Arena Mode (31 page)

Seriously?
Brynja shouted inside my head.
You’re going with a World War II reference? Has anyone ever mentioned that you should prepare your threats in advance? Get a script, maybe?

I had a bad habit of getting myself into these situations. I wanted to say something with punch – something that would strike fear into the man blocking our exit. “So ... we’re coming, Ramsley,” I said, even more forcefully. “Before you know it we’ll be there, ready to fight. And you might have the lightning ... but we’ll be bringing the thunder.”

Brynja slapped a palm into her forehead.
Oh. My. God. Please stop. Just wrap it up before you make it worse.

I dragged my fingernails through my hair and exhaled loudly, turning away. Then I paused, taking a moment to reconsider. I turned back to the camera.

I was tired of shouting. Tired of posturing. I was going to send a different kind of message. “It’s been a
long
goddamned day, and I’ve been beaten within an inch of my life.” I patted my chest with both hands. “But this is nothing – it’s all gonna heal. A few stitches, some aspirin, and before long I’ll be good to go. But the shit I’ve seen today; the bodies, the blood, the ...” I trailed off momentarily, searching for the right words. They never came. Instead I just tapped the side of my head, refocusing on the lens in front of me. “This ... it isn’t going away. Not anytime soon. You can’t go back to a regular, everyday existence and leave all of this madness behind.”

“Out there,” I gestured, towards nowhere in particular, “in the ‘real world’, I’ll be a mess for a while, trying to unburden myself from the weight of what I’ve seen. But in here, trying to survive Arena Mode, these memories aren’t a burden: they’re a
gift
. Matthew Moxon from the Fringe wouldn’t have the stomach to hurt you. To hurt anyone, really. But after today, I won’t have any problem with this.” I snatched the K9 from my hip and jerked it into the camera’s view. “I’m going to stick this barrel in your mouth and paint a wall with your brain matter. I might lose sleep over it tonight, but right now, in the state I’m in ... I won’t even
blink
.” I jammed the barrel into the lens before adding, “We’ll see you soon.” I pulled the trigger, shattering the camera with a satisfying pop and a plume of grey smoke.

Brynja’s lips parted slightly, but she remained silent. I had a feeling that I’d even convinced
her
with my performance – hopefully I’d rattled The Gentleman just as much.

As we made our way towards the North Bridge, we didn’t speak, exchange thoughts or even trade glances. I imagined she was trying to figure out if I’d snapped – if the pressure of Arena Mode or the tumor had finally overwhelmed me, leaving me incapable of making rational decisions.

For a few minutes, I was trying to figure out the same thing.

As we approached our destination, I opened the holo-com and called up the map in search of our opponents and found that the rules had changed yet again: our locations were no longer being traced with a red dot.

“That’s weird,” I mumbled, frowning at the floating projection.

Just as I heard Brynja ask “What’s weird?” a blinding flash of light exploded out of nowhere.

The tines of electricity narrowly missed us, passing between Brynja and I,
before consuming a mailbox across the street. The blast burned a manhole-sized opening in the side, charring it black.

We spun to face Winston Ramsley. He was poised and confident and taller than I’d remembered him. Clutching a fencing saber in one hand and a cloak in the other, he stepped forward and offered a stately bow, as if to welcome us.

“Why didn’t you just kill us?” Brynja asked, clearly without thinking the question through. Better not to give him ideas if he was in the mood to negotiate a truce.

“Shoot a man in the back?” he said with a sneer, as if the mere suggestion were an insult to his fine moral standing. “I’m not a savage.”

I drew the K9 from my hip and leveled it at his head. “I guess they don’t call you ‘The Gentleman’ for nothing.”

“I’m a swordfighter,” he said curtly. “It’s not just a sport I participate in, Mister Moxon. It’s who I
am
. If I killed an unarmed opponent, it would make me no different than a common killer, would it not?”

“What about the rooftop?” I distinctly remember being knee-deep in melting tar when he opened fire. He didn’t have any misgivings about using my head as target practice on that occasion.

“I fired a warning shot. You had ample opportunity to defend yourself afterwards.”

Brynja glanced curiously at the robe tucked under Ramsley’s arm. “Interesting fashion choice.”

“It’s a light refracting cloak,” he replied. “Good for a measure of invisibility if the user stands perfectly still. I found it the moment I landed. A gold casket was practically sitting at my feet, and there it was, folded neatly inside. Seems like I ran into a bit of luck.”

“That
does
sound lucky,” I responded with a heavy dose of skepticism. His random discovery sounded too good to be true, but he didn’t appear to be lying – at least not judging by his tone of voice and facial expression.

He paused a moment, lowering his saber. “They’re calling you ‘the God Slayers’, did you know that?”

Brynja and I shot each other a curious glance.

“Don’t look so surprised. You’re not the only ones who have access to a holo-com.” Ramsley reached into his pocket and produced a circular handheld communicator, identical to the device we’d recently acquired. “I’ve been keeping a watchful eye on the outside world, periodically checking in on simulcasts.”

I cocked my handgun, trying to give the illusion that it was loaded with more than the discarded screws and gravel I’d scooped out of an alley. “If you have access to the tournament standings, then you know the score: if you move aside, we tap out at the bridge. You’ll be guaranteed a first or second place finish.”

Brynja stood confidently at my side, absently stroking her manticore’s flowing mane. “Either way,” she added, “we’re giving you a free pass, grandpa. Take off and no one has to die here.”

