“Why didn’t you tell me?” Kevin asks.

I opened my eyes and found Kevin floating in front of me. Surrounding us is an entire space of nothingness, I look down and see nothing as if I don’t exist at all… but more importantly…

“What do you mean?” I asked Kevin.

“You knew I was going to die. Why didn’t you tell me!” Kevin yelled… what happened!?

“You knew what happened, Beno, we all died, and it's all because of you,” Kevin said… what? How? But… it shouldn’t have happened… how and when?

“While you are having your nice sleep, I died, you could have warned us! But no, you are too busy sleeping that I died!” Kevin said as he is now more and more angry and it’s making me more scared.

“Yeah, be scared you should, after all, it is because of you that I died! You didn’t even attempt to save me like you did to Luca and Peter!” Kevin yelled.

“I died. Alone! Nobody was there to help me! Nobody was there to warn me! While you are here sleeping!” Kevin yelled again. I desperately shook my head, I don’t want anyone to die, and I never wanted anyone to die!

No… no… please let this nightmare stop…

“Oh so now you're just thinking that I am a nightmare huh, well then how about we turn this into a true nightmare!” Kevin said and he immediately grabbed me by the throat lifting me up while doing so. Choking me as he laughed manically.

“Can’t… breathe… st… op…”

“Stop this! You are killing yourself!” I was suddenly awake from that nightmare. I look around and see that everyone is near my hospital bed again… it feels like this happened twice already…

“What are you doing? If you don’t wake up you will seriously die!” Adeline said to me with a worried tone… what was I doing?

“You were choking yourself… didn’t even know that even when asleep people could do that… pretty unbelievable if I say,” Marco said this time. I slowly touch my neck and I can feel that someone has been tightly grabbing it…

“What do you see this time…” Adeline asked.

“I… saw Kevin… he was angry at me that I didn’t save him so he started strangling me…” I said as I shuddered at the thought of that, it felt too real… well it is real, it's just that it isn’t Kevin who did it but myself.

…

Everyone went quiet. Nobody is saying anything.

“Beno… Kevin died yesterday.” Marco delivered the news, confirming my suspicion. I don’t know why, but I keep dreaming of them after they die as if they are trying to give me their last words. But the dreams often conflict with what they normally are…

“I see… us three left…” I said bitterly, and they both nodded. Three gone, three to go, and with the current trend, I am definitely the last one… the one arranging this is dead set on torturing me for this… I guess for gods, we mortals are only their plaything huh… ha… ha…

I started laughing bitterly, the other two watched me with concern in their eyes but said nothing and sighed.

“So… you know when it's our turn?” Marco asked, though Adeline looked like she wanted to stop Marco from asking that, she knew that it was useless since it would happen sooner or later.

“I…” I look at both of them first looking at Marco, then I try to think as much as I can, but nothing comes out, which means it is not Marco’s turn, then I look at Adeline, and that is when I start to have a headache.

Adeline’s POV

Seeing Beno not having a reaction after looking at Marco is a relief, but that means it will either be me or him… and if the current trend would be damned, the next one would be me…

Well, father, mother, thank you for raising me up for so long I'm sorry that I can't take care of you when you are older…

While I was apologizing to my parents in my mind, Beno looked at me and started groaning in pain. Yep, the next one is me… is this how Peter feels when Beno tells him that his death is near?

After around 10 minutes, Beno recovered and started telling the tale that it was my death.

“So you are telling me… that I was taking a bath then thunder hit my house electrocuting me… that is some grotesque way to die… not sure if I should laugh or cry…” I said, slumping down onto the chair.

At least electrocuting would be fast right? Actually no… I think it will be pretty slow… man, I was hoping for it to be fast like Peter or Kevin, one bam and gone while I am here having to suffer slowly…

“I guess I should take a bath now that the weather is clear huh? It is almost time for us to go anyway, it’s almost evening now.” I said to them, while Marco thinks it’s alright, Beno is still hesitant.

“Look, if that is my way to die, there is no way I can avoid that, a girl has to stay clean all the time! Well, boys also have to stay clean but I can’t just stop taking baths to avoid dying.” I said to which Beno then slowly nodded.

“Plus, the hospital has thunder rods, there is no way that it would hurt me here right?” I explained more. Well, thunderrods exist for cases like this, though I still wonder why did it chose my house on that day, oh well.

Marco’s POV

As Adeline went to take a bath, I continued to chat with Beno, hopefully getting his mind off all these recent events. Though judging by his facial expression, I have to say…

I am failing spectacularly.

“You don’t have to try this you know… you are always bad at shifting topics Marco…” Beno said… am I that bad that the one I am trying to console is consoling me back…

“You know, there is no need to worry about all of these you know, if we all are going to die might as well enjoy what we have left right?” I said. To which surprised me made Beno chuckled a bit.

