Hour 29

Sang-Wook watched a traumatized Margaux step from the elevator, lacerations breaking the natural flow of her face and abdomen, as well as a machete impaling part of her neck. For a second he thought her an illusion, some kind of cruel joke shown to him in the context of his hospital, his place of healing. As she staggered forward leaking blood, he remembered seeing her fighting a tan man with springy black hair as he had left in the elevator, a man holding a machete. He hesitated as he saw her eyes follow his movements before thinking, "damn, I still have this paint all over me! I'm not invisible, how could I forget!" He looked back at her and saw her bloody hand holding a phone... He knew what he had to do. He took a step forward to get himself a point, her phone was such an easy target. As Margaux tripped under her own weight and fell forward, his hands forgot about her phone and caught her. He had killed so many people, but something about being in the landscape of his hospital triggered his natural response rather than the one nourished by this obscene game, a response to help the hurt. He let her raise her weak hand and type on her phone with trembling fingers. She revealed her number to him just about obscured with both fresh and drying blood, one that read: 352 691 561090. Sang-Wook took his own phone out and called her. Her phone rang, and she picked up with a weak voice, "Thank you... For... Helping." With each word, her neck flexed, and the skin holding onto the machete oozed fresh blood. She continued, "Please help... Me." Sang-Wook observed her injuries and said, "I don't think there's much I can do for you." She tried to shake her head, but the machete stopped her, "No, that's not what I... I mean." He was confused, and at this point, his invisibility wore off; he could tell as the timer went off on his phone to let him know. Margaux, not even reacting to his expired invisibility, clarified, "That man downstairs, the one who did... This to me, you... Have to kill him." Sang-Wook was more than a little lost, was this some kind of revenge or something? She saw his apprehension and said, "He was having fun toying with me, could've... killed me easily if he wanted to. He enjoys hurting people... the look he had was one of a killer, a killer long before these games began..." She grimaced in pain, a plump clot of blood forming around her mauled eye, and whispered, "There's no telling what a man like that will wish for if he wins." Sang-Wook asked in a cynical tone he hadn't intended to, "You think I'm better than him?" Margaux looked up at him with her remaining eye, one that seemed full of life for someone so close to death, and said, "I don't doubt you've killed many people to get this far, we all have." She paused as she tried to find her words; the pain she was in and her current blood loss made simple speech difficult. She continued, "Killing to survive is different than killing for sport..." She stopped again, then elaborated, "Still, few would've made it this far on pure survival alone; there must be something someone badly wishes for to make it this far... something to keep them moving through this horror." She touched his pale, sickly face with her free hand and said, "The sadness in your eyes... the fact I can see even a shred of empathy... tells me anything you wish for, should you win this absurd game, would be better than his desire." Sang-Wook felt tears anoint his eyes, a bizarre sense of purity refining his self-esteem. He couldn't remember the last time he cried.

