Francis holds up three keys in one hand and reads from a tablet. “Welcome, finalists,” he says in a dull monotone. He points to the assortment of daggers, swords, crossbows, and spears set out on the table. “Each of you will be allowed two weapons to take into battle.” He holds out strips of yellow, lined paper. Susan rushes up to take one of the strips. Cate and I hold back, carefully scanning the weapons on the table.
We each write our character’s name on a slip of yellow paper. He puts them in a hat one of the guards holds out, mixes them a bit, then pulls one back out.
“Susan B. Anthony,” Francis calls. Susan steps up and reaches for a sword and a dagger.
“Catherine the Great,” Francis calls. Cate steps up and chooses a battle-axe and a dagger.
“Where are the men?” I ask.
“The men are waiting for you in the inner sanctum and are unarmed.”
Francis turns to me. I forgo the swords and spears—too cumbersome. I take the remaining dagger, consider a crossbow. Since we’ll be chasing each other in circles, I leave the crossbow behind.
Francis points to the door. “Once inside that door, you’ll enter the first circle.” He holds up three skeleton keys. “Inside the ice circles are obstacles. Only one key is needed to open the first door, and two keys together will open the second door, but to open the third door, you’ll need all three keys. Once a door is unlocked, it must remain unlocked.”
Francis continues as I strategize. “Each of you must wear the key on your left lapel.”
“And so we have to take a key from one of the others to make it through the second door?” Catherine the Great asks.
“That is correct,” Francis says.
“So we need to get all three keys to make it through the third door,” Susan says.
Francis nods. “So—we gotta kill our opponents to get their keys, right?” Susan continues. She slurs her words, then jerks her head from Francis to me with that sick smile. She’s not just on drugs—she’s drunk, too.
“No one said anything about killing,” Francis replies as he turns his head skyward. It’s as if he’s replying to a question from some lawyer or a viewer at home. “But please understand, these weapons are real. What you do with them is your business.”
He points to the scoreboard beneath the makeshift office overhead. Men and women with tablets and headphones move about behind the glass—hunched over screens, talking on phones; a VIP booth you’d find at a sports arena, only the men and women aren’t producers or press, and the game about to be called doesn’t have any real rules; these are the engineers he hired to deliver his baby to the world. These are the only gods Francis MacDonald prays to.
There’s a giant electronic map on the wall behind them; blinking red, green, blue dots. It’s not the kingdom of France that I liberated from the British, and it isn’t the dystopic world of the future he keeps sending us to. It’s the United States of America, and all those dots stand for people, watching, voting, waiting; all those ogling eyes, anxious fingers being primed to make history. But the map isn’t what attracts Susan and Cate and me. It’s the electronic scoreboard that hangs outside the giant booth about twenty feet overhead.
Catherine the Great (Stephanie Coombs)8,005,—.
Susan B. Anthony (Eve Lonnia)7,2—,—.
Jeanne d’Arc (Cease de Menich)7,—,—.
“These are the numbers of viewers showing in real time,” Francis exclaims like some ecstatic father looking down at his firstborn. “Not bad, considering when we started this crazy mess of reality-drama only four and a half months ago, fewer than five thousand tuned in for the WebTV trailers.”
23,537,464. The numbers blink, and I try not to blink staring them down. Francis presses a button on a remote he holds up to the scoreboard and our characters’ names flash across the screen in a column. “This is where each of you stands, based on the following question I gave to the viewers: If you could vote for the last girl standing right now, who would you choose?”
Beside each of our character names an ever changing series of votes appear. This is the largest live audience ever to tune into a streaming digital broadcast. What do the colors stand for? I don’t really want to know. But California is a Christmas tree of red and blue; the eastern seaboard mostly green; the Midwest a smattering of both.
These are the only gods Francis prays to. And no one is going to stop them from giving the world what he wants.
