The Opening Faceoff

[decoy73]

"Yeah, there are people here! Who're you?!" Melinda called out.

"Anne. What are your names up there?" Jessica looked at Melinda for a second. Anne, Anne, Anne. Have I heard that name before? Nope. She hadn't heard that name on any of the announcements, either as being a killer or as having had killed. Had she heard that name at all? Jessica had the sneaky suspicion that something was up.

"Do you know anyone here named Anne? I have no idea who it is." She asked Melinda. Maybe she'd know. If she didn't, well, then things might get complicated.

[Tythanin*]

'Anne? Who the hell is Anne? I don't remember hearing an Anne get chosen when we were all sent here...' Melinda thought to herself, a small frown on her face as she quickly shut the door and gave Jessica a clueless shrug. "No idea. I don't think they ever announced that someone named Anne got chosen for Survival of the Fittest, but it's possible that I've forgotten. Do you recognize her voice at all or anything?"

"Either way...I'm just gonna give my name. You can chime in later if you want." She said in a murmur as she opened the door again. "The name's Melinda! Melinda Schenn."

[peregrineink*]

Maddie was itchy. The itch started from her trigger finger and began to work its way towards her heart. It bothered her more than the pain from the beating did, she didn't know how to get rid of it. There was nowhere to scratch, really.

The girl called herself Melinda and Maddie didn't recognize the name, she was amazed that she had gotten this far just on the name Anne. It was a big school.

"Hi Melinda," Maddie said. "It's nice to meet you."

She wanted to continue, painting a picture of this Anne and her life at school. Anne was quiet but she had a lot of best friends who all would do anything for her but none of them got chosen. She owned a beagle puppy named Jules and never ever had ever picked up a paintbrush.

Embellishing might get her in trouble though.

She coughed a little. "Sorry, I got beat up a little before I found this place. Is it safe?"

[decoy73]

"Hi Melinda. It's nice to meet you."

A cough. "Sorry, I got beat up a little before I found this place. Is it safe?" Jessica looked at Melinda, nodding for no particular reason, before calling down to her.

"Yeah. We've been here since the start. We haven't been doing anything." She paused. "I'm Jessica Vogel. Sorry that I didn't say anything earlier. Announcements can get to you."

[Lord_Shadow]

((Jennifer Steinman continued from Don't Be Just An Observer))

Jennifer had walked with a purpose. She was going to find Megan, and then work together with her to make it out of this thing somehow. Bryant had said he had seen Megan last at the Firing Range. Jennifer wasn't sure how long ago that was. And she didn't have a way to make sure she was still there. She could just head there and hope for the best, but she remembered what happened when she tried that at the Field Hospital.

"No way am I walking into another death fiasco."

She looked up at the watchtower. From there, she'd be able to see everything. She'd be able to survey the entire compound. She probably wouldn't be able to see Megan from there, but she wasn't counting on that. The Watchtower had to have some kind of big lens or something. Something that she could light up and bring people to her. Megan would see it and come if she was still alive. Jennifer was sure of that.

She started walking towards it. The government wouldn't have taken that kind of stuff away, would they have?

---

Announcement day was boring. Somewhere, a bunch of kids would be taken to fight to the death in the Program. Big deal. It wasn't like it could ever happen here. Yet everyone was lined up waiting for the announcement. Jennifer watched the screen, waiting for the General to say which stupid school got picked so they could all go back inside.

It was General's Pride. Jennifer's eyes widened. "What? No, that can't be. That isn't possib— Wait. Get a hold of yourself Jen. There's no way your class would be chosen. Yeah, it'll probably be the seniors or something." Just as she thought that, the sophomore year was chosen. Her eyes widened even further.

"Stay calm. Stay calm. No way you can be chosen. It'll just be idiots. Just losers no one cares about." She was lost in thought. She hadn't noticed when her name was called. Her 'best friend', Melissa, had. She nudged Jen in the side. "What?" She snapped at her.

