Lord of The Stars

Akira rushed the glass that contained Noor, pounding his fists against it, but the vitreous wall remained utterly impassive.

"Damn it," Akira snarled, a new layer of fury coating his fear. "What is this? Release him, you damnable thing!"

"You cannot free him unless you choose him," the Voice replied, its tone a clinical dissection of his predicament. "In doing so, you will sacrifice the key—your very gate to survival. The choice is binary: select him and perish with him, or select the key. The latter is the logical choice, the one I would endorse, for his probability of perishing stands at ninety percent regardless of your action."

Akira pressed his hands to his skull, a pressure building within that threatened to rupture his mind. Noor's pleas were a ceaseless torrent, begging to be saved, to be chosen. But the dilemma was a chasm. Should he save a man already condemned, and in doing so, condemn himself? Or would he be the instrument of that man's doom, knowing he possessed the power to grant him even a temporary reprieve? To stain his hands with blood for his own survival, or to accept death to avoid the burden of responsibility for another's? The thoughts were a chaotic storm, a flood of warring emotions sending his heart into a wild, arrhythmic hammering.

The real Noor's voice, faint and barely audible, cut through the noise. "Choose the key, you fool. I am here. Choose it for your own survival! This is a deception."

A muffled, knowing laugh issued from the Voice. "Do you truly believe," it said, its tone dripping with malice, "that if he chooses the key, he will survive? Perhaps he will. Perhaps not. You have seen enough, I think, to know my tests are not so crude. They unfold in stages. And consider this, Noor: what will you feel if he prioritizes the key over your life? How will you perceive him? What if you truly were in the place of this facsimile, and he chose the key, leaving you to your fate? Let us say he takes the key, escapes, and finds you alive. Will the image you have constructed of him—this good, loyal man—remain intact? Or will it crumble into dust, knowing that when the choice was between you and himself, he would always choose himself? The equation is not so simple, Mr.Noor. Do not be so naive. Observe him through the lens of truth. This test will reveal the real Akira."

Akira squeezed his head, the vise of his thoughts tightening. Noor or the key? The conflict was a maelstrom, a war between the imperative of action and the judgment of his conscience. Save him, and they would perish together. Choose the key, and he would live. The fragments of his reasoning collided, shattered, and re-formed. He paced the room, like a caged animal tormented by an unresolvable calculus. A knot of anguish tightened in his heart. It was a war between his heart and his mind, though at times even his heart argued for its own preservation. He felt this was the most difficult choice of his life—a life he could not even remember. God, what must I choose? he thought. Why am I here? What did I do to deserve this?

The panicked voice of the captive Noor continued to seep into his mind, a constant pressure to choose him over the key. But Akira's entire being, the very core of his survival instinct, leaned toward the key. He looked from the inert metal to the desperate, tear-streaked face of Noor, and felt he would shatter from the pressure.

"What are you waiting for, Akira?" the false Noor pleaded, his eyes brimming with tears. "Why don't you save me? Do you intend to leave me here? To choose the key and save yourself? After everything we have done together? Why do you hesitate? Please, choose me."

Akira slammed his hand against the glass, his face a dark mask, his eyes like twin volcanoes. He roared at the false Noor.

"Can you not be silent! Just for a moment, so that I might think! If I did not wish to choose you, I would have made the choice long ago! It is the most probable course of action in this scenario. There is no utility in saving you; we would both die regardless. So why should I save a man who is already lost? The logical move is to save myself, to minimize the losses. But I am trying to find a way out of this trap, and you give me no space to think! You know that choosing you is futile, yet you grasp for survival, for delay. It is the human instinct. But I do not wish to leave you to die. I saved you once before! And I am trying to save you again, though I have known you for mere hours. Do you think any man would choose a stranger he just met over himself? And yet, despite that, I am thinking of how to get you out of here. So please, be silent."

The false Noor fell silent, tears tracing paths down his cheeks. Akira exhaled a ragged breath and raked his fingers through his hair, his mind racing.

As if to pour acid on the wound, the Voice returned. "One minute remains."

The words amplified Akira's tension, his fear. The false Noor renewed his frantic pleas. Turmoil. Anxiety. Dread. Fear. Apprehension. Suspense. That minute was the longest and most difficult of his life, a stretch of time he prayed would pass without regret.

