Once again, I find myself thinking too much once things get quiet. Marin, Sabrina, and the others were always good at distracting me from the reality of the situation, but when we sit here quietly, I can’t help but start to panic internally. My life has been pretty normal up until this point after all. My family wasn’t wealthy. I wasn’t some prodigy in any subject. I always flew under the radar, and–other than my problems with anxiety–there really was nothing that notable about my life or how I went about it. So, what the hell did I do to deserve this? It’s becoming harder and harder to keep a fake smile on my face. These people are trying to kill us! How the hell am I supposed to act like everything’s fine?! A sports tournament that means life or death?! How fucked up is that?! These people are just playing games with us. Games with our lives. I have no idea what their motive is, but there’s no chance that it’s worth this torture we are going through. I’m almost jealous of Sienna and Louis because they got to escape here, even if they did by losing their lives.

“Hey, Ryder, are you okay? You look pale…” Marin said quietly to me.

“Y-yeah! I’m fine. I was just spacing out…”

“Don’t lie to me. You’re thinking too much again, aren’t you?” Marin said. She could read me like a book. “Why don’t we get out of here and get your mind off of this sports tournament stuff for a bit.”

“Shouldn’t we continue practicing?”

“Sabrina said herself that we aren’t going to win the basketball game, so I think it’s fine if we head out for a bit,” she said. “This silence is killing me too, so let’s go take a rest somewhere.”

“Okay…”

“Ryder and I are going to take a quick break. Are you all going to go back to the court?” Marin asked the others.

“Is Ryder not feeling well?!” Sabrina asked. “If so, I’ll take responsibility for him!”

“He just needs to lie down for a bit,” Marin said. “The dorm is the best place for that, so I’ll take him since you can’t get in or out of our room on your own. I’ll be quick, I promise.”

“Ugh…” Sabrina grunted. “You better. I don’t want you preying on him while he’s sleeping!”

“I would never!” Marin said. “Alright, Ryder. Let’s go.”

We left the others in the cafeteria and headed towards our dorm. Once again, Marin helps bring me back from the brink of insanity. If…no, when we make it out of here together, I need to try and repay her. The fact that she’s probably suffering just as much and yet she’s here trying to cheer me up…it makes me feel useless. I just hope I can help her out too somehow. If she were to die, I don’t think I could go on here.

“Here we are! Home, sweet home!” Marin said as we walked through the door.

“It is weird that there really is some small semblance of comfort here,” I said.

“It feels like nothing can hurt us in this room,” Marin said. “Having a roommate also helps a lot with that. It’s a lot less lonely that way.” She gave me a warm smile.

“Yeah, the only thing that can truly hurt us here is gravity.”

“Let that go!” Marin said. “It seemed like a good idea at the time! It’s not my fault my brain didn’t calculate the risks.”

“I really don’t get you…”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re always so spontaneous, and so positive. You’re always caring about others rather than yourself. You’re amazing.”

“You give me way too much credit,” Marin said. “I’m weak. You saw me during the first motive, I was a wreck.”

“We all were. The fact that you bounced back and are still trying to keep everyone’s spirits up…it shows that you’re a good person.”

“I really don’t think I’m all that. I look at people like Carmen, Keon, Emma, and all the others, and just how everyone is trying so hard to fight against this situation… I feel like I can’t really compare. I’m not a great critical thinker and every time I act like I’m okay, it’s a lie. I’m more scared than anyone else…”

“I’m sure that everyone else is the same way too. I know I definitely am.”

“Even if you say that, during the trial you were the only one who could keep a cool head until the end! We would’ve all been dead if it weren’t for you,” Marin said with that familiar fear in her eyes. “I try not to think about how close we got to losing everything that day, but it’s so hard with the images of Louis, Jane, and Sienna burned into my mind…I don’t think I’ll ever forget it. It’ll probably haunt me forever.” She was tearing up. I walked over to her and put my hand on hers.

