he slowly woke up from his deep sleep, a weak light illuminated the room just enough to avoid being in complete darkness. He was in the same spot he was when he was brutally treat before, he turned his head to the window, barely visible, to see if the sun was rised, instead it was night. it took a while to feel a crushing pressure all over his body, it prevented him to breath properly it doesn't matter how deep they were, his lungs were never filled. Under that it was so hot that he sweated a lot.

the window start to get overwhelmed by darkness and disappeared, he was now starring into an endless void and felt like he was falling but there was no wind against his back and his hair weren't moving. after an imprecise amount of time he was not only falling but he was being dragged at the center of a whirlpool, every senses became confused and disoriented, he couldn't think at all and was just endure that without a chance to do anything. his breathing rate was increasing, he could hear his heart beating, for how loud it was he could have gone deaf.

suddenly the darkness started to vanished, he stopped falling and understood that none of that really happened, or maybe yes, he was still hearing his heart's beat echo in his head, the window was slighly moving and sometimes he felt like he was falling again.

he wanted to sat down on the floor, to do it he had to remove that immense pressure over his torso, so with his right arm he tried to and couldn't do it, but what he touched was wool and he understood immediately it was a thick, judging by the weight, wool blanket, he tried with both arms and with an immense effort he managed to remove it. finally he sat down here, is belly hurt a lot but he didn't care, his dizziness seems to have gone away.

he never felt that weak in his entire life.

the white wool blanket was made out of numerous braids intertwined together forming sinuous patterns, they were beatiful and confusing to him he was starring at them but in reality he was focusing on his short breath, even without the blancket he was struggling to breath properly. as he was starring at the sinuous pattern they began to move and intertwired themselves and formed an outline of a face which kept getting more and more detailed.

"Monica" whispered while tears started to drop on it. he could see her brown eyes, which became golden when sun's rays hits them, her straight black hair, which she kept always untied when they went out and tied them up with the most colored and cringy hair bands, he always make fun of her for that. her thousands of earring, each one contained an important moment of her life. her little and adorable nose, and the last thing her little lips that she was so insicure about and he always reassured her.

he replayed every memories he had of her, the bad and the good ones, from the moment they met to the positive pregnancy test. all of those precious memories were swallowed with her by that monster. everything he did, the people he doomed to die to save himself and her, the things he believed and loved were meaningless.

he always liked his indipendency, his freedom and days without her, but this is a nightmare he will never see her again and no matter how many days will passed she will remain dead. no one could ever replace her and he has to learn to live alone with a bleeding wound for the rest of his life.

"i avenged you" whispered with his broken voice.

deep down he knows that avenge someone who's dead means nothing except being in peace with himself, for what little it could count.

the torso was exposed to the cold environment, the sweat dries onto him making him colder and every inch of his body started to shaking. the cold was penetrating into his bones.

blink after blink the image of Monica vanished and the blanket returned to have the same sinuous patterns as before. he needed something to cover himself, even a hot shower wouldn't be bad. the man tried to get up but another sharp pain in his belly made him crunch in pain, after a few seconds the pain vanished and he could finally move again with cautious movements.

he cannot escaped from the pain, no matter how he moved it always hurted, so he needed to find the way to get up with minimal pain: first he got down on all fours, then with the help of an hand placed on the wall and the push of a leg he start to slowly get up, the pain was constant, he can endured it, sometimes though it was excruciating and made him lose some progress. all of this mixed with his overall weakness and tiredness made this simple move nearly impossible, in the end he managed to get up and leaned on the wall to rest and wait for the pain to vanished.

his vision blurred for a couple of second, he felt like losing the control of his legs and went down but it was just a sensation. he was looking down, he was still wearing his jeans with huge dried blood stains and his socks were soaked in dried blood too. he could also see a long and wide reddish scar, it went from the left side of his body, right under the rib cage, all way to the right side in an almost perfect straight line, it could saw the mark of where the knife were placed.

the weak light illuminated him from the left side, he turned his head and saw a corridor and a door open with a light on.

he went through the door at his left, following the source of the light, it was a small corridor that connected the main entrance of the apartment to a door at the end of it, between there was several doors, some closed, some opened, the light comes from the door just ahead of him on the left. he went to the door and slowly went inside always placing a hand to the wall.

it was the barest living room he had ever seen, there was just a old and full of stains sofa, a little table in front of it with on top a bottle of water, some snacks and a smartphone, behind the sofa close to the wall a tall but narrow bookshelf used to keep a lot of bottle of alcool, there were only two windows, one taller than the other, the taller one had the shutters closed meanwhile the other had a black blanket on it, close to the door there was a long radiator. sitting on the sofa there was the same man who burned him, he was lost in his thoughts and was looking at the piece of paper in his hands.

he wear a white sweater covered most in dried blood stains, tight enough to outline his skinny arms and his overall long but small torso, he wear skinny jeans and red shoes. he was looking down so the only thing he saw was his thick and unkempt black hair with dried blood on it.