"Your name was called. I think you're going to take part in it."

"What?" She asked in disbelief. The soldiers grabbed her by the arm, took her away. She watched in horror as Melissa slowly went further and further away from her view. Jennifer didn't struggle. She couldn't. She was paralyzed with fear. And what she saw just before she was put in the bus sent a chill up her spine.

Melissa waved goodbye to her.

Her best fucking friend just waved goodbye as she was taken away.

She sat quietly in the bus. She knew this had to be a mistake. They must have meant for that other girl with a similar name. The one that Jennifer was just know making up to cope with the fact that she had been chosen. Yeah, Jennifer Steinberg. Right. Mistake. It was a mistake. Completely. Totally.

She looked at the other kids. She didn't belong with them. She knew very little of them. There were a few faces she recognized, a few friends of friends. But she wasn't one of them. She was Jennifer Steinman, the girl everyone liked. Friends with everyone.

Which she now understood was total bullshit. If she was friends with everyone, why didn't she know even half the people with her?

She looked at one of the soldiers sitting with them. She had to ask. Had to make sure it was a mistake.

"This isn't right is it? I'm not supposed to be here." The soldier didn't respond. She didn't try asking again. She merely sat back, and buried her head in her hands. No tears though. How could she cry when she wanted to scream?

---

She got to the Watchtower. Knife in hand, she started her way up the steps.

[peregrineink*]

(Skipped with permission)

Maddie's attention was pulled from attempting to enter the trap door above her to the clamoring that was happening below. Her heart raced as she gripped her Desert Eagle. Who was this person? Was it the boy who had beaten her so savagely before? The itching that was climbing her arm seemed to start screaming, but could a feeling scream? Maddie now knew that the answer was "yes."

Should she speak? Would that just make the other person attack? What if they didn't have a weapon? She prayed that they didn't have a weapon. Oh god they probably had a weapon. How many people were left? Everyone left probably had a weapon, so many had already died. She gulped in air through chapped and aching lips. Was this it? Was this the end?

No. Because she had two guns, and she had her art, and she was going to keep making it. Maddie raised the gun in her hand and pointed it at the space the girl was going to occupy. She saw the girl come slowly....red hair, pretty skin, she sort of recognized her but didn't know the name.

In her hand was a knife.

Maddie's trigger finger jumped but she didn't pull. She stared at the girl.

Her hair was so pretty.

The corner of Maddie's mouth twitched.

"What's your name?" She asked.

[Lord_Shadow]

(Skipped with permission)

"How many stairs are there here?"

Jennifer wasn't sure why she even came here. The closer she walked, the more it seemed like a stupid idea. Maybe she should have just gone ahead and made way to the Firing Range. Maybe Megan was still there. If she hurried, she might just catch her.

It was that while thinking that last thought that she heard another girl's voice. The other girl was asking her for her name.

She looked at the girl. "Jennifer Steinman." she blurted out without thinking. That girl looked familiar. Jen was sure she had seen her before. She remembered her as the artist. Yeah, the girl with the gift when it came to art. A couple of names swirled around in her head.

She latched onto one: Madeline. Maddie. But what was her last name?

The gun in the Maddie's hand brought the announcements back to Jennifer's memory.

Harris. Madeline Harris. One of the most prolific killers in the game. And her gun was pointed right at Jennifer. She cringed. She really didn't like having guns in her face.

"Woah there, no need for the gun. I'm just passing through." She put her knife on the ground and held her hands in the air. "I'm not relishing the thought of being your next kill, Harris. I'd like to come out of this alive."

She had to think of a way to get out of this. There was little reason for Maddie not to just shoot her.

Unless she was convinced that she didn't want to. That might work. Talk her out of it. But first, she had to see if Maddie was even willing to listen.

"I just want to talk, okay? We can do that right? A little girl to girl talk?"

[peregrineink*]

"...A little girl to girl talk?"

