by Simon Archer
“You’ll stay here until the match is ready to start,” Theo informed me. He turned to Kennedi. “Once he’s over the pit, you’ll stand right outside the door. Don’t let anyone in. You’d be surprised at what people will do to loot an equipment bag around here.”
I dropped my equipment bag on the bench and glanced up at my reflection in the mirror. I saw a man in forest green cargo pants and a white t-shirt with stylishly messy brown hair and a firm build. I rolled my shoulders back and stood up a little straighter.
Time to make the man in the mirror look as intimidating as possible.
Kennedi quickly unpacked my bag and arranged the contents neatly on the bench. Sally had given me a list of instructions for how to prep for the match. The most unusual of which was to use the dirt she had scooped up from behind Theo’s barn. I was to rub it over my arms, torso, and legs once I took my shirt off and then slather myself in the body oil. She didn’t offer an explanation as to why.
“Theo, what’s covering myself with dirt supposed to do?” I asked while opening the jar and setting it back on the bench.
“To make the crowd root for you, initially. They love an underdog, and if you look like some old bum picked up off the street, it’ll make them want you to win even more,” he explained. “Then it is for grip. All that oil they require you to put on will do two things: Help your opponent’s whip slide off if it wraps around you and make keeping ahold of your own whip nearly impossible. So, as a hack, Sally came up with the dirt idea. You can rub your hands on yourself to get the dirt on your palms for grip if you need to.”
I was beginning to think of Sally as a pure genius. She seemed to have analyzed every part of her own experience, and I was more than grateful she’d passed on her knowledge to me.
There was a loud pounding at the door that made all three of us jump. I hadn’t paid attention to the fact that the room was completely quiet other than our voices. It was as if any place that wasn’t in the actual competition area was soundproofed. It made sense to make sure no noise was heard upstairs in case someone happened upon the place, but here in the lower level, I didn’t see a purpose for it other than to unnerve combatants.
“Five minutes!” a deep voice yelled from the other side of the door.
I reached down and began unzipping the lower-leg portion of my cargo pants to turn them into shorts that stopped just above my knee. I grabbed the belt off the bench and put it on. It had one of those release buckles on it like you find on airplane seatbelt. All I would need to do to get it off is flip the front metal plate up and pull. After the belt, I pulled my t-shirt over my head and tossed it into my equipment bag. It was time for the dirt.
When I reached for the jar of dirt, Kennedi, who was standing on the other side of the bench, stepped forward and grabbed it first. She stepped back and looked up at me, waiting for permission to apply it. I nodded and turned around so she could start on my back. I was mildly shocked at how cold it was when she reached over the bench and put the first handful on my shoulder and started rubbing it in. Thankfully, it only took her a few moments to cover my back completely.
She walked around the bench and stood directly in front of me, looking up with those bright green eyes with a soft but serious expression on her face. She didn’t break her gaze as she started applying dirt to my chest. She started at my collar bone and rubbed in slow circles. She was so close I could feel her breath on me. Soon her hands traveled down to my stomach, and she’d pause each time her hand went over a muscled section of the six-pack I’d always managed to keep in shape. Soon she was rubbing right next to the waistband of my cargo shorts. All the time, she never stopped looking into my eyes.
It wasn’t until she moved on to my arms that she spoke. “You are going to eviscerate your opponent.” Her voice was different than I’d heard from her before. It was low and fierce and had absolutely no doubt in it. That one statement from her immediately made me take a deep breath, stand a bit taller, and feel like I had this whole competition in the bag. How did she do that?
Once my torso and arms were covered in dirt, Kennedi finally broke her gaze. She knelt down to continue on my lower legs and feet, which only took a moment. She stepped back to survey her work once she was finished and nodded in satisfaction.
I heard Theo rummaging around in the equipment bag and whispering, “No, no, no,” to himself.
“What are you looking for?” I asked, alarmed.
“Your body oil. Where is it?”
“Eighteen inches from your right hand, on the bench,” I pointed out. It was just the kind of near-mishap the three of us needed to lighten our mood. The air in the room had gotten thick with a doom-and-gloom type feeling.
Two minutes later, I was covered in oil that Theo had poured slowly over my shoulders and just let run down my torso. He didn’t oil my legs, which made sense. After all, who wants to walk on an oil slick?
At last, I was ready. Kennedi made certain I knew that no matter what I encountered on the Platform, I was better. I was faster. I was stronger. I was smarter. Most importantly, I was more observant.
“Let’s go, Kennedi. He gets the last sixty seconds to himself,” Theo said, guiding her to the door.
He opened it and stepped to the side to allow space for Kennedi to exit. The crowd roar was let in. This time instead of just being loud, it was exhilarating. Kennedi stopped short of exiting the room, flipped her hair back to look over her shoulder, flashed a remarkable smile, winked at me, and both of them were gone.
Just as the door was about to latch shut, a hand darted inside to stop it. A short figure in a baseball cap and jeans slid into the room. It was Sally.
“I didn’t know you were coming!” I exclaimed, feeling unexpected excitement at her being there.
