Shadows shifted throughout the dark apartment, a result of the flickering lights dancing from the impressive array of monitors in the room. A young man sat hunched over in front. Green eyes dancing between the displays. In the central monitor, a first-person shooter played out but it wasn't him playing the game. Not quite anyways. Numerous debug statements and statistics filled out the monitor to his right as a text editor with the current version of his bot was open to the left.

Sure the account being played belonged to him, but it was the artificial intelligence he designed doing the actual playing. He was never any good at these sorts of games. Not good enough to win anyways. Not good enough to earn the sort of money these tournaments paid out at least. He used to feel bad about cheating when he was younger but had grown used to it by now. The money was more important now. Sure building a new bot that was good enough to beat outright professionals while still passing as a human player didn't pull in much cash compared to his other endeavors but every bit counted these days. He felt more guilty about the hacks and corporate espionage that really paid the bills. He had to do what had to be done.

The match was coming to a close and victory looked like it would be his again. He didn't really need to keep watch anymore. The automated tool was pretty self-sufficient these days, including depositing the winnings into his account(after going through a few intermediaries just in case the organizers caught in after the fact). He rubbed his eyes, exhausted from the long night of making the final tweaks for this match. Competing in timezones halfway across the world made for poor sleep schedules. He got up from his chair and stumbled towards the bathroom to relieve himself. Splashing his face with some cold water to wake up he prepared for the morning. He made a promise for this day and he intended to keep it.

He did one final check to make sure the bot was still running fine and got ready to leave. He pounded down a small cup of coffee and left his dingy apartment behind. The morning rays assaulted his eyes and he had to squint as he locked the door. Not that there was any real point to it. It was a bad neighborhood but the apartment was so cheap nobody ever bothered to break in. Thieves simply assumed there was nothing worth stealing. It was nice being a local to the area in some ways. Keep your head down and out of the way of local thugs and they left you alone. Bigger fish to fry than mugging someone who probably had no cash on them anyways. A distant gunshot woke him up a bit more, a reminder that it still wasn't the safest of places. Still, every dime he saved on living expenses was a dime that could go towards treatment. If his brother Eric got better, then he could consider moving somewhere better. No, when he got better. WHEN, not if damnit.

The man cursed his stray thought and took a deep breath. He left and started the long walk to the hospital, transportation was not worth the expenditure. It took a couple of hours to get there and by then he had little patience for the nurses when he arrived. They always gave him a hassle over visiting the younger brother, despite being responsible for bankrolling the whole deal, as if it was always a struggle to find him in their system no matter how many times he gave them his name.

The doctors couldn't actually figure out what was wrong. Eric would develop symptoms matching this disease or that disease and new rounds of treatments would be applied to keep him alive. As soon as it seemed he would turn around and finally make it, a new symptom would appear. It was utterly bizarre and took a substantial amount of cash injection just to keep Eric alive. Insurance had long ago run out unable to keep up with the demanding level of treatment required. Their parents certainly couldn't keep up with the demands, not on their middle-class salaries. That just left the once-promising programmer to make ends meet. His software developer job was able to keep up at first despite his young age, but then Eric just got worse as if his ailment was mocking the older brother's efforts. The kind of pay he made on the internet's seedier underbelly however could. He worried though that things were going to get worse again. He didn't know what he could possibly do more to make things work. He just had to pray Eric would get better.

"Hey bro, you look like death" Eric smiled once his brother was finally allowed to visit. "Another late night playing games? He smiled weakly.

The older sibling smiled back. Eric was shriveled at this point, his black hair finally starting to grow back after the chemo treatment from his latest outbreak. His eyes stayed as vibrant as ever though, a matching green they shared with father. No matter how much life beat him down, Eric's soul still shined in those eyes.

"Yeah, something like that." He answered back, taking a seat near the hospital bed. A steady beep filled the air between them from the machines monitoring Eric's life. The room smelled like death as it always did.

"You gotta take care of yourself man. Don't worry so much about me. I'll be okay. This will be over soon, I know it."

"Soon for sure. Whatever's got you in its grips can't hold on for too much longer."

Eric had been suffering like this for nearly a decade now.

"Yeah, I feel really good this time. I was able to take two whole more steps this time in therapy than last!" Eric beamed.

The brother couldn't help but grin in response. Maybe this time would eventually be what sticks. Maybe his brother would finally get better...

