Chapter 11 - Playing a game of cat and mouse

Your POV:

Since the last competition, both of the teams have fallen into complete chaos. Our team was on the verge of securing our winning position, and all we needed was to score two more points, which would guarantee us the victory. Somehow in all this chaos one of our friends, a level 3 researcher from light containment zone managed to break his leg so badly, that there were a few open wounds with the bone sticking out of it, and additionally a good part of it was completely shattered.

Luckily for him, SCP 239 quickly used her reality bending powers to patch him up faster than if we had used SCP 427. However we didn't have too much time to think about this accident, because shortly after we were called for another competition, where we wanted to secure our victory.

"Alright everyone, it has been a few days already, the livestream is even more popular than before, and today you are going to experience something we have never done before. "She said, while SCP 106 chuckled, before adding:

"And get ready for it, because on any other occasion, it would be an experience to die for." He spoke with a slight sadistic laugher.

Along with a few other people I gave him a confused look, because this wasn't a particularly helpful hint. C'thulu wasn't in the room, because apparently he became so popular with this livestream, that some people invited him to a team for some kind of competition. I wasn't sure which game it was, but I knew that either he was going to completely obliterate his opponents, or get his butt beaten so badly, that he will destroy another keyboard. And yes, this has happened in the past already.

One of the D-class members was about to ask Larry for the meaning of this, but before it happened, all of us got teleported away to two separate rooms. Both arenas were separated by a thick glass wall, which was probably strong enough to stop even SCP 682 ramming into it at full speed. Having looked around, I saw that around twenty people, including Diana, were wearing mice costumes.

"At first we wanted to make this a warm-up round, but because of a meeting which I have to attend today, we are going to turn this into the first round." She said, while Diana quickly asked her:

"Whom are you meeting, and what's with the mice outfits?"

"About the first one, you will find out in the future, about the second one, you will need it, trust me. This competition requires you to score three points by throwing a basketball into a golden hoop. Each time you do it, it will add one point to your score for this round." She responded while manifesting basketballs in our rooms before adding: "Good luck!"

At first most of us were confused, because we couldn't see the hoop, and while we were wondering what to do, suddenly from the ceiling a large, animated Japanese cat known as Maneki Neko was dropped. At first it looked really cute for us, until it used one of its claws to make a really deep scratch in the glass wall. Only after it made this damage to the wall and jumped at the nearest person wearing a mouse suit, did we realize that it wasn't going to be pretty.

A loud scream from that person went through our ears, and people in mice costumes immediately began running as far away from the cat as possible.

"Great, what are we even supposed to do?" Diana asked, while one of the junior researchers Carshen responded:

"Considering there is a golden loop on its neck, I think we have to try and get the basketball in there, while using the mice people to distract it."

"Okay, so I am supposed to be a sacrifice, great..." Diana spoke while Carshen chuckled.

"We cannot die in these competitions, remember?"

"Doesn't change the fact that I don't want to be eaten alive."

"Then try to run as fast as possible and avoid its claws."

"Well, thank you Captain Obvious..." Diana responded with annoyance in her voice, before taking cat's attention on herself.

While she kept the cat distracted, we quickly grabbed the ball and tried to get it through cat's hoop. As I was about to throw it, Diana was forced to make a sudden evasive maneuver, which forced me to throw the ball to an MTF closer to the animated, who without hesitation threw it through the hoop, scoring us the first point. However, our joy was short-lived, as literally one second later the enemy team also scored a point, while our basketballs teleported to the other side of the room.

Our team almost immediately began tossing the ball to the other side of the room, and D-class team did the same thing. After a few more seconds it was time to score another point, but the scientist who had the ball missed, and the ball fell next to the cat, who accidentally tossed it away, and even though we managed to catch it relatively quickly, the other team has scored the second point and began running for the third.

It took us two more attempts to get the basketball through the hoop, but unfortunately it wasn't enough, as D-class team scored their third point in this round and secured a point in the competition. Shortly after that, everyone who was eaten by the cats got released and healed from any wounds they suffered.

"The first point of this competition goes to the D-class team!" Siggurós spoke loudly, while the entire live stream chat started contemplating about the cat, which according to them looked really pettable.

"That was way too close!" Diana said while grabbing a glass of water.