"oi" said with a hoarse voice to gain his attention.

the man did a little jump out of fear he could see his ice-colored eyes scanning him before calming down.

"shit man, next time do some noise." response as he was checking with his hand if the heart still beat. "so, you're fine. i am glad." said while watching him, clearly he doesn't know what to say in that situation.

"thank you..." his short breath let him say only a few word. "i probably would... have died out there."

"it was the bare minimum, you killed that monster with that spectacular move and save us." his voice was solemn as like he was narrating the deeds of a hero, then he stood up took the bottle of water and walk toward him. as he was walking towards the ice-eyes man noticed that he was touching the scar. "i couldn't do nothing better, you were on the verge of death, i know it hurted a lot. but I had to be quick" he handed him the water.

the half-dead man was looking only at the water, nothing else was more important than that, neither the word of that man, suddently he felt the need to drink a lot of it as he was discovered the world for the first time. without a word he took it and drank all of it.

"refreshing" said with a much more clearer voice.

"i prepared some clothes for you in the kitchen, I'll go get them for you" took the empty bottle and went to the kitchen.

as he was almost passing through the door the half-dead man replied. "where is the bathroom, i need a shower" his word were shaking because of the cold.

the ice-eyes man stopped and looked back at him, he was silent for a moment like he was poundering what words to use. "better not in this moment, try to wash yourself on the sink, it's the last door on the right" and then disappeared behind the door.

the half-dead man walk slowly towards it.

he was probably near the square where he passed out, the other one said he was in the verge of death so we are not that far, maybe it's still not safe.

he open the door and even the bathroom seems empty.

it has just the toilet next to the wall in front of him, at his left there was the bidet and then the sink with a mirror, on the other side there was just the shower, inside it two hair conditioners, and a stack of towels on a wooden chair, right in front of him there was a window with shutters closed.

he turned on the light, closed the door, went to check himself in the mirror and almost passed out again. he was unrecognizable, he was pale, with two large dark circles under his greenish eyes, his dirty black hair fell in his face in clear contrast with the pale skin and his large lips were slowly turning purple. he seems more skinny, even though the last days he ate like a pig and much more older than his real age. walking away a little bit he could see his torso, he had a very thick body hair on his chest and on his belly except for where the scar is. he could also saw some veins he never saw in his arm.

overall he seems a man who returned from the dead, he was astonished but it didn't last long, the cold was penetrating deeper and he was shaking so hard all his muscles were tired. without much of thoughts he open the sink and let the hot water flow, he placed a towel below him and began to wash himself, first the body and then the hair. trying to be as quiet as possible.

the hot water warmed him up, now he had to cover as quickly as he can, there was no hairdryer so he had to cover his wet hair with a towel. he left the bathroom and went towards the living room always with a hand on the wall.

as soon as he enter in it he saw the little table with a couple of sandwich, some bananas, a bar of white chocolate and a bottle of water, a shirt and a brown wool sweater were on the sofa and next to them sits the ice-eyes man covered with the heavy wool blanket he was covered before.

"come, i prepared the breakfast, i bet you're hungry." said him as soon as he see him. "they are filled with meat and some vegetables."

"thank you man" he replied while going towards the sofa and then wear the clothes. you already had breakfast don't you?" seeing him not touching a single thing on that table.

"you got me" a little laugh made the situation more like a normal day. "i woke up almost three hours ago."

the half-dead man sit down, not without a excruciating pain, making himself as comfortable as possible.

"what time is it" said just before devouring one of the two sandwichs.

"twenty past nine, roughly." he had a glad expression on his face. "by the way my name's Vander, and, before you ask we are in a building of the square."

he finished the sandwich washed down by a large glass of water."Unfortunately that wasn't what I wanted to ask you" a little smile was formed on the pale skin of the man. "i remember that there was another guy, where is he?".

