EnderOni, Loop 2
Chapter Twenty Two:
Fake
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The second floor was quiet, and although the group looked around at the setting that seemed new to them, Tyler already knew what was in place, and where he'd have to go. Sky, Bashur, Ty, and Sub looked around at the cracks in the walls and the old wall papers, as if they had never seen it before. In part, it was true. Tyler couldn't help but stare at them, trying to pre plan his way through this loop to a game won in his favor. His hand still hurt. He shook his head.
"Hey, this door is open." Tyler pointed out when they turned a corner. He pointed to the door that lead to Ian. "Maybe we're supposed to go in here?"
"Yeah!" Bashur smiled. "That's how these things tend to work, right?"
"Alright then! Let's go!" Sky nodded his head.
Ty and Sub followed along as the group walked into the room. Inside, the group noticed right away the sounds within what looked like a closet with an iron door. Whimpering. Whatever was inside was petrified of something. Sky and Bashur stood away from the closet, but Sub and Ty walked over to the closet, brave enough to see whom was inside. Tyler stood there and watched.
Sub opened the door and the door made a loud creaking sound before gently nudging the wall, now completely open. The two looked down to see big eyes staring back at them.
"Ian?" Ty asked, confused.
"Wait what?!" Sky and Bashur walked forward to see Ian shivering, sitting in the small closet with dark blue wallpaper.
"T-Ty! S-Sky!" Ian wiped away a few tears from the corners of his eyes, and tried to stand up, using the wall to aid him. "What are you all doing here!?"
"W-What are you do-"
"You have to get out!" Ian didn't let Bashur finish his question.
"Get out?" Tyler asked, stepping up. If he did nothing at all, he'd look out of place.
"T-Thats right!" Ian still looked like he had seen a ghost. "There's a monster here! And it attacked us! The others ran off! I don't know where anybody else is!"
"Hold on, hold on." Sky walked over to Ian and put his hand on his shoulder to help calm him down. "Monster? Others?"
Ian looked at Sky with the most frightened of eyes. He could remember what the thing looked like, clear as day. "It's big. Some sort of endermen mutation. It's got sharp square teeth and big purple eyes. It's tongue is long and pointy. And a thick scary purple mist follows it wherever it goes!"
Sky looked confused, and a little unsettled. "A-And there were others with you?"
"Yeah!" Ian stepped back. "I was with Jerome and Mitch, and Bodil and Ant! But when the monster appeared, we all ran away and I lost them!"
"All of them are here too?" Bashur asked.
"I guess whoever invited us invited them too." Tyler answered, standing beside Bashur.
Tyler blinked a couple times. He still felt strange with the new loop. He looked around the room and the others talked with Ian about what happened. Tyler's eyes then landed on the door, and his grip on the journal that was in his hands tightened. He remembered that shortly after he met Ian in the last loop, the Oni appeared. A shiver went down his spin, and he walked over to the door, closing it and locking it. Which was great timing. As he looked down to the crack under the door, the faintest of purple fog had started to appear. He turned back to see the others looking at him.
"W-What?" Tyler asked. "O-oh, I thought that while we were in here we wouldn't want the Oni to find us. Keep talking."
"You'd think that maybe it would be able to take down a wooden door?" Sky turned to Ian.
Ian gulped. "It looked strong."
"We won't know for sure until it does." Ty stated.
"I guess we should look for the others and then get out of here." Sky said. "We'll need a plan."
"But dude! What about the Oni? What if it finds us again?" Ian asked.
"Couldn't the monster just be part of the map? Do we really know if it would kill us?" Bashur asked.
"You wanna test that?" Ty asked.
"N-no!"
"I think we should make a plan anyway, to be safe." Sky sighed.
"Well, do you remember which ways the others may have gone?" They looked to Ian.
Ian shook his head.
"Hmm. We'll have to look around. We were just as the first floor, so I don't think they are there. They might be somewhere here on the second floor." Tyler began.
"Or maybe somewhere on the upper floors." Sky suggested and Tyler nodded his head.
"We shouldn't split up, so I say we search around floor by floor, room by room, until we find them." Bashur added.
"What about weapons?" Ty asked.
Sub shrugged when they turned to him for ideas. Sub shifted from his position to walk around the small room. Ty and Sky joined him in search of something.
"I mean, other then the legs of the wooden desk, there isn't much else here." Bashur said. "Those can be sharped down."
"By what?" Ian asked.
"By this, maybe?" Tyler got an idea, and pulled the sharp plate shard from his pocket.
