The Calm Before the Storm

Day 6

Reprieve

“There is no mission today. Take a few hours rest Players—The Reapers.”

We didn’t believe it at first.

“Is it a trick?” Sara asked.

“I don’t think they’re allowed to do that,” I said.

“YO!”

We turned to see Jim and Rachel running towards us. They came skidding to a halt. It was good to see them. Their absence yesterday made me wonder if they were still in the game or not. As much as I would’ve liked less competition, I would’ve hated seeing them go.

“What happened to you two?” I asked.

Jim turned to me. “Yo, we got cornered by some Reapers and they wouldn’t let us go. Noise after Noise got tossed at us and we was fighting them for the entire five hours. If we hadn’t been erased by the Noise I’da thought that we’d been erased for not having enough time for the mission. It was whack.”

“I don’t think they wanted us interfering with the mission,” Rachel said. “I think the Game Master has taken a particular interest in you.”

“Speakin’ a which, why she ain’t givin’ us a mission?” Jim asked. “I can’t complain man, but if we gettin’ scored for performance on missions and all it kinda bums me out.”

“We’ll be fine,” Rachel said. “We’ve given this week our best, and whatever happens, it happens. There’s nothing we can do to change it.”

Jim nodded. “Guess so. I oughta score a buncha points for all of the Noise I put down yesterday. Bet they don’t have enough Noise left to use for the day and that’s why we don’t have a mission.”

We all laughed at this. Jim had an infectious personality. I think we all felt as though we were going to win just by being around him. He was arrogant, but in a funny way, and one that gave us all hope.

“I think we should eat and kick back today,” Rachel said. “We all deserve a break. Especially you two. You must have completed that mission all by yourselves.”

“Yeah, we didn’t see anyone else around,” I said.

That’s because there’s no one left.

We all turned to see our favorite two Reapers standing nearby: Jessica and her partner whose name we still did not know, nor did we care to. They walked towards us, but not in a threatening matter. Maybe it was the GM’s orders to keep their mitts off of us for the day.

“Congratulations,” Jessica applauded. “Here stand our final Players.”

Those words hit us all pretty hard. This was it. There had been over twenty people to play the game, and we were the only ones remaining.

“They’ve done pretty well, haven’t they, Derek?” Jessica asked.

He grinned at us. “Yeah. You know, I used to hate it when the GM’s would tie our hands for a day, but I think it’s going to be much sweeter to take them down tomorrow.”

“Bring on all of the Noise you want!” Jim said. “We can handle them.”

He cocked his head and laughed. “You newbies just don’t get it. Tomorrow is day seven. End of the week. The final day. The day we Reapers get to go hands on.”

That was a powerful threat.

“We have to fight you?” Sara asked.

“If that’s what the GM wants, but even if she doesn’t force you to fight us, which I doubt she will,” Jessica said. “The moments we get our hands on you, you’re ours.”

“Bring it on!” Jim shouted. “I’ve got a score to settle with you Reapers. You can just name the place and we’ll be there, ready to meet you.”

Jim was an absolute idiot. He was actually going to take on the Reapers? I could see that Rachel didn’t agree with this plan. Her face was pale at the mention of fighting the Reapers, and I couldn’t blame her. Jim obviously didn’t remember that Jessica had tossed him aside like a rag doll on the second day when he had tried to attack her, and that was when she wasn’t allowed to do anything more. Though she had been kind, I doubted she was merciful, and I knew her partner wouldn’t be. Fighting the Reapers was suicide, we’d have to avoid them at all costs come tomorrow.

“So, any other questions?” Jessica asked. “We’re very generous when it comes to the seventh day, especially since hardly anyone lives past it.”

These words were meant to discourage us.

“Piss off,” I scowled at them. “We’re not going to get cold feet now. We’ve survived through five of your days and one more isn’t going to make a difference. We’re winning this game, and we’ll do it together.”

Derek grinned. “Right, because if you win you all obviously get to come back to life. It makes sense to work together.”

Sara glared at him. “You’re mocking us, aren’t you?”

“Congratulations!” he clapped his hand. “If you die, at least you can die knowing that you’ve got an astute observation of the obvious.”

Sara ran at him, but I held her back. If they were allowed to defend themselves, I wasn’t going to let her get close enough to give them an excuse. I needed her, and I wasn’t about to let my partner get erased because she couldn’t keep her anger in check.

“Oh come, Derek, we know when we’re not wanted,” Jessica smiled. Then she turned to me. “So, here we have the partnership that has caught the GM’s eyes. I heard you passed what appears to be her most difficult mission she’s ever assigned. You wouldn’t believe all of the hassle she had to go through to get that approved, as her standards were near impossible to meet, and yet… here you two are.”

“She had to get a mission approved, you guys have quite a few rules don’t you?” I asked.

Both Jessica and Derek moaned.

“You have no idea,” Jessica said. “Tons of meetings and a load of rules. Our work as Reapers is very serious.”

“Yeah, killing people can be such a pain,” Jim muttered.

“You have no understanding of our work,” Jessica rolled her eyes. “You might want to learn to open your horizons a bit more. Just because you win the game doesn’t give you the right to live, it just gives you the right to have the opportunity to live. But… if you win, you’ll find that out for yourselves.”

“And if we lose, don’t you want to taunt us with what we might’ve missed out on?” I asked.

“We’d love to,” Derek said. “But it’s against the rules.”

I would’ve thought she was lying, but she had no reason to. She had plain and simply told us that they were going to try and kill us tomorrow, why lie?

“Look, I don’t care whatcha have to say,” Jim said. “We’re gonna win and that’s that. So, if you’re done messin’ with us, then get lost!”

“As you wish, enjoy your last day,” Derek grinned.

Jessica and Derek vanished, and we were left alone. Sara suggested we all get food and rest up as well as we could for the day to come. We did so, but not with the same cheery spirit as earlier. We tried to hold onto it, but the fact was tomorrow as judgment day. All of our hard work could be for naught if we didn’t complete the mission tomorrow, and that was a scary thought to all of us. We shouldn’t be resting, we should be planning.

Much to our surprise, Jim was the one who had been planning all along.

“We’re gonna hunt down the Reapers and draw their fire,” Jim said. “Then you two do whatever you can to finish that mission. If you finish it, we all win. That’s what matters here.”

We were all shocked by his words.

“If you challenge the Reapers, they could erase you with ease,” I said.

“We gotta take that risk,” Jim said. “If they’re attackin’ us from every direction, ain’t no way we’re gonna beat the mission. If Rach and I can draw them out, you might have a clear shot at the mission and a better chance of us winning. Brute force ain’t the way to do this last mission.”

I blinked. I would have never imagined those words coming out of his mouth.

“Why you two though?” Sara asked.

Jim smiled. “Cause I’m the toughest.”

We all smiled.

“I’m good with that plan,” said Rachel.

“Me too,” Sara said. “I want to personally show that Game Master just what I’m made of.”

“So we’re all agreed to the plan right?” Jim asked.

We all nodded.

“Good,” Jim said. “So, le’s do this right? Le’s win this shit!”