Vander was about to answer but the pale man was faster. "mine is Mirio" and the started to eat the other sandwich.

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"Carlin is sleeping, he was awake until six in the morning, instead i, after we heal and covered you, fell asleep quite fast." another laugh came out of him, Mirio was wondering if he had any idea about the situation they were in.

"i asked you to not use the shower" Vander continued this time with a serious tone. "because Carlin told me we were close to dying again." Mirio looked at him astonished. " when he was awake he heard strange noises in the square, he checked from the shutters and saw another monster, probably attracted by the loud noise of the dead one or by the smell of it. because it was a mix between a wolf, or a dog, and a human." Mirio looked at him more astonished than before.

"what do you mean?" he asked spitting some piece of food out of his mouth.

"just what i said" he said with a disgusted face. "it has longer fangs, the arms and legs were a mix of them but recalled more the human limbs than a wolf. it came here sniffed around, he didn't even touched the corpse of the monster, and then left."

"well, we were lucky." replied Mirio being careful not to spit anything. "we should change our own... smell apart to stay as quiet as possible." the short breath was still a problem especially now that he was eating.

"i think that the smell isn't a problem otherwise he would discovered us."

after some thoughts Mirio nodded at him.

"well i will try not to die." he turned at Vander with a smile and he smile at him back.

as he was turned again towards the table he glimpsed the piece of paper Vander had on his armrest.

"Vander, I saw you staring at... that piece of paper earlier. what's written on it?"

"huh, i just write what the strange voice said before the disaster." he passed the paper to Mirio.

it was a list: partecipate to a show, constellations, game?, survive for a week, voice's name = Director.

Mirio didn't remember well what said that voice, where he was at the time was so loud he couldn't even hear his own thoughts, then the monsters appeared and the thought of what happened next made him on the verge of crying. the memories passed in a instant, Monica eaten by the monster, the legs lifelessly fell on the ground. he would have cried so hard but he couldn't, not in front of another person, he must stay strong. he closed his eyes and push away those memories.

"you're thinking very hard" Vander's laughing made him laugh too, even louder than him, but the tears came out anyway.

"you're so funny" Mirio tried to hide the pain tears behind a tears of laugh.

"i believed even you heard that voice " Mirio was still recovering from the laugh and tears, so Vander continued. "what i've been thinking is not why they did this to us, because that is a dead end, but the implications of, all of this. what are those constellations, superior beings? so God is one of them?, above them? or we were wrong? see, too many outcomes and, yet another dead end." he was truly interested in this topic, a little too much for Mirio. "another thing that drives me crazy is the week timer. like a knife killed a monsters and the military had weapons way more powerful. so are they infinite? otherwise we quickly killed them all. if they are not infinite they have another purpose besides kill us?" too many questions and no answers, Mirio's head started to hurt again.

as Vander was about to speak again Mirio stopped him. "what are the purpose of those questions? you met a dead end twice, and... you will meet always a dead end. some things cannot have an answer"

"if we understand this show, the voice called this a show, we can exploit it or gain some advantage." Vander replied.

"so i should have danced... or singed when that monster... run at me to please the Gods? instead of cut it tongue" Mirio was getting angry but couldn't understand why.

"what i say is that if this is a show, as we intented, they could pardon us or gave us something useful if we gave something interesting to watch." maybe was the calm tone of Vander that was making him pissed out.

"we'll not be pardoned. if they like us we will just... continue this show and... who knows what awaits us." Mirio stopped Vander with a gesture as he was about to speak, his lungs were exploding and he needed time to breath.

after a few seconds and a deep breath Mirio continued. "this questions are useless... we have no informations we... should focusing on staying alive... after this week we'll see." Mirio tried to stay as calm as possible, but he was about to explode and hoped that Vander just changed topic.

in those brief moment of silence Mirio and Vander heared a helicopter flying then gunshots for a while.

"couldn't we try to get... the attention of that?" asked Mirio.

"i thought about it, they are cleaning the city so i hope they'll notice me, i'll go, wait for me." said Vander while standing up and walked towards the main door.

"watch out for monsters."

Vander was about to passing through the door and enter the corridor when the gunshots stopped and even the helicopter. they couldn't even process what happened that a loud noise made all window tremble, then an explosion scared them. in that silence only an acute roar of a beast could be heared.

Vander and Mirio looked at each other with a mixed expression of fear and surprise, which slowly transformed into terror when they both realized what could have happened.