Arena Book 2

by Logan Jacobs

  “Thanks for the heads up,” I said with a nod. “I guess that was a solid plan after all.”

  She returned my nod and offered me a brief smile before she raised her key to the gates. I followed suit, and just like last time, we unlocked in on the count of three to reveal, surprise, surprise, another portal.

  “Let’s make haste. More champions are starting to enter this area,” Nova said before she leapt through the portal. I slipped inside behind her and was surprised to find myself enveloped in darkness when I reappeared on the other side. Other than some lit torches, there was no other source of light. Just as I wished internally that I had night vision, my eyes suddenly adjusted to the dimness, and I could see as well as if the room were bathed in sixty watt bulbs.

  “Badass…” I murmured to myself. The capabilities of the nanobot attached to my cerebral cortex, the occuhancers melded to my eyeballs, in my neck, and my vision booster grew on me more and more every day.

  The area beyond these gates looked like a small cave that was carved into the side of the mountain. It was completely silent, and as I turned in a slow circle to survey my surroundings, I was surprised to find that the room was pretty small, maybe a few hundred square feet in all. Thankfully, I also noticed a small crack of light on the opposite end of the room that came from underneath another door.

  Nova must have seen it too because she began moving toward it. I started to walk behind her, my eyes practically glued to her mesmerizing backside, and as we got to the door, I had an idea.

  “Wait,” I told her as an idea hit me. “Let’s block the door. Maybe that will keep any remaining champions from getting in here with us. Or at least slow them down a bit so we have some breathing room.”

  “Not a bad idea, Marc. It’s worth a shot,” Nova agreed as she looked around the area for a large boulder or something to use.

  Both of our eyes landed on a large piece of scrap metal that looked heavy enough to provide anyone who tried to enter with some difficulty. At the very least they’d bang their shins really hard.

  Nova and I each took a side of the piece of metal and prepared to lift it, kind of like Indy and Sallah as they lifted the Ark in Raiders. To my immense pleasure, my incredibly attractive partner squatted low enough for me to capture an amazing glimpse of her cleavage through her mesh top. It boggled my mind sometimes how one person could be so dangerous and so sexy at the same time.

  “Marc…” Nova said as she cleared her throat and looked at me with a hint of deviousness in her green eyes. “Lift now, ogle later.”

  “If you insist,” I grunted while bending my knees and lifting the metal piece with Nova. “It’s your fault though, ‘cause of your mesmerizing sexiness both in and out of battle.”

  “Ha, flattery will get you everywhere, Havak,” she grunted, and then we walked the metal a few feet over and placed it against the frame of the door. I figured that it may be a long shot, but any help I could get in keeping much larger enemies off my back, I’d take. Once our makeshift barrier was in place, Nova and I resumed our task of hunting down the flag and getting the hell out of here.

  Our footsteps echoed inside the cave as we made the brief maneuver to the next door. It was more of a transitional room than a cave, really. The smell reminded me of the fresh soil my mom would use for her garden when she’d plant in the spring. A few more childhood memories flooded back to me as I noticed the stalactites on the roof of the room. They looked like the same ones I saw on a fifth grade field trip to some underground caverns except these had a slight incandescent glow that undulated from within. Almost like the mountain was breathing.

  It didn’t take long for us to reach the next door which quite honestly, compared to everything else, looked pretty pathetic. Like one swift kick would have sent it crashing to the ground in a puff of rotten wood dust and rusty nails. The only ominous things about it were the scratch marks on the wooden panels that suggested that some kind of clawed animal had gotten ahold of it. It seemed too easy and that was what worried me. I swallowed as I imagined a huge, hulking space badger type creature on the other side just waiting for us to walk nonchalantly through the non-assuming door to our gnashed by badger deaths. With a huff, I placed one hand upon the worn, woven leather handle of my axe as I reached out to open the door with my other. I hesitated and withdrew my hand from the knob.

