Existence by James Frey

Guard it well. Come home.”
    The village was full of brave men and women risking infection and death to take care of the ones they loved—but Hilal, who’d been raised to have no fear for his own life, to devote himself to the good of others, behaved like a coward. Snuck away in the dark of night. He was forbidden from risking himself; he was meant to believe that his life was more important than theirs.
    So he fled from infection, from tainted blood and stacked corpses; he fled home.
    That was two weeks ago. Fourteen days readjusting to the rhythms and comforts of home.
    Trying to forget the village he left behind. The faces of mothers clutching babies to their chests, of children kicking soccer balls across barren fields, of strong men bearing heavy loads, providing for their families. So many people, and Hilal loved them all, and now he can only wonder what has become of them.
    Whether any of them are left.
    As a Player, he has pledged himself to saving the souls of all men, but saving individual men and women, and their children? That is beyond his parameters.
    Still, he would have liked to try.
    Every night, in his dreams, he tries again.
    The door creaks open.
    Hilal flies to his feet, takes a defensive stance, battle ready.
    But it is no enemy. Hilal’s face relaxes into a smile. He has been meditating in isolation for two weeks, and if his solitude is to be broken, this is the man to break it. “Greetings, Master,” he says in eager welcome.
    â€œYou are the Player now,” Eben ibn Mohammed al-Julan corrects him. “I am the master no more.”
    Hilal bows his head to acknowledge the claim, but will never agree to it. Eben has been his master and spiritual guide since he was a very small child—it was Eben who selected him, of all the children scrambling through the fields of his village, to train for this sacred role. Eben, a former Player, saw something shining from Hilal, knew somehow, even then, that Hilal had been anointed by the Lord. Master Eben took Hilal into his own home, taught him how to speak, how to think, how to fight, and, most importantly, how to follow a righteous path, how to serve and spread the ancient truth.
    Someday, Hilal assumes, he will be the one to venture across the countryside, searching children’s faces for the spark of the divine. This is how it has always been done: the Players of the past choosing those of the future. He has asked Eben many times what it was that the master saw—how he is meant to recognize the sign of a future Player, how he will know he has chosen wisely. Eben will only ever say, When the time comes, you will know. The future Player will make himself known to you, as you made yourself known to me .
    Hilal wonders whether he will ever have Master Eben’s wisdom—whether he will be able to train a new generation of Players as Eben trained him. It seems to him that Eben will forever be the master, Hilal the willing student.
    â€œYou seem troubled,” Eben says, always able to read the truth in Hilal’s face.
    â€œI am having difficulty putting my memories of the year to rest,” Hilal admits. “I feel like a traitor to all the people I’ve left behind.”
    â€œThose are not your people,” Eben reminds him, “any more or less than all men of Earth are your people. Their mission is not your mission.”
    Hilal reminds himself that Eben knows best, and that Hilal’s responsibilities to the Aksumite line and its future take precedence above all else. A hundred miles from here, a child is training with a master of his own, preparing to take on the role of Player when Hilalages out, but he is not old enough yet—not ready. Were Hilal to die, the Aksumites would be left without a champion, and that cannot be. He had no choice but to save himself. He knows that.
    Still.
    Not since childhood has Hilal spent so much time amongst humanity, and though he did his best to remain