The Ninth Hour
A piercing roar echoes through the arena. Where the hell is she? If she dies this whole operation goes to hell. “Pera,” I call, “Per–”
I stumble on a rock and try to use a vine to steady myself. The vine breaks and I tumble down a mound. “Pera,” I call, cursing to myself. My knee is bleeding, I realize upon inspection. At least no broken bones.
“Ashel!” someone calls my name.
Huh? I whip around, only to see Pera running towards me being chased by a –
What is that? I can’t classify it in the mere seconds I have before it tramples me. But its mossy green scales and bloodshot eyes are enough to send me running.
“What are you –” Pera’s voice gets lost in the beasts roars.
“I was looking for you,” I say accusingly.
She doesn’t respond to me even though it’s clear that she wants to. Maybe she’s winded, I think, before I see her tear stained face.
“What,” I have to speak in short bursts to conserve the air in my lungs, “what’s wrong?”
She shakes her head, refusing to answer me. Instead she points ahead to – to a cave! I am so relieved I could cry. I whip my head to check on the monster, only to see that it is gaining on us. How did my life get like this? I was in a warm bed just a few short hours ago.
The First Hour
The stars are lies. They shine red because I once made the mistake of telling one of the nurses that it was my favorite color. But lying underneath a sky full of crimson only highlights the artificiality of it all.
I toss and turn in bed, trying to get comfortable under the summer sky. The pain is muted today, just a little bit around the knuckles. I would be able to sleeping if I hadn’t made the mistake of looking up.
Hmm… where was that tablet again? Still lying on my back, I grope around the nightstand with my left hand. Cursing, I decide to get out of bed.
“0.314B,” the mechanical voice on the intercom calls.
Oh, hell. “Just trying to change the ceiling.” I still haven’t gotten used to the pressure sensors in the mattress. Not much usually changes in the Institute, especially for someone who has been here for as long as I have.

“You have a visitor,” the voice continues.
“Deny visit,” I respond instinctively. I only get visits from people who can’t help me – priests, preachers and the like. There was a mortician once, but he got the room numbers mixed up. He called the encounter awkward. Funny. That’s not quite the word I would have chosen.
“Commencing visit at 1:47 AM,” the voice announces.
“What? No, deny visit. Deny, you stupid computer,” I say with irritation. “I don’t want a visit at one in the morning.”
And then it hits me. Who would want to visit me at one in the morning?
The Second Hour

“I don’t know who that is,” I announce, looking at the hologram which now hovers in the center of my room.

“Don’t you see the resemblance,” the man in the white coat asks, pulling on his mousy whiskers. “Maybe from a different angle,” he says to himself as he fiddles with the tablet once more. My patience visibly thins as the hologram rotates around on itself, and I simply can’t play his game anymore.

“Who are you?” I ask for the third time since he entered my room. His white coat identifies him to be a doctor, yet he isn’t accompanied by any of my nurses. He doesn’t acknowledge my question. What a surprise.

“Hey, I asked you a –”

“This is Pera,” another voice cuts me off. A different man had entered my room while I was preoccupied with the hologram. He is much younger than the doctor, wearing a sleek suit. “She is an eccentric. Always fighting for the lost causes – Vega rights, Free Lyra,” he peers at me through his lined eyes. “Pepola research.”

“Yeah, yeah. Congratulations to her for being a decent person, but why do I need to know any of this at two in the morning?” I ask, exasperated.

“I thought I should give you some background before I ask you to help her.”
The Third Hour

