Gamer (Gamer Trilogy) by Christopher Skliros Page A

Every time I looked at one face, it would seem to just meld
into the crowd. The fact that they were wearing all black
made it even harder to individually set them apart.
The mass rippled, the first sign of movement since its arrival
and out from the ranks squeezed Grace.
Ah great.
I wasn’t exactly sure what this meant for me but I could tell
that Grace wasn’t just going to let Stefanie and I skip happily
out of this situation. She probably thought she’d be doing us
a favour by taking Stefanie out of the picture - what had I
done?
I watched as Stefanie beamed at her, obviously elated that
Grace was still alive and that she’d managed to rally help.
Grace removed the hood from the cloak she was wearing and
glared back at her. The shift in Stefanie’s stance alerted me to
the fact she knew something was wrong.
Stefanie looked up at me and I could tell what she wanted
me to do. Hoping Grace would understand, I held Stefanie
close to me and felt as the world began to shift. We were
floating momentarily and just as we were about to be gone, it
stopped.
Opening my eyes, I was surprised to find we hadn’t moved
an inch. A wicked smile was plastered across Grace’s face.
She laughed sourly; evidently satisfied we’d failed to
teleport. I looked at her, attempting to seem love-struck – I
received a playful wink in return. She had no intentions of
harming me, I realised, but for some reason, that didn’t
entirely appease me.
“Today,” Grace’s voice pierced the silence, “only one person
can teleport out of here at a time. Too bad you need him to
teleport,” she said to Stefanie.
Stefanie was still tense as she realised what Grace was
suggesting.
Grace had played us all, appearing sweet and innocent but
scheming to win all along. I realised that my alliance with her
would only get me out of so much.
Without warning, the men circled around us and began to
close ranks.
Stefanie clutched me tightly and I realised that it was now I
had to make a decision.
On the one hand, girlfriends were not my thing. Having her
around was stopping me from doing what I wanted. But
even now, just the fact that I had hesitated to abandon her,
showed me that I did have real feelings for her – however not
cool that was.
I squeezed her in return and then weighed up my options.
The men were getting closer.
I tried to teleport us again but just like the first time, it didn’t
work.
The men were still getting closer.
I looked around for a way to escape, refusing to let Stefanie
go.
A few seconds and the men would be on top of us.
As I saw one of the soldiers draw a grisly looking, mace-like
weapon, my heart raced.
I was in danger. I panicked.
Looking down into Stefanie’s eyes, I made myself cold,
indifferent and unfeeling.
It was either stay here and inevitably be killed or drop
Stefanie and survive.
I pushed her away from me and I watched emotionlessly as
her eyes filled up with tears.
We were pulled further apart.
Our fingertips were barely touching.
I looked into her eyes.
She stared back.
I let go.
 
     
10
     
XANDER
    I lay barely conscious in a shallow pool of water. Around me
lay chunks of rock big enough to be small mountains. Along
with that, shards of glass, silver and gold littered the
clearing. I barely registered that it was still raining and
slowly picked myself up off the floor, a changed person.
    I forced myself to remember how I escaped B3ast’s prison,
to anger myself enough to fuel my movements.
I remembered the water, nearly covering my whole body.
The vines that stopped me from moving away. The
unintelligibly thick and talk outcrops of rock that became
my prison. And I remembered passing out.
But then when the water washed over my head, I awoke,
unfeeling of my pain, resisting the urge to breathe.
In that moment, I felt a rush of power swell inside of me.
Somehow I was being flooded with energy – energy that
wasn’t mine but energy that I realised I could use. It