Linus hit the cold metallic floor with a brutal thud, rolling until his shoulder slammed against the wall. The moment he stopped, the opening behind him sealed with a hiss and a clang. Smooth. Seamless. As if the hallway - and everything it had taken - had never existed.
He lay there for a long second, gasping. The pain and exhaustion finally crashed down on him. Every breath stung. His chest burned. His body trembled as the adrenaline wore off.
Around him, silence pressed in - thick, heavy, the kind that makes you hear your own pulse. The flickering lights buzzed overhead, painting their faces in pale flashes. Then the voice returned.
"Congratulations. You have completed Trial One. Trial Two begins in two hours."
A hollow chime followed, and a projection shimmered above them - a floating timer, glowing red. 2:00:00. It began ticking down.
Someone broke. "Please! Please, have mercy!" a woman cried out, collapsing to her knees. "What kind of sick game is this?!"
No one answered.
Another voice, hoarse and trembling: "The ones who didn't make it… what happened to them? Are they dead?"
The silence that followed was worse than any confirmation. Some wept. Others just stared, hollow-eyed. The grief in the room wasn't loud—it was suffocating.
"They were people," someone whispered. "They had families, lives… and they were just… gone."
"This is insane," a man shouted suddenly, slamming his fist into the wall. "Inhumane! We're being hunted like lab rats!"
"None of this is real," another murmured from the corner, rocking back and forth. "It's not real, it's not real…" His voice cracked, swallowed by nervous laughter.
Linus pushed himself upright, every muscle screaming in protest. His cheek burned where someone had elbowed him earlier, swelling and red. He touched it, hissed, and then looked around.
None of this made sense. Not the trials, not the place, not the voice. He tried to trace it back - to before.
He remembered walking to the grocery store. The air. The sound of birds. Then - nothing. Just this.
"How?" he muttered under his breath. "Teleportation?" No, impossible. He'd have felt something. The tech wasn't even close to existing yet. Unless…
His mind hesitated on the word. Aliens.
It sounded ridiculous. But then again so did everything else.
Linus leaned his head back against the wall, staring up at the flickering lights. Aliens. The thought slipped in again, uninvited. If it was aliens, that would explain the cold steel walls, the impossible rooms, the vanishing floors. But then… did aliens speak English?
The voice that had spoken sounded human. Almost too human - clear, calm, like it understood fear well enough to toy with it.
He let out a short laugh under his breath. "I'm thinking too much," he muttered. His voice cracked a little. "Might as well rest… before the next hell starts."
He slid down the wall, legs weak, until he was sitting on the cold floor. For a moment, he just stared at the countdown floating above. 1:47:32.
His breathing steadied. He was surprised by how calm he felt - almost detached. Maybe it was shock. Maybe his brain was just trying to protect itself. Thinking clearly was the only thing that made him feel remotely safe. It was his way of surviving.
But his thoughts wouldn't stay still. They drifted back - to the hallway. The faces of the people who didn't make it. The old man he'd jumped over. The woman who screamed as she fell.
His chest tightened. The image burned into him.
It was necessary, he told himself. I had no choice.
The words didn't comfort him. They just echoed in his head, hollow and cold.
He'd grown up without a family. An orphan. No one waiting for him, no one to lose him. But the others… they'd had people who cared. Families, friends, children maybe. And now – gone.
That thought sat heavy in his gut, heavier than the pain in his limbs.
Linus swallowed hard and shut his eyes. For the first time since waking up here, he wished he did believe in something - God, fate, anything to make sense of it all. But there was only silence. Only that damned timer ticking away above.
In another corner of the chamber, a small crowd had formed - twelve, maybe fifteen people. They spoke in low, broken voices, their words overlapping like the buzz of restless insects.
They were trying to make sense of what had happened in the hallway. The running. The falling. The way the world itself had seemed to eat them alive.
A young man with a torn sleeve rubbed at his temples. "I was on my way to work," he said. "Bus stop, normal morning… then nothing. Just black. Woke up here."
"Same," muttered a woman beside him. "I was brushing my teeth. Next thing I know, I'm lying on that cold floor."
They went around like that, one by one, trading fragments of their last memories. A grocery run. A jog. Closing up a store.
Different stories, same pattern.
Every single one of them had been alone when it happened.
That detail hung in the air like static.
Someone whispered, "So whoever… or whatever brought us here, didn't just snatch people at random. It picked moments when no one would notice."
A shiver went through the group. The metallic walls seemed to lean closer, listening.
The timer floated above them like a silent god. 00:30:00.Linus sat slumped against the wall, somewhere between sleep and wakefulness. His body screamed for rest, but his mind wouldn't shut up. Every tick of the countdown echoed in his head, steady and merciless.
The others weren't faring much better.Dread had settled in like fog - heavy, choking. No one dared to speak about what the next trial would be, but the question hung there anyway.What if we don't make it? What if this one's worse?Waiting felt worse than dying.
Linus shifted, trying to stretch his sore legs. Then, out of the corner of his eye, movement. Someone was walking toward him.
He turned his head.
It was her.
The girl from before - still calm, still composed, her face unreadable. The chaos that had shattered everyone else seemed to have missed her entirely.
"You," Linus said quietly, straightening up.
"You're lucky," she replied, her voice even, almost detached. "Didn't think you'd make it. You were way behind back there."
Linus gave a tired laugh. "Yeah, well… I don't go down easy." He studied her, curiosity flickering through the exhaustion. "You're fast. And… weirdly calm. Most people are losing their minds right now."
She didn't answer. Just looked at him, expression flat.
Then, after a beat, he asked, "You're not part of this, are you?"
That made her flinch - just slightly. Her eyes narrowed, more insulted than angry.
"Part of this?" she repeated. "You think I'd put myself through that?"
Linus held her gaze, but said nothing. The silence stretched between them, awkward, charged.
She exhaled sharply and turned away, muttering, "We're all trapped here, same as you."
Her tone was sharp, but beneath it… there was something else. Hurt, maybe. Or fear she didn't want anyone to see.
Linus stayed quiet for a while after she turned away, staring at the floor that reflected the faint red light of the timer. The numbers were counting down - 00:16:03.
Finally, he spoke again, voice hoarse. "Name's Linus."
The girl looked at him, long enough to make it uncomfortable. Then she shrugged. "Maya."
Her tone made it clear that names didn't mean much here. Maybe she was right. What was the point of introductions if half of them wouldn't make it through the next round? Still, it felt human to say it- to remind themselves they were more than test subjects.
Maya went quiet again, arms folded, gaze locked on the floor.
Linus tilted his head back, staring at the timer as it pulsed above. The seconds were crawling now. Fifteen minutes left.
He started mumbling under his breath, half to himself. "If the first trial was the hallway… maybe the next one will follow some pattern. A progression, maybe? Physical, then mental?" His brow furrowed. "If I can figure out how they're structured, I might- might have a better chance."
He let out a bitter laugh. "Assuming I live long enough to test that theory."
Maya glanced at him sideways, but said nothing.
Linus kept going, his thoughts spiraling out loud. "Trial one was about speed, reaction. Panic control. Trial two could be balance, or endurance. Maybe each one pushes a different part of survival instinct."
He rubbed his temple, tired but thinking harder than he ever had in his life.
"If I can just survive long enough," he whispered, "three trials, maybe more… there's got to be a pattern. A system. And systems can be broken."
Maya's eyes flicked toward him again - an almost imperceptible look.