by Azalea Ellis
I pinched the inside of my thumb pad, hard. Once again, the pain allowed me to focus. But not enough, so I bit my bottom lip, until the iron taste of blood blossomed on the tip of my tongue and spread throughout my mouth.
* * *
Mr. Wolf, drool running down the collar of his once immaculate suit, looked at the number of new “wolves,” and laughed.
Our numbers were severely depleted, and the danger of each round grew exponentially greater.
I looked at his grotesque, laughing head, and I hated him. I hated him, and I was absolutely terrified. I shuffled forward as the next round started and thought of the Seeds I’d wasted. What good was Beauty to me now, when my life was on the line?
Each round seemed to be taking longer and longer, as if Mr. Wolf was trying to get us as close to him as possible before calling Dinner Time, and because we were moving so slowly, it was a tedious affair of constant, mind-eroding tension. But Mr. Wolf never called for any time greater than ten o’clock.
When he finally turned and called “Dinner Time!” I pivoted toward the starting line as quickly as I could. As my head swung around, I met Chanelle’s eyes for a second, as if in slow motion. Then I broke the connection, running away.
Behind me, I heard light footsteps and bubbling gasps, as if someone were breathing through a layer of water.
My heart beat so fast it felt like it might literally burst out of my chest. I’d never understood those words before, but now I could feel it, expanding large and squeezing hard with each hummingbird-fast pump. My legs felt like fat, heavy logs, and wouldn’t move as I wanted. They were slow, too slow, much too slow compared to the light footsteps behind me, gaining on me.
As I approached the safe line, I started to let out great, gasping sobs. I was almost there when something grabbed the back of my knees. I went down hard, smashing into the ground and sliding just a bit.
I flipped over onto my back, scrambling to see who’d tackled me.
The-thing-that-had-once-been-Chanelle was on its knees, grabbing desperately onto my legs. Her jaw hung open halfway, and so much saliva bubbled up in her mouth that her breathing rattled with the fluid she’d inhaled. Her eyes locked on mine. There was no compassion, no recognition, only hunger.
I pulled back a knee without even thinking and slammed my foot into her face, hard enough that her small hands lost their grip on my legs. I scrambled backward like a crab, clumsily, as my arms slipped and collapsed.
She came for me, and I kicked her again and again, keeping her off until I somehow made it over the safe line.
We sat on either side of that division between light and darkness, and her eyes met mine again.
She seemed to strain forward, but was held back by some invisible force. Those blue eyes held nothing but hunger. No anger, no humanity.
Then they lost even the hunger and her interest in her escaped prey seemed to slip away. She limply rose to her feet and turned to walk back toward Mr. Wolf.
On the field, two other people were convulsing in their own blood.
My arms collapsed from the weight of my upper body, and I rolled into a ball with my eyes facing the ground and my torso bent over my knees.
It was too much. I couldn’t stand up, couldn’t do this again. That’s what I thought, but somehow I was on my feet again when the next round started.
Mr. Wolf called out “twelve o’clock” for the first time since the beginning of his sick game. I took my twelve shuffling steps forward. How many rounds had it been? Not close enough to twenty. I didn’t think I could make it till the end. But I would keep trying until I could move no more, or I got turned into a “wolf.”
I saw quick movement to my right, and looked up. The tough Spanish girl jumped forward with a huge, half-leaping, half-running step. What was she doing? My weary brain struggled to compute.
But then I saw the shrinking distance between her and Mr. Wolf.
I gasped, and in an instant I was urging her on with every fiber of my being.
She grinned viciously, and I remembered what she’d said in the beginning about being a predator. Her jumps weren’t the type I’d ever seen before from a human. Something was slightly off about them, as if despite the heaviness of this place, she was bending the rules of gravity just a bit, moving too high from the pull of the Earth, and traveling too far.
Jump, jump, jump, she went, drawing dangerously near Mr. Wolf.
How many steps did she have left? I hoped it was enough.
