She did not cry for long. She did not have any tears left, and her eyes were beginning to dry.
"Cameron's slackin'," Alfred sighed as he rose to his feet, looking down disdainfully at Yao's slumped body, "Still hasn't cleaned up the vomit. Arthur, take care of the body, please. Rhys, the blood. Cameron, still need to clean up the vomit. Haven't done that."
"I ain't your slave," Cameron said, but Alfred gave him a knowing smirk and Cameron gave a scoff. The butlers (slaves? Henchmen? What were they?) set to work getting everything done. Arthur bent down and grabbed Yao's body around the middle, slinging it over his back, before following Rhys out of the room, who had left, apparently, for cleaning supplies. Lili's eyes turned carefully towards Leon, who was staring blankly at the spot where Yao had once been, tie inserted in mouth and rubbing at his own bloodied fingers.
Lili felt sorry for him. She did.
But not as sorry as she was beginning to feel for herself, because she was a little girl, and there was no way a little girl would be able to win a game like this without extreme cases of luck, and she's never really had one of those.
But then again, this game didn't require knowledge or athleticism…
Just their ability to handle extreme measures of pain.
Whatever physical pain I may endure, Lili found herself thinking as she eyed the pliers (or whatever they were) that had been set carelessly down next to Harri, None of it will be more painful than losing Basch.
It seemed, apparently, that Gilbert was eyeing the pliers too. And Lili registered it too late when his hands suddenly lunged for them, and then everything happened in a flash.
Gilbert leapt to his feet, chair skidding backwards, and lunged at Harri, who had spun around at the noise, and in an instant, everybody else was up too, including Lili.
Lili turned and ducked underneath Natalya's outstretched arm, raising up her thin arms and shoving Feliciano out of the way as she tore through the door that had been left ajar when the others had exited the room.
All Lili heard were screams when she pounded down the hall, almost tripping over her own dress and skidding down the hallway, frantically searching for any way out. She knew just by looking at the locks that the front doors were inescapable, so Lili rushed upstairs as fast, and yet, as quietly, as she could.
A row of doors were on either side, and the hall seemed to extend on forever. She could hear screams of pain from the room downstairs, as well as Alfred screaming her surname. Lili frantically ran up to each door, trying every handle, only to come close to screaming when none of them budged. Her heart pounded in her ears, and she could almost feel her blood rushing.
If neither of the next two doors budged, she would take her chances and run down the hall. Lili reached for the next doorknob, hand grasping the cold metal, and turned it.
The door opened.
Lili almost fainted from relief, but her panic came flooding back when she heard the stomping footsteps on the stairway and an angry voice.
Lili scrambled quickly into the room, shut the door as quietly as she could manage with her shaking hands, and locked it.
The room was rather bare, but there was a paper-littered desk, queen-sized bed, and a door that lead to the closet. As she heard the footsteps down the hall, she opted to scrambling beneath the bed and hoping they would think to check the closet first, should they come into this room.
Pressing a hand to her mouth to stifle her hurried, panicked breathing, Lili clawed at her chest as if to attempt to stop her own heart, tears pricking the corners of her eyes. The footsteps were farther away, which probably meant that the owner of the footsteps knew that every door was locked.
Or, at least, supposed to be locked.
The tip of Lili's nose brushed the underside of the bed as she lay as still as she could, listening intently. When she could no longer hear the footsteps, Lili carefully and slowly crawled from beneath the bed, eyeing the windows to the left of the room. She could, possibly, escape from here. Even use the bedsheets to help her get down, if needed.
Her mind was rushing and she was panicking so much she nearly failed to notice the phone set on the desk, but when she did, she once again almost fainted from relief.
But she had to try the window before she called anybody.
Approaching it, Lili peered down onto the dark ground. The house was on the edge of the woods, and the trees might've looked dark and foreboding to anybody else, but right now, to Lili, they were a safe haven. So she placed her hands on the window, fingernails digging into the frame, before attempting to heave it upwards.
The window did not budge.
