by R. J. Batla
Chapter 18 – Jayton Baird
MUCH TO THE CHAGRIN of Royn, I made him go with me to talk to Pecos Sinton before we returned to my room. We’d just watched him win his second fight, and since I knew where he was being kept – I refused to call it his room – it was much quicker for me to get up to the bars this time.
“Oh, it’s you again. I thought I told you to get lost.”
“You fought well again today,” I said.
“I didn’t get to see your fight, Jayton Baird, but I heard you won, and in an interesting fashion.”
I smiled at that. “You have to take the opportunities the opponent presents you.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” he said. “So what brings you back to my humble abode whilst I am fighting in this ridiculous excuse for entertainment?”
“Have you thought more about my offer?” I asked.
“You mean the outlandish one where you claim you can free me?” he said with a genuine laugh.
“Yes, that one.”
“No, I haven’t thought about it in the least. As a matter of fact, I dismissed it as soon as you said it. Why dwell on something that will never happen?”
“Why couldn’t it?” I said. “I might even be uniquely qualified to make it happen.”
He turned fully around and gave me a hard look. “What the hell makes you think you can do that?”
I shrugged. “I’m good at what I do.”
He squinted at me and his face was a stone. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why would you help me? What is it you stand to gain? No one sticks their neck out for a slave without something to gain. Why?”
“Because I’m trying to save the world and you’re part of it. I detest slavery, and I feel like by helping you, I can have an effect on others in your situation.”
“Bullshit.”
I laughed and shrugged. “Call it what you want, but I was taught we’re supposed to treat others the way we want to be treated, and to defend and protect those who cannot do that for themselves.”
“So now you’re saying I can’t defend myself? That I’m weak? That I can’t protect myself, because –”
Raising my hands in submission, I said, “I’m not saying that. But your situation is your weakness, and from everything I’ve seen, despite your fighting prowess, you can’t change that situation. So I’ll try to do it for you.”
He shook his head and turned away. “You’re a fool.”
“Sometimes it takes a person who looks a fool to change the course of history.”
The conversation clearly over, Royn and I walked back to my room in the bowels of the stadium. Euless was the only one still there, sitting at the table. Royn went straight to his room, having determined that he and Euless would stay the night with me. Royn mumbled something about needing a week’s worth of sleep to catch up on the schedule he was running.
I was thirsty, so I went over to the sink and filled up a glass. “How you doing, Euless?”
He smiled, almost impish. “Doing well, Jay. As are you; you’re winning all your matches!” He inclined his glass filled with amber liquid toward me, so I did the same with my water.
“Ha, yeah,. So far. Let’s hope my luck holds out.”
“Too right, Jay. Listen, I don’t understand – what’s your interest in this slave? That’s where you were, right? Watching his fight and talking to him?” Euless waited until I nodded. “He’s just...a slave, Jayton. Nothing more. Nothing remarkable. You’re supposed to be saving the world, not messing around trying to save one man. Especially when he doesn’t even want your help. It’s madness.”
I sighed. “Euless, people aren’t supposed to own other people – it’s just not right. From the beginning, humans were always given a free will, to do good or evil. But right or wrong, it was their choice.” I took another drink of water, and my thoughts turned to my confinement in the stadium. With only a brief taste of this limited captivity, I couldn’t imagine life without freedom. “I don’t like it when anyone takes that choice away.”
Euless simply shrugged. “If you say so, Jay, but I still think it’s a waste of time.”
I shrugged. “If you think so, Euless. I’m hitting the sack.” I got up and left him with his drink, closed my door, and got some shut eye.
The next day, Sonora and I were the only ones in my room, the others out scouting or doing something else. And I hadn’t seen Gilmer in I didn’t know how long.
“Well, my cover isn’t blown, but I can’t get anything from that guy anymore,” Leona said, slamming the door and throwing herself onto the couch. “He doesn’t want to see me. Apparently one of his people saw me sitting with Jay at his fight the other day, and he doesn’t like a traitor, or, as he said, a disloyal...well, I’m not going to use his actual language. I’m sorry I couldn’t get you any more information.”
“So what were you doing with him?” I whispered, sitting down next to her.
Sonora was the only other one in the lobby, playing solitaire on one of the tables and trying to look invisable.
“Spying, like we were supposed to,” Leona said, a look of frustration on her face.
“Where and when?” I asked, wringing my hands together.
“Well, he took me on a few dates. We went around here and there...”
“Dates?”
She shrugged. “I guess that’s what you call it when someone buys you dinner and you...talk. It was nice. Good food, nice scenery. The company was the only problem.”
“What did you do?” I was having trouble talking quietly and calmly.
“I just told you.”
“Yeah, but did you, you know...”
Suddenly she was defensive. “I do not know. And what if I did?” Her body was tense and her face stern.
I was taken aback. “Well, um...I...uh...you know, that’s fine, uh...”
“Jayton Baird, you’re an ass,” she said, and stormed out of the room, slamming the door to the other bedroom.
I gave a pleading look to Sonora. “What just happened?”
She put her cards down and stared at me. “You know how she feels about you, right?”