Catherine has resumed first place. I’m in second, but my number is so close to Susan’s that it’s probably a statistical tie. When I look from the electronic board down to Catherine’s face I can tell she’s been waiting for me to see her—she wants me to watch her transform, to be entranced by the magic, like a fly caught in her web. Over the whispered hum of conversations and the drone of those giant fans, I hear the gentle click of her heels and it’s like a wand has passed overhead; the flash and sparkle of her gorgeous eyes pull me in. I shift my gaze; remember Nina’s careful instructions…and in a fraction-of-a-fraction of a second, I see her weakness.
I can beat the ice princess.
There’s nothing like playing the underdog, Cease. Stay cool. Listen to your character.
One of the guards positions us before the first door in the same order we’d drawn from the hat. Lights begin to flash overhead as we insert our keys into the three slots. We turn our keys, simultaneously. After a series of clicks, the door opens. Francis steps up onto his crane and lifts silently like some genie stepping onto a magic carpet. But then it stops, and he looks down on us. Cameras on overhead wires spin and hover into place. Francis solemnly raises his hand like some bloodthirsty emperor in a coliseum.
“What happens in the next hour will determine your fate. May the odds be ever in your…” He has drawn out each word slowly, but now he stops, gives a huge grin to the cameras. “Wait. That’s just some silly movie. But this is a reality-drama.” I feel my heart skip a beat.
“Action,” Francis shouts.
Susan takes off, running counterclockwise. Her cleats make long strides on the ice. I wait for Catherine to make her choice. She heads in the opposite direction. I head toward Susan, run a few yards, stop—glance back, catch sight of Cate’s shoulder hunched low as she disappears around the bend.
I hear a scream that sounds like Susan. When I round the bend I see a large hole in the ice—what must have been a trapdoor. A hole in the ice has swallowed Susan? I inch to the edge of the hole. I see shadows through the darkness, but as I squint I see metal rods sticking up from snow-dusted plywood boards. The chasm is about nine feet wide—if I can get enough speed and these cleats stick…I take a few steps back and make a running leap. My right boot lands on the edge of the hole, but my left slips. I pull myself up and try to nurse my injured ankle. There are boot prints on the ice ahead of me. How?
It must be from the workers who set up the stage…only I thought I’d seen them carefully sweep down all the ice as we were waiting for Francis.
I look down the pit. I can lower myself down and find her—but it’s so dark…slowly, as if on cue, a light at the bottom of the hole comes on…I pull myself up, stand and look down into the darkness.
Where is she?
I feel a sharp pain from behind and let out a yell. Susan lets out a maniacal laugh as she drives her dagger into the back of my ribs. I scream. She pushes me to the edge…
“All’s fair in love and—” Susan says.
I spin against the knife and she drives it deeper into my back, and then I’m falling, feeling the blood soak against my skin. A jolt. Have I hit the first of the spikes down below?
I’m dead.
Or should be—only the jolt that traveled up from my feet through my chest has turned me around so I face Susan, who looks surprised, WTF surprised—as in, Why aren’t you falling down into the pit where I pushed you?
The jolt saved me, and is followed by an even stranger feeling—as if my body’s on autopilot and whoever’s taken over knows my weaknesses,
my wounds. I spin; my right foot comes up, kicks Susan in the back of her knee. She buckles, rises to grab hold of my wounded left ankle. I shake her off. I pull Susan’s knife out of my back and it slips from my hand, falls into the pit. I punch Susan in the face. Her head goes down to the ice. I fall on top of her, place my cleats against her outstretched hand, reach for my own dagger, hold it to her throat. I take her key.
There’s flashing above as digits on the electronic clock spin wildly, but I can’t see the names beside them. Susan’s unconscious. I stagger up, and slowly make my way around the final portion of the ice circle.
Framed between two snow-dusted hedges is a door. I’m dizzy. I pull myself up, fit the first key into the lock. The second. Blood’s coming from my mouth, dripping down my pants from my back, and filling my right boot. I turn the second key, slowly. I hear an electronic click…the door opens. I secure the keys, and just as I take my first step into the next circle, there’s a hand on my shoulder.
“No,” I cry as the hand pushes me forward and I go face first against the ice wall. Cate shuts the door behind me. Her hand grips the base of my skull, slams my face against the ice wall. I slump down—do a face-plant on the ice floor. I feel her warm breath as she pushes her mouth against my ear.
