Golden key

A Golden Key is last seen on the loose during the prologue when Pezci becomes concerned with the approach of a maelstrom. While she dithers in the water over what to do, several Keys fall into the ocean near her position, ranging out and seeking someone to bind to. One of the Keys acquires Pezci's presence in the water and homes in on her, zooming in and attacking her left hand by burrowing under the skin. After a moment the Key becomes fused to the back of her hand, lying on her skin like a golden metallic tattoo,The Keyholder's Burden secure in spite her meager attempts to shake it loose, and binding itself to the young mermaid.Lost in Thought
== Description ==
The Golden Keys when unbound resemble a stylized fish skeleton. They appear to be made of polished gold and are about three millimeters thick, roughly as thick as a human house key. After they become bound to a Keyholder, they continue to shine like gold, looking not unlike a metallic tattoo on the skin. They even occasionally emit a bright golden light, as if to attract attention to themselves and their Keyholder and usually at an inopportune moment. Once bound, the Key can emit a golden beam similar to a laser pointer, indicating the direction of the Light Tower.Shifty Partner During the initial binding, the Key projects a hologram of the Light Tower and broadcasts a welcome message to the new Keyholder.
The Light Tower announced that one of the ways to acquire a Key was to be given one by a Keyholder who has voluntarily removed the limb the Key was bound to. To guarantee there's no painless way to transfer a Key, the Keys have been programmed to override any anesthesia given to the host, making sure that surgically removing the Key would be very painful. Dr. Crusher Jeff, during his examination of the Key, found that it may also intensify the pain. He further discovered that the Key is coded with a custom programming language that he estimated would take decades to figure out. When he was asked to describe the pain of an attempted removal, his reply was, "Imagine the most painful experience you can think of, and times it by ten." The doctor came to the conclusion that the Key has all that programming to ensure that no one can interfere with the rules of the game.
== Competition ==
Ten of the Golden Keys were randomly distributed about the ocean by the Light Tower to be used as tokens in the competition run by the Tower. During a message broadcast around the world across all media, the Tower announced that to win the competition, all that a Keyholder needed to do was bring one of the Keys, bound to their person, to the Tower, and that person upon arrival would be granted permanent residence in the Light Tower, safe from all the ills of the world. The winner would even be allowed to bring one entire tribe of their choice in with them.The Light Tower
The voice from the Light Tower made sure to point out that the only chance to find a Key was to find one of the Keys randomly somewhere in the ocean … or to find a person with a Key already bound to them. The Tower then rather sadistically informed everyone the only way to get a Key from a Keyholder was for that person to cut off their own appendage that the Key was attached to and hand it over, or they must be killed and then the Key would be bound to the killer. Consent or murder, either way — blood must be spilled. The bound Key, if left uncovered, glows, usually bright enough to call unwanted attention to the Keyholder. This could have been a deliberate effect added to the Keys to increase peril and drama in the Keyholder's life.The Game Begins
== Keyholder ==
A Keyholder is, simply put, someone who holds one of the Golden keys. During the initial distribution of the Keys, an individual Key would detect a nearby person and become bound to them without any regard to the person's status. The first reference to being a "Keyholder" was made at the end of the prologue when Pezci's Key becomes activated.
== References ==