by Ryan Tang
But now she found out that a lot of his supporters were rich bullies. She couldn't get over it. It made no sense why they'd all gravitated to him. Not even Macob's competitors, the ones who marketed themselves to win the boss' votes, had so many wealthy supporters. And she still didn't know why they were training at Paragons. They were openly fantasizing of killing people.
The handsome instructor grinned and clapped his hands together.
"On my blood, what a marvelous idea! How about this? Claudia and Hank will face off against Every Blue and her friend 2 on 2."
Emile eagerly bounded onto the stage, and Alex followed her.
Before Alex stepped into the pod, Emile leaned over and whispered in her ear.
"Drag out the fight. We need to find out every one of their machines' features. There has to be a reason why they're training."
Alex's eyes widened, and she smiled. Emile was very good at spying.
____
They gave Alex and Emile ten minutes to input their designs into the simulator. To Alex's relief, her account information was still available. Her familiar mosaic blue Paragon soared onto her screen, still wielding the familiar cutlass, rifle, and missile launchers she'd used since childhood. Unfortunately, she wouldn't be able to use her experimental single combat equipment for a team battle. The librarian frowned. Every time she'd meant to practice, something new had distracted her.
Although the match was a two on two competition, they were fighting under the three-on-three weapons restrictions. Each item was allocated a certain number of points, and there was a strict limit on how many weapons each pilot could bring into battle. The restrictions meant teamwork was more important than the individual skill of any single pilot. Alex thought back to the Paragons’ carefully coordinated fire and frowned. Fighting with Emile would add a bit of difficulty. Her friend wasn't very experienced.
She raised her gun and fired a few times.
The controls were far heavier than what she was used to. The cheap plastic of the arcades, the lightest controls of all, were her favorite. They were what she'd grown up playing on. Even the slightly added weight of the silver handles from Jared's private simulator pod was enough to bother her. These controls were like bricks.
Alex frowned and cursed.
Why would anyone play on such inelegant controls?
The librarian sighed and lowered the sensitivity until it felt somewhat acceptable. When she finished, she opened up her communications wire and peaked at Emile’s screen.
She promptly burst into laughter. Emile's machine looked like a roly-poly. It was just shield after shield after shield. There were two enormous Eternium slabs on the shoulders and then an additional pair strapped on each wrist. The cockpit was reinforced by what looked like a curved battering ram. Emile must have dug deep to find that weapon; Alex had never seen a pilot use it before.
Alex pulled up the specs on Emile's Paragon and laughed even harder. Emile’s mobility was below the charts. Her machine was so slow the simulator couldn't even display it.
“It looks like you’ve created a new model just for yourself."
Emile laughed.
“I’m just going to sit here and take their attacks. Find out everything their machine could do."
Alex opened her mouth to respond then thought better of it.
Emile had made no mention of finding out their machine’s features.Her friend knew how to be stealthy. The pods might be bugged.
The two women spoke the words, and their machines flared to life as their voices blended and echoed together.
“A woman pursues her greatest desire!”
The gate opened out to reveal a crowded and bustling city. Tall skyscrapers went high into the air. Some of them were so tall they obscured the sun. The buildings were stacked so tightly together that they practically formed walls.
Alex took one look and cursed harshly.
Emile was confused.
“What’s wrong?”
Alex almost blabbed before she reminded herself to choose her words carefully.
"It's going to be very hard to use our strategy on Metropolis."
The city-like scene was deceptive. It suggested a battle where Paragons would leap at each other from rooftops or soar high in the sky around tall towers. They'd shred the buildings to pieces with gunfire, and soon they’d be fighting in an open plain. Countless historical battles fit that very description, and two maps provided just that experience. Cityscape was one of Alex’s favorite stages to play on. But playing on Metropolis was closer to urban warfare from the human perspective. The buildings were impossibly tall. Some of them were even taller than the Spire. They dwarfed the Paragons, just like how ordinary buildings dwarfed humans. And they were so tightly packed it was impossible to see what lurked behind them. If teams ever split, the battles would devolve into a series of individual ambushes.
It was possible to destroy the reinforced buildings, but only after an exceptional amount of time. And trying to do so would immediately give up your position. The internal structures were built from Eternium, which sang whenever it was struck.
Metropolis only seemed like an ordinary city. It was actually a maze.
“Alright. We need to stay close together. Watch my back. If anyone comes out to the side, let me know, and I’ll shoot them. The key is to pin your opponents down so they can't sneak up on you. And whatever you do, don’t make the first move on the ground."
The Paragons were enormous. A single thudding step would immediately give away their position. The one positive was Emile’s itemization; a machine built entirely out of shields was arguably the perfect choice for an inexperienced pilot on a map based off of ambushes.
Alex supposed they’d be using the same weapons they'd been training with before. A clawed hand, missile launchers, and machinegun fingers.
She wanted to win, but her real mission was to see what else was hidden. Alex still couldn’t believe she'd seen them training with Paragons. She just couldn’t see how they'd ordered weapons from Stock. Was it a scam of some sort? The immovable Paragons with weapons strapped on?
