"I've got a weapon on me".
Malakai looked at the paintball gun with a massive grin. The paintball gun was all black with a shiny metallic look. It had a small body with a long, narrow barrel. The air tank hung at the bottom of the grip, and the hopper at the top had a weird oval shape. The metallic smell alone got Malakai excited. He shook the gun.
Rumble! Rumble! Rumble!
There were bullets inside. A lot of them, by the sound of it.
"Hehehehe", Malakai silently giggled.
There were no targets anywhere, but his index finger was getting itchy. He wanted to shoot something. He wanted to shoot someone. Malakai was stuck in his own world until,
"Guys, I think you should go back to your safe zone. You have three minutes left. There's no time to search another room".
He heard David's voice through his earpiece. His excitement decreased. His emotions were overflowing momentarily, but hearing the round was over calmed them down.
"Aryt".
Malakai had two plastic balls and a paintball gun. His search was more than successful. Even if Delilah came back with nothing, it would be no biggie. They were set up well for the next rounds. Heck, the whole game. Malakai had a defence and an offence. He could shoot someone if they got too close. He could shoot someone if they were running away with a ball. He could shoot a plastic ball to pop it. He could shoot someone, stopping them from getting a ball. He could shoot.
Shoot.
Shoot.
Shoot.
Malakai was getting ahead of himself. He had to calm himself down. It was true the paintball gun put him at an incredible advantage, but it didn't guarantee the win. He didn't know what the other rounds were yet. But despite not knowing, he was confident. Confident and eager to use the paintball gun. Who wouldn't be excited to use a paintball gun?
Malakai held one plastic ball in his left hand, balanced the other between his left arm and chest, and held the paintball gun in his right hand. He calmly walked out of the room and went towards his safe zone. Satisfied.
"Yo, David. Is Delilah back at the safe zone?" Malakai asked.
"Not yet. She's running up the stairs", David replied.
"Aryt".
Malakai kept strolling to his safe zone. It was only down the hall, and he didn't have to rush. He reached his safe zone, opened the door and went inside. He dropped one of the balls on the floor and started doing kick-ups (keepie uppies) with the other with the paintball gun in hand. Malakai is pretty good at football (soccer), so he could do a lot of kick-ups. As Malakai was occupying himself, Delilah came rushing into the room. Rushing into the room with one plastic ball in hand.
Malakai looked up and saw Delilah breathing heavily. "Yoooo. You got a ball", he said, surprised, kicking away the ball he was juggling and walking closer to Delilah.
"Yeah", Delilah replied, catching her breath. "You found two … and a paintball gun", she said, staring at it, a little stunned there was an actual paintball gun in his hand.
"Yeah. Sick innit", Malakai happily said, pointing the gun at her.
"Don't point that at me", Delilah replied, backing away and putting her right hand in front of her.
"Why? I ain't gonna do anything", Malakai said.
Famous last words.
Pap!
Delilah flinched at the sound of the gun. Her brain didn't even have time to program her to scream. Her brain hadn't even processed what had happened yet. After that quick flinch, her body froze. Not only her body but her mind, too. Delilah froze.
"Hehehehehe", Malakai giggled. "Why you scared?" he asked, still thinking this was a joke. "It's on safety", he said, showing the button on the side showing it was on safety. "Nothing comes out".
Pap! Pap! Pap!
Malakai pointed the gun to the ceiling and pulled the trigger a few times.
"Stop!" Delilah sternly told him. Her heart was racing, but it wasn't because of the running she had done before. That shock shocked the exhaustion out of her.
Delilah looked at Malakai straight in the eyes. "Malakai. Don't do that again", she calmly said. "Even as a joke".
Malakai could see how shaken Delilah was.
"Shit... my bad", he apologised, feeling a little ashamed. He felt bad. He didn't know if that apology showed it enough. "You can shoot me if you want", he said, holding the gun to her.
Delilah lightly smiled. "No, I'm fine". She could see Malakai was feeling terrible about what he did. "I don't have any trauma or PTSD about guns or getting shot", Delilah clarified. "I just didn't expect it. I didn't think you would actually shoot, even though you pointed it at me. So when you pulled the trigger, my whole body felt a shock. I've never been shot by a paintball gun, so I don't know how it feels either".
Malakai kept quiet for a few seconds. "It hurts", he replied. "A lot".
"If that's the case. Please don't shoot me", Delilah said, smiling to lighten the mood.
"Aryt", Malakai half-heartedly smiled, still feeling bad and looking at the floor.
