THIRD GRADE CLASSROOM ANNOUNCEMENT :

"Story 7"

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It’s Sunday. I'm locked up in a damned bathroom somewhere in this city. I am trapped. "How long have I been here?" All I can only remember that I was at my cousin's graduation party. What else? Ah! We went for a drink in a club, well, more than a club. He thought, attempting to a faint smile. "God! What a headache!". I am sure my friends must have driven me to the hotel. Yes, I remember my chamber and the toilet where I went straight to : I felt so sick after all I had drunk. Then: blank. "What time is it?" It is so dark here that I can't recognize anything around me. "I can hear a church clock strike one, two....", it must be three a.m. .....(Giorgio I.)
I can’t find my way around. I am groping my way in the darkness. I want to find the light switch. Here it is. "I am not in the bathroom of my hotel room, it must be another place". "How is that possible?"" The lights are on even in the bedroom", I had inadvertently turned them on. "Let's me see through the keyhole!" The room is all white: white walls with white tiles and a white floor. I can see a lot of pipes and a clock in the room. It seems quite a big chamber and ... right now I see a big stain right at the bottom of the white front door. The room doesn't seem so clean.(Alice M.)
I didn't understand anything. My head kept popping up. I started to look around until I turned my head towards the mirror. I looked at myself. I was naked and with wet hair like I had just come out of the shower. I took a towel from the clothes hanger and tied it to my waist. I ventured to open the door and as I had seen through the door lock, the bedroom was completely white. There was a stain though. A bloodstain on the bed. "What happened?" I kept asking myself. I looked for the front door of my room, but it wasn't there. How did I end up in that room? I went to the window that was on the right of the bed. I opened the window and I found myself standing on a small balcony. There was something strange, but I did not understand what.. then I looked down and I realized what it was. The balcony was made of glass and right under me there were at least 10 other floors. There was one person almost in each balcony. They were frightened, alone, wet and had a towel around their waistes, like me . Where the hell was I? (Giorgia C.)
It was very cold. I looked up and all outside was white. I could see nothing apart from the room behind me. It was so strange. I looked again down to see better the people under me. They were motionless.

I decided to return into the room to search a way to escape. I closed the window and I turned my gaze to the bed. I noticed something that I hadn’t seen before: there was a small hole on the wall behind the bed. I climbed cautiously over the bed to avoid getting dirty with blood, to see through the hole: black, all black. I could see nothing. So, I came down the bed to search the entrance door. It was near the bathroom and totally white apart the door handle. It was dark red like the blood. I put my ear on the door to hear if someone was out: silence.

I caught the handle, pulled it down and opened the door. There was a long and narrow corridor but I couldn’t see the end. The walls and the ceiling were white and there were no furnishings in it.

So, I decided to walk down the corridor but I could not see the end anyway. After some steps, I decided to return into the room. I turned back: the room was gone.

It was all white around me and I started having a headache. It was not like a common headache: the sight darkened more and more and fell on the ground…(Francesco S)
When I woke up I was in that room again.
Maybe they wanted to control my mind with some strange optical game, maybe they had drugged me, the fact is that I still had a big headache.
One day had passed and no one made himself heard, except for the two people with covered faces, who had brought us food.
I wanted to run away, I thought about going down the balcony, but I realized that in the opposite building there were two armed people with rifles.
I was trapped. (Edoardo Pin.)
When I woke up, I found a dark grey suit, a bright white shirt and a pair of shoes, elegant shoes. I put them on because I was still wearing just a towel. In the inside pocket of the jacket I found a cellphone. I unlocked it and there was a message from an unknown number. The text said:“You finally found me, dear competitor. You and ten other people worldwide have been chosen to play my game for three main reasons: the good looks, the distinct intelligence, and another unique skill different from those of the other players. You cannot refuse to play. After all, when the game gets tough, the tough gets going, right? Good luck, dear competitor.”
After reading the text I found myself completely freaked out. What did that mean? Which skill, were they talking about? (Susanna M.)
I don’t know… I started thinking about what to do: “I have a phone!”. So, I unlocked the phone again and I opened the browser: “Error 404. Page not found”. It was very strange: I was connected to wi-fi but there wasn’t any internet connection… I checked the address page: “www.the-game.com”. Since there was no internet connection, I tried to enter into the router, I texted: 192.168.1.1 on google search and tapped enter. I was inside. I learnt that about one year ago, because I had taken a computer science course. I started to surf into the page. I could see all the devices connected to that router: they were 10. Each one was named by a different name: “player-1; player-2…”. I sent a message to all the devices: “Hello everyone, we’re in a game. If you read this message, come out on the balcony and look up.” A notification popped up on the phone: “messages sent: 1/10”. I didn’t know why, but I came out on the balcony: “maybe that man has come out”. I opened the window and I looked down: there wasn’t anyone. While I returned back inside, I looked on the right: there was a man who looked at me. I said something but he didn’t reply. So, I ran inside, jumped on the bed, opened the camera on the phone, turned on the flash and took a picture. I couldn't believe my eyes… (Francesco S.)


FRANCESCO S.