"Ugh, the mail's here," said Amberline, looking to the envelope as it slipped under the door. I was, again, filled with dread. Only this time it wasn't because of our blue suits; it was because I hated that we'd have to work with D3. Fortunately, we were able to return our suits to their original color. That was one less thing to worry about, although I was now afraid to ever leave our laundry unwatched.

"I'll read it," I volunteered picking up the letter and taking it out. Nobody argued so I continued to read. "Dear Gamers, we sincerely hope you were able to befriend D3. Today, we are going back to the last man standing. In order to win you will have to work together effectively and have at least one person from each team alive at the end. You will, as usual, have two lives. This is, of course, virtual reality; however in real life you will always have to work with some people you aren't very fond of. That is all we wish to say, good luck gamers."

"This is a long letter," commented Victoria rather sarcastically, though there was an edge of seriousness.

"On their standards," said Duncan. I was just a little relieved that it would be a familiar competition.

"Should we get ready?" I asked. Without much more conversation we all made our way to the lobby, in orange suits, thankfully. We met D3 there rather reluctantly. Our boxes were merged. One half was orange and the other blue. I wish I could say we mixed, but we all stayed selfishly in our half of the box. The people in charge made it clear to us that we'd only be facing one other team. The one next to us. It was the people who'd informed Duncan and I how we'd won. I felt bad for having to beat them, they were so kind, though on the inside I knew we had to.

They shot us apologetic looks, knowing our situation was worse and more publicized than there's. After that we were put into the simulation. Slowly, the light began to flash and we were able to go explore.

"What the hell is this place supposed to be?" Asked someone on Jaspers team. I winced at his foul language but reminded myself it could have been much worse. To be honest, the setting was pretty bizarre. It was like a five year old girl's dream. We walked on what seemed to be clouds, lollipops scattered like trees beside the giant rainbows with what looked like unicorns crossing them. It was that bad, I felt sick looking around at all the sugar.

"Do you think it would taste good in virtual reality?" Asked Duncan, pinching sugary residue between his fingers.

"Can we even eat in a simulation like this?" Asked Parker in reply, scrunching his eyebrows in thought. He then answered his own question. "We'd feel like we'd ate it, but everything here's fake, so no. We wouldn't be eating; it'd just feel that way."

"Let's focus on the game. Not the scene," hissed Jasper. He took the leader position immediately, as if he'd had something to prove.

"Well, the scene is pretty important to take in," I said, challenging Jasper. What I said had been true, though pondering whether or not we could eat in virtual reality wasn't what I'd meant. He looked at me in anger, but hadn't decided to point out any fault in my logic.

We all split up into groups again, though this time I wasn't going to deny Parker and Duncan being on my group. Yesterday was painful as it was, and we'd stuck together in every game up to date. In fact, the only reason we took Olive with us was because she wasn't terrible and we knew we'd have to work with at least someone from D3, otherwise the people in charge would take away points.

I was about to ask how she dealt with Jasper until I remembered they could hear us. "What should our strategy be?" I asked them.

"Wait, maybe. Until someone's eliminated," suggested Parker. He wasn't confident in his suggestion, it seemed as though that strategy almost never worked out for us.

We were reminded about that when Duncan said, "we should take action to ensure they die first." They both looked to me and I shrugged.

"Olive, do you have any suggestions?" I was glad to not only take the attention off of me but to allow her to speak.

She looked down at her weapon nervously. "Jasper and Erin usually call the shots. We just follow them."

"You guys do realize they're just Wildcards, right?" Asked Duncan. Olive's face grew worried and she tensed in hearing Jasper yell at us for saying such things.

When Jasper was done with his tangent, Olive said, "yeah, but he's as good as the rest of us. He's more than proven that."

I wanted to mute the others when we heard Erin saying 'what about me? I'm good too!' I was too frustrated by that point and almost yelled "Focus on yourselves, please!" I was glad I could block them out because the people in charge had adjusted their volume to be lower. I hoped that the fact that the people in charge helped us was a good sign. I couldn't be sure.

We agreed to do a mixture, staying hidden but also attacking when necessary. We were hiding behind a giant fallen down lolly pop when someone decided to use their splash damage to destroy the sugary candy we'd used as cover. We scattered and ultimately shot back as we searched desperately for another spot to hide.

I was relieved when they were damaged enough to retreat, but disappointed that we hadn't finished any of them off. "How's everybody's health holding up?" I asked, gritting my teeth through the pain. About a quarter of my first life was gone. Wasted. It was for almost nothing at all.

"My first life's almost gone," said Parker feeling guilty. I looked around and wished there was a regeneration or health orb. It seemed the people in charge hadn't felt the need to help this time. I didn't see one and had to, rather painfully, listen to Jasper rant in the background. He thought Parker was pathetic for almost wasting his first life.

