I was interrupted in my musing by someone calling my name. Looking up, I saw Emma jogging over to me. She had just gotten out of the pods recently, if her hair and the robe was any indication.

"Whatcha doing?" She asked, coming to a halt in front of my bunk. To my eye she still looked a bit shook up from the game.

"I was browsing the store to try and figure out what I wanted to purchase. I ended up picking the Medkit, but there's also some interesting information I was able to draw from the store. But that doesn't matter right now, are you doing okay? Especially given the whole throat thing." That had to play havoc on your psyche, helping someone only to have them try to kill you.

"I think so. I was super scared for a second and then unconscious the rest of the time. I barely felt it, honest. I wanted to thank you since I didn't get the chance while we were in there. I heard from Allison that you were one of the main reasons we made it out safe. She's around by the way. Over there a ways." Following her gesture, I saw Allison standing at the door of her berth just past a group animatedly talking in front of her. I waved, and she waved back, then started making her way over to us.

"What did you think of interviewer who grabbed you when you got out of the pods? Some of those questions it asked felt a bit loaded. They wanted to know about whether I felt I could be successful and why I left you with that crazy guy. What did they ask you about?" I asked Emma

"Well, they mainly asked me about you and Allison. Why I chose to follow what you guys said instead of striking out on my own when I didn't know if you were on my side. They also wanted to know why I tried to help that guy, which was probably the easiest question I had to answer. Nothing too difficult on my end, but they seemed a little bit shifty, like they were trying to get me to answer a certain way." Emma said.

"It did seem like they were searching for something from me as well. I answered as best as I could, even if I would have loved to tell them to go to hell. I mean, they didn't give us a choice on being here, and yet are treating it as if we are happy about it."

"That's because we are supposed to be happy. According to them, this is how we get to work to better humanity, how could we not be overjoyed." Allison said as she walked up. "I'll be honest, wasn't expecting to wake up inside a coffin. I may have freaked out a bit, I'm just a tiny bit claustrophobic. Glad that's over." She shivered, likely remembering she would have to go back in eventually.

"Wasn't exactly the most pleasant experience that's for sure. Oh, have you checked the store page yet? Turns out their whole reasoning behind this and Earth is on a probationary period. We can technically buy out the period using points, 100 Trillion to be exact but getting enough people to contribute to is going to be impossible. If we don't it's just as bad. Considering we get around 1000 maximum every time we do a game, unless everyone contributes to it, even just a bit, we will be doing the equivalent of banging our head against a brick wall. On top of that, we are weakening ourselves by not taking advantage of the various starting equipment and other options we can purchase with points. In a sense, it's a perfectly designed system for them to keep us acting as their entertainment, the selfish get stronger, and the selfless are eliminated or at least forced into a situation where they are constantly purchasing more lives." I said, getting angry at how unfair it was, but lacking the ability to see a way out of it easily.

"So, what do we do?" Emma asked. "It's not like we are really in a position to stop them."

"We have to play their game for now, and look for the right moment to strike" I waved at the people around us. "We try to convince the others, and hope they join us when the time comes. For now though, buy what you need, and contribute what you can spare. We might as well try and make a dent in it."

"Enough of the depressing talk and defeatist attitude now." Allison said "We survived the first game, isn't that a cause to celebrate? We should see if the other two are around. Maybe we can throw a party, get drunk and liven up the drab place a little.

A party did sound fun. I could only stew in my own thoughts for so long without going crazy.

Luna and BT had met up after

After rounding up the two missing members, we asked around to find where everyone had been getting the drinks we had seen. One of them pointed us in the direction of what would, according to them, be our only source of food and drink for the foreseeable future. It looked like one of those Coke dispensers, where you'd scroll through a bunch of options, select one and presto, you get that type of soda. The operation was similar to one as well, pick what you want, and a blob of gray nutrient paste was modified at the atomic level into what you asked for. At least food wise. For drinks, anything alcoholic was brought in for us from off planet, or at least I had never heard of a hufflesnupper or a juma before. All things considered, they weren't that bad, and they worked just as well as normal stuff at getting you drunk. Non-alcoholic stuff was easier, but most of the drinks available were stuff I recognized from home. The machine only accepted points as currency, but the rate was relatively cheap. Only 1 point had gotten everyone a round of drinks and food to boot. If you ignored the fact it had previously been gray unappetizing goo, it was almost like going to a restaurant to eat. We had a few more rounds, talking about random stuff like Luna's acting career, and telling some old stories from our youth. Luna had apparently gotten started in her job acting when Disney had held tryouts for a new show it was making way back in the day. Emma then chimed in and talked about how she had done the exact same thing, and bombed the audition so badly that even her mother had told her she maybe wasn't cut out for acting. It was nice to think about something other than the ever present threat hovering around us.

