7-Not so Sweet...

          „LADIES AND GENTLEMAN, WELCOME TO THE SIXTH ELEMENT GAMES!!!  I WELCOME YOU AND WISH YOU GREAT FUN!!“, we heard a male voice coming from the speakers that were all around us.

          „I HOPE ALL OF YOU PLACED YOUR BETS, FOLKS!! NOW, I THINK WE SHOULD EXPLAIN THE RULES TO THOSE WHO ARE PARTICIPATING FOR THE FIRST TIME!!“

          Participating for the first time? Oh. OH! That must be it! I had a feeling that the fourth roomate and Janneth knew something we didn’t... They must be ex-participants... no... THEY MUST BE EX-WINNERS!! How else would they still be alive AND want to participate again?? They were laughing at us, the newbies, because they were sure that they would beat us! Hehe... little did they know I had an ace up my sleeve...

          An ace called Linda...

          „OK!“, continued the voice, „I WILL SAY THIS ONLY ONCE, SO LISTEN CAREFULLY!! AS YOU ARE AWARE YOU’RE SPLIT INTO 8 GROUPS OF EIGHT... EACH GROUP WILL GO IN A SEPARATE ROOM. ALL ROOMS ARE THE SAME. AFTER YOU GET IN THERE THE RULES OF THE GAME WILL BE EXPLAINED. THIS PROCESS WILL BE REPEATED FOR EACH OF THE 8 GAMES... NOW... THE PRIZE... THE PRIZE FOR WINNING ONE TIME IS THE SAME AS THE ENTRY PRIZE: 5 000 DOLLARS!!  EACH WIN WILL INCREASE THE PRIZE BY 50 PERCENT!!  SO IF YOU WIN TWICE THE PRIZE IS 7 500 DOLLARS, THREE TIMES 11 250 etc...“

          WOOOOOW!! That’s some big stacks of cash! But... this is all suspicious... There must be a catch-

          „YOU CAN QUIT WHENEVER YOU WANT... HOWEVER THAT WILL COST YOU... THE FEE ALSO INCREASES THE LATER YOU DECIDE TO QUIT... SO THE FEE FOR QUITING THE FIRST GAME IS 10 000 DOLLARS... FOR THE SECOND IT’S 12 500... FOR THE THIRD IT’S 15 000, etc... HOWEVER IF YOU DECIDE TO STAY ALL EIGHT GAMES, YOU WILL NOT BE CHARGED ANY FEE...“

          I KNEW IT!! I CALLED IT!! So... the 5 grand was just a bait! The only way I can get out with a profit is to either stay the entire game or quit if I win 2-3 times in a row...

          So if we are split into 8 groups... does that mean there are 8 winners each game?? That... That’s actually way more then I expected! Surely this doesn’t also have a-

          „LAST, BUT NOT LEAST: IF... ACTUALLY WHEN THE NUMBER OF PLAYERS DECREASES, SO WILL THE NUMBER OF GROUPS, DEPENDING ON THE SITUATION...“

          -caaaaatch-of course there is...

          „AAAAAAAAALRIGHT, LADIES AND GENTLEMAN, WITHOUT ANY FURTHER DELAYS, MAY THE ELEMENT GAMES BEGIIIIIN!!!! “, said the voice. As soon as he finished the crowd started cheering and screaming. They were so hyped for this... this insane competition! They were all freaks... Monsters... I already know that many will either die or get terribly injured in these games, and yet all of these people are cheering like it’s the Olympic; not the Element Games... I took a closer look at the public. That’s when I saw...

          Saw them...

          Linda and, who I assume is, her father. The man behind all of this. Linda was smiling, but not cheering like others. She must be forced to be there, but acts like it’s fine because her father told her to do so...

          „Group 1, will you please follow me.“, said one of the men in black. The group followed the man and disappeared shortly after. Groups 2, 3 and 4 followed and it was time for my group to follow one of them.

          We did so, and in about two minutes we got to locked iron doors. „Room #5. It’s where you will be playing The Periodic Table of Doom...“, said the man in black as he smirked and unlocked the doors.

          We entered one by one aaaaannnnndd... we were met with a small room with one round table, 8 chairs (each marked with a number 1-8), 5 cameras (one in each corner and one above the table, pointing directly at the table) and a big monitor that showed the public zoomed in(it switched views every 30 seconds or so).