"Some of the Candy hit me hard, I don't think it took much of my health though," informed Duncan. I looked over to him and frowned at his cut and bruised face. I knew that he wasn't actually marked in real life, but I still found myself wishing I could at the very least wipe the blood from his face. The people in charge hadn't let actual wounds show, I found out. They had, however, let scrapes and bruises remain visible. For the viewer's sake.

"I'm good," said Olive, she shook her head and I saw she'd lied. In the background Jasper was praising her but in reality she was worse than Parker. She mouthed the words 'please don't tell him' and all I could do was nod. I understood why she wouldn't want to live with him on her about it. I was shocked about how I'd always ended up better off than everyone else. It seemed like pure luck, but obviously no such thing existed. My lack of damage would catch up to me, I just knew it.

After that was all sorted out we all walked together quietly around the map. The other team must have decided to let a few others roam free because as we walked we plucked off a few stragglers. I got a sick feeling when the other half of our group met us. It wasn't because of all the sugar around us. It also wasn't because Olive cowered by a chocolate bar as Jasper yelled at her for lying about her health.

I felt sick because only three people had died in total, and in killing them we were led together in an area where hiding spots were easy to occupy. I looked above my number to see a map the people in charge had helpfully given us. We were led to a corner.

"Guys, I think we should go," I suggested, looking around us frantically. Panic seized me momentarily and I started heading away from the corner.

"Why? What's wrong? You can't handle-" I never got to hear the rest of Jaspers sentence because he suddenly started screaming. It was way out of his character, but understandable because he burst into flames. I recognised the effects of the weapon and grabbed Olive and Parker to get them away.

Someone used the splash damage weapon that froze its direct target, the one used on me.

Only this time Someone else on Jaspers team experienced the frozen state, we all backed away further. When I realized we were being shot at from above I looked for the assassins in the heights of the lollipops as I found a spot that was safe.

Olive and Parker went in a different direction, but not far from me I saw Duncan and Victoria shooting together. It seemed they were getting along in such a desperate attempt to take the game back. I followed their example when I'd realized I hadn't been attacking the other team. This kind of lapse could cost us the game.

One by one, us and D3 faded, our names being called out to the world as we fell. A new sort of hope surged within me when I heard an unfamiliar name being called out. Finally I went numb and became a spectator. It hadn't lasted long before we were sent back to our cubicles. I went to take off my earpiece and drink my milk. As I went to the lobby, the other two teams we'd played against were celebrating. I hated that we'd fell into their trap.

"What happened? I was still alive," said Parker as he rushed into the lobby, followed by his new friend Olive. They looked around at us for an explanation, but all I could think of was how smart it was for them to flee. Unfortunately, it seemed someone was able to kill Olive. If she'd been in a better state they could have won the game for us.

"Someone from both teams needed to be alive," I explained. We ignored the other teams and started heading to the leaderboard. A few other teams were finishing and the scores shuffled around. I was glad to see that we hadn't lost much of a lead. We would have really been at a loss if D3 got a different score, but they didn't. We were still ahead of them (barley) and the other teams got to catch up.

"I should have been better," said Olive. She looked around, obviously feeling guilty.

I was about to assure her it wasn't her fault when jasper said, "Yes, you should have. You should have defended yourself better, we lost because of you."

I'd had enough of him, and I had an unpleasant reminder of how Victoria had done the same thing to Duncan. She blamed him for slowing us down but in reality he was the reason we'd won. His words, though, was enough to send me spiraling through my anger. "She's your teammate. Don't ever talk to her, or anyone for that matter, like that again," I stated firmly. He looked at me and laughed bitterly.

"You think you can tell me what to do?" He asked, crossing his arms as he took a step closer. I stood my ground, not willing to let him think he was better than everyone.

"I think you should listen to people with a better judgement. Don't blame her when it was just as much your fault as it was hers," I replied. We both seemed to ignore the growing crowd, which had been fueled with curious people who'd just finished their own games.

"Look, I do and say what I want. One brave soul standing up for her pathetic friends won't change me," he taunted.

My blood boiled with anger and as I was about to take another step forward Duncan touched my shoulder. I shook him off and was about to proceed until it seemed my whole team thought it was best I shouldn't. Jasper took that as his sign to continue, "Thanks for letting us down. I have no intentions of working with you guys again."

Before I could go off about how he was blaming people for his own loss, I decided to just go with, "I'm surprised your team isn't going to walk away with us."

We all started to walk away and we spent a while in silence in our flat. I was so glad I didn't have to deal with him daily. Duncan tried to lure me out of my thoughts, he tried to bring me back to the real world. I was too preoccupied to really respond to him. That night, when we all were in bed Duncan snuck out. We didn't have a curfew here but most people stayed to themselves. I couldn't sleep at first because of my inner thoughts about the competition. I switched topics in my head and wondered what he'd be doing at this hour.

Hey readers! I can't believe I'm about half way finished posting this story on Wattpad.. I thank you for the support, can anyone guess what he'd be doing? Why'd he sneak out after everyone slept?