Chapter Seven – Settings

“Psst.. Jess.” Mae whispered to Jess who was sleeping in the sleeping bag she brought to sleep in at the haunted house. Mae poked her until she let out a silent moan and opened her eyes. They were at the ground floor living room of the house, everyone was asleep. Well, everyone except Mae and Jess now.

“What?” Jess whispered back. She looked at Mae, her voice was tired.

Mae looked around the living room. Everything in it was covered with dust and spiderwebs. Tanner was sleeping on the couch as Ella forgot her sleeping bag and he gave her his. Ella was next to him by the couch. Mae and Jess were at the far corner. The big grandfather clock by the fireplace stopped working a long time ago. It showed '03:21'. According to the legend, that is when the girl visits.

Mae checked her phones clock. '02:56, not much left...' she thought.

“It's almost time.” Mae continued to whisper. She could hardly keep her eyes open as she couldn't sleep with all the dust. It made her throat dry.

“Oh, okay.” Jess sat up “So what's the plan?”

Mae shrugged, and told Jess the plan she had, meanwhile Jess' smile got wider and wider.

Jessica looked around at her new house, it was just like the one in her dreams. She loved it. Smiling wide, she started to like 'The Game'.

Open Settings. she thought as a huge set of details appeared in front of her eyes, she just wanted to check the game time.

11: 23 am it showed. It's been almost 24 hours since she logged in. How long was she supposed to test? The guy greeted her said he would inform her when to log out.

Buying the house was easy. Apparently the machine they were in read brain waves or whatever and creates the house you design. It also adds all the stuff you want.. But of course gives each of them a price. But that didn't apply for the testers as, everything was free to them.

The house was like a palace. It had three floors, each had five bathrooms, two living rooms, a kitchen, two bedrooms.

There was also a basement floor which had a movie room, designed like a theater, a bowling alley too.

First floor had the biggest kitchen and it had one of those elevators that help move the food up and down and an indoor pool.

Second floor, had a huge room just to store drinks.

Third floor had a balcony that had a wonderful view of the city and the huge botanic garden back of the house, a telescope, a really good one, to gaze the stars at night.

The garden also had a pool at the size of a tennis court, but shaped more like a bean, a hot tub right next to it and a tennis court.

The house looked very modern from the outside and the inside with the wide and long windows and the furnishing. The wooden frames around the windows looked great with the beige walls.

Jessica wondered how much all of this would cost when you pay for it. How much do you start with? What are the jobs? Why do you need jobs? Of course the guy who came to greet her, she forgot his name, told her all of it but still. She found working needless.

Close settings. The settings disappeared, and she was back at her living room.

“Good afternoon ma’am, what would you like for lunch?” a sweet female voice came from behind her, Jessica turned around and looked at her. Her eyes opened in shock and fear as she saw a young girl, maybe fifteen, in a maids uniform.

She looked a lot like “Ella?” Jessica gasped, watching her. She even had the same teal eyes.

“Sorry?” asked the girl, giving her a confused look “I'm Madeline. I'm sorry I was late.. I had problems with my family. It'll pass.” she smiled.

Jessica was still shocked “So... You are... My maid?” she asked and the girl nodded 'I have a maid and she looks a lot like Ella Irvine... Great.' she thought to herself.

Somewhere else, in 'The Game' Jane and Lee were walking in the city, that reminded New York a lot. But, it wasn't New York. Lee grew up there, he told Jane. The city had canals at some part. They called it 'Little Venice'. There were other places named with country names after the 'Little' part, and some cities, like 'Little New York'. That's where Jane and Lee were. It was crowded, all NPC's. No one looked the same though, and oddly: They all acted like people. They had their own life, their own story.

Jane and Lee asked around, met NPC's, even made some friends. They knew they were NPC's but they were fine with it. They were happy.

Jane wondered where Derek was. Lee's guess was he was doing what they were doing, exploring. Jane agreed to that looking around.