"Where'd you get that?" Bashur asked.
"I found it in one of the rooms I went in. Picked it up. Felt it would come to use." Tyler shrugged and handed the plate shard over to them.
They tried to find something else other than the desk legs, but in the end, it seemed to be the only things that could be even made into weapons. Well, without hard work. Anything could be a deadly weapon If you tried hard enough. Even the pen in Tyler's journal or Sky and Ian's glasses. So Sky, Sub, and Bashur ended up having to take apart the legs of the desk to make spears with the plate shard. Four weapons for six people. Tyler watched as the minutes went by, and he found it funny as Ty would watch them, not really helping. Sub had two of the legs, and was the main one working. But this was a normal thing for him.
Tyler turned to see Ian, only what struck him as odd was to see Ian playing with the back wall of the closet. Curious, he stepped over and tried to peek over to see what he was doing. He was picking at the wallpaper, reveling slowly by slowly a secret behind. Ian after awhile realized Tyler was watching and tried tearing down the wallpaper a bit quicker. There was a large tearing sound, but then it got stuck. Tyler knew what this was, and stepped in to help.
In the end, they had found a weak wooden wall hiding the safe room. Tyler kicked the wall to find it wasn't very sturdy, and with a bit of a push, he alone could break the wooden pieces away. The other four were watching, and their curiosity left them with unfinished weapons as they followed Tyler down the newly found stairs to the safe room.
It was very dark at first, but Tyler knew where the light switch was. He turned on the lights and everybody looked around at the safe room. It was just as Tyler left it, only restocked food and no dead bodies on the beds. Tyler watched as the others looked around in awe. The hidden room amazed them.
"You think these are good to eat?" Sky asked, picking up one of the apples from the baskets in the kitchen.
"Uuuhhh I wouldn't be too sure." Ian shrugged.
Tyler walked over to the basket next to Sky and took one of the apples out, then taking a big bite out of it. But instead of enjoying a delicious apple, all he got was plastic and foam. He could taste the chemicals from the coding on the red factory made fruit. He coughed, and spit the pieces out. What the hell?
"Hah!" Ty laughed. "That's what you get for being to sure of yourself!"
Sky grinned, but then was surprised when Tyler looked horribly confused and grabbed the apple from his hand. Tyler bit into that one, but instead of foam and plastic, he found the deliciousness of an actual real apple. Tyler looked at the fake apple and the real one to notice a small signature at the bottom of the fake one. Tyler dropped both apples. He hoped Onity the piece of shit was having a good laugh with such a stupid switch around prank. Tyler looked at the other apples in the basket to find they were all real.
"That was odd." Sky said.
"What's one fake apple doing in a pile of a bunch of real ones?" Ian asked.
"Who knows?" Tyler sighed.
"Well anyway, there is a bathroom in here and beds and tables, as well as that kitchen. There really isn't much else to this room." Bashur stepped but, Sub behind him.
"It was hidden away. Do you think that monster would be able to get in?" Tyler turned to Ian.
Ian's eyes widen. "N-no! He's far too big!"
"Maybe this could be our safe room." Tyler suggested.
"It's certainly set up to be one." Sky pointed out.
"G-Guys, can we maybe go out to look for the others?" Ian stuttered. "We should find them before something bad happens."
"Y-yeah." Bashur nodded his head.
"So we'll form a rescue party." Ty said. "Sub, how are the weapons?"
Sub pointed to the two finished spears on the table and the two untouched wooden table legs. The plate shard also laid on the table, a bit duller then before. Tyler walked over and picked up the plate shard, then handing Sub and Ty the sharpened table legs. He handed Bashur and Sky the untouched table legs. Ian didn't get anything. Well, he'd have an excuse not to fight at least.
"I would assume best course of action is to wonder around until we find them." Tyler suggested.
"Can't argue with that." Sky agreed.
The group left, Ian not fulling closing the iron door on their way out, just so they could get back in. They made it into the second floor hallway, Tyler leading the way, and seeing that the purple fog that had tried to get it's way under the door was gone. No Oni in sight. Tyler began to turn the corner towards the hall with the stairs, but bumped into someone. He nearly fell back, but caught himself, his glasses sitting uncomfortably on his face. He fixed them, and then looked up to see Ant.
"A-Ant!" Ian smiled and walked over to his friend.
"S-Sorry there, Tyler!" Ant shook his head, looking around at the group. "I didn't know you all were here."
"We didn't know you were here until Ian told us." Bashur replied.
"They were invited here too. Just different times." Ian told Ant.