Maddie wanted to scream. She wanted to scream real loud and she didn't care. Girl talk!? Girl talk!? Maddie had never talked like a girl in her life, she had never gotten close to anyone and confided her innermost secrets. Hell, Maddie didn't have any innermost secrets, she never had. What was she saying? What was her implication?

"Girl talk." The phrase was foreign on her tongue. She stared at this girl, this Jennifer Steinmen, and wondered what it must be like to be her. She probably had an incredibly easy life, being so pretty. It must be so incredibly easy...having everything be so shallow and simple. Girl talk. Maddie didn't even feel like a girl. She felt like a sack of flesh and bone and skin and lymph held together by bloody matted hair and feverish inspiration. Madeline Harris may have a girl's name, she may possess the organs that belong to a girl, but Maddie had stopped considering herself one back when she realized that no boy really considered her one.

And now this pretty little... confection of a girl wanted to have girl talk. GIRL TALK.

Maddie gripped her gun as tight as she could muster but did not lower it. The itching was everywhere. She itched so terribly.

"Girl talk," Maddie repeated, her dull gray eyes boring into Jennifer's. "What would you like to talk about, Jennifer? I really only ever talk about one thing. If that's okay."

[Lord_Shadow]

Maddie's stare sent a shiver down Jennifer's spine. Whatever she was thinking about, it wasn't about talking. And she hadn't lowered the gun.

"I think... I know what you're talking about."

She swallowed a gulp of air. This 'talk' could very well be her last.

"I want to talk about what you're doing Maddie. You know what it is that you're doing. You know perfectly well." She stood her ground, every instinct in her body telling her to run away as fast as possible. But she knew if she did, she would never take more than a single step. Rationally, this was the only course of action. And it was near suicide. But, so long as it had a chance of success, she had to take it.

"You're playing their game. You're doing exactly what they want. What do you think is the point of The Program? It's to show us that our lives don't matter to anyone. It exists to show just how far we've progressed as a country, as a people. Only, we've progressed in the wrong direction. Because as we are, we exist in a state that as soon as everything familiar to us is taken away, all we have to do is be told to do something by our government and we do it. We don't question it." She took a step forward.

"Or rather, they don't want us to question it. They want us to be good little American children and slaughter each other for no reason other than that we were told to. But think about it. If we weren't told to do that. If we were just dumped here, even with everything we were given, what would happen? Certainly not this. Not for a long time. Humans have a capacity for atrocities like this, but it's never our first choice."

She took another step. "But take away our choice, even if you really haven't, and suddenly we're all okay with our evil nature. Like you Maddie. Back home, you probably wouldn't even want to look at a gun, much less hold one. You were an artist Maddie. You had a gift, something that should have been nurtured. But here, once you were told to kill instead of make art, it all went to hell."

She stared right back into the other girl's eyes. A fire was rising in her, and she couldn't quell it. She understood now, and she had to share. Maddie had to be made to understand. "Tell me, do you consider your kills to be 'art'? Do you think there's anything beautiful or noble in murder? Because that's what you've been doing. You became a murderer, simply because a bunch of men in uniform told you to under pain of imaginary consequences. What have they done? NOTHING! They haven't done anything here! But like robots we did as ordered and fought and killed each other."

"Fuck that shit! I'm not killing because I'm told to. I'm not letting them take away my choice. You have a choice too Maddie. Are you going to continue being a pawn in their game? Or are you going to be your own person, like you were before? Drop the gun. There's no need for you to use it anymore."

Somewhere, deep in her mind, Jennifer understood it all. No one makes it out of the Program. But you can choose how far you make it. "I choose to make it to the end."

[peregrineink*]

Maddie listened carefully and patiently to Jennifer's lies. She was using her name, no one really knew her name. The only reason this girl knew her name is because it had been mentioned so many times on the announcements and that was it. If Maddie was in the hallways of General's Pride she was relatively sure that Jennifer would look right through her.

