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by Matthew Siege

  He sighed and closed his eyes. A small part of me felt bad for him, since he was obviously in pain over his decision to take part in all of this. "The future of the world is worth some necessary pain, even if it is you who has to feel it."

  I scowled. "That's easy for you to say. Is Evelyn around? She said she'd tell me the truth about everything, and I'm ready to hear it."

  "I will fetch her."

  Kyun leaned over and picked up the tray. Before I knew it he was gone, leaving me in the familiar company of a bank of machines whose sole purpose in life was to monitor the things that kept me going; heart, lungs, brain.

  It was the last one that held the ticking time bomb. The way Kyun had been speaking made it sound like I had been incommunicado for all of the thirteen days, even though I only got to experience a couple of them in the Citadel.

  Either something had gone wrong, or it was yet another twist in the tale they were carefully refusing to tell me. Whatever the reason, I'd just pissed away two weeks of what little life I had left.

  And for what? So that these assholes could jerk me around once I got back?

  Even now, I couldn't trust the passage of time. I drifted. There weren't any clocks on the walls, and I had no idea how long I waited. I took stock of the apparatus again and saw one that escaped my notice. This one was sucking out red stuff through one tube before eventually pumping it back into me through another. It was a dialysis machine, which meant that there was something wrong with my kidneys, too.

  Kyun must have given me enough of whatever that cocktail of his was to last for a while, since he hadn't consulted any charts or spoken to any nurses about additional doses.

  The door slid open again and Evelyn was there. She had another tray of food in her hands, and this one looked like it was piled high with stuff I was better acquainted with: burgers, corn bread, roast beef and mashed potatoes.

  "Knock, knock," she said, though her sing-song voice felt forced. She was trying to lighten the mood, but she wasn't very good at it. "I come bearing gifts."

  "Drop the act, please. The food's more than welcome, though."

  I'd thought the tone of my words might have had more of an effect on her, but she brushed them off and carried the tray to the narrow table that was stretched across the bed. "You have every right to be angry, you know."

  Up until now, everything was gasoline. The way I'd been brought here. My treatment thus far. The mental anguish and physical ailments. It was flammable, fuel for a fire I had been fighting.

  But listening to her give me permission to be 'angry', like I was some toddler still learning how the world worked...

  That was the match that let it all burn.

  "Do I, now?"

  She was halfway to standing back up after setting the tray down when she froze, sensing that she'd gone too far. "Hang on. I didn't mean it like that."

  I felt my rage rising, and I didn't know how to shut it down. "I don't care how you meant it. You promised me answers, and that's what you're going to give me. So spill, okay? No more bullshit. No tucking that stray lock of hair behind your ear the way you do or biting your lip while you think. I need the truth, and I need it now."

  She looked stunned, her eyes wide. "Adam, I'm here to help. We weren't allowed to—"

  "No," I said, cutting her off. "I don't need to hear your excuses. If you want to prove that you're on my side, you'll answer my questions without leaving anything out. Agreed?"

  Evelyn nodded, pulling up a chair to sit beside my hospital bed. "I can agree to that. It's us against all of them. If we start backstabbing and infighting, the Evvex have already won."

  I shook my head at her. "If that's the case, then chalk one up for the bad guys because I don't think I trust any of you. And if you're planning on lying to me, make sure I don't find out."

  She looked me in the eye. "I'm not going to tell you anything but the truth."

  "Then let's begin," I said, eager to get to it.

  "How are you feeling?" she asked.

  "Damn it, I'm the one doing the asking, and you're supposed to be doing the answering."

  She took a deep breath and sat back in the chair. "As you wish. Ask away."

  I tried to slow my brain down, fighting to kill the anger. I'd spent half of my life going off half-cocked, and the other half trying to clean up the mess that caused, which had left me with zero time left to learn from my own actions...

  "Okay," I said. "Um..." I was stuck having to admit that her question had been one that mattered to me. "How am I?"

