I'm such an idiot. I knew Lara's death wasn't gonna be easy for anyone, why did I choose her first thing? Maybe I just thought I could get through the tough ones first then maybe... no, no why am I even thinking about this? Why can't I just go back? Why are we here? What sick fuck thought this was a good idea?

At first, when the lights went out I looked up at one of the cameras. Whoever was behind there was gonna pay someday for this. But for now, I need to manage. If they could kill Veronica so quickly I'm sure they could do the same to me if I didn't play by their rules. In fact, they could just do that to anyone. Why the hell would they want me to kill everyone? Fuck, I need to focus on this. I need to kill someone no one would miss, someone that was hardly known in the first place. Someone that wouldn't make as much of an emotional scar as Lara and Veronica. In the living room, I spotted them.

Of course, almost everyone was in the living room, so I'd have to do this quickly. For the most part, everyone was trying to stay quiet, but I could hear Lukey whimpering. I'm not killing him yet though, he'd be worse than Lara, I'm sure. Making my way to my real target and seeing them sitting by the coffee table gave me an idea. I gave up being quiet and casually walked towards them. They noticed me, but couldn't quite see me in the dark. With one fell swoop, I reached down and grabbed them by their neck, beginning to strangle them. For some reason, even on the brink of death, they didn't scream or shout. That was until I dragged them up and slammed them back down on the corner of the coffee table. Nothing seemed to happen the first hit except that they were now screeching for dear life, and everyone around caught on to what was happening. The second hit spewed blood all over the table, and every hit after that just added more and more gore, along with the terrible cracking sound that came with busting their skull open. After maybe 10 hits or so, I stop. I let go of their body and flop it down on top of the table along with their crimson red innards.

I still feel terrible, but it's already been done, and I can't change it. Plus, I had a better idea.

I scoop up a bit of their blood onto my finger and began to write something on the edge of the table, one of the few places that haven't been covered in blood yet. After writing the message, for some odd reason, my body decides to lick the blood off the tip of my finger. Realizing what I did, I expected to be hit with the usual salty, irony taste, but...

Why does it taste like sugar cookies?

Soon after the banging stopped and the screaming died down to a few silent sobs and whines, the lights came back on.  That definitely didn't help the problem as I could hear a couple more screams erupt from behind me.  It made me hesitate to turn around, but eventually, I peeked my head over the side of the couch.

"Oh my, it appears another one has died!"  The announcer chirped.

"The Murderer had killed Liza.  The dead player has been bashed in the head and set down on the coffee table."

My eyes widened at the sight before me. There laid Liza's dead body just in front of me, blood splattered all over not only that table, but come to find out, on the couch as well. While looking over to see it, my arm accidentally slapped into one of the puddles, spraying a few drops of blood onto the side of my face. I gagged at the scent of it.

Looking over at everyone else near the incident, I could see quite a few people were covered in the red substance, but only because they were so close to the table. From who I could see, it was Lukey, Kai, Dan, Ash, Vinny, and Jojo. Lukey was bawling his eyes out while Kai and Dan were trying to comfort him, Ash and Vinny were trying their best to wipe the blood off of themselves, and Jojo just sat there in stunned silence. I was beginning to feel nauseous from the smell alone, so I backed away from the couch and sat against the far right wall of the living room to take a breather. The rest of them seemed to get the idea and backed away themselves.

After everyone else saw what the announcer was talking about, the speaker crackled to life again. "Remember players, you have 30 minutes until voting time, so you best get to finding your clues!"

"Great job Medic." Kai sighed and rolled their eyes. "Really out here saving our lives."

"Hey don't say that!" Vinny told them. "They could be trying their best."

"Shut up Vinny."

"Oh ok..." 

"Alright, let's not have a huge fight over it this time."  Kees stood up from next to where I used to sit.  "Let's look around for something that can actually prove who the Murderer is."

"Well, I can already see something." We all turned to Jo, who was pointing to the very edge of the coffee table while covering her nose from the scent with her plaid overcoat. "It looks like whoever did it wrote something down there."

"...anyone volunteer to move closer and get a good look at it?" Trey asked, looking around at the rest of us.

We all stayed silent until Alicia cleared her throat and spoke up. "If I may have a word... not it."

