Chapter Text
Matsushita had already been surprised when the lights flickered off for a minute, the power here didn't go out often. He was even more surprised when the door to his room slowly started to open. He walked out into the hallway with the lights still off seeing no one. The lack of nurses and therapists surprised him even more, it was only 6pm and not a lot of the other patients or staff members should be sleeping right now. As he walked down the asylum halls he made his way to the lobby, still no one in sight. Matsushita felt a sense of comfort having no nurses around to bother him. He walked to the front door and opened it.
He was out of the asylum now but who knows what time the nurses would come out from their hiding spots and send someone to find him. He thought about this for a bit until he stopped walking. He had now made it to Shibuya crossing, looking around he saw no one. It was strange, there were usually hundreds of people here. He was confused about where everyone went but also delighted. No one was here to try and control him anymore but there was also no one for him to control.
Ever since being sent to the asylum Matsushita had missed the delicious feeling of being in control of another human. The rush of excitement that he got when people just couldn't say no to him made him want it more.
Matsushita had first heard of hypnotherapy when he was 9. He saw something about it online and thought it was interesting. The concept of being able to control people and have them do anything you want was exciting. As he read into it more he realized that if he wanted to learn more about this he would have to keep it hidden. His parents already thought he was strange because of his tendency to lean closer to the screen when a character died a brutal death in a movie. They even thought he was strange just because he liked gore-filled movies at his age. But he didn't see anything wrong with it, it was exciting to see someone scream as they got stabbed over and over again, was it not?
When he turned 12, Matsushita decided he was done with just studying hypnotherapy and needed a test subject. How would he ever know if it actually worked if he never tried it himself? He could only get his classmate to go as far as writing a curse word on the whiteboard. He was happy that they did what he wanted but also upset he couldn’t get the classmate to do something far worse. Matsushita decided he would just have to keep studying, then occasionally use his classmates as his test subjects.
Before he turned 15 the farthest he had gotten was convincing a classmate to stab themself in the leg with a sharp pencil. After turning 15, Matsushita decided that he wanted to try and push one of his classmates farther than he had ever tried. He started by finding a shy, introverted kid in his grade and started the process of wearing the kid down. Over the course of 5 weeks he slowly convinced his classmate that stabbing other people was acceptable and even enjoyable. Finally he brought a pair of sharp scissors he had bought at a convenience store to school and handed them to the classmate. He told the classmate to stab one of the kids who had ratted out Matsushita for cheating on a really hard test. It had finally worked, the thrill of watching someone get stabbed in real time felt amazing.
Matsushita continued watching as the teachers ran over to the brutal scene, pulling the kids apart and calling emergency services. The teachers tried their best to keep the injured classmate breathing until the ambulance and police got to the school. The ambulance took the injured student away, while the police took the perpetrator. Unfortunately the student survived.
Matsushita had expected the police to come knocking on his door any day now. He expected the classmate he manipulated to tell the police about Matsushita and how he had manipulated the classmate into the stabbing. But no one ever showed up, he guessed the kid had been too scared to rat Matusuhita out, or maybe there was a different reason. He wanted to know badly but was still scared of seeing the kid he manipulated.
A year had passed since the stabbing, Matsushita was now almost 17 and he was hungry to watch another person get close to death or maybe go as far as to even die. He tried to fulfill his hunger by watching some of his favorite movies, but none of them seemed to work. He thought about that rush he got while watching his classmate get stabbed and decided he wanted to watch it again. He needed to watch it again.
He hadn't been as careful as he was in the past. He just wanted to see someone get hurt as soon as possible. He had been careless. He didn't try to be secretive about talking to his new victim, he didn't try hard enough to make the victim believe killing was acceptable. Matsushita just ended up scaring the kid into doing it. On the bright side the kid his victim stabbed was dead but since he had been so thoughtless with his work the victim ended up telling the police all about the manipulation that Matsushita has ultimately failed at.
