by Lee Bond
“Are you fucking kidding?” Garth ignored the shriek he heard in his own voice. “Nineteen more? Come on, dude. I knocked the guy down. Look at him! He’s still unconscious. I bet his brains start leaking out any second. This will happen to all of them.”
“Congratulations on your fighting skill, sa.” The manager pointed to the ring, where the next opponent was just climbing the ropes. “If you want to leave this ring without forfeiting, win nineteen more bouts. Then I shall be happy to see you leave, sa.”
“Fuck me sideways.” Garth climbed back into the ring, prepared to waste the rest of his day beating up the Latelian equivalent of five year olds. At least he’d have time to think about his rescue plan unimpeded.
After six knockouts, eleven paralyzed bodies and an uppercut obliterating all of one poor man’s teeth, The Game promoters put a temporary halt on the lightweight eliminations, pending reexamination.
xxx
Everyone in Naoko’s booth was very impressed with Garth’s performance, and with good reason. The commotion he’d kicked up with the ring manager had grabbed everyone’s attention, but only because they’d been hoping to see someone kicked out early. Ironically, Bornok’s easy defeat had fallen on disinterested eyes. The young man was a fool and deserved the easy loss.
After that, though, the ex-Offworlder’s skill had shone. He struck like a snake, moved like the wind and hit like a cannon. Garth Nickels wasn’t as good as some of the other combatants in other weight classes, to be sure, but he had definitely been categorized incorrectly. The judges were doing the right thing by making changes.
Naoko was full of mixed emotions. Watching him fight was very exhilarating even if each bout lasted barely half a minute, but his skill and strength were worrying. Very. If the Gamemasters expected him to continue fighting in the Lightweight Unaugmented category, he would win his way through to the Final Game with no effort at all, making her attempts to convince him that fighting a God soldier was suicide impossible.
Naoko wished very strongly that Garth moved to one of the heavier categories so he could lose with dignity. After a short stay in a hospital recovering from life-threatening injuries, the two of them could spend some time together exploring their inexplicable connection.
xxx
“Well?” The judges waited impatiently while an Arena doctor went over his notes a final time. The man who’d asked the question was The Game president, Sa Harold Hroff, and he was sweating from every pore. They needed a quick resolution. Determining that Garth Nickels had indeed been placed wrong had forced them into the difficult decision of putting all bouts on hold until the right category was discovered. Every minute lost was a pile of money thrown into the Sun. The problem was … the problem was no one could agree where to put the man.
Doctor Millis plucked at his lower lip, mistrusting his own equipment. “According to these readouts, he’s not augmented.”
Harold waited for Millis to continue, his face betraying his emotions.
“We tested his strength, reflex and endurance levels.” Millis said, flashing the assembled judges the information. “And according to the data, he falls just short of a stage one God soldier.”
“That makes him heavyweight, full-aug, class five.” Harold ran a hand through his thinning hair. At his wrist, his prote continually displayed the amount of money the delay was costing, as well as an occasional update on the mood of the waiting horde. Things were not going well, but at least the situation was still under control. His predecessor, Si Sharon Fine, had put the eliminations on hold for half a day due to a bomb threat. The resulting riot had been six times as destructive as any mere explosive. “How is that even remotely possible? No augmentation? He’s from Trinity, is it possible he’s got some kind of … I don’t know, organic … stuff in there we can’t see?”
Millis shrugged. “Couldn’t tell you, sa, and it wouldn’t matter either way. There are no limiting criteria for type of augmentation, be it mechanical, organic or other. All I know is what the machines tell me, and the machines tell me that while Sa Garth Nickels might not look augmented, he is strong and fast enough to fight in the heavyweight division. You could stick him in the ring with any number of contestants from any other division and he’d go through them like you saw him do the lightweights. Might take a little more time, but I guarantee they’d be hurting a lot more, too. He’s in Ultra or this whole thing becomes farcical.”
Harold looked to Si Joan, who knew more about rule interpretation than anyone. “What’s our legal standing here? Do we have to make him fight twenty heavyweights after he’s already fought so many?”
Joan consulted her prote. “No. Twenty fights a day is the law. There’s never been a ‘mistake’ like this before. There’s no provision for misclassification; Sa Nickels has one more fight, then he’s done for the day.”