"Well, at least you didn't get eaten." I responded before adding. "D-class team won by sacrificing six people to the cat.

"It doesn't really matter to us considering we have lost the round. How much would you like to bet that we're gonna deal with lasers next?"

"Diana don't give them ideas!" Leif yelled almost immediately, while Siggurós started giggling, before saying:

"Oh but she isn't wrong, that is going to be a part of the next competition."

"Oh you have got to be freaking kidding me..." Leif spoke, visibly disappointed from what 239 said.

"Suckers!" Natas yelled to us before running away to his team with a maniacal laughter, which was already annoying to us.

"Hey, Siggurós?" Diana suddenly piped up a question.

"Yes?"

"I have an important question. May I smack Natas for the sake of our team's honour?" Diana asked with a slight smile.

"I'd rather avoid any violence between your teams, but I can punish him for unsportsmanlike behaviour in a different way..." She responded with an even bigger smile, before manifesting a white cone hat on Natas' head with a word "Donkey" written on it, which quickly gathered everyone's attention.

Visibly furious, Natas tried to take the hat, only to figure out it was glued to his own head, and after an unsuccessful attempt to destroy the hat, he approached Siggurós with anger.

"Take it away bitch." He demanded, but 239 didn't even say anything after the insult, which gave Natas confidence to try and punch her.

However, his arm almost immediately fell down as Siggurós removed every single bone in it, and then in Natas' body, which made him fall on the floor like a gelatinous mass. With annoyance in his eyes he tried to stand up, only to realize it was impossible, while she spoke coldly to him without any emotions:

"Insult me, my friends or other contestants one more time, and I am going to cover you in flour, egg wash and breadcrumbs, and then toss you into a container full of hot boiling oil, and keep you in there until you are fully deep-fried and cooked to well-done. Am I being clear..?"

"Y-You cannot be serious 239..." He spoke with slight fear in his eyes.

"Siggurós, not 239."

"Okay, okay Siggurós, fine, I understand, I am sorry!"

Using telekinesis, she threw him on the opposite wall before giving him his bones back while angrily glaring at him, which made him silently come back to his team with the hat still on his head.

"As I was saying..." She continued like nothing happened. "The next competition is going to be related to lasers. To say it as shortly as I can, one member of each team will be put in the centre of a room with only one bridge leading to the exit. The bridge will be completely filled with lasers, which will teleport you back to the beginning if you touch them."

"This doesn't sound that bad..." I spoke while SCP 682 responded:

"It is because Siggurós didn't agree on my proposition to make each of these lasers a 1 Petawatt laser.

"Maybe because those lasers would be excruciatingly painful for them?! You already got the Maneki Neko, and that was still an overkill brother."

"You're not fun." He responded before crossing his limbs.

"Anyway..." Siggurós continued her speech. "I will give each team around three minutes to choose a volunteer, who is going to try and slip through these lasers faster than the opponent."

At this moment a timer began ticking above our heads, but thankfully we were quickly able to find a guard, who was more than willing to give this a shot, and after the enemy team also chose their participant, both of them got teleported into two rooms with the laser challenge. Immediately our team member sprinted towards the lasers, and slowly began sneaking past them, while the D-class stood in front of them and was looking at them for quite a bit of time.

His team started yelling at him, with some even threatening to stick a knife into his neck if he failed that, which forced Siggurós to do something with them. When our volunteer was done with about half of the challenge, the D-class contestant smiled maliciously and began going through the lasers with such a grace, that we were hoping our friend wouldn't mess it up.

And while it was looking like he had the lead, the D-class was quickly closing the distance, which immediately turned the threats from his team into motivational screams, at least until he accidentally slipped and touched one of the lasers, which instantly teleported him back to the beginning.

At his point all of us yelled in joy, but our happiness was short-lived, as exactly one second after the D-class touched the laser, our guard did the exact same thing and got teleported back to the beginning. As he ran towards the lasers once again, the D-class was already around 10% done with it, and with his speed it was unlikely that our team member would be able to outrun him.

Despite that, he gave it his best, knowing that one mistake from the enemy team would grant us another chance. However, luck wasn't on our side and that D-class managed to go through all the lasers way faster than him, which made the D-class team make a roar of joy, while Diana furiously punched the nearest wall for the second time. Yes, the second time, because she also did it after our contestant touched the lasers and got teleported back to the starting point.