That seemed more likely.
Alex took a deep and steady breath and pushed the thoughts aside for now.
She dove deep into her battle-mind. Her only goal was to extend the fight for as long as possible, to discover every weapon her enemies carried.
A single step thudded somewhere to her right.
Hank and Claudia were on the move.
“Hey. Did you hear that?”
Emile paused for a moment before responding.
“Sorry. No.”
Alex wasn’t too surprised. Metropolis was a noisy map. To facilitate ambushes, the map's digital citizens still went about their lives despite the Paragons running wild in their city. Cars drove beneath her feet, honking angrily against each other. Alex always found the absurdism funny, but there was no time to be distracted. Another thud echoed through her sensors.
Hank and Claudia were moving away from her, moving toward the north side of the city. The pair were smart enough to stick together. They weren’t quite marching in time, but it was a close thing. The double thuds echoed in her ear.
Thudthud.
Thudthud.
Thudthud.
By then, Emile had caught on.
“It sounds like they are moving away. The sounds are getting softer.”
“Yeah.”
Alex wished she was just playing to win. It'd be easy to snipe them from long range.
Thudthud. Thudthud. Thudthud.
They were circling back around.
“Two streets down.”
“Huh?”
“We need to go two streets down. Then we’ll meet them. I can tell by their steps.”
“Man. You’ve spent way too much time on this thing.”
Alex turned a little red and giggled.
"We need to get in the air so they can't hear us."
Claudia and Hank must have been running because of t
heir inexperience. The buildings were high enough to cover any flight, and you wouldn't make a noise. The Hummingbird model, which could fly indefinitely without landing, was banned on the Metropolis map for that very reason.
Even flying a little bit before walking again elsewhere could throw off your opponent’s balance.
“Get ready.”
Once fights on Metropolis started, they ended very quickly. Getting slammed against one of the Eternium-framed buildings often instantly broke your machine.
THUNK.
There was an incredible crash.
Emile’s machine slammed right onto the floor.
If it weren’t for her battle-mind, Alex would have buried her face in her hands, either to cry or to burst into laughter. Emile had been so focused on shields that she'd forgotten to add thrusters. Now Alex knew what the chart meant. Her machine was literally in the negatives in aerial speed.
Hank shouted so excitedly that Alex could hear him through the walls of the simulator pod.
“There! There! They’re there!”
Emile cursed.
“Fuck! Just leave me!”
“No way!”
At that moment, Alex the strategist instantly vanished. She was in the Paragon pod battling alongside her best friend for the first time. It’d only be fun if the two of them were playing together.
“Get back on your feet. I’ll drive them off.”
The tinkling of windows gave away their ambush.
The shots came from the southwest.
Alex leaped into the air. The hail of bullets soared harmlessly past her as the Eternium frames of the buildings sang and sang. The shots were messy and uncoordinated.
Hank and Claudia had been exceptionally disciplined during their training, but nothing could make up for their inexperience. They'd fired thinking that their shots would kill Alex and Emile through the buildings. Instead, the Eternium frames had scattered their gunfire.
Emile's Roly-Poly lumbered to its feet.
It was taking a very long time.
Their enemies drew closer and closer.
Thudthud.
Thudthud.
Thudthud.
They still weren't flying. Alex frowned. If you knew where your enemy was hiding, you should descend on them as soon as possible. Perhaps the machines they ordered couldn't fly?
That was an interesting thought, but Stock's machines couldn't walk either. If he was going to lie to Diligence, why didn't he just exaggerate his machine's capabilities even further?
She caught the edge of a hand from just behind the tower. The fingers had been enlarged and turned into machineguns. Machinegun fingers were a popular weapon among midrange duelists. They couldn't grip items, but they gave their pilot's incomparable shooting speed. It was impossible to lose a quickdraw contest when your hand was a gun.
An ambush was different, though. It was about who saw who first. Alex raised the gun and fired. Claudia screamed with rage.
"Oh my god! Oh my god! How dare you? You'll pay for this! You'll pay!"
Alex rolled her eyes. Claudia was acting the same way she'd acted after the kid from high school hit her back. But she couldn't get Alex fired, not when the librarian had Plenty. Hank and Claudia withdrew, and Emile got back to her feet.
"Sorry about that. I didn't realize."
"Not a problem. Not a problem."
Alex sighed.
She'd only gotten a few fingers. They needed to destroy all their weapons to see what else was being hidden. Perhaps she should have waited longer. This was a very unusual battle.
Thudthud.
Thudthud.
Thudthud.
The pair circled back around. Based on what she'd seen of their training, Alex suspected they would use the missiles next to flush them out, unless they had some sort of secret weapon.
"Mind if I use you as a shield?"
Emile just laughed.
"I'm pretty sure that's all I'm good for at the moment."
Alex ducked for cover. Emile angled herself so that her massive shoulder shields covered both of them. Alex smiled. Emile had decent instincts. She was just unfamiliar with the simulators. She hadn't done too badly the few times she joined in on training either. Perhaps it was the wrong decision to have her focus solely on research. They'd all train hard together once they returned to Plenty.
