Are You The Complete Player?

1/2 DO YOU WANT SOMEBODY'S LIFE IN YOUR HANDS?

CHAPTER ELEVEN: DO YOU WANT SOMEBODY’S LIFE IN YOUR HANDS?

The players had gathered themselves in the hallway a few hours after the raft building challenge that had caused the death of three of their colleagues. Emerson, Eliyaz, and Pietro were all renowned tennis players, being part of the top ten in the current world rankings, yet it didn’t save their lives at all. The players were beginning to realise now that they were all equal in WIC’s eyes. What mattered were the points they would earn in the WIC tournament. Their tennis success had suddenly become irrelevant.

No one was in the mood for a chat. Everyone had just finished their shower, but not even that had lightened up their mood.

Aksel Olsen decided to sit far away from everyone else. He couldn’t believe Lev, Emerson, and Eliyaz were all dead. He had formed some sort of alliance with them ever since they all found themselves in WIC’s lair. If Krystupas Pavlis didn’t pick him to be part of their team, he might have died with his friends.

Or you could have saved them, he told himself. Only Maxim Popov was left of their original five-man crew. He didn’t particularly care for Maxim. Maxim was with them most of the time because he was one of Lev’s best friends, but Aksel never really liked Maxim. It was his stupidity that killed Lev. It was his weakness that failed to save Emerson and Eliyaz. If there was something good that came out of his cronies dying, it was that he didn’t have to hang out with Maxim Popov anymore. Maxim was weak, and Aksel wanted a stronger ally.

“What are you thinking, Olsen?” Basil Andino asked. Aksel didn’t realise he was already standing beside him.

“You wouldn’t want to hear it,” Aksel said coldly.

“Maybe I want to,” Basil said. “I could use a friend in this hellhole. You don’t seem stupid to me, or totally ruthless. Maybe we could form an alliance. That’s only if you want to.”

Aksel regarded Basil with cold eyes. “You really want to hear it? I think you are crap at leadership. It’s why two of your teammates died. You couldn’t do anything to protect them. Why do you think I would want to form an alliance with you?”

“In case you didn’t notice, I was the leader of Team #4, who was the last team to pick members. As one of the leaders, I was unfortunately paired with the weakling Kaminska. My team didn’t stand a chance,” Basil said. “Who do you want to be allied with? Miroslav Petrovic? It was his fault Lev Ivanov died. It was his freaking fault! What? You are surprised I’m angry? I am! Lev was my friend. He was the only decent one here who wasn’t a weakling like the others. Miroslav should have protected him, but he didn’t.”

That caught Aksel’s interest. He was angry at Miroslav and his crew, too. He cried for anyone to help pull Lev away from the fire, but no one even attempted to. If not for Eliyaz, who was also dead now, Aksel would have burned to death like Lev did.

“You’re right, they didn’t. It’s almost like the escape attempt was orchestrated to get someone to die,” Aksel said.

“What are you saying? That someone here is a spy for WIC? Pretending to be struggling with us but really working for them?” Basil said, lost in thought. “But it’s impossible. We know everyone here except for…”

“I know who you’re thinking, but that can’t be. Carmella Cortez didn’t come with us. I have no idea why. But if she orchestrated the escape to have someone killed, she would have been there with us. So, no, I don’t think it’s her. I think it’s someone trying their best to look innocent. Maybe WIC paid them off to pretend to be in this with us,” Aksel said.

“Do you remember our tennis rankings before we got trapped in here?” Basil asked. “Do you think Pavlis or Adamovich even made the cut? I mean, to play in RG main draw. I didn’t think their ranking qualified them to be playing in RG as direct entries.”

“Well, yeah, Pavlis I remember. He is well inside the top 100, I’m sure, because we share racket sponsors. We’ve done a lot of adverts together. But Adamovich, I don’t know. He’s been playing on tour for more than ten years now, but I don’t remember him succeeding in anything,” Aksel said. “Now that you mentioned it, I do get a bad vibe with that guy.”

“It must be the weirdo glasses,” Basil said, with a chuckle.

“Yeah, it must be,” Aksel said, laughing along. “Anyway, you are right. I do need an alliance in this hell. Partners?”

Basil gripped Aksel’s hand as hard as he could and said, “Partners.”

***

The players were having their meal when the hologram of the updated overall points from highest to lowest appeared all over the walls. Mira was still leading with 780 total points after 5 games, followed by Mia, Carmella, Grace and Luis not so far behind. Crina Aldea was now at sixth place, just a few points behind Luis. Krystupas was at the 7th spot, while Artem, Chloe, Borysko and Adela tied at 8th place, each with 630 points. Adam, Marek, Gavro, Hana, and Aimilie were the lowest 5. It was noticeable that WIC had already removed the eliminated players from the scoreboard.

Hana Watanabe was lost in her own thoughts. She was beginning to resent Joanna for adding more and more people in their circle. It was as if Joanna was here to make friends and not to make sure both of them would make it out alive. While she didn’t particularly like it when people died, Hana didn’t like seeing her name at the bottom more. She was very competitive by nature, and the current scores were just making her angry. She decided to join Mia who was eating by her lonesome at another table, while Joanna was busy chatting with her newfound friends Adam, Adela, and Lucija. Jihan Jung and Keavy Filan were also seated with them. What was Joanna starting? The losers’ club or something?

Few guys were gathered together talking about the recent scores. They weren’t happy that girls were ruling the competition so far. Artem wasn’t seated with his friends as usual because he opted to sit with his wife Galyna somewhere else private.

“Miroslav and Marek have always cared about everyone’s well-being. But WIC doesn’t even reward them with points they deserve. Look at Marek being second to the lowest. This ‘tournament’ is degrading. WIC is like shoving to our faces that women are way better than men. We need to stick together. We need to beat those girls and kick each one of them out of the top eight,” Dragan said. Marek, Miroslav, Gavro, Drew, Maxim, Jules and Francois were listening to him very intently.

Jules and Francois spoke silently to each other. They both didn’t agree with Dragan’s sentiments. Luis had proven to be a better leader to them than either Marek or Miroslav. They decided not to contradict as they realised they were outnumbered in that table. Every one of the other players seated there was more or less part of Miroslav’s crew.

“I agree with this, actually,” Drew said. “Girls are actually useless and annoying. The only reason they have higher points is because of their affinity for drama, like Mia the skank got 100 points for revealing a hookup. This is actually laughable and insulting.”

“True, dude, but I actually really thought you were one of the ‘girls’ you know,” Maxim said. The guys laughed, but Drew’s face reddened in anger.

“What? I really just thought you were gay! I thought you were, like, Will Cortez’s lover. I’ve watched your old interviews, you were saying you were wrecked since he disappeared,” Maxim deadpanned.

“Shut up, mushroom face! You don’t know anything!” Drew said, his nostrils flaring. “That should have been you who burned to death, not Lev Ivanov.”

“Guys, come on, stop fighting like girls,” Miroslav scolded. “Dragan is right. We all need to stick together to have better chances at the top eight. No need for this kind of drama. On the next challenge onwards, we have to keep picking one another whenever we can.”

“Yeah, we’re so much better than girls,” Dragan agreed.

As Marek looked around and saw Carmella, Mia, and Crina, he realised how wrong Dragan was. These girls seemed to be doing well without needing any help from other players or without group alliances. Maybe it was time for him to do the same...