Chapter 4

Death, Desolation, Defeat, Despair

Day three

Morning came, Jimmy's second sleepless night. His eyes were bloodshot, his head was throbbing, and surprisingly, his stomach was growling. A tournament to the death and his stomach still demanded food, remarkable. He dug through his bag and pulled out a bottle of water. Cold there possibly be anything in the kitchen fridge? He wanted to check, but he couldn't let Brittney out of his sight. If someone broke into the house and got to her he wouldn't forgive himself. Then again, what were the chances of someone picking that particular house to break-

There was a huge thump outside the door. Jimmy took the precaution of barricading it. It was a simple barricade, a chair under the doorknob. The windows however, were left untouched. He wanted to curse himself but there was no time for that. He ducked behind the door and aimed the bow towards the front window. Because both the door and the window were on the same wall, Jimmy couldn't be seen. However, Brittney was in plain sight.

A head poked through the window. An arrow whistled through the air, right into the side temple. The head dropped, then fell outside with the rest of the body, it landed with a thump, similar to the first one moments ago.

"Get the bag," Jimmy said to himself. As quick as a cat, Jimmy jumped out the window.

Brittney's eyes snapped open. She sat up just as Jimmy climbed back into the house through the window.

"What happened," She asked, her left hand working out the kink in her neck. Sleeping on a nice firm bed one day, to a sofa in an abandoned house must have been hard for her body to adjust to.

"Nothing," Jimmy answered shaking his head.

Brittney saw that he had a knapsack in his hand. "You…killed someone," she asked. She trembled slightly. Although this was a fight to the death, she would have never thought Jimmy would take a life. "Who was it?"

"No one," Jimmy assured, "someone that we don't know." Brittney rose from the couch, "since you're on your feet we should get going."

"I…I want to see"

"What?"

"I want to see…who it was."

"I really don't think that's a good idea." Brittney shuffled past him towards the door, Jimmy grabbed her arm. "We should really get go-"

"Let go," Brittney shouted. The floodgates in her eyes threatened to break again. Why was she mad? Jimmy might have just saved both of their lives, and she had the gall to be upset? She pulled the chair from under the doorknob and opened the door. As soon as she peeked around the corner, she ducked back inside, her hand over her mouth, Jimmy expected the worst.

"Okay, I killed Butch," he started, "it was a kill or be killed situation! Butch never cared for anyone else's safety, so why would he now?"

Brittney shook her head, "that's not it. Someone's coming."

"Did he see you?"

"I don't know."

"Is he dangerous?"

"He had two guns in each hand, and a big knife thing strapped to his back." Brittney's heart was beating so hard, it looked as if an engine piston was in her chest. Once again, Jimmy took the crossbow in hand. If only they could have left the house sooner. By the sound of Brittney's description, someone serious was approaching!

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"Hello students! I am so proud of you all! We have a slew of coffin stuffers." Sakamochi's voice boomed through the intercom system throughout the island. His voice had a certain cheery tone to it, he enjoyed his job. "From P.S. 118 we have Patti Smith, Nadine, and Eugene. From Dimsdale there is Elmer, and from Retroville Elementary we have Carl Wheezer, and Wendell Bender. Oh and students, be careful, Elmer was caught in a protected zone. You walk into a protected zone you will be killed. Speaking of which, get your pencils ready. At 9 o'clock, D4 is off limits. At two, B1 is off limits, and at 4:30, E5. Good luck everyone!"

"More coastlines," Phoebe said, drawing 'X's over her map, "except for this one." She pointed at D4, "these houses are forbidden now."

"Who would run to the neighborhood during something like this," a boy that accompanied her asked. This kid's hair was more than half his height. Could he actually hide in a bush if he needed too?

"It's actually quite clever, Gerald," Phoebe corrected, "Maybe everyone thought the same thing, so only a few people actually went there."

"I think Gerald's right," a second kid added. This one had to be stranger than the first one. His head was in the shape of a football. A football! Try hiding that in a bush! As if that wasn't enough, was he wearing a skirt? A plaid quilt? Maybe it was an extra big shirt. Whatever it was, it had a ring of mud around the bottom. Did he escape from someone by hiding in mud, did he thread through mud, who knows.

