Part 2, The Game…

Goliath blasted from his stone sleep and found his wing healed, but that may have been the only improvement in his situation. Now he was looking down on a creepy little doll holding a gray personal tape recorder.

Elisa….

Elisa awoke to find herself naked from the waist up and the two 'hunters' working feverishly on a strange device hooked into her body, behind them a red digital clock was counting down to one.

"Wha…" Elisa began. "Who are you… Where are my clothes…"

"We're done! Put in the tape!"

Elisa was coming to when they rushed to an ancient RCA and pushed in the tape just as the counter ticked to zero. A metal collar popped off the smaller hunter's neck and clanged to the gray concrete floor.

"But I did what you said *ulp*…," the larger hunter reached for his neck as his face went from rosy, to crimson, to purple.

Static crackled on the ancient television screen, then a bizarre doll's face appeared, looking in the direction of the hunters, "Terrence McElroy, you were given the chance to atone for years of poaching by herding the Gargoyles to their test locations, conditions of your game were that you would see the world's most exotic creatures and yet you would not harm them. You were warned."

Elisa and the remaining Hunter screamed as the constricting metal band cut through the man's neck and his head popped off with a cascade of blood. His hands reached out for his lost head as he toppled, his body shivered as it hit the floor.

The doll's head still looked in the direction of the Hunters, the remaining one now clutched the wall as her chest heaved and fell in great panic breaths.

"Annie Bradshaw," the puppet said. "You have completed the first part of your game. Instructions are on the table upstairs for the second. You may continue your downward spiral into shame and degradation or remain here where this room will be your tomb… yet you'll be remembered forever as a hero. Live or die, make your choice."

Annie gave Elisa a final look before charging up the stairs.

Finally that terrible puppet face turned on Elisa, "Elisa Maza, your friends have given you everything you could ever possibly want, and yet you burn them with your secrets… I want to play a game. Wired onto your chest is a new secret for you to keep, one liter of slow mixing napalm which may, or may not, be mixing as we speak.

Should your heart rate stop, you go out of the broadcast range, if the mixture is exposed to oxygen, it will ignite and burn at two thousand degrees, incinerating yourself and anyone around you in seconds.

But I also have a secret, only I know if the device is actually armed, only I know if you are a living bomb or if this is just a bluff so you can feel what your friends feel.

When this tape ends the room will start to fill with sub-freezing water and in sixty seconds the door will shut, sealing you in forever. Fortunately water conducts temperature faster than air and hypothermia kills so quickly, your end will be mercifully short. Winning this game is easy, remain in this room and die the way you lived, frozen by your need for secrecy and isolation. Or escape and go out in a blaze of infamy. Make your decision."

Elisa gasped when water began to dump from the air vents, she instantly jumped from her seat. Doing that, however, pulled a pin that started the timer at sixty seconds.

She grabbed her shirt and jacket and ran for the same stairwell that Annie had taken earlier and could see an open door at the top, but she hesitated. She took a second to study the two metal cylinders hooked to the skin under her breasts which may, or may not, be filled with napalm. As water sloshed, already up to her knees, she wondered if the tape was right and she should stay, she knew how Goliath would react if he found out about this….

The timer hit the halfway mark and more vents opened, dumping freezing water. It was already up to her shoulders with electrical appliances exploding when she ran for the top, barely jumping through when the door slammed and iron bars locked the room forever.

Goliath….

He was curious and nothing could stop his hand as it closed around the recorder and pressed the play button.

"You have two defining characteristics, Goliath. Your reliance on your friends and your steadfast black and white view on justice, I want to play a game. You have always seen yourself as doing the right thing, as a protector, but see what I see. I see a man who alienates those he relies on and hurts them time and time again by letting your, and their, enemies go free.

On the puppet you will find a picture, this is Annie Bradshaw and this woman is your worst case scenario. She was once a protector, a guardian as you are now, an activist who once protected what few natural wonders this world has left. Now she has become a shadow of her former self, a murderer and a terrorist wiling to sink to any depths to achieve her goals.

The objective of your game is to end her downward slide. You have no time limit, but be warned. The longer you let her live the more harm she will bring to your friends, given enough time she will kill them and eventually, yourself. Continue to see in black and white or finally accept that true justice is a shade of gray, make your choice. You will find Annie at the Gardiner Community Center plotting with accomplices to murder Park Rangers and other law enforcement officials. No matter what, you must not let her go. End her shame, Goliath, and your friends will survive."

Goliath's eyes burned white and he crushed tape player.

Angela…..

Angela had not gone far from the decrepit house and the strange people inside, just far enough to where she thought she would not be found during the day. But she had been found. When she woke she found a recorder with the image of a strange puppet in her hand.

"Hello Angela and welcome, you have only known victory the way you have only known life, tonight you will be tested by defeat" the intimidating voice on the recorder said. "Congratulations, you have found the Michael's Sword Punishment Ranch, an institute long searched for by the FBI and other organizations. This is a dumping ground of a local cult for members who are… not getting with the program. However, as you see victims, see what I see. Every so called prisoner at this ranch has been heavily involved in criminal activity, from embezzlement, to drug trafficking, to slave labor, to recruiting more victims to this perversion of religion. All here have secrets.

Where you see victims, I see victimizers, criminals that must be tested.

I want to play a game. Your game is simple: accept defeat and walk away. You have already learned that you can't save these people and you are endangering them and yourself by staying. So climb a tree and glide away, follow the river south and you will find the town of Gardiner. Wait there for two days and two nights and you will find that the game has played itself out and everything is for the better. Or remain, look under the band saw and find a tool that will better serve your view of absolutes and start these prisoners, and yourself, on another game.

Can you learn to redefine defeat? Can you learn that victory and justice can be as subjective as the people you think you understand? Or will you and your family die?"

The tape was over and Angela stared at its player, she wondered if this was some sort of joke. Maybe a jest played on her by the people who stayed here, but she doubted that. She walked across the open field in the dying post dusk light and into the collapsing barn. There she picked up the band saw and moved it aside, under it she found the missing .44.

Angela picked up the human weapon and opened its cylinder and found that it was fully loaded. A post it note was taped to the barrel which read, "only they can free themselves."