“Sorry. Go, Foster, go! Shoot that spike right out of her side! Go, go, go!”

Foster fired. The spike sailed through her throat and slammed into the wall in front of Daniel.

“Foster, you jackass!” he shouted.

Susan clutched at her throat with both hands. By now her entire body was covered with blood. She dropped to the ground and lay still.

“I told you, the aim is off!”

Josie stepped away from her cannon. “Nice going, jackass.”

“It’s the aim! Come over here and check it out!”

“Your cannon’s fine, jackass,” said Mortimer.

Foster made like he was going to walk over and hit him, but then grinned. “But that was a pretty good throat hit, huh? I’d like to see you try that.”

“No way, it’s seven to one, we still need more points to make up for Stan’s dumb move,” said Mortimer, putting another spike in his cannon.

Trevor had been staring at Susan in horror, and suddenly realized that he needed to continue gathering the flags. Mortimer’s shot missed him completely.

I blinked and felt a tear trickle down my cheek. I hurriedly wiped it off on my sleeve before anyone saw.

Another shot by Mortimer lodged in Trevor’s stomach. I had to put the poor guy out of his misery. I fired, missing his head yet again and instead striking his shoulder blade.

“Ooooh, vicious hit by Andrew!” Daniel declared. “That boy is dangerous behind the cannon!”

Mortimer fired. Trevor dropped to the floor, a spike jutting from his forehead. “Ooops.”

“Smooth move, jackass,” said Foster.

Mortimer shrugged. “We still would’ve won if it weren’t for Stan. But that’s okay. Daniel, Foster, Josie, I salute you. Very nice shooting Andrew, especially for a first-timer.”

“Absolutely,” said Daniel. “You did great. Should’ve put you on my team instead of the jackass.”

The others applauded. I stood there, doing everything I could to hide how miserable and sick I felt. I looked away from the bloody corpses and stared at the spike in my hand.

I couldn’t pocket it, not with everyone walking toward me.

I could certainly lunge at Daniel.

But no. I’d earned some respect. Maybe not a lot, but it might be enough. I had to play it smart. Now I’d just find a way to get Daniel alone. Then I’d break his neck, get his gun, and finish off the rest of them.

I tossed the spike back into the box.

“Mind if I pump a few more into ‘em?” asked Stan. “For practice?”

Daniel shrugged. “Be my guest, you sick bastard.”

“I’m up for a rematch,” said Mortimer, coming around to our side of the cube. “How about you snag a couple more prisoners?”

“No, no, no,” said Daniel. “It’s time for the really gruesome, hands-on, one-on-one stuff. And we’ve got lots of new props this year.”

Snap! Stan fired a shot, and then loaded another spike.

“Great! Who gets to go first?”

“It’s Foster’s turn this year.”

Mortimer looked over at Foster. “I hope you’re not going to take three and a half hours again. You know, there’s a point where you just have to kill them and move on.”

Snap!

“Then maybe I’ll do four hours,” Foster told him. “Maybe four and a half. Maybe, and this is only an unverified rumor, so don’t say anything, but maybe I’ll do five.”

“Jackass.”

“The jackass joke is long gone. Why don’t you go with it?”

Mortimer started to say something, but apparently decided that his comment lacked the wit of the current conversation thread and decided against it.

Snap!

“However,” Foster began, “I think Andrew should go first.”

“Oh, no,” I said. “I’d rather see how it’s done. Whatever it is.”

“It’s nothing you haven’t done before. This’ll be your chance to prove you can do it well. What do you think, Daniel?”

“If you want to trade him spots, that’s fine with me.”

“Good. Yes, I’d like Andrew to go first. It should be interesting.”

Snap!

“Don’t I get any choice in this matter?” I asked.

“Nope,” said Daniel. “New Initiates have no rights. C’mon, let’s go make a mess!”

THINGS AREN’T going well.

I’ve been trying to conserve tape space, so I haven’t been talking much, but things are getting really bad. A couple hours ago, the bald guy, Foster, came in here and took away Susan Piccinini and Trevor Wenford.

Ten minutes ago, he brought them back on a big cart. I couldn’t even tell how many stab wounds they had, not with all the blood, and they had a bunch of metal things, about the size of pencils, sticking out of them.

Foster pushed the cart really slowly. And he was whistling.

He took them through the other door. I don’t know what they’re planning to do with the bodies. He was only gone for about half a minute, so I guess they’re just storing them for now.

Then he took Charlotte Burgin.

That was five minutes ago.

I want to go home.

Chapter 15

THOUGH nothing had been explained to me yet, I had a feeling that this next event was going to be far worse than the game of darts.

I was in a small room with a white tile floor. An operating room, to be specific. The kind with the glass-enclosed spectator gallery above, which is where everyone but Foster was seated.

The walls were lined with eight different carts. One of them did indeed contain surgical tools. The others were filled with more different types of weapons and tools than I can even begin to list completely. There were the standards: hammer, screwdriver, nails, and wire cutters. Then hedge trimmers, a chainsaw, and a weed whacker. Knives of all shapes and sizes. Clubs. A blowtorch. A bottle labeled “hydrochloric acid.” Lots of frightening instruments that I’d never seen before or even imagined existed.

And (I swear this is true) there was a lawnmower in the corner.

Foster wheeled in a gurney, upon which lay a woman I recognized well from pictures Craig Burgin had shown me. It was Charlotte, his wife. Physically, she was quite the opposite of her husband, tall and slender instead of short and chubby. She looked about ten years older than her photos, but I was pretty sure that wasn’t because they were old pictures. Nevertheless, there was a definite sense of dignity about her, even now, that she’d somehow managed to retain for all these months.

I’d completely forgotten that the original purpose of my involvement was to aid in her rescue. I wondered what Craig was doing right now. Hopefully he wasn’t being a slacker about keeping the real Headhunter medicated.

She was on her back, her wrists and ankles tightly bound to the corners of the gurney with leather straps. Her face was tearstained but I could tell she wouldn’t be begging for mercy. Foster saluted, and then left the room, shutting and locking the door behind him.

“All right, Andrew,” said Daniel, speaking into a microphone. His voice, blasting through speakers, echoed throughout the operating room. “This is your big moment. The fulfillment of a life-long fantasy. You have every kind of weapon you could possibly want. You have a helpless victim. You have a captive audience. Do your worst. Entertain us.”

I was so appalled that I stood there staring at him for nearly ten seconds before I caught myself. “Sorry. What exactly am I supposed to be doing?”

Daniel rolled his eyes. “Use your imagination. Let it all out. Ruin her.”

There wasn’t truly every kind of weapon I could possibly want. What I really wanted was a trusty submachine gun, to take them all out. Or any kind of gun. But there wasn’t one, and somehow I didn’t think hurling a hammer through the glass was going to solve my problem.

“Okay,” I said, wiping my perspiration-soaked hands on my pants. There had to be a way out of this. There had to be. If I could stall long enough, I’d find it.