Chapter 23- Hostiles

  My stomach knots. I’ve never felt like retching before a drill until today.

  Was it a mistake to increase the stakes? I’ll lose my Govon bag now! No—I refuse to let these thoughts crowd my head, it’s making me sick.

  “I call dibs on the bike, by the way,” Raven says, an elbow to mine. Her tone was too jovial for me to digest. “I know how to ride one.”

  “Congratulations,” I reply, flatly. “All yours.”

  “You can have everything,” Viper says. “I just want to keep my dress.”

  Her famous wedding dress from her debut movie. She was a side character, but a beloved one, and that one wedding scene stole everyone’s heart.

  “I can’t believe you bet that,” Raven says.

  “Well, I had to match her Govon bag,” Viper replies, an arm over my shoulder as if we’re best of friends. “We got this! I have a good feeling we’ll win.”

  Only those two, while the rest of us sulk in silence. This lineup of players isn't the worst in hindsight. Given that they’re all better shots than I am, my incompetence is not the reason for their discontent.

  There’s a long history of unsettled quarrels between us. From my rough first year where I laid hands on them, and fucked up their face, to the years in between, with numerous times I betrayed them in a drill just for a win. The tension between us only amplifies in this small cell.

  At least Viper and Raven are obliviously diluting it with their empty excitement.

  I let out a sigh. “Me, too.”

  The countdown begins, red light pours over us. When the door opens, I’m the first to slide out. Carefully. The only light source came from the red door cell, illuminating the narrow pathway. Other than that, it’s dark and damp. A sewage tunnel? The ground is firm but slippery under my boots. Thin pipelines stretch across the walls. Both sides are equally threatening, with no indication of which direction to begin.

  “We need to find a way out of here,” I say to no one in particular. I ready my AR with one arm and the other against the wall, and begin walking. “Stick to the left.”

  A lesson we learned a few semesters back. If we were ever lost in a maze or strange building, the trick was to keep to one side, and eventually, we’d find our way out. Time-consuming, but I see no other option in this rat tunnel.

  I’m about twenty feet deep from where we started before we hear the cell door slam shut, knocking a gasp out of everyone. When the echo wanes, something else sounds. The pop of a pipe followed by the flood of water. It’s not just one, but multiple screws fly off their hinges. A stream of them sprayed us all.

  “Oh, what the—” cried a boy named Croc.

  After a few more seconds, we smell the brininess of the sea. Not nanophene or any tech, but tapped from a real body of water. The sickly touch of ocean water dripping down our suits. Then it’s not long after that the water begins to flood and rise over our heels before we realize what Cerena meant by water terrain.

  I glance down both ends again to find another way out. But it was all pitch black, except for a kinetic shine like a white flower petal on water. After a second take, I realize it’s a reflection of light on the surface of the waving water.

  “There's light,” I say and lead the way through the flood. The water splashes and batters as we trudge through the dark.

  A short metal-grate stair comes into view, and we climb up without another thought.

  At first, I suspect we’re back in the default view of the gray Arena box with the soaring arched ceiling and cement walls. Only when I reach the top do I see the rest of the space. Every angle is filled with steel, iron beams, ventilation tubes, and stairs that lead to open levels with more unrecognizable machines—large interconnected generators in the middle of the floor. We’re in a nuclear power plant.

  From the industrial era. Everything is bleeding rust, abandoned from nuclear war, decaying. I blink rapidly, before my mind confuses the streaks of rust against the walls with real blood.

  I take a few careful steps onto the ground floor. Any insignificant weight wakes the deep slumber of this place with an eerie yawn of metal. The echoes bounce against the hollowness, announcing the depth of the space. Across the generators, there’s a dark corner where the lights from the shattered windows don’t illuminate. The walls there are charred black, scarred by intense heat. The railings and floors there have melted and sunk into a chaotic gorge.

  Raven sweeps me up and down before propping up my AR correctly back in my arms. “Eyes open, Princess. We’re in Hostile territory.”

  Others shift their weapons, ready as they overhear us. Right. Eyes up. At ground level, the power plant is stadium-sized and half as tall, then slims toward the center. Then it’s only up from there, with multiple levels of floor where I can barely see the skylight filtering down, a perfect place for hide and seek with Hostiles and players on the Red team.

  “Anyone seen a Hostile yet?” I ask.

  We all spread a few steps away, not far enough to accidentally wander off, in search of any threats.

