THE RIDER (Galactic Football League Novellas Book 4)

by Scott Sigler

  Pete knew Bocephus from way back. They’d been in the circus together, a pair of abandoned, terrified little people doing whatever it took to survive. How funny they’d gone their separate ways only to wind up in the same line of work.

  Wee Bob trotted out to the screams of the home crowd. The mammoth joined the andrewsarchus, Crazy Jake and the proactors. The Ogres were 5-6, just a smidgen out of the running for the tournament. Maybe they weren’t the best team in the league, but with their black-armored riders and silver-and-blue mounts glimmering in the sun, they looked magnificent.

  “All right, boys and girls,” Pete said. “Our intros are over. Let’s get our butts ready.”

  He turned Bess toward the Ridgeback’s backline. Sydney and Jerry followed suit.

  “Five on three,” Dar said. “Gonna be tough, Cap.”

  “They ain’t nothin’,” Ian said. “We’ve got two bigs, and Sydney can outrun those proactors all day long.”

  Pete wished he felt as confident as Ian sounded.

  The crowd quieted down as they were asked to sing the Planetary Union anthem. Fireworks flew into the air as the song reached its crescendo. Pete suddenly wondered why the League of Planets teams didn’t do the same before their matches.

  The crowd noise ratcheted up as the song finished. Guestford welcomed the guest spinner for the match, Jupiter Jacks quarterback Shiraz Zia. Zia stepped out onto the field with two scantily clad Human women in tow. They were dressed in silky green dresses cut to the hip, and something that resembled Guestford’s golden chest plate, but with much, much less metal.

  Pete wondered what guarantees the Loppu Chamber of Commerce had to make in order to get Zia there. Then again, Shiraz was known as a publicity hound.

  Zia spun the glowing wheel. The stadium holoscreens focused in on the multi-colored disc. The needle knocked against the pegs until the wheel slowed, then landed on a blue-colored wedge.

  “And the game is Steal The Mount!”

  The crowd roared with applause and shouts. The stands rocked with a sudden chant of Weeeee-BOB! Weeeee Bob!

  “Dammit,” Dar said.

  The objective of Steal The Mount was as basic as the name: knock a rider from his mount and take control of his animal. It sounded simple, but the hand-to-hand aspect made the game extremely difficult. Wee Bob was the ideal mount for the game, as he could use his 2.5-meter trunk to place Bocephus right on top of the opposing mount, where Bocephus would use his favorite weapon — a battle axe — to knock the rider clear.

  The trumpeters sounded their signature three-note trill. The platform — Guestford and Zia still onboard — floated off the pitch.

  “All right, Cap,” Ian said. “What’s the plan?”

  “Their big,” Pete said. “I know that rider, he likes the spotlight. The other mounts will try to distract Bess while that mammoth rides straight in. Let him. Ian, now that you’ve felt the stadium and the crowd, think you can make Sydney do some acrobatics?”

  “Hell yes, Cap.”

  “Good. You do a couple of circles to keep the proactors busy. When I close in on the mammoth, you ride Sydney right up Bess’s tail.”

  “Got it,” Ian said. “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m diving onto the mammoth. You make sure none of their riders can take Bess’s saddle while I’m gone.”

  Ian laughed, a genuine sound, a glimpse into the pure competitive soul that hid behind arrogance and cockiness.

  “Brilliant, Cap. I’m in.”

  “And me?” Dar asked.

  “Everyone wants to see Jerry in action,” Pete said. “So you go after that half-melon Crazy Jake. Go at him, but whatever you do, stay in the saddle, you got it?”

  Dar’s helmeted head nodded once. “Roger that, Cap.”

  Pete’s body buzzed with adrenaline. He drew his war hammer from its saddle sheath. Dar adjusted her grip on her lance. Ian leaned forward, spoke quietly into Sydney’s ear. The raptor hopped from foot to foot, she twitched, she jittered, almost as if she couldn’t wait to get out there.

  It seemed to take forever for the trumpeters to sound off the start signal: bah-bah-bah-bah, BAHHHH!

  “Ridgebacks, charge!”

  A Tyrannosaurus rex, an Austroraptor and a Triceratops shot off their backline and toward the battle. Pete kept Bess from going full speed, keeping apace with Jerry while Ian/Sydney darted forward. It was the trike’s first fight: the familiar sight and scent of Bess would help keep him anchored, keep him from being overwhelmed and terrified.