“I’m not. Not for very long anyhow,” she said, extending her hand towards me.
“Here.” She was holding something black and floppy. I reached out and took it from her. I was now holding a pair of receiver’s gloves.
Sally noticed the confused look on my face because, as the door was closing behind her, she called, “You can only use them for your first match, and they work better than dirt. Then you’ll get a talking-to from the suits, but they won’t disqualify you.”
I took one last look in the mirror as I put the sticky-palmed gloves on. I looked like a different person. Like a dirty bum that someone pulled off the street and stripped of their clothes and shoes. At least now, I wouldn’t have to worry about the oil causing me to drop my whip.
10
When I exited the tiny ready-room, there were two large men in matching black suits, standing beside Kennedi, waiting to escort me. They both had on dark glasses, and neither smiled. I was going to ask if they’d just stepped out of the old, classic movie Men in Black but thought better of it. The expressions they carried on their faces didn’t indicate that either of them had a sense of humor.
Kennedi looked different. She was standing as straight and tall as I’d ever seen her. Her tiny one-hundred-ten-pound frame looked like it could strike through a boulder and be unscathed. When the door closed, she stepped sideways to stand directly in front of it and crossed her left hand over her right wrist. She looked like a statue. The only indication I had that she wasn’t was the slight nod she gave me when I winked at her as I was led away.
The crowd noise caused an energy to fill the entire stadium. I’d never felt anything like it. The louder the audience yelled, the more confidence swelled up inside me. I was nearing the Platform when I realized they were yelling for me. Sally had said the crowd liked an underdog, but the cheers sounded more like what I’d expect for a champion who’d just won the fight. I felt the confidence continue to well up in my chest. I rolled my shoulders back and held my head a little higher as I strolled between the black-suit-twins. When they stopped about five feet away from the edge of the Platform, I kept going and stepped onto it like I owned the fucker.
I was alone on the Platform. I knew this would be
the last moment I had to make certain my senses were sharp, my mind was clear, and my body responsive. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath and held it in. I pictured myself in my current state running up the loose-graveled side of Slide Lake Mountain in Wyoming. The rocks were moving so quickly under my feet that I doubled my speed to make any progress. The more I disturbed the ground, the larger the rocks were that started rolling down the mountain at me. One by one, I dodged them, jumped over them, or pushed them aside. I could feel my breathing even out as I neared the top and knew I would reach the summit. Just as I stepped off the loose gravel and onto solid rock, the mountain slid away behind me. I had made it. I was safe. I had beat the mountain. My eyes snapped open, and my mind came back to the stadium I was in. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I would leave this match a champion.
The lights lowered, and a gentleman in a gray pin-striped suit holding a microphone walked out onto the Platform from the opposite side. I assumed he was there to get the match started. Directly behind him followed a huge specimen of a man. He was decked out similar to the way I was but without the dirt, and he was easily forty pounds heavier than my two-hundred-twenty-pounds. His muscles weren’t as chiseled as mine, but his bulk was indeed muscle, not fat.
As I expected, the man with the microphone put his arms up to silence the crowd. It took a full sixty seconds to get the noise level low enough to hear what he would say.
“Ladies and Gentlemen! You are in for something special tonight!” he shouted into the mic. The crowd roared but calmed quickly to listen. “You all know Evan!” He motioned toward my opponent. Again, the crowd roared. “Evan has a visitor tonight! From the snow-covered, treacherous slopes of Antarctica, I bring you the man whose simple name will be on each of your lips before the night is over, win or lose! I bring you CLAAAAAAAARK!”
Antarctica? Apparently, the organizers had taken liberties when drafting my introduction.
The crowd was louder than ever. I took a slow look around the stadium at the faces in the seats. There were women in formal dresses, men in sports coats or suits. There were even kids dressed as though they were going to a symphony. The alcohol was very clearly kept in circulation by the waitstaff, which were all cat girls.
It was the first time I’d seen any CGs around, other than Kennedi. Knowing that Omnicorp ran the event, I shouldn’t have been surprised at their presence, but I was. I thought of the mark on Kennedi’s wrist. No wonder she was standing the way she was when I left the ready-room.
“Now, Evan, Clark, come to the center of the Platform,” the announcer continued after several minutes of the ear-splitting crowd cheering.
Speaking directly to the two of us, he said, “I’ll lay this out simply for you. Neither of you can touch the other until your whip touches them first. First strike with a whip has to be made from behind the centerline. After that, anything goes as long as you stay on the Platform. When the blue lights on the poles at either end of the Platform show, that is your two-second warning that one of the additional challenges will be added to the match. No outside weapons other than your whip and no blood-smearing. You will be disqualified. The first person into the pit will be declared the loser. Note to whoever loses, you will be escorted outside, and it will be your responsibility to seek your own medical care if needed. Any questions?”
“Yeah,” I said loudly. “What the fuck is blood-smearing?”
“If either of you bleeds, you are not permitted to use the blood to blind your opponent.”
Of course. Why didn’t I think of that? I thought sarcastically.
“Anything else?” the announcer asked.
“No,” Evan and I said in unison.
