Scene iv
Isaac's dead body leaned against the bloodied scythes that were still submerged into his flesh. The red liquid continued dripping to the floor; a puddle of blood had been created underneath Isaac.
With the weights beginning to real up, Alison let her arms drop down and she let out a scream, "Oh my God!" She grabbed her mouth and looked at Isaac's corpse with wide eyes.
"Roy," Kaden muttered as he glanced over to the officer who had been lowering himself to let the scythes kill him before they killed Alison, "How are you not—"
Click—click
The platforms beneath them made another clicking noise and they rose up a few inches.
"We can't fool him," Grace said, quoting what Jigsaw had told them in the first room. "Look at his stand," she said, pointing to Isaac's pedestal, "He was too heavy to be on Alison's stand; the base lowered and caused those blades to come up."
She couldn't keep her eyes off of Isaac, and neither any of them. To see someone die so ferociously was unsettling.
Roy was on his knees, staring straight at Isaac. He almost felt as if he was the one who died. Roy was just about to throw away his life to save Alison's. Instead, by mere luck of being too slow, Isaac was the one who was dead. "Just a few more seconds, and…" he muttered to himself.
Stepping off his stand, Kaden walked toward the four scythes. He went to each one, looking up and down, examining them. Kaden stopped at one and bent down, ignoring the puddle of blood by his feet. "Hey, I found the key," he announced to his teammates.
With one hand pushing against the scythe, which was wet with blood, Kaden pulled forward with his other hand, removing a key that was lodged into the scythes side.
Kaden stood up and shook his hand. "Ew," he said as drops of blood flung to the floor.
He moved for the door but stopped, Kaden looked back at the three other remaining players. "Well? Come on," he urged.
"'Come on'?" Alison asked, shocked, "Didn't you see what just happened?"
"I saw that you almost died. I don't feel any remorse for him," Kaden stated. He waited a moment, noticing that the others were still not ready to move, "Or we can wait and see if the weights will fall again."
The three survivors gave each other a glance and within a few seconds they stepped off.
"Are you ok?" Roy asked as he walked by Alison's side.
"Yeah, don't worry about me," she said while holding her face. It was still red from Isaac's punch.
A sense of awkwardness was around them, Roy was expecting some sort of comment about his willing sacrifice but he never received any appreciation.
Kaden stopped in front of the locked door. He stared down at the key previously used by Isaac in the lock. "What's wrong?" Roy asked.
"The key, it'll shock me. Remember?" Kaden responded, in fear that if he attempted to remove the key he would receive the same punishment that was given to Isaac.
"We need a shirt or something," Grace said, looking from the door to Kaden.
"I'm afraid I don't have any more vests to give," Kaden said with a shrug.
Alison gave a small sigh and grabbed her shirt's sleeve. With a hard tug the sleeve ripped off; it matched her other sleeveless arm from when she had to pick up the boiling hot key from the floor.
Kaden wrapped the sleeve around his hand and gripped the key tight; he gave a hard tug back but the key refused to budge. "Damn it," he groaned as he pressed his other hand against the door and pulled back again. The key flew out of the lock and from Kaden's hand; it bounced off and slid across the floor.
Kaden pulled out a new, longer, key from his pocket and looked at Grace, "Hey, could you—?"
"Yeah," she quickly responded and walked away from the others to fetch the key.
The key was inserted into the lock and Kaden gave it a twist. Many clanks and the grinding of metal gears could be heard from behind the door. A final loud snap could be heard directly in front of them and the door moved open just an inch.
Kaden pushed open the door and walked inside as Roy followed. Alison turned her head and stared at Isaac once more. Blood continued dripping from his backside, and the scythes still dug into his skin. She winced and ripped her eyes away from the scene and moved into the next room.
"Jesus Christ," Roy muttered. He coughed and held his hand over his nose, "What's that damn smell?"
Roy's eyes wandered up to the ceiling and found several dim and flicking florescent light bulbs. The wooden floor was cold and quickly began to bother his bare feet. Two black sheets were covering objects placed in the room. Next to the first sheet a cassette tape was set and what appeared to be broken bits of a recorder were scattered about the room.
On the wall of the room was a single phrase written in some sort of red substance, 'The Most Truthful Liar Of All.'
"Ugh," Alison said with a disgusted look on her face as she exchanged glances with Roy.
She moved to the first black sheet and looked down at it, there was a hump in the sheet, and there was no doubt a human body underneath. "Pull it off, Alison," said Kaden.
Alison took another step forward and her eyes darted to her feet. "Oh, ew!" she cringed as she stepped back from the puddle of blood she just stepped in.
Grace slipped past the door to the new room with the key she had gone to find in her pocket. "Who died?" she asked with a cough, covering her mouth and nose from the foul odor.
Bending her back in order to keep her feet from the blood, Alison grabbed the black sheet and moved backwards, the sheet was pulled off the body.
Alison let the sheet drop to the floor and her eyes widened while she stared at the body before her.
Not a word was spoken for several moments before Roy muttered, "No… he can't be…"
Kaden looked over to Roy, "Who is that—" he was interrupted by Alison's shrill scream.
"Oh my God!" she cried out as she stepped forward and fell to her knees, the blood beneath her splashed as her hand grabbed the man's dark brown hair. "No, no, no!" Alison's eyes filled with tears as her other hand grabbed his blood-covered shirt.
