All For A Few Cards ➺ Alice in Borderland

episode 2 || dead ends are inescapable

One month later

I opened the back doors and exited the football stadium. The rest followed me, a few others stayed behind to sob onto their friends dead bodies.

We came to a small table that held the playing card we had won. Four of Spades. Most people ignored it and walked around the table. A girl with short black hair stood in front of the table.

She impressed me in the game. She could fight, unlike a lot of the other people in the game, most of which died. She could climb up the goalposts with ease. It surprised me a bit.

She picked the card up and stared at it before turning around and walking up to me. My face stayed blank. "I think you should have it. You're the one who cleared the game, anyways." She smiled a bit.

I took the card from her hands and stared at it. "Thanks," I said. "No problem. You're really good, by the way. At fighting and stuff." She complimented. "You're shockingly good too. I don't come across many good people. But today, I guess I did." I said.

"Thank you." She smirked. I nodded in reply. "I'm Usagi, by the way." She introduced herself. I hesitated. Could this be another stupid trick?

"Aria." I told her. "Nice to meet you. I hope to see you in another game soon." She said. "Me too. I always like a good competition." I smirked a bit. She smiled. "See you around," she nodded and walked away.

I looked back down at the card. This was a new one. It wasn't worth much, but it was something. I put it in my pocket. Some of my other cards were laid there. I took them out. My good cards? No fucking way I forgot to hide them.

I counted them like I do after every game. There were five, like always. I glanced at my new card on my other hand. It'll have to go with the other bad cards—five or under. Six and up I would consider good cards.

But before I could hide my good playing cards, I heard the exit door open behind me. I quickly shoved the cards in my pocket and began to walk away.

"Hey," a lady called. I turned around. It was the late twenties (early thirties) lady with sunglasses and hair up to her neck. "I'm not selling the card for anything." I immediately told her. She smirked. "Sweetie, I don't want your card." She told me.

"Great. I'll be leaving then." I said and turned around to continue walking. "Hold on. I'd like to talk with you." The lady said. "I'm not interested." I responded and continued to walk. "Interested or not, you'll be coming with me anyways, so I suggest listening to me now and cooperating."

I stopped walking and scoffed. "I won't be going anywhere." My voice was sharp. "We don't want to be your enemies, and you don't want to be ours. So just hear me out, and everything will go smoothly." She told me, sounding brutally honeyed.

"What do you mean, ours?" I fully turned around to face her now. She was roughly nine feet away from me. Her hands were intertwined together pressed against her chest. A slick smile was on her face. "There are more of you?" I asked.

"Oh, yes. Many more of us. Some are just on a higher level then others. And if you'd care to join us, I'd assume Hatter would place you with the executives, considering your impressive skills." She implied. I crooked my head a bit. She went on, slowly walking up to me as she talked.

"We're called the Beach. A man named Hatter formed a community at a hotel, to collect every playing card there is," she told me. I stood still, watching her warily. "We mean no harm to anyone. Only to those who betray us, of course." She smiled.

"So you lied?" I asked her, backing away a bit as she got closer. She stopped walking a few feet from me and frowned. "I don't recall." She said gently. "You told me you didn't want my cards. But you do, don't you?" I asked her.

"Oh, no, darling. You must have misunderstood. Like I said before, I don't want your cards. Hatter does. But of course, for a good cause!" She remarked. "Yeah, no thanks." I scoffed and turned around. "But, sweetie. I'm afraid you don't have a choice."

Just then, three black cars jerked into the driveway, blocking my escape. My hands dropped to my side. Men began to come out from the cars. They had guns. I turned around to run the other way as the men started to come.

The lady stood there, walking over to me too. "Please, don't make a scene. We don't want to hurt you. Just follow us into a car and we'll leave with peace." She told me, taking her sunglasses off.

I searched my surroundings. Six men on one side, one lady on the other. I turned around and ran towards the men. The lady was going to be a dead end. They put their arms out to prevent me from going above and under them. I jumped on one of the black cars and jumped down on the other side. I ran.

"Get her." I could hear the lady say calmly. Bullets started to get shot. Car engines began to start. Curses were shouted.

I know many things. I know how to calculate a person's height by just looking at them. I can make antidotes to sicknesses that haven't been cured yet.

I know how to beat a ten of diamonds game. I can figure out how to cheat a hearts game. And right now, I know I'm fucked and I can't do anything but run.

So I did and I ran as fast as I could. I was on division one track and field. I was the top runner of my school. I'm fast. But not fast enough to outrun a car, unfortunately. I got away from the stadium and turned as many corners as I could to slow them down.

I looked for any alleyways that didn't have an end. I searched for any possible opportunity to get away. But before I could come up with something, two more black cars came from my other side. I quickly backed away. But I couldn't. The three other cars were behind me. I couldn't go left or right. There were buildings there. Could I go inside the building?

No. It'd be a dead end. Fuck, what else could I do? The men began to exit the car and started inching closer to me. Okay. Ten men and only one of me. I'm really fucked.

"Come on, princess. We don't wanna hurt ya," a big buff man told me. "But we will if we have to." Another man behind me smirked. I had to stay calm. I had to think. Running wasn't an option anymore.

A man grabbed my wrist. I kicked his shin. He shouted and let me go. I punched his nose, causing him to back away with a groan and blood dripping from his nose. "You little motherf-"

A man reached to yank me away. I shrieked at the top of my lungs. They all flinched at the loudness. Hanako taught me that distraction from past experiences. The man loosened his grip on me slightly. I twisted his hand upside down and kicked his chest. He fell backwards.

A lot of the men were now attacking me. One came from behind and covered my mouth with his hand. I bit down on his palm as hard as I could. The metal taste of blood tainted my lips. The man screamed and cried. Another man threw me to the floor. I fell on my stomach with a grunt.

The man was about to get on top of me to hold me down, but I dragged my legs across the floor and to his feet, getting him to lose balance and stumble. I took the chance to jump up. A fifth man pulled out his gun and began to shoot. I ducked his first shot and kicked the gun out of his hands. The gun dropped to the floor. I kicked it away.

I was about to attack the man, but someone grabbed me from behind and put a bag over my head. Everything went dark. They shoved me inside their car as I struggled and yelled. Fifteen years of Material Arts for nothing.

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❝ [ɴᴇxᴛ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ] ❞

"𝘐 𝘴𝘦𝘦. 𝘚𝘰 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘸𝘢𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘥 𝘮𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘦 𝘢 𝘱𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘤𝘭𝘪𝘲𝘶𝘦 𝘣𝘦𝘤𝘢𝘶𝘴𝘦 𝘐'𝘮 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘣𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘺𝘦𝘳 𝘺𝘰𝘶'𝘷𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦𝘯?" 𝘐 𝘢𝘴𝘬𝘦𝘥. "𝘗𝘶𝘵 𝘪𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘸𝘢𝘺 𝘪𝘧 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘭𝘪𝘬𝘦. 𝘚𝘶𝘳𝘦." 𝘏𝘦 𝘯𝘰𝘥𝘥𝘦𝘥 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘢 𝘴𝘮𝘪𝘭𝘦. "𝘖𝘬𝘢𝘺. 𝘈𝘯𝘥 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵'𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘪𝘵 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘮𝘦?"

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