Not that she had really expected it to, but it still felt terrifying when it didn't. Taking a deep breath, she tried once again, feeling one of her shoulders pop, before taking a step back from the window, heart pounding.
The phone was her next best bet.
Crossing the room to the phone, Lili picked up the handset and glared down at the numberpad. It was a bit old fashioned, but she didn't care.
She should probably call the police.
She needed to call the police.
But…
Instead, she found herself punching in Basch's number.
If something did happen to her…
He needed to know.
And he could inform the authorities.
It was killing two birds with one stone.
Lili bit her lip as she finished, and held the handset up to her ear, her remaining nails digging into the wood of the desk, paying the scattered papers no mind. Her chest hurt from how hard her heart was pounding. Her fingers ached.
She waited.
And she waited.
But the phone didn't even ring.
Frowning, Lili put the receiver down, before picking it back up, this time dialling the police. She held the handset up to her ear once again and waited with bated breath, but the phone didn't ring.
She tried again. And again. And again.
Her breath became faster and her heart pounded harder as she did so, her fingers smearing blood all over the touchpad as she felt her eyes burn, slamming the handset down over and over because the phone had to ring, it had to work, it was plugged in, it-
"The phone is specially wired so it can only make and receive phone calls to and from one place," A voice said from behind her.
Lili almost dropped the handset as she did so. Her free hand tightened around the base of the phone, and she turned her head, slowly, feeling as if the floor were leaving her feet. Alfred stood in the doorway, a set of keys in hand, smiling at her. He did not look angry. He looked calm.
This scared Lili even more.
"In case I ever forgot to lock the door, of course," Alfred grinned with a wave of his hands, taking a few steps into the room.
Lili's blood turned to ice.
"I was careless. But that won't happen again."
Alfred's eyes glinted.
"I'm not going to hurt you for trying to escape. That's natural human instinct. Come quietly, now, and I won't hurt you for this. I won't touch you for doing this."
He chose his words carefully, Lili thought to herself.
Just because he promised he himself wouldn't lay a hand on her, did not mean that he couldn't tell the others to.
So when Alfred took another step forward, she dropped the handset and twisted around, grabbing the base of the phone and yanking on it so the cord ripped out of the wall, and instantly lunged it at Alfred.
It hit his shoulder and he gave a cry, more out of surprise than anything, and Lili scrambled over the bed to avoid getting in his area of reach and stumbled out into the hallway, nearly screaming as she did so, because Cameron was nearly forty feet down the hall and staring right at her.
Lili turned and pounded down the stairs, praying and hoping that there were more rooms that might be unlocked downstairs, that she could be able to escape, please, leave her, and-
A heavy weight slammed into her back, and she toppled down the six remaining steps, screeching as she did so.
Her elbow slammed onto the marble floor and a shock went through her entire body as she was pinned from behind by someone rather heavy, hot breath on her neck. Lili gave a futile attempt to push him off of her, only for a hand to be placed on the back of her head and to be shoved down, her heart beating rapidly, spit dribbling down her chin.
Something warm and wet ran over the shell of her ear, and Lili felt her entire body freeze.
"Now you're still," The voice said, and Lili realized that Cameron was the one pinning her tiny body down.
Lili couldn't speak, and could only grit her teeth as tears flowed down her face, her fists clenching before rapidly unclenching when her still-sensitive fingers pressed against her palm.
Rough fingers threaded through her short hair before caressing her neck, and Lili realized with a jolt that both of his legs were on either side of her own, so if she tried, she could kick his back…
She didn't need to, however.
In an instant Cameron was shoved off of her and she was being grabbed roughly by her forearm, and Lili gave a gasp as she was pulled to her feet. Cameron cursed behind her, and she didn't look back as she was dragged away. A quick glance told her it was Arthur, but Lili didn't care, for her head was already spinning with ways they could hurt or even kill her for running away.
Feeling sick to her stomach and tripping over her own feet, Lili was pushed into the dining room forcibly, and would have probably thrown up her own intestines when she slid in the puddle of blood on the floor had she not swallowed heavily to stifle her own scream.
