Caitlin found herself frozen in place. Chills went down her spine as her mind worked double-time to help her understand what just happened. 

She and Vivian both thought Mr. Isaac sent those abominations and hounds after them to kill them, therefore plugging the leak. They weren’t necessarily wrong. If Katie didn't gut those monsters one by one, the two girls would be long dead, along with their precious plan of breaking free. 

But even with Katie’s deadly combat prowess, Mr. Isaac still got what he wanted. The monsters and that weird floor didn't kill them, but they did slow them down. Using that time, Mr. Isaac unleashed his monsters onto the other party of this meeting. 

RCTV. It would be pretty hard for them to expose what happened when the media platform itself was wiped out completely. 

And these people...they didn't have Katie Lockwood to protect them, which meant they died slow, painful deaths. 

Caitlin slowly walked across the blood-stained floor of the office building. In a cubicle to her right, a middle-aged woman sat in front of her computer. She was gutted alive, with half her intestines gone and the rest out in the open for the world to see. The twisted look on her face suggested she didn't go down peacefully. 

On her left, a bold man laid down on the table. It was only when Caitlin got closer that she saw the man’s brain had already been reduced to goo by an invisible force. White and red paste slid out of his nose and mouth and formed a puddle under his seat. 

One more step forward, and on the left...

The three advanced through the slaughterhouse in silence. Caitlin and Vivian looked traumatized. They expected Mr. Isaac to grow desperate, but...massacring all these people? What did these employees ever do to him? 

“How many people are here on this floor? How many are in this building?” Caitlin whispered quietly. “Dozens? Hundreds? Thousands?”

This floor was purged of all life. Caitlin didn't know if the entire building was cleansed, but knowing Mr. Isaac...

Katie bit her lips. A part of her brain rejoiced in the massacre. The blood...the corpses...the horrified look across their face...all of this came together and painted a glorious picture of slaughter and death. If anything, it made her feel aroused. 

Yet she knew better than to let this show. Even if it wasn’t for what her girlfriend would think, Katie knew this wasn’t right. At least hundreds of people died. Granted, some of them might be bad people, and a few of them might deserve this. Maybe they were secretly murderers or sexual predators or something. Maybe…

But most people here, they were good people. They might have done a little wrong here and there, but they definitely didn't deserve to be slaughtered like sheep, with the last moments of their lives composed of utter horror and pain. Their lives were taken away brutally. Their bodies were staged across the room like trophies. And their families? They would never know what happened to their loved ones. 

Under the influence of the curse, their families would forget that they ever existed. If someone got into a car accident, that person’s memories would still be preserved. Now, even their memories were erased from existence. 

Katie knew she wasn’t really a normal human being. Whatever was going on with her body was transforming her, turning her more and more into a masochistic, sadistic beast with every passing day. Give it some time, and she might be doing massacres like this herself just for the fun of it. Yet, perhaps most times, she couldn’t resist this change, but now, just this once, she wanted to make a stand. 

The trio kept on walking. Finally, they came to a stop in front of an office room. A layer of glass separated the room from the rest of the floor, but just like many other things, that glass didn't do anything against the monster onslaught. From the look of it, two hounds charged into the room and tore the man inside to shreds. 

His body, at least. His head, though...his head was gently placed on the middle of the desk that somehow survived. It was cleansed of all its blood, which meant the trio could clearly recognize every piece of its expressions. Its fear. Its disbelief. Its eyes were still wide open as they stared blankly at the trio. 

Vivian’s voice was shaking. She wanted to look away, to close her eyes and forget everything that has happened, but she couldn’t. All she could do was stare into the dead eyes of the severed head. 

“That...he...he is the producer that I...that I talked to.” 

Vivian was far from naive. The moment she made the schedule with the producer, she knew there was a chance she has put him under Mr. Isaac’s crosshair. But it was one thing to know it might happen, and it was another to look into the lifeless eyes, knowing she was why he died screaming. 

“It’s a message.” Caitlin noted quietly. Her voice was quiet, hauntingly quiet. “Mr. Isaac wants to show us the consequence of resisting. If we fight back, even if we don’t die, other innocent people will.” 

She had to admit this threat hit her exactly where it hurt. She was fine with being reckless with her own life, but the thought of having innocent people, people who otherwise would never be involved in this, killed in her name made her sick.

Today, it was hundreds. Tomorrow, it could be thousands.

Perhaps Mr. Isaac had restrictions, but these restrictions were looser than she hoped. 

Katie scanned the room. She could kill nearly anything given the time, but there was nothing here to kill. 

“This is...unfortunate.” Vivian whispered as she worked to return to the logical individual she strived to be. She turned away from the decapitated head as she spoke. “But we cannot give up.” 

“We cannot give up on defeating Mr. Isaac, but exposing him is not the way to do it.” Caitlin replied with a cold look. “He can kill any outsider we drag in. Trying to expose him will be futile. This means we need to take a different approach.”

“A different approach? How?” Vivian suddenly felt a surge of despair rising from the bottom of her heart. “How else can we beat that monster? With your friend and her knife?”

“There has to be a way.”

“Oh, there is a way.” Vivian found herself hissing. The anguish in her tone was clear. “Mr. Isaac killed everyone in RCTV? Fine. Guess what? There are dozens of tv networks out there, and I’ll meet up with every single one of them! Can Mr. Isaac terminate every single tv network in the country? On the planet? Soon, he either has to kill me, or he has to watch as the world learns about his sickening games!”

“A lot of people will die. You included.” Caitlin replied quietly. 

“Yeah, so?” The brunette smirked, a cold look in her eyes. “People have always been dying left, right, and center! As long as we beat Mr. Isaac, I don’t care how many people end up like this!” She waved her hand, gesturing at the atrocities around her. 

