."
Rival kept Ally in a hug, "I will..." Rival cried as Ally slowly began to disappear, revealing it was just the blue light disguising himself as the brother to comfort Rival.
"Did that make you feel better Rival?" The blue light asked as Rival wiped his face off.
"Yeah..." Rival choked out, "I think... I think it did..."
"That's good to know..." The blue light replied as Rival calmed himself down, "But we have one last thing we'd like to give to you before this conversation ends."
Rival looked up with tears still in his eyes, "What is it?"
Rival watched as the three lights summoned another book right in front of him, though this book was a bit different looking, seeing as it looked more like a journal than anything. Rival grabbed the journal from out of the air and held it up, "What is this?" Rival asked.
"It's a journal of a man who first discovered this prison's properties," The green light stated, "His name was Gael Aquila, and he wrote down everything he found in this journal, if you don't believe us, you can open it and read the first entry."
Rival opened the journal, which revealed a page that read 'Gael's Journal #19', he then flipped to the next page to see what it said and began to read it out loud, "Well this is it, I'm finally getting around to exploring what this Hope's Lament prison is all about! I must admit, I do believe a lot of the ghost stories that my parents and grandparents told me when I was a boy, but I'm not too afraid of going in there… maybe it's because of how adventurous it feels? I don't know, but, regardless I've made sure I have more than enough supplies to take me through the many nights I will be spending at this prison. Maybe I'll even consistently update these journal entries as celebration, who's to say? I guess if there's anything major I want to leave off on here before I head off, it's that spirits are rumored to be within that prison, and if that's true…. Well…. I hope god can protect me from them…. But with that, I'm signing off" Rival then closed the journal after reading it, "Ok, but how is this important to me?"
"It will allow you to learn about the man who is pulling every string here, but be sure to hide it from those you don't trust... it's a very sensitive piece of information." The purple light stated.
"Got it." Rival nodded in response.
"Good..." The green light added, "Well Rival, this is goodbye for now... if we cross paths again, we hope to see you in full health..."
"Goodbye..." Rival gripped the two books in his hands.
Right as Rival said goodbye to the lights, they completely disappeared from sight, leaving the guitarist all alone with a lot to take in...
"Chris McLean..." The man in the shadows stated as Chris slowly moaned and came to life, "My my... you're body gave out so easily, luckily for you, we gave you a little courtesy and healed your wounds... isn't that right Salem?"
"Yes..." Salem gave a toothy grin as Chris came to completely.
"AH!" Chris screamed out as he tried to get away from the two, only to find himself restrained with a rope tied around his body. The host looked around the room in pure fear, only to spot a now-healed Edwards who was unconscious and tied to a chair as well. "What do you want from me!?" Chris yelled at the two as he tried to escape from his bounds.
"Want?" The shadowy figure laughed, "Chris... Chris... Chris... I already got what I wanted from you... now it's just a matter of if I even need you anymore... I just needed you to bring the prisoners here..."
"What are you gonna do to me!?" Chris screamed as he continued to struggle in the chair.
"Let me think about that for a moment Chris..." The figure responded. After he replied to Chris, the figure stopped for a moment to think it over, only for him to walk over a table that was covered by darkness. The figure picked something off the table and began to slowly approach Chris. "It seems that the well that contained your luck has run dry Chris..." The figure shook his head as he slowly walked over.
"Hey! Hey! Hey! What are you doing!?" Chris shook his head repeatedly as his heart began to pound in fear... he should've listened to Chef when he had the chance... that was all that could go throw his mind in that moment.
"It's a shame really, I'd love for you to see my vision reach reality Chris..." The figure spoke as he got closer, "But I suppose this'll be what my old army mates called a 'mercy kill'." The figure stepped out of the shadows, finally revealing himself to the light. He was very tall, standing at 6'7 tall and he had very horribly pale skin. Speaking of his skin, parts of it were completely decayed and had dried up and fallen off, making him look like he had cracks in his body. He had a very thin build, with his skin looking like it was barely able to stretch over his body. He wore a torn and tattered brown robe and had brown boots on his feet. His gray eyes looked completely mad, and his long gray hair was but a few strands that poked out of the top of his head. "Don't worry yourself, Christopher..." The man pulled Chris' head back as he revealed he had picked up a very rusted knife from off the table, "I'm sure the great god above will still love you despite everything you've done..."
"Wai-" Chris was cut off by Salem covering his mouth with his hand, before Salem turned over to the man and said, "Feel free Abigor."
