CHARACTERS: John Tillman, Robert Capa, Chase Kilgannon, Simon Silverton and possibly more.
LOCATION: Hallway of the passenger's quarters.
WARNINGS: Violence. Death threats.
SUMMARY: In which a new arrival takes a man hostage, gets attacked by a little girl, and is then forced to defend himself by a wise-cracking teenager.


Tillman's awakening was somewhat violent. One minute he was preparing for the final match-- he could practically taste freedom- and feeling more anxious and hopeful than he had in a long time. Without warning, there was a tube in his throat and he was naked and spilling out onto the floor.

He breathed through his nose, the sound harsh and angry in the silence of the room. His legs refused to hold his weight, so he remained on his knees on the cold tile. Drugs, he assumed. Castle did so love his theatrics-- a point made even more clear when Tillman bothered to look around. Strange. Foreign. It looked like he was on the set of some kind of science fiction flick.

It stood to reason that the administrators would not warn the cons before changing the scenery, but why now? Because it was the thirtieth match? Had Castle decided to switch it up to make it all fresh and exciting?

Turn me loose, kid. You want to win? Turn me loose. Find a way. His words echoed back at him. He debated the probability of Castle overhearing that and introducing this new hell as some kind of punishment. Or maybe the kid had ratted him out.

The attempt to reason out the why of his situation ended the moment he could stand, albeit unsteadily, on his own two feet. He was alive and he was loose, and therefore the motives of his captors did not matter quite as much as getting somewhere safe.

His right wrist was tender, the only fresh injury besides his throat that he could feel. He examined it briefly and his guts tightened with cold rage. A fresh tattoo penned beside his existing one. 'I am right here with you' was part of a mantra that kept him sane. Any time he could feel himself slipping into despair, he could look at the ink on his arm and remember what was waiting for him outside. Now he couldn't even do that without a further reminder that he was, in fact, in prison.

030. There was no way that that was an accident. More games, then. Always more games. He exhaled a calming breath. There was no point on dwelling on it. It was done.

Tillman crossed the room on unsteady legs. The rest of the pods, which he assumed contained the rest of his team, remained sealed and silent. If the intent was to make the room as creepy as possible, it had the desired effect. He was relieved to come across the rows of lockers. Different though they were, lockers were lockers. It was nice to see something familiar. He tried his old number and found it quite locked. He tried the next one. And the next. With an expectant frown, he made his way over to locker 030 and of course that one opened. Theatrics and games.

In place of his standard fatigues, there was some kind of... space suit. He didn't think too hard about it before pulling it on. His body armor fitted over it neatly. His weapons were stacked in an orderly fashion: hunting knife, SMG, pistol. He strapped them on. The firing pins on both guns were still inactive, so he drew the knife.

Everything about this was so strange. So surreal. It didn't make sense. Why give him his weapons if they didn't work? Why let him out but keep his squad locked down? Why the shift in setting?

Breathe, Tillman. There were no guards in sight which meant he was free to move around. At the request of the disembodied voice (which nearly scared him out of his skin) he took the lift up and cautiously made his way down the hallway it led to. He had walked for just under fifteen minutes before he came across another human being.

Thin, mousy, dark haired, unarmed. He didn't move like a prisoner and certainly not like an I-Con. He wasn't looking over his shoulder and almost seemed unaware of his surroundings. He must have felt safe.

Tillman theorized that maybe, just maybe, some computer error had resulted in his pod opening earlier than it should have, which made this man some kind of tech in charge of setting up the arena... It was an opportunity too good to pass up.

Tillman stalked forward silently, grip shifting on his knife. He grabbed the young man by the hair and wrenched his head back to expose his throat and keep his face angled upward. In the same motion, he brought his right arm around to rest the sharp edge along the left border of the techie's neck lightly.

“I don't want to hurt you,” he whispered in a voice that was hoarse from disuse. “I know you're only doing your job, but don't think for one second that me not wanting to hurt you means that I won't. This knife is over six inches long. I can slice through your carotid, your jugular, and your trachea in one motion. I just want some questions answered. Don't fight me. Don't test me,” he paused. “Put your hands out. Palms up.” This was not his first rodeo.