They piled into the conference room yet again. Thomas had already resolved to vote for Wendy, had discussed it with most of the others and knew they planned the same. Still, when Wendy called for a meeting in the conference room, and Warren and Lucile and Josh and Alexandra stood up and followed her in without a word, Thomas and all the others had joined them, not wanting to be left behind, or perhaps merely out of habit.
And even though everyone knew Wendy was on the outs, even though everyone had turned against her, she somehow still took her customary place as the front of the room, where a teacher would stand, and everyone else sat.
“I know I’m not in the best standing in the community right now,” Wendy said, “And I will not waste our time or insult your intelligence defending myself. Yes, I made alliances, made plans, and arguably made betrayals, depending on whether you consider my plan to eliminate people from the Bloc once only the Bloc remained to be treachery. I was playing this game to win, just as we all are, and I won’t pretend I wasn’t. And I know I am likely going to be eliminated next vote. That’s where things stand. I’m not going to argue my character or try to form last minute alliances. Instead, I wish to discuss a matter of strategy.”
Wendy pointed at the whiteboard, where it was written and underlined: The Problem of the Five.
“The Problem of the Five,” Wendy said. “There are four slots to get into Heaven. What happens when only five of us remain? Everyone wants the slots for themselves, everyone has guns. As such, there is immediately an incentive for everyone to shoot whoever they consider to be the weakest. This is true irrespective of any prior alliances, because once there are four people, no one has any incentive to do anything other than ascend to Heaven together. Because why would you risk shooting someone when they might shoot back? In the situation with five people, you can kill your ally, and there will be no repercussions. The correct play is for the four strongest people to work together to kill whoever is weakest, because that way there is the lowest chance of that person successfully killing anyone else in return. Questions so far?”
No one had anything to say.
“So,” Wendy continued, “This means that if there are five people left, and you are the weakest, you are probably screwed. That means that in a scenario with six people, you would want to leave a weaker person than you alive, so that you won’t be the target when there are five. And so on with seven, eight, nine, etcetera. The logic does get a bit more confusing then, I will admit. But if you consider the chance that this whole thing devolves into a free-for-all firefight eventually anyway, you see the point. And the point is, when the guns start shooting, you don’t want to be the only one without good aim. The weakest one. This is the Problem of the Five, and the solution is, while we still have order and voting, we should eliminate those who are too strong. We should eliminate those who could just overpower us with force, once there are not so many of us left. Because you know they will have every incentive to do so.”
Wendy was gathering steam, her voice stronger and more assured with every sentence. And what she said did make sense, Thomas had to admit. He hadn’t thought it out that far, but surely if there were people who were much stronger when they got down to, say, seven or eight people, those people would just kill the others and secure Heaven for themselves.
“I’m not very strong,” Wendy said. “I’ve never shot a gun. I’m five foot two, obviously. If it came down to it, I’m sure most of you could beat me up. I’m sure most of you wouldn’t be too stressed if you had to duel me, or something. But not all of us are so weak. Take Peter, for example. He told us that he was a gun owner and a professional shooting coach. He demonstrated his skills. There is no way he can overpower us all, but if it got down to ten people and he and a few others teamed up, they could finish the rest of us off, no trouble. That’s why we’ve got to eliminate people like him before it’s too late. That’s why I’ll be voting for Peter to be eliminated next dawn. It’s nothing personal, it’s just simple logic.”
“This is ridiculous,” Peter said, standing. “Obviously, she’s just trying to save her own skin, when she knows she is about to be eliminated.”
“Yes, I am trying to save myself,” Wendy replied. “Just like we all are. Just like you are, right now. But even so, I believe my logic holds. And I want every one of you to think about it, to talk about it with me or with each other. Are we just going to be screwed over by a few good shooters when we get to nine or ten people? Shouldn’t we eliminate those who are going to be threats? That’s all. See you at dawn for voting.”
With that, Wendy walked away, leaving Thomas deeply uncertain.
“I wouldn’t do that,” Peter said. “I wouldn''t just start shooting people. I follow the rules. I’m a good citizen! We are Americans, we follow democracy. I’ll stick to any method the group chooses!”
“Really?” asked Josh, “Cause we had random ballots, and you didn’t like the results, and I distinctly remember you arguing against the legitimate method that the group decided.”
“Will you shut the fuck up about the random ballots?” Peter shouted. “No one cares!”
Ryan put his hand on Peter’s shoulder to calm him down, and Peter sat. But already, Thomas was looking at Ryan and thinking. Ryan, a big guy who seemed to know his way around a gun. Thomas certainly wouldn’t feel safe if there were single digit people remaining, and Ryan and Peter were still there and could just kill whoever they wanted. Thomas barely knew how to turn the safety off his gun, much less aim it accurately. He knew Wendy was against him – he had betrayed her and been found out – but it was hard to argue with the logic of what she had said.
~
“For the first time, and possibly due to me being Arbiter and ineligible to be voted for, haha,” Lucile said, “There are only two people who have received votes this day. Any guesses who? No? Wendy and Peter, please step forward. Hey, that’s a nominative literary coincidence! A match made in Heaven – or, wherever we are.”
“Trust me, it is a mere coincidence,” Wendy said drily, stepping into the semicircle.
If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
“This is bullshit,” Peter said, but with over a dozen guns pointed at him, he had no choice but to drop his weapon and enter the semicircle.
“And today’s lucky winner is… Peter! Any last words, Peter?”
“Fuck you all,” Peter said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a second gun. But before he could point it at anything, a series of bangs sounded, and a series of holes appeared throughout Peter’s body, and he vanished through the floor into Hell. It didn’t matter how good of a shot you were when it was fifteen against one.