Maddie could see the knife if her hand, she knew the score. The second Maddie lowered her gun Jennifer would be on her like some demon thing, taking and taking like she probably had her entire life. Those popular girls, with everything handed to them. The pretty girls who took without caring or thinking about the feelings of others. How dare Jennifer even begin to understand Maddie? How dare she even say her name...

For a wavering moment, Maddie's gun hand shook. She considered Jennifer's words with an inward glance. Her mouth turned down in a sort of frown before she looked up again, meeting Jennifer's eyes.

"You know nothing about art," Maddie said.

And she pulled the trigger. Hopefully the face would remain intact. She needed it to be.

[Lord_Shadow]

Maddie's rebuttal was surprisingly good. Amazing what a gunshot can do to make one's argument hold more merit.

The bullet tore into Jennifer's chest. Her eyes grew wide with shock as she fell to the ground. Blood gathered on her clothes, seeping through quickly and collecting on the floor. Her hair almost matched it's color.

"Why?" She placed her hands over the wound, desperately trying to keep what little life that remained in her from leaving. But it was no use. In a matter of minutes, if she was lucky, she would be dead. She choked on her words as she tried to speak, but she managed to get three out. "Why? Kill? Me?"

She felt the warmth of her blood on her body, but only where it was collecting. As for the rest of her, all she felt was cold.

She looked right into Maddie's eyes. "If this is your 'art', know that you'll soon join your gallery." That was the thought that filled her mind as her eyes stared at her killer. She only wished that the girl would understand what that look meant.

---

The sun shone brightly. At least, Jennifer thought it was the sun. She wasn't quite sure where she was. She was wearing a white robe. It wasn't her style, but she felt it fit the situation for some reason. She looked around for a bit.

All that was there was a gate, ornate and beautiful beyond imagination. She felt drawn to it and she started walking. But after a few steps, she realized something. She wasn't supposed to go through that gate. Not yet.

A man with a flowing white beard nodded at her. He never spoke, but she knew what he wanted to tell her. She'd have to wait a while before she was allowed in. She had to make up for some things she had said and done.

She smiled. That was fine with her. No matter how long it took, she was going to go through that gate someday.

---

A smile was on her face as her breath left her. She felt, relieved, strangely. It was almost as if dying... wasn't all that bad.

F13 - JENNIFER STEINMAN: DECEASED

[peregrineink*]

Jennifer was smiling and Maddie was just happy that her face had been left. This one was going to be special because she was carrying a knife. Maddie could sculpt.

Maddie loved to sculpt.

The blood was pooling beneath her like an angel's wings, and she decided to keep the girl on the ground. Prying the knife from her hands was a little more difficult, not because of rigor mortis (that would come later) but because Jennifer had been gripping it so tightly when she died. It was a nice knife, big with a good grip.

Maddie took it to Jennifer's face. It was nice, cutting along the cheekbones to open
the flesh. The bone peeked out, pale against deep red. The eyes were next, they were beautiful and hazel. It took a while for Maddie to get them out of the skull. She slit the mouth from ear to ear, enjoying the smile that it made, and wrapped limp fingers around the the newly liberated orbs.

Maddie sat back on her heels.

Simply called "The Angel", the crowd set their eyes upon the strange configuration that the up and coming artist had unveiled. Her face was a mask of red, flesh and skin open and parted to reveal the intricate skull beneath. Her mouth was opened in a smile of jubilation, red hair flowing.

The wings seemed to almost hug her figure, blood red and languid. Her hands were crossed in front of her, each holding a single hazel eye.

It was abstract, it was strange and provocative. And most importantly...

It was art.

Maddie smiled at her creation before leaning down to cut a bit of beautiful red hair free with her knife. Her mother had always said that Maddie was a redhead, but the weak strawberry blonde stood no chance against the rich red. Maddie lightly wrapped the hair around her thin wrist. The red of her hair mixed in with the blood.