“Remember my offer, Cease.” Her voice is ethereal but her “offer” is as blunt as a Mafioso telling a fighter she has to go down in the third round. “I don’t want to kill you. We share the same blood…the same gift…there’s just no need to expose someone’s unfortunate past to twenty million people.”
I feel her cleats on the small of my back.
It’s a lie…you’ll kill me…you just want to do it slowly.
“My speech…it’s all right there…twenty million people will know how you killed your brother,” she says, sotto voce—her words feel like a giant needle she’s slowly drawing from my chest. Her mouth remains against my ear. “Did you fuck him first? Is that what your mother taught you to do?”
“I’ve got a speech, too, Catherine, and it’s about what real love feels like.”
“So be it,” she pronounces with dental precision. “I’ll be sending you back where you belong. You’re white trash from a trailer—”
“I’m not trash. I come from a long line of strong girls. I’m just as good as you—”
“Sure you are, honey. And I’m a genie in a bottle.” She turns her face up to the pool of light like an animal basking in a kill. Catherine preens as the cameras close in…I see my chance. I grab the collar of her tunic. She tries to shrug me off. She rises but I’m still attached. Her left foot slips on the ice, and when she goes down to her knee, I head-butt her and she falls backward. I grab her key before she can rise, and stuff it into my breast pocket. I jab my dagger into the ice wall and slowly pull myself up. Cate moves slowly, so I know she’s alive.
I round the bend, careful to search for another trapdoor, but as I look up I see a gigantic figure lumber toward me. It’s the giant that nearly took me out in the forest. He looks even taller than he did then, over seven feet. He’s in the same white jumpsuit we’re wearing, which makes it hard for me to see his arms and legs on the ice. His motorcycle boots are thigh-high.
He looks taller, Cease, because you’re barely standing up…and you’re bleeding, too…so much blood…you’re losing it. About to go down…
I wish I’d taken the crossbow. I could fire from here. He’s closing, making those lopes with his arms swinging, his knuckles scraping against the ice as he bares down. I go for my dagger. He’ll make the same lunge he did on the dry creek-bed and when he does, I’ll slice his neck—another step…he’s within arm’s reach. I lift the dagger. I stare helpless at my frozen fingers…My fingers are numb. I can’t feel the handle of the knife. The knife slides from my hand and lands at his gargantuan feet. He takes hold of my face, pushes me backward, and I do a complete somersault. My neck makes a muffled thud on the ice. I let out a cry and lie helpless. He takes slow, menacing steps as the cameras hover overhead. He’ll pick me up and drop me…he’ll throw me against the ice wall as the viewers scream for more. He reaches. I have one last chance. I grab my key from my tunic, hold the butt against my palm and the shaft tightly between my two middle fingers. I play dead. He picks me up by the shoulders, lifts me a few feet off the ice, drops me. My head hits the ice with a crunch. I still play possum, and when he draws his face near mine I can feel his foul breath. I jab the key into his left eye. The giant staggers backward.
I’m not done. I’ll never make it through the final door with him behind me.
I leap up as he contorts his face and goes down on one knee. I jump onto his back. He slams himself up against the wall and I feel my whole body crunch.
OK, now what? As soon as he stands up, I’m dead.
I take a few steps back and race toward him. I jab the key in the back of his knee. When he goes down on one leg, I kick him in the head. The sound of the giant’s head hitting the ice shakes the ice walls, and he looks like some demon falling into the depths of hell. I kick him again with the toe of my boot. He lies motionless as I back away.
I can hear steps behind me as I fit the keys into the final door, and close it as hard as I can. It could be Susan. It’s probably Cate. I turn and see an orchard of cherry trees, lightly dusted with snow. In the center of the final circle sits the stump of a tree—an axe is embedded in its innermost rings. I’m the first girl into the circle, and according to the rules I can improv until I get the signal for my speech. I know what I have to say to Brad. I know what I want everyone to hear.