~
The Meek, they called themselves. Thomas was the founder. He had been waiting for someone to form such a group, and no one had, so he had taken it upon himself. It was a big shift in mindset. Before, he had always looked for powerful leaders to attach himself to. Now, he was the leader, creating his own thing.
There was some debate over who was allowed to join the Meek. It was easy to tell who was physically imposing, but it was not obvious who was good with a gun, and they realized pretty quickly that it was impossible to tell if someone was good with a gun if they were pretending not to be. They couldn’t just tell everyone to do target practice and rank them by proficiency, since it didn’t take a genius to realize that you should probably pretend to be a worse shot than you are, so as not to become a target yourself.
Josh had tried to join the Meek, but had been rebuffed by a majority vote, judged to be too strong for the group. Wendy and Lucile were not allowed in the Meek, but that was more because everyone felt sketchy about them than their strength or weapons proficiency. Lucas might have been able to join if he had wanted to, but he had always been aligned with Ryan and Claire, and didn’t seem inclined to switch sides now. The members of the Meek were Thomas, Anita, Warren, Elena, Lanie, Alexandra, Daliah, and Maya, and together they almost had the majority of the voting power.
So far, they had successfully eliminated Peter, Kyle, and Tyler, and George. Thomas was getting a bit worried about how few men were remaining. As far as he knew, no one had yet suggested anything resembling a gender based alliance, but he could easily see the women deciding to eliminate all the men before figuring out the rest among themselves.
~
“I think I’m screwed,” Ryan told Lucas.
“Don’t say that!” said Lucas. “There’s still hope. People like you!”
“It doesn’t matter who people like. People liked Peter. People liked Avery. And everyone hates Lucile and Josh, and they are still here.”
“Well, I mean, it sucks to say this,” Lucas said, “But people might vote for Josh. He is a big guy, and a good shot, and people don’t like him. And he isn’t as good looking as you. People will do anything for hot people.”
“That didn’t seem to help Trinity,” Ryan said, but he smiled. He wasn’t sure what was going on between him and Lucas – wasn’t sure it was even possible for anything to happen given the place they were in – but he really liked the other man, and thought the feeling was mutual. Just to make it extra clear, he added, “Not that I really think about women in that kind of way, personally.”
And somehow, he was cheered up. Lucas had that effect on him. Somehow, even though he was probably about to be consigned to Hell for all eternity, Lucas saying he thought Ryan was hot seemed to matter a great deal.
“We’ll figure something out,” Lucas said, and he even managed to sound like he believed it.
“Worst case scenario, we can just pull the trigger,” Ryan said, but then he was cut off by a gunshot.
~
The scene was thus: a body on the floor, bloody, with a gunshot wound in the chest. As it was dragged to Hell, it was clearly identifiable as Warren. Standing beside him, Josh, hastily pocketing a gun. Around, everyone else, in a circle, sticking vaguely to the factions that had developed. Thomas standing in the middle of the Meek, a step forward, as befit a founder.
“It wasn’t me,” Josh said, not very calmly. “I didn’t shoot him!”
Everyone looked at him.
“He attacked me first,” Josh said. “I had to.”
“Is there any proof of that?” Thomas asked.
“Look,” Josh said, “It’s not like anyone was friends with Warren anyway. Really, I did y’all a favor. It’s one fewer person to contend with, right?”
“And if someone shot you right now, would that be doing us all a favor too?” Lucile asked. She raised an eyebrow at the group, a not-so-subtle suggestion.
“We have rules,” Wendy said, “and the rules are clear. If someone kills someone else, outside of the voting process, that person should be killed too. I see no reason why we should not follow the rules here, and just shoot him now.” For some reason, Wendy started backing away as soon as she finished speaking.
“But it was self defence!” Josh protested. “If anyone shoots me now, that is an unprovoked killing, and they should be killed too.”
“How can we know it’s self defence?” Thomas asked. “It’s not like Warren is here to testify to his side of the story.” He felt powerful with the Meek at his back.
“Why would I just shoot him if it wasn’t self defence?” Josh said. “When Claire shot that guy, everyone took her side. Is this just because she’s a woman and I’m a man? I’ve been the victim of unfairness ever since we got here and I got screwed out of my lottery win. Where is justice?”
“Meh,” Claire said, “Justice is overrated.” Before anyone could react, drew her gun and fired.
Josh was dead before his body hit the ground.
“You can’t just do that!” Maya of the Meek said. “You can’t just shoot someone like that!”
“Watch me,” Claire said, and then shot Maya. “It’s time,” she said, and then her whole faction pulled out their guns and started firing.
The Meek outnumbered the shooters by more than two to one. If they were coordinated, if they had strong leadership, surely they could have kept order. But they were unprepared, and in an instant everything devolved into chaos.
Some of the Meek fired, hitting Julie, and others in the circle pulled out their guns. Everyone who had stood still, too slow to react, had fallen already. Claire exhausted her six shots and dove for a gun on the ground, left when a corpse had been dragged to Hell.
And then everyone was shooting their guns and screaming and running and dying. So many were dying, the entire floor was transparent and showed a bigger window into Hell than Thomas had ever wanted to see, but he didn’t stop to look because he was running. Dodging around office chairs, desks, unsure if anyone was pursuing him but not taking the time to look back. He ran with Anita beside him, searching for any cover, any safe harbor. He didn''t have to kill anyone himself, he just had to survive, and he was doing it, he was down the corridor, into one of the out-of-the-way offices –
And then Thomas felt a sharp jolt in his chest and he was suddenly on the floor.
Anita stood over him. She flashed him a smile. “Sorry,” she said, “Guess I’m not so Meek after all.” She held her gun as if she very much knew what she was doing.
Her next shot went through Thomas’s head.