The police talked with Matsushita for a while. He denied everything but the evidence was all there, from the conversations the police had with the victim to the surveillance footage proving everything he said. And even the footage of Matsushita screaming at the kid in the hallway minutes before the incident. But instead of sending him to jail the officers decided on sending him to an insane asylum. They thought he was a danger to society or something like that. He could see where they got that idea.
On his 17th birthday he was whisked away to the asylum. His parents didn't even look upset when he was taken away, honestly they looked relieved. He didn't blame them though. Matsushita would feel the same if he was his child.
It was getting dark now, he realized he must have walked for a while to get all the way to Shibuya crossing. Matsushita decided to investigate, he continued walking past the crossing and made it a little ways away. He continued walking for around 10 minutes until he came across a gym. The lights were on contrasting all the other buildings he had seen before with the lights off. Matsushita was intrigued and decided to go inside.
As he walked in he saw around 30 people standing in the lobby. Some were chatting with each other, some were standing by themselves. He saw one blue phone left on a white table by the entrance with a sign that said “Take 1 please.” He took it because he was curious, then decided to go up to one of the people and ask about this whole situation. There was a woman who looked around thirty with long black hair and a flowy dress that went down to a little below her knees. She looked approachable and easy to manipulate if needed. As he started to walk up to her he saw the phone in his hand light up with a list of something then he heard an animatronic voice say:
Player limit reached
Game: Jail Ball
Difficulty: 6 of Clubs
Amount of players: 30
Instructions:
Players will be split into 2 teams. Each team will be assigned one side of the basketball court. There will be dodgeballs lined up on the black line in the middle of the court. When the voice calls “GO” the game has officially started. If you are hit by a ball or a player on the opposing team catches a ball you threw, then you will be sent to jail. There will be 2 big cages in the back corners of the court that will serve as jails. If you are sent to jail then you should make your way across the court, preferably on the sidelines to the jail on the opposing team's side of the court. You will stay in jail until a person from your team gets the person who put you in jail out. When you are sent to jail your phone will light up red, when you are let out your phone will light up green.
Rules:
Do not leave the jail if you have not been officially let out. If you are not sent to jail then you should not cross the line onto the opposing team’s side. If you are sent to jail you should get into the cage within 1 minute of being sent to jail. No violence other than throwing the dodgeballs and headshots do count. Do not enter the jail on your side of the court. If you do any of these actions then it is game over for you.
Time limit: 2 hours
Clear condition:
Send all players on the opposing team to jail. If the time is up and there are still players out of jail on both teams then it will be game over for everyone.
It continued, "Everyone make their way to the court. Blue phones on the right side and yellow phones on the left side. The game will commence in 5 minutes."
Matsushita was now standing right behind the woman while staring down at his phone. She turned around to face him confused on why he was just standing there.
“Are you new here?” The woman asked.
“Yes,” Matsushita responded. Before he could even stop himself all the questions he had about this place spilled out. He was confused about where everyone was, what were these games, what happened if you got game over and so much more. To himself it was kinda scary how much he just said. He had never been much of a talkative person especially with strangers.
“Calm down, I'll tell you after the game. Just try not to get game over.” She started to giggle as she walked away, before stopping herself and turning back around to ask, “What color is your phone?”
“Blue” He responded.
“Ooo fun, we're on the same team.” Then she walked into the room where the game was being held.
Matsushita contemplated leaving but decided he was curious about the games and where everyone went. And the easiest way to get that information was to stay for the game and find out from the mysterious woman afterwards. He followed her into the room seeing many dodgeballs all lined up in the middle of the room. He looked to the far back left corner of the room and saw a big cage, diagonally across from that was another big cage, he realized those were the jails. Matsushita thought about the rules of the game and decided that it didn’t seem too hard. He had never been a big fan of gym class but he could throw a rock pretty far if he wanted to.
Matsushita stood next to the woman for a couple seconds in an awkward silence before asking a question. “What's your name?”
“Kano Mira, what's yours?”
“Enji Matsushita” They stood around in an awkward silence for a minute. Matsushita was about to try and make conversation before a voice cut him off.
“Now that everyone has made their way to their respective sides of the court the game will commence. GO.”