I managed to blubber out, “Well, I mean, I know she’s my friend, and –”
Sonora scoffed and hit me in the face with a blast of air. “Don’t be a fool. That girl’s crazy for you. And she’s trying so hard to not pressure you into anything, to not cause you any stress while doing anything she can to help you and not distracting you from your task. She was spying to allow you to have a better chance.”
“Yeah, I knew that, so...”
“So you basically asked if she ‘got physical’ with someone when in reality the only reason she was even talking to the guy was to help of you. You basically called her a –”
“Oh no, that’s not what or why or –”
“But it’s how it came off.” She turned her attention back to her cards.
Damn it.
Chapter 19 – Gilmer Borger
THE TARGET SLIPPED out of the house and into the street. Gilmer followed him several blocks, unseen, while the night crept on. The target was one of the nobles on the West Side, and he had ventured out to meet with several unsavory characters without any guards.
At least that’s what Gilmer suspected. This was his third op this week. He’d found out a whole mess of intel, including just how corrupt the entire West Side was, and had reported it to Royn. Almost everyone had a hidden agenda, and everyone had several people on the payroll for different reasons.
His target entered a house, so Gilmer waited invisible, standing out in the open. Several minutes passed by with nothing happening. Gilmer eased his way up onto the roof, which seemed to be the target’s favorite meeting place. This particular roof was square, with a small brick enclosure around the stairs, a door on one side. The only other cover was in the southeast corner, where someone had managed to grow a vine-like plant. That’s the best cover I’m going to get. Gilmer hurried over and
nestled himself within the leaves of the plant. While he was invisible, that didn’t mean it was smart to stand out in the open.
Sure enough, a few minutes later his guess was confirmed, as his target appeared, accompanied by... damned if Gilmer could remember his name, but it was someone Jay was going to fight later on, assuming the rankings held out.
“How good are you?” his target asked the stranger.
“Very good. Probably second only to the Uland himself.”
“What are your powers?” the target asked. The fighter told him, and as he listed them, the target’s smile got wider and wider.
The target handed the fighter a large bag of coins. The fighter pulled one out, and solid gold glinted in the moonlight. “If you face Jayton Baird, you are to end him, do you understand? I don’t care what our agreement is with Malstrak, you are to end him.”
“For this much gold? Consider it done,” the fighter replied with a smirk.
The pair shook hands and exited the roof through the door they had entered. After a couple of minutes with no activity, Gilmer decided that was all he was going to learn here tonight. Rising slowly from concealment, he turned to walk back toward the edge of the building to climb down.
At least he tried to — but something had a hold of his arm! Quickly he looked back - it was one of the vines!
No wonder these were here — it was a trap for anyone stupid enough to try to spy on a secret conversation. It was the only cover on the roof, so naturally that’s where anyone sneaking around would try to hide.
In a near panic, Gilmer managed to draw his sword and slice the inch-thick vine that had wound its way around his left arm. Other vines had started raising themselves from their resting place and searched him out. Apparently his invisibility was good enough that the vines couldn’t find him easily, but they knew he was there.
He jumped out of the leaves, a vine tripping him as he went, a thorn penetrating his thin clothes. A sharp pain shot through his leg as he scrambled back to his feet and kept running.
He realized he could see his own arm! Nothing had been able to weaken his invisibility power before. Were the vines poisonous, or did he just lose concentration? They crept towards him, actually detaching itself from the thin soil on the roof to get to him.
Not good.
Sheathing his sword, he bolted toward the side of the roof and shimmied his way down as fast as he could. He touched his earpiece as he hit the ground and ran, a thump behind him indicating the plant had jumped off the roof.
“Royn, this is Gilmer. I have a bit of a situation.”
“Gilmer, where are you?” His commander said from the other end of the line.
Gilmer stuck to the back alleyways as the plant scraped itself along behind him, keeping pace. He chanced a look back; it was gaining on him.
“I’m in the alley behind the buildings off Park Street. I have a vine sentry after me.”
He chanced another look back; the damn thing was getting bigger. Each step he took, the plant grew — somehow drawing power from the ground it ran across. Gilmer saw yellow sparks beneath it as it “ran.”
“And I don’t think I can handle it by myself.”
Royn was silent for second then came back. “Turn down the alleyways off Clayburgh Street, and the team will meet you there. We must destroy the vine so it can’t report back to whoever created it. Hurry, Gilmer.”
“Confirmed. Clayburgh Street.” He went over the map in his head. “Be there in thirty seconds.”
“We’ll be ready for you, Gilmer,” Morgan said, making his heart thump even harder than it already was. “You’ll see a yellow energy triangle as you’re running — keep running past it and don’t stop till you get to the yellow energy square. Stop right in the middle of that, turn around, and blast the vine with everything you have.”
“Confirmed. Be there in five seconds.” The dull thumps behind him were getting closer — and the plant fiend had grown to almost fill the alley he ran down.
He passed the triangle and felt a slight tingle over his body as he kept running. He saw Euless out of the corner of his eye give him the thumbs up — half a second later, the vine behind him slammed to a stop, giving a shriek.
I didn’t know a plant could shriek.
Gilmer made it to the yellow square and turned around. The vine monster filled the alley, now standing ten feet tall and equally as wide in a roughly humanoid shape.
