The surgery took several hours. By the time it was done and Strangelove arrived, the celebratory initiation had already begun. Standing on a pedestal dressed in shining, ceremonial armor, Lieutenant Zachary is finishing up his speech welcoming the new recruits to the fold.


    “After our next long rest, you will sign your contracts and officially join Dawn Genesis. You’ll be real men! Remember; there is never enough strength in the world for everyone. And always, always push yourself to the edge. Strive for growth in every opportunity you take for yourself!”


    A little more than half of the recruits break into enthusiastic cheers and shouts.


    “Let’s fucking go!”


    “Hell yeah!”


    Strangelove scans the group as they are ushered inside. It doesn''t take long to find Beam.


    He’s alone, standing aimlessly with a cigarette in one hand and a half empty shot glass in the other, contemplating the choices that led him here. But also, surveying the largest social occasion he has ever seen in his life.


    Looking at the countless "favors", including a buffet line stocked with bongs and bags of all kinds of substances crafted in the game, Beam wonders how many laws this party would violate in real life. Many of the foods are picked from throughout history, but some are completely new to Beam.


    In the center of a food tray, an animal about the size of a deer was seemingly still alive, despite its vivisection. In the last, sluggish movements of its life, it is carefully kept open with metal threads to make a natural bowl. Inside the murky, hearty broth, organs still pulsate and seize.


    Some of the recruits sit with crisscrossed legs in a circle, devouring their treats and sharing even more drugs as they pull them out of their inventory. Beverages spill and grease is splattered onto the heroic frescoes covering all the walls and decorative marble pillars.


    Portraits of mythological barbarians and prophets are tainted by fingers gripping their greasy pieces of meat. Beam is so taken aback by the disorder, he almost doesn''t notice Strangelove striding over to him.


    Strangelove smirks at his dumbfounded reaction.


    "It''s a lot, isn''t it? Check out that guy, ha."


    Beam follows his pointing finger. So drunk he is unable to stand, one partygoer''s hand brushes uselessly across his own crotch. To his dismay, the game still blocks avatars from touching themselves in any way which would violate the terms of service. He is not alone in his frustration, not even close.


    Everyone trapped here often finds their pent-up energy makes it easier to engage in impulsive, dangerous behavior. In another arm of the enormous banquet hall, armor and game prizes are tossed from their tables. Men in varied levels of undress hurl the items onto the floor. They clamber atop, shaking the table and taking turns in sweaty, hand-to-hand combat.


    While the party animals engage in another night of debauchery, gaggles of prophet class players draw circles with runes, and exchange pieces of parchment with game-breaking exploits scrawled inside the folds.


    Beam finds the will to turn away from the spectacle and gives Strangelove a look over.


    “You look okay, having new legs and all.”


    “Yeah, can''t say the operation was the best moment of my life.”


    “The trial went alright, then?”


    Strangelove’s clammy face contorts into a forced smile. “Well, I’m not dead yet. But they’re sending me on a suicide mission. The odds of-”


    Strangelove looks up and notices Cassius is at the party, too, and the shame aches his body.


    “A suicide mission?” Beam echoes. “Why’d you stop? Hey.”


    Strangelove’s sight is tunneled onto the last glimpse of Cassius turning a corner and leaving the building. His face was stiff like carved rock, with a forced, cracking mask of apathy.


    “Hey! What were you saying?”


    “I got lost in my own world for a second.” Firmly back in reality, he grips Beam’s arm. “I’ll tell you everything, but only if you tell me how your evaluation went.”


    Still staring at the corner where Cassius had disappeared, he takes Beam along to the court gardens outside.


    The festivities have spread into the gardens. In the fresh air circulating through the cavern, people here and there sprawl out on the flowers and moss with rolls of shimmering paper in their hands and mouths.


    They pick an area where the light seems to be snuffed out, providing a feeling of near privacy.


    “Okay,” Strangelove sits on a stone bench in front of the bush walls enclosing everyone. “I’m not authorized to say this to you before your contract is written, but I might never get the chance.”


    “What? Why?” Beam sits to the ground a few feet away.


