January 23, 2073, Old York, Alan Walker.
The suited men drag my trembling frame down the long, bleak, narrow hallway. It feels infinite.
I am thrown into a massive, packed room filled with a sea of people wearing expressions drastically different from mine.
They all look pleased.
A stream of bodies continues to pour in through four steel doors opposite my point of entry.
Why was I the only one dragged in here?!
An array of mahogany tables is meticulously arranged throughout the corporate, office-like space. Cubicles would be more fitting than these tables, topped with Halo-Display watches.
"Pick up a watch and place it on your right hand where your I.I.D. is!" a guard yells, repeating the words a couple of times to get it through to us.
Holy hell, I heard you the first time.
I pick up a watch and follow his order. The watch flickers out its Halo-Screen with a rapid double tap of my finger, displaying my height at 5'6", my weight at 105 pounds, my heart rate at 109—and... a rating?
The Six Trials of Olympia are displayed beneath my physical attributes. All but mind are ranked as N/A. Mind is ranked at...
A-
I guess I'm not the star student.
I swipe my finger to the left; the screen shifts, displaying three things. The top-left corner of the screen displays my Amount at...
11 million?!
Who the hell is dropping 11 million dollars on me?!
Feeling both flattered and disturbed, I look at the number to the right.
#3
What is the calculus behind #3?
I'd only deduced the truth of the game in the final moments—why would that make me #3?
Then I look at the large symbol beneath the two numbers and see—
the Sigil of a Cognate.
I quickly double tap the watch, closing out the display.
I really should have looked at that one first.
My head whips around, eyes scanning for any sign of notice from the other players or the HWs—though the HWs probably already know.
"Birthday Boy! Over here!" a man chirps, like a tone-deaf hummingbird.
There's no way.
"I'm glad you passed!" Giddy says.
How the hell did he pass the Trial of Mind?!
"Oh, you made it. Good job, I guess." I mutter, refusing to meet his eyes.
"Just barely! That test sure was tough."
Test?
"What—what do you mean 'test'?" I stammer, a cold dread coiling in my stomach. I know damn well the game I'd just survived couldn't be mistaken for a test.
"The test they had us take! Well, I didn't see you in my room, but you did take it, didn't you?"
I see.
They must've separated the higher-Sigil men from the rest. Of course. There were obviously too many people here for individual interviews—so only a select few played in the true Trial of Mind.
And that means—
There are two other players who performed better than me.
"Yeah, I did! I just barely passed, I think. Tests are pretty nerve-racking for me." I say.
"Oh, I'm sure you did better than me though. I got 67th. How 'bout you?"
That's not bad, considering the hundreds of players who must be participating. Perhaps his demeanor is a calculated facade—though I wonder about the passing rate for this test.
"Yeah, I'd really rather not say. It's too embarrassing, honestly." I faux anxiously chuckle.
I look around at all of the pleased people sliding on their watches.
Of course—no one here knows the truth of this game:
that almost everyone here is going to die.
"Everybody! Go through the doors!" HWs repeatedly shout, funneling people through multiple large, rusted garage doors to the right of where I was dragged in—leading them into what I can make out as a giant, open warehouse.
Even this hopelessly optimistic man in front of me.
He most certainly—
is going to die.
"Looks like it's time for the next game! What do you think it's going to be? A race, I hope! Ohhh, I bet I'm faster than you!" Giddy says as we walk toward the doors.
"Answer me. What happened to the people who left the testing room?" I ask.
"Didn't you see? They were just escorted out... why?"
So only the smart get to die?
We enter what feels like a vast, cavernous abattoir, ever more crowded as a flood of people pours in from the tower through the garage doors.
"Listen to me. Forget about 'becoming a player.' That's not what this is. Look around you. This isn't a test. It's an auction block. And we're not the bidders; we're the damn livestock."
"Wait... you mean this is for real? We could... die in here?"
"Some of us. The ones who stand still. The ones who trust the cheery music..."
"The ones who think it's just a game."
And the ones who talk too much.
My eyes desperately scan the chamber for any point of egress, any structural flaw. On my toes, I peer over a sea of troubled heads. I can see huge, rusty shutter doors along the long flanks of the warehouse, but the far end is sealed by a monolithic concrete wall. Multiple steel double doors are set into that wall, where most of the HWs have drawn a hard line, pulse rifles at low ready. More are stationed along the edges—observers. Predators.