Rico heard Akachukwu's door open and turned to look at the young man currently walking towards him. Rico read his stare and body language expertly, though he couldn't know why this boy had such a hatred for him. He smiled, though, because such emotions always seasoned a fight beautifully. As Akachukwu made the mistake of invading his personal space, Rico punched him 3 times in the face before he could react. The first two strikes were jabs meant to disorientate him, which were made more effective given the fact he had unknowingly stepped right into them. The third blow was a devastating right hook that connected with his chin so hard his teeth clanged painfully together and nipped the tip of his tongue off. Akachukwu excited him when he didn't fall, instead reworking his balance with an intuitive firmness that projected a robust durability. Akachukwu palmed Rico's face with his free hand, his lanky fingers imbued with a palpable girth as he caved in his cheeks. It was obvious while Rico had the experience, he underestimated Akachukwu's raw strength, allowing him to heave his face forward for a savage headbutt. His head pulverized Rico's nose with ease, crushing it into a spouting rupture of blood that birthed a current of red down his face. Any normal person would've recoiled from such damage with misery, but Rico's smile couldn't have been larger; prey that fought back was always the most rewarding. Rico grabbed his right shoulder using his left hand while he used his right hand to secure the back of his left arm before driving his body into him with all his weight in a forward motion, hugging the arm he seized. He danced his left leg behind Akachukwu's own left, drawing him hip to hip, and pushed forward on his shoulder, slamming him into the ground with a full-force leg sweep. Rico's flexibility was maliciously precise, allowing him to maneuver behind his back and trap him in a rear naked choke hold, capturing his neck in a slim arm that was as hard as steel while he locked his hands and chin in place. Before Akachukwu could even realize what was happening he was blacking out, the blood flow from his carotid artery sealed. A gunshot rang out behind them, causing Rico to lessen his grip and allow Akachukwu to remain conscious. Rico saw a man dressed in jeans, a red jersey for a sports team he didn't know and a matching baseball hat standing behind him with a handgun pointing at the ceiling. The man, who had tan skin a shade lighter than Ricos, fixated the gun on him and ordered in Spanish, laced with a thick Peruvian accent he tried to disguise as masculine, "Get up." Rico complied, fully releasing Akachukwu from his arms before sitting up. The man persisted, his gun jumping with every word, "Give me your phone." Rico replied with an uncannily blank stare devoid of emotion, "Sure, I'll give it to you." He rolled to his knees and stopped for a brief second before taking to his feet and began walking towards him. In that second that Rico paused to stand, not more than a blink of an eye, he had deciphered the man's entire personality type. He held a German revolver, a korth NXS 8-Shot .357 magnum, and though Rico couldn't know these intricate details he could still understand it was a fine weapon, that the trembling man holding such an expensive firearm had taken it from someone else. The man shook with unease as he yelled, "Stop! Don't come any closer!" Rico sighed, a sigh of boredom that bellowed from deep within his diaphragm, "Do you want my phone or not?" The man issued a pointing motion with the barrel of his gun and ordered, "Throw it to me!" Rico slowly reached towards his pocket and then with a motion so quick, so devilishly timed with a nimble grace, launched 3 serrated throwing knives in blinding succession that had been concealed behind his belt. The 2 blades that landed in the man's middle and lower neck impacted him with such tremendous force blood didn't even form on their perimeter since it had been such a clean puncture, though the meaty sound the third knife made as it connected with his groin suggested it was definitely a wound that would bleed. The man fell forward in slow motion, unable to even vocalize a protest, and before he could try to brace himself, Rico calmly accepted the gun from his hands. The man fell to his knees grabbing at his throat, and Rico executed him with a clean shot to the back of his head with his own gun. Though Akachukwu recoiled at the sound of the gun, all he could logically think was, "If he had used those knives on me, I'd be dead." Rico stared at the man as his body decompressed and fell to the floor, his final pose one of insignificance. To Rico, it was obvious, the way the man's hands had shaken as he held the gun, the way his face begged not to be forced to kill as he pointed it at them. He wasn't a predator, he was prey desperately trying to camouflage himself as a predator. Rico remembered it well; his dad had beat the knowledge into him at a young age, the same dad he had been forced to kill as a teenager; in life, only prey and predators existed. Bugs and frogs, mice and cats, zebras and lions, it was an unavoidable fact of life. Modern formalities and sensibilities had dulled this perception throughout most cultures, but the truth remained self-evident: When someone cut another in line, they were the predator as the prey moved away in defeat. When someone stole a parking space and another sighed but didn't confront them, they were the prey. When someone pointed a gun but was too afraid to kill...

They were prey.

Rico picked up the man's phone and thought, "And with this, I have 14 points." As he reclaimed one of his throwing knives from the man's neck, he looked at Akachukwu and spoke in Colombian Spanish his purebred African ears couldn't understand, "So, who are you?" As he licked the knife he laughed, "Because right now, you aren't a predator."

Before Akachukwu could react, Rico's phone rang.