Malefis: Her Thoughts are Silent

I took a brief stroll inside the house before going to check out the preparations in the backyard.

The theme for the day was a pool party, so Michelle and the staff were setting up a buffet, snack bar and drinks stand near the pool. She was also setting up the speakers and other tools required for the games and activities she had prepared for the day.

"Care for a dip?"

The queen bee asked, motioning at the pool.

"Nah, I think I'll pass"

Adrian was already making himself at home though, swimming in the pool and sipping margaritas, good grief. Michelle naturally took advantage of my companion's distraction to monopolize my attention.

"Since you're not busy, could you help me with something over by the storeroom?"

"What happened to the thing you said about a host not working guests to the bone?"

"Teehee, well, the staff are quite busy and I can't carry it by myself...."

She clapsed her hands together and fired up her damsel in distress look.

".... Pretty please? I'll pay you back for this, I promise"

"*Sigh— Fine. Just wait a minute, I need to give Adrian something"

"Yeah, sure"

I headed over to Adrian and handed him my watch telling him to hold on to it for me.

After that, I accompanied Michelle to get the thing she needed my help with.

"So, did you find any treasures while exploring?"

She asked with a rather mischievous smile

"As a matter of fact, I did—"

"He's admitting to it so easily, never expected him to be a public pervert. He'll be a lot easier to tame than expected" She thought, clearly misunderstanding my response. I continued before her thoughts had achieved the record of thinking up 34 seduction tactics per second

"— I saw a lot of framed pictures. You were a cute kid"

"Huh?"

"Hmmm?"

"Oh, well, I'm not that cute"

She said, portraying false modesty. Pretty much out of reflex, I asked a question on what I found strange.

"Although, while there were photos documenting your growth, the ones from your middle school was missing..."

"Y-Yeah well, I d-didn't like taking pictures in middle school, just a little phase I went through"

"I see..."

A boldfaced lie. It's only been 30 minutes since I set foot in this mansion and my mission might as well be over now— her thoughts dropped a bombshell enough to make Sara dance. Still though, I have to stay till the end.

We arrived at the store.... house. It was an old shed near the back of the compound. I tried pulling the door but it didn't open. Michelle took over and opened it without issue—apparently, there was a trick to it.

"You guys use this place for storage? Doesn't look like anyone's been here in months"

"We don't normally use it. Although, the servants told me what I'm looking for is here"

She searched the storehouse for it but couldn't find what she was looking for.

"Not here either....*sigh"

"Can we go now?"

"Yeah, sure"

She headed to the door and tried opening it

"Oops.."

"What is it?"

"I forgot....the door can't be opened from the inside... we're stuck"

"How do you forget something like that?!"

"I'm sorry, okay? I haven't been here in a while..... Could you try calling for help? I'm not with my phone"

I tried calling Adrian repeatedly, but it went straight to voicemail. I also tried calling Michelle's phone too in case someone close by might pick up but no dice.

"Do you know the numbers of any of your staff?"

"I'm afraid not....."

She sat down and took a deep breath before continuing

".....well, I'm sure someone will notice we're taking too long and come check, we have no choice but to wait it out"

"I hope you're right"

"Why don't we chat a little to kill time? I want to get to know you more"

I put my phone in my pocket and sat down as well.

Seriously, who would've thought we'll get caught in the classic lock-up hook-up scenario? I'll answer that— someone who reads minds.

Her original intent once I arrived 2 hours early was to get me to assist her with setting up thereby breaking the ice, then lead me here where we'll be trapped till someone finds us— she had already instructed a servant to come get us few minutes to the start of the party.

However, Adrian's arrival with me threw a monkey wrench into that plan—it'll be odd for her to ask only me to help out and if we both helped out, it might ruin her plan for alone time. So, she improvised— she got us to explore ourselves and used that opportunity to get Adrian distracted. Then, she took his phone to charge somewhere else in the house so I won't be able to call for help. Once that was done, she made up a story about something being too heavy to carry alone thereby bringing me here, good grief.

