"Contestants, please come forward," The fortress said to each of them.
Solan was the first to walk forwards, around the black glass chamber in which they answered the questions and deeper into the blackness of the fortress. Flood lights snapped onwards as he descended deeper into the darkness. The other contestants reluctantly followed.
As Solan came to a stop, the rest of the concealed stadium emerged upon five powerful spot lights which flicked on from left to right. A black concrete wall stretched all the way to the ceiling of the great fortress, the blue tube where Eeva and her guards used to be projecting forth but hidden from view. The great five circles of light which shone on the black wall revealed five doors, haunting and brown and wooden, the icons of each of the contestants upon them; four ravens on Tristan's door, three wolves on Luka's door, two bears on Adrian's door, one Orca on Calysa's door, and nothing but an empty plaque on Solan's.
The contestants walked slowly towards their designated door, awaiting the Programmer's instructions who remained silent for many moments, all of the Hosts wondering what the number of animals upon their doors could mean.
Solan, realizing silence was wasteful during their awaited instructions, turned to his fellow contestants who looked back to him, hate in their eyes and hearts. Luka's face was sternest, and took a majority of Solan's focus.
"Would you like to know why I keep beating you, boy? Where true greatness comes from?" Solan said, fixing the white collar to his uniform and running his hand through his hair which matched the innards of the fortress.
"I see you winning battles, Scientist. You haven't won the war," Adrian said, his fists and teeth clenched.
Solan ignored Adrian, and while keeping his green glaring eyes upon Luka, said, "Belief."
"Spare me your 'you can achieve anything as long as you believe in yourself' speech," Calysa scoffed. "We've all heard it before when we were children."
"You are mistaken, girl," Solan said as he smoothed his suit, Luka and the others cocking their heads in confusion. "I keep beating you because I believe in something greater than myself. And this belief is why I have achieved greatness. Why I am great. The five of you..." Solan stopped and chuckled, infuriating the Hosts, and continued, "...Four of you, my apologies... Believe only in what's right before your noses. Believing in each other. It's why you're destined to be mediocre. You haven't looked to the stars."
"Your 'belief' is in death and destruction and suffering," Calysa said to him. "Nothing more."
"Ah, just like during the Intermission you are two thirds correct, girl," Solan said back, his eyes now upon Calysa out of amusement. The other contestants were shocked he apparently knew how she answered. "I am a proponent of death and destruction, yes. Not suffering."
"You're not great. You're evil and ego, within flesh and bone. Even if you beat us, I know what happens to men like you," Calysa said and spat towards Solan.
Solan smiled and said, "And what happens to men like me, girl?"
"You die. And your bones turn to dust. And history books revile you. You won't be revered like you ego maniacs think you always will be," Calysa said.
Tristan glared at her, a glare that told her to relax and not let Solan get under her skin, as Tristan thought was happening.
Solan smirked at Calysa. "I like you, girl," He said to her as he turned back to his door.
Almost as if the Programmers were waiting for their conversation to finish, voices boomed in each contestant's head, the instructions of the next game presented.
"We congratulate you on making it to the Second Game. This game is called the Dream Race."
The Hosts exchanged pondering glances, while Solan stared forward. The glowing score board flashed before each of them, and they realized it was now projected in their minds, still in their top field of view even upon clasping their eyes shut, as long as they looked in the direction of the wall. The five doors with each animal laid at the bottom of the projection within their mind, a shaded bar above each, and atop the bars they converged to what looked like a single path.
"There are two components to the Dream Race. In the first, you must relive a past moment, survive, and make it to your Gate. The second component, past this Gate, is the final hallway, where each of your paths will converge to the final stretch of the Dream Race. The first four of you to pass the finish line of the Dream Race will move on, while whoever finishes last is eliminated. Are there any questions thus far?" The Programmers stated to and asked the contestants.
"What kind of 'past moment'?" Tristan said.
