Chapter 11 - Arena

Akshay hit the ground hard. The impact rattled through his bones, knocking the air from his lungs. 'f*ck.. hurts like a giant bear playing drums for rock n' roll with his body as a stick' he thought as his head throbbed, his ribs ached—some of them broken, judging by the sharp pain stabbing through his torso. He barely had time to register the pain before a searing white light swallowed everything.

Then, silence.

When his vision cleared, Akshay first recalled his memories of how he along with others went into the woods, saw an Officer disappear and he ran and then he… he fell down'

Now he looked around and found that he was no longer in the woods. Instead, he stood in the center of a vast arena, the kind that looked plucked straight from a gladiator's nightmare.

he would have whistled and be excited if not for Blinding lights burned overhead, so intense he could barely see past a few steps in front of him. Everything beyond that was swallowed in darkness, as if the world itself ended just beyond his reach.

A voice, low and guttural, crawled into his ears like an infestation.

"You have been found by It. Now you must fight. Kill It, take its place, or die."

Akshay shuddered. He remembered something before the fall—Jared. No, not Jared. Something like Jared. The whisper that had slithered into his skull: Tag. You're it.

And now he was here.

A quick glance down revealed his clothes had been replaced with rags, tattered and bloodstained. His gear, his weapons—gone. Even his voice when he tried to call out. No sound left his throat, just the eerie quiet of the arena.

Then he noticed them.

Three others stood beside him, dressed in the same miserable rags, bodies covered in varying degrees of wounds. He recognized their faces. Some researchers. A doctor. Bruno Accardi, his youngest teammate. The only way forward was straight ahead, where four figures loomed in the distance, each armed to the teeth.

Then, the tremor.

A rumbling beneath his feet, followed by the heavy, rhythmic steps of the approaching figures. Weapons gleamed in their hands, but their faces—Akshay squinted, but the damn lights made it impossible to see clearly.

He tried to shout again. Nothing.

"Let the fight begin."

The lights dimmed just enough for Akshay to see the people opposite them.

His stomach twisted into a cold, tight knot.

They weren't strangers. They were the people from the expedition.

And their eyes were wrong.

Vacant, soulless, as if something had scooped out the person inside and left a husk behind. One of them stepped forward, almost mechanically, as if yanked by invisible strings. A man Akshay vaguely recalled—some reporter, always smirking, always shadowy. Except now, he had no expression at all, just dead eyes and an axe too large for his hands.

An invisible force yanked the doctor beside Akshay into the center of a circle that hadn't existed moments ago. The reporter followed, stepping in voluntarily.

The doctor let out a strangled scream, panic-wild, stumbling back. But the circle trapped him, an unseen barrier holding him within its bounds. Akshay tried to move, to intervene, but his limbs refused to obey. He could only watch.

The reporter didn't hesitate.

The axe came down, splitting the doctor open like a ripe fruit. Blood sprayed. Bones cracked. The doctor's screams lasted far too long before they gurgled into silence. And then—

The reporter ate.

Ripping flesh from the corpse with jagged teeth, gnawing, consuming until the body was little more than pulp. As he did, his body changed. Eyes darkened, skin turning an unnatural shade of gray, teeth lengthening, fingers sharpening into claws.

Then—

Gone. Both of them. Just like that.

'The is so not the horror he wanted to witness' Akshay thought as this had barely sunk in when another force yanked the next person forward.

Bruno.

He stumbled into the circle, fists clenched, teeth bared. Across from him, a woman—a researcher Akshay didn't know by name. She gripped a spear, her blank eyes unreadable.

Bruno swallowed hard. Then, unlike the doctor before him, he did not scream. He did not beg.

Instead, he raised his finger. "Fuck you," he muttered, voice shaking. "I'm not playing this game."

The woman lunged. Bruno dodged, barely. The fight that followed was quick, brutal. He knocked her down, twisting the spear from her hands, pinning her to the ground. She fought back like an animal, relentless, uncaring if she lived or died.

Akshay wanted to shut his eyes, but he couldn't. None of them could.

Bruno panted, spear aimed at her throat. His hands trembled.

"Finish it," the voice commanded.

Bruno's grip tightened, but he didn't move. His jaw locked, his eyes glistening with unshed tears. "No."

A new pain racked his body. His scream tore through the arena as fresh wounds opened across his arms, his chest, his legs—long, jagged slashes as if invisible knives carved into him.

He collapsed to his knees, gasping, blood pouring from his wounds, soaking the ground beneath him. The pain didn't stop.

Still, he refused. "I—won't—kill her," he gritted through clenched teeth, voice shaking. "Go to hell."

And then, something worse happened.

The woman moved.

Not naturally. Her body jerked like a puppet on strings, limbs twitching unnaturally. Slowly, she grasped Bruno's hands, forcing them around the spear. Her blank eyes stared straight into his, unblinking, soulless.

"No," Bruno breathed, his voice cracking. "No, no, don't—"

She drove the spear into her own chest, guiding his unwilling hands.

Bruno screamed.

A raw, agonized sound that cut through the silence like a blade. He tried to pull back, to let go, but whatever force controlled her made sure his grip stayed tight. Blood bubbled from her lips, her face still frozen in eerie stillness.

Then, she collapsed, lifeless.

Bruno was left kneeling, hands covered in her blood, his breaths ragged, his sobs shaking his entire frame. He looked at Akshay, at nothing, at everything, as if the universe had just shattered around him.

The voice returned, mocking, pleased.

"Congratulations."

Bruno's wounds healed before their eyes, the blood soaking his rags vanishing as if it had never been. The bright light flashed, and when it cleared—

Bruno stood, dressed in the same outfit he had worn before entering the woods.

But his face was different.

Blank.

Cold.

Empty.

Akshay felt ice creep into his veins. The man standing before him was not Bruno. He had seen that emptiness before.

Jared. The reporter. Now Bruno.

The voice crooned.

"You're It now. Go find the others."

Then Bruno and the woman's body disappeared.

Akshay barely had time to process it before an unseen force pushed him forward into the circle.

His breath caught in his throat as a Silhouette slowly approached him.

 'oh..s**t... I'm f***ing toast' Akshay thought cause he knew his opponent before he even saw the face.

Jared.

Twin knives glinted in his hands as he stepped into the circle.

And now, Akshay finally understood.

There were no survivors here.

Only death.

And monsters.