  In mere seconds, Pete realized something — on the practice grounds, Sydney hadn’t been running as fast as she could. She took off like a shot, a crimson blur heading for the right wall. Good gods was that girl fast!

  The sail fins of the two proactors flipped high. Thin membranes caught the afternoon sun, making the tissue glimmer translucent yellow, then the fins lowered and the beasts ran to their left to catch Ian/Sydney.

  The mammoth, the thick Andrewsarchus and the Glyptodon barged forward.

  “Dar, stay with me,” Pete said. “Send Jerry straight into them, force them to turn.”

  “Roger, Cap. Let’s whack ‘em and stack ‘em!”

  Pete glanced around, just for a split second. He took it all in. The sun beating down, blazing off Bess’s armor. The crowd, waving and screaming, jumping and pushing. The feel of Bess running beneath him. The smell of the air: dirt and dino, fur and sweat.

  Lock it in. Soak it up, store it, turn it to bone so that it’s part of you even after you die. Treasure it and remember it always.

  Then, the moment ended.

  A 6,200-kilo armored mammoth barreling in at full speed is quite a thing to see. Wee Bob wasn’t backing away from Big Bess, not even for a second. Crazy Jake lagged behind a bit, while the Andrewsarchus came on a tad faster.

  “Dar, straight through Andy, make that mammoth turn!”

  Dar didn’t answer. Instead, she stood in her saddle, and Jerry found a last reserve of speed: 3,300 kilos pulled ahead, three armored horns and one long lance leading the way.

  The Andrewsarchus cut in front of Jerry at a sharp angle, trying to distract the trike. Dar leaned out of her saddle, planted the lance in Andy’s right shoulder. The lance shattered in a cloud of composite, but it knocked Andy off-balance, sent the 900-kilo beast into a vicious tumble.

  Jerry rushed forward, undaunted.

  Pete angled Bess in behind the trike, following the charge.

  Wee Bob slowed but didn’t waver from his straight-on course. The rush became an instant and deadly game of chicken: 3,300 kilos of horned triceratops against 6,200 kilos of tusked mammoth. Pete saw Wee Bob’s big head twitch slightly to the right.

  “Bess, rush!”

  The T-Rex lurched forward, an explosion of muscle and mass. Bess launched high, 6,400 kilos sailing through the air as she hurdled Jerry. Wee Bob broke to his right. Before Bocephus could get the mammoth under control, Bess landed and closed in.

  Pete held the pommel tight as he hopped out of the stirrups and squatted, feet on the saddle.

  “Bess, steady!” he shouted. He hoped she obeyed, because in his peripheral vision he saw what was coming from the right — a lithe blur of a crimson-and-black armored raptor trailed by two thick-chested silver and blue proactors snapping madly at her heels.

  Wee Bob saw Bess barreling in and swung hard left, faster than Pete — or Bess — expected. She slowed hard, making Pete stumble in the saddle, but she couldn’t stop in time: a tungsten-tipped tusk punched through the armor at her right shoulder, driving into flesh, past bone, a shuddering impact that would have made Pete fall if he hadn’t leapt at that exact moment.

  Everything seemed to slow. Pete saw it all: Sydney, leaping impossibly high toward Bess’s back ... the Brain and Pinky gathering to follow ... Bocephus whirling his axe high to try and swat Pete out of the air ... Wee Bob roaring a battlecry that sounded like a thousand dented trumpets all fighting for dominance ...

  Bocephus reared b
ack, axe positioned like a baseball bat. Still flying in, Pete whipped his war hammer: it glanced off Bocephus’s helmet — not enough to do damage, but enough to throw off the dwarf’s swing. The axe blade glanced off Pete’s left shoulder, taking a chunk of armor with it. The impact almost knocked Pete clear, but he swung hard with his right arm, wrapping it around Bocephus’ waist. Pete’s armored legs slid along Wee Bob’s armored flank — Pete kicked his legs high, letting his momentum carry him up behind the other rider.

  Wee Bob lurched beneath them, trying to drive his tusk deeper into Bess. She twisted away with agility that seemed impossible for a creature so big, and the bloody tusk slid free.