  “You know the last time we opened a seemingly harmless door, we wound up covered in foul smelling purple goo from some space-alien’s insides,” I complained. “You don’t want to know the interesting places I was cleaning that out of for days!”

  “I’m sure it’s fine, Marc,” she said with a sigh. “I don’t hear anything on the other side. Just open it.”

  “I am going to open it. I just need a moment to properly prepare myself,” I said as I began to take small, short, huffs of air to psyche myself up. The purple goo was the stuff of nightmares. Truly.

  “Besides, what if there’s a camera crew? We need to look awesome for the sponsors, right?” I stepped to the side like I was going to comb my hair. “There are no photographers either, Marc,” Nova sharply replied. “Fine, you know what, I’ll open it.”

  “Good call. You always look good on camera,” I said as she shoved past me.

  “Again, flattery will get you everywhere, Sir Havak,” she said right before she ripped open the door. It let in a flood of light and led us back outside onto a footpath that lead up the mountainside like one of those crazy routes people on Youtube took to reach a secret Chinese monastery for tea which was really, really lame because it also looked like it was about fifteen stories high and was definitely missing half its steps. Oh, and if you fell, you’d fall into a never ending abyss to your demise. So, it had that going for it, which was nice.

  “See?” she questioned, “I told you, nothing to fear--”

  Her words were cut off as a giant glob of slime fell from the sky and dumped all over her, covering her from head to toe in glowing pink goo that plastered her hair and armor to her orange skin.

  “What was that you were saying?” I asked as I smiled brightly at her, not able to help myself from gloating. Then I pointed past her. “Now, smile for the camera.”

  She turned just in time for one of the local ‘live-feed’ drones to flash brightly. The Crucible of Carnage was an intergalactic hit TV show as well as being a battle for the survival of your home world.

  Then the entire sky lit up as my favorite announcer returned.

  “Well isn’t that fuh-fuh-fun! Nova Kwark has triggered the slime trap. It’s slimy, it’s pink, and it is disgusting, but it will enhance her speed for exactly twelve point two minutes. Let’s see what the acceleration challenged Palladinian does with the augmentation.” Chi-Cheshire’s voice boomed across the arena as the image of her getting slimed was replayed in delicious slow motion from several angles. Most of them flattering.

  “They really got your good side there.” I joked as the camera zoomed in on her slime covered breasts.

  “Very funny, human,” she grunted as she flicked some slime off her hand and onto my breastplate.

  “Well, nowhere to go from here but up, right?” I could sense that we were drawing closer and closer to our final destination and victory… or potential death. My increased reliance on humor to break whatever tension came our way meant one thing: I was getting anxious. I had a deep down gut feeling that someone else was likely ahead of us in getting to the flag.

  “I suppose…” Nova said with a grunt and a sigh as she scooped pink goo from her prodigious cleavage. “You were right.”

  “Wait, did you actually admit I was right?” I gasped dramatically. “Nova, you know all the right things to say to a fella.”

  “Yeah, don’t make a thing out of it,” she huffed before starting up the pathway.

  “Right, I’m super low key about things like that,” I replied as I followed her up the stairs spiraling up around the top of the mountain. “I would not be storing any of what just happened in my
steel trap like mind vault to use later. Nope. Not doing that at all.”

  The staircase sucked. The steps were placed entirely too close together and were about a foot too narrow so that my balance was always in question. For the most part though, we didn’t seem to have much trouble climbing them. There were a few moments where I had to be strategic about where my feet went. I was thankful for the stairs, don’t get me wrong, but one wrong step on a weak stone and that was it for me. Guard rails or some sort of barrier to keep us from taking a spill were, evidently, deemed unnecessary. I seriously wanted to know what the galaxy had against guard rails. From Mordor stone staircases to Dealthstar scaffolding there were never any damn guard rails.

  A layer of fog engulfed Nova and I as we climbed higher and higher up the side of the mountain. Since the slime enhanced her speed, she was a few paces ahead of me.

  “Hey,” I called to her. “Some of us aren’t drenched in speed-boosting slime.”

