Episode 36: Beetles, Bullets, and Blood

## Synopsis

Bjorn sees the demise of his squad and faces the Dragon Council. Henry avoids drowning in blood and blasts some beetles, and himself, with an explosion. Sammie sees her best friend killed in front of her very eyes.

## Episode Description

How much more can there be? How many more rooms of torture and terror will our heroes have to make it through? Well, at least five in this episode.

## Key Events

* Bjorn sees what happened to his squad in Afghanistan from a different perspective.
* Henry escapes a room that is filling with blood only to enter a kitchen full of beetles.
* Sammie watches as the Order kill Elise in front of her eyes. She's knocked unconscious.
* Bjorn finds himself facing the Dragon Council, but is able to break through the illusion an escape.

## Summary

Bjorn goes from the freezing cold mountain top to the blistering heat of Afghanistan. He finds himself in a very familiar cinderblock room. He sees himself and his squad sitting in a circle playing cards. The event plays out as he remembers it. No one seems to be able to tell Bjorn is there. He feels the area start to grow cold, he watches the fog fill the room. He sees what he didn't know then was a malevolent djinn form and begin to shoot lighting through the room.

Bjorn wants to stop the djinn. He shoots a fireball at the djinn, but it passes right through him. The fire does not even effect the wall behind the djinn. Bjorn runs to one of his fallen squad mates. His hands pass right through him. He looks up to see his commander push him through the door and tell him to leave. Bjorn tries to tell the past version of himself to stay, but he leaves just as he remembers. Bjorn can't stay in this room any longer to watch what happens. He leaves out a nearby door.

Henry finds himself in a gray, slate room that seems to be empty other than his gun which is sitting in the middle of the room. The door slams shut behind him and when he turns to look, the handle of the door has disappeared. The door now looks almost like a hatch on a ship, but the handle is missing. He notices there is a hole in the ceiling about the size of his head, but can't see anything through it. He picks up his gun and suddenly feels something dripping from the hole in the ceiling. Henry touches the liquid that's fallen onto him and realizes it's blood.

The drops of blood soon turns to a stream and then thousands of gallons of blood pour from the hole. There is no drain in the room so it begins to fill with blood. Henry turns and realizes the hatch door now has a wheel-like handle for him to spin to open the door. He wades through the liquid toward the door. He tries to turn the hatch handle, but it seems to be stuck and doesn't budge. The blood filling the room is now up to his waist. He keeps trying and then it finally budges. He tries to spin the wheel to open the door as fast as he can. The blood fills the room above Henry's head level. He finally gets the door open, holds his breath, and dives under the blood to go through the door.

Sammie leaves the storage room and enters her apartment. She can hear and smell someone cooking in the kitchen. She enters the kitchen to see Elise cooking shrimp. Sammie tells Elise that they need to get out of here right now. She grabs Elise and heads toward the door, but the doorbell rings. Sammie tries to look through the peephole to see who is outside. The door bursts open and men wearing body armor force their way inside. hey all have a distinctive tattoo on their neck. One of them is Blue, Anthony, her uncle. They keep asking her if she is Samantha Overbook, but tries to dodge the question. Anthony confirms that this is Sammie.

Elise pops up from behind the couch and asks what's going on. The Order guards start pressing Sammie about who this person is and what she knows. Sammie yells at Elise to run. Before she can stop it, one of the Order guards shoots Elise. She immediately hits the ground with a thud. The guards grab Sammie and try to pull her out of the room. Sammie erupts in anger and rage, throwing fire around her. She knocks the guards off of her and runs toward Elise.

Elise isn't breathing. She has a bullet hole in her chest. Sammie puts her hands on Elise's chest to try and heal her, but nothing happens. She shakes Elise in a vain attempt to wake her up. Nothing happens. She puts her head down on Elise's chest and sobs. She feels herself being struck on the back of the head and everything goes black.

Bjorn bursts through the door and finds himself in a jail cell. He quickly heals himself, which draws attention from two guards outside. They are wearing body armor and have dragon wings folded against their back. Bjorn asks where they're going but they don't answer. He tries to pull himself free, and does briefly, but they strike him with a stun baton that inflicts a magical damage.

The guards drag Bjorn into a room that looks almost like a cathedral. There are large, high stained glass windows. There is a single high-backed chair in the center of the room. In a semi-circle around the chair, there is a long curved table. Twelve people sit behind this table. Each of them has large, scaled dragon wings folded up behind their backs. Bjorn is led to the chair and he is shackled to the chair. The oldest man at the center of the table says, "You're Gunnar, yes?"

Bjorn knows this can't be real. He knows he was just in Afghanistan and is now in the Dragon Knight Council. He closes his eyes and focuses on the sick feeling he has, the one he felt before he was ever in the club. When he opens his eyes, the whole room melts around him and dissolves into just a regular room. He tears up a sheet from the bed and tries to use it to apply some first aid to himself, but his hands are shaking so badly he can't seem to patch himself up. Instead of going through another door, he jumps through a nearby window.

Henry has now found himself in a large kitchen. There is a pot bouncing around on the stovetop. He notices that the stovetop is not on, but the pot is moving of its own accord. The lid of the pot blows off and thousands of black beetles pour of it. Henry jumps onto the kitchen island, but the beetles follow. They sprout wings and fly at him. More bugs than could have come out of the pot fill the room.

Henry jumps from the island he's on to the counter by the stovetop. He's able to turn on the stove so it starts leaking gas, but the beetles catch up with him and begin biting him. He starts to crush them with his hands and throw them away from him. He runs over to the door and throws it open. Before he goes through, he takes a shot at the stove. The bullet causes a spark that ignites the gas and causes an explosion. The explosion blasts the beetles and throws him through the door.

## List of Appearances

* Bjorn Olafson
* Henry Marlowe
* Sammie Overbrook
* Elise Romano
* Anthony Overbrook (Blue)