Volcanus had it out for Nemesis and was already headed his way. Dionysus was also going for Nemesis, or perhaps Volcanus since both were almost to each other. The three of them met in a clash of fists, and then Thor tore Volcanus away from the battle and snapped him over the ring. Volcanus staggered but stayed upright, and bared his teeth at Thor. Thor just stared at him. Ink thought it was almost insolent. What you got, Volcanus?
Then Volcanus crouched down, held out his arms, and charged Thor, who looked like he was going to attack in return. His hands were over his head like he wanted to land a blow to the top of Volcanus’ head, and he lifted one leg for a groin kick.
But then he just blithely stepped aside as Volcanus closed in. It was nothing more than that, a mincing jump of a sidestep to the right, and done when there was only a fraction of space between them so Volcanus couldn’t halt his momentum to spin after him. Arms closing on nothing, Volcanus slowed down and turned to try it again.
Volcanus wasn’t stupid. He expected Thor might try that a second time, and was curving his body ever so slightly to the right to catch Thor in his sidestep. Thor went the other way, a jumping sidestep to the left, and Volcanus again flew past to embrace an armful of nothing. Nemesis and Dionysus were tussling ferociously, but Ink wasn’t watching them. His eyes were on his dancing zombie, who was letting Volcanus waste his energy while he just did the shuffle. A very weird zombie shuffle.
“I love this guy!” the announcer yelled about Thor. “Ink Delwich, I love you!” The crowd shouted in laughter at the third mincing sidestep of a charge.
In anxiety and aggravation, Randy Kamen turned in his seat and said to Ink, “But what is he doing?”
Fuck if Ink knew. Thor was being Thor. And Thor was biding his time.
Dionysus got in a particularly hard punch at Nemesis, and the Greek woman winced in sympathy. Now that was a rank newbie reaction. Ink could see her now, giving Nemesis hugs and kisses and bandages in playful colors afterwards. Cooing over his injuries like he had the brain to care; fussing over him behind the stall’s sheets, which were put up there so no one saw her giving love to her zombie man. Ugh! It wasn’t like this woman could be all that picky, and maybe that was exactly what this was. She had made a boyfriend out of Nemesis. Some people with screws loose did that.
Volcanus was going nuts from not being able to get hold of Thor. He yelled and waved his arms over his head, his face twisted in a frenzy of hatred. It seemed like his mind had gotten locked into this one battle strategy, because he crouched and ran yet again. The announcer said, “This is just cat and mouse here!” Kamen’s lips were tight at how Thor was embarrassing his popular champion of a zombie. So sorry, Ink thought insincerely. It could have been Kamen who ordered the hit on Samson. He hadn’t expressed his condolences or even said hello all weekend. Ink was nothing to him, that was clear to see, but Volcanus was nothing to Thor.
Thor had his arms over his head like always, and one foot lifted for a kick. This time though, he didn’t sidestep. As Volcanus closed in, arms out wide and the front of his body exposed, Thor put down his foot hard and leaped into the air, kicking out his other foot and nailing Volcanus squarely in the face.
A flying front kick! The impact was so hard that Volcanus turned over in the air as he flew back. Then he crashed down onto his stomach. The reaction from the stadium was even louder than it had been at the high points of the melee. The announcer questioned if Thor was actually a zombie and how the sponsor needed to check the veterinarian’s paperwork for medical verification of the virus. “Is he getting up? Volcanus, are you down for the count?”
Volcanus was down! All it had taken was a dance and a single kick. Kamen had turned gray in his seat and his fists were throttling the armrests. Becoming aware that his visage was on the big screens, he squeezed out a smile so strained that his face looked at risk of shattering. The camera moved to Volcanus. A pool of blood was forming under his head. One of his fingers flexed weakly in the dirt.
Nemesis and Dionysus had been fighting the whole time, getting injured and wearing each other out, and Thor was still fresh as a posy to the ring. He turned to them just as Dionysus reeled away from a blow and fell on his ass. For a second time, Thor and Nemesis shared a stare. Then both of them turned to Dionysus.
