Chapter Six
The Hysteria
"This...this can't be true!" Cain uttered under his breath. He couldn't believe his eyes. Was it really a friend of his doing all of this villianous deeds? The rest were all just as awe struck, to see the culprit.
"Tokage, is this true? Are you under a spell?" Eyria shouted, holding back his tears. Riff didn't speak, and Jizabel was trembling too much for words.
"You guys have missed so much fun." Tokage said, staring down at his subjects. It all was coming true. Eyria's visions had come true again. The four not being killed was them. He did value his life, but not if he had to carry a burden of death he could've of prevented.
"Why are you doing this? Explain yourself!" Jizabel finally managed something out of his lips. Tokage however, didn't answer him. Instead, he gave a slight chuckle, licked the blood off his white teeth, and sat down on the side of the fountain.
"To get a higher score, why else would I?" he said, not making sense to any of the other players.
"They'll understand quite shortly." Tokage thought, looking around, seeing if he missed anything.
"A score! You think this is some kind of game!" Riff shouted, grabbing Tokage by the collar of his shirt.
"Certainly." he said. "Want me to fill you in? Or do you already know how to play?" His voice was croaky, and just terrible to hear. After what he had done, neither of the other players would accept him as a friend, like he even cared anyway.
"Why! Killing people isn't a sport!" Cain shouted.
"I never said a sport, fool. It's a game. I just completed the tutorial. Now, I have to pass level one, and that'll be easier said than done. On the other hand, at this rate, it looks like a piece of cake." Without a simple of hesitation, Cain approached Tokage, and open handed him across his bloody cheek.
"Shut your trap! I don't care about any kind of sick games you play!"
"Oh, but you will. You are one of the players Cain, along with them too." He pointed at the rest of the group, and chuckled again.
"What?" Riff shouted, almost ready to slap Tokage himself.
"It's a simple little game. Also a very deadly one. I can explain the rules the long way, but to be simple, I'll just give you the correct motive." Tokage rose from his seat, and paced around the fountain, his voice more and more coarse as he continued his speech.
" This fountain here is the center of the playing feild, where no one owns territory, until the end of the game. The foster home, church, hospitial, train station, the univeristy, and the bar are the bases for each player. I am not deciding which base you get, that's up to you. Each of us, have the same weapon, or controller, the platinum gun, and bronze bullet. The mission and major point of the game; Take control of all territory."
"Um, quick question. How do you take control?" Jizabel asked, doubting he wanted the answer.
"Simple. One spin, one shot, one bullet. Kill them." The four trembled, as Tokage chuckled after he spoke.
"NO! I won't play your sick little game!" Cain shouted, standing beside Riff, for protection.
"Be careful, and watch your surroundings. Everyone is now your enemy. And if you don't play, you'll be an easy target."
"Shut up! We don't care what you say! We'll never play!" Eyria shouted, standing up close to Tokage's face. With a slight chuckle, Tokage grabbed his weapon and held it, ready to fire.
"Want to see what happens if you don't play?" he asked, already taking action. Cain, Jizabel, and Riff were too stunned, and paralyzed to prevent that event. With less than half a second of time, Tokage pulled the trigger, and the bronze bullet grazed, across Eyria's shoulder, making an open wound. The blood spilled out quickly, and great pain encoursed through his tiny frame of a body.
"See? Interesting isn't it? Soon, the madness will encase you all, then you'll reconsider this little game." Tokage said, turning his back to them, and retreating away from the center feild.
"Are you all right?" Jizabel shouted, picking up Eyria, who was now crying in pain. The blood was flowing quickly, but luckily the wound wasn't fatal.
"We must take care of this quickly!" Cain said, noticing the wound, but he re considered. In the back of his mind, two thoughts were going on at once. One being, we have no medical care anymore. The only way to recover the wound is some other alternitive. That was a decent thought, but the other one scared him. It was something like this.
"Why would you aid your enemy's wound? Let him bleed. Let him suffer. He'll be easy to hunt down later." Cain slapped his forehead, trying to eject the thought from his skull.
"Are you alright master Cain?" Riff asked, wrapping his arms around Cain's figure.
"Yes...I am fine." his words came out more shaky than he intended.
"Luckily I have a background in medicine." Riff stated, getting back to the problem at hand.
"Yes, but I am a doctor!" Jizabel shouted, lifting Eyria off the ground. "I might know of an herb than can dis-infect the wound, but the problem is, it's poisonous." Cain's ears perked. Posion? I can help.