“So when do we log out?” Lee asked to his NPC, Nancy. She looked like a normal girl, nothing special about her. Brown wavy hair, small nose, slightly tanned skin and brown eyes.

“Whenever you want. But we suggest two days of game time.” Nancy answered smiling.

“How long will it be outside the game?” Lee looked at Jane if she would respond.

“Two hours?” Nancy shrugged, smiling.

“...And how do we log out?” Jane jumped in.

“Just like opening the settings... I think. We can't log out you know.” Nancy kept smiling.

Log out. Jane thought, and a small blue text appeared at the corner.

'Logging out in 10 minutes. To cancel think 'Cancel''

“It's been an hour... I wonder how it's going there..” Nate sighed, nervously tapping his desk, looking at Claire who was standing in front of his desk.

“I'm sure everything is fine.” she said calmly and Nate's phone rang.

“Hello?” he answered the phone.

“Hello, Nate.” a female voice came from the phone, it was clear she was grinning by her voice.

“Who is this?”

He heard a chuckle “It's me... Rose, the girl who beat you and dad. I just called to see how you were holding up after you defeat... Oh, and let you know that I know what you are after.”

“What am I after?” Nate asked, looking at Claire, who now leaned closer to his desk to hear the phone.

“Your employees, I know they are in 'The Game'.” she answered.

“I don't know what you are talking about.” Nate lied.

“Oh? So, you don't know...” she paused “Derek Reynolds, Lee Kita, Jane Brooke and... I see, Mae's friend Miss Jessica Hawk is there too?” her voice raised in curiosity.

“Jessica? Huh. Small world.” Nate tried to change the subject.

“So, you don't know them?” Rose asked.

“Nope.” Nate lied yet again.

“Okay, so it's fine if I trap them in the game and not let them log out?”

“What? No! It's not fine! You can't do that to anyone!” Nate raised his voice.

“Fine.” she sighed “Only one...” she hung up before Nate could speak.

Nate slammed the phone furiously, there was silence in the room. Nate felt dizzy and fell on his chair as his legs suddenly started tingling.

He tried to move them but they suddenly stopped working.

Was he dreaming again? He hoped this was a nightmare.

“Nate? Are you okay?” he heard Claire, he was started to panic.

He tried to speak out but he sounded funny. Instead of talking normally he sounded like a baby. He was talking like one, before he fell from his chair.

Unconscious...

“Keep that boy, Derek, inside.” Rose told her employees. “He seems to enjoy it.”

From the monitors she could observe every part of 'The Game' and currently she was focused on the one that showed Derek.

“Log out everyone else. It's been two days, for them.” Rose continued, smiling she looked at her employees “Congratulations all, 'The Game' has begun!”

Everyone started to clap cheerfully and Rose joined them.

“Hello gentleman, how can I help you?” Rose greeted the two men that walked in to her office. They were twins.

“Hello Mrs. Greeb.” one of them said. “I am Martin and this is my brother Marvin.” he nodded his twin, smiling.

“We are here to deliver you something your father wanted you to have.” Marvin said.

“Yeah, right...” she said sarcastically.

Martin grinned “Well, we knew you would say that. He knew you would say that. But this has nothing to do about family. You are the smartest person he knew. So he believed only you could do this.” he said as he took out a black file that said 'The Game' on it.

“There is also a hard-drive, but he told us to give it to your brother...” Marvin told her. “He told us that you two should work together.”

Rose looked at the file, then up at the twins “Thank you.”

The twins nodded “Well, we will talk soon, Mrs. Greeb.”

“Please, it's Rose.”

“Very well.. Rose.. We have other people to see.” Martin smiled and gave a bow with his head, and the twins left the room.

AN:

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OH, and before I forget! This chapter was specially dedicated to someone out of wattpad! But she is one of the few people who followed my story and talked about it and all, so she deserves a dedication. Don't you think?