'Kay, first of all, I'd like to say that I'm really proud of you guys for making such great predictions and guesses. :3 My reading teacher always used to say that a good reader can guess what will happen next in a book (or at least what happened behind the scenes, A.K.A. Ty's mini-challenge). Now, I'm not saying any of you are right; for all you know, you're WAY off.

I'm just saying I'm proud of you for making guesses.

Games

Ch 12: Exploding Bathroom

"T-Ty!" I wail, stumbling out of the dark room where the GameMaster healed the intense damage done to my body by the squids. Physically, I look perfectly fine, but emotionally? I'm a wreck.

I take two steps and then fall directly into Ty's open arms, and we both bawl our eyes out while he plays with my hair and I hug him half to death. "S-Sky, are you a-alright?" Ty chokes out after a while.

"No," I whisper, "not at all. A-Are you?"

He sighs, closing his eyes for a few moments and holding me closer. "I-I'm getting there."

"What h-happened in your challenge?"

"U-Uh... I'd rather not talk about it," he says, glancing down at his feet. I nod, completely understanding. I shouldn't have asked that question anyways. I mean, I certainly wouldn't want to relive my challenge.

"That's okay. Let's just sit here for a moment and enjoy the peace," I say quietly, taking a deep, shaky breath and trying to dispel the memories of the squids from my mind as I pull Ty down to sit on the floor with me. It's not working. It's not working, it's not working, those squids and the pain and the helplessness, that's all I can think of. Before I can completely break down again, I bury my face in Ty's shirt. He gently wraps his arms around me, silently giving me comfort.

"Quentin!" Ian shouts, chasing a crying fish through a door and into the big, round room that Ty and I are in. There are doors placed around the room leading to bathroom-sized rooms that all look identical to the one I was teleported to after the squids... ugh. Anyways, the GameMaster healed my physical damage in one of those rooms, and Ty was teleported into another of the rooms. The rest of the Team should be popping up in the other rooms soon. "Quentin, wait, please!"

I should help, I should get up and see what's wrong. But really all I want to do is snuggle up to Ty and never move again.

But Ian and Quentin need help.

But Ty and I are freaking traumatized over here.

But Ian and Quentin need help.

Sigh. The things I do for my friends. I gently pry myself out of Ty's embrace so I can stand up, and he literally jumps up to stand by me, clinging onto my arm. Whatever the GameMaster put him through, it affected him more than he's been letting on. I move Ty's hand off my arm and hold it in my own hand instead before moving towards the area where Quentin is now flinching away from Ian. Ian has him backed against the wall and is reaching out a hand toward him hesitantly. "Quentin..."

I tap on Ian's shoulder. "What's wrong?" I croak, my voice still hoarse from crying.

He hesitates, glancing at Quentin. "The GameMaster combined my challenge with Quentin's, in a way. Quentin was put in this mirror maze, like in a fun house, you know? Except the mirrors didn't show Quentin's reflection, they showed you, me, Ty, Jerome, Mitch, Seto, Jason, everyone. But mostly me, for whatever reason," Ian begins, keeping his voice down so Quentin doesn't hear him. "And the people in the mirrors were just continuously throwing insults at Quentin. No matter where he looked, ran, hid, they were always right in front of him. It may not seem that bad, but it went on for the entire three hours that we were in there. It got to where Quentin was just rocking on the floor, covering his ears and crying his eyes out.

"And I was above him the whole time. The ceiling in Quentin's maze looked just like another mirror to him, but in reality, it was like a window on one side. I could look through the floor of my challenge room and see Quentin. And it was terrible, watching all the mirror versions of me hurt Quentin like that and not being able to do anything about it. I just had to... watch him suffer. It was... I just..." He lowers his voice even more. "It's a horrible feeling, not being able to help the one you love when they're in pain."

"I know how you feel," Ty whispers, but I'm focused on what Ian said earlier. The window/mirror thing, the squids weren't lying about it. But why would... Hmm... Maybe the GameMaster was watching me through the window/mirror in my challenge room?