  "Pardon?"

  "I mean, what's my status?"

  "Severe concussion. Three cracked ribs, one of which grazed your lung almost to the point of puncture. Lacerated kidney. Thirteen of the twenty-seven bones in your left hand are broken, and I doubt that number's a coincidence. Your knee will need to be reconstructed, and both of your ankles will have to be fused and implanted with titanium rods in order for you to maintain the mobility necessary to continue."

  I let out a low whistle. "Shit. Is that it?"

  "Not by a long shot, but those are the major injuries you suffered during your time in Labyrinth. We've never seen anything like it."

  "What happened?"

  "Ask me a few more things before we get to that, okay? The answer won't make sense if you don't. How about this? Let me start where I need to start, okay? Everything stems from the beginning, and you haven't been given enough information to inform your queries."

  "Fine. I don't have the strength to steer the conversation anyway. You talk, and I'll eat."

  "Thank you."

  I picked up a fork and started on the roast beef. Some of the IVs pulled painfully at my arm and one of them popped out, but I ignored it. Evelyn left it alone as well, so it probably wasn't an important one. "And no more lies," I reminded her.

  "I've never lied to you, but I understand what you mean."

  I was already scooping food into my mouth, gravy dripping down my front like I was a barbarian that hadn't eaten for weeks, which was pretty much the case. "Just start somewhere."

  "Very well." The tray had a knife and a spoon on it too. I hadn't touched either one yet. Evelyn leaned forward and delicately plucked the knife from the tray, holding it over the mountain of mashed potatoes. "May I?"

  "Do what you have to do."

  In response she used the knife to divide them neatly in half right down the middle. She widened the gap between the white mountain, and for a dizzying second of déjà vu it felt like I was back in a completely different doctor's office, staring down at a glossy graphic of the two halves of the brain as the doctor pointed out where my tumor had made its home.

  "What are you doing?" I asked around a mouthful of food.

  "I try to begin by reminding all of you that none of this is fair," she told me, resting the knife back on the edge of the plate. "It was before my time here, but a lot of smart, noble, diligent, and ethical people agonized over our decision before it was made. I don't think that will make it better. I know it doesn't help me sleep at night, but it is the truth. That's what I promised you, remember? But the truth isn't kind."

  I tapped my skull with the handle of the fork. "I get it. I've had some time to get used to staring down the barrel of a fact you can't run away from."

  She cocked her head and nodded. "Yes, I suppose you have. Anyway, suffice it to say that we made agreements that were in the best interest of the human race. At no stage, perhaps to our failing, did we let ourselves err on the side of the individual. I'm not saying we were right, but the alternative was even worse than what we've done."

  She took a steadying breath and absently licked a stray smear of potato from her finger before pushing on. "I feel certain that you're ready to agree that the universe is full of entities far more powerful than us. Most of the races that take part in the Citadel could end us on a whim. If the mood struck them, they could reach out in any of a hundred ways; viral, mental, nano, interstellar, trans-dimensional, intra-reality. The
y could snuff out our sun or crank it up to a supernova, land amongst us and tear us apart from within or put themselves into orbit near Jupiter and bombard us until we were nothing more than dust. Whatever they chose to do, we would have no reasonable method of retaliation."

  "Sounds like we're fucked," I said cheerily, mopping up the last of the beef and starting on the right side of her mashed potato visual aid. "Did you cut this in half for a reason? Because if you did, you better get to that soon. I'm hungry."

  Evelyn sighed. "This space station is the most technologically advanced thing the human race has ever built, and the best parts were part of an exchange with the Evvex. The artificial gravity? The new power source? The tools to build the Labyrinth itself? Those were gifts, granted to us once we agreed to terms."

