Grave to be Green

CW // violence

Green was once my favourite colour. It represented health, nature, tranquillity. It had decorated birthday parties and reminded me of Christmas. Green was a comfort on my darkest days.

Now it's the difference between life and death.

I don't know how long I've been here, or how I got here in the first place. I don't know if it's day or night. I don't know who the others are. All I do know is that when the light turns green, somebody dies. And we have no idea who will be next. There's no pattern, no order to it. Some have been here for days, like me. Others have been taken within hours of arriving. Waiting is part of the torture. I suppose our captor knows that.

The room is bare: windowless concrete walls, hard wooden floor, rickety steps leading up to a solid metal door. We must be in someone's basement. The stench of decay pervades the air, its source the bloodied corpse in the centre of the room. The young man the body belonged to was foolish, unafraid and overconfident, questioning how we knew the green light meant death. The cadaver was thrown down the stairs hours later.

A single red lightbulb swinging lazily from a thick wire illuminates the room. In any other situation, the crimson hues would frighten me. But red is safe. Red means nobody dies.

Yet.

Beside the red bulb hangs another, unlit and uninteresting. That is, until it's switched on. Then it becomes a beacon, not of hope, but of horror. The green light engulfs the room and enters our very souls. Tears fall and screams rip through the air. We are not humans anymore. Only shells of fear.

A whimper brings my focus back to the present and I glance at the boy in the corner, his arms wrapped around his legs, his shoulders shaking with sobs. He can't be any older than sixteen, and when he first arrived his girlfriend was with him. She was taken at the next green light.

The echo of a chain dragging across the floor fills the room as I crawl over to him. Six pairs of eyes snap to me, but nobody speaks. It's the first time any of us has moved under the red light.

"Hey," I whisper, "What's your name?"

Tear-filled brown eyes peek up at me, anguish and fear on every lash. "Cody. What's yours?"

"Avery."

I open my mouth to say more but can't. I can't tell him things will be okay. I can't tell him he'll survive. I can't tell him he'll see his mother's face again.

There's only one thing I can really say. "Do you want a hug?"

Cody's eyes widen and a shadow of a smile appears on his lips. I hold my arms open as he shuffles towards me and leans his head on my chest. He lets out the quietest sigh and I place my hand on his head, gently stroking his hair. It changes nothing. It fixes nothing. But in that moment, he is calm. And so am I.

After a while, I speak again. "Tell me about your family."

Cody's body stiffens. Nobody has asked questions or tried to get to know each other until this moment. And why would we? Anyone who wasn't alone when they arrived is alone now. Familiarity leads to attachment. Attachment leads to heartbreak.

After a few seconds, however, he speaks. Cody tells me about his parents, that he's the eldest of four siblings, that next week is his youngest sister's tenth birthday. She's having a dinosaur-themed party and he spent hours online searching for a blue stegosaurus because it's her favourite dinosaur and colour. As he talks, I listen, making the odd comment and occasionally asking a question. The others don't look at us, but their stillness tells me they're listening, and for a magical moment, everything feels normal.

Then the room goes green and the spell is broken.

Screams ring around the room and the elderly man by the stairs bursts into tears. I'm almost deafened by the cries, the desperate pleas to a deity that clearly isn't listening. Cody and I spring apart, shrinking back against the wall to make ourselves look as small as possible. Death may be coming, but hopefully it will pass us by.

The middle-aged woman with small round glasses shrieks as the door bursts open and a shadow appears. Silence falls as heavy footsteps thud down the stairs, but I can almost hear the whirring of everyone's thoughts, the same question bouncing around each of our heads: will I be next?

When the captor reaches the bottom step, he stops and slowly takes in the room. His presence is overwhelming; dressed all in black and wearing a black balaclava, he towers over us, at least six foot five yet stocky, muscular. The captor's gloved hand is clenched around a blood-spattered carving knife, and the familiar sound of jangling keys coming from his other hand fills me with dread.