    “They almost chose to send me to fight monsters, but an old comrade was one of the jurors. He convinced them to send me on a suicide mission with a squad made up of the failed recruits.


    Beam remembers the state of the failures in the chamber leading up to his interview. If those are the men he’s getting, Strangelove’s odds of success are nonexistent.


    “The deal is, if we survive, they get recruited and, I….” He trails off. “I get to keep fighting for Dawn Genesis.”Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work!


    Beam’s voice is hushed as he glares at him. “Are you telling me you believe in their bullshit?”


    “Wait, shut up!” Beam holds a hand back towards the bushes. A rustling sound is coming from inside.


    “Can you hear that?”


    “No, whatever it is must have stopped…” Beam hesitates.


    <i>What if something got past their defenses? Some kind of creature, or an enemy? </i>


    “Hello.”


    Someone in robes and armor comes out of the bushes, but his face is hidden by the darkness. His voice is snooty, drawing an irritated groan from Beam.


    “I was checking out the garden''s… <i>interesting</i> layout, but whatever you two are up to…” He shifts as if stifling a judgmental chuckle. “Is bound to be far more interesting. Isn''t that right, Strangelove?”


    He steps forward, and they see him more clearly.


    Strangelove would recognize that try hard blond haircut anywhere. Paired with the charismatic, false smile worthy of a billion dollar televangelist, he had the perfect mask of an old friend.


    “What were you talking about?”


    <i>God dammit!</i>


    Sharing the same thought, Beam and Strangelove share a glance at each other. Beam decides to improvise and end this conversation as quickly as possible.


    “Well, he said he knows a great smoking spot around here. Right?” The lie comes so easily, it even surprises Beam.


    “Yeah, but I forgot to grab anything from inside…”


    Beam opens his inventory. “Shit, I forgot too. There’s plenty of time, let’s go back and–”


    Cassius takes on a silly tone. “Aw, fuhgeddaboudit. I got it covered.” Reaching into the robes gracefully draping over his armor, he retrieves a lighter and three cones of rolling paper stuffed with a strange powdery substance. The sad, multicolored mess looks like pocket lint.


    <i>God fucking dammit! Go annoy somebody else!</i>


    “Hell yeah…” Beam awkwardly plucks his blunt from Cassius’ open palm between his pinky and ring fingertips. Simulated or not, this is going to be the first time Beam has ever done drugs. He considers asking what is in the joints, but Strangelove is already puffing away.


    Sparkling, green-gray clouds spread into the air, drifting in the wind toward the ceiling of the cavern.


    “So what were you guys <i>really </i>talking about?” Cassius takes a fat hit and blows it out onto the floor. It bursts from his nostrils, spreading across the floor on impact like a tiny mushroom cloud.


    Strangelove conjures a ball of fire between his fingertips and lights Beam''s joint. “Well, if you really need to know…”


    Beam hesitates, looks at both of them, and takes a long, deliberate drag as he imagines a straw struggling to pull through a frozen milkshake. Smoke swirls out through his lips and stain the air with a rainbow aurora.


    “I doubt he wants to hear about that nasty shit.” Beam forces out in a fake laugh. “When we were naked in the–”


    Cassius cuts him off. “Jesus Christ, say no more.” He takes another hit. “I won’t judge whatever you want to do with your time tonight, but keep the details to yourselves. We will discuss something else.”


    He turns from Beam, back to Strangelove. “We’ll have to be careful what we speak of here, until little Beam here earns his wings, but I have to know. What’s your loadout for your next quest?”


    As Strangelove and Cassius engage in the deep details of their loadouts, Beam reaches the halfway point of his joint. He tries to pay attention, this is critically important information.


    “That suppressor is dog shit, I use…”


    The words are nearly discernible, but because of Beam’s low Toughness stat, the drugs are hitting him much harder than Cassius or Strangelove. “Ah fuck, uh…” Beam’s hand slips and he falls onto the grass. “That shit’s hitting a little too hard.” He tries to squint his eyes, but everything blurs.


    He feels his weight shift when a hand reaches for his shoulder. “Are you okay?”