She jumped and landed one last time, stopping obviously too far away to reach Mr. Wolf without moving her legs. “Dammit!” she growled. The sound carried well in the taut silence.
I felt the pit in my stomach yawn open and suck the air out of me.
Mr. Wolf chuckled.
But before we asked the time again, she stiffened her body, stood up on the tips of her toes, and extended her hands toward the sky. Even her fingers were straining to move higher.
It looked like she was trying to fly away.
Then, with her body extended and stiffly clenched, she started to tilt forward. She tilted until she was falling, and didn’t flinch even a bit as she slammed face-first into the ground.
A few moments of frozen silence passed, and then I saw that Mr. Wolf’s ankle was caught in her outstretched hand. Her feet were still planted on the ground where she’d stopped, at exactly twelve steps.
“She’s touching him!” I whispered. Then I shouted it desperately, as if making sure everyone heard it would make it irrefutably true.
The Spanish girl stood up stiffly. She’d probably knocked the air out of her lungs when she hit the ground. She rested her hands on her knees for a moment, taking a few deep breaths. Then she let out a low chuckle, spit, and straightened, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “Screw you,” she said succinctly.
Mr. Wolf seemed to be frozen at first, but then turned around. His head was once again an innocent stuffed costume head, except for the saliva drenching the lower half of it and his entire torso. “It would’ve been a waste to eat you, anyway,” he said to her. Then he lifted his arms wide, palms facing toward the sky. “The game is won, and the Trial completed. Congratulations, Players!” His voice was jovial, pleased.
The sound made me shudder, because I knew his true nature.
He took a step toward us, and I flinched, but he didn’t move to bite the Spanish girl or chase after any of us. He walked through our pitiful group and away, into the darkness of the trees from where he’d come. On his whistle, the ones who’d been bitten followed him, shuffling strangely off into oblivion.
Was it over, now that she’d won the Trial? No, no, not yet. Don’t trust, don’t relax, I ordered myself.
In the middle of the field, where we’d first gathered, the floating cube sank down to head-level once again.
I waited to see that nothing happened to the ones who moved close to it, and then followed.
CONGRATULATIONS ON SURVIVING THE TRIAL. THERE ARE NO BESTOWALS.
The beautiful girl scowled, pacing back and forth in front of the cube.
I watched her without realizing what I did. Every step made my wire-taut nerves stretch even more precariously tight, her agitation feeding my own. Every sense was on the alert for danger, and the hair on my sweat-slick skin stood up. I couldn’t take any more.
Then the cube’s message changed.
DO YOU WISH TO RETURN FROM THE TRIAL?
YESNO
The girl’s face lit with relief, and she lunged forward to press, “Yes” without hesitating. A mirage-like wave, like those formed when I received new Seeds, rolled out of her body, and then she disappeared.
Nothing remained where she had been standing. She was just gone.
After her, others pressed, “Yes,” and the same thing happened to them.
I swallowed, reached out, and touched the cube before I could worry about it any longer. I thought I heard a snippet of the eerie children’s song again, loud in my bones, and then it
exploded out of me.
I was dizzy and nauseous, but my knees didn’t buckle this time.
The breeze was warm on my skin, and the grass under my feet was the normal grass of my backyard, not the too-green, too-sharp stuff of the Trial.
The tree was a normal oak, large, but not towering, and the smell of the air was fresh, but with a bit of a smog-like tang. The darkness wasn’t true-black pierced only by distant light from the expanse of sky. Rather, the grey-tinged, half-sick haze of an insomniac city.
I threw up from relief, all over my shoes.
Chapter 7
Death is not the greatest loss in life.
The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live.
— Norman Cousins
When my stomach was empty, I noticed the window hanging in front of my face.
YOUR ACTIONS IN THE TRIAL HAVE AWARDED YOU 2 LEVELS.
YOU HAVE GAINED 2 SEEDS.
I wiped the back of my hand across my mouth and stared at the words for a long while.
