GLADIATOR | ELYSIUM RISING 1 ✔️

⍢ | 12

Iggy found himself staring at the ceiling of the sleeping hall, listening to the loud snores around him. He couldn't sleep. How could he after what happened?

Part of him still felt like he was riding that Skimmer. The adrenaline left his veins hours ago, but he could still feel the rush. It made him restless. Antsy. The cot underneath him felt more like a rat trap than a bed. Lifting his head, he peered at Tenn.

The man managed to survive his first challenge as well. Iggy caught a few seconds of their game on a screen in one of the arena's halls. Like Moxi said, the second and third-rounders battled each other. Except, it wasn't a normal fight with hands and weapons. No, they fought on skimmers around the stadium, firing blaster bolts from the rapid vehicles at each other. The crowd loved it.

Tenn's team won the game. The other squad perished. Not a single one of them survived.

A few of the winners bragged about their victory upon returning to their sleeping quarters for the night. But not Tenn. He walked right past Iggy as if he didn't exist, laid down on his cot, and went to bed. Or, rather, pretended to.

Iggy couldn't see his face, as he laid with his back facing him, but he knew the Andradan failed to fall asleep. He heard it in the old man's choppy breathing. He noticed it through his uncomfortable shifting along the stiff cot.

The pair couldn't be more different, but he knew they were alike in this manner. Victory at the cost of another's life brought them no joy. It brought them no solace. But it might've brought them salvation.

As he laid there in the dark, he wondered what was better to have. What would keep him alive in the end? His dignity or his willingness to survive? The answer hid in that arena. A shiver seized him, running up and down his spine. Gritting his teeth, he flipped onto his stomach and buried his face in his pillow.

For once, Iggy wished to be a Hand. They existed within their predetermined protocols, never acting outside of them. Their coding didn't allow for independent thought and philosophical questions unless their makers programmed it into them. Most times, they didn't. He envied them to a point. Being sentient wasn't all it was cracked up to be.

He shot up from his bed with his face scrunched up.

Clearly, sleeping wasn't on the cards. Being cooped up in this dark room listening to everyone else snore would've driven him crazy. He needed to go for a walk. He wished the training center was open at night, but they weren't allowed out of their rooms once curfew arrived.

That didn't stop him last night, though.

He peeked at the door.

Surely not...

He carefully stood up from his bed, equipped his shoes, and tiptoed to the exit. No one paid him attention. If Tenn was awake, he didn't let it be known. Iggy turned his attention to the door handle. Just like before, it'd been left unlocked. Did they want him to sneak out? He figured security regarding the tributes would be a bit tighter.

Maybe they just didn't care.

It didn't make a difference to him.

Armed only with his quick wit, weak fists, and his father's pendant, he ventured into the bright hallway for the second time.

#

Iggy might not have been as lost as before, but he was still lost. Whoever designed the tunnels snaking beneath the stadium needed to get their cranium checked. They shouldn't have been this complicated and tricky. Then again, it might've been by design. Tributes couldn't escape if they didn't even know where they were going.