"I might know it's location! Give me a minute!" Cain fled off, away from the purple flares and the fountain. Riff quickly followed after his master, and Jizabel stayed put with the little boy. His cries and sobs were almost hard to bear, but he was sort of used to it. After all, he used to cry, a long time ago.
"It's going to be okay. Just hang in there." Jizabel tried comforting him, but it seemed none of his words reached his ears...
"Go ahead, release yourself. Kill him! You have the power! Do it, you patheic little child!" the voices were shouting inside Eyria's little mind. The pain was taking over the rest of his nerves, but the screaming filled everything else. There was no sense of him anymore. Swiftly, his feelings were changing to dark and evil. His heart was fading into a stone cold shell, leaving everything warm out, and blocking happiness. The madness was reaching him, just like Tokage said.
"Fight it! Fight it!" Eyria tried thinking to himself, but the voices in his head screamed, "RELEASE! RELEASE!" Trying to silence the voices, he released a scream of pain, echoing across the empty Central Square. Jizabel had covered his ears, but Eyria hadn't noticed. He was afaird to open his eyes, or even move a muscle in his thin corpse. He could feel it, the blood pooling up around his body. If the others didn't do something about his wound, he'd be out of the game! Wait! Why am I thinking this?
"You're going to be all right!" Jizabel's voice was very muted, and hard to hear beyond the screaming voices. Eyria wanted to respond, but it was almost impossible at the moment. He was afaird the only thing he could emit as a sound, was screaming and sobbing...
"Found it!" Cain shouted, running out of a deep thicket with a root, bearing white blossoms, and black pollen.
"Careful Milord! That's very deadly!" Riff exclaimed, taking it from his master. Riff was wearing gloves, so he wouldn't be affected by it's deadly pollen.
"Quick, we must return to Jizabel, or Eyria will die!" Grabbing Riff's free hand, they dashed through the forest, and back to Central Square. Riff couldn't pay attention to his sense in direction. Cain was basically pulling dead weight. Riff was getting lost into his mind.
"Don't let yourself be next. Open your eyes, and kill them! One's right in front of you, the other is wounded, and the last one is afaird. Do it! It's an easy win!" Voices were talking to him. Dark ones, with evil, and malicous intentions.
"No, I'd never kill anyone, unless they were endangering master Cain." Riff said, talking back to the voices. He was controlling the madness inside his head, but he wondered how long he could keep it up. Sometime soon, he was afaird he'd have no choice but to stop the voices, and that would be by winning the game.
"I'll fight them off as long as I can." Riff thought, coming back to reality, and arriving at Central Square...
"Good, you've returned!" Jizabel said, holding out his hand for the plant.
"Hurry, that wound bleeds anymore, we might lose him!" Riff said, ignoring Jizabel's hand, and placing pollen right onto the wound. Eyria's little body shook in pain, and screams left his mouth. High pitched and glass shattering cries of pain. Jizabel held him down, and Riff added more pollen to the wound.
"It's painful I know, but we have to do this to save you!" Jizabel thought, watching the pollen infect the blood inside the wound. His thoughts were only hoping to recover the small child's wound, not a trace of madness to be heard of.
"That's odd," Jizabel thought, looking at Riff and Cain, "It looks like the madness is already affecting them. Why hasn't it hit me yet?" Why would he even consider worrying about the madness. He had swore he'd never weild a gun in his life, and plus, Tokage was the only one with it. If anyone was going to kill anyone, it'd be that one. He had the gun, when Jizabel last recalled.
"Not quite," a voice whispered in the back of Jizabel's mind, but he didn't hear it...
"It used to only take one, now it takes two or more. This deadly game, this one chance of suicide. If you were given the chance to play, would you accept it, or deny it. Take your pick." Tokage whispered to himself, watching the other players. "Pathetic, I'd kill them by now." He brought his finger up to his lips, and began biting it, until blood trickeled down his wrist. "Well, I better give them time. They'll play shortly. When madness reaches them, then the real games will begin."
Author's Note: Ok, this was probably shorter than Intended it to be, but I am running low on ideas for this chapter. I am sorry for anyone who was expecting a longer chapter. (Hell I am running out of ideas for this Author's notes! EPIC FAIL!) I'll keep trying and if you like it, I am very proud of you. No one ever likes my stories, and you'll be a first I guess.
I am still thinking of a cover for this little story, (since all of my stories deserve a cover don't they?) and it's not coming well. All I know is that all of them need to be in it, or something close to it. Well, hopefully you'll continue reading, unless you are just entertaining yourself with my pathetic stories.