Caitlin stared into Vivian’s eyes and saw sheer madness, mixed in with fear, anger, and despair. The two only truly knew each other a few hours ago, but Vivian has always been rather logical. Her reasoning was intact. Her hopes were high. But it suddenly occurred to Caity that perhaps this has always been a fragile appearance. In reality, she was on the brink of collapse, and the massacre all around them was the last straw required to break her. 

That was what Mr. Isaac wanted, wasn’t it? He wanted to take the students and, slowly, break their minds and bodies alike with cruelties beyond imagination. He wanted to take young men and women who had their hopes high and souls intact even after all the gruesome games, and slowly tear that hope apart piece by piece until all that remained was despair. He rejoiced in that descension into madness and chaos. 

“We should go.” She finally decided. The effect of the curse ensured that no one would suddenly realize an entire building was slaughtered, but no sane person would enjoy having a conversation in the middle of a field of bodies. 

Behind her, Katie was playing with the zipper of her black jacket. 

---

The trip back home was a silent one. Vivian dropped off Katie and Caitlin and Caitlin’s house before departing without another word. Caitlin suspected she was still planning on dragging innocent people into this mess, but there was little she could do. 

Well, she could actually do plenty. Even if she couldn’t convince Vivian with words, she had little doubt Katie would gladly threaten Vivian on her command. Yet Caitlin said nothing as Vivian departed. 

She was protected by her psychopathic girlfriend, but Vivian could die at any moment, and since Katie killed her boyfriend, she has been alone. Could she really stop a lonely, terrified woman from grabbing onto the insignificant strand that was hope? 

The two girls made their way onto the second floor of Caitlin’s house. The day was already getting dark, but Caitlin’s mother, influenced by the curse, did little to question where the two girls went. In fact, she never even greeted the two as they walked in. Caitlin checked to see she was on her computer in her bedroom. 

Katie and Caitlin made their way into the kitchen. Caitlin collapsed down on the sofa as Katie made two quick sandwiches, poured a cup of Soda, and took the make-shift meal to her love. 

Caitlin picked up the sandwich. She gave it a few bites before suddenly looking about at Katie with a small frown. 

“You’re not eating?”

Katie shrugged. “For some reason, I’m not actually that hungry. Weird.”

Caitlin nodded. She quickly finished the two sandwiches. The sight of hundreds of corpses still lingered in her head, but she quickly realized this did little to curb her appetite. 

We’re all getting mad...she thought to herself. 

Speaking of mad...Caitlin suddenly looked up at Katie. “Thank you, my friend.” 

“Hmmm?”

“Thank you, Katie.” Caitlin repeated, staring at her friend’s soft cheeks and deep eyes. “Thank you for everything you have done for me. I would’ve been dead so many times without you. When everyone else left me, you alone stood with me the entire time.” 

Katie returned a small smile. “Yeah, don’t worry about it.” 

Caitlin slowly laid down on the sofa and put her back against Katie’s side. Slowly, she unzipped Katie’s jacket and caressed her finger across Katie’s bare soft skin. 

“The monsters back there...did they hurt you?”

Katie shrugged, wondering if she should tell the truth or not. The answer was simple. “Not really. They were a lot more fragile than they look. Disappointing, really…I one-shot them easily.”

“Katie? I can tell you’re lying.” 

“Ok, fine.” Katie sighed in defeat. “Yeah, it was quite bloody. It was literally a war of attrition. But, well, you know me. I should be thanking you for taking me there! I never would’ve gotten into that fight with you!” She said as cheerfully as possible. 

Caitlin nodded slowly, somewhat relieved. “And the entire time, I could only hide behind and let you fight. I...I feel so useless.” 

“Oh Caitlin…” Katie bit her lips, unsure of what to say. “Look, I have my strengths and you have yours. I am a badass, ok? I am literally the very definition of a berserker, but guess what? I can’t defeat Mr. Isaac, but you can.”

She reached out and tapped Caitlin on the forehead. 

“You and your smartass brain...you can take down Mr. Isaac. You’ll find a way and I know it! And when you do, I’ll be there with you, and I’ll help you take down that son of a bitch!”  

The blonde nodded. For a while, the two girls laid there on the sofa in silence. Caitlin rubbed her hand across Katie’s bare skin as Katie laid there, obedient and still. It was a brief moment of peace in a time of chaos, and there, in Katie’s arms, Caitlin found herself feeling oddly safe. 

Suddenly, she spoke up without turning. 

“Stay here for the night, Katie.” 

For the rest of the night, the two girls stayed in Caitlin’s bedroom. Caitlin was working hard going over all the leads and information she had once again with renewed confidence. She didn't know if she could find a way out, but Katie trusted her, and that alone was enough to fight for. 

What did she know? Mr. Isaac was a teacher-turned-undead. He has the power to summon monsters out of thin air, as well as the power to light people on fire or cut them in half. He could force students to slice their own throats open. He could take dead bodies and restore them to life in a twisted form, with the souls of their owners trapped in their decaying corpses. Most importantly, he had the ability to curse the students, practically cutting them off from the rest of the world.  

At the same time, he was likely from an organization. Purpose? To extract pain and suffering from the classmates. And the games were spreading in the form of Mrs. Dent, so why didn't the games consume the entire school immediately. Some restriction in power, perhaps? 

All of this made her head hurt. 

The entire time, Katie sat back and watched as Caitlin worked. A satisfied smile was on her face. She might not be maiming and torturing, but she was happier than her worst moments of agony. 

At the end of the day, as Caitlin finally got ready and went to bed, Katie was beside her. Neither girl attempted any naughty activity. Caitlin was too tired, and Katie knew it was not the best time. All the two did was lay there, cuddle together, and fall asleep. 

The next morning, the two girls got back up to the sound of alarms, and the games continued. 

---

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