“What a total nightmare.” They were going to have to reset the entire lightweight roster now. There’d be lawsuits from the defeated contestants. The heavyweights would go ballistic at the interruption, and if he managed to beat the current first round Contender, Harold knew he could expect a lawsuit from him as well. Harold took a deep breath. It was a catastrophe. “All right. Let him know, and for crying out loud, make sure you tell him carefully. He seems pretty high strung.”
xxx
Reywin smiled from her position in the upper rafters of the dome covering the Arena; her breakdown of Garth Nickels’ fighting skills must have been misplaced or lost in the bureaucratic shuffle that went along with immigration. The promoters had done their best to take control of the situation, but the damage was done. Many of the unaugmented lightweights that Garth had so easily beaten were crying foul play -Reywin could almost feel the legal avatars flooding the cyberspace around the Arena. Most of the augmented heavyweights already beaten by Sa Antonio Yrtzog were also crying foul play because they seemed to think they’d have stood a chance against the puny Offworlder-turned-citizen. If only they could see what she’d seen. They’d all run home to mama.
The agent had to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. The situation with Nickels was spiraling rapidly out of control, and as far as she could tell, the OverSecretary was letting it happen. Reywin -no slouch in the political game- recognized that OverSecretary Terrance was involved in some convoluted plan to oust Chairwoman and that was fine. Doans was a poor leader. It was plainly obvious that Terrance intended on using Nickels as arbiter for that change, but how, when, and in what manner were criteria beyond her current ability to guess. The only thing Reywin did know, and know it she did, with her full heart, was that whatever Garth was asked to do, it would be explosive. Whatever it was that Terrance wanted was moot, though. There were ways to oust Doans without embroiling a Trinity maniac.
“Rey.” It was Bolobo. He was down in the crowd of employees somewhere, keeping a casual eye on Nickels in person rather than through the spEyes. Arena security was tight enough to warrant the additional risk; whoever was in charge of the spEyes had set up an avatar to run three minute control sweeps on their locations, sparing the agents no opportunity to suborn one for their own purposes.
“Go.” Reywin shifted her binoculars until she located Bolobo. He was lounging casually by the heavyweight ring. His fingers flicked out, and she followed the direction until a swarthy figure loomed 10 x magnifications in her visor. “Shit. Pull out. We meet in ten hours, spot B. Pass the word.”
The dark skinned man Bolobo’d spotted was none other than the Chairwoman’s number one field operative, Sa Hamilton Barnes. There was no one better than Barnes was, and as the leader’s right hand man when it came to dirty ops, there was nothing he couldn’t do, no favor he couldn’t demand, no life he couldn’t take, so long as the job got done. If he was in the Arena then Doans was aware of at least one edge of Terrance’s nebulous plans and wanted an update on Nickels from one of the few people she could trust implicitly. Reywin didn’t even want to be on the same relay post as Barnes; the man was as stone cold as they got, and
being black anywhere in a five mile radius of his person was begging for trouble.
Reywin ran a sweep for spEyes focused on her area and found nothing. It didn’t mean anything, though; Barnes had access to software that could make entire buildings vanish from proteus sensors. She hoped he’d find no reason to come after her team, at least until after they’d taken payment from Jordan Bishop’s assassin. Then they’d be able to afford black market upgrades to their protes and vanish.
xxx
Naoko struggled with her prote for another minute before giving up; the Eyes dedicated to the heavyweight ring were already fully controlled by hundreds of people interested in watching the history-making bout. She could easily wrest control of one for herself, but it was a stupid risk. Taking a deep breath, Naoko pushed past the God soldier bodyguards and made her way carefully through the crowds towards Garth. None of the data she had on the man –which was depressingly stark- gave any indication how he was able to fight so well or with such strength and speed, and yet the flash updates from Arena servers said he’d been scanned with definitive precision. The call was in. No detectable implants, no discernable augments. Garth Nickels was, officially, Ultra.
By all accounts, a death sentence.
The fight would become legend if an unaugmented man beat a single slated opponent. The world would flip end over end in shock. Naoko didn’t think there’d be any real way to even guess at the far-reaching implications if Garth won, but the chances of that was a sliver of thin hope buried beneath thousands of tons of distilled logic; he was not augmented, Antonia Yrtzog was. It wouldn’t be a Game at all. It’d be slaughter, which was why Naoko was plunging her way through the jostling crowd. She needed to stop Garth from fighting, no matter the risk.
xxx
Garth bared his teeth at some monstrous motherfucker by the name of Sa Antonio Yrtzog. While he wasn’t the size and general shape of a God soldier infantryman, Yrtzog was definitely going to be more of a challenge than the lightweight sissies he’d fought; the heavyweight challenger was a few inches over eight feet and at least four from shoulder to shoulder. Like most of the contestants, Antonio prowled back and forth in his corner, betraying more about his fighting abilities and possible enhancements than he could possibly realize. Garth stood there like a bump on a log while he considered his options. Antonio’s size and shape suggested an even mix of speed and strength; a wise choice, considering his much-professed intention of fighting in the final Game. With most God soldiers packing heavy subdermal plates and duronium-laced bones, the best chance to win was by outlasting your opponent.