She pet the liberated hair lightly. The itch was gone, it was lovely. She sighed deeply and sat next to the body spread out on the ground. So pretty. She looked back up at the trap door.

"Are you still there?"

[Tythanin*]

"Oh uh...lemme just uh...talk it over with Jessica, all right?" Melinda said uneasily as she exchanged a look with her friend and partner. She once again just let the door slam shut and she sighed, running a hand through her hair as she thought about their situation. If Anna down there was telling the truth and she actually wasn't a danger at all, then it'd be kind of a dick move to just send her on her way. But there was always the possibility that she was lying...and she hadn't gotten a good enough look at her to recognize who it was. "So...got any ideas? I mean...I haven't heard that name over the announcements and I don't recognize her. And you don't either so..."

"Let's just keep quizzing her some more, all right?" She said with a brief nod, hoping that Jessica wasn't going to object to her decision or anything. So she pulled at the latch, lifted it, and paused when she heard someone else's voice echo through the watchtower. Another voice she didn't recognize...but the conversation that was going on was definitely one that set Melinda's stomach churning. 'Oh fuck, fuck, fuck, a killer's down there.'

She turned to Jessica with a slightly panicked look on her face. "Shit, what are we gonna-"

A gunshot.

Melinda gave a start and stumbled backwards, the door swinging closed with another, softer slam. She didn't know who that other girl was...the girl who had unknowingly given them a clue as to who 'Anna' really was, but there was no doubt in Melinda's mind that she was dead now. 'Shit, shit.'

She heard Anna's...no, Maddie's muffled question through the door and she looked at Jessica again, clutching her BB Gun tighter until her knuckles turned white. "Hey...what do you wanna do? There's no way in hell we're going to let her get up here, right?"

[decoy73]

BANG

Anne, no, Maddie, had shot the other girl that had come in. Melinda shut the door and stumbled backwards a little.

"Hey...what do you wanna do? There's no way in hell we're going to let her get up here, right?" Jessica stepped towards the door and opened it just enough to look through.

Maddie was down there, removing the knife from the dead girl's hand. She would probably go away ...

And then she started cutting. It was like the proverbial train wreck. Even though she clutched her stomach, she couldn't close the door or turn away from what Maddie was doing. First the mouth, cutting it open from ear to ear, then the eyes, removing them from the sockets and placing one in each hand before posing the body. Jessica just calmly closed the door.

"Do not open that door." Jessica said softly, as the queasiness started to become nausea. Jessica moved over to the edge of the room, leaning her head out, and after a few seconds, what little food she had eaten decided that it was now safe to evacuate the way it came in, falling the height of the tower to the ground.

That little bitch is insane.

[peregrineink*]

Maddie glanced back down at her beautiful artwork, fully aware of the fact that the girls who spoke to her earlier were now conspicuously silent. Maddie herself wanted to go up there and probably skin the flesh from their hands for being so mean about everything, but she resisted. No point in going where one isn't welcome or anything, she figured.

All she had wanted was a place to feel safe. This, now after what she had done, wasn't very safe at all. She looked back to Jennifer, twirling the piece of red hair through her fingers. She sighed a little. It was sort of like eating potato chips to Maddie now, once she started it was pretty damn hard to stop. This didn't worry her though, none of this was illegal. Plus, it was beautiful.

She looked back up at the door where she knew people were. Clearing her throat slightly, she spoke.

"I'm sorry that you had to see the creation process, I would never want to see Monet make one of his paintings, it takes away the magic." She looked down awkwardly at her blood spattered sneakers, then back to Jennifer.

"I'll leave you with this one, okay? Consider it my gift. I'm sorry again."

She slowly backed away, slipping the knife into her pack. Gripping the bannister of the stairs, she sighed a little to herself.

Why did she always have to mess things up with friends?

She started to make her way down the stairs again...


(Madeline Anne Harris continued in Fancy Footwork)