3. The Game
3
The Game
B laze
As I pass the threshold into the small barebones lobby, I go into what I call my Terminator mode. There’s that scene in the first movie where you get a glimpse into what it’s like in the cyborg’s brain. He assesses everything as his computer-mind lays odds and suggests the best course of action.
I used this technique in the Army, but I don’t think I’ve ever needed it as much as I do today.
My guards pull me into the small room, cameras filming from every corner.
It’s what, maybe twelve by twelve in here, but there are eight guards, including the two who dragged me in. Other than an industrial-looking desk near the back right corner, the room is bare. At one time, maybe it might have held a few chairs, but they expect no one to sit and wait now.
A female Frain approaches me.
I’ve been in space for three years and I’m familiar with some of the many species that inhabit the galaxy. Frains are decidedly cockroach-esque with hard, brown chitinous exoskeletons and mouths that open sideways. I’ll admit, they’ve starred in some of my dreams. Well, my nightmares.
I know this one’s female not because she has breasts, which of course she doesn’t—she’s insectoid. I know she’s female because she’s wearing lipstick.
If I wasn’t in Terminator mode and if I didn’t have eight laser rifles pointed at me and if I had no desire to wake up tomorrow, I’d crack a joke about putting lipstick on a pig. Instead, I follow the action as I pretend I’m watching this on TV.
The two males who brought me tell her my name, which incidentally is not Blaze. My masters give me names they like. My current one is unpronounceable, but my subdural translator says it’s Slayer in Anthenese. It’s a laugh a minute up in space.
I’m forced at gunpoint to sign a fourteen-page contract with my thumbprint. I’m not given enough time to struggle through even the first paragraph, but the words “The Game” jump out at me in the translated English.
I’ve been accused of having more guts than brains, but not today. It would take guts to refuse to place my thumb on the computer screen. And then I’d be dead.
As I press my thumb to the screen, I notice a slick of blood under my boots. Looks like somebody earlier today had more guts than brains. See where it got them?
As soon as the legal portion of the event is completed, my old slave collar is replaced by a new one.
“It’s a tracker. Of course, it can still administer a shock all the way up to a killing level,” the reptilian guard informs me, his voice even and detached.
I’m nudged at gunpoint through the grungy doorway into the next room. When the door clangs closed behind me, the metallic sound of finality makes the hair on the back of my neck stand on end.
My nostrils flare, my eyes slit, and I swallow slowly.
Give nothing else away, Blaze , I order myself. Terminator mode. Assess. Figure out a plan to keep breathing.
The room looks like a 1950s high school gymnasium filled with a hundred aliens of a dozen different species. Let’s face it, I’m fucked. If all the felons, scavengers, and psychopaths surrounding me haven’t figured a way to break out of this holding area, I doubt I’ve got a chance. My best bet is to stay in Terminator mode, pick up on what kind of shitstorm I’ve been dropped into, and come up with a strategy to make it to nightfall.
Even though I haven’t had access to vids over the last few weeks, I’d have to be deaf, dumb, and blind not to have heard about The Game . They’ve been advertising it non-stop.
What was that phrase? Give them bread and circuses. I may not be on Earth anymore, but give humanoids more than a few square feet of land with a natural resource or two and they’ll fight over it.
At some point, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and then the oligarchs take over. Whether it’s Aeon II or Hyperion or Marentine, it doesn’t seem to matter. To keep the lowlifes in line, keep them distracted from the fact there’s more than enough to go around and no one has to go hungry. Give them a steady stream of brutal gladiator games. If that doesn’t quench their appetite for escapism, create The Game .
It looks like I get to be tonight’s entertainment.
In my mind, I replay the commercials I heard while working in the king’s kitchen. One of the red Halckons who worked there chopping vegetables couldn’t tolerate the quiet. He and I had a little fight going where he’d turn on the intergalactic equivalent of the radio and I’d turn it off. Ah, good times.
The intro began with sounds of laser pistols, and males and females screaming over loud hover motors. Then came the voiceover with a deep, urgent male voice that could hold your attention through an alien invasion. It had that little bit of reverb like the “Sunday, Sunday, Sunday” radio commercials of years gone by.