Everybody in the room seemed worse for wear.
Tereza was bleeding heavily from a wound in her side that was heavily bandaged with what looked like Lukas's shirt. Lukas himself was sporting a bloody nose and his own wound in his stomach, eyes half-lidded. Natalya sported a bruising eye and her hands were covered in blood, but they didn't seem to be his own. Leon's neck was covered in bloody fingerprints, that didn't look to be his own, either.
Gilbert was missing.
"I hope none of you think to try this again," Arthur said lazily as he shoved her into her chair, and she can only stare at the puddle of blood she had almost slipped in near the doorway.
"You two will probably die from those wounds," Harri said cheerfully to Tereza and Lukas. Tereza looked like she was about to cry. Linh buried her face in her hands.
Alfred entered the room, looking nearly bored as he tossed the pliers in his hand to Harri. The pliers were certainly much bloodier than they had been before.
Lili didn't want to know what had happened to Gilbert. Feliciano's blood-spattered, blank face and slack posture told her enough.
Harri approached Tereza with a gleeful look in his eye that only brightened when she flinched away from the blood-drenched tool.
"Well, miss Tereza," Alfred drawled as he slid down into his seat, fixing his gaze down at his watch, "Would You Rather-"
"F-fingernails," Tereza sputtered, and Rhys strapped her down while Harri examined the blood on the pliers, rubbing at it absently with his sleeve. When Tereza's arms were pinned down, Harri leaned over and proceeded to tear her fingernails from her flesh.
This process was repeated twice more with Lukas and Linh, both who gave their answers before Alfred could even finish asking, which Lili understood. She wouldn't let that thing in her mouth.
Lili herself was curled up tightly in her chair, gripping her arms tightly and trying not to stare at what Harri was doing and failing to do he reached Linh, she couldn't watch anymore and turned her face away, only to meet Toris's gaze.
"You scared?" He asked in a whisper, and Lili did not shake or or nod her head, but her eyes must have answered for her, because Toris himself nodded and turned his gaze away from her face to stare vacantly at Harri's back.
"You have a good memory, right?"
"Yes." Lili answered.
"You live in the area, right?"
"That's right."
"Should I die...Would you please give some money to Feliks?"
Lili probably would've felt shocked at Toris asking her this before, but now she just felt numb.
"Okay," she said.
"I'm going to tell you his phone number."
"Okay."
Toris told her Feliks's phone number. Lili repeated it back. Toris corrected her. Lili repeated it again, but this time she did so perfectly.
Lili told him Basch's number as Linh cried out. Toris had to be corrected three times.
"You're both stupid," Natalya suddenly said, and Lili's eyes flickered over to her pale face before realizing that there were tear tracks glittering down the older woman's cheeks.
"Okay," Was all Lili said.
In her mind, she went over Feliks's number, and thought to herself, if she did win, and Toris had to die for this, she hoped Feliks was worth it.
With this in mind, Lili's gaze traveled towards Lukas as he grunted in pain, his fingernails placed on the table behind Harri. When he finished, he scooped them up into his pocket, as well as the pliers, before smiling towards Cameron, who had entered the room without Lili noticing, carrying something in his hand.
"The icepick!" He cheered when he saw the item, before rounding on Rhys, "You got the nails, right?"
Rhys silently extracted two very long, rusted nails from his pocket. Lili heard Feliciano whimper. The numbness that had filled Lili was slowly replaced with dreading anticipation, her mind feeling tired of everything already. She wanted to go home. She wanted to be done.
She had to save Basch.
But she wanted to go home.
Lili didn't cry. But she did shiver when the icepick and the rusty nails were placed in front of her, Alfred's voice saying,
"Would You Rather choose the icepick, or the nails?"
it's a short chapter i know i'm sorry but there have been a few conflicts writing this
mainly rEWRITING 90% OF THE REMAINING CHAPTERS
so yes please enjoy this or i will cry
you can't make a child cry
it's against the law