"See, Arnold knows I'm right," the two boys put their right fist together and shook their thumbs (I can't think of any better way to describe it ).

"So what do you suggest Arnold," Phoebe asked.

"We could stay here."

"Here," Gerald asked, "are you crazy, we can't stay here."

"We don't have the firepower to win against anyone at the moment," Phoebe added, and she was right. Between the three of them, they had a whip, a salad fork, and Phoebe's vest. "So what do we do if someone finds us?"

"We set up an ambush."

"An ambush," Gerald asked. His doubt was apparent in his voice, "you make it sound like it's easy."

"I never said it was. Someone has to distract while the other two sneaks up from behind."

"Distraction? That's signing up as the bulls eye for target practice! And uh, no offense Arnold, but I don't feel like being turned into Swiss cheese."

"Gerald's right," Phoebe added, "the odds of surviving that are 527 to one."

"I'll do it," Arnold volunteered. No discussion.

"You're a bold kid Arnold, a bold kid."

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"How many psychos' are on this island," Helga shouted running for her life. The gun she held from the shoot out at the Stonehenge only had two shots left. She had more ammo for the gun. The issue was that she had no idea how to reload it. Sure she could figure it out, but not while running for her life. There was the sound of water ahead, Helga ignored it. There were more things to worry about; one would be escaping from the galloping sound behind her.

Helga took another step ahead, her foot sunk, followed by her leg, then the rest of her body. She ran right off the top of a waterfall. The drop was not high, only twelve feet. It was still enough to make her scream her head off. She fell into the water, and then quickly surfaced to see her pursuer.

"Is that….Curly," she asked.

"Sneak up on me will ya," Curly shouted at over the waterfall. He had orange and black tiger stripes panted on his face. What really threw Helga off was that he was on horseback! Where did he find a horse? How was she supposed to take down a gun wielding maniac on horseback?

"I know you're down there," he said to himself. He pulled something round and small out of one of his knapsacks. His weapon of choice, the grenade.

"Oh…my…go-", Helga statement was cut off. An explosion rocked the pond the waterfall spilled into. She was blown out of the water and onto the shore. Curly watched her fly through the air, laughing insanely as she did so. He then reached into another knapsack and pulled out a pistol, a glock 17, and aimed for Helga.

Helga took quick aim with her own gun, she only had two shot, she had to make them count. The first bullet missed, badly. The second one whizzed by Curly's ear. The last shot was enough to startle his horse. It resembled a bucking bull at a rodeo show, running in a tight circle and kicking its hind legs. One wild kick sent Curly down with the waterfall. As it tried to run away, the harness got caught on a thick tree branch. It nearly took its own head off when the harness pulled its neck.

Curly surfaced from under the pond. He looked around, Helga was long gone. He emerged from the pond, two muddy hoof prints on the back of his shirt. He scaled the wall behind the waterfall, which was quite hard to do since the wall was wet. When he got back to the he stood before, he stared at the horse, it was in a frenzy trying to pull away from the branch. Curly positioned himself right in the horse's sight of vision. He then aimed his gun, and shot it.

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Sid's gogo boots walked in the direction that the noise was coming from. Between two gunshots and an explosion, someone had to be there. He walked until he came across what appeared to be an old campsite. Could the person who was here cause all that racket? Maybe they wanted to attract people to here. Normally, a grave situation would cause Sid to become paranoid until someone came to claim his life. However, ever since making the decision to play the game, his mind was clear. His motivation was clear, he wanted to live. He recalled himself thinking that earlier, 'I want to live, to hell with everyone else.'

A voice snapped Sid out of his thoughts, someone was coming. Sid didn't care who there were, for they would soon be dead. There was a purple vest, he lunged for it. A quick slice from a dagger in his hand, and the purple vested body fell. There was another one, this one was a girl. She wore a pink skirt with a white shirt. There was a large, pink 'V' on the shirt. She screamed, a bloody dagger between the eyes silenced that. Everything was quiet. Could these two be the cause of the explosion and gunshots? Couldn't be, there were far too easy. Sid shrugged it off and pulled the dagger from the girl's head.

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The conversation that Arnold, Gerald, and Phoebe held was suddenly cut short. A blood curdling scream has that affect. All three had the urge to pack up camp and leave. Without saying a word, they frantically gathered their belongings; it took less than 30 seconds.