"Mally, that should teach you a lesson", David told him. He found it amusing how Delilah told him off. "You need to stop joking all the time".
"Shut up, man. If it was any of you lot, this gun wouldn't be on safety", Malakai replied, slightly embarrassed, realising the whole class might've seen what he did.
"Don't worry, Mally, only half the class saw that", David said. "The other half just came now".
"Is the round over?" Delilah asked.
"Yeah, it ended a few seconds ago", David replied, taking a look at the table with the map pieces. "We got a lot of map pieces".
"Did someone get pieces for our floor?" Malakai asked. "Wait, what floor are we on?". Due to his excitement about having a paintball gun, he forgot what Delilah's role was in this round and forgot to ask.
"Oh, I haven't told you yet", Delilah remembered. "We're on floor nine".
"Nine. Let me help sort out the map pieces, and then I'll let you know what we've got", David said.
David stood away from the mic and went to the table where all the map pieces were. The class found six pieces.
"Did any of you find a map piece for floor nine?" David asked, looking around the table.
He got a few blank stares.
"No, but we found the same piece twice", someone replied.
"Twice?" David looked at the pieces they were talking about.
They both showed four rooms, but one had two dots while the other was blank. He turned them around, and they both had the number two.
"What do we do with the spare?" David rhetorically asked. He looked at his classmates, but they met him with shrugs. No one knew what to do with the extra piece.
"You have to hide it somewhere else in the next round", Ms Green said, standing behind them.
"Huh?"
"You can't keep both of them. That would be unfair to the other classes", Ms Green said. "Next round, when you go to search for more pieces, you have to hide it somewhere else".
"Do we have to hide it in the same place?" Emily asked.
"No, you can hide it anywhere. Anywhere that is in bounds", Ms Green replied. "You cannot be stupid and hide it somewhere someone can't get it".
"We can choose which one to keep, right?" David asked, hoping for a yes.
"Yes".
"Great. We keep the one with the dots", David said.
He looked at the rest of the pieces. They didn't complete a floor, but five different pieces were good. Three of them had dots, while the other two were blank. David turned over the map pieces to see the numbers.
"No one got any pieces from floor nine", David said, a bit disappointed. He turned to his friends. "Did you guys find anything".
"No", Ray shamefully replied, looking at the floor.
Lucas was looking at his fingernails.
Benjamin was scrolling through his phone.
William was counting his fingers.
David face palmed.
"Dillon and Kayla, get ready. Your fifteen minutes will start shortly".
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Dillon stood up from his seat and walked to the door. He wanted to be let out. Hearing what Malakai got made him more eager to get out. He thought it was unfair how they were made to search fourth. It seemed like a disadvantage, but he couldn't do anything about it. This is what he gets for being in a lower class.
"Are you not going to make a plan?" Sabrina asked. "You had all this time and haven't planned anything".
"We don't need one. All we need to do is search some rooms. Why do we need a plan?" Dillon replied.
"Don't you need to know what floor you're on right now?" Sabrina asked.
"No", Dillon curtly replied. "We can find out later. It's better to clear out this floor. If Kayla wants to go down all those stairs, she can".
Sabrina rolled her eyes. Was there any point in telling Dillon anything? He wasn't going to listen anyway. She hadn't given up on him yet. It was only the first round. But she was growing tired of him.
"Kayla, search the floor you're on. You don't have to go to the bottom floor", Sabrina told her.
Kayla listened and didn't reply. She's barely said anything the whole time. She only talked when Sabrina asked her some questions to cure her boredom. She still wasn't confident about the challenge, despite Sabrina telling her it would be fine. From their safe zone, they could hear sounds of running down halls on floors above and below, which made her more nervous. She didn't think she would be quick enough.
Kayla didn't want to be here.
BEEP!
Dillon yanked the door open and rushed out of the room to the right. Kayla quickly followed out of the room and went in the opposite direction to Dillon, towards the left.
Dillon ran down the hall to the closest room. He swiftly opened the door and let himself in. The room he entered was bare. It had two couches facing each other at the centre of the room and two single tables with computers at opposite ends of the room. There were no other objects like lockers or cupboards around the room. It only had decorations like paintings and pictures hung up on the walls. From the looks of it, it didn't look like it had anything. But there was only one way to find out.
Dillon went over to one of the couches and removed the pillows. Nothing. He checked beneath the seat. Nothing. He removed the seat pillows and checked. Nothing. He lifted the couch and moved it away from its original position. Nothing.
"Tch".