"Each of you have had past experiences, experiences which have forked your reality considerably, which happened to you directly or indirectly. Events that, if they did not happen, you would not be here. Events you must confront. Truths and lessons which must be learned."
The contestants shuddered.
"Please note that, your live ranking during the race compared to your fellow contestants will be available to you as you progress."
The contestants watched as the score board in their minds shimmered, each shaded bar turning coloured to illustrate how far a contestant was from the finish line. The colours pulsed back to grey, while each of their respective icons filled in with colour.
"Please note that within the Dream Race are Trade Stations. We recognize that the race will be... quite perilous. Weapons and other resources will be available at these Trade Stations."
"...Well what do we have to trade in order to get weapons at these 'Trade Stations'?" Adrian asked. "We have nothing."
He was met with silence, but Luka cursed to himself realizing Solan had his power for this Game and was a weapon himself now. He wouldn't have to trade a thing. Luka felt naked and sluggish, having given his right to his power to Calysa who didn't seem to realize yet, as he looked at her longingly and sadly.
"You may begin on our count in ten, nine, eight..."
The Hosts' hearts thudded as they realized the Second Game was beginning, whether they wanted it to or not, without an opportunity to calm themselves. Sweat skidded upon their foreheads and their muscles flexed, ready to run to their door, as the red seconds flashed in their minds upon the score board.
Play the Games to win, Luka's voice echoed in each of their minds. Each prayed silently to themselves that Solan would be the last to finish. Each with the inescapable desperation and unconscious desire to survive.
"...five, four, three, two, one."
They each sprinted and smashed through their doors.
Expecting blackness beyond, they all were met with colours and aromas and sights that were both horrifyingly, yet comfortingly, familiar.
**
Tristan
Tristan's shoulder smashed through his door, and as he did so, the wooden door turned to a black steel material he was all too familiar with.
He knew immediately where he was. His mother's cooking in black pots strewn upon the small golden countertop, but she was out somewhere. Mugs of Raven tea still steaming upon a small table at his knees to his right within the dining room, a comforting bitter scent enveloping him. Papers spread chaotically about another silver table beyond, a person seated beneath their own set of papers.
He was home.
"Tristan? Home from school so soon?"
The voice made him weak, ill, happy. His worst fears, combined with his happiest thoughts, were confirmed as a man with his legs crossed peered atop his paper and glasses at Tristan.
"Dad?" Tristan said to the man, who gave a raised eyebrow back. His father was not a warm man, but his raised eyebrow in affirmation was as endearing as it got from his Host father.
Tristan shook his head angrily. The memory, or Dream, whatever it was, it was so real he almost forgot his place in the fortress, within the Second Game, upon an entirely different continent. His father was dead. This father in front was something else entirely.
"You're dead," Tristan said sadly. "What is this? Where am I?"
"Sadly, you are right where you're supposed to be, my son."
As the last word left his mouth, the same door Tristan thought he burst through creaked open, a tall man entering.
At first Tristan thought it was Solan. But he quickly realized it was someone else entirely. The man walked forward with purposeful steps, appearing to ignore Tristan entirely with his eyes upon his father.
It was Lleyton Alva.
He calmly grabbed a chair, skidded it across from Tristan's father, and sat with a sincere and sympathetic face.
"Dad, this is Lleyton Alva... can he hear us? Can he see us? We trapped him in the ocean, how is this possible?"
Lleyton appeared to freeze in time, as Tristan's father turned back to his son. "He can see me, of course. Not you. One of our words is 'wise' son. Think," Tristan's father prodded him.
Tristan realized as Lleyton Alva froze still, as he tried to figure out what was going on, that so too did his bar indicating his progress in the Dream Race. The other bars of his fellow contestants continued their ascent towards the final hallway. He was falling behind. His lack of understanding halting his progress.
"My Gods," Tristan finally realized, his coloured orange bar in his mind beginning to ascend again. "This happened... this happened right before the massacre in Blackland, right before the genocide of the Ravens."
