00:00:15
Everyone was staring at the timer as it bled seconds.
00:00:10
"Any idea what's next?" someone asked, their voice thin with anxiety.
No one answered. No one could.
00:00:05
Maya tensed. Every muscle was ready, coiled tight beneath her skin. She glanced at her team. They looked prepared, at least on the surface. But beneath that? Fear. Raw and unspoken. She felt it too.
00:00:03
00:00:02
00:00:01
00:00:00
Silence.
Nothing happened.
A shaky laugh broke out.
"Ha… haha—see? Maybe nothing wi—"
CLANG.
The sound ripped through the floor, deep and mechanical, like something massive locking into place.
"Something's not right," Lana muttered.
Linus glanced around. "Have they stopped?"
"I don't know, man," a tired-looking guy beside him said. "Maybe they're just messing with us."
Linus turned back to the timer.
Then his stomach dropped.
The timer was getting farther away.
For a split second his brain refused to cooperate. Then gravity reminded him.
He was falling.
The floor split open and folded inward, swallowing them whole, dropping everyone into an endless black void.
What the fuck.
Air screamed past Linus' ears. His heart slammed against his ribs as if trying to escape first. He looked down.
Nothing.
Just darkness. Endless. Hungry.
Lights suddenly flared to life along the walls as they fell, one after another, revealing a vertical tunnel stretching far below them. Engineered. Deliberate.
"AHHHHH!"
"What is this?!"
"We're going to fucking die!"
"Why me?! Why me?!"
Bodies tumbled through the air around him. Some screamed. Some froze. Some just stared, their minds lagging behind reality.
Across the open space, Maya was falling too.
But then a hand clamped around her wrist.
She turned sharply,It was Ralf.
Lana and Noah had also latched on, their hands linked, forming a shaky ring as they dropped together.
"ANY IDEA WHAT'S DOWN THERE?" Ralf bellowed, wind battering his face.
"I HAVE NO FUCKING IDEA!" Lana screamed back.
Ralf glanced at Maya. She looked… calm.
He grinned. "Looks like a normal Monday for you, huh?"
She didn't respond.
Inside, her thoughts were spiraling.
This is the trial.
No. This is part of it.
There's something down there.
There has to be.
Or maybe we're supposed to stop falling.
Shit. What if we're already failing?
Her heart pounded so loud she could hear it over the wind, but she forced her face still.
"I'm sure we'll be fine!" Noah shouted, trying too hard. "They wouldn't just kill us off right away… right?"
Something warm splattered across his jacket.
"AH—FUCK!"
Noah stared down in horror.
Vomit.
"Ew!" Lana yanked her hand free instantly.
"Oh come on!" Noah protested, shrugging out of the jacket as it was ripped from his grasp and torn away by the rushing air. He was left in just a tank top, shivering as they fell.
Below them, the darkness waited.
And it wasn't finished.
"Man, whoever's behind this nightmare better hold their balls tight, if God saves me from this hellhole, I swear I'm killing that sone of a b*that!"someone shouted.
This is a long fall, Linus thought.
Is there even something down there?
"Huh! Wait... I see something below"
"Yh... I see it too, what is that?"
"Looks like... is that! OH SHIT!!"
"Its the f*king floor"
"Oh my God, we are gonna die"
"No,no,no- Noooooo! Not like this!"
Just below them,the lights had illuminated the void below,now revealing a smooth metallic steel looking floor.
"Wow, getting turned into mush was not on my bucket list" Ralf joked drylly, as if death wasn't staring him in the face.
The floor was getting closer as the people screamed.
So this is it huh? We never stood a chance did we, linus thought as the floor got closer and closer.
Everyone instinctively crossed their hands infront of their face as if that was gonna save them.
Just as the first body was about to hit the floor, it split into two and opened inwards, into another chamber.
Bodies flew into the chamber, then they stopped, they were suspended in mid air as a powerful wind blew from below, keeping them afloat.
"Huh!TF'
"Im alive, IM ALIVEEEEE, hahahaha"
"Damn what kind of cruel game is this"
People were shouting as they were suspended.
Just then, the opening above that they came through closed and sealed seamlessly.
Linus looked down at the floor. The floor was steel but net-like, and below it were huge vents. Just then the vents began to close as the people were lowered onto the floor. And then the floor changed into smooth metallic steel floors just as the people touched the floor.