We were selling the bluff. It was time to see if he’d fold, or raise the stakes.

The Gentleman paused for a moment. He began twisting at the edge of his thick greying moustache with one hand, and leaning on his saber with the other, as if it were a cane propping him up. I hoped he was carefully considering our offer, realizing that, being outnumbered, the deck was stacked against him. A three-on-one brawl didn’t favor him, regardless of his ability to channel electricity.

“I appreciate the gesture,” he replied, unflinching, “but I’m afraid I can’t accept your generous offer. I saw your speech earlier, and you made a compelling argument. That being said, I had a goal coming here today: to defeat the greatest warriors in the world. At my age, this is about more than money – it’s about the continuation of my name, and what I leave behind.”

The confidence drained from Brynja’s face as a grim realization set in. “So if you defeat us ...”

“I’m written into the history books as the man who was able to slay the God Slayers.” He raised his saber and rolled his head from side to side, cracking it in either direction. He was loosening up in preparation for a duel.

He was calling our bluff. Either that, or he simply didn’t care about the odds that were stacked against him. “I get the feeling that I can’t talk you out of this.”

“Afraid not,” the polite Englishman replied with a small shake of his head. “But before we begin, may I ask you a question? Not all of us are going to leave here, and I’d like to satisfy my curiosity.”

I raised an eyebrow, leaving my gun aimed squarely at his chest. “I don’t see why not. No reason why we can’t be civilized before we start killing each other.”

“Your power,” he asked. “I saw you blow up that car on the news. That was quite a show. But from what I understand, you haven’t used your abilities even once during this competition. Do you mind if I ask why?”

We’re surrounded by cameras,
I thought.
Whatever I say is going to come off as a lie, and I can’t afford to give any indication that I’m powerless.

“On second thought, screw being civilized. This is New York.” I fired the K9, blasting a fistful of screws into Ramsley’s chest plate. The volley bounced harmlessly off his armor, but the distraction allowed me a moment to dive towards the curb and roll behind a parked car. I didn’t know how much cover it would provide, but without any remaining armor I needed to put something between myself and several thousand volts of electricity.

Melvin took flight and sailed towards The Gentleman. The manticore roared and flapped his wings, but was thwarted by a few waves of the Brit’s sword – a weapon that was now wrapped with tendrils of crackling blue energy. He fell to the pavement and scurried back to Brynja, cowering behind her legs like a terrified kitten.

I peered through the window of the car and saw Ramsley, who had apparently decided to ignore Brynja and her pet, standing in a low offensive stance, saber extended – what fencers referred to as being ‘on guard’.

“Mister Moxon,” he shouted. “Don’t be coy. Come and put your superpowers on display. Surely the world wants to know what the God Slayer has to offer.”

We were about to engage in a fight to the death, and this guy was
still
being polite. He obviously hadn’t spent much time on this side of the pond. I scraped a handful of pebbles from the street, releasing them into the mouth of the secondary barrel with a series of tiny clinks.

Toss me the gun,
Brynja shouted frantically in my head,
I’ll distract him.

And then what?
I replied.

You’re the brains of this team. Think of something.

The events that followed took just moments. A heartbeat passed, maybe two, but the world was moving in slow motion. It was like a sequence from one of the Hong Kong action films that Gavin would force me to sit through every Friday night.

I lobbed the handgun over the hood of the car, trying to keep the barrel upright, allowing the pebbles to stay in place.

My partner reached up to catch it.

Ramsley turned his attention towards Brynja, leveling his saber.

I stepped from behind the car and lunged.

Unlike the meticulously choreographed fight scenes that moviegoers were accustomed to, my attack was far from spectacular. I would have liked to pull off some sort of kung-fu-inspired spinning kick, but all I could manage was an awkward tackle. I drove my shoulder into Ramsley’s ribcage and reached around his thighs, dragging him to the pavement. It wasn’t pretty, but it was effective.

I landed a few well-placed punches that cracked his cheekbone before reaching for his sword, but he refused to release it. We rolled and wrestled, fighting for the saber’s hilt like rabid dogs competing for a bone. Tugging and twisting, I was unable to wrest it from his hands. For a senior citizen, he sure didn’t fight like one. I outweighed the Brit by a solid twenty pounds, but he had the grip of a vice.

Run!
I shouted in my head.
Go for the bridge, Brynja – this is your chance.

During the struggle, we both regained our footing, and I threw an elbow into Ramsley’s jaw with the hope of loosening his hold. The blade suddenly hummed with electricity and exploded, firing a powerful burst of energy down the street.

We continued to struggle for another minute, smashing each other with punches and elbows.

And then I saw her: Brynja, face down, blinking in and out of existence like a broken fluorescent light bulb. She had been struck by the electrical charge, and it didn’t phase through her like solid objects normally would.

She was dying.

Before I could scream, the manticore was already in motion.
He pounced on Ramsley, latching onto his forearm, crushing bone and tearing muscle tissue.

I scrambled towards Brynja, stumbling for a few awkward steps. I dropped to my knees and flipped her over, gently cradling her head and neck. There was no entry or exit wound. The electrical bolt hadn’t affected her like it did physical objects, but it must have disrupted her system in some way. Her mouth opened and closed impotently, eyes rolling into the back of her head. I couldn’t identify the wound, but it was clear that I was losing her.