Ofcourse, I knew about this from the start which was why I handed Adrian my watch with a small note underneath telling him to come let us out in 10 minutes— I wrote it while exploring because I had a feeling she'll still try to execute her lock-up hook-up tactic.

It shouldn't count as interference since I'm giving her a whole 10 minutes to pull her crap. Now, I just talk and wait.

*Creak

The door opened far earlier than expected. This was because the person at the other side of the door wasn't Adrian, it was.....

"Huh?! Why are you here, Bruce?!"

Michelle said, venting at her big brother

"Uhm, S-Sorry. I forgot a couple of books in my room so I came to get it..... Then I saw you closing the shed door so I..."

The student council president, Bruce King who has been glazed by everyone I know as well the thoughts of those I don't.....was cowering before Michelle King like a little kid. Isn't he the older one here? I really don't get what Sara and everyone else see in him.

"Huh? What's that?"

Michelle asked with a hint of disgust in her voice after noticing the shopping bag in his hand

"Oh, this? I got some apples on my way back. You wanted to make apple pie, didn't you?"

"Huh? How did you know about that? Were you eavesdropping on me, you creep?!...scum, stalker, human trash, die, die, die, die, die"

She responded while repeatedly kicking the student council president who was also apologizing repeatedly. Seriously, what's wrong with these two—

"That's enough, Michelle. He got us out of the shed so the least you could do is thank him"

I grabbed her by the shoulder, cautioning her. She stopped but didn't apologize, instead, she glanced at me with a sharp glare and stormed off.

I apologized on her behalf and took the apples, following her. What the hell did you mean by a brother complex, Sara? She straight up bullies the guy.

"Hey! What the hell was that back there?!"

"SHUT UP!"

She responded sharply, glaring at me with furious, blazing eyes— her gaze was like that of a human looking at a lower lifeform and her thoughts... Made me actually agree with Sara.

This girl's a full on tsundere for her big brother.

In the eyes of Michelle King, everyone on the planet was inferior to her.....well, everyone except for Bruce.

She truly admires, respects and looks up to her big brother.....hell, she's probably even in love with him too. However, she doesn't know how to properly express her feelings and resorts to violence and insults on reflex.

How ironic, she treats the people she sees as lower lifeforms in high regard and treats the only one she cares about like a lower lifeform. But then, there's the even weirder big brother who doesn't stand up for himself and also told a clumsy lie.

According to his thoughts, as he was heading out this morning, he noticed the staff returning with ingredients for food for the party— from the bulge and shape of the bag, he guessed the ingredients purchased and cross-referenced it with Michelle's preferences, thought patterns and meals prepared in her previous parties to accurately deduce the ingredients as well as the possible dishes she intended on making.

Upon doing that, he realized she wanted to make her favorite apple pie but no apples were in the bag. To confirm his suspicions, he went to the nearby shops and confirmed they were all out of apples. So, he headed to Still Peaks to buy some for her. Once he got back, he noticed some staff members handling something Michelle will normally do herself while preparing for a party and found her absence as odd.

He deduced she was probably somewhere she couldn't get out of and instantly narrowed it down to the shed, then he rushed over to free her. The main reason he was apologizing was because he caught on to her lock-up hook-up tactic the moment he opened the door.

"Show off"

"Did you say something?"

Michelle asked, unable to hear the words I muttered.

"It's nothing you should concern yourself with..."

I retorted sharply, shoving the bag of apples on her

"..... I need to go use the restroom"

"Oh, it's..."

"I know where it is, I saw it while exploring."

I walked off leaving her and used my mind reading to confirm if my performance worked. I fought her anger with anger— making her believe I was genuinely angry thereby forcing her to rethink her unjust anger.

It's a rather common psychological tactic— in other to stop someone from getting mad at you, you get mad first and put them on the defensive. It also applies with a spur of the moment anger which the aggressor starts feeling guilty for a little later.

Ofcourse, it doesn't work every time. Hell, in some cases the situation escalates with both parties not knowing when to stop and screwing up bad. Glad it worked here though.