“This Arumsday you will see something that has never been done before in the history of the galaxy. Don’t miss out when your friends and neighbors talk about it the next morning. The Game.” Those last two words were always heavy on the reverb.
Another commercial went into more detail, “One hundred will enter. They will fight. They will run. But they won’t be able to hide. Remember, it all comes Down To One.” Down to One was heavy on the reverb, too. I’m not sure if it’s called The Game or Down to One. I guess it doesn’t matter.
I size up the competition. You know how in every civil war for the past eighty years there’s always a faction of bully boys riding around in their trucks with machine guns mounted on the back? They’re smirky and destructive and would gun you down without blinking.
They’re the “life is cheap” folks who sneer and jockey for position within their little faction. They’re psychopaths who enjoy killing.
Well, I think someone scoured every patch of soil on this planet to find a bunch of these guys and then brought them all together tonight.
There’s enough room in this dumpy holding facility to give the hundred of us enough space to break into gangs.
There are the shaggy blue guys over there, the seven-foot red Halckons over there, and the almost-milk-white ugly guys over there. The spikes that grace their browridges, wrists and ankles look like they’d be deadly in a fight.
A businesslike female’s voice comes over the loudspeaker, “The Game will start in one hour. If you wish to select out, you can assemble in front of the red door and be terminated before this process begins.”
Sweet. The staff will mercifully kill you before The Game begins. Kill you, that is, if you can remain alive while making your way through the crowd to the red door.
I stand perfectly still for a moment as my brain freezes. The producers of this mess are not-so-subtly telegraphing that choosing death right this minute might be better than proceeding with The Game. Bone-chilling. The implication is so stark, so foreboding, I actually consider the offer.
I’m a survivor. I can’t say I’ve survived worse—my gaze is drawn to the seven-foot-tall guy whose mouth is way too big and has rows and rows of shark-like teeth—but I’m not giving up.
Since everyone seems to have divided into teams, I look for an entry into one of the groups. I see a few females. They’re all over six feet and each seems firmly ensconced in a gang.
I seem to be the only singleton here. I’m voting me most likely to die first.
Titan
They don’t exactly pipe entertainment vids or news into the gladiator barracks. I’d never heard of The Game until an hour ago when Mistress mentioned it. It’s not like she and I did a great deal of talking when she ordered me to her quarters to service her.
I listen closely to the commercials playing on the hover’s comm system as they’re hyping tonight’s show. The premier of The Game, Down to One starts tonight. I assume that’s where they’re transporting me. Master had the physician dose me with a painkiller known for its doping effects. I’m not thinking too clearly.
“You must not pray to the right God,” the Branteen guard on my right says with no trace of malice. “You’re fucked.”
I lift my brow in question. There’s no reason for us not to talk. They’ve cuffed my wrists and ankles. There are three pistols aimed at me, and I’m so groggy I can barely keep my eyes open.
“The premier is tonight. My mate is recording it for me while I work my shift. It’s so brutal they’re suggesting no one under 18 watch it. It will take place right here on the outskirts of Corinthus.”
“What are the rules?” I don’t know why I ask. Certainly they’ll tell me the rules before it begins.
“There aren’t any.”
“Which arena?” I ask. I’ve been in melees before. They had dozens of gladiators and no rules. I’m still alive. I shouldn’t have to worry about The Game.
“No arena. The commercials have been short on specifics, so I looked online. No arena, no rules. People can help you, give you weapons, tell you where the others are. No one wins until everyone else is a confirmed kill.”
“99 to 1 odds, Titan,” the guard on my left offers helpfully, as if I couldn’t do the math. Even in my stupor, I figured that out.
The hover lurches to a stop and one of the guards announces, “Here we are,” in that cheerful way transport drivers do when they have a bus full of tourists.
They process me quickly and shove me into a cavernous room full of hardasses. I’d hoped my gladiator training could serve me well, but these guys are tough and they’re in gangs—safety in numbers.
Looks like my life just got stamped with an early expiration date.