“True, though, maybe you and Adeline should go enjoy… I mean, I can’t exactly move right now…” Beno said pointing towards his leg, currently casted…

“I mean, there is a lot of stuff to do even in here, I mean, your hand is fine, so we can still play games and the sort. We can still play games right?” I said to Beno and he nodded.

I grabbed my phone as Beno went to grab his that is currently charging next to his bed. But as he unplugs the phone, the charger suddenly explodes and the entire hospital seems to run out of power.

At the same time, I heard Adeline scream, without caring anything I immediately opened the door and saw that Adeline was currently standing in the bath twitching due to the electricity in the water. I look around and use some of the bed sheets to try to drag Adeline to me, but it is too late… by the time Adeline is out, she is already not breathing…

We lost another one again… just me and Beno left… wait…

“Beno!” I shouted as I walked towards him, I saw him holding his hand in pain, it was bleeding badly from the explosion. I quickly go outside to find a doctor, but due to the power outage, everyone is panicking, doctor and nurses are running around, and people are shouting and screaming. What was once a serene place was now filled with chaos.

I wanted to find a doctor to help, but there was just too much chaos, so I quickly went back into the room and helped Beno a little… glad I paid attention to those first aid classes even though I am sure it probably won’t help too much, looking at Beno’s bloodied hand I start removing the visible remnants of his phone and quickly get a bandage from a nearby first aid kid to quickly treat him.

“What is… going… on…” Beno asked while still in pain. I think he can’t see properly… did some shards go to his eyes? But there is no blood…

“Somehow the electricity went out… or overloaded… and…” before I could finish Beno finished the sentence for me.

“Adeline is gone now, right? I hear her screams…” Beno asked. I… I nodded slowly and he just slumped onto the bed, even though he is still in pain, I could feel that he didn’t care about it anymore.

“Marco… I am sorry… I killed you all…” Beno said. His voice is almost on the verge of crying…

“No, you didn’t, you did not, it’s just fate playing with us. Don’t blame yourself for this…” I said comforting him. Beno is normally quite the cheerful person but here he is… leg down and possibly hand down too…

“Don’t worry, I will help you until the moment you die…” I said to him, reassuring him, though it doesn’t look to be pretty effective…

“It I alright, I know our fate… Luca, Peter, Kevin, and now Adeline, soon it will be you and then finally me… then we are free from this torture.” Beno said while laughing dryly. For a good few minutes, we stay there in silence, well as silent as the outside chaos is.

“By the way… do you know where my mother is… she went down to get something to eat but it has been quite some time since then… maybe she is taking the stairs…” Beno said.

“Well, before coming we saw her at the cafeteria, we said hi to her and then headed back up here. Since then we never saw her.” I said to Beno, I could see he I thinking something but gave up midway. At the same time, the noise outside started to calm down, and I could see doctors going from room to room to check out the patients.

Upon entering Beno’s room, I can see the shock on his face when he sees Adeline’s lifeless body and the state of Beno’s hand is at. He immediately rushes to get more doctors to look at Adeline while he rushes toward Beno, one of the doctors goes and checks me out but because I am far from most of the incidents, I don’t really get hurt.

“This is bad… his hand is damaged badly, the shards are deeply lodged into his flesh and a huge part of his arm is burnt. Even if we do take the shards out, his fingers would be unusable.” The doctor checking Beno said. While on the other side, the doctors are trying to resuscitate Adeline, but so far there are no signs that she is coming back.

“You two are taking this surprisingly calm, normally when people face with this type of event they would just break down.” One of the doctors said. Which made me and Beno laugh dryly.

“Normally we would… but this is our fourth friend who died already, and who knows, I might be next…” I said to them, feeling defeated. They tried to console me but if there is one thing that I am sure… that is to not tempt fate.

“Not sure if I support that mindset but I can’t blame you. It is just… sad, so many deaths had occurred today, not just here… lives that can be saved… life support failure, operation cut off suddenly, even the lift claimed some lives.” The doctor said and I can only listen to him. I am just a student, there is nothing I can do here…

“I am not sure what will come out of your friend, but I hope that you can be with him till the very end, seeing friends lost is one thing, but the survivor guilt will inevitably come to you, I don’t see it on you for now but I can see that your friend there is having an enormous amount of it.” The doctor said before he went and get some helpers to move Adeline’s body to a morgue after determining that she is dead and had zero chance of being resuscitated.

I look at Beno who is now being pushed out by the doctors, assuming to get his hand removed and his eyes fixed. He also looked back but I could see nothing in his eyes, as if his heart already died. I can say this… his body may be here, but his mind is not.

If Beno died before me, would that be me too…

I am sorry Beno… but I can choose who goes first… I don’t want to suffer anymore…

Forgive me for my selfishness.