          The doors closed and we were each given a small piece of paper. We were told to look at it and sit at the chair marked with the same number as the one which was written on the paper. Mine was #4. Josh was #5, which was great because it meant he sat right next to me. Others were seated as following:

          As all of us sat down lights flashed and a voice, this one was different then the one from the previous room, spoke from the speakers: „Welcome everybody!! As you’re all aware by now, this is one of the rooms for the first game; THE PERIODIC TABLE OF DOOM!! I will now explain the rules of the game... On the table in front of you, you can see a periodic-table shaped candy bar. Now... if you can count, which I assume you can, you’re probably wondering: ’Why is there only 94 candies, if the bar is supposed to mimic the periodic table? Shouldn’t there be, like, 118?’; Well, you see, due to last 24 elements of the periodic table not existic naturally, we excluded them from this game... Now... Each candy has a small amount of the element it represents, for example candy number 63 has a little Europium, while candy number 17 has a little bit of Chlorine, etc... “

          I heard of Chlorine, but what the fuck was Europium?? Linda said to avoid anything above 56, so I will avoid Euro - whatever, just in case...

          The voice continued: „Okay, you got that? Good. ’Cause I won’t repeat myself. What makes this game dangerous is that, well, a lot of chemical elements are poisonous/radioactive or some other really bad shit for you. But, if you have some knowledge in chemistry, you should be able to win this one. OK!! Now... you will take turns, starting from seat #1, ending with #8; eating the candies, 1 by 1. The game will end after 8 rounds, and everyone who is still standing afterwards is declared a winner. Well, without any farther delays... BEGIN!! “

          Wha-There can be multiple winners in this game? And all you need to do is survive for 8 rounds? Ha! This is awesome, it will be easy then. Heck, even Josh and Axel may win, so we all go to the next game! I’m sure there will not be many games such as this one, where there’s a high chance that more then half people playing become winners, so we gotta take this chance!

          „Uh-oh, I’m going first, right?“, Janneth asked.

          „That is correct. If you hesitate for too long, you will be disqualified.“, said one of the men in black suits.

          „Got it, got it!“, she said as she reached for a candy. Candies were labeled by nothing except for a number, and they all looked the same. She took candy number 23. Janneth started sweating as she put the candy in her mouth. She started chewing it... and she swallowed the candy.

          ...

          We all sat there for a few minutes as she was the first one of us who ate one of those dangerous candies. Just as that buff baldie was about to take his candy something horrifying happened.

          „Ah-“, Janneth moaned. „A-Ah!“, she fell from her chair. We all looked in shock as she started screaming and grabbing her throat. She rolled on the ground and she started coughing rapidly.

          The scene was terrifying. „I HAVE TO GET IT OUT OF ME!!“, she yelled, as she put her fingers in her mouth to try to vomit.

          The girl who sat in the chair number 8 started crying. „I-I can’t do t-this! I can’t go through this!“

          Janneth vomited on the floor and she fell next to it. She stopped moving. We were all shivering in fear. Was this the fate of the losers? Is this all worth the risk?

          I’m sure all of us had the same thoughts at that moment. „Ah-Ah-I-N-Nooo-“, Josh said, trembling in horror. „C-Cal-“, I tried to say ’Calm down’, but the words wouldn’t come out.

          „NOOOOO, FUCK THESE GAMES, YOU’RE SICK!! YOU SICK BASTARDS!! I CAN’T DO THIS! I CAN’T RISK THIS MUCH! I DON’T WANT THAT  TO HAPPEN TO ME!! I’M OUT! I DON’T CARE THAT MY DEBT WILL NOW DOUBLE, I JUST WANT TO LIVE!! I DON’T CARE ANYMORE!!“, the blonde girl from seat #8 screamed and, afterwards, got up from her chair and ran outside of the room.

          Others just stayed in their seats, we couldn’t stop shivering. 1 candy; 2 players out of the ga-

          „Victoria Balsky left the room, therefor she is disqualified from the game. 7 players remain. “

          ...

          ...

          What?

          Did-

          Did he just say ’7 remain’ ?

          „ha..haha...“

          We heard a voice. We turned around and saw Janneth, smiling mischievously, like a child who just did something bad on purpose. “AHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!”, she burst out a lunatic laugh.

          “Number 23. Element called Vanadium.”, she said. “We can consume as much as 1.8 mg of it and nothing will happen to us… That is a very small amount, the candy has a lot more than that. But, you see…”, she laughed a bit more, as she sat back on her chair.

          “The lethal dose for Vanadium is 400-1000 milligrams, and I doubt there was that much inside the candy anyway. Even if there was, due to this metal not being very toxic, it would probably take half an hour for the symptoms to take place…”

          “S-So you faked the reaction?”, Axel asked in shock.

          “HAHAHAHA, OF COURSE I DID!! A little trick I learned from my last time here! The trick that goes: ‘Take an element most players are not familiar with and fake you got poisoned’, at least 1 or 2 players give up after seeing the terrifying scene. My plan worked out flawlessly!! HAHAHAHAHA!!”, she answered. Her eyes were glowing red. Her face was full of… of some twisted joy! She looked like a psychopath!!

          She-Janneth-this… This sick bitch was-

          She was dangerous.

          Not Axel. Not the Moustache-Man or that buff guy… She. She was my main opponent!

          The first turn was over.

          Just 7 more until round 1 is over…

          These candies are not so sweet, are they?