Murder the Game Read online

  Murder the Game

  Dark Asylum book 1

  By Nicholas Bergman

  Edited by Ashlynn Bishop

  Chapter 01

  The Beginning

  Murder is a board game played between two and four friends. Back in 1962 two friends

  partook in a riveting game, upon conclusion one friend mysteriously ended up dead!

  Many thought there was a sick, sadistic murderer on the loose however, no compelling

  evidence was found. In 1979 three kids found the game in an old abandoned mental

  asylum where it’s said that the medical staff performed many gruesome, rather

  experimental procedures on the patients under their care in the facility. The Rose Wood

  Asylum, named after the founder’s sister Mary Rose, was created as a lasting

  monument of the pain his sister and the family sustained growing up with a

  schizophrenic family member. Rose was so dearly loved, yet no one wished to admit

  her into their facilities in order to provide the care she so desperately needed.

  The asylum was a labor of love and cutting edge architecture for the era, being built

  between 1952 and painstakingly finished in 1956. Mary Rose was admitted as the

  inaugural patient, followed shortly by patients from all over the country. As day to day

  operations progressed there seemed to be an influx of patients, with some being

  callously abandoned and dropped off as if they were some discarded piece of refuse,

  left to be cared for by others.

  Mary was just 16 years old when she was admitted. As expected of a girl her age, she

  had many varied interests, and spent much of her time devouring books about: horses,

  dogs, cats, and anything she thought would be interesting to her. Of those, one book

  was her love above all others, it was a book about the famed, tortoise and the hare,

  needless to say the story was so enthralling.

  Mary kept to herself, never spoke with anyone, she saved her sole piece of “human”

  interaction for Doctor Jackal White, she liked talking to him about most anything. On

  Mary’s worst days she would lose control and descend into a “dark” state which

  rendered her a tempest of angry, violent emotion, often yelling and screaming at

  whoever and whatever she deemed a threat to her leave her alone. At times Mary

  would see this long dark wolf looking creature, beginning on all fours as a normal

  canine, then becoming human-like, walking on crooked hind legs with matted,

  odiferous fur. It spoke to Mary in a low crisp voice with one blue eye with a hint of

  yellow and the other resembling a black hole. This creature had long sharp claws (the

  clicking could be heard on the floors surface “click, click”) that he would scrape across

  the floor and sharp teeth that would show every time it would smirk or laugh. It would

  speak to her saying, “no one cares about someone like you, you do not deserve to live,”

  and the world would better off if she should kill herself.

  She would often see other dark visions, a “shadowy thing” that would coil and constrict

  its sinuous, muscled body around her and spoke with a lisp; the voice was old and evil,

  the deepest grumble coupled with the vision in one’s mind of the voice of the one who

  tempted Adam and Eve! It morphed in her mind’s eye, being both snake-like and

  humanoid, at times it would have arms and legs while other times it would have

  nothing but its body. Mary called the wolf creature Wolfy and the other one Damian.

  Damian would always tell her to hurt or kill people because they think she is a freak

  and a crazy person who needs to be locked up. Mary kind of liked Wolfy because it

  would tell Damian she should not kill anyone but then Wolfy would end with “only kill

  yourself you little freak” the laugh with Damian.

  When Mary was 20 years old another young girl by the name Emily Foster was

  admitted. Emily was admitted for bi-polar disorder with manic symptoms, one moment

  she would be the happiest girl in the world, next she would be so depressed that no one

  could make her happy or talk about anything but death. Emily would tell Mary that she

  knew Death personally and that if she ever wanted to meet him all she had to do was

  just ask. Emily and Mary would play board games together and play with dolls

  together. After a while it got to the point where you would not see Mary without Emily.

  Once a week Emily would ask Mary if she wanted to meet Death and every time Mary

  would say maybe later or not now and then they would play a game even though it was

  a board game or with their dolls. Mary named her doll Evelyn, after her brother’s wife,

  who Mary thought was the most gorgeous woman in the world, even prettier than

  Emily. Evelyn had golden blonde her that reached the middle of her back, she always

  wore the prettiest dresses and was a very caring person. On October 12, 1962 Mary

  found a board game called Murder and ran to Emily with it and asked if she wanted to

  try to play it, Emily said she would and when they opened the box there were four

  player pieces a die, the board it self, 50 game cards and the rules. The rules are simple

  on the board there is ten places to draw a card and eight places that are safe

  (Where you cannot get murdered) ten trap locations, six haunted houses, two murder

  spot (where if you land on it you die), and one finish line for a total of 37 spaces. The

  point of the game is to reach the finish line alive, whoever finishes first lives and the

  ones who do not finish, meet their death in a horrible manner. On the bottom of the

  page it reads, “ If no one reaches the finish line or if the game is quit in the middle of

  playing, everyone dies and there will be no winners; if anyone cheats they die.”.

