0:47….0:46….0:45
Joe's heartbeat raced. His palms were sweating, his hands trembled. How do you beat a man without hands?
"Joe, think!" he muttered desperately. The Sentinel behind him stepped closer, the sound of his laser gun growing louder.
Beat. Not fight, not punch. Beat a man, without a hand.
0:32….0:31….0:30
Beat like a drumbeat. Like a heartbeat. Like…..
"Wait..A heart!" Joe shouted. "You beat a man with his own heart!"
His fingers ran across the holographic keyboard. W-I-T-H-H-I-S-H-E-A-R-T
0:10…0:9…0:8...
The screen buzzed, this was it, the final moment that will decide his fate whether he would die or survive. Joe held his breath, his hands shaking visibly. Cold shivers ran down his spine.
The screen lit up in green.
Joe's heart almost jumped out of him, he felt relieved.
A deafening siren blared through the arena. The barrier that enclosed them disappeared and Joe collapsed to his knees and was gasping for breath in relief.
He felt a tap on his back and turned.
It was the girl. Joe felt relieved that she also survived.
"Whoa, thank God you survived, I was so occupied that I never even looked at you again."
"Congratulations to the passengers that survived," the gothic voice announced.
"Thirty-four passengers have been eliminated, Nineteen passed."
Joe glared around. Bodies weren't piled on the ground as he expected. They were simply vanished and erased from existence.
"Whew!, That was so close," she said, looking at him all over. "I'm Lena. Lena Allen." She extended her hands.
"Joe. Joe Miller." He stood up shakily and took her hands. "Thanks for the help back there, I really owe you one."
"We actually helped each other," Lena said, and adjusted her glasses. "That's the only way of surviving here."
Footsteps echoed loudly across the stone floor. Maya appeared from the crowd, her expression was unpredictable as usual. Behind her were three other people: A short stout man with scars all over his face, a young boy who is nearly fourteen and a woman in grey auburn hair almost in her mid-thirties.
"It's good you survived, 'cause most newbies don't actually make it past the first game." She said, almost sounding like she was mocking him.
"How long have you been here and how do you know about all these games?" Joe threw her the questions.
"Long enough to know the games only get deadlier the more we survive." Maya gestured towards others. "This is Marcus, the kid's name is Leo, and that's Goldy."
Marcus nodded slowly, Leo gave a nervous wave. Goldy remained calm and mute, her tired eyes scanned Joe and Lena like she was always suspecting them.
"We don't have the time to introduce, let's skip that." Goldy said suddenly. Her voice was cold and sharp. "The next game will start in three hours' time."
"Three hours?" Lena echoed. "Didn't we just finish?"
"Welcome to the Dark Lands," Marcus said, smiling coldly. "Rest is the most expensive thing you can ever find here."
They moved as a group through the winding corridor beneath the arena. The walls were made of the same black stone, covered in the same glowing symbols that seemed to be alive.
"What's the next game?" Joe asked as they walked.
Maya glanced back at him and nodded. "No idea. But I bet it's gonna be a team game."
"You should have gotten used to the games by now then, if you've been here long enough." Lena burst out loudly.
"The game to be played is decided once the passengers are present."
They reached a large chamber with six doorways, each one marked with different symbols. At the center was a stone table covered in supplies: water bottles, cans, ropes, small knives and small devices that looked like compasses facing different directions.
"The Maze of Horror!" Maya exclaimed at the sight.
"What does that even mean?" Joe asked, noticing her hidden fear for the first time.
Maya glanced back at them. "The Maze of Horror, I've been in this game before. It's a team game. Six enter, only three come out."
Joe's stomach turned. "What?"
"You heard me, only three people are gonna survive. The maze, it changes, it tricks you and feeds on your fear. You will be paired with another team. One team will be predators, the others will be the prey."
"And what if you're the prey, I guess the prey gets killed right?" Lena asked quietly.
"Well, let's find out and see." Maya said, stiffening her gaze.
"You run as fast as you can." Leo said, speaking for the first time. His voice was small but steady.
"Take all what you need now," Maya said, already grabbing a knife and rope. The others loaded up swiftly, like they had done this before.
"How many games are there?" Joe asked.
"Ten," Marcus said. "You're on game two, most passengers don't make it past four."
"I guess the main intention is to kill us all then," Lena said, a little bit of fear all over her voice.
"How do you even know about all these games?" Joe asked and peered suspiciously at Maya.
"I have survived five games and this is my sixth." Maya replied, a little bit of darkness in her voice.
"You mean you've all played these games before?" Lena removed her glasses.
"No, this would be our third game. We all met Maya at the second game." Leo answered this time, his voice soft as usual.
"And what if we complete all the ten games?" Joe asked again.
Maya stared at Joe, and for the first time he could realize she wasn't sure of the answers she was about to give. "Then I guess you get to leave the Dark Lands, that's the promise anyways."
"You guessing actually meant you don't believe it, do you?" Lena asked.
"I've seen a lot of people die believing in promises," Maya said simply.
A loud siren boomed through the chamber. The symbols on the doors began to glow bright, moving in rhythms like a heartbeat.
"Two hours left," Goldy announced. "We need a plan. The maze has six zones: The Corridors of Whispers, the Hall of Death, the Shadow Abyss, the Chambers of Imagination, Hall of Ghosts and the final and most dangerous one, Pit of Apocalypse. Each chamber is designed to break you mentally before it destroys you physically."
"If we're the prey, we stay at the outer corridors," Marcus said. "The predators always rush to the middle. That's their mistake."
"And what if we're the predators?" Joe asked.
"Then we split up and corner them at the Chambers of Imagination," Maya said. "That's where the prey always panics."
Joe looked around him and observed his new team. A hardened survivor, a tactical genius, a strange woman with cold eyes, a kid too young to be here and a girl with glasses who solved riddles faster than anyone he had ever seen.
"We can do this," Joe said, surprising himself with confidence in his voice. "You guys survived this game once, we survive together."
Maya almost smiled. "That's the spirit, newbie. Let's see if you still have it when the shadows are hunting."
The siren boomed louder again.
"One hour before doomsday," the gothic voice echoed around the chamber. "The Maze of Horror awaits."