"Diana, chill!" Amanda tried to calm her down, which surprisingly made her even more furious.

"Chill?! We almost had this round and despite all of that we still lost!"

"The second round has been won by the D-class team!" Siggurós announced, while we tried to find out, how in the world that one D-class managed to go through all those lasers so smoothly.

While SCPs were preparing the third competition, we quickly dived into some documents and found out the reason. Apparently that one D-class was one of the smartest thieves and managed to steal from places secured by far more lasers than what SCPs prepared. Normally this wouldn't be enough to get him into one of our facilities, but considering he also had a few confirmed murders on his account with particular bestiality, it was more than enough to bring him to us.

While we were still searching for information about this D-class, Siggurós called everyone and started announcing the third competition, which was going to be the last one for today. It meant, that if we somehow failed to win it, we would end this day with basically no progress and allow our opponents to slowly catch up to us.

"The third competition is going to be similar to the previous one, and your goal is to reach a button at the end of the track." Siggurós started talking and explaining how the competition was going to look like. "If you have ever played a game known as "The floor is lava", then this round is going to be pretty similar to this game. You have to move from point A to point B, without touching the floor, aka the lava. If you slip and touch the ground..."

"Then your body is going to beautifully start crisping up and cooking with all this heat from the lava on the floor." SCP 682 spoke with a maniacal laughter, while SCP 239 was holding herself from slapping him for interrupting her.

"You wish brother. It will work like in the previous competition, and they will be teleported back to the very beginning of the track."

"That's it?!" He started yelling furiously. "Seriously?! I came up with this beautiful idea, and this is how you decided to do it?! You completely broke it, now it is not going to be exciting for anyone!"

"We don't want our competitors to get hurt, at least until the show ends. You agreed to these rules along with me and everyone else, so move back to your spot and stop being a crybaby Reptile!" SCP 106 spoke to him, and a few other SCPs took his side.

SCP 682 however, didn't seem particularly content with the fact that Larry called him a crybaby, and began approaching him with visible madness on his face.

"Take that back. Now." He demanded, but Larry just leaned back on his chair before showing him a middle finger.

This must have pissed him off, as almost immediately he jumped at SCP 106, who quickly hid in his pocket dimension. As 682 was yelling insults at the tar, black tentacles grabbed him and pulled him to the same place where 106 went. While some of us were looking at the scene, unsure what was going to happen to these two, SCP 239 quickly explained that both of them should theoretically be fine and come back a few hours later with minor wounds on their bodies.

After that, we had to choose our contestants one more time, and after a slight quarrel one of the O5s agreed to go. Most of the times it was us doing the dirty work in the competitions, so an O5 member doing it for us was a nice exception from the rule. He got teleported to one room, while an enemy D-class landed up in the second room. Both of them had the exact same track filled with obstacles, and their goal was going through it without touching the floor a single time.

As they started, both of them turned out to be absolutely atrocious at this, as our team member fell down on the first obstacle, while the D-class jumped in such a way that he twisted his ankle, and required Siggurós stopping the competition for a brief moment just to heal him.

When the round was continued, both of them managed to fall down five times within the first minute without even passing the first 25% of the obstacles. After around ten more minutes of constantly falling down every now and then, O5-8 was the first one who managed to go through the first half of the obstacles. And then he fell down three seconds after that...

At this point both of our teams started getting irritated, and SCPs looked like they were getting bored of this round, and one of them was even asking Siggurós to switch the contestants into different ones, as these were taking ages to finish.

During the half an hour mark, both of them were reaching the end of the track, and all they had to do was make the final jump in order to win. O5-8 had a slight distance advantage, which gave us hope for the victory, until he slipped right when he was about to jump and fell down on the floor, which teleported him back to the beginning. When that happened, the enemy D-class didn't waste a single second and immediately used the opportunity to win the competition, which made O5-1 absolutely furious at O5-8.

After Siggurós announced the winner and granted another point to the D-class' team, she teleported both contestants back to their respective teams, which made all of us quickly run back to our rooms. However, even that wasn't enough to spare our ears from the screams of the sermon which O5-1 gave to O5-8 for his incompetency, which cost us a whole point.

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