None are back here. An oversight.
High above the double doors, a single word is painted in vibrant, almost mocking graffiti: GOAL.
"A goal? Is this Race?" a voice murmurs from the buzzing crowd.
Is it not obvious?
led from the fattening pen to the abattoir.
It's battle.
"The shutter doors on the flank! It's our only chance!" I scream to Giddy over the roar.
I have to warn the others. All of them.
The thought is a pure, stupid instinct. A hero's impulse I can't afford.
But I'm not escaping.
I have to win.
"Everyo—"
A spurt of white-hot agony lances through my head, as if a rod of pure electricity has been jammed behind my eye. My eyes blur. Nausea surges up the back of my throat and stifles all unnecessary thought under a wave of sickness.
No.
A clinical, unfeeling lucidity pierces the pain.
Don't. It's a waste.
They wouldn't listen. They'd just create a stampede. They can't hear me anyway.
Survival. That's the only rule that matters.
Focus.
When the cold, hard thought gets its hold, the pain seeps down to a throbbing, dull ache—a leash drawn taut, then released.
The thoughts are right. Saving them is a tactical impossibility.
But so help me God, I can still save this one.
With that foolish thought, a residual pain resonates.
We struggle forward into the packed throng of bodies, making hasty progress toward the Goal before the game can commence.
The upper girders flicker—blink, flash, blink—in a rhythmic, hypnotic pulse that transforms the pandemonium-tossed crowd into a stuttering, reeling mass of darkness. I can't tell which way we're moving.
Blasts of saccharine, irritating pop music emanate from hidden speakers, a nastily upbeat background to increasing desperation. I shove through the sea of bodies, the gap between us dwindling to nil. Giddy lags behind, his high-pitched chattering—a mixture of excitement and fear—mostly masked by the cacophony.
We're about two-thirds of the way there, angling hard for the wall. For the shutters. We finally reach them, slamming our hands against the cold, corrugated steel.
Locked. Bolted tight. Of course.
"The shutter! Help me get this open! You have a family—get back to them! NOW!" I roar, the words ripped from my throat.
He actually has a life to fight for. I just have spite and instinct.
"Why?!" he screams back, his voice cracking with confusion. "Are you sure?! What if this is a trick?!"
Because you seem a good man, you fool. And this place is fueled by the souls of good men.
["Hello, Players!"]
The Witch's voice echoes, laced with a syrupy, joyous venom. Momentarily halting my movements.
["Welcome to the second game: Beat Down Brawl!"]
It's fine. With our combined strength, we should be able to burst it open.
["The game of..."]
"Help me!" I snap at the man.
With all our strength, we try to pry open the doors.
["Battle!"]
Clank
After the Relinquishing, a desperate man's strength can tear metal. We weren't just given power—we were made into weapons: a world full of loaded guns with the safeties taken off. Who knew we were all this dangerous?
The lock breaks off—the door flies up and open.
Revealing...
A solid cement wall.
["To advance..."]
We stand there, breathless. In the sudden, profound silence, an HW laughs—a short, barking sound of pure contempt.
"W-what does this mean?!" Giddy looks at me, all hope torn from his eyes.
["Simply eliminate one other person!"]
Upon hearing the harrowing words, I turn to see many men eyeing me and Giddy, greedily scouring for easy targets, pushing through the chaos of flying fists, charging toward us.
["Begin!"]
Giddy looks horrifically at the wave of barbaric men tearing through the gory scene of men juxtaposed to more inviolable men making the former appear more akin to boys, women screeching a deafening hymnal of death, reverberating in my ears, mushing together in my mind, creating a sinister harmony of yelps.
Giddy's head is smashed, crashing in the clean, new concrete wall, his vacant eyes turned to me as my body is beset by many men on all degrees at my front. The men akin to boys pile on the most seemingly boyish of all. Weak men. Corrupt men. Disgusting, despicable men throw pathetic strikes at my foundering body. I crumble beneath myself, twisted in incorrect positions from the wrangling of men with arms the size of my head.
