by Azalea Ellis
I felt Deja-vu in my next twisting dodge and knew my death swung down from above. But then I slipped, tilting backward as my legs shot out from underneath me.
My back smashed hard into the ground, but I received no broken neck or collapsed skull. I bucked and arched, bringing my feet right back under me, and slipped through the already-fading shadow's legs. I headed straight for the other birdbath, ignoring the Oracle, and her bell-tone laugh of surprise.
I reached it before her shadows could stop me, and plunged both my good hand and the one hanging limply from my ruined shoulder into the water. Blood mixed with the crystal-clear liquid in silky tendrils, and then my mind exploded like a crackling firework.
I understood how the cocoon-room worked, what each string signified, and exactly how to play them to get the melodies I needed. Even so, my brain wasn't equipped to hold all the information, and pieces of the puzzle slipped into and out of focus as it strained to hold everything.
I breathed deep and focused on the blood in my veins, and then outward to the blood swirling in the water, and then the water itself. The focus helped, and I twitched my fingers, sending out an experimental thread of sound and tumbling light to meet one of the melodies she'd sent my way.
I knew what would happen even before the shadow actually followed my instructions, so I focused my energy on stopping the Oracle’s other shadows from coming to remove me from my place of power and kill me.
In the water I saw all the moves she could have made, and all the ways I could respond and counterattack. At first, I played out only the strands of my future that would stop her from killing me. My waves met hers in just the right way to cancel out both sides, silence resounding where they met. But as I focused harder my brain bent with more dexterity to the task, and I began to send out preemptive strikes of my own.
We matched each other through a myriad of possible futures for a long time, long enough that I began to lose concentration. Each time I slipped up, I stopped her from killing me later and later. Soon I would be too late, and I would die.
I started to tremble with the effort of sustaining so many different fights, even if I was only thinking through them while standing still. I couldn't go on for much longer and she showed no signs of wearying. I needed a way to stop her from attacking.
The next strand she sent toward me was a simple, lilting thing.
I split a larger portion of energy than I could truly spare away from my other futures and played one strand of my own in an exact match. The sounds and lights playing on that thread synced to each other so exactly that they meshed, and as she tried to finish it, I pushed in another direction, continuing the music in an unexpected tumble, then let it fall into a soft silence.
She let out another laugh. "That's it, tiny one. Show me your worth."
I'd let the other futures slip too far from my control, so I pushed extra hard against them for a moment to buy myself some time. She pushed back, but not overwhelmingly, and strand by strand, piece by piece, I matched her melodies, taking them over and changing their course.
Finally, I wrested them from her control even as she began to play them, laying each violent attempt to rest. From there, it wasn’t so difficult to play her as she was at that very moment, and draw her hands from the water in gentle contentment. I played docility into her as hard as I could, straining to my breaking point. The last notes were little more than a squeak.
I slumped over the water, shuddering and gasping. If there was more, I could not fight it. I had pushed for life with everything I owned, and nothing remained. Even as I thought that, I defied my own exhaustion, already gathering strength to match her next attack.
But she didn’t attack. Her strange, stone mouth stretched in a soft smile, and the lines down her cheeks no longer flowed with tears. She walked to the middle of the room and knelt on one knee, bowing her crowned head to me. She raised her head, and her chest opened strangely, folding in on itself, creating a twisting slot. She was still, then, her eyes focused unwaveringly on me.
Nice. Why hadn’t I gone straight for the second birdbath in the beginning? But I knew it wouldn’t have worked in the beginning, because there had been no blood to mix with the water. It was something I understood in the way you remember understanding a complicated concept in a dream, and it slipped from me as I withdrew my hands from the small pool and lost its connection to understanding.
I shuffled to her, keeping a wary eye out for any sudden movements. “What now?” I wondered aloud.
She flicked her eyes downward, leading my own to the hole in her chest.
I pulled the puzzle from my pocket, placed it at the opening in her chest, and pushed. It slid in, but met resistance, so I twisted slightly, and it slid further, continuing until the last bit lay flush with the surface of her body.
With a small click, her chest folded inward once again, opening up to a large cavity about a foot wide. Inside were three piles of what looked to be silver loops. Small, medium, and large.
She whispered to me with a voice made from the splashing of spring water and wind across the tops of glass bottles. “You are worthy. These are my three gifts to you, that they may guide your path. May you walk through the midst of tribulation, and not waver from the way.”
I frowned, said, “Umm, thank you… I guess.” and reached into the space within her chest. I pulled out the smallest set of loops first. Each was bent strangely, and connected to the others in a chain. I placed the small and medium pile in my pockets, and the large loop in my pack of crushed and broken supplies, as it was too big to fit anywhere else.
I felt the Boneshaker begin to hammer into me without warning, and stared into her sad stone eyes as it carried me away.
Chapter 20
People often believed they were safer in the light, thinking monsters only came out at night.
— C.J. Roberts
I crumpled to the floor of the base, surrounded by my team, and ignored the level up window that appeared.
"You're alive!" China screamed, smashing into me and wrapping her arms around me. "Oh, we thought maybe you were dead, but you're alive."