Kai glared at her.  "Are you serious?"

"Not it!"  Lukey shouted.  Everyone else quickly caught on and followed suit except for Kai. 

"I fucking hate you people."  Kai sighed but covered their nose and walked towards the body.

"We love you too Kai, don't lose your sense of smell!"  Alicia said.

"If I had my way with the Murderer, you'd be losing all 5 of your senses by tomorrow."  Kai shot Alicia one last glare before continuing.  Once they were close enough, the read the message out loud.

"113 145 145 163. It's just a bunch of numbers."

"Wait, it's gotta be a code for something," John said.

"Well, what is it?" Alex asked, crossing his arms.

"It's been a while, I can't tell what code it is or what it means, but it's definitely some kind of code."

"So does that mean the Murderer knows how to speak computer?"

"No, that's binary Lukey," John shook his head. "and those numbers definitely aren't binary code."

"So it's not binary, and it's not anything having to do with letters, so-" Ally began to speak until the speaker interrupted her.

"You all have 10 minutes until voting time! You best get to discussing your thoughts on the Murderer!"

Sabrina groaned. "So the message did absolutely jack shit. Great."

"What if it's the Murderer's name?" Ash suggested.

"That would narrow it down a lot, but we still can't make any huge assumptions," Mason said. "We don't even know what code it is, and just guessing out of the ones with four letters in their names might get rid of someone important. Not only that, but it could also be a way for the Murderer to throw us off."

"Wait a damn minute," Annie looked up at the speaker in the living room. "what happened to the Investigator's vote?"

"Oh, I was too bored to read it." The announcer said. "It's just the same as last time. Seriously Investigator, most people in your position choose someone random, target some other person for a moment, christ."

"So they voted for me again?" Ash asked.

"Well, who else would it be?" The speakers shut off right after.

"Ok, I don't wanna make any assumptions, but..." Austin spoke. "what if the Investigator's right?"

"Are you fucking kidding me?!" Ash growled at the other male. "Of course they're wrong, why on Earth would it be me?!"

"Didn't the speaker say the roles were random? There's definitely still the possibility of it being you-"

"Shut up Vinny!"

"Ok..."

"Guys, cut it out," Kees said. "We're here to discuss things, not fight over them. Yes, the Murderer is confirmed to be someone random, and yes, that means it could be Ash, but that also means it could be anyone else in this room, myself included. Blaming each other isn't gonna get us anywhere."

"Kees is right." I finally spoke up. "If we just keep fighting over who it is then we'll never figure it out, or worse, vote out someone vital like Mason said. We should at least try to rationally use the clues we have now to figure it out."

"So that would be a strand of black hair and a code the Murderer wrote in blood," Trey said.

"Stealing Ash's guess, it could very well be the Murderer's name,"  Dan said. 

"Ok, everyone with four letters, come stand over here."  Jo pointed to the east side wall of the living room.  Kees, Ally, Alex, Jojo, John, and Trey moved to that area. 

"The hair strand's black and short, so John, Trey, and Ally can't be suspects."  Austin pointed out.  The three moved back to the group. 

"Didn't Kees have an alibi the night before?"  John said. 

"Y-Yeah, I told you guys he was with me!"  Thomas confirmed.  Kees walked back to us. 

"So if all of our evidence is correct, it could be either Alex or Jojo,"  Mason said. 

"Times up!  Head over to the kitchen table to cast your vote!"  The announcer said.  We were all worried but went to go pick up our tablets anyway. 

I stared at mine for a long time.  I was terrified to vote for the wrong person, but I had to make a decision soon, or else I'd run out of time.  I tap on Alex's icon and set the device back on the table, hoping that we'd just get it right.  It wasn't for any particular reason, I just trusted Jojo more at the moment.  After everyone cast their vote, the speaker turned on again. 

"Woah, ok, wow."  The announcer chuckled a bit.  "I would say Jesus Christ but there's no Christ where you're at right now, for fucks sake, your earlier discussions meant absolutely fucking nothing!"

"Can you just say who got voted out already?"  Sabrina asked impatiently. 

"Fine fine."  They laughed one more time before speaking again

"The players believe the Murderer is Ash."