Bokurano 1 – The Game
Yadoine
Azada's P.O.V.
"It really is hot," my big sister Celoa says, wiping her brow. I, my sister and 13 other acquaintances are standing in a crevasse in the Dyodyne mountains for no reason.
"Why are we even here? What are we doing here?" a boy called Arin asks. "Hey, Azada, what's that on your elbow? No, the other one," he says, pointing to my left elbow. I crane my neck and see a pale red, circular shape around my elbow.
"What's this?" I ask. Everyone else stares at it as well, especially Celoa.
"Is that your eczema, sis?" Celoa teases, and I blush.
"Enough stupidity, you two. We should head back to the central dome." a girl called Fayne says. She has a pinched face and she doesn't look like one to be messed with. I decided to stay away from her as far as I could.
"Fayne's right," I agree. "I want to go back anyway. I'm hungry." My sister groans and slaps me round the backside of my head.
"Stop thinking about food at a time like this!" she snaps. "Anyway, I want to know what we were doing down here. I'm going to stay here and—" Celoa gets cut off by a large rumble from underneath us.
"What the hell is that?!" I shout.
"Is it another earthquake?" Mariya panics. Mariya is a good friend of mine and she's easily set off by loud noises. Suddenly, a gigantic robot comes out of the crusted earth of the crevasse. We stare at it, flabbergasted by this ginormus piece of metal. It seems to be a giant spider, with five chunky, metallic legs. It is dark grey in colour and on its head is a crest-like shape with fifth-teen flashing lights, like eyes. We just stare at it until everything goes black...
We all wake up to find ourselves underwater, but peculiarly, we are able to breathe. But wait, I don't feel wet. I realise. We must be in the hub of the robot! I stand up and everyone else wakes up too.
"Where the hell are we?" Fayne murmurs darkly.
"This doesn't look like Yadoine," Mariya trembles.
"It's cause it's not," a strange voice says from the darkness. We all jump as a familiar looking face comes out of the shadows.
"I know you! You're that man who said about that dumb game!" Arin cries.
"Kokopelli, or something," a boy called Dedra says. The man nods.
"Yes." He says. Kokopelli turns around, and as he does, fifthteen chairs appear from nowhere. "Sit down, children, and the young girl will play the game,"
"But, hey, WAIT—" I start as Kokopelli disappears. There is a long silence. It is broke by us all picking chairs.
"I'll pick this one," Mariya whispers, perching on a soft, turquoise stool.
"I guess this one's mine," Fayne says, slumping on a hard-looking, steel framed chair.
"These two are the same. I guess I'll have the bigger one and Azada can have the smaller one," Celoa smiles.
"Fine," I say. I sit down and soon after, everyone else does as well. There is a sudden rumble, like the one earlier, and the robot grinds its gears. On my command. Everyone is frantic and they shout at me, "Are you controlling this?!" and I can only reply with a nod. We emerge to find another robot waiting for us on the surface of the water. It is a gigantic monster, with a pearly-black coating and massive, spike-like arms reaching down to its steely knees. On its shoulders are huge plates of armour and right in between its shoulders is a small head, with fifthteen lights on it, just like ours. As we gawp at it, I feel an urge to move forward. The machine jolts forwards at my sudden moves. My eyes are screwed up into little slits I'm concentrating so hard. As we get closer to the behemoth it makes a swipe at us and our legs give way. Everyone screams, even Fayne, but I am the only one who is content. Suddenly, the other robot's arm stabs onto our chest, ripping armour from every angle, until it grabs a small, pearly ball attached to a wire from our chest. It starts to crush the sphere, and I feel like my heart is being torn apart. The sphere eventually breaks, leaving small fragments of white metal to settle on the surface of the water, which has been thrashed about by our short-lived battle. Everything is quiet, except for the sound of water trickling into the cockpit* of the robot. It stops for a second, then the cockpit walls begin to crack and tonnes of water comes thrashing in. In a matter of seconds, the cockpit is halfway flooded with sea-water. Everyone screams, and Celoa comes splashing** towards me. She raises her hand, and slaps me across the face.
"Have you realised what you've done?! You're killing us! Look, most of us are dead and it's because of you!" she screams.
"I didn't mean for this to happen," I splutter, rubbing my cheek. "I'm sor—" I'm cut off by the sound of me gargling and gasping for air. I realise that none of us can live anymore, not even the people of Yadoine. I'm sorry. I think as the water fills my lungs. I eventually lose conscience and I drown along with my friends. I can only hear one thing; the sound of a sinister laugh which seems to say, Looks like you lost the game, punks.