PRI: Pepola Research Institute.
The words glare down at me as a grim reminder. I haven’t seen the outside of this building since I was brought here half a lifetime ago. I tighten my scarf, trying to fight the winter chills. It must be winter right? I can see my steamy breath in the air. Eight years in a temperature controlled building has made me too sensitive to extreme weather. I am already sneezing by the time the shuttle comes to pick me up.
“Ashel Lehane,” the steward asks, looking at his tablet. The words sound foreign to me. I have been 0.314B since I was seven years old. They brought me to the institute and branded me with a barcode that summed me up in 3 words – 0.314B: Female, Minor, Pepola.
“Are you Ashel Lehane?” he asks again, looking at me. He is short – even shorter than me – but his calm composure makes him appear to be ever the professional. He wears a standard blue suit, regulation for government hovercraft stewards from what I remember. Everything about him save his piercing gray eyes seems painfully ordinary – piercing gray eyes that are staring directly at me for an answer.
“Um, Ashel. Yeah,” I manage to get out.
“Follow me,” he commands, checking my name off of the list on his tablet. “And do try to keep up.”
The Fourth Hour
We are flying over some kind of a lake. I stare out the window, looking for any kind of landmark that would indicate exactly where we are at the moment. The lake hasn’t frozen over yet, so the cold must not be as bad as I had thought.
“Ashel Lehane,” the voice on the intercom calls, “Please report to infirmary on board.” Why do they all use the same computer generated voice as the Institute? I can’t imagine anyone finding that voice pleasing.
I see a dozen eyes on me when I stand up. Ignoring them, I make my way towards the door at the back of the compartment. They know why I’m here just as well as I know why they’re here. There’s no point hiding my condition in shame.
The Fifth Hour
“Okay, hold still,” the nurse instructs me as she fills up the syringe. If I was ever afraid of needles, the fear dissipated in my eight years of being poked and prodded by anyone with a scientific degree to his name.
“Now it says here that this is your first dose,” the nurse continues, looking at her tablet. “So I want you to stick around in the infirmary for the remainder of the hour. Sometimes people don’t respond well to this treatment.”
“I thought it was an untested treatment,” I say to the nurse.
“Is that what he told you?” the nurse smiles, knowingly. She doesn’t seem sinister. In fact, her puffy pink cheeks almost have a motherly tone to them. “Sounds like him,” she remarks playfully.
“So it has been tested?” I ask with annoyance. Why would the man in dark suit lie to me when he knew I had so little to negotiate with? The woman meets my eyes, and I know she won’t lie to me.
“Well, it’s not untested per se...” her voice trails off.
“The test results aren’t good,” I guess.
“Not entirely,” she agrees grimly. “But he seems to think your particular stage is compatible with the treatment,” she forces a smile which I don’t return. “Tell me,” she continues after a short pause, “why are you doing this?”
“I don’t have much of a choice, do I?” I answer. “I have been caged in that Institute for the past eight years, ever since I was diagnosed at the age of seven. Everyday someone new would come in and promise to cure me. Some would say it would take a few years, others a few months. Even the most ambitious of them couldn’t give me a time frame shorter than six months. But last night, a man came in and told me he would cure me in a day. One day. He promised to take me out of that forsaken institute and heal my bones.”
“But at a price,” the nurse reminds me. She seems to think I made the wrong decision taking the man up on his offer. She didn’t understand.
“My own bones fight against me,” I say angrily. “My own bones create my cage. If I can help one brat gain a pardon and rid myself of this wretched disease, this Pepola, why would I say no?”
The nurse gives me a sad smile. I can see that she still disapproves of my decision, but she doesn’t bring it up again. “Make a fist with your left hand,” she says instead. “This might sting a little.”
The Sixth Hour

When I return from the infirmary, there are more faces in the compartment. They don’t pay much attention to me as I take my seat. I count eight girls besides myself, which means we still need two more decoys and then the original herself – Pera.
“Is this seat taken?” a hoarse voice asks. I look up and see a frail girl standing in the aisle next to me. “I just boarded,” she explains.
“No.” I respond. This is the first time in years that I’ve spoken to anyone my age. She nods and takes the seat across the aisle from me. She looks similar to everyone else in this compartment, as well she should. As the man with the eyeliner explained, we were chosen because we all easily resembled Pera.
“It’s a numbers game,” he said, eyeing his tablet. “The more there are of you, the more likely you are to get chosen. And then we simply switch whichever one of you that gets chosen with Pera, and she gets the pardon.”
“How many of us will there be?” I asked with suspicion.
“Eleven decoys,” he answered.
“All Pepola patients?”
“No,” he smiled at my naïveté, “not all Pepola patients. Though most of you do share that frail look as Pera.”
“It’s all those hunger strikes she goes on. I keep telling her, riot all you want. Run however many marathons you must. Just don’t go on hunger strikes. But does that Pera listen to me? Of course not.” the man in the white coat spoke up.
“Yes, grandfather,” the man in the sleek suit said in an effort to tolerate the doctor. “But not all Pepola patients are fit to take part in the trials,” he addressed me. “Besides, you will not believe how hard it is to find a combination of blond hair and brown eyes.”
Blond hair and brown eyes – he meant me. I hadn’t looked at myself in so long that I had almost forgotten what I looked like. Patients didn’t have a need for mirrors at the Institute.
“And if said combination produces a pretty face,” he said with a devilish grin, “then all the better.”
The Seventh Hour

