Countdown

Bernard's fake smile slipped back over more of his teeth. 'Rogan Ellis, convicted rapist and murderer, could not bring himself to kill an Ellipsis Cyber Drone. And for that, both of you shall be eliminated from The Countdown.'

I felt a line of perspiration slide down my spine.

The robot smirked, and suddenly I could see what he truly was. Before I was in too much shock, too much fear, to see that this guy didn't look all that human after all. He was too shiny, too seamless. His eyes reflected no inner personality. His voice had a slightly metallic tinniness to it that reminded me of the computer countdown I couldn't run away from because it fed directly into my brain.

'It will not be long now,' the robot said. 'Rogan Ellis, my database tells me that you have been wishing for death for many months. You do not like Saradone Maximum-Security Prison? I know that the scar on your face is from fighting off four other inmates who wanted to do very bad things to you. You killed two of them before the guards stopped the fight and placed you in solitary confinement. I think that you are lucky you received only a mark on your face. I am not surprised that you agreed to come on The Countdown instead of facing life back in the regular prison population. I would say that you would not have lasted another week.'

I looked at Rogan. That was how he got his scar? Trying to fight off other inmates? I felt a flood of pity fill my chest but tried to push it away.

I couldn't even wrap my head around how wrong all of this was. From holoscreens, to flying cameras, to robots posing as fucking accountants-it was so messed up my brain couldn't even process it all.

'There are two minutes remaining in this level of The Countdown.'

'You know what, robot?' Rogan said, and there was zero emotion in his voice. 'I still have two minutes left to reduce you to a pile of tin cans. You can't kill us until after the level's done, right? So we still have time.'

The robot nodded with a firm jerk of his head. 'This is true. I cannot kill you yet.'

He lowered the gun and pulled the trigger. I felt the bullet rip into my upper right thigh and I fell to the ground, screaming and clutching my leg.

'However,' the robot continued, 'I can still entertain the subscribers until the level comes to its conclusion.' He chambered another round. 'Rogan Ellis, I would have believed that you would appreciate watching another woman writhing around in agony before her inevitable death. Why do you look so stern?'

'Kira!' Rogan called out to me, his voice hoarse.

I could barely hear him. My leg felt like it was on fire, and all I could do was wrestle with the pain. It hurt so horribly that I couldn't see anything but white. I couldn't hear anything except the countdown, now at one minute.

One minute and no more pain.

'Fifty-nine.. fifty-eight.. fifty-seven …'

I blinked and tried to focus as tears streamed down my face. Rogan had rushed Bernard and grabbed his arms, wrestling him to the ground. The gun skittered across the pavement, coming to rest an arm's reach away from me.

'Son of a bitch!' Rogan snarled as he pounded his fist into the robot's face. Through my tear-blurred vision I saw a glimmer of metal show beneath the artificial skin.

With a metallic roar, Bernard flipped Rogan onto his back, effortlessly pinning the large man to the ground. A viselike metal grip fastened around his neck.

'Do not fear, Rogan,' the robot said in an eerily calm voice. 'It will all be over soon. You failed. You failed Kira Jordan and you failed yourself.'

Rogan moaned and swore incoherently. 'Don't hurt her!'

'It is my job to hurt her.'

'Thirty.. twenty-nine … twenty-eight…'

I reached out and wrapped my hand around the gun, then staggered up on my left leg, doing my best to ignore the searing pain in my other leg. I felt nauseated and weak and ready to drop back down to the ground. I swayed unsteadily but managed to stay upright. Bernard looked up at me from where he had Rogan pressed against the hard ground. I could see the robot underneath the skin. Just multicolored wires and smooth silver metal, like the cameras that spun around the area taking in every angle of the scene. His skin must have been plastic. Just plastic.

All of it was fake.

I'd been ready to die to protect somebody who didn't even exist.

'Ten … nine … eight…'

I raised the gun and pulled the trigger over and over until it was empty, and I hoped it would be enough.

It was. It blew Bernard's robot head clean off his body.

I dropped the gun and collapsed back to the ground and let the pain take over again. Rogan crawled to my side.

'Kira.' There was a red mark around his neck where the robot had almost choked him to death. 'Are you okay?'

His hand clamped down on my thigh, attempting to slow the bleeding.

I tried to speak, but found that I couldn't form the words.

The words would have been something along the lines of: Okay? Do I look okay to you?

Just before I passed out, the last thing I heard was:

'Congratulations, Rogan and Kira, on successfully completing Level Three of The Countdown.'

CHAPTER SEVEN

It was dark that night. So dark.

'Mom? … Dad?' I said, too softly for anyone to actually hear me. I was scared. I'd gone to bed early, mad that I couldn't get something-new jeans, a new purse .. didn't matter anymore. Didn't matter then.

My bedroom door was closed. Locked. I didn't want to talk to anybody. Not even my friends, who were sending me text messages. I ignored the soft vibrating sound my new phone made every few minutes.

It was after midnight on a school night. I remember I had a big test the next day that I hadn't studied for. Math, I think. Or Neogeography. I didn't care what happened- if I passed or failed. I actually couldn't think of one thing in the stupid, boring city I really gave a shit about.

But suddenly I did care about something. The creaking sound of somebody moving around in the hallway. I knew that it wasn't either of my parents-I just sensed that it wasn't. It wasn't my older sister returning from a late date and sneaking back in the house so she wouldn't get in trouble for breaking the new citywide curfew of eleven o'clock. She'd gotten back from the movie theater hours earlier.

It was somebody else.

Somebody bad.

For a moment I thought it might just be my imagination, my overwrought, overworked brain that always came up with the worst-case scenario. My mom said I should be a writer, since I always made up such crazy, overdramatic stories. Made mountains out of molehills, she 'd say. But even before I had my flex-or at least, before I'd learned to use it-/ had this sense. A sense of impending doom. The ability to tell if something wasn't right-that something felt off.

And that was how I felt when I lay in my bed that night with the sheets pulled up to my nose, listening to the footsteps outside my door.