literature

Once Dead Post-Round 1

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Ridley stood off to the side of the overgrown tower's doors, fully expecting Veronica to come charging out at any moment. But minutes went by, and nothing of the sort happened.

         His heartbeats and breathing had calmed down. With a liberating sigh, he took his page from the right pocket. The dry, ancient-looking parchment had cracked, but was still intact, and the words it contained were now fully formed:

A friend you have grown up with, and trained alongside, for most of your life was absent from your tale. All you would remember of him will now follow.

          A friend? For some reason the concept was strange to him. Did he have any friends? He thought back -- did anyone he knew even qualify?

          Almost immediately, a face came to mind, followed swiftly by the moment he first saw it -- both of them were a lot younger then.

 

Aside from any of the species within the Boltaneon Empire, he was the first new species Ridley had ever seen.

          Two of the Boltaneon races had no hair, but neither had the same gray, leathery skin as this one.

          One of them (not counting the arachnid type) didn't have a nose -- this species had one that hung down past his mouth.

          All of them except the arachnid type had visible ears, but none had ears as big and floppy as this one.

          Of course Ridley asked right away what he was.

          "He's an Ydelu," the guard answered.

          "Ee-deh-loo?"

          "That's right," he said. "The last naturally born Ydelu. The very last one who ever had a mother."

          "He had a mommy?"

          The guard nodded. "Not anymore, though," he said. "Now, in a way, he's like you." He smiled. "I think you two are going to get along just fine."

          The young Ydelu stirred.

          "I'll see you both later," said the guard on his way out.

          He sat up. The two were about the same age as each other -- and even at this early point in time, there were hints towards how strong he could be. One of them was literally in his voice -- unusually baritone for all its current youth.

          "Who are you?" he said sleepily.

          Ridley shrugged. "Guess I's supposed to be your friend. I's Ridley. Wha's your name?"

          Instead of answering, the Ydelu tilted his head. "Is that it?" he asked. "Just 'Ridley'?"

          "Nope. I's Ridley Jor-Dayn."

          Ridley's new friend yawned. "My name's Chellic. Vol-ur-kahn."

 

The more he thought about it, the more the gaps in his memory of a fictional past started to fill themselves in. This fellow, Chellic, was there in nearly every recollection he had. They spent sixteen years together Below-Decks -- separate from the other Arena fighters. Of the only times they were ever apart, he realized, about half of them were when they showered after many a long day's training.

          The other half were when they were old enough to participate in "Below-Decks" fights -- non-lethal confrontations that served to prepare underage combatants for a moment in their lives when any fight could be their last. Ridley and Chellic never actually fought each other -- and they always met up soon after a fight to talk about it.

          If one word could be used to describe them, Ridley would have to pick inseparable.

          He wasn't the only one to notice.

          Ridley remembered another incident involving them both. They were eleven years old then -- in a week, Ridley would be twelve, and old enough to start participating in "Below-Decks" fights. Their trainer, a Boltaneon-Aleph named Ssilviat, had pulled the two of them while the others went to lunch.

          His serpentine features looked the two of them over head to toe; it looked as if he were trying to decide how best to start the conversation.

          "So," he eventually said. "The two of you seem pretty close."

          Ridley and Chellic both stole a nervous glance at one another. "I'm not sure what you mean, sir," Chellic said to Ssilviat's face.

          Ssilviat knelt down to look into their eyes. Ridley tried his best to avoid looking at Chellic again. He had never seen their trainer treat them like this; he had towered over them and every other fighter their age for as long as he could remember.

          "What I mean is that I never see you without him," Ssilviat hissed. "You always stand next to each other in line. Even when I pair you off with other children…" (Ridley winced slightly at the notion that he was still a child) "…you're always within a few meters of each other. Every time I see you in the hallway, Chellic's there with you."

          He looked at Chellic. "And when I asked him yesterday, CRAIG told me the two of you have been roommates since the day you met each other."

          Chellic shrugged. "All right," he said. "We're 'pretty close' friends. Is that against the rules?"

          Ssilviat frowned. "No," he said slowly. "But it's not just that you're friends. It's that I've never seen anyone so friendly to anyone else." A forked tongue shot out, twitched in the air, and withdrew.

          "My concern," he continued, "is that you two are so… how should I say this… indivisible."

          "I don't follow," said Chellic. Ridley nodded in agreement.

          Ssilviat sighed. "Well, from the moment you're old enough to fight other combatants in the Arena, Below-Decks or not, CRAIG will be in charge of who you fight," he said. "And whether you know this or not, CRAIG might seem like he is capable of feeling, but he is a computer. He will not discriminate. He is equally likely to pair the two of you up in a lethal confrontation as with anyone else. And if that happens, you will have to treat it just like any other fight with anyone else."

          He stood up. "That is all," he said.

          Neither of them moved.

          "You may leave now," said Ssilviat. "It's time for lunch."

          Only then -- and still very slowly -- did they leave.

 

Ridley thought about what Ssilviat had told them all the way to the mess hall. Presumably, Chellic was thinking about it, too, because for the first time Ridley could remember, neither of them spoke the whole time while they ate.

          When they had finished, Ridley tore off a piece of his plate and started to chew on it -- it was perfectly edible. Chellic, however, was absentmindedly folding it.

          Ridley just stared at him while he worked. When Chellic was done, the off-white tray vaguely resembled a vehicle that could travel through space.

          With a heavy sigh, Chellic launched the makeshift vehicle towards the nearest trash receptacle. It hit the wall above it, crumpled slightly from the impact, and fell otherwise neatly into the colorless bin.