“Gilmer, fire!” Morgan said in his ear.
Oh yeah. Thrusting both hands forward, Gilmer let loose two streams of fire. The vines shrieked again and started advancing on him. The fire burned the plant, but it wasn’t doing too much damage.
“Um, guys? Not sure this is going to work.”
Sonora stepped up beside him. “Of course it is. Gilmer, watch this.” She whipped her hands in a circular motion, the winds instantly picking up to surround the monster in front of them, which stopped.
“That’s not doing anything,” Gilmer said, watching as the vine tried to attack the winds. This only ripped the leaves off some of the vines.
“That’s because it’s only phase one,” Morgan said.
Fire ignited on the rooftop to Gilmer’s right, and he looked to see the red-skinned Phoenix gather power in each of her hands. She thrust them forward and down, directing them into the plant monster, just as Gilmer had, but her higher level of power in the fire element showed.
Where Gilmer had sent two fist-sized streams, Morgan sent two boulder-sized streams of fire. Gilmer felt the heat from where he was, and then Morgan turned it up.
The plant monster shrieked again, but it couldn’t escape the inferno that Morgan fed and Sonora’s winds kept in place. In twenty seconds, and after many shrieks, the plant monster was nothing but a pile of ash in the middle of the alleyway.
Morgan slid down the drain pipe to land next to Gilmer with a big grin on her face, and Euless walked out of his hiding place at the other end of the alley. Morgan clapped Gilmer on the back. “See, I told you not to doubt us! Where did you find that thing?”
Gilmer said, “It’s a long story and not one that needs to be told here. I’ll fill you in at the Dew Drop. Let’s go.”
Chapter 20 – Jayton Baird
“I’M GOING TO THE ARENA,” I announced to the group filling my quarters. My fight wasn’t until later in the day, and we’d been prepping, but I couldn’t stand being cooped up anymore.
Several people glanced over, and Troup and Celeste, apparently volunteering as my normal body guards now, got up. Royn asked, not looking up from his notes, “Why are you heading up?”
“To watch Corbman’s fight. He’s a friend and I want to see how he does.”
“Well, let’s go then!” Anton said, jumping up. “I’ve got to see what that crazy Halfte does. He’s got something up his sleeve, I just know it.”
Leona acted like she was going to stand, but then she frowned and went back to playing cards with Morgan. Uh oh. Still mad at me.
We managed to find our seats at the same time as the announcers started. “Here we go again, ladies and gentlemen, and have we got a good one for you right now. Our number eight fighter.” Corbman was ranked that high? Holy crap! “Corbman Kermit!”
As he drew out the name, the crowd went nuts, my group yelling with them. Corbman milked every second of it, doing some crazy bows, flips, and somersaults while waving to everyone, yelling something at the top of his lungs but we couldn’t hear a thing.
Somewhere we heard a chant start: “Lava Man! Lava Man!” It took an abnormal amount of time for everyone to get quiet, and Corbman did nothing but egg it on.
Somehow the announcer managed to introduce his opponent, who got considerably less applause. That had to be disheartening, but it didn’t bother his opponent Spur apparently, as he swung a massive battle axe around, loosening his muscles.
“Fighters ready?”
Corbman once again made a show, moving wildly and doing at least three flips before getting into a
ready stance. “All right, axe man, get ready! If you’re not careful, I’ll melt your face off!”
The crowd erupted, and I think few people other than me noticed that Corbman’s smile was replaced by a stone face of concentration.
Spur just spit.
“Fight!”
Spur went right in at the Halfte, swinging that axe like he knew what he was doing. Corbman dodged each strike, bringing up a column of earth to block the last one – the earth leaping onto his right arm – and sending a boulder into Spur’s midsection, flinging him to the other end of the arena. The crowd cheered and Corbman gave a bow before walking toward his rising opponent.
Then an odd thing happened. That earth around his arm... melted.
“Lava Arm! Lava Arm!”
Apparently the crowd knew what was going on, and Corbman stood there in the red glow, his face showing no discomfort. We’d heard he could do something like this through all our scouting, but hadn’t seen it. Or really believed it, honestly.
Spur finally got up and punched, a technique that should have produced a fireball.
Yet nothing happened.
Spur moved, performing a spinning kick that should have sent an air slice at Corbman.
Again, nothing happened.
Spur moved two more times, a double punch meant to move earth and a sweeping hand motion meant to shoot a water jet, and still nothing happened. No element moved at all. I flicked the Ignis on and off, just enough to get a scorecard. I scooted up in my seat and told my group, “Suppress. He has a Suppress Quantum power. A strong one.”
Abandoning powers, Spur dove back into attacking with his axe, swinging with all his might. Corbman blocked each with the lava arm, which started working its way around his shoulders and down his left arm, until his entire torso was covered. At that point, Corbman began hurling balls of lava at Spur, who danced and dodged to avoid the molten rock, batting some away with the head of his axe. Eventually one of the balls clipped Spur’s shoulder, extracting a squeal of pain and the man went down. Corbman rushed in, ready to finish him off, the blow coming way too fast to block and everyone knew it.