  “Shuck you, circus freak,” Bocephus screamed as he threw an elbow hard backward, catching Pete square in the helmet. Pete slipped sideways, started to fall off, but grabbed the saddle’s left fender and held on tight.

  Bocephus turned in the saddle, whirled his axe high.

  A wide-open Tyranosaurus maw blocked out the sun. Bess drove her head down clamping her jaws around Wee Bob’s armored skull, driving the mammoth’s head downward as if someone had dropped a wrecking ball on it. Pete was thrown right, his little body flipping up so fast it smacked against the top of Bess’s armored nose. Bocephus tilted back, staying in the saddle by the strength of his legs alone.

  Pete dangled for a moment, saw the carnage taking place atop Bess’s neck. Sydney’s feet were splayed wide, claws digging deep into Bess’s leather saddle, letting her hold her position despite Bess’s massive movements. Sydney had landed a blow on Pinky, who was just behind the saddle. Pinky’s claws sought purchase on crimson armor. Blood poured from a cut below her left eye, ran down the silver and blue armor in beaded streaks that arced toward the ground. Behind Pinky, Brain couldn’t stay on the slick surface of Bess’s armor — mount and rider tumbled away.

  Wee Bob raised his head, hard, trying to push Bess away, but the T-Rex growled an open-mouth growl and pushed down again.

  Pete saw a flash above him: an axe. The blade caught him on the right temple. Blackness and light fought for dominance. Pete hung, his hands operating on their own, stopping his body from falling. He opened his eyes just in time to see the blade whipping down again — it hit his left shoulder, again, the blade driving deeper into the already-damaged armor.

  Still Pete held on. If he fell, Bocephus would make Wee Bob step on him: six-plus tonnes would finish his day, if not crush his armor and kill him outright.

  “Pete! Hold tight!”

  Dar, screaming through his headphones. What was she going to do? He felt Wee Bob lurch to the side, heard the roar of a very worried and pissed-off T-rex.

  Pete looked up, knowing he could hold on no longer, knowing the next axe blow would be the last.

  Then, movement on his right — Jerry, galloping in hard, 3,330 crimson-armored kilos coming at top speed, Dar on his back, broken lance leveled. The trike’s long horns drove into Wee Bob’s flank, making the mammoth stumble sideways. Dar stood in the saddle and thrust her lance high — the splintered end caught Bocephus under the chin, snapping his little head back like he’d been caught with a heavyweight’s uppercut. The black-armored rider sagged and swayed in the saddle.

  Wee Bob spun his hindquarters away from Jerry, bringing his long tusks to bear. The momentum swung Pete’s legs along Bob’s side, and Pete dug deep into his last reserve of strength to flip onto the mammoth’s back — just in time to see Bocephus stand in the saddle, turn to face Pete and raise his axe for the killing blow.

  Bocephus’ voice bellowed from his suit’s speakerfilm: “Now we’ll see who the real star is, midget.”

  He had Pete beat, but Pete saw something Bocephus did not.

  “Always thought you were a piece of crap,” Pete said. “Now, you actually will be.”

  Bocephus instantly understood — he turned to dive off Wee Bob, preferring to take his chances on the ground, but it was too late: a shadow fell over him just before Bess’s gaping mouth snapped shut around him, picking him right off Wee Bob’s back.

  Pete shouted as he ran along the mammoth’s back and launched himself into the saddle. When his butt slapped down, an explosion of pain in his left shoulder told him something was very wrong in there. He gritted his teeth, pushed the pain away, grabbing Wee Bob’s reins with the one arm that was kind enough to move. Pete leaned back hard on the reins.

  “Woah, big fella! Woah!”

  Wee Bob rose up on his hind legs, waving his front feet at the Tyrannosaurus Rex gulping down his rider. An armored foot slammed into Bess’s head, making her stumble away like a punch-drunk fighter. The blow made Sydney slide to the side of Bess’s neck — she leapt free, landing delicately after a three-meter fall. The snarling proactor — Pinky — fell away as well, landing hard on his side, his rider thrown skidding across the pitch.

  Pete stood in the stirrups.

  “Goddamit, Wee Bob, I said woah!”

  Pete lifted one leg, twisted, and kicked his tiny foot against the back of the mammoth’s armored head as hard as he could. The impact was a tiny dink that couldn’t have hurt the beast in a million years, but for some reason it worked: Wee Bob dropped to all fours and stopped moving.