Thirty seconds. The seconds ticked past like swords, slicing his body and heart to shreds. Time continued its inexorable decay as he stared at the terrified Noor, who begged for salvation, and then at the key, his instrument of survival. Choose death to save a doomed man? Or save himself, mitigate the damage, but become the cause of another's end?

Ten seconds remained. Akira's fingers dug into his scalp, his mind a furnace of frantic calculation. A distillate of agony poured from his brow, coursing down his body in ceaseless streams. Pressure built behind his eyes, turning them a bloodshot red. He trembled, like a leaf caught in a gale, his body seized by a series of short, sharp spasms that contorted his features into a mask of torment.

Five seconds. The Voice issued its final command, an imperative to choose. Akira's mouth opened, prepared to utter the choice his gut dictated. His hand rose to point, but then froze. A new computation, a sudden unfolding of logic, bloomed in his mind. How had he not perceived it before? Why now, in this crucible of mental effort? The thought was a shard of ice in the fire: What is the consequence of inaction? The Voice has delineated every rule, save for the penalty of refusing the choice itself.

A silence descended. Akira rescinded his gesture, the fear of losing both now warring with this new, defiant strategy. The time expired. Nothing happened.

"The time has elapsed," the Voice observed, a note of analytical curiosity in its tone. "Why did you not choose?"

Akira's own voice was a dry rasp, the words catching in a throat tight with feverish strain. "You failed to specify the outcome should I refuse to select one."

"Ah. So that is your gambit," the Voice replied. "The consequence, then, in this case: both of you are free."

A sudden hiss of depressurization, and the glass cages retracted. A wave of profound relief washed over Akira, the sensation of a mountain of weight being lifted from his very soul. He drew a deep, shuddering breath and moved toward Noor, freeing him from his bonds. Noor collapsed against him, a torrent of thanks spilling from his lips, a prayer to his god for this deliverance. Once Noor was free, Akira turned his attention to the second cage, securing the key. He gripped it, the cold metal a totem of renewed hope.

But a chilling thought intruded, returning the familiar coil of anxiety to his gut. The Voice had stated there were only two keys. Jean had secured one. This meant Noor was without a path to survival.

The Voice returned, as if sensing his internal calculus. "You are, no doubt, considering the fact that Noor's freedom is merely a temporary reprieve. That the key in your hand is the last. What will you do, Akira? Grant him passage? Or offer a final farewell and leave him to his fate? To heighten the drama of the moment, I will inform you that Noor, too, possesses a key. It is in his right jacket pocket."

Noor fumbled in his pocket, his eyes widening as his fingers closed around the object. A broad smile spread across his face, mirrored on Akira's, who felt a second great weight lift from his spirit. But the Voice was a master of its cruel craft and did not permit the relief to settle.

"However," it continued, its tone laced with a silken, venomous thread, "there is one true key in this room, and one false. The question remains: who holds which?"

The false Noor stared at Akira, his hand clutching his own key with a desperate tension. Akira's features hardened, his face becoming a mask of shadow and fury. A guttural roar of pure rage tore from his throat.

"You puppeteer!" he bellowed, his entire being vibrating with defiance. "Will your cursed games never cease? I have passed your test. Why do you thrust me into another, more insidious one? What is it you want from me, you damnable thing? I was forced into this folly, and after all this, you still refuse to grant me a clear path?"

The Voice offered no reply, leaving him alone in the echo of his own fury. Akira saw Noor shrink against the far wall, waiting for the outcome.

"Do you wish," the false Noor began, his voice trembling, "to proceed from here?"

Akira turned a gaze of pure exhaustion and contempt upon him. "You will wait. We must first determine which key is the correct one."

"But how can we know by remaining here? We must go to the gate to learn the truth."

"You wish to go to the gate so that if your key is the true one, you might secure your escape," Akira snarled, his voice low and dangerous. "A singular focus on your own preservation. If you thought otherwise, you would offer me your key now, as payment on a debt. Twice I have stood between you and oblivion! But your concern is for yourself alone."

"I am not concerned only for myself! I suggested we go to the gate to test them. What other method is there to ascertain the truth?"

"Then give me your key," Akira commanded. "And I will test it for you."