Day 1

He said someone would have to keep a record. He wants to be sure that the story of what happened won't die with us. He wants people to know what he's doing. Given the nature of "the game" I happily volunteered to take the role of narrator.

As such my first job will be to explain what happened.

You might stumble upon this not knowing anything about it and as much as I hate to bring you into this, if you are to read our story you should understand what's going on.

There are monsters. Quite a lot of them in fact. Seems like there's more popping up every few years. It's not actually surprising really. As fear spreads it's only natural that new things to be afraid of might be born in the climate of terror and of course as more sources of fear are born the larger number of fears causes the fear to spread further and faster and it becomes a self-perpetuating cycle that will probably not end until there's no one left to be afraid. Again it's not surprising. It's just horribly depressing and frightening.

Sorry, I went off on a bit of a tangent... I am still... somewhat adjusting to the current scenario which I will explain as soon as I get the rest of these explanations out.

So, yes there are monsters. They are collectively referred to as The Fears by most people who know of them and they represent or are the source of everything we fear. Some of them having existed since the first thinking creature stood alone in the dark and wondered if there was something standing beside him he couldn't see. At the moment at least in our story there are only two of any real importance. The creatures known as The Wooden Girl and The Dying Man. I... Can't say I'm superbly knowledgeable about these two. I know the first controls humans like puppets with, usually, invisible strings and the other is a body jumper who can transfer from body to body with a touch. Possessing people and using them to it's own ends before jumping again usually leaving them dead in the process.

I am what is called a Runner. Someone who garnered the attention of one of these creatures and decided, instead of fighting or giving in, to just run away and hope that it won't catch them. Being a runner is not fun. It's all the downsides of being homeless, with the added extra of having a supernatural hit put out on you.

As a result the standard runner is an isolationist. Distrustful and sometimes quick to violence. Many of them had families they either saw killed or who they had to leave behind in a hurry when they decided to run away.

Myself included. I had a mother, a father and a younger and older brother. The last I saw of them they were all still alive.

Sorry, went off topic a bit there again. What I meant to say is that is what The Standard Runner would be, except such a life is not feasible. A runner who stays alone and refuses help from others, doesn't last long. Most runners don't last long, but I mean even for a runner they don't. This is because there is a specific one of The Fears who preys exclusively on those who isolate themselves.

So, for a runner there's no way to know who you can trust, but eschewing all social interaction with others will get you killed. It's an endless game of paranoia and hopeless gambles.

Now then I can explain what's going on here. Sorry that took so long.

A bunch of other runners and I took a gamble and lost. There's a community among runners... At least in a sense. Runners will leave signs and messages for others who might follow in their footsteps and some are even fairly well known. One such well known and respected member of the community started spreading around a message.

"Survival through Unity" not a new idea, by any stretch of the imagination. It was the simple time tested idea that we are stronger together. Even with hundreds of us we couldn't fight off one of The Fears, but we could at least perhaps better watch each others backs. It had been done before to varying levels of success and so a few of us went for it. The man's name was Randall Kriegan. He wasn't a legendary figure among runners or anything. He wasn't Proxiehunter for instance, but in our sort of locale he was well enough known.

He gave us coded messages leading us to a meeting ground. It was in a cave. Now, you might be thinking, this already sounds like a bad idea, but honestly, not so much. I mean it wasn't a great idea, but assuming he could be trusted a cave was about as safe as anywhere else and was less likely to be found unintentionally by our enemies.

We arrived there was about 12 of us. He shook each of our hands and told us that this was a temporary base, but just in case things went wrong he had managed to gather supplies. A large amount of non-perishable food, Safe bottled water, back up weaponry (As a runner we pretty much all had our own weapons anyway. You never know when you might have to stab someone to stop them from stabbing you) and various flashlights, lanterns and candles to light the place in case we end up having to stay for a while.

He gave us some time to meet and greet and explore the place and then went and stood at the entrance to the cave to give his speech. The speech he gave, however, was nothing like we expected. I'll try my best to transcribe it from memory.