"Oh. Have they seen the monster yet?" Ant asked.
"Nope." Sky shook his head.
"Let's hope it stays that way." Ant sighed.
"So are you alright? Where'd you run off to?" Ian asked Ant.
"I'm fine. I ran down there" He pointed down the hallway he came from, "But when nothing happened after awhile I decided to walk around. I found a knife in the drawers of the room I hid in I have that as a weapon."
Ant held out the small kitchen knife In his hands. Tyler looked at it, and knew that it wasn't a very good weapon, but if you had the right moment and targeted the oni at the right spot, you could maybe do something with it. In his moment of thought, a sound from the background found it's way to his hearing. Though the conversation between the others, something stood out.
"Can you hear that?" Ant stopped. So he heard it too.
Sub got their attention and pointed down the stairs to the first floor. It was coming from the front door. Tyler didn't hesitate to begin walking down the hall to the stair well, Ant and the others following behind. Halfway down the stairs, Tyler saw two familiar people at the front door, trying to get out. Jerome and Bodil, beating against the door, trying to escape.
"The door won't open!" Jerome shouted, when he turned around and saw the group coming down the stairs.
"So stop beating on it!" Tyler sighed. "It's not going to do you any good!"
"We have to get out of here!" Bodil yelled, his voice high pitched. "The Oni! It's here! It's here and it'll kill us!"
Tyler pushed through them and grabbed the handle of the door, but just as he knew, it was locked. Sky pushed over and tried to open the door aswell, but it wouldn't budge for anyone. Not even Sub, who gave it a try.
"What do we do?" Bodil asked, still freaked out.
"I mean, we arn't safe here! You saw that monster, right?" Jerome asked Tyler and Sky.
"N-no." Sky shook his head. "Not really."
"But we have, and all I can tell you right now is that we need to find another way to escape." Ant told Jerome and Bodil.
"For now, though, we found a safe room. It's got food and beds!" Ian added.
"Really?" Ant asked.
"That's good." Jerome sighed as he was feeling a bit hungry. But then he shook his head. "Is Mitch here? With you guys?"
Ian shook his head. "We haven't found him yet."
"We need to look for him!" Bodil shivered.
"Calm down, Calm down." Ant reminded them. "We'll him and then rest in that safe room, okay?"
"O-okay." Jerome dipped his head. "How'd you guys get here anyway?" He turned to Tyler, Sky, Bashur, Ty, and Sub.
"They were invited just like us." Ian replied.
"So are we going to split up to look for Mitch?" Bodil asked.
"It's a bad idea. We should all look together." Ty reminded.
"We scanned the first floor when we got here. Do you think it's okay to go on to the second floor?" Bashur asked.
"I say we take one more look!" Jerome shook his head.
"One more look it is." Tyler said.
The large group walked around the first floor, but there was no sign of the missing Mitch. Jerome and Tyler lead the group to the second floor. Tyler, if everything was as the first loop, knew where Mitch was. He was in the same room, with the same sword, and if not careful, with the same jumpiness that would almost make him decapitate Ty - and the real one this time too.
They checked a few more rooms before they got to the room that Tyler was sure Mitch was hiding in. Tyler was the one who knocked on the door before slowly opening it. If a stone sword were to fly at him, he was prepared to jump back. But one did not, and that knock before hand proved to do good, as Mitch was found sitting on the edge of the bed, surprised to see them. He did have the sword in his hand though.
"A-Ah!" Mitch gasped, jumping a bit to the sight of them.
"MITCH!" Jerome smiled, running over to his best friend.
"Jerome!" Mitch was glad to see him.
"That didn't take too long." Tyler sighed. He expected to see the Oni just once while looking for Ian's group, but in fact it went by rather effortlessly. Onity was either planning something or taking his precious time. Tyler didn't like it at all.
But again, one of the rules was that he couldn't die first, so he needed to use this time he had now to his advantage.
Mitch asked the same questions about how Sky and the others got to the mansion, and they were answered. The group found their way to the safe room, everyone new to it amazed as the hidden place. Bodil laid down on one of the beds, and Mitch grabbed some water from the kitchen. The weapons were laid out again on one of the tables, and Sub went back to work on sharpening the table legs. A stone sword and small knife were added to the collection.
Tyler sat on the dusty floor with his head against the wall. All he could think about was the game he was playing. One more group was doomed to come and be pawns, and Tyler shivered when he, for a moment, remembered that in order to win, everyone in the room had to die other than him. He had his journal in his hands still and hugged it. It was the only thing there to help him.
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