  “The sooner we make this climb the better,” she replied while she glanced back at me. “Slowpoke.”

  I couldn’t help but snicker at her matter-of-fact response. I also picked up the pace a bit, but she seemed to move further and further ahead of me gradually. It sucked that we were wasting her boosted speed on climbing stairs, but it was probably for the best since I doubted some of these steps could handle her increased mass for more than a few seconds. I was just about to lob a witty barb Nova’s way about it when my foot landed on a loose rock embedded into the staircase and caused me to lose my balance.

  “Oh shit,” I exclaimed as the rock under my foot tumbled off the side of the mountain. I grabbed hold of the mountainside to steady myself and watched briefly as the rock bounced downward and eventually disappeared into the thick fog.

  “Are you oka--” Nova asked me but then the stair her own foot rested on gave out completely, utterly proving my unspoken point about mass and the staircase.

  A surprised gasp escaped her lips as she waved her arms in an attempt to catch her balance, but there was nothing for her to grab onto. She fell onto her side and tumbled all helter-skelter downward toward where I was.

  “Nova!” I shouted with worry.

  I felt the adrenaline spike hit my brain as my vision tunneled slightly and time slowed. Luckily, I was more than used to the effects of a massive adrenaline dump and leapt up two stairs to grab ahold of the back of her chest plate as her body began to topple sideways off the mountain.

  Instinct took over at that point and I quickly spaced my feet as far apart as I could and leaned my back up against the wall of the mountain to keep from falling myself. I used the downward momentum of her roll and my arm like a pendulum so that instead of falling to her doom, I was able to swing her up onto the staircase a few steps below me where she landed on her feet. Both of us just stood there for a second as our breath came hard and fast.

  “Whoa!” Chi-Cheshire boomed. “That was a close call for Nova there!”

  “Kitty-Cat dude is right, that was way too close,” I breathed. I had moved closer to her, and we stood eye to eye. “You good?”

  “Yes....thank you, Marc,” she said as her breath returned to normal. The air fairly crackled with sexual tension for a long second.

  “Anytime,” I replied, my voice huskier than I had intended. “I’ve kinda gotten used to you being around to keep me out of trouble.”

  “It is my job, human,” she replied, her voice husky as well. “I do it with pride.”

  I finally let Nova go, and we began to climb back up the stairs. Nova was decidedly slower and more deliberate with her stride, so I was able to keep pace with her better.

  “No more surprises today,” she said suddenly. “Do you remember which champions have fallen and which champions are left?”

  I thought for a second as we walked carefully up the stairs. Keeping track of all the champions was probably something I should have been more cognizant of, but between the ogres and the portals and the goo, I’d sort of lost track of just about everyone.

  “Nope. Not at all,” I sighed with a shrug. “We can assume there’s not anyone behind us on the path at least I think. We would have heard them by now.”

  “True,” Nova agreed. “There is a chance that one or two could be ahead of us. I think we need to be as prepared as we can.”

  “Depending on how many there are up there, I think one of us should stay back and cover the other,” I suggested.

  “Right. I can be the backup just in case you get into a bind,” she agreed.

  “Plus, you can look out for any others who come up behind us,” I added. “I’d hate for us to both be busy battling and then some schmuck sneaks in and grabs the flag out from under our noses.”

  “Agreed.” Nova affirmed.

  We finally rounded the last turn and saw a pathway that led to the front doors of a massive dojo-looking building. It was made of rounded, gray stones, and arched wooden roofs, and looked like the kind of place Ryu and Ken would practice Hadokens in all day long. A large wooden door barred the entrance to the building. This one looked much sturdier than the door from the cave and was about four times as big.

  I drew in a deep breath and paused momentarily to take in the view. The valley below and seemingly endless mountain range was even more spectacular now that we were higher up and could take it all in.

