Chapter 56 The Pit

Chapter 56 The Pit
He opened his eyes. The light was almost gone now. The hole above him was just a darker shape against the dark. He could hear things moving in the shadows. Small things. Fast things. Things that had been waiting for him to stop moving.

He pulled his leg toward him. The pain was worse now, a deep throb that pulsed with his heartbeat. He tore a strip from his shirt, wrapped it around the knee, pulled it tight. The pressure made him see stars. He waited for them to fade.

He needed to move. If he stayed here, he would die. Not from the fall. Not from the blood. From the things in the dark. From the quiet. From the part of him that had been waiting three years to stop running.

He put his hands on the wall and pulled himself up.

His leg wouldn't hold him. He leaned against the wall, his weight on his good leg, his hands flat against the glass, his breath coming in short gasps. He looked for something. Anything. A door. A seam. A crack in the wall. Something that would tell him there was a way out.

There was nothing.

He stood there for a long time, his leg throbbing, his hands shaking, his chest tight. He thought about Kara again. About the way she'd looked at him in the motel, her face wet with rain or tears, her voice steady even when her hands were shaking.

You think they can win?

I think they can try.

He pushed off the wall. His leg screamed. He ignored it. He took one step. Then another. Then another. He kept his hand on the wall, kept his eyes on the dark, kept his feet moving.

The corridor stretched ahead of him, glass walls on either side, the floor smooth and cold. He could see other corridors branching off, other players moving through their own darkness. He could see a woman curled in a corner, her arms wrapped around her knees, her face buried in her arms. He could see a man walking in circles, his hands reaching for something that wasn't there.

He kept moving.

The door appeared when he stopped looking for it.

One moment the corridor was a dead end, a wall of glass that reflected his own face back at him. The next moment there was a seam, a crack, a handle he hadn't seen before. He reached for it. His fingers closed around the metal. He pulled.

The door opened.

The room beyond was white. Bright. Warm. He stepped through and the light blinded him, made him cover his eyes, made him stumble. He heard voices. He heard footsteps. He heard Cassandra's voice, calm and cold, saying his name.

"Derek. You made it."

He lowered his hands. He was in a room with white walls and white floors and white ceilings. Kara was there, her arm in a sling, her face bruised, her eyes on him. Patricia was there, standing in the corner, her hands folded, her face calm. Others he didn't know.

Cassandra was in the center of the room. She was looking at him with something that might have been interest.

"You were in the pit for forty-seven minutes," she said. "Most players don't get out."

Derek didn't answer. He couldn't. His leg was screaming. His hands were shaking. His chest was tight.

"You didn't scream," Cassandra said. "You didn't call for help. You just waited. And then you walked."

She stepped closer. Her face was very close to his. He could smell her perfume. Something floral. Something expensive.

"You're interesting," she said. "Most of the players who survive the collection facility don't survive the games. They've been broken too many times. They don't know how to be whole anymore."

She reached out, touched his face. Her fingers were cold.

"But you're different. You're still fighting. Even when you know you're going to lose."

Derek looked at her. At the woman who'd been running games for fifty years. At the woman who'd watched thousands of players die. At the woman who was still standing, still smiling, still waiting for something that would make her feel alive.

"I'm not fighting to win," he said.

Cassandra tilted her head. "What are you fighting for?"

He looked at Kara. At Patricia. At the other players who were watching, waiting, hoping.

"I'm fighting to give them time."

Cassandra's smile didn't waver. But something flickered in her eyes. Something that might have been recognition.

"The ones who are coming," she said.

Derek didn't answer.

Cassandra stepped back. She looked at the players, at the room, at the cameras on the ceiling that were broadcasting everything to the investors in their glass booth.

"You think they can save you," she said. "You think they can walk in here and take you away and the Order will just let you go."

She laughed. It was a cold sound, the kind of laugh that came from a place where nothing was funny.

"I've been running games for fifty years. I've seen a hundred players like you. A hundred survivors who thought someone was coming to save them." She looked at Derek. "No one ever came."

She walked toward the door, toward the corridor, toward the dark. She stopped at the threshold.

"The next game starts in one hour. Try to survive."

She left. The lights dimmed. Derek sat on the floor, his leg stretched out in front of him, his back against the wall. Kara came over, sat beside him, put her hand on his arm.

"You made it," she said.

He looked at her. Her face was bruised. Her arm was in a sling. But she was smiling.

"I made it," he said.

They sat there in the half-dark, waiting for the next game, waiting for the thing that was coming, waiting for the ones who said they would save them.

Outside, the rain was starting again. Inside, Derek closed his eyes and tried to remember what it felt like to be whole.