The movie appeared to resume, as Tristan's father put his paper down and returned his focus on Lleyton, who clasped his hands and leaned forward.
"Torillio Hugin," Lleyton said as he unclasped his coat. "I don't think we've ever met, you and I. You and your kind always slinging your arrows from afar, during the War on the Wolves."
Tristan watched on uneasily, as he watched his Host father stare down the legendary Lleyton.
"Ah, so you're Nik's visitor. I should have known, him being so ashamed to tell me who had returned," Torillio said, lighting a pipe and offering Lleyton a puff.
"Dad, no... it's a trap," Tristan pleaded to his father and the memory, which again sat still and stopped Tristan's progress.
"I didn't know that at the time, did I, son? The past cannot be changed. But the past must be learned from. Do you understand?" Torillio said to him, with a stern point of his rough finger extended from his black robe which Tristan was so used to seeing.
Tristan nodded reluctantly, as his bar began rising again and so too did Lleyton's movement.
Lleyton took the pipe, and thoughtfully puffed on it. "Tell me, was it you or your fellow Host who informed Aimos of my city's weakness?"
"It was me," Torillio said quickly, bravely. It made Tristan proud and scared at the same time. "No one could have predicted what the Outlanders would do next. Not even you, Lleyton. It was my objective to end the war, which I did."
Lleyton appeared done with small talk, and grabbed a kitchen knife off the counter. Torillio didn't grab a weapon, smart enough to know it was pointless when facing down a Six.
"Smart, Lleyton. You attack me, I scream, and then the Ravens descend upon you, and capture you for the second time in your worthless life. Is this why you've come to Blackland and guilted Nik to let you inside? Just to kill a soldier who was doing his duty?"
"No. I've come to kill all of you. Scream, or don't scream, it really doesn't matter to me. The trap has already been laid. Your screams will just ensure more Ravens look upon it as they rush out of their houses with pitchforks and rage."
Tristan's skin went red as he realized what Lleyton was talking about. It was the Orb, already in the middle of the city and high above and waiting for eyes to gaze upon it to blind everyone.
"Why come here, then?" Torillio said.
"Turns out you're lucky. I couldn't find your boy in this damned city, and as I'm on a tight schedule, you'll have to do, even though you're a little old."
Torillio grabbed his pipe back from Lleyton, puffing it with a wry smile. "So, you intended to kill my innocent boy out of revenge? I hope your son Markus rots."
"Believe it or not, I needed to save your boy," Lleyton said, his tone angered that the Raven had the nerve to bring up his son Markus. "I need a male Host. It's you, or him. I'm not asking again," Lleyton said, his pointed blade directed towards Tristan's father. "You're coming with me. Alive."
The Orb outside detonated in the next instance. A majority of the Raven population had looked upon it, blinded instantly. Those Ravens who didn't, like Torillio, were still blinded but to a lesser degree as the light flooded into his house and bleached his delicate Raven eyes. A wise man, Torillio recognized quickly what was about to happen next. That his people stood no chance against such technology. That Lleyton was the Trojan Horse which already hatched. His city would fall. And he also knew Lleyton was truthful. Ruthless, but not a liar. For some unknown reason, he wanted to save Torillio or Tristan from the impending massacre.
With a swift and shockingly fast grasp, Torillio grabbed Lleyton's hands and blade in his blindness, and to Tristan's horror, forced it into his own gut.
"No," Tristan and Lleyton both said, as they descended upon Torillio, trying to stop the bleeding at his stomach which was a fruitless endeavour.
"Looks like you have to look for my boy again, a little harder this time," Torillio said through weaker words and a clammy face, Lleyton's eyes wide. "Try the school. He's always at school, though I'm not sure he's there for the classes. Handsome as can be, Tristan is. Save my boy, Lleyton."
