15000 died yesterday. They said she caught a cold...she was only five.

...-._.-._.-...

The clicking sound of heels stomping on the cold and humid floor made its way along the dorm's corridors. Well, more than a dorm, I would call it a prison. Our so-called rooms are "cells" after all. No getting out without the guardian's key. The same guardian walking behind my iron door just now.

The boots halted. An eerie silence replaced the former monotonous sound. Great. The rattling of keys echoed through the walls. My lock sprung free. "Get out" ordered the guardian. His voice was as rough and cold as ever...if not more so. Without complaining, without talking, without looking at him, without even so much as breathing, I stepped outside my prison cell. Barefoot, as always. The heels of his boots began stomping against the floor once again, and I followed suit, head down, making myself as small and unnoticeable as possible. I was useless here after all, a waste of space, the trashiest of all after yesterday. I was 14999.

...-._.-._.-...

Year 26 of the New World. Earth as we knew 26 years before was gone, forgotten, as if it never even had existed in the first place. How would I know? Because since the day I and another 14999 - I guess 14998 now - were born, we were constantly monitored, brainwashed, experimented on, verbally and physically abused in this place we call home. Well, the experiments and abuse happened mostly to the last 5000 of us...the worst of the bunch.

The higher your number, the worst your treatment. You can all imagine how I, 14999, was treated all my life. No, forget I said anything. You couldn't possibly imagine it unless you went through it. And I hope for you that you will never EVER have to go through it. I wouldn't wish it to my worst enemy...unless that enemy are the people who did this to us. They can all rot in hell for all I care. They DESERVE to rot in hell.

Anyway, our so-called home is, as you might have guessed, just a glorified name we gave to one of many laboratories across the world created 26 years ago. After all hell broke loose. After the system decimated one tenth of Earth's population in less than a minute. 26 years later, only one third of the population remains.

...-._.-._.-...

After the first massacre, they, meaning the remaining governmental figures across the countries, decided to create labs in order to preserve humanity. The labs all fell under the jurisdiction of the New World Organization, an organization founded during the same period. At its head were all the influential figures of our society. But what was an initially good idea, formed for the good of our existence, soon turned into the nightmare we have today. Each "head" of the NWO soon became more inhuman and disgusting than the next. Each greedier for power and resources than the next. If the videos shown to us during our meals, our trainings, even during our sleep were any indication of that.

I guess I should be happy that our caretaker was against the New World Organization and their inhuman acts, opposition that she didn't fail to transmit to me and some other kids. The acts committed by the NWO were, in fact, mostly hidden from the rest of the world. Such were the acts committed against me and every child in every laboratory across the world. "Acts of torture", our caretaker said. She was the only reason why I managed to resist the perpetual brainwashing we were exposed to since birth. She was the only reason why I was able to keep a sense of self and not be reduced to a lifeless tool like so many of us, ready to be used in whatever way THEY found more suiting. She ignited and fueled the deep hatred I hold against the labs, our "doctors", the NWO. And she was gone. Taken, tortured, killed by the man who makes us call him Father. The very same man the guardian seems to be taking me to.

The boots halted in the middle of a long hallway. I slowly lifted my head to look at my surroundings. Sure enough.

A pair of familiar looking heavy bronze doors lay before me. The guardian seemed to hesitate for a moment. Then, he raised his right hand and knocked as gently as he possibly could on the imposing doors...well if you could consider a gorilla banging on the ground as "gentle". A honeyed voice came from within.

"Please come in."

The guardian opened the doors with both hands and entered the sunlit room. The only sunlit room in the entire lab. Such was the privilege bestowed upon our Father. He then turned towards me, expecting me to follow him obediently like always, but I remained frozen in place.

No, I thought, please for once in my life LEAVE ME ALONE!

But my silent plea was left unanswered. The guardian looked straight into my eyes, his own exuding anger and violence. Without any warning, he grabbed my arm and threw me into the room. A loud CRACK resounded as I fell on my knees.

Tears began forming in my eyes. OUCH, that freaking hurt man. I was tempted to turn around and punch him in the gut, but I knew that resistance would only be rewarded with death...or worse.

I breathed in, slowly. As soon as the pain in my knees started to subside, I stood as unfazed as possible and waited, arms crossed behind my back, eyes facing the ground.