  “We also need to move up,” Raven says, staring at the rising water from the sub level, touching the halfway mark. “I don’t think the flood is stopping anytime soon.”

  “What are we going to drown?” Croc replies. “It’s just nanophene, isn’t it?”

  To be sure, a handful of us take off our velm, revealing the skeleton of the drill. The billions of blue atoms that make up the pipes, generators, and stairs of the powerplant. Everything is blue except for the flood, spewing from the wall.

  “It’s real, alright,” says a girl, Scorpion. She sighs heavily. “That’s why there’s a medical team—in case we do drown.”

  A few of them curse under their breath.

  “Fuck it, whatever,” Croc cries, raking through his hair and shaking away this distress. “Do we take the staircase up?”

  “Shouldn’t we locate the vault?” Viper weighs in. “I mean, that’s our goal.”

  I cut a glance around us. “The place is too big to know for sure what we’re looking for. I think we should head up for now. Get ahead of the water. There’s no downside to being on high ground.”

  There are a few nods, but of course, there are a couple who challenge everything I say, like Croc. But I go anyway despite any protest. There’s a balcony rail on the side that brings us up to the endless floors of stairs. By the time I reach the base of the stairs, a loud thud bangs behind me like equipment has fallen off the edge and dropped onto us.

  We all swing our heads and ready our AR at the noise. At the top of the generator sits a bulky, furry animal with four limbs gripping the metal edge—a gorilla.

  For a second, I don’t believe my eyes. The animal is larger than I expected, its hefty weight crushing the metal pipes. Every strand of charcoal fur flows in the wind, its chest breathing with life and a low hum of charging aggravation. Mouth agape just enough for us to see its gnarly, yellowed fangs, eyes large, untamed, and vicious.

  “Is that the Hostile?” says a shaky voice.

  Before anyone can answer, the noise must’ve triggered the animal. Its large eyes scan us all before snarling, its foul breath palpable from this distance. It beats on its chest before leaning back, pulling on the weight of its arms, and launching itself at us.

  I shoot. We all do. Spread backwards and let the gun rip. Gunpowder brushes under my nose, flashes burst corners of my vision. The ape vanishes at the peak of the air, standing no chance against our modern technology. No wonder they all went extinct. It’s so easy to get rid of anything that can’t keep up with the times.

  The gun is still warm in my palms when I realize I used the whole clip. And I’m not entirely sure any of my bullets landed on the Hostile.

  “An overkill,” I grumble. Without knowing exactly how many Hostiles are left plus the players on the enemy team, we’re one magazine down from the start. “Did it at least drop something?”

  Please get this over with.

  My prayers aren’t heard. There’s nothing but the afterimage of the gorilla fading away into pixels. I suck on my teeth and reload as I ascend the stairs. I keep one eye on the creaky stairs so I don’t fall into what seems like a nuclear reactor pool, and the other on another gorilla that might fall out of the sky. The moment I reach the top of the stairs, a girl from our team screams.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Instinctively, we all swing towards the noise, expecting another large ape. But our barrels pause on the girl tumbling on the ground, a vibrant forest-green snake entwined around her leg. Its mouth wide open, clasping on her outer right thigh, no amount of rattling can shake the serpent away. And no one dares to pull the trigger on their own teammate.

  We all freeze for a moment, watching the girl cry and struggle with the reptile on her own, not knowing what to do.

  Viper slings her AR over her back and rushes over to the poor girl. She unsheathes her knife. One hand chokes the serpent's trachea, the other beheads it. The cold-blooded serpent uncurls from her leg and glitches out the moment it hits the ground.

  No key.

  “Fuck,” grunts the bitten girl, her chin props up, wincing through her teeth.

  Viper tears through the fibersuit with the ragged edge of her blade, revealing her pale skin and the distinct bite marks left by the Hostile.

  “Is it venomous?” the girl asks.

  Viper examines her wound. “I believe that was a Craspedocephalus macrolepis pitviper. They’re all venomous.”

  “But it’s nanophene, isn’t it?” Croc says, then cuts a glance around for confirmation.

  The girl takes deep breaths. “I’m not going to die…am I?”

  Viper retracts the lower part of her velm, exposing her pursed lips. “Hold onto something,” she says, then scoots back on her knees. She lowers her lips onto the open wound and begins to extract the toxin, then spits it out. The thick slob is deep red and drooling from the side of her lips. Viper does so rapidly and effortlessly, like she’s trained for this. Many of us peel away from this scene, like we’re intruding on a surgeon performing surgery, and let her do the job privately.