On to the next couch. He did the same thing. Remove the pillows. Nothing. Removed the seats. Nothing. Moved the couch. Nothing. In the first minute, he found nothing. But it wasn't a big deal. He still had two desks to check. He went over to the desk to the right of the room. The desk only had the computer and the keyboard on it. Dillon pulled out the chair and checked under the desk. Nothing. It was fine, though, because the desk had three drawers on the side. He opened the first one. Nothing. The second one. Nothing. The last one. Nothing.
"Tch".
Nothing was going his way. Out of frustration, he quickly rushed over to the other desk and did the same search he had done for the first desk. Nothing.
Dillon looked around the room with furrowed eyebrows. Even though this was one room of many, he was still pissed he found nothing. He looked down at the desk. Through pure anger, he swiped at the keyboard. Knocking it off the desk.
Swish!
A card flew out from beneath it. Dillon's eyes followed the card's movement in the air while it flew off the desk. He quickly stepped forward and caught the little card before it touched the floor. Dillon brought the card to his face to take a closer look.
'Safe zone pass. This card will let you enter anyone's safe zone. Unlimited Use'.
A grin broke out on Dillon's face. He could go into any safe zone he wanted for the rest of the game. This was an item. A good one. After a moment of relief and excitement, Dillon realised what he had done to find that item. He rushed to the other desk and lifted the keyboard normally.
Nothing.
He put the keyboard down. Then swiped it off the table out of rage.
In his first room, he found an item. Which was better than nothing. Anyway, onto the next room.
Dillon exited the room and went to the room across. The room he entered was twice as big as the previous one. It was the complete opposite of the last in terms of aesthetics. The last room was bland and bare, but this one was colourful and filled. Paintings, greenery and furniture everywhere. It was a weird room, as it was split into mini sections. One part of the room had a meeting area with the usual table with six chairs around it. Another part of the room had a table with computers back to back to each other. That was the mini work area. The final part of the room had a flat-screen TV hung on the wall with a couch facing it and a pool table to the side. It looked like an area for people to relax. Not to mention the odd cupboard and shelves here and there. So many places for a plastic ball to be. Dillon got right to work and started his search.
After 5 minutes of searching.
Nothing.
Dillon looked around the room. He displaced everything to find a plastic ball, but there was nothing. So many places for a plastic ball to be, but there wasn't one. He did the same tactic with the computers, too, by checking under the keyboards. Nothing. Dillon hadn't seen a plastic ball. He didn't even know what they looked like. He was getting impatient, all this searching and all he got was one item.
Dillon walked over to the pool table and saw it was set up. He didn't bother to search around the pool table because it was obvious a plastic ball couldn't be hidden there. Dillon placed his hands on the cue ball and slid it across the table, causing the balls in the centre to disperse. He did a break shot without a cue stick. The balls flew in different directions around the table, but there was a white rectangle under where the balls were.
Dillon's eyes lit up. He knew what that was. It was an item card. He walked around the pool table and picked up the card. He turned it around to see what it was.
'Two players. This pass will allow you and your teammate to participate in a round even if the rules state only one participant can play. One round use only'.
A grin didn't break out on Dillon's face. This item would have been good if his teammate had been good. His teammate was Kayla. He had no faith in her whatsoever, so this item was nothing to shout about for Dillon. He put the card in his pocket and was about to leave the room.
"Dillon, the round is ending in a few minutes. Go back to your safe zone".
Dillon heard Sabrina's command. He instinctively looked down at his wrist to check the time, but there was nothing there. Mr White confiscated his watch before the challenge started. Next, he looked around the room for a clock, but there was no clock. There was no way to check the time. Dillon had to listen to her. Most of the round, Sabrina talked in his ear, but the stuff she said was directed to Kayla. She basically talked to Kayla and guided her the whole round. Dillon stopped listening to her voice after the first few minutes, so he had no clue what Kayla's situation was. The only reason he listened to her voice this time was because he heard his name.
He was pissed the round was over, and he was embarrassed he didn't find a plastic ball.
Instead of rushing, he walked back to his safe zone. He was too pissed to jog or run. It didn't take him long to reach his safe zone, as it was only a few steps down the hall. The door was already opened, so he entered with his hands in his pockets. Dillon looked up and saw Kayla holding two plastic balls. Kayla looked back at him as soon as she saw him enter the room. Her eyes widened at the sight of his hands empty. We all know what she was thinking, but there was no way she could say what was on her mind. Instead, she timidly asked,
"Did you find anything?"
Dillon stepped closer and closer to the table. His eyes averted away from Kayla. He took his right hand out of his pocket and threw the two cards he found on the table.
"Nothing".