Krystal and Meredyth were best friends. Through school they were inseparable, Krystal with her white blonde hair and Meredyth with her flaming red locks. They careened together through phases and fads, but not until Meredyth brought home one day a copy of a little known game called The Precursor Legacy did they finally find their true obsession.

Now, years later, they sat on that dark and stormy night. Lights unlit, the only illumination flaring from the screen, the ruddy brown light of the Wasteland throwing distended silhouettes against the pink paint of Krystals bedroom.

Lightning, nearby, crashed.

The two girls jumped as the thunder rolled over and through the room, "That was a close one! Maybe we should stop playing!" squeaked Meredyth, the owner of the game disk and the one to lose should it be destroyed.

"No! Not yet!" begged Krystal, "I've almost unlocked my next battle medallion! I'm so close!"

"But the lightning!"

And the world turned white.

…

…

…

There was a moment of pain, short but sharp, as the girls opened their eyes. The lightning bolt was centred almost directly overhead. Had they died? Was this the afterlife? Did Krystals game actually save?

Their eyes opened to a light so bright that it seared the eyelids. Brown, baked mud walls lined the area where they lay, something cold and hard under their arms. As they stumbled to their feet, the sound of a thousand voices roaring in applause hit their ears, a human roar that would have drowned out the thunder of moments ago. Meredyth was the first to her feet and as she rose, she grabbed the cold hard object below her. A Morph gun. A Blaster, no less. Krystal rose, only to find a Scatter Shot underneath her body. The two weapons were dead and lifeless, ammo counts showing empty. The two girls looked around to see the bodies of marauders littering the arena, a monument to the devastation that hit these area moments before like a tidal wave. They grinned at each other and looked up at the beaming face of Damas, ruler of the Spargus Arena. Krystal unconsciously picked up her Playstation controller, the wire having been seared off in some unimaginable heat.

"Well done, girls," the large man stated, "But the rules of the arena are simple. Only one leaves. Begin"

The two girls looked at each other, still grinning. Surely, he meant that they had done well and were free to go. They had tattooed men to seduce!

"Um.. .Lord Damas? Like, we'd rather just go now and, y'know, like pick up some boys!" giggled Meredyth, her fantasy coming to life. The crowd shifted, whispers filling the girls ears as a silent denial was passed through the crowd. Damas slammed his fist down on his throne, "Activate the Matter Reorganisers!" he shouted to a minion before looking down into the arena, "One of you leaves, or neither do. Choose!"

The girls looked at each other, looks of panic appearing for the first time upon their faces. The panicked looks nly intensified as the walls of the arena, obedient to the wishes of its master, began to iris shut, wall segments losing on each other with a sound like a sword being slid out of a scabbard. Krystal began to sob. Meredyth was looking at the walls and began to mutter over and over, "This can't be happening" The crowed roared its appreciation of this twist to the events before them. Soon, one way or the other, they would have their shed of blood.

It was Meredyth who broke the tension, "This is, like, all your fault! If you stopped playing when I said you should!"

Krystal looked up from her sobbing, eyes red ringed, "My fault! It's your stupid game!"

"But you were, like, the one playing!"

"You're just pissed because I was with Justin yesterday and he hates you!"

"What? But, like… you know I like Justin!"

"Well he doesn't like you! He told me so!"

"Well yesterday? I was, like, with Toby!"

"What? YOU BITCH!" and with that, Krystal launched herself at her best friend, lashing out over and over again with the controller.

The crowd went silent, even the iris slowed its inexorable close, as the blonde knelt over her friend, bludgeoning over and over again with the now blood coated controller weeping.

Two entered. Only one would leave.