“I know…I don’t think I’ll ever forget either, but I don’t think that’s a bad thing. Like Keon said before, we have to remember that day, so that we can prevent something else like that from happening. That’s what happens when we aren’t all united. That’s why they’re trying so hard to use the sports tournament and those escape tickets to tear us apart. It’s because they know how strong we are together.” Marin gripped my hand with tears running down her cheeks.

“And you call me strong,” Marin said, wiping her eyes with her free hand. “Here I was trying to bring you here to cheer you up, and all I do is whine and cry. *sniff* I’m a mess.”

We spent a few minutes in silence, hand in hand.

“The others should have left the cafeteria by now, and since it’s after one o’clock, Alex shouldn’t be in the cafeteria anymore. How about we go bake something?” I said, breaking the silence. “You can show me what kind of tricks the Ultimate Baker has under her sleeves.” Marin looked at me with a weak smile on her face.

“That sounds nice.”

We headed towards the cafeteria, and once we entered, it was in fact, empty. Heading back towards the kitchen, Alex was nowhere to be seen either, so we had the whole place to ourselves.

“So, what’s on the menu ‘Chef Marin’?”

“Well, ‘Sou Chef Ryder’, I was thinking we could make a favorite of mine that I perfected while in France…macaroons!”

“Hell yeah! I love macaroons! Now I’m pumped!”

“Calm yourself, young padawan,” Marin said. “You’ll need to listen carefully if you’re ever going to eclipse me one day.”

“Yes, master,” I said bowing to her.

It was nice to have Marin back in her cheerful lighthearted mood. I think it’s good that we got some of the fear and doubt we were feeling out in the open. It’s therapeutic. I would have never guessed that she felt the same way about me that I felt about her though. She thought I was strong from the way I acted during the trial, and I thought she was strong from the way she always tried to cheer me and the others up, but in the end, we both felt weak and worthless in our own heads. We truly are our own worst enemies–other than our captors of course.

Marin and I gathered eggs, powdered sugar, almond flour, vanilla extract, granulated sugar, salt, unsalted butter, and cream of tartar. Marin started the recipe and was meticulous in both her actions and her instructions. It was strange getting taught by Marin. She was like a completely different person. I felt like I was actually learning quite a bit about cooking just by watching her cook and listening to her speak. Cooking with her brought back memories of our first night here when we managed to bribe Emma and Conrad into letting us make brownies. That was the first time Marin really opened up to me. I got to hear about her family and how worried she was for her mother’s heart. Now, here we are again, cooking to try and return to some semblance of normalcy in this concrete hell.

“So, what do you think the chances are of us actually getting out of here?” Marin asked bluntly while mixing her batter. I was slightly taken aback.

“I’d like to give a more positive answer, but it’s hard to tell without knowing what the motive is for us being kept here,” I said. “If we go off of the morbid idea that each time someone is killed, we get to move up a floor, that would mean there would be seven of us who make it to the top, if the only death on this floor comes from an execution after the sports tournament, and not a murder.”

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“With fourteen of us left, that means half of us will die before we reach the top,” Marin said.

“That’s the worst-case scenario,” I said. “There’s also the possibility that someone will go under the noses of us and buy an escape ticket and then get to leave.”

“I guess it’s also safe to say that the next floors could have weird rules that could lead to us having an opportunity to leave or have deaths that are unrelated to an actual murder plot as well,” Marin said.

“Yeah, it’s really hard to say how similar the future will be from the present and past in this place. So, what made you want to bring this up?”

“Sorry, I know the subject is pretty bleak. I just wanted to get your thoughts on it,” Marin said while putting the macaroons in the convection oven on the counter. “The idea that our rate of survival is about 50% is a tough pill to swallow. A coin flip resulting in life or death. It’s a scary thought.”

“Yeah…but if you think about it, we put our lives on the line every day when we walk around in public, or drive, or do just about anything,” I said. “People die in the strangest ways at seemingly random times, and so many people die while driving around doing mundane things like grocery shopping or picking up friends, and some people die due to complications when they’re not even old enough to walk. The world is such a dangerous place. We’re young so we always feel immortal, but the truth is that we’re so fragile and the universe has no rhyme or reason when it takes people’s lives. If you think about it that way, 50% almost seems generous.”