Realizing his predicament, that Solan would never give Markus or his wife Yulia back if two Raven Hosts were not saved as was instructed, Lleyton rushed out of the house with a twirl of his black coat into the streets, in search of Tristan in the past. Tristan knew how the story ended. Lleyton did eventually find him along with Rosaya, locking them in a cellar.
"Dad, I didn't know..." Tristan said as he clung to his father, tears forming at the corners of his eyes. "It could have been you... you're stronger than me. You could have helped Luka far better than I ever could have. Protected Rosaya far better than I ever could have..."
Torillio put his bloodied hand on Tristan's cheek as the life continued to leave him, mustering a smile. "You're wrong, Tristan. You're stronger. Our people, sacrifice runs through our veins. Sacrifice in pursuit of all things good. Sacrifice to end all things bad. Do you understand, son?"
Tristan nodded as tears now fell to his tanned and freckled cheeks as he hugged his father. In his closed eyes and upon the score board, he saw that his orange bar overtook Adrian and Luka's green and silver bars, slightly behind Solan's and Calysa's black and blue bars.
"Where do I go, Dad?" Tristan asked his dying memory and Dream.
"The same gate you and Rosaya and the Wolf escaped through, son. Be strong. Be wise. Be the son I know you to be."
Torillio died and slumped to the floor. Tristan rose, with a broken heart, but reignited bravery. He closed his father's eyes, and with an exhale, turned to finish the Dream Race. To find the Gate.
He rushed outside, Outlanders now pouring in through the front gate which was also his Gate, gunning down Ravens seemingly everywhere, but just like Lleyton they ignored Tristan, or couldn't see him.
The first time Tristan experienced his people's genocide, he was blinded. In this moment he didn't know what was preferable. But his legs willed him forward, dodging soldiers and Ravens alike, muscling through the crowd and trying to get his eyes upon the Gate.
As he spotted it, four giant Ravens with terrifying wing spans and talons the size of his head streamed through, with a great screech and snapping beaks, searching for their prey, Tristan realizing quickly that it was him.
The Ravens belonged to the Dream Race, but unlike Lleyton and the Outlanders, Tristan realized they were there to kill, and more than able to do so.
This reality sunk into Tristan as one of the Ravens spotted him, and with unbelievable quickness descended and sunk its large talons into his shoulder.
Tristan yelped and fell to the ground of his city, punching the great beast off of him which ascended back into the clouds to encircle him again in the near future.
Tristan quickly crawled to cover, a nook at the base of a nearby house, Outlander soldiers storming inside it and raining their bullets upon the innocent citizens within. Tristan tried his best to tune out the horror, looking above at the circling Ravens, looking around for a way to defend himself as he clutched his bleeding and piercingly painful shoulder through grit teeth.
Across the street and somehow fastened to an abandoned food cart, a glowing green piece of metal surged and caught his eye. Above the tray of still steaming delicacies, and between the clamouring crowds and running soldiers, it glowed 'Trade Station'.
Tristan looked side to side and up, the four Ravens still circling with predatory instinct. No doubt they had their eyes on Tristan, waiting for the little mouse to make his daring dash out into the open from his cover. The more he waited, the more distance was created between Solan's and Calysa's bars in his mind. Their blue and black colours had almost gotten through their Gates and to the final stretch of the race, Tristan's bar barely outpacing Adrian's green. It was now or never for Tristan.
He sprinted and rolled through the crowd of streaming soldiers, ducking and dodging his way to the Trade Station. Two ravens plunged at him, but their talons struck necks of Outlanders rather than Tristan's to his relief within the sea of black and yellow.
He finalized his roll, out of the crowd, more defenceless than ever now as he arrived to the food cart at the side of the road, scanning the Trade Station diligently.
All four ravens descended.
Tristan saw a pistol, jagged black and a rounded barrel, five bullets to the right of it, caged and locked within the green glow. To the left was a sinister looking hole, with words above which Tristan read aloud.
"'An eye for an eye is wrong. An eye for defence is noble'," Tristan said under his breath, trying his hardest to understand. He didn't have time for riddles.