“Good, let’s not hold up the show any longer!” he shouted. “Esteemed Platform guests, please commence the countdown!”
Suddenly the entire crowd started counting backward from ten in unison. I’d never before heard such a large group be so in sync. “Ten, nine, eight…”
I started backing up away from the center which I now noticed was marked with a blue line. Evan did the same. The surface felt like sandpaper under my bare feet. I dropped the tail of the whip onto the rough surface of the Platform and secured my grip on the handle. I lowered my head and stared in the direction of my opponent. What is your weakness?
“Seven, six…” the crowd yelled.
Evan had also readied his whip. It was white and looked like it had a slick surface in contrast to the braided leather of mine. I noted that the material his whip was made of would cause a more stinging wrap, not unlike comparing a snap from a dry rolled-up kitchen towel to a wet one. He was shifting from one foot to the other and was hunched forward slightly. He kept tossing the handle of his whip back and forth between his hands. Note number one, he’s ambidextrous.
“Five, four…” the crowd roared.
Evan was glaring directly at my face while I sized him up. I stood completely still, which I got the feeling made him nervous. He expected me to move or try to be more intimidating. Note number two, he’s used to fighting meatheads.
“Three, two…”
The lights over the crowd dimmed, leaving only the center of the stadium brightly lit. I saw Evan tilt his head and look up at the ceiling, and that’s when I noticed his right shoulder sat higher than his left. Note number three, he has a habit of tilting his head to the right.
“ONE, ZERO!” the screams of the members of the crowd were louder than I thought possible as they ended the countdown and sat forward, waiting to see who would strike first.
I began slowly flicking my wrist from side-to-side out in front of me, causing my whip to dance back and forth. I advanced towards the centerline slowly until I was three feet from it. When I stopped, Evan moved forward. He made a show of lifting his legs high and bringing his foot down hard with each step. I brought my right arm down to my side and slightly behind me, moving the tail of my whip so that it laid outstretched behind me. I crouched just a bit and watched as Evan thudded toward me. If I timed this well enough…
Evan slammed his right foot down, and I watched as he shifted his weight to bring up his left. When all of his weight had been transferred to his right leg and he was about to lift his left, I dropped down to my left knee, with my right leg bent in front of me. At the same time, I cocked my right shoulder back, and then, using my stance for leverage, I swung my whip-arm out to the side and forward. When my arm was outstretched in front of me, I snapped my wrist sideways. I watched as the end of my whip passed underneath Evan’s left foot just as he lifted it up. Then it wrapped around his other ankle.
The second I saw the tip snap, I sat down on the Platform and planted my feet. I pulled back on my whip as hard and fast as I could until I was almost laying out. The move had its desired effect.
Evan’s body weight was already shifted to his right when my whip wrapped around his ankle. When I pulled, he went down like a bowling pin that just had its bottom knocked out from under it. The weight of him hitting the Platform shook the length of it.
The crowd erupted as he went down.
I immediately stood back up and flicked my wrist to unwrap my whip from his ankle and recoiled it behind me while I planned my next move.
Evan was not a fast-moving chap, so I had more time than I’d originally anticipated to calculate what to do next. His assumption was that I was just another meathead who had done him wrong. I knew I was going to have to continue to use his own size against him if I was going to get him into the pit before me. That meant keeping him off balance.
I snapped my whip out to my side and spun three-hundred-sixty-degrees, keeping my hand low and my wrist straight until I was facing him again. Then I yanked my arm across my body hard. The first time around, my whip had whisked right in front of him as he lay on his side. It connected as it came around again, though, and with more force. In a millisecond, I had cut him from ankle to sternum with the silicone tip.
He didn’t yell out in pain, but I could see it on his face as the bl
ood started to run from him onto the Platform. He was working on getting up as quickly as he could, but he was only to his knees when the blue lights at both ends of the Platform lit up and started flashing.
I stood completely still. I knew I was giving him time to get up, but I was out of his reach, and it was more important for me to know what challenge was being added to the match. I fixed my gaze on the center line and held my breath, focusing on what I saw in my peripheral vision. I shut the crowd noise off in my mind and listened for new sounds.
Then I saw it. Metal edges on both sides of the Platform were raising up. They were starting to glow red. The higher they got, the brighter they got. When they reached about five inches in height, they locked in place. I needed to know if my assumption about why they were glowing was correct, so I turned my head and spit on one. My saliva went up in smoke with the familiar hissing sound that happens when you add cold water to an overheated pan. The edges were smelting-stone hot.
My eyes darted back to Evan, who had made it onto his feet and was crouched in a boxing pose fifteen feet away. His whip was in his left hand and was already coming forward from over his head. If I stayed where I was, his whip would land square on my shoulder. I immediately charged him. I had already made contact with my whip, so I was now allowed body-to-body contact, whereas he was not.
I ran at him like a defensive lineman gunning for the quarterback, and the tail of his whip passed over my head. At the last moment, I tucked forward and rolled into his legs, knocking him back to the ground, face down. This time he wasn’t so slow to get up. We were both back on our feet facing each other and had switched sides of the Platform.