Ofcourse, in my case, I made her believe I— an ordinary, non telepathic classmate was disillusioned by her conduct. She wouldn't want her reputation tanking because of this so she'll calm down quickly and start thinking rationally.

The guests started arriving while I was resting my head, locking myself in the restroom and the party started soon after.

I joined the party soon after and mostly just watched everyone having fun. Michelle tried severally to close the awkward distance between us all day but it wasn't that easy.

I watched the boys and girls play of stone high play different games at the pool in their swimsuits while also dancing to music and chugging down booze like people possessed. It felt like way too much of a drag to join them so I sat at the buffet stuffing my face till nightfall.

Hey, the food didn't do anything wrong, ofcourse I'll enjoy it.

"AAAND NOWWW... THE FINAL GAME OF DAY 1 OF THIS EXTRAVAGANZA.... IT'S THE DRAWING"

Brock, the MC roared with his annoyingly loud voice. "The drawing" referred to the lottery for those who get to sleepover at Michelle's home.

There were 6 slots available for 4 boys and 2 girls and as the name implies, there were two boxes representing males and females— all participants write their name in a piece of paper and fold it. Then, they insert it into the box with their gender after which the designated "drawer" dips their hands in the box and draws a random paper. The person whose name is on the paper wins a slot.

"DOING THE HONORS IS OUR VERY OWN HOST... MICHELLE KING!"

She got up and headed to the boxes, waving at the cheering crowd.

"IF YOU WILL, M'LADY"

"Alright everyone! The first slot goes to....."

She dipped her hand in the box and drew one.

"Huh?"

"Is something wrong?"

"N-No"

She replied at the curious Brock, a little flustered. She looked at the paper to confirm she didn't hallucinate but the writing was clear as day. She started wondering if she had made a mistake but had to call the name regardless

"Adrian Wood"

The first person was Adrian. She dipped her hand and drew the second one, looked at the paper and silently breathe a sigh of relief.

"The second slot..... Adam Graves"

As expected. Fact is, she rigged the game to make sure I'll be selected for the sleepover.

The trick was quite simple, long before the box was presented for us to insert our paper, Michelle wrote my name down on a piece of paper and taped it's corner to the bottom of the box. Then, once we inserted our papers and it came time to draw, she felt for the tape and ripped off the taped corner, then drew it without anyone suspecting a thing.

Basically, the paper she was holding wasn't the one I inserted but the one she had prepared in the box beforehand. Ofcourse I knew about it but I couldn't interfere by removing the paper, so I decided to drag my friend down with me.

I taped a paper with Adrian's name to the bottom of the box where mine was supposed to be and moved mine to a different location of the box you won't reach without actually searching for it like Michelle did the second time.

Ofcourse, I tried interfering as little as possible so Sara won't have an excuse to void our contract— I knew she had a GPS transmitter in my phone but there was no way of knowing if that was all. More so, she was serious enough to threaten me with Rachel's safety. Best to thread carefully.

The 6 slots went to Me, Adrian, Brock and 3 extras whose names I didn't bother to remember at the time. Once the party animals dispersed around 9:40 or so, Michelle held a small after-party among the 8 of us.

We spent time playing video games, mini karaoke, a barbecue under the night sky and then topped it off with some indoor games— twister, 10 yen coin game, old maid, etc. fostering some level of camaraderie. Although, the one which somewhat annoyed me was the game of "Truth or Dare"

".... and the bottle lands on Adam. Truth...or dare!!!"

"Truth"

There's no way I was going to let someone dare me into doing something embarrassing. Female extra 1 who spun the bottle asked her question.

"Okay..... Why are you always such a jerk towards Michelle"

Because I can read minds so I know she only sees me as a potential slave— like I can say that. The thing that makes truth more flexible than dare is that as long as your opponent believes your statement to be true, you can lie as much as you please.

Without concrete proof or eyewitness account, no one will ever know you're lying if it's believable enough.