"Any idea where to go," Arnold asked by the time they had ran a safe distance away from the scream. By Phoebe's calculations, they were in a thick forest on the west side of the island.

"What about here," Gerald asked, looking at his map.

"Huh," Arnold asked. At the north east corner of the island, A5, was a lighthouse.

"Someone is already in there," Phoebe answered

"True, but would you rather stay out here," Gerald asked.

"You have a point."

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Brittney and Jimmy took cover on the floor, behind some furniture. Before they did so, Jimmy got a quick glance out the window. It was a big kid, a big kid with an over active pituitary gland. There was no way he could have been Jimmy's age. Frankly, Jimmy decided that between his size and the grey skin, the kid was just creepy. He could have sworn he'd seen a creepy looking kid like that before. However, the big question was whether they had been spotted or not.

"TURNER!"

"Turner," Jimmy asked to himself, "Timmy Turner? That's it!" Jimmy remembered, that was the bully Francis from Timmy Turner's dimension.

There were two loud clicks, bullets started to tear the front wall of the house apart. After about 30 seconds, the bullets stopped. Francis had gotten automatic guns in his knapsack? As if he needed those!

"Go hide in the back," Jimmy shouted.

Francis kicked through the front door, the chair had been re applied but it was no match for him. "You're that fudge kid," he said lying eyes on Jimmy. Jimmy wasn't taking any chances, he remembered his first meeting with Francis. He raised his crossbow and shot. An arrow went cleanly through Francis' right shoulder.

"Why you-" Francis reached around his back with his injured arm and grabbed a machete. He swung, Jimmy dodged, his hair wasn't so lucky, it laid in a pile on the floor. Francis took another swing, Jimmy side stepped to the right and rolled behind the sofa. Francis suddenly became trigger happy. With his good arm, he took aim and held the trigger. The sofa was shot into shreds. Francis stopped, something was wrong, there was no blood. Where was the blood? There was some pouring freely from his shoulder, but he didn't want that, he wanted fudge head's blood! No matter, if he couldn't have his, he would get, "the girl in the back."

Before he could turn away from the sofa, something made out of glass hit the back of his head. Francis fell, Brittney stood behind him with the remains of a broken vase.

"Brittney," Jimmy asked, "When did you- how did you?"

I saw he had you cornered; he didn't think to shoot the other end of the sofa but…"

Jimmy nodded, "thank you."

"Shouldn't we get going?"

"I think you're right." Sakamochi called the zone there were in as a future protected zone. They did not want to learn what the collars did through first hand experience. Jimmy grabbed his crossbow and peaked out the front door, the coast was clear. "Let's go!"

"Right," Brittney said, walking behind him.

"Where should we go next," jimmy asked to himself out loud. He didn't expect her to answer. Ever since they arrived here he has done all the thinking for the both of them. At the moment however, he thought it was strange that she didn't say anything. Something in his gut told him, something was wrong.

He turned around, Francis was on his feet! His forehead was covered in blood, his shoulder was covered also, but that didn't stop him from pressing his bloody hand over Brittney's mouth. Jimmy aimed the crossbow.

"Don't even think about it," Francis said pointing a gun to Brittney's head with his good arm. "Any sudden moves and the girl is dead."

Jimmy scowled, was he trying to negotiate in a fight to the death? "What do you want?"

"Your bag, hat bow gun, her bag, and her weapon."

Brittney was furiously shaking her head from side to side. Why didn't Jimmy just grab those guns before they walked out the house?

Francis' hand slipped, Brittney started screaming. "Don't do it Jimmy! Don't do-"

Francis reapplied his grip over her mouth, "shut up!" There were three clicks. Francis had pulled the trigger on his automatic. Brittney's eyes widened, then rolled in the back of her head. Jimmy screamed; every fiber in his being screamed. His heart screamed, his brain screamed, he was still screaming when he fired his crossbow. Another went through Francis' injured shoulder, another one hit his heart, and a third went cleanly through his right eye. His body jerked back as the last arrow hit.

Jimmy kept firing, he kept shooting arrows until there were non left. Afterwards, he threw the crossbow as hard as he could. His eyes began to tear, blood was pouring freely from Brittney's head.

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