The two talked for hours, their laughter occasionally heard from the halls. Their spirits soared even as both brothers were tired and exhausted. When it became clear that both needed their rest the bid their goodbyes.

He knew something was wrong two blocks from home. He just couldn't place his finger on it but the streets were just too quiet for it being midday. He supposed it could have just been the exhaustion getting to him, being awake for thirty-two hours in a row now played funny tricks on the mind, but his gut said that wasn't the case. He couldn't possibly know for sure, but he was being followed. Crap crap crap. What should I do? Calling the police was out of the question. He’d be lucky if they ever even showed up here. He was close to home, but leading his trail right to where he lived was likely a bad idea too. He could confront whoever it was here and now. Hopefully, it was a tweaker desperate enough to try to rob the poor. He had no cash on himself, he could just hand the wallet over, move on from this miserable experience and cancel his cards as soon as he got home. Whether or not it was stupid, he decided to duck into a nearby alleyway and wait. His fears were well founded as not shortly after another person stepped into the alleyway.

He seized up his attacker. Tall, but didn’t have the bulk that any of the local thugs would have had, and dressed in simple jeans and a hoodie. It was impossible to see the muggers face from the lighting but the person’s movements were slightly erratic and unhinged. Definitely a tweaker then.

“Look, man, I don’t want any trouble. Wallet is right here, just take it and let me go okay?” He held out the wallet with his left hand, the other raised into the air.

The only response he received was some vague mumbling.

“Come on man just take it and go.”

“Y-y-you took everything!” The tweaker suddenly spoke up.

“Uh, what?”

“You t-t-took every t-t-thing”

“Look I really don’t know what you’re talking about man.”

“Im f-f-from V-v Vivli Pha-Pharmaceuticals. Desmond in re-research.”

Shit. Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck.

“I uhh never heard of them.”

He lied. It was one of his early jobs a few years back. Hack into the R&D department and supply the formulas for some new drugs they were working on for a competitor. It was a challenging job that took a couple of months but well worth the pay. Their rivals were able to bankroll the development of said drugs and got them patented before Vivli Pharmaceuticals was any wiser. Their entire business was hinging on the new developments and it didn’t take long before they went under. It was the first time he truly felt bad, but Eric was more important to him.

“They FIRED me. My life's work GONE. Stolen! I took out every loan I could and paid every investigator I could to find you. You were good. Covered your tracks pretty fucking well but not good fucking enough!” The man’s stutter went away as the rage crept into his voice. He grew louder and louder with every word, screaming by the end.

“You have the wrong guy!”

The enraged researcher offered no reply, would hear no argument. Truthfully it didn’t matter anymore to him if he had the right culprit or not. He stepped forward guided by a dark purpose. The object of his rage backed away, but the gap between them was closing. It turned out confronting this Desmondl had been a very very bad idea. As the gap closed to a few feet the attacker pulled a knife from his pocket a four-inch knife gleaming in the midday rays.

Shit gotta think come on. He’s going to kill me if I don’t do something. Gotta get past him somehow and hope he doesn’t stab me before I can get away. I HAVE to take this chance.

The hacker chucked the wallet at Desmond, hoping to distract him for even a moment. He lunged forward, hoping to shove the deranged man into a wall and get away.

It almost worked.

He shoved his attacker alright but as he turned the falling man grabbed his shirt and pulled. They both lost their footing from this and fell to the ground together. Before he could comprehend what happened a sharp pain radiated from his side like fire. Desmond had plunged the knife into his victim’s side.

It was by far the most excruciating pain he had ever felt in his life. There wasn’t any time to process anything however as pure survival instinct took over.

Desmond was on top of him now, trying to dig the blade deeper into his side. His left arm was pinned under the weight of the man’s body. Even though Desmond couldn’t have weighed much more than he did it was still too much. His right hand was free though and he swung a fist as hard as his adrenaline fueled arm could. It cracked into Desmond’s jaw who was laughing maniacally at this point. He followed through on the momentum, rolling over on top of Desmond triggering a fresh wave of fire-like pain from his side. He tried to pin down Desmond’s knife arm with his now freed left hand but only had partial success. He rained uncoordinated blows with his other fist onto Desmond’s face.