As he got up, Nemesis knocked him back down. He tried to get up a second time, and Thor knocked him down. They were ganging up on him, and Constanzo began to look very worried. Thor and Nemesis were nothing if not deliberate in their methods, and they made other zombies look like they belonged in the remedial ring.
Dionysus tumbled over backwards and then rolled over deliberately a second time, understanding that the only way he was going to regain his feet was through a little distance from his stalkers. The announcer was going on about Thor and Nemesis being friends, because he was a fool who didn’t see that these two were just taking out the weaker competition first. Goodbye to the Old Guard; hello to the new.
Once Dionysus was standing, he backed away from his challengers. They were moving him to the wall, feinting right and left when he tried to escape out the sides. Shepherds guiding him to slaughter! Ink exclaimed about Nemesis, “What did you pay for this zombie? He’s marvelous!”
“Blood, sweat, and tears,” the woman said, which wasn’t really an answer at all. She was a bitch. As she leaned forward to watch, the short sleeve of her surfboard T-shirt hiked up. A broad-shouldered, well-muscled bitch. Man face and man frame and Ink hurled silent epithets at her for acting like she was in a position to spurn him instead of the other way around.
The zombies got him to the wall, Dionysus backing up that last step and striking it. He held out his hands warningly, intending to scratch if they got any closer, and snapped his teeth. Then Nemesis lashed out his fist and Dionysus ducked. It soared over his head and left a bloody splash on the wall. Constanzo laughed and struck his armrests in delight. “Not so easy, is it, young upstarts?” he crowed to Thor and Nemesis.
But it was. Thor swung and missed, Dionysus ducking the other way. He ducked right into Nemesis’ next blow, a swift uppercut to the chin that knocked his head against the wall. His neck exposed, Thor wrapped his hand around it. Dionysus chopped down on Thor’s arm to loosen the hold, but a blow Nemesis delivered to his nuts weakened the hit. As Dionysus raised his other hand, Nemesis caught it and bit off the tip of a finger. Chomped it off like a piece of carrot.
“Your zombie is going to have a great career,” Ink said as the fingertip went flying and Nemesis chomped on another one. Dionysus raised his knee and Nemesis took a harsh blow to his stomach. He staggered back several feet, almost falling over, and Dionysus struck at Thor bloodily.
“No,” the woman said. On her face was nausea. “I will not fight him again.”
That was insane. Insane! “Why?”
“I do not like to see him get hurt, or to hurt others. So I will just take him home after this and let him live out his life in peace.”
“Sell him!” Ink cried. A fighter like Nemesis could command many thousands of dollars. Tens of thousands! She shrugged in disinterest and Ink stared at her incredulously for a moment before returning to the brawl. Batshit crazy! People would be lining up to buy Nemesis. Fuck, he would buy Nemesis if only he had the dough! Ink had guessed right about the woman. She had made a boyfriend out of a zombie just like the blind boy had made a buddy from one.
Nemesis wasn’t coming back to help with the destruction of Dionysus. He was creeping along to get Thor. Ink yelled, “Thor! Thor!” in the fleeting but mad belief that his voice would ring over the stadium and warn him. Other people were doing the same, despite the fact that it made no difference.
Thor didn’t need the warnings. He knew what Nemesis was up to. Releasing his chokehold on Dionysus, he jerked the zombie around and pushed him violently at Nemesis. The two of them went down and Constanzo screamed in his seat as Nemesis bit Dionysus’ nose. The zombie’s dollar value was going down by the second. Leaping up from his chair, C
onstanzo went to the bar and beat on it. He screamed for Dionysus to fight.
Thor made a sandwich of them, throwing himself on top of Dionysus’ back and returning to the choke as Nemesis mutilated that handsome face from below. The announcer yelled something dumb about the threesome the zombies had made, and how parents should cover their kids’ eyes from this X-rated performance down there. How was it sexual? They were all clothed from the waist down.
As Dionysus went limp from lack of oxygen, Thor grabbed hold of his head and slammed it down into Nemesis’ face. The Greek woman shouted with Constanzo and stood up in horror.
Better, Ink thought viciously. Better that Nemesis perish here than to be relegated to a stall in this woman’s stables for all the long years of his life! The crowd was split in half, cheering for Thor, cheering for Nemesis, the announcer shrieking along for both of them.