    “Never better.” Gritting his teeth, he rubs his eyes until the image of them smoking becomes clear again. He slaps his hand on the side of his head and shivers. His body is slowly adjusting.


    He fights the fog and focuses on Cassius’ stoic face. “I''m gonna ask you something too.” The thumping pain in Beam wants him to stop, but he needs to say it. He can''t stand ignoring. “Do you really think it''s right for us to enslave people?”


    Cassius scoffs. He shakes his head and flatly repeats, “The Dawn Genesis’s goals are my own.”


    Beam had never heard such a monotonous recall of a propaganda slogan. He raises an eyebrow, but says nothing. It wouldn''t be safe to speak truthfully where anyone could hear it. Maybe this guy is trying to blend in too.


    “Saaaaame…” Beam fumbles a sarcastic expression, making the fake smile of an angry primate. The cloudiness in his mind grows impossible to hold back. He snuffs out the rest of the joint under his boot. By gritting his teeth and clenching his fingers, he slowly grounds himself back to reality.


    By then, the conversation has gone too far to understand, but he does his best to try to pay attention.


    “The shotgun is an interesting choice,” Cassius says. “That means you''d rather finish something, or someone off up close and personal. As long as it''s not me.” His plastic grin feels like a cut to the ankle.


    Strangelove and Cassius ignite a second joint while Beam pretends to sip from a bottle of wine.


    “I''m ready to turn in.” Strangelove extinguishes his and places the rest in his inventory. “Need to rest for a full recovery in time for the mission.”


    Beam pats his shoulder as he passes him.


    “Hey.”


    Strangelove turns back. His eyes are filled with dread. “Yeah?”


    “Be safe out there.”


    “I’ve been through worse, and I’m still here, right?”


    He hides away his shaking hands and walks away. Beam watches him weave through party goers and out through the exit. Looking to Cassius, he almost walks away, but instead turns towards him. Fighting through the muck in his mind from the intense mind high, he steps closer.


    “Your vibes are off. What’s your deal?”


    Cassius guffaws. “Off? Come on, we’re just partying…” He trails off, and his smile turns to a serious grimace. He thoughtfully twirls the joint between his fingers, staring solemnly into the ground.  “No, no more bullshit. Your ‘friend’? You need to be careful around him, he’s a fucking coward. He gets one, only one more chance with the mission in a few hours, now. After he and the rest of the handpicked squad rest to full HP. If I tell you anymore, we could both be demoted to slaves.”


    Cassius backs again into the bushes without warning, as if the bushes had come alive and devoured him. “Let’s talk somewhere more private. Follow me.”


    Beam backs away, holding up a hand. “Are you fucking kidding me? I don’t get it, but I can tell you have something against Strangelove.”


    “No shit! He abandoned his squad!”


    Beam remembers how he had met Strangelove. On the ground, covered in blood and missing his legs.


    <i>Surely he hadn’t deserted them… Maybe they encountered some kind of boss enemy? There must be an explanation….</i>


    Beam steps into the bushes to pursue Cassius, but he must have slipped away while he was lost in thought.


    Questions linger in Beam’s mind as he leaves, following other recruits to his bedding.


    <i> How much of their conversation had Cassius actually heard? And did Strangelove really abandon his squad? Even so, it’s not like the people here on saints. They’re irredeemable pieces of shit. Murderers, torturers, and slavers. Maybe a squad of these dumb pieces of shit isn’t even a bad thing. </i>


    Thoughts clouding his mind, he leaves the party and an older recruit guides him to their resting barracks.


    The bed is shockingly comforting and realistic, but the soft satin sheets make Beam sick to his stomach. Some number of floors beneath him, rejected players with missing limbs and grievous wounds lie on beds of nails with no end to the misery in sight.


    <i>I need to blend in until I find another way… I’m not like these people! </i>


    After tossing and turning for a few minutes, the exhaustion racking his body lulls him to sleep. In the last moment awake, Beam swears he feels an unwelcome presence at the foot of his bed.


    The fatigue is too strong to let him investigate, and against his will, he falls asleep. First, his eyes flutter shut, and then he begins to dream.