“That’s pretty morbid, Ryder,” Marin said. “I do see what you’re trying to say though. I guess all we can hope for is that it’s not our time to go yet. Let’s just focus on what’s in front of us and adapt to the rest.”

“Yeah, I’m sure everything will work out in the end.”

“I sure hope so. We can’t lose hope now, or our whole lives will be for nothing, so let’s keep fighting,” Marin said.

The convection oven then beeped, and Marin opened it slowly and pressed a small spoon on the top of one of the macaroons.

“Looks like they’re ready,” she said, taking them out.

“They look great!”

The macaroons smelled amazing and were in four rows of five, separated by color. The top row was pastel blue, followed by green, yellow, and light red.

“They just need some time to cool, and then we can share these with the team.”

“The other team is going to be so jealous.”

“Everyone will think twice before wanting to pick me last again! This is my moment!”

“I would definitely pick you first if it meant we could eat like this,” I said. “Good food is essential to a team’s morale.”

After waiting for them to cool off, we decided to head towards the second floor to meet up with the others. Once we reached the stairs, we saw a familiar face coming down those same steps.

“I was just coming to look for you!” Sabrina said, towering over us from the top step.

“Sorry it took so long!” Marin said. “We wanted to make some snacks for the team.”

“You better not have touched a single hair on his head!” Sabrina barked.

“I didn’t! Tell her, Ryder!”

“Nothing happened! Marin brought me to the dorm, went to make macaroons, then came back to get me when they were done.”

“If you say so,” Sabrina said, crossing her arms. “She very well could have poisoned them though, so I’ll need to see her eat one first!”

“Not a problem! That just means I get first dibs,” Marin said before taking one of the blue macaroons and shoving it in her mouth. “Mmmmm! They turned out great!”

“Hmph, you could have just made that one the safe one and poisoned the rest!” Sabrina said. “I better have one just to make sure! I don’t want Ryder getting sick.”

Sabrina then descended the steps and took one of the green macaroons and took a small bite. Her eyes lit up and there was an obvious look of ecstasy on her face.

“It-it doesn't seem to be poisoned. I-I’ve had better though!” Sabrina said, before scarfing down the second half of the macaroon.

“That food orgasm you just had says otherwise,” Marin said with a smug look on her face.

“Sh-shut up!” Sabrina’s face was turning red. “Let’s just go! They’re waiting for us.”

“Oh, hell yes!” Atticus said when presented with the macaroons.

“I’ve never heard you speak like that, Atticus,” Cyrus said, while nibbling on a green macaroon.

“I’m getting macaroons from a master baker, so this is the exact situation that calls for a show of emotion,” Atticus said with three macaroons in his hand.

“These are good!” Robbie said. “I haven’t had macaroons this good since I was overseas in Paris after I robbed a British cruise liner!”

“Sugoi!” Carmen said. “These really are amazing, Marin. If I was gay, I’d try to scoop you up in a heartbeat.”

“Well, I’ll still let you try to put the moves on me if you think you can,” Marin said, sticking her tongue out with one eye closed while trying to do a sexy pose.

“I’m quite the prize,” Carmen said. “I guarantee I could get any man or woman to fall for me.”

“Let’s see it then!” Marin said. “What’s your opening line?”

“I gotta play off of where we are, so what’s the setting and situation?” Carmen said.

“You’re a fellow kidnappee trapped in a murder school, and a cute blonde girl who’s on your basketball team gives you a macaroon…Go!” Marin said.

“Really? That’s not very creative. I guess I won’t have to change my current role at least…Okay, so I walk up to you…” Carmen advanced on Marin. “. . . I get really close…” Carmen then put her face inches away from Marin’s. “. . . and I whisper in your ear-”

Carmen then puts her lips centimeters away from Marin’s ear and whispers something softly. None of us could hear what it was. Marin’s face immediately turned beet red. Carmen then gave her a peck on the cheek before walking away. A thick veil of sexual tension filled the air.