Desmond never stopped laughing and started to repeatedly stab the hacker over and over with his limited mobility. The man on top was relentless, seemingly impervious to the pain. He could definitely still feel it but he was too submerged in his own rage. A dim part of his mind knew that he had taken too much damage. There was no way he was going to get help in time and he would bleed out even if he did manage to incapacitate his attacker. The more dominant thought was that after he died, no one would be able to pay for Eric’s care and his brother would die too. Years spent trying to save him would be wasted. Their parents would lose both their sons. It felt far too unfair to him. He did what he had to be done and now the consequences were going to kill him with nothing to show for it. He felt powerless and in his despair, he reached for control over the one thing he could at this moment.

Before he died he would KILL Desmond.

He continued to rain blows on Desmond’s head long after the other man lost the strength to keep stabbing. Still, he continued to laugh, the man’s madness was infectious and the sound burned into the bloodied victim’s skull.

Though any passerby would find it challenging to identify who was really the aggressor at this point.

He decided to silence the laughter and began squeezing Desmond’s neck, forcing his entire body weight down to crush the trachea. He used both hands as trying to prevent further stabbings had long since become useless. Finally, the laughter stopped as it changed to gurgling gasps for air. Gasps that were ultimately futile.

After what seemed like an eternity, Desmond shuddered and stopped moving, eyes glazed back and lifeless.

The fury of the fight began to leave the victor’s body. Blood had pulled around the two from his gaping wounds. He slumped over and rolled onto his back, no longer possessing the strength to hold up his body. He could not process taking the life of the other man as he could barely process his own impending death. He was cold. His vision was filled only with blue sky.

That is until he hallucinated the devil standing over him. Come to take his soul away. He must have been dreaming up the disturbing yellow eyed figure hunched over him. A morbid representation of his own inner guilt and failures he mused. The devil reached out a gray hand and offered it to the dying man and somehow he found the strength to accept the help.

It was no hallucination however.

Thetos had come to bargain.

He thought he knew pain from being repeatedly stabbed. No pain was what he felt now. A strange strength filled him down to his very soul and he stood up with the assistance of the grey demon. His whole being felt on fire and he screamed throughout the entire process. Thetos said nothing during this process, merely smirking the whole time.

After an eternity the pain began to recede as he stood upon his feet once again. His vision swam and he had no idea how it was possible for him to stand at all after what he had gone through. He looked down and screamed again.

Below him, on the ground, he saw his own corpse. Green eyes glazed back the same as Desmond's surrounded by a pool of blood. He looked over ‘himself’ and only saw a golden silhouette of the body he remembered. Thetos had plucked his soul from his dying body before it could move on.

“Now then my friend, are you done screaming?” Thetos spoke with his rasp.

This question strangely calmed the apparition who looked at Thetos in bewilderment.

“Ah much better my friend. I get enough screaming from living mortals. I don’t need the dead screaming at me too”

“Wh-what demon are you? Are you taking me to some sort of hell?”

“Oh ho no my friend. No demon, though you may visit some manner of ‘hell’ yet. I am one of the Named and I am called Thetos. I am a god.”

The name seemed to vibrate in the air, quaking down to the ghost’s very core. As if reality struggled to support the utterance of a cosmic being.

“I am here to offer you a deal. I like you, my friend. I’ve been watching you for a long time now and I think you have what it takes to become one of my champions. To fight for my cause, crush my enemies, and claim kingdoms and souls in MY name.” Thetos elaborated.

The dead man was bewildered. Some sort of god wanted him to fight as what? Some sort of crusader? And why the hell did he keep calling him ‘his friend’?

“I..uhh..what?”

“Oh, I believe I was perfectly clear my friend. Accept my terms and gain a chance to live again. Fight for me. Use that determination of yours that has kept Eric alive for so long focus it towards my enemies for they are many. Look at poor Desmond there,” Thetos gestured at the second corpse on the ground. “He had you dead to rights literally, but then you decided he would die and he did. You decided Eric would live and he has...for now anyway. I like that kind of determination. I want to weaponize it.”

“Will I be able to continue helping Eric if I accept?”

“Oh, there is no if about the matter my friend,” Thetos chuckled. “But yes, those are part of the terms. In exchange for accepting a Contract, the mortal benefactor gets one wish granted to them within the capabilities of the deity offering. Yours is the life of the mortal Eric and it is well within my power to cure him in totality. No more sickness, ever.”

“There are other benefits to this arrangement my friend.” Thetos continued. “The Contract weaves the Fates of the mortal and god together. No longer will you be bound by the constraints of the universe, you will gain a measure of our kind’s control over our own Fate. True free will, no longer a slave to determinism. Trust me, it is a far better perk than many realize.”