  She looked down at the mashed potatoes, frowning when she saw how much of them I'd already eaten. "To them, you're either disposable or you're a Contestant. That's it. Plants, minerals, water, animals, and plasma and everything else the universe is made up of is no more than floating Debris, however useful. Contestants," she said, pointing at the mostly-gone side of the potatoes, "or Debris. Debris has no rights. Debris doesn't get a voice. Debris cannot and will not be granted a second chance to become anything other than Debris. You don't make war on Debris, you simply sweep it aside. Only Contestants are masters of their own fate, given voice and vote."

  "So, it sounds like the Evvex had us over a barrel," I said. "Either we agreed to their shitty terms in exchange for the somewhat dubious honor of becoming Citadel Contestants, or we end up the inevitable casualty of Galactic indifference."

  She nodded her head emphatically. "Exactly. And as bad as the terms were, to be honest with you, they could have been much worse and we'd still have jumped at them. Think about it! When powers like that give you a chance to count yourself amongst them, passing that up is suicidal. Which, speaking of suicide, is why you were not able to play out the rest of your time within the Citadel. You spent the remainder of your thirteen days in limbo there. That's the penalty for taking your own life."

  "Would have been good to know before I did it," I grumbled.

  "Would it have changed anything?"

  "Probably not."

  I avoided the rest of the potatoes for now and grabbed a hamburger instead. Once I'd gotten started, I asked between bites, "So what were the terms?"

  Even though I'd told her not to, Evelyn bit her lip for a second as she worked out how best to answer. "The Citadel is a complex beast. In theory, every race in the Citadel has a chance to conquer the top floor and own it, at least until they themselves are thrown down. I have spoken of the Evvex, and you weren't surprised. Did you meet one?"

  "I cussed one out, and I know they're the guys at the top..."

  She frowned, clearly wanting to know more but getting back to her explanation instead. "Correct. And they have been for a long, long time. Whoever's on the top floor runs the game, but the Citadel is older than any of them. The Evvex have just had the most practice because they've been top dog the longest."

  "Hang on a second," I said, swallowing a final bite of burger. "Because I think I see where this is going. All of these mighty races found a tournament generator, and they're using that to settle their disputes?"

  "Pretty much. We think the Citadel found them, actually. But yes, all of their conflicts are settled within it."

  "So why'd they let us in to their club?"

  "We don't know."

  "That sounds ominous..."

  "It is. The Evvex offered to vouch for our entry into the Citadel. If we refused, we would be classified as Debris for all time. If we accepted, they stipulated that we must take the top floor within our first one hundred and thirty years of participation. Before you ask, they never explained a reason for the stipulation or the number itself."

  I felt a cold line of fear press into my side and worm up toward my heart. "What happens if we can't?"

  Evelyn shrugged. "Then our race will be enslaved."

  "You bet the entire human race on a game?"

  "We had to," she said. "If we were Debris, they'd have been well within their rights to do much worse to us. They put a gun to our heads and we bought ourselves time."

  I took a deep breath and held it before letting it out in a sigh. "Humans have a hundred and thirty years to turn their Citadel presence into a victory?"

  "Yes."

  "And if we can't, then they own us?"

  Evelyn nodded. "Every man, woman and ch—"

  I interrupted her. "I don't suppose they told you that there were already humans in the Citadel though, right?"

  She recoiled as if I'd thrown water at her. "What?"

  I nodded. "I met them. Neve, the one who's been in the longest, didn't even know what a fucking video game was. I'm no historian, but that must mean she's been in the Citadel for at least a century, maybe more."

  Evelyn got up in a hurry. "I have to research this woman to find out who she is. We need to know how much longer we actually have before the contract expires."

  I held on to her arm before she could go. "Wait a second. You still haven't told me why I'm so beat up."

  She was distracted now, and had obviously decided that the best way to deliver the news was to rip the Band-Aid off, and so she blurted, "The race that runs the Citadel's top floor can drop in on any of the Contestants' bodies while they're 'playing'. They've never bothered us before, but we built the Labyrinth just in case. One of them has spent the last thirteen days doing as much damage to you as he was able."

  "Crap..."