Before Matsushita had any time to think people on both teams had run to the middle of the room and started grabbing multiple balls. He thought it was a little unfair that people could grab more than 1 ball at a time but it wasn't against the rules. He also didn’t want to interfere in fear of getting a game over, he still didn’t know what it was but assumed it was bad from what Mira had said.
People had already started going to the front lines and throwing balls at each other. Matsushita saw Mira start to back away and stand towards the back wall. He decided to try and start a conversation with her now.
“I never really liked gym class in school. What about you?”
“I hated it," she responded, "but I'm fine with this game. It seems kind of fun, honestly.”
“Could you tell me what happens if we get game over?” He asked.
“Hopefully i'll be able to explain it to you after the game, you seem interesting. I'd like to learn more about you.” Matsushita had no idea what this meant. “For now just don’t go around asking people about it. I don't want you to freak out, so just stay here with me. If you get out I'll try my best to save you, and you will do the same for me right?”
“Sure, I guess.” He responded, Matsushita honestly had no idea what any of that meant but there was something so captivating and familiar about Mira that just made him want to trust her. They stood in silence for a minute until Matsushita asked, “Wouldn't it be easy to not get game over by just staying back here and just letting the rest of the team do the work for you?”
“Probably,” Mira responded. “But this is a game of teamwork and I don’t like to feel useless, so now that the game has officially started I think I'll try and have a little fun playing this.” She then picked up one of the balls that was laying a couple inches away from her feet and walked up to the front lines.
When she got up there, Mira dodged a couple flying balls, then threw hers. It didn’t hit anyone but luckily no one caught it. Matsushita watched as she continued playing the game, dodging balls, throwing a couple of her own and even hitting a couple people. Maybe Mira really was good at sports or it was just luck considering how she said she hated gym class.
4 of the players on their team had gotten out, it was now 11 versus 13. Matsushita didn’t think this was horrible, they still had plenty of time to get the players back and take down the other team. He watched as Mira bent down to pick up a ball next to her and as she was distracted, a man on the other team took the opportunity to get her out. Matsushita watched as the ball flew towards Mira and hit her right in the side of her stomach. She was surprised but didn’t look distressed, she looked back at Matsushita and he slowly nodded at her as she walked to the jail.
This should be easy, all he had to do was either catch the ball of the player who hit Mira or hit the player with a ball. He tried many times to hit the man with a ball but failed each time. Matsushita was still so confused on what was happening and now had lost the one person who he thought he was gonna get answers from. He thought for a couple minutes before coming up with an idea on how to get Mira back.
He found a man that looked pretty fit on his team and decided that the man was his new target. Matsushita tried to start up a conversation with the man but he kept blowing him off saying something about how his girlfriend had been hit and how he was most focused on getting her back right now.
Mira watched as Matsushita dragged a man to the back of the room and started speaking to him. Mira was confused about what he was doing but watched as Matsushita held the man in place. It was painfully obvious that the man Matsushita had grabbed really wanted to continue playing. She watched as Matsushita spoke to the man for many minutes, every time the man tried to speak he would put a hand over his mouth and scream at him. Mira was still so confused as to why Matsushita was screaming at random players instead of attempting to get her out.
Matsushita could tell that the man he had decided on was around 2 years older than him. He had only tried this on his classmates and wasn't sure if it would work based on the situation and how much stress that man was obviously in. Matsushita had kinda felt stupid for a couple seconds when he realized that he definitely did not have enough time to break down this man's mindset into doing what he wanted. So he decided to just scream at him, kinda like how he screamed at the classmate who had ultimately been the reason he was put in the asylum. Whenever the man would try to protest, Matsushita would put his hand over the man's mouth and scream at him. He screamed at him about how he needed to attempt to take out the man who hit Mira before the person who hit his girlfriend, followed by a lot of threats to the man and his girlfriends life if he didn't do what he said. Matsushita thought about how this was good practice for whenever he didn't have enough time to manipulate someone into listening to him so he would just scare them into it.
