[Ardyn pressed a hand to his eyes and laughed hollowly, the smile on his face clearly one he was struggling to keep in place as he put perhaps a little too much sugar in his own coffee.]

Let me try to put this bluntly; forgive me, but it's not been long and it's easiest to just get it all out with as little dancing about the issue as possible.

We were taken from our home worlds and timelines to participate in an intergalactic television show presented as fiction to its audience. Airlocked, popular in seven galaxies and with a fanbase completely unaware they were watching actual people being put through the ordeal of memory loss, murder, trials, and the like.

[The halfhearted smile finally faltered, Ardyn staring blankly at his coffee like he was reciting something that happened to someone else, a million miles away.]

Those of us who survived their games escaped and spent time on the run from the network responsible, but we didn't realize we were being tracked and essentially led back into enemy hands when they were eventually prepared for their fifth and final season. Thankfully, that one ended with the executive producer brought to justice and the network collapsed, with all of us that had been killed being awoken from the simulation we were being stored in.