  She reached for me, laying her hand on my arm. "I'm so sorry. We don't choose the Contestants, if it makes you feel any better. Every race has a console, and the next individual capable of engaging with the Citadel appears on that screen."

  I didn't know whether to laugh or cry, and I guess I shouldn't have been surprised when I did a little of both. "So the whole time I was in the Citadel—"

  "The Evvex was in you. That's the reason that your suicide in game didn't let you respawn. The Citadel punishes you for ending your life at your own hand, but it does so by simply keeping you there until your stint is up. I guess the thinking is that it wouldn't be fair to the Evvex if you could jump off a cliff over in that world and prematurely end the time they have to work through the Labyrinth in this one."

  "Well, by all means," I chuckled, "the last thing I want is to treat the Evvex unfairly. When does the rest of my team get back to the Station?" I said at last.

  "Isaac will return in a little less than an hour."

  "Send him in here when he does, okay?"

  Evelyn nodded. "I'll make sure of it."

  "Thanks. And when you're looking into Neve, start with military records. She told me she was in the Army."

  "On it," she said. "Have you got any more information about her to give me? A last name or a location?"

  "Nope. I know it's a matter of finding a Neve in a haystack, but we don't have much choice." I thought for a second about not revealing the names of the others, but I'd already broken my promise to Neve. If any of her crew would be the key to finding out how long she'd been in there, so be it. "There's a guy named Zane in there too, and a Chinese woman named Jia from the PLA, whatever that is. A man named Peter, though that doesn't help, and another one who supposedly used to work at Los Alamos a long time before he entered, a Dr. Ford."

  She hurried out, and I sat there wondering how much time we had left before the Evvex claimed the planet. In the end, it was a little hard to pretend that it mattered to me personally, since my number would be up long before Earth's was...

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  My intention had been to find out where Isaac's room was and head there right away. I knew that would mean arriving before he was out of the Labyrinth, but I was worried that if I didn't stake my claim in there early on, Kyun or Evelyn would prioritize my recuperation over my need for more info and 'forget' to put us in the same room.

  I still ha
dn't decided how much to trust them. Sometimes I was sure that I was letting the people running the show off the hook without cause, but even I could only be pissed off for so long before reason trickled back in.

  I had to accept the reality that they may simply be doing the best they could in the face of two impossible choices. After all, if the Evvex had come to me with the same conditions, could I really pretend that I would've done anything different?

  I wanted to lie to myself that poor, sick, brilliant Adam would have found a perfect solution where everyone else had seen only despair. Smiling hurt, but I smiled anyway. The truth was that I'd have signed on the dotted line just like they had, and counted myself lucky in the bargain.

  Evelyn had been right about one thing. No matter how high the cost of entry into the Citadel, the repercussions of not competing were far more dire. Even sacrificing thirteen lives for the sake of all the rest was a simple decision to make.

  So, I asked myself through another wave of the migraine that had decided now was as good a time as any to step up its game, if you couldn't have done any better, when are you going to cut them some slack?

  At least that question was easy for me to ignore, since the pressure in my skull was quickly becoming the only thing I could focus on.

  I felt like I was going to black out, which made me try to grab on to the facts I'd just learned in order to stay grounded. The Evvex had tricked us with a victory deadline that would only give us a much shorter reprieve than we'd thought. Worse, while I was in the Citadel I had a visitor beating the shit out of my body in an attempt to either punish me or escape the Labyrinth.

  Neve's abduction was the key to a lot of this. The Army connection gave me hope that Evelyn would be able to call up her service record and find out when she went AWOL. Not for the first time, I wished that I'd been smart enough to press Neve when she’d dodged my question about what year it’d been when they took her.

  Oh well. I guess I'd know soon enough.

  Still, I had a sinking feeling in my gut. The Evvex appeared to be far more cunning than we'd given them credit for, and I didn't think they were pulling the hundred and thirty year deadline out of their ass.