Finally the man agreed, Matsushita watched as he walked closer to some of the balls and continued playing the game. But instead of going for the person who hit his girlfriend he went for the man who hit Mira.
Matsushita kinda felt disappointed in himself because of how he handled that. He had been studying hypnotherapy for half of his life and still had to peer-pressure people into doing what he wanted. He decided that if the nurses from the asylum ever came after him he would run, hide and continue his studies. He wanted to be able to walk up to someone, talk to them for a couple minutes and already have them wrapped around his finger. Matsushita never wanted to hear someone refuse his orders again.
It took the man a couple minutes but finally he caught one of the balls Mira’s captor had thrown. As soon as the man caught the ball that Miras captor had thrown he started shooting more balls at the person who hit his girlfriend until he finally hit them. Mira noticed her phone light up with a green glow on the screen. She was relieved and finally started walking back to the blue team's side of the court. She saw a girl that looked around 20 follow after her a couple seconds later but decided she looked uninteresting.
Mira had noticed that a couple of her other teammates had been saved while Matsushita was screaming at the man. Her team was now ahead with the score being 11 versus 10.
The blue team slowly started to pull even farther ahead of the yellow team. To be fair it seemed like a lot of the players on the blue team were more fit and worked out more often. Making it easier to throw the balls farther and harder.
There was now 3 minutes left in the game, there was one person left on the yellow team. A boy that looked around 14, he looked very scared. The blue team still had 6 players out of jail including Matsushita and Mira. Matsushita remembered seeing the boy on the yellow team cower behind another boy that looked to be around 14 too. That boy had ended up having one of the balls he had thrown caught, ultimately being sent to jail and leaving his friend to fend for himself.
Mira could tell by the look on the boy's face that he knew it was over. He didn’t even try to pick up a ball let alone throw it. All of the people left on the blue team looked too scared to be the one to end the game. None of them wanted to have that burden of being the person who basically killed 15 people. Mira took pity on the boy and the rest of his team, she didn’t want to have to watch him just shakily stand there any longer. Mira grabbed a ball and walked up to just before the line cutting the room in half. The ball hit the boy straight where his heart was. He walked to the cage and stepped inside, going to stand right next to his friend. The animatronic voice then called out:
"All players on the yellow team have been put in jail. Thank you for playing."
Matsushita watched as 15 lasers came down from the ceiling. Piercing each person on the yellow team right through their skull. He was shocked for a moment then thought back on how many times Mira warned him about getting game over. It honestly wasn't surprising considering how crazy this situation was already.
Matsushita followed Mira and everyone else on the blue team out of the gym. Some looked calm while others looked like they were having a full blown panic attack. When they made it outside the building Matsushita decided it was finally time he got all of the answers to his many questions.
“Could you explain what just happened, how and why those people died and what is going on?” He questioned.
Mira then explained everything, well kinda everything. She explained what this world was and all about the visa. How you had to play deathly games to survive and get days on your visa if you beat the game. She explained that if you ran out of days on your visa you were killed by a laser like the people on the yellow team. She explained how the difficulty was based on the number of the card and the category was based on the card suit. She explained that she had no idea how she got here and how to get home. She explained all this as they walked. Then as she stopped talking he noticed they were standing in front of a small house. “So that's really all I know about this place, if you have any more questions, ask, but I probably don't have the answers.”
“How long have you been here for?” Matsushita asked.
“6 days,” She responded. He nodded as she continued. “I met a few nice people the other day, I started hanging out with them in the mornings and throughout the day. I'll introduce you to them tomorrow, but right now we should probably go to bed.”
Matsushita followed Mira into the house, still trying to take in all this new information. She set him up with a pillow and blanket on the couch then continued talking.
“This was my house even before coming to this place, so you don't have to worry about any weird people coming in. Good night.”
She then walked down the hallway into another room he assumed was her bedroom. He laid awake on the couch, thinking about so many things. He thought about how crazy this whole situation was. How surprisingly nice Mira was. He even thought about how he and Mira were similar in some ways. He continued just laying there and thinking until he finally fell asleep.