The god’s words struck him to the core. He may not have entirely understood what Thetos was talking about but he understood two points. He never truly controlled his own actions, he was predetermined to fail in saving Eric and was always meant to die uselessly in a random alley. Also, Eric would live by accepting this ‘Contract’.

He thought the matter over in his head wordlessly and Thetos silently allowed him to absorb the ramifications of this proposal.

That’s when it occurred to him.

“If everything I’ve done till now has been predetermined and I don’t truly get a choice until we ‘weave our Fates’ or whatever then that means I don’t have a choice even now do I? You already know I say yes don’t you?”

Thetos laughed at this revelation. The laugh was a deep baritone in stark contrast to his normal raspy voice. Reality shook from the reaction.

“See my friend this is the other reason I like you. Not everyone manages to put two and two together like that, but I would have been gravely disappointed in you if you hadn’t. Yes, you indeed have already accepted. My offer here at this point and time is a mere formality.”

The confirmation didn’t bother him as much as he thought it would.

“Then I accept. How do we do this? And how will I fight your enemies as a ghost like this?”

"No worries my friend. The battlefield my kind wages war over is not here on Earth, and it’s not like you could take your body over anyways. Instead, I will find a body for you and shove your soul inside. That will be the last moment I can help you until further terms of the Contract are executed. A bridge we will cross when the times come. For now, I merely need you to sign the Contract.”

Thetos waved his hand and a floating piece of paper appeared in the air. Scrawled across it was glowing golden lines. The words seemed impossibly dense and endless. Far more was written on this single page than what seemed possible for a simple piece of paper to hold. He didn’t question such oddities at this point though dealing in the absurdity of being dead and making deals with a god.

He examined the Contract over and realized he couldn’t actually make out what it said or even where he was supposed to sign, it was not like he was offered a pen or anything. A wave of paranoia flashed over him. So far he had taken this so called god at his word but was now being asked to sign a strange mystical document he couldn’t even read. He knew he was being played like a fool somehow but had no idea how to figure it out. There was no other option than to continue though was there?

“H-how do I sign?” He asked, more nervous and less confident in his decision than he was a moment ago.

“Oh thats simple, press your hand against the Contract and offer the appropriate sacrifice to consecrate it. For a Contract to be accepted you must trade away a fundamental part of who and what you are.” The grin on Thetos’s face grew wider.

“And what am I supposed to be sacrificing here?” An edge came to his voice, this must have been the real catch to the whole deal.

“Nothing crazy important, my friend. Just your own name. But dont worry, I will give you a new one once the Contract is sealed. Im not like other nasty gods that demand more grievous things like memories or emotions. In comparison, a name is the cheapest thing to give up really.”

He sighed. His own name. It couldn’t have been as simple as Thetos was saying. Now he knew he was being screwed in this deal. There wasn’t any alternative unfortunately. He placed his hand on the Contract and somehow knew what to do. He pushed his name forward, lodged deep somewhere in his soul and into the Contract where it stayed, blended seamlessly in the inscrutable words of the document.

Energy flowed back into his soul, the text of the Contract being burned and carved into the deepest recesses of his being. He thought being ripped from his dying body was bad, this reached a whole new level. The essence of who and what he was had been changed.

He knew at that point his name was gone. Not just a frivolous thing like what people called him, but the very marker and cosmic stamp of who he was. It was gone and he felt lesser for it. It was scoured from his soul and along his Fate, reaching backward and into his own past. Suddenly it made sense why the nurses had trouble looking him up, why nobody referred to him by his own name, why he couldn’t even remember calling himself anything. His name was traded away now and that means it was always traded away, that it never existed. He wasn’t a person, he was a character, an entity of vague identity. Reality had merely bent around this fact and made it seem like it had always been the most natural thing in the world.

Even as he felt lesser for his trade a new feeling rose up from within. A sense of power and direction. It was likely waking up from a deep slumber. He had always been going through the motions without ever realizing it, without ever having a choice. Now that was different. He was more awake than he ever was, he felt he could truly choose now, he tasted real and true freedom for the first time ever like discovering a lost limb or remembering a dear friend. He awakened to free will for his Fate was now in his own grasp.

Thetos watched the change with glee. He underwent changes of his own but handled the transition far more smoothly with a practiced hand. An observer would be mistaken in thinking nothing had changed the god.

Thetos waved his hand and a rent in reality appeared in the shape of a simple doorway. It lead out to a complete unnatural blackness.

“Come Kuzari, there is work to be done.”