"I mostly enjoy my alone time and I dislike people who butt into my business for no reason. That also applies for people who continuously pester me just cause they believe it's a nice thing to do"

"Huh?! She only does it cause she's worried about you and wants to help—"

"— There's a saying "the road to hell is paved with good intentions" . In this case, no matter how pure you think your intentions are, you fail to view your actions from your target's perspective which makes your actions selfish with the intent of satisfying your own ego"

"You bastar—"

"— Answer me this.... Let's say you're in the hospital with someone worrying about your health. Now let's say that person gives you poison to drink thinking it's medicine. My question is....."

I focused my cold glare on the naive extra

"..... Will you drink it knowing full well it's poison?"

"H-Huh?"

"After all, the person had good intentions when giving you that poison..... refusing it will make you scum like me, won't it?"

"T-That's totally diff—"

"Different? By all means explain how exactly they are different. If you believe inconveniencing someone else is okay just because your intentions are pure then surely you'll drink the poison"

"O-Okay, fine.... I'll drink it! Happy now?!"

"Is that so?"

"What? You've got no witty comeback for my resolve?"

"Resolve? Ha.... That's a good one"

Her hypocrisy annoyed me a little so I took things a step further. I reached into my pocket and brought out one of the vials I obtained from Liz, lifting it up for her to see.

"I happen to have a super lethal poison on me right now, got it from a friend. Now then..."

I stretched my hand out to her with the the vial in my palms

"Why don't we test your resolve"

"....."

"What's wrong? You're not going to drink it? What happened to all the fire you had earlier?"

" Y-You're insane"

And there are the words I was waiting to hear. I put the vial back in my pocket and took a breath

"I'm simply just echoing back your words without any of the BS.... so doesn't that mean you are the insane one?"

"Why you..."

She was about to fly of the handle and attack me. She had already started motioning towards me when

*CLAP

A single, short, loud, unexpected clap from Michelle drew everyone's attention to her

"Alright, that's enough.... why don't we end the game here"

She said with a smile.

"B-But I—"

" —Let's move on to something more exciting...."

Michelle pulled out her phone showing the picture of an old, abandoned hotel

"...A test of courage"

"HUH?!"

Everyone except myself and Brock exclaimed in unison— apparently, he was the one who found the location for the test of courage. Michelle continued with glee

"This is an abandoned hotel close by and as rumor has it, the place is haunted!"

"Eek"

The female extras and Adrian chorused, although it was mostly drowned out by Michelle's excitement

"Let's go, it'll be fun!"

"Right now? It's way too late to go anywhere"

Adrian retorted sharply

"But it's close by. Besides, the night's still young"

"Young? It's almost midnight!"

"Making it the perfect time for a test of courage...or.... Are you scared?"

"Me? Scared? Pfft. I laugh in the face of danger"

"Then why don't we put it to a vote?"

She asked, turning to the rest of us. The extras and Brock voted yes because Michelle wanted to go and I remained neutral. Adrian was the only one who stubbornly clung to "no"

Can't say I don't get where he's coming from. Back in middle school, he participated in a test of courage with his friends and got cursed during the said test of courage. Still though, Michelle King gets what she wants and I can't interfere.

At the very least, I got them to end the truth or dare game by causing a scene. While that wasn't it's intented use, Liz's vial came in handy.

We all eventually made our way to the haunted hotel in pairs— and you guessed it, I was with Michelle. She planned to use the spooky hotel as an excuse to jump on.me, hold my arm in her bosom and let her imagination run wild

I was starting to think she lifted all her schemes from shoujo manga cause what the actual fuck?!

The reception was old and decrepit with the building's layout plan pasted on the wall but mostly in tatters. There was one thing that stroked all our curiosity though

The building was old , but there was a new Bell on the counter?

Brock, who was in front of all of us at the time touched the bell out of curiosity, but then—

My head strated feeling woozy and my knees getting weak. I looked around and noticed two of the extras had fallen unconscious on the floor. More people dropped, and soon it was my turn.

I fell down and collapsed completely