Brad approaches from the shadows. I can’t find Craig as I shake my right boot and feel my foot sloshing in a pool of blood. It looks like Eve’s plastered her malicious glint on Brad’s face.
“Did Susan make you a man last night, Bradley?” I ask through clenched teeth. He advances to the stump, eyes the axe. He’s got bruises on his face and looks like he’s been crying. His eye’s swollen; his nose is bleeding onto the soft, real snow.
“Doesn’t look like she did a much of a job.” Whatever mercy I felt for boys like Brad has left the building. The crane carrying Francis silently lowers itself behind me.
I raise my dagger; stick it in the tree trunk.
“You want to pick up that axe, don’t you, Bradley?” My chest feels heavy. My lungs are clogged. “She must’ve put on quite a show for you. But you don’t look like a man now. You look like a scared little boy.” He puts a hand on the handle of the axe.
“Was that the deal you made with her? That you’ll be on the podium if only you could eliminate me?”
“There’s no turning back after you pick that up, Bradley.” I see a figure in the shadows of the trees on the perimeter of the circle. “No turning back on your manhood now,” I shout, but it comes out hoarse. I can taste and feel the blood dripping down my throat.
“You’re no good,” Brad shouts. “You killed your own flesh and blood.” He grabs the handle of the axe and works it out of the stump.
“You’re angry, Brad. You’re lost, too.” I take another step. Brad’s face is contorted, but not from the physical wounds. His hapless, innocent grin that nearly seduced me has morphed into a crude Joker’s leer…
“It’s not your fault,” I say. “I guess the journey into manhood is a lot tougher than just going all the way.” I don’t know where these lines are coming from, I just can’t think straight anymore. “Boys are taught to conquer girls like peaks, make them trophies; but I’ve found another kind of love, a love that can save you from all this heartache.”
“Susan tricked me,” he cries. “She told me we’d be together and all I’d have to do is eliminate you.”
“You mean kill me, don’t you, Bradley? Because make-believe’s over. We’re not just actors on a stage, Brad. We’re real people and this is what we face every day, not on a set but on the real battlegrounds at school and in the real world.” My head spins. My lungs feel as if they are slowly constricting.
Plea
se, Jeanne. If you’re really out there. I don’t want to go down until I give my speech.
The digits spin overhead. I take a step toward him. Brad’s face softens. I rise up to hug him—but as I reach his lips, he steps back.
“Jeanne, watch out,” Brad shouts.
I turn and see Susan, a dagger in her bloody hand. She takes a sideswipe at my throat. I block her with my wounded forearm. I wind up and punch her in the nose. I hear the same crack I heard when I punched Rex. As she goes down her shoulder catches a tree limb, twists her around, and she does a face-plant in the snow. Two grips shuffle their way onto the set and drag Susan off by her feet. I’m trying to recall who gets to speak next. I turn back to Brad.
“I did you a favor, Brad. She’s just not the kind of lover you need.”
“Cut.”
Francis touches down from the crane as his assistants hold up two whiteboards, one to Brad, one to me. Mine reads: You wanted a final scene with Cate. You got it. Francis hugs the camera console as the crane rises. He shouts, “Action.”
My eyes are swollen slits, but I can just make out a figure in the open door. It’s Cate. Craig appears from the shadows and makes his way to the stump of the cherry tree. What are the boys and girls back home thinking now? What do all the grown-ups really want to see?
Why didn’t I kill Susan?
Because that’s what Cate would’ve done. It’s her flaw —the blind ambition that I, too, have tasted. She may walk away with Craig. She may stand on the podium. But I want the whole world to see what real love looks like.
Cate emerges from the shadows of the cherry tree in his full, dress uniform. We square off. Or, Cate squares off and I drag my wounded legs and body to face her. Craig steps up onto the stump as if it’s the podium. Golden medals adorning his tunic glitter beneath the lights like a thousand suns.
I’m listing, as if Francis has shifted the entire set to a cockeyed angle. I’m bleeding. I’m dizzy. I will get only one shot at my speech. I see the signal come from the production assistant standing behind Francis on the crane.
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