Just as Alex predicted, a storm of missiles pounded down on them, but there was nothing they could do against Emile's Roly-Poly. Between Emile's shoulder shields and the massive plates on her arms, she could block anything.
Of course, the design wasn't a good idea under normal circumstances. Alex wasn't sure it needed a pilot to operate. She was pretty sure they could just build a bunker for the same result.
Alex chuckled.
Emile would like that joke.
She was just about to tell her friend when the two enemy Paragons leaped high into the air. Hank's machineguns screeched. Hank and Claudia must have thought Alex and Emile were on their last legs. A head-on attack was a textbook follow up to a missile barrage.
They should have scouted first.
She and Emile were just getting started.
She rolled out from behind Emile, raised her gun, and fired out three shots in rapid succession.
The librarian clenched her teeth. Her hand was tight on the trigger. She could feel every additional ounce of weight on the unfamiliar controls. Alex dove deeper into her battle-mind, and soon she was concentrating so hard it felt like she and her machine were one. She guided the unfamiliar stick exactly where she wanted it to go.
Techniques like suppressing opponents with missile fire or a storm of machinegun bullets had their uses. When Alex played in three-on-three competitions with Jared and Duncan, she usually focused on spreading on supportive fire. But there were times like this when a scattershot approach wouldn't work. During those times, an ace shone through.
Her rifle sang in her hand.
Her first shot pierced Hank's hand.
He reeled backward – just as Alex had already accounted for.
Her next two shots destroyed his missile launchers.
She could have defeated them both then and there, but she needed to draw out their machines' weapons and capabilities.
The librarian turned back around to the left. Alex grinned as Emile instinctively shifted to give her cover.
Two more shots and then Claudia's missile launchers were gone. Again, Alex found herself cursing the controls. The additional focus required to move them nudged at her concentration. She'd only barely managed to snipe away the pod on the right.
The pair was restricted to melee weapons – or so it seemed.
Alex raised her gun.
Charging in here would be suicidal. There was no way they could make it past Emile in time before Alex gunned them down.
If they had other long-ranged weapons, they would use them now.
They did.
Panels opened across their chests.
Alex frowned.
Placing weapons in front of a cockpit was incredibly dangerous on a real Paragon. It was popular in the simulator. It was a convenient place to stash an extra weapon, but only because a defeat in the simulator didn't mean actually dying.
Alex raised her gun to fire, and then Emile grunted pointedly.
Alex stopped.
Her friend was right.
What if they had more weapons?
The hidden guns fired out two enormous cannonballs.
Emile let out a cry of surprise as her cockpit trembled.
When your Paragon took extensive damage, the simulator pods jerked back and forth to emulate the stresses you'd undergo in a real battle. High-quality machines like these could even heat up or display the whistling wind of a near miss.
The barrage continued.
"Rock her! Rock her!"
"The other one is weak!"
"Keep hitting her! Just keep hitting her!"
Hank and Claudia giggled excitedly.
Emile let out another cry of pain. Her pod must have been jerking very painfully. The cannonballs were enormous, enough to shake even her thickly laminated armor. Alex frowned. The weapon didn't make any sense in real life. Placing giant cannonballs in front of your cockpit was a great way to blow yourself up.
Emile spoke through clenched teeth.
"Get out of here! Get out of here!"
Even now, Emile wouldn't give the game away. Even now, she remembered the pods might be recorded.
"Nah."
Alex stood and fired.
The shot pierced through Hank's cannon. It exploded, and the cockpit burned with it. His machine crashed to the ground.
She could hear his cries of pain and rage even through the noise-canceling pods.
Alex whirled for Claudia, but she was just a second too late.
In her haste to stop the barrage, she'd accidentally exposed her position. Claudia had immediately capitalized. Her cannonball was just inches in front of Alex's cockpit.
The librarian yanked for her cutlass, but the unfamiliar controls betrayed her.
The sword came out just a few milliseconds too late.
She managed to block the shot, but the explosion sent her crashing into the building behind her. Her machine screeched as it slammed into the raw Eternium.
Alex nearly fell out of her chair as her pod jerked violently back and forth. She shielded her head as red lights flashed around her. She'd hit the building behind her so hard that her Paragon's arms had been torn off.
What the hell was inside those cannonballs?
Claudia cackled.
"Don't come back to Diligence again, you stupid bitch!"
Claudia stomped toward her. She raised the claws high above her head.
"You might have been the best when only losers were playing, but this is the real deal!"
The claws came down so hard and fast that they buried themselves in Alex's cockpit. Alex was slammed against the back of the chair. She moaned. Her shoulders were badly bruised.
The gray Defeat Screen flashed across her screen as she groaned. She couldn't believe she'd lost to these people. She should have been more careful. Then she looked more closely. The grayed-out screen didn't say she Defeat. It said Destroyed. Her team hadn't lost yet.
Emile's Roly-Poly couldn't move very fast, but it certainly could take a lot of hits. Emile was still in the game. Emile stumbled forward as Claudia frantically tried to yank her claws out of Alex's chest. But she'd buried them too deeply.
