Free Murder Genes by Mikael Aizen

  It was useless.   A sick part inside Jay saw the events and gave a humorless, grim smile at how pathetic it seemed.
    Freckles spoke to the boy and gestured at the girl.   The boy shook his head and screamed her name, loud enough that Jay heard it clearly.   "Adri!"   It echoed around Haven.
    Silence was the reply from the hundreds that watched.
    Freckles shrugged, pulled a knife, stabbed the boy in the gut.   Jay bit his palm as the boy collapsed to the ground.
    Eyeballs began to rape the crying girl.
    And Freckles knelt.   Using the hilt of his knife, he began knocking free teeth from the dying boy's mouth.   The boy twitched once, twice, at the impacts.   Then just lay, unmoving.   Only the *thunk thunk thunk* Jay mentally heard as the hilt lifted, dropped, rhythmic and precise.   Freckles used a finger to pull the boy's cheeks back like a dentist as he worked.
    Then he stood up, undid his belt, knelt over the boy's head.
    Jay stumbled backward into his hiding place, fighting back the need to hurl.   His injured leg suddenly screamed at him.   Fucked up bastard's hell .   He wanted to help but it wasn't even close.   Wasn't even hard to choose.   His own life was more valuable to him than both theirs, not that he could have helped.   The denial humiliated him and the guilt was worse than killing Paul had been.   He couldn't swallow it away.
    He blocked out the sounds and sat, putting his head between his propped elbows and fingering the crushed bell at his neck.   Freckles said he forgave Jay for smashing one of the bells because he had earned it, he'd killed the Enforcer after all.   He'd killed an enemy.
    It didn't matter if Jay felt guilty now or before.   Guilt didn't factor into the equation.   Jay was 'justified' in preserving his own life.   And he bet that next time wouldn't be much different.   He'd chose his own life above another's.
    After far too long, the sounds ceased.   Jay clambered tardily to his feet, supporting himself on the sharp, rocky wall, keeping the sore weight off his leg.
    After a deep breath, he looked at Haven's center again.   The girl and the Gamers were gone.   Only the boy's body remained in a pool of bright, red blood.   People "too valuable to die" were entering into the light and Jay felt as if he watched some sick theatrical performance.  
    This indeed was a Game.   It was the only way a world like this could exist.
    The emerging people were 'Valuables.'   People like Karah, worth more captured than killed.   Many were medical professionals, some engineers and specialists, a few were Morir's equivalence to sex slaves: women and men that could be traded as commodities...like the girl "Adri" would become.
    The Valuables held flags high in the air as they approached.   The flags meant immunity.   Each flag's color represented a supply.   Green for food, blue was water, red for medicine, white for materials.   Black for charity.   The Valuables walked into the open space, nervous caution in their gaits.   When they came close to the supplies they dropped their flag and took a case.   Just one.   Like the rules said.   Then they drug it, rolled it, wrestled it back to hiding and safety.
    On more than one occasion a fight broke out between Valuables.   Freckles had explained it like he had explained everything.   Action and consequence.   If someone, for example, brought back a charity box and there was nothing of use within, there would be consequences.   No one really knew what was in each box, but like a fight for the biggest White Elephant gift--grass looks greener on the other side.
    In Jay's case the grass really was greener on the other, any other side.
    "You will play the Game and follow orders.   If you 'forget' again , the bomb I've strapped to the back of your fucking neck will remind you," Freckles had said after he'd finished with Karah.   Served Jay right for making such a pathetic excuse.   "I forgot" didn't work on Gamer any