It was easy to slip into the house without my family noticing me. I went into the bathroom, stripped off my dirty, torn clothing, and stepped slowly into the tub, using my hand on the wall to support myself. Every muscle in my legs seemed to be shivering in a violent threat of collapse, so I turned on the faucet and sat down in the tub.
A bath was better, anyway, because I wouldn’t have to close my eyes under the stream of water.
My skin was scraped and sliced everywhere it’d made direct contact with the ground and grass of that place, but I hadn’t even noticed. Now that the overwhelming tension was gone, the raw skin started to hurt.
I ran the water hot, as hot as I could stand it, and soaked in it till it turned tepid. Then I got out and went to my room. I shoved my clothes to the bottom of my trashcan so my mom wouldn’t see them. My shoes went into a plastic bag in the closet until I could find time to wash them in secret.
I dressed in a long-sleeved shirt, pants, and socks, wanting to have as much of my skin covered as possible. I twisted my hair into a single braid and tied it off with a hair band, out of the way. Then, with my light on full brightness, I checked in every corner and possible hiding spot of my room, just in case. There was no one, nothing new.
As prepared as I was going to get, I turned off my light so that no one would think I was still awake and come checking in on me during the middle of the night. I couldn’t handle that right now. I crawled into bed and tucked myself into the corner between two walls of my room, so I could see both the door and window, and any movement without turning.
“Bunny?”
I’M HERE.
—Bunny—
“What was that?”
I THINK YOU KNOW.
—Bunny—
“No, I mean—It was a Trial. But what was it? What happened—it was…It’s not freaking possible! It’s not possible.”
DON’T BE OBTUSE. IT HAPPENED, DIDN’T IT? THEREFORE IT IS POSSIBLE. YOU JUST DON’T UNDERSTAND IT.
—Bunny—
“But…how?” I whispered.
I CAN’T TELL YOU THAT.
—Bunny—
“Why not?”
I JUST CAN’T. I’M NOT INVOLVED WITH THE TRIALS, EVE. I’M JUST YOUR NORMAL GAME MODERATOR.
—Bunny—
He didn’t know, I realized. I bit my split bottom lip again. That’s why he couldn’t tell me. “Please, can’t you let me go? I don’t want to be a Player. I’ll give back all the Seeds. You can change back the things I leveled up. Just, please, let me go. I don’t want to do this anymore.”
THERE’S NO WAY OUT BUT THROUGH. ONCE YOU’RE A PLAYER, THERE’S NO GOING BACK.
—Bunny—
“How do you get through?”
I DON’T KNOW.
—Bunny—
“Has anyone ever done it before?”
There was a delay in the answer that time.
NOT YET. NOT THAT I KNOW OF.
—Bunny—
I swallowed the blood welling from my re-opened lip, but didn’t say anything.
Bunny didn’t prompt me for more words, and left me alone in the darkness, the almost-silence of my room.
Perhaps it was then that I began to change.
If any evidence of the true nature of humanity was needed, I only had to look at myself. I wasn’t thinking about those Players’ families or the tragedy of their deaths. I wasn’t sad, or guilty about not being brave enough to stop and help them.
I was only scared for myself. My mind was focused not on regret, but rather on exactly how I could ensure I didn’t lose to the Game, like them. I wanted to live.
I tucked my knees to my chest, wrapped my arms around my legs, and stared into the darkness. There was no way I would be able to sleep that night, despite my physical and mental exhaustion. Even if I could, I didn’t want to. I was afraid I’d dream of the Trial, but never wake up.
I stayed curled up on the far corner of my bed till morning, watching my room, my door, and my window for any danger. The sunrise was a relief of epic proportions. For some reason, humans always feel safer in the light. They’re not creatures of the dark.
* * *
I crawled stiffly out of bed shortly after the first hint of sunrise and dressed in silence. Then I peeked in on my sleeping mother and brother to make sure they were okay. They had to be kept separate from all of this. Safe.
I went outside to examine the ground where I’d been the night before, when it happened. There was only grass, manicured and sedate, and completely unhelpful. I stood up and sighed. “Fine.”