  The player pieces were four different colors yellow, blue, grey, and black; Emily chose

  black and Mary chose yellow. Mary told Emily she could go first so Emily rolled the die

  and got a four, so she moved her piece four spaces and landed on a draw a card spot;

  when she picked up the card it said “the axe slasher is after you roll a five to get away,

  anything lowers you lose a leg and every roll divide in half” Emily rolled the die and

  got a 4. Emily chuckled and said “I guess I have one less leg to shave” Mary laughed

  then rolled the die and got a six, landing on a no murder spot. Emily rolled the die

  again and landed on a haunted house space and drew a haunted card, the card said

  “roll the die get higher than five or get so scared you cannot move for a turn, if you roll

  higher than a five move five or 6” when she rolled again she got a five so she moved

  five spaces and landed on a no murder space. It took half an hour to finish the game, at

  the end Mary who won, ended losing only an arm and traumatized while Emily lost

  both her legs, her left arm, and her right eye. That night, someone broke into the

  asylum, raided the pharmacy and stole numerous bottles of various medications. Emily

  was walking around the asylum due to her restlessness, she walked by the pharmacy

  and glanced towards the box where the fire axe should have been, it was gone. Emily

  then walked to the pharmacy door to
which she noticed it looked like someone used an

  axe to chop the door open; then suddenly she remembers the card she picked up while

  playing the game, “the axe slasher is after you'' she started to back away slowly so she

  did not make any noise. On her third step, a tall man wearing a black ski mask with a

  bag full of the medication from the pharmacy in one hand and the fire axe in the other.

  The man turned and looked at Emily, he dropped the bag of medication as Emily

  screamed; with both hands the man tightly gripped the axe and raised it overhead, with

  a downward swing the axe punctured Emily’s chest right where her heart was. The

  man left the axe in Emily’s chest as she fell to the ground still screaming, when she hit

  the floor the room went silent. The man grabbed the bag then darted through the north

  corridor and out the far side window, the same way he came in.

  The funeral was held that weekend, Mary and the pastor were the only two to attend.

  No one really knew Emily so no one really cared, the police only investigated because

  they had to and they did not want a “normal” person getting killed. They started the

  investigation the Monday after the incident, because they knew no one would take the

  case and when someone was forced to they would take a leave of absence. When they

  were looking around the pharmacy they found no fingerprints. The investigators

  dusted everything, to no avail there was nothing even when Detective Jonathon Wright

  came to help with the investigation he redusted everything and still no prints. While

  looking around he found a piece of fiber that may have been a mask or a piece of a

  jacket, when he picked it up to put it in an evidence bag it disappeared. Looking like he

  just saw a ghost, he looked around for the piece of fiber and could not find it. He lifted

  out pieces of the door, looked around the shelves, behind the shelves but still could not

  find it. He then started to look at the pieces of the door, to him it looked like it just

  exploded open not like it had been chopped. Detective Wright took two pieces of the

  door, put them both in an evidence bag and put one in his pocket. Detective Wright

  then went to the window where the killer came in and looked at the broken glass then

  at the floor, to his surprise the glass was scattered outside while they were on the third

  floor. No one saw a rope and this was the only area in the asylum that looked like

  someone had broken in, so there is no way someone got in by jumping; the next

  question raised was why the glass was blown out and not in. Detective Wright could

  not figure it out, none of this made any sense to him. Then he thought maybe it was an

  inside job maybe someone acted crazy to get to the medication, so he asked Doctor

  White to see if anyone was missing with the hope someone was missing, that way they

  would know who did it.

  Doctor White went to his office and gets a roster of every patient that was staying there

  and told his staff to see if everyone one the list was still here and if someone is missing

  to let Detective Wright know as soon as they know do. The staff scrambled to find the

  missing person, going to the recreation room, the courtyard and the bed rooms, the only

  two missing was Emily and a woman named Grace Winters, a patient that has major

  bi-polar disorder and paranoid schizophrenia, who was prone to violence. Nurse Jane

  Peters was the one that found Grace missing. Nurse Peters ran to find the detective but

  he was not by the window or in the pharmacy, she then ran outside and found him

  looking puzzle right below the broken window. She asked him what was wrong to

  which Detective Wright responded, “There is no glass, not even a tiny amount it’s all

  gone”. With a glove on Detective Wright was shifting through the tall grass hoping to

  find something that could help him find out what had happened, then remembering

  that the nurse was there, he asked her if she found the missing patient. Shocked that

  there was no glass she finally said, “Yes, a patient named Grace Winters. No one knew

  when she went missing but she was gone now”. Detective Wright then asked who was

  the nurse and doctor on duty last night, the nurse said she was and they did not have a

  doctor on duty, they simply call the doctor when they need him.