Ian smiles sadly. "Anyways, Quentin thinks we all hate him now, and he's terrified of us. Whenever I try to talk to him, he just runs away and covers his ears."

I frown, moving carefully towards Quentin. "Hey, fish," I say softly, meaning to start into some comforting speech about how we're his friends and the things he saw in his challenge were all fake.

Quentin cuts me off, sobbing the words "I'm not a fish, I'm an amphibian!" Well. That did not go as planned.

I turn to Ian with wide, questioning eyes. Ian sighs. "Mirror-You told Quentin that you considered a fish to be in the same family as a squid and therefore wished he would die a painful death."

"Oh. Well, then." I pause, then turn back to Quentin to try again. "Quentin? I just want you to know that squids are not fish. They're squids. Squids and fish have no relation whatsoever in my book." I stop again, thinking. "And you're a mudkip anyway. You're our mudkip, our friend."

Quentin sniffles a bit, not full-out sobbing anymore but definitely not smiling, either. Ian steps in to try to back up what I said. "You're a lovely mudkip, Quentin, and we all care about you a lot. In fact, you're my best friend."

Quentin shies away from Ian when he steps closer, shaking his head slowly. "No, no! You're lying! You hate me and you're sure Notch wasn't in his right mind when he created me and you think I'm a dumb, ugly, worthless fish and you can't wait for me to die and go to the Nether and if I'm alive much longer you're just going to kill me yourself!" he cries.

"Woah. That's a lot more than comparing him to a squid and wishing him a painful death," I comment.

Ian winces. "Yeah. Like I said, most of the mirror-people were versions of me." He glances at Quentin with a mixture of love, regret, and helplessness. Quentin won't even look at him.

"Oh my Notch, but did you see the look on his face!?" someone asks, giggling.

I turn around to see Mitch and Jerome walking out of a room and laughing. "Yeah, it was great! He so thought he had us!" Jerome replies.

"He was no match for the Benja-Bacca duo!" Mitch yells, fist-pumping the air.

"We are too strongk!" Jerome says in a funny voice.

"What happened?" I ask.

"The GameMaster pitted us up against this huge army of mobs, but we were taking them out without a problem," Mitch explains. "So he teleported in Wobbie, you know, my old nemesis? But we totally owned him, too!" He turns to Jerome and high-fives him.

"Well, then. I guess we know who won the challenge," I say, laughing slightly.

Ty shrugs. "Jason or Seto might have done really well. We'll just have to wait until they get out."

While Ian tries to convince Quentin that he doesn't want him dead, Mitch and Jerome run around the room in a game of tag that Ty and I refuse to participate in. Right now, we just want to sit down and relax. I let out a relaxed sigh and lean into Ty, who hums and starts fiddling with my curly hair again.

"Dood, are you okay!?" Mitch asks, stopping mid-stride to look at Jason, who is stumbling out of one of the rooms.

He shakes his head, panting as he leans his back against the wall and then sinks to the floor, hugging his knees. "That was horrific," he breathes. "I was in space, and I was absolutely loving it, and then... I don't know, my suit started malfunctioning or something, and then I couldn't breathe, and it was just constant pain... I don't think I'll ever dream about going to space again."

"There goes your entire life goal," I say. He sighs, apparently too exhausted to glare at me as he closes his eyes. Now we're just waiting for Seto.

That's when one of the little bathroom-sized rooms blows up.

I hope the feels killed you.

But I also hope Notch revived you afterwards, because I don't want your parents to sue me for your death.

Oh, and also because I care about you. Yeah, that too.

:3

You probably didn't die, though, 'cause this really wasn't as good as it could have been, sadly. JUST WAIT UNTIL THE RAPIST SESSION, THOUGH.

OOPS. I MEANT "THERAPIST." :3

kthxbaii, my Rulers!