“Wh-what did she say?” I asked.

“Uh…” Marin was at a loss.

“It’s a secret between us girls,” Carmen said, winking at Marin. “So, Marin, did I put the moves on you properly?” Marin nodded shyly.

“Don’t underestimate my powers of seduction anymore. I could very well have been the ‘Ultimate Pick-Up Artist’ rather than the ‘Ultimate Polyglot’.”

“She must have been a succubus in another life…” Marin said.

“Don’t compare me to a demon!”

“Only a demon would say something like that to me!”

“I feel like I’m learning way too much about you guys the longer I’m here…” Cyrus said.

“Enough chit-chat,” Sabrina said after downing the last macaroon. “Let’s get back to practice. We’ve still got a couple hours before dinner, so let’s get to work.”

“Before we start, where did the other team go?” Marin asked.

“They never came back to the court,” Atticus said. “We’re not sure where they are at the moment.”

“It’s possible that they’re done practicing for the day,” Carmen said. “They probably know that they’re going to flatten us when we face each other.”

“Even if that’s true, that doesn’t mean we’re done practicing for the day,” Sabrina said. “Exercise is good for you anyway, and God knows some of you could use it.”

Over the next hour we continued practicing, and I finally felt like I was getting better. Sabrina may be strange, but she really is a good and thorough teacher when it comes to sports. She’s starting to give me some hope that maybe we will win the tournament somehow.

“See! You’re getting it!” Sabrina swooned. “You’re such a quick learner!”

“O-oh, thanks,” I said. I’m always kind of awkward when given praise.

“Nice work, Ryder!” Marin said. “That was a swish! If you play like that during the game, maybe we can win!”

“Shush, Marin,” Sabrina said. “Leave Ryder alone. He’s busy.”

“It really is kind of strange that you’re learning so much so quickly though,” Carmen said. “I always thought you’d be a liability to this team.”

“You take that back!” Sabrina barked. “Ryder just needs a competent teacher, then he’s capable of anything!”

Another hour passed, and I started to feel much more confident in my shot. I started consistently making three-pointers and was dribbling better than I ever thought myself capable of. It was a good feeling. Feeling this good having only practiced a few hours total was indeed pretty strange though. I feel like it should definitely take more time to learn this sort of thing.

“Alright, Ryder is ready,” Sabrina said confidently. “We’re going to leave for the day. We’ll be back at practice tomorrow morning, but only to sharpen up our skills. You can all stay here if you’d like. C’mon, Ryder.” She took my hand and walked me towards the exit.

“This is a little sudden!” I said. “W-we’ve still got time to practice, so why are we leaving?”

“Yeah! The night’s still young! You guys can’t leave now,” Marin protested.

“What happened to your little speech about how we should practice even though the other team isn’t?” Carmen said.

“We’ve still got another day tomorrow, so it’s fine,” Sabrina said, still gripping my hand. “See you all later.”

Sabrina dragged me towards the door, and the last thing I saw was Marin mouthing the words “Sorry” before I ended up out of the hallway alone with Sabrina.

“Uh…so what’s the plan?” I asked nervously.

“It’s time to hit the showers,” Sabrina said. “It’d be a good idea to get there early, so we can get clean before the others take their turns.”

Sabrina then started walking towards the locker rooms, and I started to then get really nervous about the situation I was about to be in.

“I-I can just use the shower in my dorm! I’m more comfortable in that one anyway!”

“That won’t do. Those showers are too small. How am I going to be able to wash your back in such a small shower? This one’s closer anyway.”

“‘Wash my back’?! I really don’t need you to do that!”

“Nonsense. You’ve been working so hard, you deserve it!”

We then arrived at the locker room, and Sabrina’s face started to get red.

“O-okay, so I’m going to go get prepared,” she said. “I’ll call you once I’m ready, okay?”

“I really, really, really don’t think this is a good idea! What if someone comes in?!”

“No one will come, I promise! Now, just give me a moment, and we’ll start.”

“Start what?!”

Sabrina didn’t answer me.