  Raven climbs up a few steps and joins me. “Did she say pitviper?”

  I nod. “Like her. Viper.”

  “That gorilla before,” another boy joins in, “was a Silverback gorilla. That's my buddy on the other team. Silver.”

  A few of us exchange thoughtful looks. It can’t just be a coincidence that two of the Hostiles are from our aliases. That these aren’t just random animals chosen from a spinning wheel.

  “The whiteboard in the lobby,” I point out. “Maybe it’s not a list of attendance.”

  From high above, a feathery bird spreads its wings, fluttering across the ceiling and casting a shadow over us. Its cry echoes in the vast space.

  “A hawk,” Raven says.

  “Or Falcon,” I add. “Either way, that confirms it. We’re the Hostiles.”

  There are twenty of them. Eighteen left to go unless the eliminated targets respawn. But that wouldn’t make sense since only one of them drops a key.

  I sweep around the Arena. The hollowness no longer feels empty as it did before. I list the animals above everyone’s head to keep it in mind when Croc curses.

  “Fuck. That means we’ll have to fight a polar bear.” He clutches his weapon close. “Do you—those things are terrifying. They—they deliberately hunt for humans. And…” His gaze snaps to me. “And we’ll have to deal with your fucking tiger, too! This is…we’ve descended to hell.”

  “A jaguar,” I correct, stifling any signs of fear. I’ve never seen a polar bear before, nor a jaguar, and if possible, I like to keep it that way. “Just stay away from water.”

  Speaking of which, is beginning to pool on our level.

  “Those things walk on land,” Croc continues. “They swim and they—”

  “So do we,” Raven says. “And we have guns. Let’s get going before they reach us, huh, Croc?”

  Raven and two others help Viper and the bitten girl up. Her wound is slightly bruised purple, but she’s able to walk on her own with a slight limp.

  Faint gunshots echo from the far end of the Arena—red team. Though much of what’s actually happening is hindered by the distance, it’s not hard to picture what they’re dealing with. From the noise, we’re not as far apart as I imagined. But they’re a problem for later.

  When the ten of us make a formation and are ready to go, a loud growl bounces off the walls—the roar of a tiger. We snap up to the noise. Up and far away at an undetermined level is a tawny beast treading to the edge of the rail. His back is hunched, as his broad shoulders alternate in between each step, ready to pounce on any prey in his way, all the graceful movement of a king. When he halts in the open for all of us to see his great glory, it roars again. Those prominent, long, and curved fangs challenge us to raise even a finger at it.

  Then it pivots back into the shadow as quickly as it came.

  We all freeze there without a word, enticed and petrified by the beauty of the beast. If not for the pooling water to remind us of the time, we’d be trembling and crumbling to our knees.

  My shoulders drop after another moment. I clutch my AR close, a trembling finger on the trigger, as if my shooting skills can save my life. Counting that and the rest of the remaining Hostiles on the roster, the magazines on my hips suddenly feel light.

  “What the fuck is that?” Croc says under his shaky breath.

  No one answers him, as we all should know.

  “The Smilodon,” I say anyway, accepting what we’re dealing with. “The prehistoric saber-tooth tiger.”

  Raze’s tiger.

  Saber.

  Even when the Saber disappears, my heart continues to race, knowing it’s not far from a lurking corner. And am I just supposed to go up there? The Saber, Jaguar, and Rhino are all waiting above us. But if we don’t go up, the Crocodile, Bull shark, and possibly the Polar bear are just swimming beneath the surface of the water. We’re nothing but the slices of meat sandwiched between apex predators.

  We’re fucked.

  Water rapidly grasps at our ankles, as if it were increasing exponentially over time. If I stay any longer, I’ll drown before the game even starts, so I start walking down the rail without another word. Raven and Viper follow me closely, as do the rest of the group. All except Croc.

  “I can’t do this,” he says, then repeats it louder for Cerena to hear. “I quit! Take me back to the lobby.”

  He’s surrendering. A shame Cerena hasn’t implemented that option for us. There’s no button to press or a safeword to blurt. He’ll have to play until one of the Hostiles chews him dead. Then the bitten girl joins him.

  “Take me back too,” she cries. “I can’t continue. It’s too painful!”