"Look at me", said the same sweet voice. This time, it was laced with an edge of sharpness. He was getting impatient.

I raised my head. The sight before me was even more repulsive than the sound of his voice.

"Father", I said, trying my best to sound as composed as possible

The man facing me couldn't be more than forty years old. Not a single wrinkle could be found on his face. His delicate features, the dimples on his cheeks as he smiled, the tender curve of his eyebrows, gave him the look of a benevolent father talking to his beloved child.

Fake ass bastard.

His sparkling blue eyes were partly hidden by his lush and well-groomed chestnut hair. But the hair didn't manage to hide the glint of malevolence shining through. Malevolence solely directed at me.

Shit, I was in deep trouble.

...-._.-._.-...

While I braced myself for the worst, Father began talking.

"14999, how old are you now?" he asked, resting his chin on top of his linked hands

"The same age as my sister, Father," I answered. There's no way that he couldn't know my age as his favorite "daughter" was none other than my twin sister.

Suddenly, the guardian took a fistful of my hair and yanked my head backwards.

"Answer the question trash," he growled in my ear.

As my eyes began to sting from the pain, I quickly said "sixteen, I'm sixteen". While he released my hair, Father continued his questioning, as if nothing happened.

"Sixteen...," he said, pensively, "yes, the perfect age indeed... I imagine you already had your first bleeding, yes?"

I froze. Oh no, please, anything but that.

As I remained silent, he took it as confirmation.

"You know 14999, despite your useless capabilities, we still raised you, fed you, gave you a home for sixteen long years. If it weren't for your twin sister, we wouldn't have bothered keeping you here all these years. Don't you think it is time for you to repay us?"

I looked at him then. Really looked at him. Whatever hope I had kept deep in my heart that he could have truly loved any of us at least once in our lives was completely gone.

"You do know what kind of important job is reserved for useless ones like you right? You should feel honored that I even propose this to you, as I love you so very much" he added, his smile failing to reach his eyes.

I closed my eyes, wishing it was all a dream. Ha, what "important job", what "great honor"? I could taste vomit in my mouth, the nausea slowly numbing my senses. After all these years of pain and torture, after all the training sessions, the sparring, the wounds, he just wanted to use my body as a freaking birthing machine.

Something in me snapped. I turned around as quickly as I could and threw up all over the floor. The guardian was already walking towards me in big strides, but I paid him no heed.

Fine, you want to play this game Father? Let's play.

26 years ago. The end of the Old World and the beginning of the New World. The documentaries about that infamous day describe it as the beginning of our annihilation.

It was a day like any other, they said, people woke up, got ready for work, school, or whatever people did. The sun was shining brightly on half the globe, the other half still plunged into the darkness of the night. Then suddenly, without any warning, a booming voice resounded in the ears of every human being on Earth.

“HELLO HUMANS! IT’S THE OTHERWORLDS SYSTEM SPEAKING. ARE YOU READY TO FACE MY CHALLENGES? INFINITE POWER AND WEALTH AWAITS THE BRAVE WARRIORS WHO MANAGE TO CONQUER THEM. HOWEVER, FOR THOSE WHO CAN’T, YOU’LL NEVER BE ABLE TO RETURN TO YOUR BELOVED WORLD."

“BUT FEAR NOT! DEATH IS SIMPLY A PART OF LIFE. FOR WHAT WOULD BE LIFE WITHOUT DEATH?"

“NOW, YOU HAVE 240 HOURS TO DECIDE IF YOU WANT TO FACE THESE CHALLENGES OR NOT. IF BY THE ALLOTED TIME THE NUMBER OF VOLUNTEERS FAIL TO MEET THE REQUIRED AMOUNT, I’LL RANDOMLY CHOOSE FROM ANY ONE OF YOU. THE COUNTDOWN STARTS…NOW!”

As soon as the voice quieted down, a big ephemeral screen appeared in front of everyone. On it was displayed “240:00:00”. It then began to change.

“239:59:59”, “239:59:58”, “239:59:57” …it was a countdown. For what? Nobody knew. But oh, how they wished they would have known.

As soon as the countdown started, another screen appeared, this one visible only to the person it belonged to. On it were displayed what we now call “capabilities” or “stats”. Innate talents or hard-earned skills. Strength, agility, intelligence, charisma, luck was measured in numbers while skills and talents were scored with letters.