We hold our breath as he moves further into the room, eyeing each of us in turn. I shake violently when he looks my way, but I will myself to keep it together. If it is my time, I won't let Cody see my fear; I want his memories of me filled with the comfort of the last fifteen minutes.

But I am not the next victim. The captor turns away from me, fixing his gaze on the corner of the room. I realise who he's chosen half a second before he moves.

The look of fear on Cody's face will haunt my dreams for the rest of my life. He hyperventilates, frozen to the spot as the captor uncuffs his ankles and yanks him to his feet. I want to scream and demand he take me instead, but last time someone did that, the captor slit her throat and took her husband anyway. I look around wildly, desperate for some kind of plan.

My eyes fall on the chains around my feet and a wild thought enters my mind. The captor is almost a foot taller than me, and twice as wide, but he is still only human. And humans have weaknesses.

There's no time to doubt it. Making as little sound as possible, I pick up the chain and grasp it with both hands. I get down on one knee, staying low so I don't arouse suspicion, and sniff loudly. The captor notices nothing, but Cody glances my way, distracted from his panic. Keeping my grip firm on the chain, I release my forefingers and point to the floor, dropping my head. Confusion followed by understanding flickers in Cody's eyes and without hesitating, he collapses.

The captor loses his balance momentarily from the sudden deadweight and bends forward, his back to me. Saying a silent prayer to the universe, I pounce. Jumping on the captor's back, I swing the chain over his head and round his neck, then pull with all the strength I can muster. The captor drops his knife and lets go of Cody, arms thrashing as he tries to reach round and grab me. The rust of the chains scrapes my palms, but I don't let go.

"RUN!" I yell to Cody, knowing any minute I will be overpowered.

Sure enough, the captor stomps back and slams me into the wall, my head bouncing off the concrete, the air forced from my lungs. Sliding to the floor, black spots invade my vision. The chain is ripped from my hands, making me gasp at the rough metal scratching against my fingers, and I know I am finally next.

Closing my eyes, I wait for the inevitable blow, hoping my efforts gave Cody a chance to escape. I hear a scraping as the captor picks up the knife. But the blow doesn't come. Instead, the sound of a blade piercing flesh greets my ears, followed by a low grunt and a loud, sickening thud.

I tentatively raise my hands to my torso, still not opening my eyes. I'm groggy from my collision with the wall and my hands are slick with blood from the chain, but I'm otherwise unharmed. Peering through my lashes, I yelp at the sight before me.

Cody crouches by the blonde pregnant woman, shakily unlocking her cuffs and whispering reassurance. The redheaded woman covered in tattoos who can't be older than twenty is guiding the elderly man through a deep breathing exercise. Two men, one in his twenties and one in his thirties, cry and laugh softly by the stairs. And the woman with the small round glasses stands in the centre of the room, gazing down at two corpses: the one belonging to the young man, and the one belonging to the captor.

The handle of the carving knife sticks out of his abdomen and his eyes are glassy. I get to my feet and, once my head stops spinning, cautiously edge towards the woman, not taking my eyes off the enormous body before me. The captor's chest doesn't move.

Before I can speak, Cody rushes across the room and throws his arms around me, sobbing and spluttering his thanks.

"You saved my life," he cries, burying his head in my shoulder. I squeeze him tight and laugh, not quite believing what has happened.

The bespectacled woman, who introduces herself as Claire, doesn't take her eyes off the captor's corpse as Cody releases me and finishes unlocking everyone's cuffs. We stand in a circle, the bodies in the middle, and fall silent, realisation setting in. We may not ever know why we were taken, or why so many of us had to die, but we are finally going to discover the identity of our captor.

As Shay, the tattooed redhead, runs up the stairs to search for a phone, Claire pulls the balaclava off the captor's head.

But before his face is revealed, the green light goes out and the basement door slams shut. Plunged into darkness, we hear a scream above us, and realise, far too late, that our captor was not working alone.