Fun and Games

Sixteen

Like many nights before, everyone jumps at the slightest sound, worried it's another player coming to thin out the competition. But everyone is so exhausted from the games, the hunger and staying up most of the night previous, they all, inevitably, fall asleep. They wake the next morning to the gentle sound to classical music that had woken them almost every morning of the games and the bright shine of the harsh industrial lights above. The first thing the players are greeted with is staff members carrying in a black and pink box, much like the ones they had used to take out eliminated players after the riot. The players look around to see who had died in the night and find that 069 had hung himself from some of the stairs that still remaining in the room with his blanket. As the staff work on getting him down, there is an announcement, "player 069, eliminated." Shortly after this, the number of remaining players go down, the price money goes up and the money added to the piggy bank.

Opal lays her head against Sang-Wii's chest. Sang-Woo, in turn, wraps his arms around her and gently strokes the back of her head, "it's okay."

Opal takes a deep breath, "at least he got to choice how he went."

"Yeah, but to do it, he had to be in a dark place," Sang-Woo looks down to Opal, knowing she had pulled him out of that dark place. A few nights after he had met her, he intend on doing the same thing himself, until he got the offering to participate in the games. Afterwards, when the pair had spent a few nights together, he realized that he had found a bright light. His bright light in his otherwise dark world. Wishing with every fiber of his begin, now more than ever, that she had listened to him and let him return to the games alone.

"Attention all players," another announcement begins, "the fifth game is about to begin. All players, follow the staff's instructions and swiftly make your way towards the game hall." The players all exhausted and hungry walk through the stairs and to the game hall. They are shown into a white room, the some where they had chooses their teams for Tug-of-War and Marbles, but now there are sixteen mannequins set up, all wearing vests. "Welcome, players, to the fifth game. Before we begin, please make your way down the steps and choose one of the mannequins that you see presented before you. Once you've chosen, take the corresponding vest. They are numbered one through sixteen. Let me repeat the instructions. Please make your way down the steps and choose one of the mannequins that you see presented before you, and take the corresponding vest."

Player 244 is the first to walk up to a mannequin, choosing the number six, "it was on the sixth day God created the first man on Earth. And now, I will go back to that day God made us sinless and innocent." He takes the vest off the mannequin and is shown out of the room by the staff.

Opal scoffs, "think he'll meet God sooner rather than later?"

"For all of our sake, I hope there is a God," Sang-Woo glances over to Opal, wondering if she or her family are, or ever were, religious.

Deok-Su and a few other men waste no time in grabbing them middle numbers, leaving the first four and last four. Before long Gi-Hun heads down to pick a number, but it soon becomes clear he is unsure where he wants to play. Opal looks up to Sang-Woo, "what are you thinking?"

"I'm not sure. What about you?"

"I think we should go for the end, but not last."

"Why?"

"It'll have a time limit, but if we go first we won't get to see other tactics and be able to see which work and which don't. But if we are last, the time limit plays against us."

"Fourteen and fifteen it is." The pair walk down the stairs and Opal grabs fourteen, "shouldn't I go first?"

"Why? If we fail we're both gonna die anyway, does it really matter who goes first?"