“A World of Fun”
Every day children, families, all the people who visit my sector, pass me and sometimes they stop.  Some of them politely ask where the nearest bathroom is or where certain rides are averting their eyes trying to hide their disgust, and I guide them to these places as is my job working in “Shipwrecked Harbor” the amusement park I have worked for since I was five, but some of them stare shamelessly. I quit wondering what they were staring at, my scar is pretty hard to miss. It’s long, and pink, and goes from above my left eyebrow down to just above my left cheekbone, not only leaving me a spectacle for children to cry at,  but also blinding my left eye. So I suppose I understand why The APA kept me, it costs less for me to not have to put on character makeup every day, I simply look scary on my own.  When I was younger I never thought The APA would hire me. A nobody, an ugly little girl who doesn’t have potential to be anything useful. The APA – Amusement Park Association – has been running the world since around 2085 now and their motto is “a world where fun doesn’t end is a world worth living in”.  What a joke. I walked to my station and a blue l.e.d. laser scanned my wrist clocking in for another days work at the harbor. Robin, my best friend since the age of nine, scanned in exactly seven minutes ago. Robin transferred to my sector eight years ago. I was one of the first people he met and he was one of the only people who didn’t cringe at the sight of my face.
“What’s wrong with your face?” he plainly asked as he reached to touch my scar.
“Nothing. What’s wrong with yours?” I answered sarcastically pushing his hand away from my face. That is how our relationship has been ever since. Teasing and laughing every chance we could. It was good to have his humor some days. I knew he would be getting dressed because Ritual was about to start. Ritual is the APA’s way of keeping cast and citizens in check. I headed to the cast lockers and into my assigned stall. It reads on the plain, cream colored door
Cast Member 4872 –Shipwrecked Harbor
I read this daily wondering if I really am just a number or “a valuable link of the chain” like the APA wants every cast member to think. I quickly throw on my lady pirate uniform, a black ripped skirt with shorts under them, and a blue crop top that goes just above my belly button, showing more skin than my assigned leisure clothes for when curfew commences. I find myself staring at the label on my door while I put on my white bandana and black pirate hat, when I hear a familiar noise. A sort of muffled gurgling noise coming from the bathing area of the lockers. Robin is standing behind his favorite sink, which I find silly seeing as they are all identical, rinsing his mouth with water after brushing his teeth. He catches my reflection in the mirror and stares a little too long before he turns around and shines his pearly whites in my direction. I noticed he has been doing that for a little while now. Looking at me too long, staring for an extended amount of time when he thinks I’m not paying attention. He beams as if today is going to be perfect, which is far from likely.
“Morning gorgeous, love the outfit.” He winks at me as we start walking together towards the arena.
“I try to impress” I say back to him taking a short peak at his biceps that practically bulge out of his striped pirate shirt.
“You know I really don’t understand why I am the one who has to wear the eye patch, I mean clearly you’re the one who needs it”, he teases as he puts his black patch with a skull and crossbones over his eye.
“Ha-ha, wise guy, I wonder how long it took you to think that one up”. I poke his stomach and he cringes laughing as he tugs a lock of my dark long hair.
The mood turns a little less ethereal as we approach the Ritual arena. The gravity of what we are about to witness sets in as we approach the stone arch entry of the arena. The viewing side is the left while the unlucky “guests” make their way through the dark corridor on the right of the stone archway. Robin and I both scan our wrists to prove we attended the ceremony. I cringe as I see a young boy who couldn’t have been older than seven walk through to the right side, as the APA guards body scan him for weapons he may have brought. Robin tugs my arm slightly pulling me to the viewer seats which encompass a wide oval shaped arena, hills and crevices and other obstacles carved into its deadly desert landscape. This is the hour upon which the APA will knowingly kill anyone that dare defy them, even if they be too young to understand, like a small child for instance. Almost nobody ever makes it out of this arena but if they did everyone in the sector would know. Much like everyone knows me and my scarred face. There are children, teenagers, adults of all different ethnicities and backgrounds, people with stories and reasons for their crimes committed that line up on the “guest” side. I see their agony through the gleam of the sun against their dead eyes. Each of them accepting their fate the day they were caught infracting the laws set in place by the APA. Each of them pretending for the sake of being human, they might make it out alive. Our sector has only had two survivors, ever. It is not likely today there will be a third.

Robin and I make our way to two empty seats near the back. A young girl around the age of twelve sits in front of us. She fidgets a little and I remember the little boy. They share the same crystal blue eyes and I wonder if she thinks he will make it out alive. I swallow the despair crawling up my throat wishing this young girl had not sat by us. I try to think of anything besides what I am about to witness like the way Robin’s caramel brown hair curls around his ears, or the way his hands shake when he is nervous, or how his dark green eyes put me in a trance. Yes, all really, really great things to think about, distractions from the massacre that is about to take place before me. The giant arena clock is set for exactly one hour until Ritual will be over. The guests are brought in chains down to the open arena floor, held at gunpoint by the guards. Soon enough the chains will be unlocked electronically, releasing them into their last minutes of life. Some of them pray, some cry, and some stare defiantly to the VIP section of the viewers in which the disgusting leaders, who find this a source of entertainment, sit. A loud click echoes through the air signally the release of the shackles upon the prisoners, I mean guests. Some of the young ones run and cry and shamelessly begging for mercy. It pains me to watch. I hear the machines before I see them.
Black mechanic arms with red laser scanners that detect movement. Wielding death to the unlucky souls before me.  These APA made machines slicing through bone and neck with no conscience to guide them are called op-units, over population is controlled as well as instilling fear towards APA. I watch horrified as they bring an end to the lives of about a hundred people. For an entire hour these people desperately seek refuge. They scream, run, panic. Some try to fight back, some succeed I see a

busted op-unit in the far left on top of a hill. I think about how many people that machine single handedly killed on APA’s orders. There is only a few people left. I do not see the young girl’s little brother. I do not look for his mangled, bloody body either, because I was too scared I would find it. I glance in Robin’s direction. He is clenching his hands so tightly his knuckles are white. I know how hard these ceremonies are on him. Sometimes he talks to me about the Rituals where he came from. His previous sector caught his mother stealing and she was a guest in one of the Rituals. I don’t know much more than that and I won’t push him to talk about such awful memories. There is only one person left now. He made it to the last ten minutes of the Ritual. I didn’t think anyone would do so well today considering the heat but here is the last man standing. He looks scared out of his mind, he used his chain as a weapon against the op-units and stands at the top of a dune holding it out waiting for his assailants to attack. He looks to be in his thirties possibly a dad, a husband, a brother. Three op-units go at him from all different sides and it was too many. He tried to dodge them but his right arm was sliced clean off. I don’t want to look but I can’t stop looking. His sorrowful howl thickens the air going into my lungs and I can think of nothing but how much physical pain that man must be in. I have only known that kind of pain once in my life and I hardly remember it because I was so small. He kneels as a fountain of red explodes from his arm. One of the op-units stabs the man right in his chest. A small trickle of blood dribbles down his cheek and the man hunches over. I say a silent prayer for every soul taken today. I don’t know if anyone hears me but I feel like it’s only right that these people should be protected by something celestial, because I know for sure no one is doing it here.