  While the base of the mountain was no longer visible due to the thick, billowy, cotton ball-like fog that surrounded us, I was more than a little impressed by the nearby mountain ranges that went on for what felt like miles and miles. There was nothing but silvery-gray granite shot through with streaks of dark purple and vibrant pink that led to snow-capped peaks for as far as the eye could see. It was as if the entire planet was made up of nothing but endless mountains. Which, for all I knew, it was. When the solar systems twin sun’s light hit the fog, it created a halo of amber orange and violet around the entire range that created a sense of serene calm. At least it would have been serene if the air hadn’t hung in heavy silence. There was no sound at all. No birds chirping. Or wind blowing. Not even the sounds of the battle that still roared below. The total absence of natural sounds made my hair stand on edge, and it reminded me of the scenes in video games where the music would fade, and the controller would begin to vibrate as if it had a life of its own. It usually meant a boss was on his way, or in this case, one of the remaining champions.

  “Do you think many others are coming up the mountain?” I asked Nova as I looked around. “Because if they are, I want to find this flag and blow this two-bit Tolkien wanna-be Popsicle stand long before they show up.” I leaned against the mountain and tried to psyche myself up. My shield rested lightly against my leg as I set it down for a moment. My nerves had started to get to me. It had been a long match, and I was frayed, but I didn’t want Nova to see her mighty and fearless leader as a nervous Nelly.

  “Who or what is a Tolkien, and I have no clue what a Popsicle is, but I agree,” she murmured, took a deep breath, and then continued up the crumbling steps. “Besides, my speed boost only has about two or three minutes left.”

  I picked up my shield, slung it across my back, and bounded up the pathway. My arms pumped at my sides as I did to help my forward momentum. Nova jogged beside me at a steady pace, and strands of her messy auburn hair flew freely around her face. Despite the mud, pink slime, and space ogre gore splattered on her, she somehow continued to look just about as perfect as a fearsome knight errant from a feudal planet could. It was like running alongside an Amazonian goddess who could kick anyone’s ass in a matter of seconds, and I couldn’t help but feel like a badass warrior dude.

  The gravel crunched beneath the weight of our boots as we rounded the final curve in the path, and the rest of the dojo building made of stone came into view. From closer up, the door was made of a wood that had intricate swirl patterns in the grain that looked almost Celtic. We cautiously approached and crept up the first steps toward it. I reached for the handle but paused when I h
eard a gut-wrenching roar, followed by a short-lived shriek and what sounded like a big watermelon going splat on stone from inside.

  “So, oh great and knowledgeable one, any idea what lies behind the door?” I asked her quietly as I reached for the door knob again.

  “It’s the Dark King,” she whispered urgently as she positioned herself to my right. “I’d recognize the sound of him crushing an opponent's skull anywhere.”

  “Thanks for that disturbing mental image that will haunt my dreams,” I quipped in response. “Any chance he’d be interested in joining our alliance?”

  “Unlikely,” Nova replied simply. Then she narrowed her eyes at me as if trying to will me into taking things seriously. “Marc, this champion is…” She trailed off.

  “…is a reasonable fellow?” I prompted her.

  “He is dangerous. Lethal. Fearsome,” she listed off.

  “Ah, yes, but can he wiggle his eyebrows sexily?” I asked as I wiggled my eyebrows sexily at her.

  “Havak…” she sighed.

  “That is my name. Don’t wear it out.” I shot back with a wry smile as I shifted my shield into position on my left arm and grasped the handle of my ogre blood encrusted battle axe. “Come on, you know I’m sexy.”

  “Yes, you are a fine specimen of human maleness, I won’t disagree,” she said, “but this--”

  “--is what I get paid the big bucks for. Watch and learn, babe,” I joked. “I’ll draw his attention, and you stay back, until you get a good opening.”

  With a wink and a patented Havak smirk, I flung the door open, saw the Dark King, and sighed.

  “Oh, ballsacks.” I said in exasperation.

  He was most definitely not sexy, nor a reasonable fellow, and I was pretty sure he could eat me. I was beginning to get very tired of large bad guys who could eat me. So very, very tired of them.