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Jason and Annie quickly slipped through the door of apartment 4B completely unnoticed. The apartment was pitch black, but neither one needed light to see as they were already embraced in each other's arms.

Their tongues touched as their lips stuck together like glue. Jason allowed Annie to run her hands over the intricate design of his muscles. He was the exact replica of a greatly detailed sculpture, perfectly designed in every way.

Meanwhile Jason was coursing her dirty blonde hair, and then proceeded to her shirt. For a second Annie hesitated. She grabbed his hand knowing full well what would happen next.

"Jason, before we go on, I have something to tell you," Annie muttered guiltily.

Jason stopped and asked, "Can't it wait until after we're done babe?" He comforted her by dragging his hands across her pasty white skin. Oddly enough he found she had a peculiar odor to her, but it really hadn't bothered him until now.

"No," Annie hissed between her gritted teeth. "I'm hungry, and you, my living friend, are my
lunch." Jason fell to his knees as Annie's teeth sunk into the sides of his neck.

Her body absorbed several blows to the ribs. Jason tried putting up a fight but all he was doing was wasting his energy.

"Freak!" He shouted in pain.

She ignored the word and continued sucking every ounce of blood from the boy's body. Everything about it was exhilarating, the moment of betrayal to the sucking of the blood.

By the time she was done there was no life left in Jason. The boys once ocean blue eyes now resembled the color of coal. His skin had once shined like gold, but was now as white as Annie's.

As Annie licked her teeth clean of blood a light in the back of the room came on.

Annie twirled around. Everything in the room was visible. A wooden table sat in the middle of the room with an empty violet vase covered with intricate carvings. A bookshelf had been crammed in one corner and in the other, next to the tall lamp that had mysteriously turned on, was a geeky forty year old man who appeared to be no older than Annie, sitting quietly in a small wooden chair.

If you ever gazed into his eyes all you could see were storm clouds rolling around inside. A pair of bent glasses sat on his bony nose, ready to slide off at any minute. But worst of all was the massive heap of black hair sitting atop his head, almost touching the tips of his rather tiny ears.

"What a mess we have here. Resorting to seduction I see, unusual. You must have been spending time at the bar again," The man muttered under his breathe.

"I must feast father. You know that."

The man rose to his feet and approached his daughter. He gazed upon her with worn out and baggy eyes due to the result of sleepless nights. "Annie, I have good news. The boy, he's finished. I've already shipped him to Corruption's Headquarters."

Annie averted her gaze from her father; the very idea to her was simple psychotic. “What if your plan fails?"

"It won't, Annie I-"

"You don't know that!" Annie screamed. "You're so myopic father. You've gone crazy ever since Sy-Tech went bankrupt. No matter how much money you'll have you'll never be able to find a cure because there isn't one. I'll be stuck a mangy vampire forever." Annie assumed a position that made it appear as if she was bowing down to her father, but really she was just trying to suppress her rage. Normally she'd be crying to ease the pain, but everyone knew a dead person can't cry.

Sahar Sorek once had an ordinary life. Graduated top of his class, got married and had a wonderful daughter named Annie. From there he had developed Sy-Tech. Through hard work and sweat it had quickly advanced to a billion dollar company.

Sy-Tech Corporations had been the leading manufacturer of the latest gadgets and weaponry. Rich people scattered across the globe cashed in billions for their products.

Life had been great, until Sahar had gotten mixed up in a bad business deal with vampires. Everything went wrong, his business went bankrupt and his family was slaughtered; his wife had been killed and his daughter badly bitten.

Now Annie and he lived in the slums of Beijing desperately trying to make a living, clinging on to the pathetic thing called life.

"Do not doubt me. Tech-Zone will be Corruption's biggest hit yet. I had him in the virtual reality lab today, his performance was outstanding." Sahar reassured her as best he could; he left out the part about getting knocked out cold knowing it would only make Annie more upset. "Thanks to him Corruption's ratings will boost and the prize money will be ours." He grinned avidly as the last few words rolled off his tongue. Images of buckets loaded with cash filled his head.

Annie grabbed onto her father’s lab coat and rested her head on his shoulder. They sat there for hours, neither one speaking a word.

____________________________________________________________________


"Reboot complete. All systems online." The voice inside Tech-Zone's head buzzed. Tech-Zone felt his head throb as his eyes opened.

He was inside what appeared to be a large metal container decked with two flat screen televisions. There were no visible windows, just a single door and an overly buff white man sitting across from him.

Wrapped tightly around the man's skull was a leaf green bandana, blocking his eyesight. His lips twitched as if he could sense Tech-Zone staring at him.

The man leaned in close and cocked his head forward. With a large grin he held out his hand and with a scruff voice said, "Nice to finally meet'cha kiddo. You were knocked out on that bench for quite some time. Don't know how considering the fact their hard as rock." He rapped on the bench with his gloved fist just to prove a point.

"Tech-Zone, my name is Tech-Zone. It's nice to meet you uh mister-" He was quickly cut off from saying anymore.

"Raiku." The man chuckled. "Now let's see those muscles of yours." Raiku reached out and started feeling Tech-Zone like he was some sort of jacket. When he finally reached his arm - the one that wasn't a prosthetic - he quickly complained. "No meat, no muscle. You must have a pretty pathetic life to be attempting this challenge kid. Well, looks like we'll both be seeing each other in the afterlife very soon."

Tech-Zone cocked his head in confusion. "Raiku, why do you wear a headband? And what do you mean by challenge?"

For a moment there was silence. Raiku was no longer smiling. A sour look now sat upon his face. It caused the scar across his eye to crunch up, taking the shape of an odd V.

"Thought it was obvious, I've been blind since eighteen, have been for the past ten years. Sorry if me feeling you like that put you in an uncomfortable position. I like to have a general understanding of what my comrades look like." Raiku leaned back against the cold interior behind him, and then continued speaking. "You're sitting on a ship hovering above televisions hit series Corruption, or at least it used to be a hit. It's become so difficult no one has won in years. Did you lose your memory or something? The only way to participate is if you applied."

"I'm sorry to hear that." Tech-Zone croaked. For no particular reason the back of his throat started throbbing violently. He cringed, he had never applied or heard of such a show, and if he had it was one of the many things scraped clean from his memory. Last he had checked there had been killer robots attacking him; the bump on his head even proved the earlier incident had been real. "I guess you could say something like that. I probably just knocked my head on something. So how exactly did you go blind?"

There was a pause. That slight pause meant Raiku was either trying to make up a lie or remember the one he told everyone else when they stumbled upon the question.

"Ten years ago I just woke up blind. Not much to it," he lied.

Tech-Zone decided to just let the subject drop. Everyone had their secrets. Instead he asked, "So how exactly do we win this game?"

"Survive. There are sixty teams of two. If any more than two survive the three challenges then there's a death match before the fourth and final challenge. The last team standing has to win the fourth challenge to earn the grand prize, twenty five million dollars."

"Are there any consolation prizes for the losers?"

Raiku grinned and said, "You really don't know what you've gotten yourself into do you?" Tech-Zone shook his head in response. "The only ones who play this game are the poor and the ones who no longer want to go on living. In this battle only one team has the chance to survive."