Stolen novel; please report.

Our drinking session was cut a little shorter than expected as Emma dipped out, citing tiredness. We had still gone for a few hours, and looking outside it was starting to get late. I got to chatting with BT a bit more while Allison and Luna were continuing to try and drink each other under the table.

"So, Sheldon huh?" I laughed while tossing back another shot of juma. "What's your first name?

"We ain't good enough friends for that, especially not with you having a kid about my last name. That's why I go by BT. My folks were... eclectic in their names they gave my brothers and I."

"How many brothers do you have?" I asked.

"6, and every single one of them got a unique sort of name from my folks." After a couple more minutes passed I worked up the courage to ask him about the game.

"So, I gotta ask man, what happened when you first got dropped in? You were gone and it looked like never to return when I first walked in and hours later I find out you snapped out of it to save Luna."

"I'm not really sure. Obviously I don't remember what happened before my mind went AWOL. I can tell you what snapped me out of it though. When Luna called for help, I heard my daughter, and I had to answer.

"Luna?" I asked

BT shook his head. "My daughter has been dead for about two years now. Died in a house fire along with my wife. I was on deployment at the time, nothing I could have done, but not a day goes by that I don't think about how things would have been different if I wasn't so far away. And I don't know, I guess when Luna called out some part of me went back there and said, not this time."

"Wow man, I'm sorry for bringing that shit up."

"Eh, don't be. You didn't cause the fire. And you couldn't have known what you were dredging up."

We sat there in silence for a while, each nursing our drink before Allison staggered up to us with Luna, both using each other to balance. "Hey pussies. What are you two over here moping for? BT, is Noah dragging you into his depressive shit as well? It's a party, liven up, live a little. We can think about all that tomorrow." Allison said.

"Your turn. I'm getting some sleep. BT can you walk me back? I'm a little bit drunk as well, and kind of dizzy" Luna said, as she foisted the very drunk Allison off on me and grabbed BT. As they were leaving he stopped for a second, turned and said "What I said stays between you and me right?" I nodded. "Good" he said, and continuing acting as a support for Luna while they walked. I took Allison back to her berth, all the while enduring her attempts to get me to cheer up. When we arrived at her berth, she waved her wristband in front of the door, unlocking it for us. "You know, I probably won't remember most of this tomorrow" she said, "But I wanted to at least give you this as a thank you." She kissed me on the cheek, and stumbled over to her bed. "It was nothing" I said, but that girl had fallen asleep before she even hit the pillow. Leaving her there, door automatically locking behind me, I went to try and figure out more about this place we found ourselves. Forewarned is forearmed after all.

I talked to a few groups that were still hanging around about the previous game they had gone through. Based on what they said it seemed there were two major types of possible games, with a few others mixed in for variety. The one we had gone through was a combat based one, where both sides are allowed conflict with one another, and there are typically other threats about, but there was also a deduction based one. The major rules with that one seemed to be no direct combat, instead using a voting system. Traitors could still kill, but there were limits on it, sometimes on a nightly basis, other times based on some other mechanism. A war type game also popped up once or twice, with large armies that had the traitors act as spies for the other side. It's likely there were others as well, but no one had gone through them yet.

By the time I finished, I was exhausted and quickly made my way to my berth. Looking down at my wristband, it was displaying 10 hours remaining on my countdown. We'd be back at it again in the morning. I had checked the others wristbands while we were hanging out, and all of them had at least another day before getting called in. Staring up at the ceiling I closed my eyes and fell into a fitful sleep.