Thor hadn’t had dope, but Nemesis had had a lot. Not a crazy amount, swelling him up to cartoonish proportions, but just the right amount. With a heave, he pushed Thor and the body off his own and rolled away in the dirt. Then they were up, with Dionysus lying on the ground between them. Knocked out or dead, either way he wasn’t moving.
The newbies had vanquished the Old Guard entirely, at least for the young male part of the Games competition. Volcanus wriggled in the dirt. Thor hadn’t killed him, but had left him too out of it to stand.
“If they don’t fight, we might just have a tie!” the announcer called. But Thor and Nemesis were going to fight. These weren’t two zombies staring stupidly at each other. Everything in their posture reeked of hatred. And Nemesis still had all of his dumb facial prosthetics on! His manager had paid for top-drawer stuff. A close-up on the jumbo screens revealed only the tiniest tear in the rotted cheek, revealing a patch of tanned skin underneath.
Ink was one opponent away from Hawaii and his chilled towel. One fight away from a million dollars and a permanent place in the clubroom, a grand property close to the Hill and an introduction to Cantine’s blonde. Adrenaline surged through him as Nemesis and Thor went for each other. Now he was standing at the bar and screaming Thor Thor Thor! Take ’im out! Come on, Thor!
The fight was brutal. The Greek woman looked positively ill at every fist to land on her precious boyfriend Nemesis. If Thor won, Nemesis survived, and Ink got his million big ones, he was going to make her an offer that she couldn’t refuse. With these two in Delwich Stables, Ink would be unstoppable. With the money she’d make, she could afford some therapy and a dating service.
Blows landed on faces and chests; kicks bent knees and doubled them over. Ink screamed like a little child in a tantrum for his future, his voice just one thread in the deafening glissando of a quarter million people. Thor wasn’t giving Nemesis time to devise a strategy, and Nemesis wasn’t giving Thor time to get hold of him. They raged across the ring, slugging and tripping and tossing each other about like dolls.
There had been a strategy. Ink saw that soon. But it belonged to Thor.
Their fight had appeared to have no direction, but it had gradually moved closer and closer to fallen Volcanus. Thor threw out another fist, one that looked like it had gone wild, but when Nemesis moved away, he tripped over the zombie sprawled in the dirt. The punch hadn’t gone wild at all. It had only been a fake. Nemesis landed on his side, and Volcanus attacked him.
The Old Guard still had some kick to it. Holding onto Nemesis’ legs, Volcanus bit into the skin as Nemesis struggled to beat him off. Thor watched for a few seconds, blood rolling down his face and arms. The Greek woman was in agony and Ink was elated. Then Thor lifted his leg and ended it with two short, well-directed kicks, one to the head of Nemesis, and the second to Volcanus. Both of them were knocked unconscious, or had their necks snapped and died.
He had won. Oh God, Thor had won, so Ink had won.
Aloha.
Chapter Nine: The Post-Party
When the big oak doors to the clubroom opened, Ink was pulled into a mob of celebrants and a blinding wall of flashes. Hawaiian-themed music was playing over the speakers. He set down his luggage and Vasilov slapped his back, crying, “Here he is! The man of the hour!”
“Let’s see a kiss!” someone yelled. Ink swept Nadia into his arms and planted a big smack on her for the cameras. She wrapped the back of her hand around his neck as everyone cheered. Then they broke apart, and Ink looked slyly around the room for Cantine’s blonde as he shook hands with Ivan Cantine himself.
Then a crowd of other people fought to shake his hand, Gareth Hodging and his wife, Milla Gorvich, Stanson and smelly Bayder, everyone who was anyone and the sponsor of the Games himself. Even the announcer was there, and Ink forgave the man his idiocy because the guy was so excited to meet him. “Oh my God! Do you know how exciting this gig was for me because of your Thor?”
“You did a great job,” Ink said magnanimously. “Even Thor thought so.”
Thor was standing on his podium in the position of honor right beside the doors, with Maenad as the highest-ranking female on the other side. He was battered but still a stately sight. Her legs were badly injured and covered in bandages, but she still had the strength to stand. Nothing stopped Maenad! Even when staring at the lights, her face settled into a fierce expression.