"Hello, all of you who know me know me as Randall Kriegan. However, that is not my name. It was once, but not anymore. Most of you will still know my new name. They call me The Dying Man." At this point he drew a gun and kept it pointed at us to make sure no one tried anything, "I have touched all of you and infected one of you. Alongside that, one of you is a servant in disguise, A puppet in fact, another of you is a murderer and lastly there is an undercover police officer who is currently getting much more than they bargained for when they decided to follow an anonymous tip about a strange gathering in a cave. I brought all of you here to play a game. It's a simple game, those familiar with it might already recognize the set-up. You will all be trapped down here for a month. There is food and water enough to survive for a month. To The puppet the nurderer and myself . Good luck killing everyone without being found. To everyone else good luck finding and killing them before they kill you. The murderer and cop are completely unaware of the fears so that should be fun. Lastly I'll need someone to record everything that happens. One of you will narrate these events. If they die someone else will take their place. Otherwise you will all die. Let the game begin," he said and then triggered a cave in that crushed him and sealed the entire cave. No way in and no way out. With three people who want to kill us and possibly a jumpy confused cop.

There are as I said 12 of us.

Here is the full list in alphabetical order.

Christopher Lance
Ellie Vasteren
Emily Senegal
Heather Korwin
Ian Cornwall
Isaac Duvall
Marian Hopper.
Martin Kilpatrick
Michael Corsack
Nathaniel Timbarris
Nina Douglas
Tanya Maple


One of these is a murderer, one of these is a puppet, one is the dying man and one is a cop who got themselves involved in an unfortunate situation.

After the announcement there was a small meeting. I will transcribe everything that was said and by who said it.

Emily: Alright, so this is a pretty bad situation we're in, but it's not hopeless. Well assuming The Dying Man wasn't lying anyway.

Martin: How is this not hopeless. There are three people here who want to kill us.

Ian: But they're not working together. We are. Everyone here either came with the intent of violence or was a runner that means we all have weapons on us. Most runners carry knives or small easily concealed weapons. A servant or murderer trying to stay hidden will probably have a concealed weapon as well.

Nina: The Police Officer might have a gun concealed. 

Ian: Yeah, the cop probably has a gun. So, we have three people working individually to try and kill 11 other people with weapons as well. One of whom has a gun. So, they're not likely to reveal themselves if they have a choice. They're going to try and be subtle about it. Kill us when they can without getting caught.

Michael: Perhaps we can try and figure this out. We know that most of us are runners. So if we each talk about what fear we were running from that might help?

Nathaniel: The Dying Man and Puppet will be able to lie, but we'd know who the cop and murderer are since they don't know anything about the Fears.

Nina: No. While it would let us know who the cop and murderer are it also let's the Puppet and Murderer know who the cop is. Which is a bad idea. They'll be guaranteed to try and kill the cop and if they do they'll get the cop's gun and then we're all in trouble. It's better that we try and find a way to out the killers without outing the cop unless it's absolutely necessary.

Marian: Who cares. The Dying Man undoubtedly already knows who everyone is.

Emily: Yeah, but he'll undoubtedly play by the rules he set. He wouldn't want to ruin the game.

Martin: Well whatsisname said we all have concealed weapons. Why don't we all show our weapons. That way we might learn something.

Nina: Yeah and expose the cop.

Marian: Yeah. What are you an idiot? We just talked about how we don't want to expose the cop.

Martin: Geez sorry I was just making a suggestion.

An announcement then arrived though none of us could locate any speakers...

"Hey guys it's Dying Man Randall. I'm still dead, but this is a prerecorded message. The end of the first day is coming. Now you may have noticed despite the cave being sealed you are all still able to breathe. That is because there is a very complex system that is pumping air through the cave. In the event that you break the rules I set. That system will be turned off and you will all die. So, I hope one of you agreed to be my little narrator," (I informed the others that I would do it) "Aside from that here's another rule. Curfew. At curfew you must all go to sleep. I showed you each your rooms when you first arrived. Go to your rooms. You don't have to actually go to sleep, but you must go to your room. Curfew starts now and will be announced on time each day from now on. There will also be an announcement when the curfew is over. Also, assuming there is a narrator you will find a laptop in the crate marked other necessary supplies. Now then off to your rooms. I look forward to seeing what tomorrow brings," the announcement ended and I grabbed the laptop and we all headed to our rooms.

We all had flashlights, but nevertheless the cave was very dark. It would not be difficult to sneak between rooms during the night. I'm writing this now facing the entrance to my room. I don't think I'll be able to sleep. The laptop has internet access... Might just watch funny videos all night and hope no one comes to kill me.

I think I'll be fine though. Taking the narrator position was a bit of a stroke of genius. I'm hoping they'll leave me alive cause no one else wants to potentially end up being the narrator and they know if I die and no one takes my place we all die.

Even if that's wrong I can at least assume The Dying Man won't kill me. Hopefully.

I... Pray I'll be able to talk to you all again tomorrow.