4
The students in the bus celebrate like crazy. We’re entering Faya’s capital, Sol, the most beautiful city in the world. Sol is a half hour drive from my town, Eve. Everyone is excited as we enter underneath the beautiful palm trees and hills surrounding it. The drones of celebration are euphoric. This year is going to be special. Not just because it’s Ranking Day, but because it’s the tenth year of the Monster Show, which was invented when I was six years old. We pass by a huge effigy of a Burning Man on our way. The Burning Man is no joke. We have to lower our voices and heads, and pay our respects to the symbol of Faya. The Burning Man is a representation of our God Almighty.
The bus enters the neighborhood where Grand School is located. This is where the graduation will take place. Fireworks will blast against the night sky during the ceremony later, and I see white zeppelins floating and watching us. Teachers and senior students are waving at us from the zeppelins’ balconies, wishing us a happy Ranking Day.
In front of us, dozens of other buses drive slowly toward the Grand School’s dome. Booming speakers are pumping music that sounds like restless heartbeats on a dance floor. To the left and right, girls are dressed in bright yellow latex trousers, dancing with colorful pink scarves in their hands. Beautiful, muscular boys are playing the big drums that are strapped on their broad shoulders. Senior boys tease and take pictures of us. Ariadna poses for the camera instantly. I shy away, but she pulls me into the frame. I plaster my fake smile on, and let the flashes hit me. I blink like always, and mess up the photo shoot.
Hundreds of girls, younger than sixteen, jog next to the bus and throw purple and orange flowers at us. Ariadna catches one and sticks it in my hair. It smells surprisingly pleasant. Faustina, sitting with her legs crossed, is blowing kisses from her hand to the crowd outside, as if she is the queen.
Not far away from Grand School, there is the place no one gazes at. They pretend it doesn’t exist—at least until the games begin. It’s called The Playa, an almost endless city dug twenty-feet under ground-level. It’s where the battles and games take place. It’s surrounded by military troops for now. Even I pretend I haven’t seen it, although I know that in only a few hours, I’ll be fighting for my life down there.
Looking away from the Playa, I see Eva. She is dancing on her own, but she is smiling. I admire her enjoying herself, even when she thinks she is going to die a couple of hours from now. She doesn’t know she is going to become a Seven. I would love to see the look on her face when she gets ranked.
Timmy isn’t celebrating like others. He is educating a couple of his nerd followers, telling them about the history of the Monster Show. He is showing them recaps of older games on his iAm. How could he stomach watching all that killing of young people? I hear the Monsters screaming from his iAm’s speaker. They’re shouting from the top of their lungs: “I Am Alive.”
“The one and only rule in the Monster Games is that you have to report you’re alive on your iAm,” Timmy brags to his awkward friends. “Even when the games aren’t on, a Monster has to scream ‘I AM ALIVE!’ every six hours, or he’s considered dead. The Monster has to shout to the world aloud, so the Summit knows he means it.”
“We know that, Timmy,” a nerdy boy rolls his eyes. “They all die in the end anyways.”
“What you probably never thought of is what happens if a Monster doesn’t report he is alive, on purpose.” Timmy winked at the boy, showing him he is smarter.
“Why would anyone do that?” the boy wonders.
“Isn’t obvious? To escape the games.” Timmy says.
“And then what? Everyone knows that no one can survive the Playa after the games.” The boy says. “There is no food, water, or means to live in this place after the games. It’s like trying to survive a deadly jungle or desert.”
“You’re probably right,” Timmy shrugs his shoulders. “We’d have definitely known if anyone had survived.”
In the middle of this fest around me, I try not to let Timmy’s conversation distract me. But I can’t. All this talk about a Monster escaping the games reminds me of Woo.
A day before attending the Monster Show, Woo told me he was thinking of escaping the games and surviving in the Playa on his own. It’s never been done, but Woo thought he could pull it off. I never heard from Woo after, and the Summit never brought it up. In fact, they announced that all Monsters in the games died last year.
Still, my heart tells me no. I have been trying to live in this stupid world without him for a whole year. It didn’t work. I miss him in ways I can’t explain. After Woo’s death, I played naïve to get under the Summit’s radar. It worked. They think I am a Monster now. I can enter the deadly Monster Show that every teenager in our nation avoids at all costs. It’s my choice. I’m attending the games to find Woo. If I fail, then living didn’t mean much without him anyways.