  “Winner, ROUGHNECKS!”

  Guestford’s excited voice echoed over the stadium’s echoing boos and screams.

  The next few minutes passed in a blur. Pete focused on keeping Wee Bob still as Bess came up beside him. That wasn’t easy to do; he didn’t know if mammoths were peaceful animals way back when, but Bob wasn’t here to play. The big beast radiated violence and pure aggression, but it obeyed basic commands.

  A blank moment, then Pete found himself back in his saddle atop his friend Bess, the two of them standing on Roughland’s backline. Guestford’s platform was back at midfield, complete with scantily clad human girls and the star quarterback for the Jupiter Jacks.

  “Status,” Pete said. He heard pain in his own voice. He wasn’t going to make it through two more matches.

  “I’m okay,” Dar said. “Jerry did great, but I’m having trouble controlling him now. I don’t think he liked the violence, Pete. He did his job but I don’t know about the next match.”

  “You make him obey,” Pete snapped. “This is the big-time, girl. Your mount doesn’t have a choice. Ian, how about you?”

  “I’m ... okay.” A forced grunt. Pete looked down at him. Doc Baiman was pouring nanomed powder into gaping holes in the armor of Ian’s right leg. The composite armor looked like someone had taken a jackhammer to it.

  “He’s not okay,” Baiman said without looking away from her work. “That proactor tore him up. He can’t play in the next match.”

  Ian lifted his foot and used it to push Baiman away.

  “We’re one win away from the tournament, you jackass,” he said. “I can make it one more game.”

  Guestford’s voice echoed out from the stadium walls.

  “The next game is ... Dismount!”

  Pete nodded. Dismount, they could win that, they could take two of three and forfeit the last match. Sure, there would be a fine, but the Ridgebacks were already screwed when it came to money, so what difference did it make? And if the second part of his plan played out, he wouldn’t be the one paying the fine, anyway. Neither would Salton. But that didn’t matter right now, what mattered was taking the second match before Ian bled to death, before a broken collarbone and High One knew what other internal injuries made Pete pass out.

  Baiman looked up at Pete. “You going to let this happen? Ian is hurt.”

  Pete had doubted Ian’s loyalty, and now he felt ridiculous for doing so. The kid was hurt because he’d ridden a ‘raptor atop a T-Rex and fought off two primitive mountains of muscle and teeth, all to protect Pete’s back so the Ridgebacks could win that game. What Pete had done would wind up on a highlight reel — what Ian had just done would wind up in a documentary. It was just that spectacular. All Ian had to do was say I’m too hurt to continue, and not one sentient in the
galaxy would doubt him, yet here he was kicking his team doc away so he could stay in the match.

  Pete felt stupid. Pete felt small. Ian had every right to meet with other teams, to look out for his future and to chase his dreams. Pete’s doubt of the boy had been fueled by raw jealousy more than anything else.

  “One minute to the next game.”

  “Ian is in,” Pete said.

  Baiman’s gaze snapped up like a rifle barrel brought on-target.

  “He’s in? You idiot, he’s bleeding to death. And you’re not any better. I know that collarbone is broken.”

  “No it’s not.”

  “Then raise your hand!”

  Pete raised his right hand, and Baiman lost her mind.

  “Your LEFT hand, you tiny little excuse for a man! Both of you are too hurt to go on. This isn’t a goddamn joke! “

  “You’re right,” Dar said. “It’s not a joke. It’s our life. We’re one game away from taking this match and qualifying for the tournament. It’s our call, Doc — not yours.”

  Baiman looked from Dar to Pete to Ian, then back to Pete.

  “You know what? Screw all of you. I’m sure you don’t care, but it’s not just about you. Bess is missing half her face armor, and the ligaments in Sydney’s arm are shredded. You want to put them at risk, too?”

  Pete glanced at his mount. He hadn’t even noticed that the right half of Bess’s helmet was gone. Must have been broken by the power of Wee Bob’s kick. Bess’s right eye was already swollen shut.

  “Girl, you up for another tussle?”

  In answer, Bess lowered her head close to Baiman, opened her mouth, and let out a roar that made Baiman cover her ears and turn away. Long strands of spit and blood flew from Bess’s mouth, splattered on Baiman in wet ropes.