She squeezed, and I let out a gurgling scream as my shoulder moved under the pressure.
Jacky grabbed China by the forearms and yanked her arms open and away from me. "She’s hurt," she snapped. "Sam, come now. Fix her." Her finger pointed at me imperiously.
Sam sat beside me, stony faced, and placed his hands on my shoulder.
"I'm so sorry, Eve. I shouldn't have hugged you. I was just so excited," China whispered.
Blaine saw me and went pale. "Oh, my god. What happened?"
I laughed. "Got in a bit of a tussle. No big deal. Tell me what happened to you guys."
Jacky crouched in front of me and grabbed the hand of my uninjured arm. "The spider egg thing swallowed you up, and you were inside for a long time. We tried to cut through it and get to you, but nothing worked. Then the cube said congratulations on surviving, but you were still inside. We all pressed the button to return from the Trial, but nothing happened. Honestly, we were starting to panic a little, but then all of a sudden the song started and we were back here, and you were with us."
"Right before that, the cube popped up with one last message," Adam said. "No one else was paying attention."
"What—” I broke off and bit my tongue to stifle a scream as Sam did something with my shoulder that caused it to pop and grind. I went lightheaded for a moment, and had to take several deep breaths before I could think again. "Ouch. What did it say?"
"Eve Redding has been found worthy, and granted the blessing of the Oracle," Adam said. “It seems similar to the message when someone gets a new Skill, but worded differently.”
"Interesting."
"What happened in there, Eve?" he said.
"I met...something. A huge, huge woman made of stone crawled out of the ground. She called herself the Oracle, and said she was there to test me. She could see everything I was going to do, and I could
n't win. But then I figured out how to play the same game as her, and beat her. She said I'd proven myself worthy and gave me these little silver chains. Then the Boneshaker started playing, and I was back here." What an extremely simplified version of events. It felt like everything in my life was spinning around in a tornado of pain and fear and the illusion of strength I'd tried to wrap around myself. I needed to grab hold of things before I could talk about what had just happened in more depth.
I squeezed Jacky's hand. "But I'm fine. How about you guys. Are you okay?" I let my voice soften on the last sentence, speaking directly to her.
"Yeah, because you saved me. Thank you. Words don’t even cut it.” She, squeezed my hand painfully, swallowed, and shook her head, blinking suddenly shiny eyes.
I nodded my understanding and smiled. "Good. And you, Sam? Are you all right?"
His face was pale from the injuries and pain he'd been absorbing from me, but his cheeks flushed at that. "I killed someone today. I took a life, with my bare hands, while you—because of you. Do you think I'm okay?"
Adam stepped forward and yanked on his arm, pulling Sam away from me. "She saved you, you idiot. She kept you alive when you were too stupid to stand up and save yourself. If not for her, you'd be dead."
Sam stood and yanked his arm away, still staring at me. "You didn't save me. You made me betray myself. You're a murderer. I'm a murderer." His voice broke on the last bit, and he choked off any more words.
I stood up to match him, feeling the sharp pain of my heart breaking for him. "No. I helped you choose to live. NIX made murderers of us all tonight. There was no other choice for us. Kill or be killed. If I'd let any of you die when I knew I could stop it, would I be any less a murderer, then? This is...horrible beyond words. I know it. But we can't blame ourselves. You can't blame yourself. If not for this Game, tonight would never have happened. We are monsters of circumstance, not of choice."
I knew the words weren't enough. Nothing external could absolve someone from guilt if they couldn’t forgive themselves. And in truth, I called myself a murderer, too, just not aloud. “There’s nothing we can do about this except get out of this Game. What happens if the next time, it wants us to turn on one another?” I looked at my team. “It won’t ever stop as long as we’re forced into the Trials, unless we die, or find a way to escape. So we’ve got to find a way, because I won’t let any of you die.”
I turned to Blaine, who’d watched the exchange with wide eyes from behind his glasses. “Please tell me you got something useful from monitoring the transfer.”
“W—well, I’ll have to examine the data more closely, but I think so…”
Sam clenched his fists and left the room in red-faced silence.
China smiled bravely. “We’ll find a way.”
I gave her a small smile of gratitude and started to hobble toward the bathroom. Sam had left before getting to my twisted knee, but hell if I was going to call him back and ask for his services now.
Jacky immediately slipped my arm around her neck and half-carried me, despite her smaller size. “What crawled up his butt and died?” She snorted. “And what the hell was that thing he did? Nucking futts, he turned that kid into one of those pretty rock crystal things. What are they called?” She looked to the others for help.
“A geode?” Adam supplied.
“It was a Skill,” I cut in. “One he wishes he didn’t have, for obvious reasons. Let’s leave it to him to talk about, when and if he feels like it.”
Jacky pursed her lips. “Just seems like he’s been holding back on us. If I had a cool Skill like that—”
I shot her a look, and she clamped her mouth shut, pursing her lips. “Let me know if you need me,” she said as she deposited me at the bathroom entrance.
“Thank you.” I opened the door and limped inside. The mirror over the sink showed a face covered almost completely in blood from a cut at the edge of my hairline. My clothes were torn and bloody, and my skin was covered in scrapes and string-burn.