He turned and looked up after a screech echoed towards him from the sky, the four ravens approaching speedily, breaking through clouds and almost into the city. Almost upon him. If one sunk their talons into him again, there would be no escape. He would be prey.
With fear, understanding, and realization all breaking through Tristan's uncertainty like a blinding light through fog, the words of the Trade Station made sense.
He hastily placed his left eye over the glowing green hole, took a deep breath, and as if the Station had stolen his breath too, Tristan's eye was cut out with green lasers which cauterized the great wound just as instantaneously, Tristan yelling out in both bravery and pain and shock.
He fell to the street, shaking with adrenaline, the cage which held the gun and bullets unlocking itself and dropping into his lap. With shaky hands and pain surging on the left side of his face, he loaded each bullet into the chamber of the pistol, fumbling and dropping them, pleading to his right eye to be more efficient, to do better now that it was alone.
Suddenly, warm hands grabbed Tristan's which were shaking and attempting to grab the last remaining bullet which fell to the dirt. The person picked it up and loaded it in the chamber for him, grabbing his face with their delicate hands and directing his gaze to her.
It was Rosaya, and Tristan couldn't tell if it was the Programmer's Rosaya, or Rosaya from his own dreams. It didn't matter.
"I can't do it, Rosaya. I don't have my powers, and now don't even have an eye. I'm sorry."
"You're right," She said to him, her hand to his chest, his heart beating slower as she touched it. "But you have something greater."
The apparition of Rosaya evaporated, and Tristan tightened his grip on his weapon, exhaling, wiping away tears at his right eye, blood from his left. He turned to face his predators, aiming his pistol as best he could, his remaining eye straining and squinting.
As the stream and line of ravens were within ten feet of him, Tristan unloaded his pistol with four squeezes of his hand which were faster than lightning and the most focused shots he had ever taken.
All four of the ravens fell and skidded in the sandy street towards him, floundering and defeated and dead, green blood streaking as the birds slid forth.
Tristan put his smoking pistol at his waist, as he walked through the black giant birds which underestimated their prey, still as statues within the crowd of Outlander soldiers.
As Tristan got to his Gate, the front gate of his home city, he ripped off his orange and black sleeve and tied a patch around where he surrendered his eye.
Before he entered the final pathway, he rechecked his pistol.
In the chamber was one bullet left.
**
Solan
Unlike his fellow contestants, Solan delicately opened his door and entrance to the Dream Race, and snugly shut the door behind him.
Red light flooded his senses, chrome and steel and a magnificent barred window beyond, and just before the shimmering window were command chairs and shining panels and screens. In his immediate orbit was a long, silver table with golden plates and thinly sliced spiced meats upon them which triggered a flood of his childhood memories.
Dread filled Solan as he realized where he was.
"Ah, Solan, you're just in time. Sit. Eat."
His mother, Gwenta, and his father, Jackea, gently stood and guided Solan to his vacant seat, filling his plate and mug and smiling upon him, their hands on his shoulders.
As they slid in his chair for him, Solan looked around the table with bewildered eyes.
It was the Alva family, a family dinner.
His heart sunk as across from him sat the only one he had ever loved. Even after all these years, her face in his memory caused him such pain, such happiness. But now seeing her in the seeming flesh set his skin ablaze. She even wore the same Orca necklace he gifted her, and had monitored her with, the very details of the Dream Race devastating.
It was Thaia.
"So, Thaia, tell me. What is it your parents do?"
Solan turned to the head of the table. It was his grandfather, the great Samuel, who he had learned so much from. The words sounded hauntingly familiar to Solan.
"Her mother is a teacher, and father a repairman for the outskirts. They are great people, grandpa," Aimos replied after several awkward seconds, Thaia searching for the correct words.
Solan furrowed his brow in thought. "This has happened already," He quietly said to himself.