          Ridley continued to stare in disbelief -- Chellic was the one that figured out and told him the plates were not only malleable, but also -- more importantly -- edible! Chellic looked at him, and sighed again.

          "You're still not thinking about what Ssilviat said?"

          Chellic just nodded.

          "Well, so what? What are the chances we'll end up in a Red Match with each other?" Ridley tried to work it out. "It's like, one in ninety-nine? And not every Arena Match is lethal, either, so it's less than that!"

          Chellic sighed. "But if that ends up happening," he said, "we have to fight! One of us will have to kill the other! We have to!"

          Ridley snorted. "Come on!" he said. "Who says we do?"

          "It's in the rules, I think…"

          "What rule?"

          Chellic sniffed. "CRAIG," he said -- a translucent panel behind him lit up -- "Supposing two Arena fighters are in a lethal match…" He paused. "What would happen if they choose not to fight?"

          A whirring sound came from the panel, followed by an artificial voice that barely had just the slightest hint of personality in it. "When any Match begins," said CRAIG, "both combatants have five minutes to begin the fight. If one of them does nothing, the other must assault him or her until they begin fighting back -- or lose consciousness or die, where appropriate." Another whir followed.

          "If neither combatant begins the fight within five minutes, they are to be removed from the Ring and terminated. The result of the match is then recorded as No Contest."

          Ridley stared at the panel. "What do you mean, terminated?"

          CRAIG whirred. "I mean exactly what the word itself means," he answered. "The participants are executed. Killed. Their bodies are destroyed. All fighters ranked below them advance upward accordingly. Two additional Entry Matches must then be scheduled to fill the vacancies."

          Chellic didn't say anything, but frowned at Ridley as if to say, Now you know. The Bufaiken felt his heart sink.

          "Okay, yeah, that's pretty bleak," said Ridley. "But that just means Ssilviat is completely right. We have to fight if we're matched up, no matter what."

          "Thanks for so perfectly capturing my agony."

          "Hear me out. Because if we don't fight, we both die." He leaned in close. "But if we do fight, only one of us dies."

          "Exactly." Ridley looked back at CRAIG's panel, and Chellic finally turned around to look at it. "Although as I'm sure you are aware, both of you are ten years too young to participate in any form of lethal combat. As long as you two continue following the rules, you are guaranteed to live until then."

          Chellic blinked a tear out of one beady eye; both of them looked back at Ridley. "One thing," he said. "Promise me you won't ever hold back. Ever. Not even if it's me, 'cause I'll give every fight I have, from now on, everything I have."

          Both of them smiled -- though for the first time in their lives, they were not happy smiles.

          "Deal."

          Behind Chellic, the panel dimmed.

 

It was the most serious conversation they had ever had, and perhaps the one that best defined him. Ridley had given all of the fights he had since then his best effort -- and as far as he could tell, so did Chellic. For his part, there was only one person that Ridley lost to consistently -- apparently, more than a hundred times. Then…

          Something happened that his story didn't cover yet. Their last fight. And for the first time ever, he could guess what happened after that: he won. It was the very first chapter of his story. If he were to lose, there would be no more story.

          So that would mean I finally beat him. Whatever his name was…

          Winning that fight would have made Ridley one of the hundred Arena fighters. Of course, he still didn't know any details of the fight; and had his story gotten that far, it would have been days, possibly weeks, before he knew whether Chellic would follow him or not.

          Slowly, Ridley's thoughts returned to the present. The sky had turned a reassuringly beautiful orange color, the last rays of the sun peering adamantly through the distant treetops. And just off to his right, the distant tower --

          -- was no longer aflame. In fact, it looked as though nothing had ever happened to it.

          Ridley turned around. The once overgrown tower -- the one within which he had just snuck by traps and a maze -- was visibly identical to the other one. (But when he looked at his forearm, he found fur that was matted with sweat and, in one localized area, blood.)

          A cry of static pierced the air.

          "Testing," said Veronica's voice. "Testing one, tw- nah, screw it."

          He spun around. A couple of the contestants that followed him to this tower were still hanging around. A lot of them looked confused, some exhausted, but overall none worse for wear.

          "It looks like most of you made it," Veronica said, "so good for you. As for what 'it' is…" she sighed. "We're not really sure what the hell happened today. You should probably expect any damned thing to happen. For now, I suggest you all return to your rooms and concentrate on this 'being alive' thing we're all fond of."

          CLICK. Echoes of the announcement hung in the darkening sky. Everyone else was too far away for Ridley to clearly hear what they were saying amongst themselves; from the looks of things, though, they didn't know what to make of the day's events.

          Neither did he.

          But --

          Promise me you won't ever hold back. Ever.

          A challenge. Survive until the end. Then, as promised, he would be reinstated into his own story, alongside a lifelong friend who had a chance of rejoining him at a later point in it.

          Don't worry, Chellic. I won't ever hold back.

This took longer than I thought it would, but here's what happens after Ridley leaves the tower.

So Ridley has this lifelong friend named Chellic (who will not be along for the rest of the ride, sorry to disappoint), a member of a dying race of elephant-people. The first part of the flashback was, per usual, lifted from my unfinished story. Everything that happened after they exchanged names is new, written ultimately as a setup to Ridley's main motivation from this moment onward: A promise never to give less than his full effort to everything. It also contains a small seed for my solution to Round 2.

Speaking of which, I should get going on that. Good luck on that, everyone.
Also, this is NOT following the current spectator entry prompt, because it's not a spectator entry. It's an epilogue. Sorry if I disappointed soap opera fans on that front.
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