A bodybuilder would for example have Strength: 10 but Agility: 3, while a gymnast Agility: 11 while Strength: 6. The former would have a skill called “Hard muscles” or something, graded B or C if he was good, D, E or F if he wasn’t, while the latter could have one called “Snake flexibility”, graded in the same way as the former. And so on and on.

At the bottom right corner of the virtual screen was a button with on it written in bold letters “VOLUNTEER”. If you clicked on the button, you would open a new screen where you could read “I VOLUNTEER FOR THE NEXT EXPEDITION YES; NO” and underneath it “REQUIRED NUMBER OF VOLUNTEERS FOR EXPEDITION I: 1 000 000 000”. As soon as someone clicked on the YES button next to I VOLUNTEER, the required number of volunteers would go down one number.

“What a cool game!” screamed some of the people.

“I wonder who created this system…he must be some kind of genius!” said others.

“I’m too old for these types of things” some complained.

Nobody had taken the so called “Otherworlds System” seriously, taking the situation as a revolutionary creation of some new game company. No one knew who it was, not even the game companies themselves.

Maybe the creators were shy, they thought. Or they didn’t want fame or money, said others. Maybe they simply didn’t exist, and the Otherworlds System is some mysterious new entity, one would occasionally say. They would immediately be condemned and marginalized from the rest of society, treated as parasitic psychopaths. For what does man fear more than the unknown?

One hour before the end of the countdown, the required number of volunteers was down to 0. The volunteers were mostly curious youth and young adults, unable to resist the temptation given by the promise of a new revolutionary game. As soon as the last slot was filled, the booming voice started speaking again.

“I SEE THAT WE HAVE MANAGED TO REACH THE REQUIRED NUMBER OF VOLUNTEERS. GOOD. IN LESS THAN ONE HOUR, INFINITE RICHES AND POWER AWAIT THOSE ABLE ENOUGH TO SURVIVE MY TRIALS. FOR THOSE WHO DON’T, YOU ALREADY KNOW THE CONSEQUENCES. GOOD LUCK TO YOU ALL AND MAY THE BEST FIND THEIR WAY HOME AGAIN.”

After that announcement, the entire world lay in wait for what exactly would happen at the end of the countdown.

00:00:09, 00:00:08, 00:00:07, 00:00:06, 00:00:05, 00:00:04, 00:00:03, 00:00:02, 00:00:01, 00:00:00.

Silence.

Nothing seemed to have happened. All eyes remained fixed on the ephemeral screen and the 00:00:00 written in a thick black color. A few minutes passed and the first bored onlookers finally decided to look elsewhere. That’s when the chaos began.

Screams of agony pierced the skies as mothers finally became aware of the disappearance of their children, as family and friends looked around for missing persons and failed to find them. All the volunteers had vanished without a trace, gone to who knows where. It was the first time since the appearance of the Otherworlds System that people finally began to understand the true meaning behind its words. But by then it was too late.

......-._.-._.-......

A few weeks later, the first survivors made their way home again.

Of the 1 billion people who volunteered to take part in the expedition, only 292 came back.

They were known as the first Moons, a title given by the System only to the best challengers. They all came back with haunted eyes, frantically talking about different worlds, different dimensions, stories too surreal to be true. Stories that were anything but untrue.

Decisions were taken, bases were formed, each base under the jurisdiction of a Moon, each containing two laboratories, created to nurture and train children into high talented individuals. Talented enough to face the challenges offered by the Otherworlds System during the expeditions.

After EXPEDITION I soon came EXPEDITION II and EXPEDITION III, each time leaving only a few survivors.

That’s when the New World Organization, the only organization with a base under its jurisdiction, decided to keep the seeds of the most talented challengers, namely the Moons, to produce new promising generations of children. Tools that could enhance their chances at survival.

26 years later, the useless girls of the labs were given the role of birthing machines, constantly injected with the seeds of the few unfortunate Moons who never managed to return from their expedition. Until they were too broken to continue that is. Until the “Fathers” of the labs forced them to volunteer for the next expedition. In other words, a death sentence.

A sentence that my oh so sweet Father gave to me. But I should feel honored, I should be grateful. Let me show you just how grateful I am Father.