The White Games

26) Chapter Twenty-Six

#1 Clarice Barron – Day Seven - 2:55 PM

We exit the forest and find ourselves on the path that leads towards the lighthouse. I take point, stalking forward with my trident in one hand and stolen machete in the other. Too much time has passed. I should already be in the passageways. It shouldn't have taken me so long to find Alana.

I glance back at the sneaky girl. Her black hair is a disheveled mess, her face pallid and scratched from running through thickets, eyes perpetually cast downwards. She was difficult to find. Especially before I got the Challenger tracker granted from being ranked #1.

I try not to think of those early hours. Combing the woods for any sight of the girl, searching high and low to no avail. It was pretty sucky.

"H-how much further?" Alana surprises me by speaking. It's the first thing she's said since that mug incident. I don't know what to think of it. Originally I thought that she was telling the truth, but that wouldn't make any sense. It wouldn't be possible.

"Not much longer now," I glance upwards as the path beneath our feet begins to slope. A few more minutes and we'll be there. "The lighthouse will be in view once we pass that bend."

Alana falls silent. What to make of that mug? Was she lying about not having it? She must have been. It's the only thing that makes sense.

I don't think about how the chocolate was warm.

"Oh! I see it!" We take the bend and suddenly the lighthouse looms into view. Its tall orange and white striped figure points into the sky like a beacon. Though it's sunny out now, I think I still see the light on.

"Told you." The mug doesn't matter. Only Mr. White does. But...Alana's other revelation, the fact that only Mr. White is really watching us, it...discomforts me. I don't know why. It shouldn't. I shouldn't care. But I do. What else has that bastard been hiding? I'll kill him to find out.

Unless he's not even on the island.

That could be a problem. If he's not even here, how do any of us escape? We can only win his game and hope that he provides us with an exit. And knowing him, I fully expect that he'll just leave us stranded here.

"Clarice?" Alana has approached the lighthouse, passing me by in my thoughts. She stands by the open door, peering inside.

A thought strikes me. "Alana...you said there's no cameras, right?"

"Clarice, I really think that you should—"

"Answer the question!" Something is bugging me. Something else that doesn't make any sense. Why?

"I...fine." She drags her vision away from the room, turning to me with obvious reluctance. "What was your question?"

I repeat myself and she nods. "Yes. I mean, have you seen any? I sure haven't. He couldn't have hidden them all." Yes. Yes, that makes sense. But it doesn't mesh with something else I know.

"So how does he watch us? If there's no cameras?"

Silence.

"I..." Alana trails off, looking troubled. If there are no cameras, it should not be possible for Mr. White to see anything that we do. But he clearly does. Why? "I don't know, Clarice. But I know for a fact that I've never seen a camera on this island."

"And the replays," My mind is working too fast. I'm thinking about everything we've seen that contradicts itself. "He always shows us the deaths. How? If he has no cameras?"

Alana pauses, looking around at everything nearby. The lighthouse, the cliffs, the roaring ocean. Finally she shrugs. "I guess he does have cameras...My theory must have been wrong."