I struggled to take off my jacket, and paused in surprise when the door swung open.
Adam stepped through with a chair in one hand and a first aid kit in the other, and set the chair behind me. “Sit down.”
I did, gratefully, and reached for the first aid kit.
He pulled it back from my reach. “Nope. You’re in no shape to fix yourself up right now. Let me help you, since the self-righteous jackass didn’t finish his job. Besides, I brought numbing cream.” He held up the tube of numbing antibiotic ointment with a teasing grin.
“Hurry up, then,” I said with a grin of my own. I was exhausted and in pain, and I’d take any break I could get.
He unwrapped some steri-pads first, and wiped my bloody face down with them till they came away clean. He did the same to the rest of my cuts and scrapes, squeezed a small bit of salve onto his slender forefinger and carefully applied it to the cuts, then bandaged them with a layer of camouflaging, second-skin patches. They would help me heal without scars and also disguise the events of my evening from my family.
His fingers were gentle, and I relaxed into the chair back and closed my eyes, letting some of the pain flow away. Salve, bandage, repeat, until my little surface cuts were all clean, numb, and hidden.
When he finished, I tried to stand up, but he held me back down. “I’m not done yet.” He pulled out a can of numbing spray, pushed up my pant leg, and misted the bruise already forming on my shin from when I’d tried to kick the Oracle. “Feel better?”
“Yes,” I sighed.
“You did the right thing today. With Sam, I mean.”
“Did I?”
“Yes. We become what we need to, to survive. He doesn’t understand that. Someday he will, or he’ll die or cause someone else’s death because he can’t make the hard choice. But you can make those choices. That’s what leaders do.”
I thought I should put some strength in my spine, thank him, and leave. “Leader? Is that what I am? Because I don’t feel like it. I’m flailing just as much as the rest of them,” I said instead.
“But you don’t show it.”
“What am I doing right now, if not showing it?”
“I can handle it. Besides, I know that when the time comes, you’ll do what you always do when it counts.”
“And what is that?”
“You’ll get your way.”
We both laughed.
He sprayed the side of my face, noticeably avoiding eye contact. “I’ll be the first to tell you when I think you’re making the wrong decision. But as a leader, you did the right thing today. I understand that. I understand what you’re dealing with. And I know you’re not a stone.”
What? Was he offering support?
He clamped his mouth shut then, and finished spraying. “Okay, all done. You ready to go?”
“Yeah. Uh, do you think I could get a ride? Home, I mean? I’d rather not go on foot, and paying a transport pod leaves records.”
“Of course. Let me bring my bike around. I’ll come get you when it’s ready.”
I nodded silently, and when he was gone, slumped into the chair. I took my link sheath out of my bag and slipped it onto my arm. “What a crappy day,” I said into the silence.
YOU DON’T LOOK SO GOOD.
—Bunny—
“I’ve heard that one before. When do I ever look good, after a Trial?” I worried for a second Bunny must have cameras in the base to be able to see me, but then I realized he was using the ID sheath. He must have been waiting for it to be taken from its protective spot in my pack.
ARE YOU OKAY?
—Bunny—
I took a breath, and then another while my answer built in me. “No, I’m not freaking okay. Tonight, I killed three people! I—” I stopped myself, as I heard the resemblance to Sam’s earlier reaction. “Do you know what the Trials are like, Bunny?”
BASICALLY, YES.
—Bunny—
“No, not basically. Do you know?”
—Bunny—
“Let me tell you about them, then. I’ll try to help you truly understand. NIX takes kids, children, sometimes ones even younger than China. They put them into the Trials, places where nothing but monsters live, with no explanation and no help. Everything within the Trial is designed to either terrify or harm you in some way. Did you know, in my Characteristic Trial, a little boy died in my arms? He must have been younger than twelve. Did you know that, Bunny? Did you?”
NO…I DIDN’T KNOW THAT.
—Bunny—
“He was innocent. He did nothing to deserve this. Why would NIX do that to him? What kind of people could hold down a little kid and make him a Player, even knowing what it meant? That he could die in the acclimatization process, and that dying before becoming a Player might actually be the kinder option?”
Bunny didn’t respond.
“What about what happened tonight, then? We were trapped in cages where the floor rose up in the shape of our nightmares. We had to kill the person across from us to be released, so that we could live. If neither of us was able to kill the other, then both of us would die. What could possibly be a good reason to do that to a group of kids? To anyone? Do you seriously believe there’s some good purpose behind all of this? That they’re doing it because they need to? That’s what you told me, but I think you were lying. Bunny, let me tell you what the Trials do. They make us so desperate to survive that we’ll do anything for more Seeds. We’ll do anything to become less and less human, and further the course of this sick little experiment. We’re like little ants in a terrarium to them. You watch us, and you monitor us, and you give us drugs to enhance our performance, and do tests to examine our behavior.” My claws dug into the arms of the chair.
“Have you ever killed someone, Bunny?”
I waited a long while for him to respond.
NO, I’VE NEVER KILLED ANYONE. BUT YOU’RE TRYING TO SAY I HAVE KILLED, THROUGH BEING A PART OF ALL THIS.