I angled my left arm across my body and used my right hand to type an address into my forearm sheath link. “China, right?” I muttered to myself, and started walking toward the street.
Two public transport pods and a short walk later, I was in front of the house from the address Chanelle had given me.
It was nice. Not mansion-rich, but it wasn’t stacked next to or on top of any other houses, and there was a large fenced backyard, exclusive to their family. Even the pollution was lighter there, so far from the jobless slums.
I stood awkwardly, shifting from foot to foot. “What now, dumbass?” It didn’t seem right to just knock on the front door. What would I say? ‘Hi, I think one of your daughters is gone forever, possibly dead, because she got bit by a crazy, salivating Player in a secret Game your daughters and I are being forced to play? But no worries, because I’m here looking for the other daughter?’ Probably not a good idea.
I slipped around the side and hauled myself painfully over the tall wooden fence enclosing their backyard. My decimated muscles gave out and dropped me on the other side with a painful thunk.
I held in a groan and stood up, then crouched and started to move through the huge bushes, flower plants, and trees of the backyard garden. I realized belatedly that sneaking around and peaking in the windows probably wasn’t the best way to earn someone’s trust. But I didn’t want to interact with anyone but China. No non-Players.
Then something dropped out of the tree beside me onto my back, flattened me to the ground, and knocked the air from my lungs.
Panic flooded me and I struggled wildly to turn around, sucking desperately for air that just wouldn’t come.
When I saw my attacker, my lungs finally accepted a surprised gasp of air. A small girl with blonde hair and big blue eyes scowled down at me. “Who are you? Why are you here?” she whispered.
“Chanelle?” I croaked. “What are you doing here? I thought—”
She pressed her hand over my mouth and leaned over to hiss in my ear. “Where is she? What did you do to my sister?” Her hand pressed harder, and I could only let out a muffled, “mmph.”
“Be quiet. If you alert the others, I’ll kill you.” She took her hand away. “Now, tell me. What did you do with Chanelle, and where is she?” China looked exactly like her sister.
I shook my head. “I didn’t do anything to her, I swear. After the Trial, she went with th
e Examiner. She told me to come find you.” I paused as a horrible thought filled my head. “You are China, right?”
She nodded, scowling.
“And you’re a…Player?”
Hesitation, but another nod.
I hadn’t broken the silence rule, then. “I know this looks suspicious, me sneaking around and all, but I promise I’m not here to do anything bad. I was just trying to find you.”
“What do you mean, Chanelle went with the Examiner? Is she all right? And what are those people doing in her room?”
When I didn’t answer immediately she leaned down with narrowed eyes and said, “Talk! Just because you’re a Player doesn’t mean anything. For all I know, this could be a quest, and you’re here to trick me. If I don’t start getting answers right away, you’re going to start hurting.”
I nodded. “China, I’ll tell you everything I know. I promise I’m only here because of Chanelle.” I tried to imbue my voice with calm trustworthiness and confidence. “You can trust me. But you just said someone’s in her room. What are they doing?” I said the last slowly, emphasizing the importance.
She pulled back and frowned. “I don’t know. Going through her stuff. I snuck out here to hide, but then you came. I wouldn’t even have noticed them if I hadn’t been waiting up all night for her.” Her eyes were wide, half wild and unstable from fear.
I nodded again and swallowed. If I was going to gain her as an ally, now was the time to act, to be confident. “Let me up, China. We should find out what they’re doing. It could be important—about what happened to Chanelle.”
She stared down at me for a few seconds, and then the tension in her face loosened, and she scrambled up and offered a hand to help me stand.
I took it, and the two of us hurried to the back of a huge, leafy bush. China pushed aside one of its branches, and I saw there was enough space in the center for the two of us to crouch uncomfortably. I crawled in, and she came after me.
“What a great spot. It’s perfect.” From within, we could see out through the leaves, but anyone who looked in our direction would see nothing but a bush.