  Detective Wright began examining the grass again hoping to find a clue, when he got

  about ten feet away from the building he found a card that looked like it belonged with

  a board game, he read it and thought what the hell kind of game is this. The card said

  “the axe slasher is after you roll a five to get away anything lower you lose a leg and

  every roll divide in half.” He placed it in one of his evidence bags then in his pocket.

  Detective Wright then went to go find Doctor White to question him about Grace

  Winters and anything that could aid in finding her. The detective found Doctor White

  in a room that looked like a study, he was looking over some papers and looked really

  stressed, Wright knew he was about to stress him out even more. “They found the

  missing patient its a woman named Grace Winters do you know her?” Wright said to

  the doctor. After a few minutes and without looking up the doctor said room 313,

  Wright looked at the doctor puzzled and asked him what is he going to find there. After

  no response, Wright walked up the stairs, after almost reaching the third floor he found

  a little black game piece. He grabbed it with a glove he got out of his pocket and stared

  at it for a while and wondered why it was on the stairs, the patients aren’t allowed in

  the stairway. Wright finally got to the third floor and saw all the third floor nurses

  running around like something bad just happened, he stopped one nurse and ask what

  is wrong the nurse told him that another patient is missing the patient from room 333.

  Wright was walking down the hall as he arrived at room 313 he glared at the number

  on the door for a while, then proceeded to open the door.

  The door had Grace’s name on it and inside was a mess, there were papers everywhere.

  Wright stepped in and on the walls was writing saying, “Kill the bird with a stone; kill

  the man with some wood; kill the dog and the cat, before they come after you too.” The

  writing was on all the walls, on the ceiling, and on a paper on the wall. The paper was a

  picture of a black bird and a person throwing a rock at it. In the corner of the room there

  were two yellow eyes that looked like cat eyes but had a piercing effect on Wright.

  Wright steered at the eyes for what seemed like hours then when they blinked he got a

  cold chill down his spine. He quickly went to find the light switch so he could see what

  that thing was. When the lights came on that corner was still dark and the eyes were

  still glaring into his soul trying to find something. When Wright took a step towards the

  shadowy eyes it suddenly came straight at him and knocked him down then vanished.

  What seemed like a few seconds Wright opened his eyes, the whole room was bright

  and Nurse Peters was standing over him asking if he was all right. Wright got up and

  looked around then asked nurse Peters if something ran out when the nurse arrived,

  she said nothing came out of the room. Wright picked up a picture, a cat turning into a

  black bird. Wright then turned to nurse Peters and s
aid, “We need to find Ms. Winters

  she knows what happened”.

  Wright stepped out of the room and looked right then left, when he looked left he

  thought he saw the yellow eyes again and when he closed his eyes and opened them

  again it was gone and so was the chill in his spine. He then started to walk towards the

  left, towards room 333, with the hope to not find anything else like he did in that room.

  When he got to room 323 he heard someone scream, he quickly opened the door and

  the woman standing there looked at Wright and began screaming again then ran

  towards him with her hands stretched out heading for his neck; Wright stepped to the

  side and the patient ran past him into the wall with several nurses following her. When

  the patient opened her eyes she looked confused, like a deer looking into headlights.

  The nurses picked her up then walked her to the medical evaluation room. Wright went

  into her room and saw two eyes and fangs that looked like they were smiling, then he

  heard it growl and saw a dog like face get lower to the ground, like it was about to

  attack him. Wright quickly turned on the lights and saw nothing there, not even a

  shadow of whatever that was, then he remembered “Kill the bird with a stone; kill the

  man with some wood; kill the dog and the cat before they come after you too.” Wright

  turned off the light to rush out, before leaving he saw the cat eyes and fangs on top of

  one another, he blinked and then it was gone.

  Wright got to room 333 and knocked on the door, he heard something say, “Killing is

  wrong, killing is bad, killing is fun.”, he opened the door and saw only nothingness. He

  took one step in and instantly felt cold, like all the heat in his body was being sucked

  away from him. He stepped out and felt normal, then once more stepped in and tried to

  find the light switch but only felt something cold and hairy. He quickly brought his

  hand back to his body but could not feel his legs, his torso, or his other hand; the

  thought of being a child then came to mind. Suddenly everything was bigger than him,

  but when he looked back he saw nothing. He started to see his father and his mother in

  their room, his father was yelling again and probably drunk like always, he sees him

  take a book off their bookshelf and hit his mother with it. Wright yells out but no sound