My spine is bowed, kowtowed beneath a mountain of frantic flesh. My mind screams desperate signals to my legs, fighting desperately not to be submerged. And yet, even while I am battered and beaten, there is some corner of my mind with a strange, cold calm. The head rattles, but within that head my mind is lucid, as if I were watching from the serene seat of a chessboard.
I have been here before.
In grimy pits and illegal arenas, I have been cast as the sheep for wolves and their kings far too many times. Not every game was a victory. I have lost. I have scraped by on pure, ugly grit. I have been in better positions, had better odds, been in better shape than this. But my fight has never been for first place, or even just for survival.
I fight to live.
My mother had always told me to live for more. To live is more than I have ever fought for. I only ever fought for her. I fought for her health. Her home. Her well-being. Her beautiful eyes of inspiring light like the seagull-filled skies of yesterday. To be looked at and loved; to be seen, heard, and helped. A guiding light to show me the path of tomorrow.
A tomorrow that I will see.
When the sun arcs over the world, eradicating the darkness of tonight—like a dream sent to calm the nightmare before.
Only then will I truly know—
That tomorrow is here.
My body gives in to the men ruinously contorting my feeble frame.
I sink.
Submerged. A sunken vessel crushed beneath the pressure of a fat, fleshy ocean. My body is under siege, a wreckage primed to break, but my mind remains a fortress—a cracking one, perhaps, but a fortress nevertheless.
Above the men form a toppled, raven pyramidal ruin—a lion pride tearing at the corpse of a gazelle.
I don't blame the poor pride. Even as my own breath gutters and fails, I feel no malice. These men are just like me: animals fighting for the next scrap of meat, for the privilege of another sunrise.
But I am not meant to be a marvelous tragedy—the Titanic, destined to sink in a blaze of celebrated glory.
I am the Olympic. The beast before the legend. The ship that met the U-boats and came home. A survivor. A warrior. A fiery, reliable engine of purpose in a sea of ice.
I am not the one who sinks.
My arm finally breaks free from its joint-popping prison, a gasp of freed motion in the crush of bodies. There is a man laid diagonally across my stomach, his face a mask of panic, his situation as dire as my own. His arm is a greasy bar against my neck, fingers scrabbling to cut off my windpipe. Animal desperation.
My mind does the cold geometry of pain.
I don't fight his strength. I redirect it.
Stiffening my neck, I use my right hand to wrench his arm up and over, using the very weight of the pyramid above us as my fulcrum. I drive his own shoulder past its breaking point, crushing the joint. An imperfect, agonizing, but brutally effective kimura.
The pressure on my throat vanishes. I gasp, pulling in a ragged, oxygen-starved breath—not enough, but it's enough. My left arm, now free, snakes under his neck, my hand searching, finding purchase. I pull it through. A needle through the eye of a storm.
My mind hazes then, a retreat into pure, necessary instinct. The body takes over.
My arm contorts into an awkward position it was never meant to take, an unconventional choke that is lethal only for the inexorable downward pressure of the crowd. My joints scream in pain, but for this single moment, pain is only something to be sacrificed. For the sake of survival, I am impervious.
I tighten and tighten.
My watch buzzes, presumptuously notifying me of my passing.
And thus, I weave the strings of fated death for this faceless lion.
I desperately shoot out my arm from the mass of men and latch on to the metal frame of the roll-up door. At last, I struggle free from my broken form, tumbling out of the twisted mass of bone and flesh. The strobe-like, flashing lights of the abattoir whirl around my face, illuminating the blood and grime. My lips twist back into a grin that is not mine, a feral, elated grin I do not recognize.
I am alive.
I wriggle. I struggle. I pull.
I fight.
All for a dream.
For now, only a dream for tomorrow.
The flashing lights are no longer a maddening whirl. They are a promise. A shattered, strobe-lit glimpse of a dawn I fight for; of the sun that will incinerate this interminable night.
They call this a game. They call this a test. They are wrong.
This is a rise. The goal is up there, a single point of light in an ocean of darkness. And these bodies—they are not tragedies. They are not victims.
They are rungs on a ladder.
Their dying screams are the thunder of my ascension. Their broken wills are the crimps I must grip. Their lost hope is the breeze at my back. It is the price of my tomorrow.
And if the cost of that singular beam of light must be a mountain of fallen souls.
Then so be it.