"Ah, vital roles," Samuel responded, slurping upon a glass of red wine, his face intimidating. "May I ask what your mother teaches about me?"
"This has happened before! You're memories!" Solan yelled and slammed his hands on the table.
Solan expected the memory to keep unfolding, utterly disregarding his presence, but to his shock and horror, every single head at the dinner table oriented towards his outburst.
"Is it, now?" Samuel said to him, pointing a dinner knife in his direction. "And if we were memories, would this make it less painful for you, I wonder?"
"Why am I here?" Solan asked the table, looking around, his green eyes catching Aimos' blue ones. "What do you want?"
"This isn't about what we want. You decided each of our fates. This is about what you want," Solan's uncle Felix said to him calmly, chewing a carefully cut piece of meat.
Solan was about to stand, to escape the nightmare of his family's presence, but realized his black bar in his mind indicating his progress of the Race was not moving. This prompted him to sit still as stone, and it began moving up again.
"You all still don't understand? Even you, Felix? Even you, Samuel? Don't you see what I'm trying to accomplish? Don't you see that our lives mean nothing in the grand scheme of what I'm trying to accomplish?"
"Enlighten us," Solan's father Jackea said. "We gave you everything as a child. All the happiness. Where did we go wrong with you?"
"I never pulled the trigger on you, father. Nor you, mom. I loved you both. That was him," Solan replied, his finger pointed squarely at Samuel.
Samuel scoffed. "Me? Why, it was your plan to send me on my dark path, wasn't it, Solan? I was but a monster that you unleashed upon the family. I've paid for my crimes. Have you?"
Solan looked down at his plate as the table members awaited his response. "Some things are greater than ourselves. Greater than family. The truths I seek within the Chamber of Truth... how can you all point your finger at me alone? You've all seen what we do to each other. What humanity does to itself. We are harbingers of suffering, a species of hurt. Our death and destruction is the final path to a Universe of harmony. I aim to bring it. I am the finality."
The table members exchanged glances and then directed their stares back upon him.
"Now you know why you are here. You've made a fatal flaw in your calculation, Solan. There is good in humanity. While I applaud your conviction, and determination, we ask that you at least acknowledge that you were happy. That you robbed us all of potential joy, even yourself. And in so doing, you must admit that humanity can attain happiness, and peace. Whether humanity ever actually will is besides the point. But this quest you are on... you are robbing humanity the chance. Leaving the equation unbalanced," His uncle Felix said, his way of speaking reaching deep within Solan.
"But that is the point, uncle. Our species has been around for far too long, like a wheel spinning in the mud, making the same mistakes over and over and over again. If the equation could have been balanced, it would have been done so by now."
Solan paused and looked across to Thaia. "Yes, you are right, uncle. Would I have been happier if I told Thaia how I really felt at this table, in this exact moment? Maybe starting a family of my own? Certainly. But then what of my children when Samuel inevitably snaps? What of your children? I was mercy. I... am mercy."
"Most of their children are dead, because of you," Thaia said coldly across the table. The words like sharp icicles upon Solan, her tone so different from what would be expected from someone so golden and glowing within a white dress. "Panza, Nik, Aaron... my beloved Aimos. All dead because of you."
Solan couldn't look her in her eyes, the same eyes Eeva had, as he clenched his fists upon the cold steel table.
"And now, you want to kill my daughter, Eeva, because I died giving birth to her? Her newborn, too? You're a monster, Solan. You have to admit this, or you're never getting out of this chamber."
"Yes, I'm a fucking monster," Solan blurted out, standing, angry, usually so calm but a storm raging within his unfurling mind. His nerves ablaze with fire.
As the words left his mouth, a great spot light snapped upon a door beyond the table. His Gate, the Gate to the final path of the Dream Race which Solan had almost forgot about. His black bar surpassing those of his foes in his mind.
He stood, and walked slowly to the lit doorway. As he turned the handle, he turned back to Thaia, and said, "But the Universe needs monsters to stop the monsters."