She comes in with bad music blasting from her headphones. Who even carries around headphones anymore? All the eyes in the compartment immediately fly in her direction, which is just the way she seems to like it. While the rest of us picked seats around the middle of the compartment when we first boarded, she walks to the very front without hesitation.
She jingles with every step. At first, I think it’s part of that awful music she’s listening to, but then I realize that it’s her clothing. There is a labyrinth of chains running up and down her torso, under which she wears a faded t-shirt with FREE LYRA written in block letters. Her pants are strategically shredded, and her hair is riddled with feathers and flowers. Yet, underneath it all, I can see the resemblance between her and the rest of the people in the compartment.
They – we – all have the same blond hair and brown eyes. But looking around myself, I realize that it’s more than that. We all share the same determined look on faces. We are all on the verge of getting our lives back, and we’ll do anything to get it back. I need the treatment, Pera needs the pardon, and the others need the freedom.
The Eighth Hour

“We will be landing shortly,” the voice on the intercom informs us. “Ashel Lehane, please report to the infirmary.”

I stand up, sighing. I blacked out after that first dose; I hope I gain consciousness quicker this time. I stumble stepping into the aisle, realizing that the dizziness still hadn’t worn off from the first shot.
“Need some help?” the hoarse voice asks. I look at its owner and she gives me a warm smile.
“It’s okay. I don’t want to be a bother,” I answer carefully.
“Nonsense,” she says dismissively, “I need to pick up something for my throat anyway.” She stands up and extends her arm, “I’m Lieza.”
“Ashel.”


The Tenth Hour

“Lieza’s dead,” Pera announces, trying to catch her breath. “As soon –” she takes in a deep breath, “as soon as we entered the arena. She was the first to go. Then it was one of the decoys from the prison – Yosie, I think her name was. A lot more dead outside the twelve of us too.”
I sit down, leaning against the wall of the cave. Lieza was dead. Living, breathing Lieza with her hoarse voice and her warm smile – she was dead. “Wha… How?” I ask.
“Spinning wheel,” Pera answers. “I almost didn’t make it either.”
“Yeah, me neither,” I admit. They hit us hard with that one. The first trial cut down the participants in half. “Did you know this would happen?”
She looks at me in disgust. “Of course I didn’t know this would happen,” she holds back a scream. “Do you think I want to be responsible for Lieza and Yosie? Do you think I’d want that kind of guilt looming over me for the rest of my life?”
“I’m just saying, Guyliner mentioned trials,” I remind her.
“If my brother knew anything about the extent of the trials, he neglected to mention it to me. It’s funny because I’m in this mess because of him, you know. Him and my grandfather,” her voice becomes louder and louder with each word.
“Pera –”
“I was perfectly content living with a record,” she cuts me off, “but no, nothing must blemish the good name of the Dunbys. I just had to enter the arena and earn the proper pardon. And everything would be fine. They would rig the system so I am bound to win. Well guess what, I don’t give a damn about the Dunby name!”
“Pera!” I am too late. The beast has heard her voice. I can hear its roars getting closer. “Pera, get ready,” I command her.
“But –”
“This is it, okay. You and me.” I cut her off “You want to make it out of here alive?”
She nods, and for a second I see the wild look return in her eyes.
“Then follow me.”
The Eleventh Hour

Pera and I stand shoulder to shoulder on the stage, drenched in blood, sweat, tears and the ooze that came out of that scaly green beast when we slayed it. We are the finalists. Any moment now, one of us will be rewarded. No matter which one of us it is, Pera will step forward and accept the reward, asking for a pardon in the name of the Dunbys.
The director steps forward, and announces that the winner is the one who dealt the fatal blow to the beast. That would be me. I wait for Pera to step forward and accept the pardon, but she surprises me. Instead, she gently nudges my shoulder, willing me to step forward.

People have a wonderful way of surprising you.