Abigor grinned as he slowly dragged the knife across Chris' throat, the knife's poor condition made the act hard, but after a little while, the deed was done, and Chris slumped over in his seat... Abigor backed away from the now deceased host as walked over to the table and set the knife back on it, "Good night Chris... you're the end of an era..." Abigor turned around the room to see that Salem had also disappeared, which caused the man to shake his head as if he had made a small mistake, "Ah, how poorly planned of me, I had forgotten about that clause..." Abigor rolled his eyes as he reached under the table to take out the exact same book that Rival had found earlier. Abigor looked over at the unconscious Edwards, "No matter... there's a new host for Salem to have..."
Jade grabbed her sides as she walked into the main cellblock, where she passed by Rival sitting in his cell. Jade walked back and waved at Rival to get his attention, "Rival! It's so good to see you!" Jade ran over to Rival to give him a hug, with the guitarist being so invested in reading the book that he didn't even notice her.
"Huh?" Rival looked up as Jade grabbed him, "Oh thank goodness it's just you Jade..." Rival shook and stated as he set the book down under his cell's bed.
"Is something wrong?" Jade asked, "You sound very upset."
"Upset?" Rival gave a slight smile, "No... I'm so happy right now..."
Jade raised an eyebrow in confusion, "Ok... did something happen? Did you miss what happened earlier!? That was horrible!"
"It's not that..." Rival shook his head, "We have a fighting chance Jade!" Rival teared up, "To..." Rival paused for a moment, "Survive this, I finally think I've found a way to finish this once and for all!"
"You have?" Jade gave a smile of pure relief, "That's amazing! So what is it? Is it a way to make Chris pay? Or to get everyone out of here."
Rival contemplated telling but kept it to himself, "Oh... I'd love to tell you this Jade... but... I'm afraid that Chris might be listening right now as we speak... so I'll keep it to myself."
Jade looked down with a small look of disappointment, "Oh... That makes sense, but I still can't help but feel disappointed."
"I trust you Jade... but I don't trust Chris... and I can't even take the risk of speaking without the fear of him listening in," Rival lied, "But... hear me when I say this... this'll be over soon..."
Jade hugged Rival in response, "Finally... everyone here can be saved..."
Rival felt a huge pain in his gut about lying about everyone being safe, but he still went along with it, "Yeah... hope's finally shining through. But I have something else I want to talk to you about Jade." Rival changed the subject, "I... It's that fear of everything going wrong, you know? If this all goes horribly wrong and something... awful happens to all of us, or we're all sent to jail to rot for the rest of our lives, I want you to know that these past few weeks... you've been such an amazing person to be around... In fact, everyone has, no matter how bad they are, I still am glad I got the chance to meet you all. It's.. truly been an honor I guess..."
"Rival..." Jade looked over at the guitarist who had a sad look on his face.
"I know... I'm being a pessimist like usual," Rival joked, "But I want to at least get a meaningful goodbye in the case that everything goes to shit."
"If that's the case..." Jade leaned over to Rival and kissed him on the cheek, "I want to have my own goodbye..."
Rival gave a slight smile as the two gave each other a quick kiss, "Well... we should probably get going to the others... See if anyone needs help to calm down..."
"Yeah..." Jade nodded as she got up and walked out of the cell. Rival didn't follow behind immediately, instead choosing to look under his bed at the book. Rival pulled the book from under his bed and opened it, just so he could stare intensely at the pages. "I'm glad I got that goodbye in..." Rival muttered to himself as he looked at the pages, which read something very simple, 'A man of doubt will make a last sacrifice.'...
Haha! Cliffhanger ending! I bet that one got you didn't it? Well, yeah, you'll just have to see where that plotline goes in the future won't you? I'mma see if I can get another episode out before the end of Unlawgust tbh, since there's only a few days left on my break before it ends, so ending Unlawful off with a bang with the next episode or the one after would be pretty cool. Also a huge thanks to Zoryan El Muerto for letting me use Ryo and Andrius in this.
Remaining Prisoners: Bella/Edna, Clover, Davy, Deena, George, Jacque, Jade, Rival
Elimination Order:
14th ~ Romeo Darnell McFarland - The Toxic Farmer (BigBadBrad)
13th ~ Quinn Potter - The Pyromaniac Matchmaker (GirlPower54)
12th ~ Giuseppe "Picollo" Bilancia - The Clown (lordgemini) [ESCAPED]
11th ~ Monica Rosette Lee - Little Miss Perfect (xxPrincsxx)
10th ~ Matthew Matthews 'Aztaroth' - The Underground Gambler (MorbidGinger) [FREED]
9th ~ Relinda Temple - The Clumsy Waitress (BaseballCapClyde)