  A part of me thinks Cerena withheld details for this exact reason. If we knew what we were up against, half of us wouldn’t make it past the lobby doors.

  Raven huffs. “What a bunch of pussies. It’s not even real.”

  “So all my efforts are going to waste,” Viper says, rubbing her jaw.

  “Yeah, you got on your knees and sucked for nothing.” Raven jabs her friend on the arm.

  A few of us chuckle nervously.

  We spare a few moments to see if Cerena will respond, then hurry along when there’s nothing but silence.

  “C’mon, guys,” Raven says, gesturing to the two to follow. “If we stick together, the big cat can’t eat us all at once.”

  The bitten girl sighs and limps her way out of the water, but Croc just stands there, eyeing his weapons thoughtfully. I won’t be surprised if he chooses the easy way out and shoots himself.

  Right as I think to offer to do it for him, the speaker above clicks on. A brief ring sounds in the Arena—the rising water stills.

  Cerena begins to speak. “So I’ve heard a few declarations that some of you are unwilling to continue. The difficulty has increased since the last drill, but mind you, this is a very possible task. But since a few of you are unwilling to participate, I’ve decided to make some changes to make it easier for some of you.” She clears her throat. “The original intent is for you to eliminate the Hostiles, but if you deem that impossible, you can eliminate the corresponding player to that specific animal instead. Both the player and their alias will also be eliminated. The changes are effective immediately. Best of luck to the rest of you.”

  The water plummets out once again.

  Raze. The first person that pops up in my head. He’s been promoted to my main target before the speaker clicks off. He’s not far, and we can find him before the real tiger comes at us. Just as I begin to announce to everyone that he's just on the other side, four rifles are raised at me.

  I almost choke on my own gasp. I’ve been so focused on other Hostiles that I forgot my own. Other than Raze’s Saber, my jaguar is not too far down the food chain. To the rest of them, I’m just the same level of threat.

  I take a step back with my hands up. If not for Raven and Viper reacting quickly with their guns up, I’m as good as dead.

  “Guns down,” Raven demands. “Why are you going hostile on your own team?”

  “She’s a threat to us all,” Croc says, training the gun on me. “Step aside or I’ll take you out too.”

  No one moves an inch.

  I swallow hard. If I reach for my gun now or show any other signs of threat, they’ll shoot.

  “The targets kill anyone on either team,” I say. “My Jaguar could kill off a bunch of Red players. But that won’t happen if you eliminate me. And I’m on your team. If worst comes to worst, and my tiger is coming at us, I’ll shoot myself. How about that?”

  That appeases a few of the players in front of us. They exchange a glance and lower their weapons. But Croc isn’t satisfied.

  “Hand over your guns,” he says, finger on the trigger.

  I might be treading on thin ice, but I let out a scoff that’s almost a laugh, a message that’s clear to everyone: You’ll have to kill me for it.

  And he does. Without hesitation, he shoots in my direction. At the same time, Raven takes her shot. He misses. She doesn’t. Croc lets out a yelp as he limps to one side of the water. The bullet scratched his upper thigh. Red trickles down his leg and into the water, dotting pink.

  “You bitch,” he cries, clenching the side of his leg.

  Before this commotion between them develops further, a scream rings out. The cry dies as something pulls the bitten girl under the surface of the water. A few feet from Croc, a dark and murky figure glides under the water. A shark? A seal?

  Whatever it is, it has swallowed the girl whole. She’s gone from the Arena without a trace of blood.

  So much for helping her.

  Croc trudges away from the dark figure as the water erupts high into the air. An olive leathery skin, horn-like texture covering its back, snaps open its jaw, revealing its pink mouth and a row of gnarly, sharp teeth. Crocodile.

  Fire blasts without another blink.

  Croc safely flees away as the reptile gnaws on another boy instead. His leg is caught between the teeth, and his pitiful wails are adding to the anguish. He fights it, stabbing it on the side with his knife, but the cold-blooded animal doesn’t budge. Blood stains the water, and I have to snap away.

  Viper raises her rifle, but Raven stops her.

  “We need to go, now,” she whispers, and turns for the stairs.

  I agree. My presence among them will only induce fear. But will I be safe with them? Viper and Raven aren’t my friends, and the last thing I want is to be stabbed in the back.

  Still, they had every chance to take me out when everyone else did. There’s no one else on the team I can rely on. While the rest are occupied with killing the crocodile, we hurry away before we become the next target.