The rest of the champions encircled the round room, their wounds patched, broken bones splinted, and foul little Scrapper dressed in a cheap prince costume that had a gold lion brandishing its claws on the blue velour top. He looked tiny and stupid between his company of imposing Athena and an older, handsome male called Paris. The fighters stared to the center of a room, where the brightest light of all was dazzling them. The regular light there had been switched out for this giant one, and it chased all of the shadows away.
Ink Delwich had swept the Games. Clapping his back again, Vasilov said to the sponsor, “Let’s have him try out one of these seats!”
They guided Ink through the party to the line of seats by the windows. A ribbon and bow was stretched across one. He snapped it to applause and sat down. Vasilov said, “Tap the button on the side of the armrest, my boy. These are the most technologically advanced stadium seats in which your bottom will ever rest.”
“Just had them installed last month,” the sponsor said proudly. “Top of the line.”
A screen lifted from the armrest and displayed itself in front of Ink. The ring was divided into four quadrants. All he had to do was tap on the one he wanted to watch for a new perspective, and in the corner was a circle for an overhead view. If he missed something, either a whole fight or just a moment from it, he could view a replay menu and select what he wanted, even put it in slow motion. The sponsor was pleased at the enthusiasm his new stadium seats provoked, and then Vasilov swept Ink away. “There are a few people here, representatives from causes if you take my meaning. I will introduce you to the ones whose causes you might find tug at your heartstrings.”
Ink took the meaning. Some representatives in here mattered more than others. He was introduced to Melvin Harbridge, an administrator for a charitable organization that provided funding to childhood cancer researchers. Gorvich donated to this one, due to a niece who had survived childhood cancer herself, and had been written up in the news for it many times. Shaking the man’s hand, Ink said, “Such a pleasure to meet you! I’ve always admired your organization’s work tremendously.”
“Mr. Delwich, it is an honor to meet you,” the man said. “What a show your fighter gave us! I could hardly believe my eyes that these two fellows-” he gestured to Nemesis, whose podium was near Thor’s, “-are new! Beginner’s luck, eh?”
Ink didn’t see Adra-whatever anywhere in the clubroom. “I was just as shocked as anyone, to tell the truth. But Thor taught me to have a little faith.” They laughed heartily and he added, “Childhood cancer has always been an issue close to my heart. One of the boys in my elementary school was struck down with it. How terrible to learn of your mortality so young. I didn’t understand at the time, but now I feel for hi
s poor family.” All of it was a white lie, but statistically, the odds were in his favor that one of those kids to go to his school had experienced cancer. If Ink didn’t give a personal touch to the cause, they would think he was doing it only for the kudos. Vasilov beamed in approval at his side.
They all agreed about how terrible cancer was and the man slipped over his card. Ink promised to give him a call as soon as he was back from Hawaii. And he would. Vendors had already crowded his inbox with offers, and he was going to be rolling in dough. A generous donation wouldn’t set him back one bit whatsoever, and it would pay off in goodwill and mentions in publications. Vasilov guided him around to two more representatives that would only make Ink burn brighter, a woman high up in the entertainment industry who also sought sponsors for children in third world countries, and a fellow into disaster response whose family had even more money than the Hodgings did. When another man interrupted to thrust out a card for an environmental foundation, Ink accepted it and caught the tiny shake of Vasilov’s head. As the two of them walked away together, Vasilov whispered, “Aleshire is not worth your time, but he can be spiteful. Throw him a small donation now and then as we all do, but do not let him pressure you into more.”
How wonderful to hear that the head of a worldwide organization wasn’t worth Ink’s time. Ink was going up, only up from here. He could feel the floor rising under his feet. An old antagonism raised its ugly head and he thought see, Mom? See what I just did? She hadn’t believed in him, but he had believed, and look at him now! He was king of this room, king of the Games, king of the zombies, and soon to buy a castle that befit his position. Maybe Mom had seen it on television, Ink becoming sports royalty.
“I was thinking to myself: why not join in the fun?” Nadia was saying to a group of women. “Everyone tries to dress down and let the child shine, but I thought-”
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