Alison looked over the corpse, its right arm was completely mangled, and parts of the bone could be seen and strips of flesh hung off of it.
"Steven!" Alison cried out as she lifted him up by his neck, her other hand stopped on his back, "Oh my God!" She lifted up Steven's body even more so she could look at his back, the clothing and skin was torn and twisted, the spine was almost clearly visible and appeared to be badly cut and broken.
She let go of his body and she quickly stood up and backed away. Alison's fingers curled as she backed up into the wall and let herself drop down to a crouching position. "It's—it's Steven, Roy!" she cried out, her grief-stricken body shook as tears rolled down her face.
"God damn it!" Roy cried out as he shook his head and moved toward Steven. "He didn't deserve this!" he shouted as he looked around the room at the walls, as if he expected someone to answer.
Roy knelt down by Steven's body, a red box by his head. He lifted it up and looked inside, a few photos were stacked on top of one another. The photos simply had Steven pulling out a small knife from under his pillow, the scars on his arms clearly visible. The pictures appeared as if they were taken from outside his window.
"Who is that?" Kaden finally asked. He kept his distance from the officer.
"My stepbrother," Roy said with a frown on his face. He clenched his fists and tossed the photos into the box. "I—" he stopped talking and stood up. Roy stared down at the red box before him.
His foot slammed against the box and sent it across the room, breaking into further pieces as it hit the floor. "Who's taking all these fucking pictures?" Roy shouted as he watched the box smash from the other side of the room.
Tension filled the room as Grace and Kaden quietly watched the other two struggle.
Roy turned around and sat down, his eyes locked onto the cassette that was simply lying on the floor. He reached for it and pulled it toward him, a wire snapped from the cassette and as it did the door to the previous room into slammed shut.
Kaden quickly moved back to the door and pushed against it and tried to pull it. "It's locked. Again," he said with a sigh.
Roy looked at the cassette; it had the words 'Play Me' painted on it. "Alison, the recorder," he said in a low voice.
Alison sat still for a moment but she soon pulled out the recorder and slid it across the floor to Roy. The cop removed the older cassette and placed in the new one he took from the floor and hit the play button.
"Hello Steven. You have spent the last few years of your life abusing the precious endowment that your parents gave to you. Your body," the voice from the recorder said as Roy placed the recorder on the ground, listening to what Jigsaw had told Steven.
"I am giving you the chance to feel that pain your loved ones have felt, and if you succeed, you will also have the chance to move on, move on from yourself. There is a box in front of you; needles and spikes—" Roy's eyes moved up to the second black sheet. He stood up and moved to it as the recording continued.
Roy pulled off the sheet, a simple saw fell to the floor and a glass box was revealed, needles and spikes filled it. Patches of fleshy skin hung off the needles and a small pool of blood sat on the bottom of the box.
"What will it be, Steven? Cut your wrist, or cut your spine? Live or die. Make your choice. Let the game begin," the recording ended and another cry came from Alison.
"You sick fuck!" Alison shouted as she began to sob uncontrollably, her arms covered her head and her shoulders violently shook.
Roy took little notice of the saw and moved to the tape recorder, picking it up from the floor and removing the cassette. "Where's the rest?" he asked, worried about the time they had left before the poison took effect. Although he couldn't help but feel like he wasn't paying enough attention to his stepbrother's death. But as an officer, he had seen enough crime scenes to try to ignore it for now.
Poor Alison could not.
Roy flipped the cassette and a different phrase was written on the back, 'Play Me 2.' He stuck it into the recorder and looked at Alison, "Hey, Alison…" he said with a frown but Alison refused to respond. "I don't know how much more time we have. We need to get through this and we can mourn all we want later." Roy said, attempting to sound as kind as possible.
"Just play the damn tape, then!" Alison screamed as she looked at Roy with her red, watery eyes.
The officer followed orders and clicked play.
"Hello Alison. If you're hearing this, then that means Steven has failed his test," the recorder began to play the cassette. "You once said you had a very happy relationship with Steven. You helped Steven through his troubled high school life and told him you loved him. You said you'd protect and care for him. What happened Alison? After one party you ended up cheating on the young man who would do anything for you. His heart was broken and he left you. You—Alison, were the straw that broke the camel's back. It wasn't his family's neglect or his stepbrother's drug addiction."
Alison buried her head back into her arms and began to sob again; she bit her lip tightly in an attempt to stop the tears.
"You were the one that caused him to begin abusing his body. He was able to move on, start a new relationship for someone that truly cared for him. But you couldn't move on, you couldn't let go. You continued to cause him harm; you sent him messages and attempted to persuade him into taking you back. You told him you still loved him. If you truly loved him you would've moved on from him and let his wounds heal. Now I'm going to give you the same chance to redeem yourself as I gave Steven. There is a key inside your former lover's body, the same key he struggled to obtain to save his life. The saw you see before you is what you will use to look for the key. Cut Steven one last time to save yourself Alison. Then, and only then, will you be able to move on. Take the key and you will take—back—your—life. But hurry, the timer should be starting soon. If you don't get the key before time is up…" suddenly red numbers appeared on the other side of the room and they began to count down from two hundred seconds, "You will be stuck in this room forever. Live or die. Make your choice. Let the game begin."
To be continued…
