Chapter Nineteen
Missing


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JC and Kevin had gotten Laura off of the floor after to her scary prediction and were trying to console her because she was obviously upset.

“Come Laura, let’s look for everyone else. It might help you if we find them and no that they are all all right,” Kevin told her.

Laura nodded and she and Kevin started to walk towards the left side of the first floor when they heard someone running down the stairs. They all looked up to se AJ running at them in a panic.

“You guys,” AJ started to say, out of breath, “they.....they got...Joey.”

JC gasped and said, “How? What happened?”

AJ shook his head, “I dunno. We were walking down a hall on the second floor when three skeletons started to come after us. We ran and Joey tripped. He told to go and find you guys. God, I hope they didn’t do anything to him,” he finished, sounding worried.

JC put a hand on AJ’s shoulder and said,” Don’t worry too much. Joey’s smart. He’ll get out of it.”

Kevin nodded. “Did you see anyone? We’re trying to get everyone together. I think we had a bad idea there splitting all of us up.”

“I haven’t seen anyone else. Did you find Nick though?”

Laura pointed behind AJ. “He’s unconscious. JC and Kevin found him like that. He needs a doctor.”

“Aww...shit...” AJ said as he took a look at Nick. “Damnit. We need to get out of here.”

“Don’t you think we already knew that?” JC said, sounding frustrated.

Just then they heard running footsteps. They all looked to see Justin running towards them. He stopped for a minute to catch his breath also before he stuttered out. “Chris.....he’s...gone....”

“Fuck.....” Kevin said, “this is getting out of hand! Now we have both Joey and Chris missing, Nick’s unconscious, and the others God knows where.”

“I’ve got this though,” Justin said, showing the diary he held in his hands, “me and Chris found it. It’s the diary of someone who lived here.”

That’s when they heard footsteps running towards them again. This time it was Lance. He had a wide eyed scared look to him. “They got Howie,” he said as he came running up.

“Ok, now Howie is missing. This just keeps getting better and better!” AJ said with disgust.

“Yeah and there’s been no trace of Teri or Brian. And don’t forget that Emily is missing too,” Laura pointed out.

“Damn....Howie, Chris, Joey, Emily, Teri, and Brian. They’re ALL missing. And Nick’s unconscious,” Justin shook his head, “this is not good.”

“What's that diary all about Justin?” JC asked.

“It’s of a woman that lived here. Her name is Abigail Calhoun. Her last two diary entries explain some stuff though the last page of the last entry is missing so....” he trailed off.

“Wait a minute, did you say her name was Abigail Calhoun?” Lance asked, remembering the newspaper clipping.

Justin nodded. “Yeah, why?”

“Well, before Howie disappeared, I saw a newspaper clipping about a woman that disappeared. Her name was Abigail Calhoun.”

There was a silence. “Let’s look at the diary,” AJ finally said.

Kevin took the diary and opened it up to the second to last entry. He read it to the whole group and they were shocked by what it said. He then read the last entry and that’s when Lance realized two things.

“Whoa...wait a minute. What did you say the date of that last entry was?” Lance asked, looking at Kevin.

“Saturday, July 14, 1887,” Kevin repeated.

“Umm....isn’t today Saturday, July 14, 2001? Which means that yesterday was Friday, July 13, 2001 like the entry before.”

“Oh God....which means that the same thing is happening to us like happened to this woman 114 years ago,” Laura said.

Lance started to say something again. “I think I found the missing piece to that diary entry too.”

The other turned to look at him as he pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket and unfolded it. Kevin took the piece of paper and read it.

‘to conquer FEAR itself’

“Ok, that means that the only way to defeat the “Game” is to conquer fear itself. What the hell is that suppose to mean?!” AJ shouted.

“Ugh...don’t you get it?” Laura said, “it means the only way to defeat the game, you must overcome each obstacle by conquering the fear. You can’t fear it or it’ll keep coming at you. Each thing that has been thrown at us has made us scared and sometimes almost killed us. If we aren’t afraid of it, “The Game” can’t be played because the whole object is to literally ‘scare us to death.’ If we don’t fear it, the “Game” has no use anymore and will be defeated.”

Kevin started nodding. “That makes total sense. The plan is to scare us but if we don’t fear it, we can’t be scared.”

“So which means, when we are thrown into each thing again. We have to not fear it,” Laura said.

“You’re saying we have to live through each thing again?” Justin asked, not sounding happy.

“Yeah, unfortunately. It can’t be that hard though. Think of something happy I guess,” Lance said shrugging.

“Well, first what we gotta do is find everyone else and tell them the same thing and then I guess we wait for this “Game” to come back at us,” JC said.

“I gotta question though. Nick’s pretty hurt and still unconscious. How the hell is he suppose to play the “Game” again?” AJ asked, looking over at Nick.

“We can only hope he wakes up. The only way to defeat the “Game” is if we all conquer the fear. If one of us fails, we’ll probably all fail,” Laura told them.

“Comforting thought,” AJ mumbled.

“Well, do we look for everyone else or just sit here and wait for them to come back?” Justin said.

Kevin sighed. “I dunno. The last time we looked for someone more than half the group got missing. I think we just have to wait.”

“I hate waiting. They could be in a lot of danger,” Lance said.

JC shook his head, “We can only hope not.”


Chapter Twenty - Illusion

Go back to 'The Game'