Antonio executed a series of frankly impressive double and triple flips, launching himself straight into the air and landing with a heavy thud that rattled the thick mat. He smacked his own head a few times, impatient to get the fight over with so he could go on to someone more deserving.
Garth laughed out loud. He’d finally figured out why the scene today had been bugging him: professional wrestling. He’d forgotten all about it until just that moment.
In his day, the matches had been fixed, each one a cross between an actual sporting event and ballet, sometimes complete with damsels in distress and betrayal.
While there was utter certainty that The Game wasn’t fixed, the behavior was identical. This was going to be fun.
Garth jumped up on one of the ropes and pointed at Antonio, flaming death in his eye. “YOU! I am going to destroy you! Ohhhh yeahhhh! There will be no hope for you, puny worm! Oh yeahhhh! I will crush you alive and throw you around this ring like a little doll!!! YEAHHHH!”
A ripple of shock spread out from the ring. The puny man wasn’t just suicidal, he was psychotically, masochistically, insane. Antonio went an interesting shade of scarlet.
Garth jumped down off the rope as the bell rang. He stepped into the ring and started circling Antonio warily, reminding himself that the guy was going to be a hell of a lot faster than his last opponent. He slapped away a few probing feints and was about to launch some of his own when a purely radiant beauty walked close to the ring. Just like the last time his eyes had fallen on Naoko Kamagana, Garth felt the world underneath his feet buckle and sway, and his vision doubled, tripled, and spun around sideways.
No. Wait.
That last bit was him, hitting the mat after taking a high-powered cannon-kick to the side of the head. Garth staggered to his feet, automatically absorbing most of Antonio’s furiously delivered punches and snap kicks with his forearms and legs, kickboxing style. Garth shook his head, trying shake loose the cobwebs. Antonio hit like a freight train. Dancing backwards with a fancy shuffle of the feet, Garth put enough distance between him and his rabid opponent to take a deep breath. He risked a glance out the corner of his eye and saw Naoko watching the match with a calculating expression on her face.
Antonio, seeing the moment’s hesitation in the phony Latelian’s expression again, launched himself with a flying roundhouse that came close to knocking the man down; Garth stepped back just in time to avoid a foot to the face for the second time. As soon as he hit solid ground, Antonio used the momentary surprise from the kick to deliver a painful knife kick at Garth’s shins.
“Ouch.” Garth stepped back. Antonio grinned and tried to come back in for another round of Kick the Offworlder. Garth pushed Naoko firmly out of his mind and went on the offensive, ducking and weaving and otherwise evading Antonio’s deflective attacks, waiting for the right moment. It came in the next attack; Antonio raised a knee, intending to ram it into Garth’s stomach. Garth, waiting for some kind of kickboxing move, slammed his fist into his opponent’s thigh.
Antonio stepped nervously backwards, left leg stinging painfully from the surprisingly powerful punch. There was no need to look at the leg. The bruise was spreading quickly. Any harder and Garth might’ve succeeded in bending or even snapping the thin duronium mesh under his skin. Time to play it safer, even if the pain was a fluke.
Always one to oblige, Garth put on a burst of speed he knew Antonio wasn’t expecting. Garth jumped about half a foot to deliver a crushing elbow to Antonio’s jaw. When his toes touched the mat, Garth ducked under Antonio’s instinctive grab and moved around behind the flailing Latelian.
Moving slowly because of the blazing pain in his jaw, Antonio missed the opportunity to stop Garth’s next attack. A double shot of stinging agony washed out from his knees as Garth rammed Antonio to the ground face first.
The small crowd of employees and spectators who’d moved in to watch the impossible oohed.
Garth was on Antonio’s back immediately. He drove a fist into the man’s kidneys, then proceeded to hammer out a tattoo of punches up and down the back, many of them centered on the spinal column. Each punch elicited a gasp of pain from Antonio that grew worse and worse as every second passed. Garth pulled a fist back and waggled it at the back of Antonio’s head, mugging for the audience, loving the utter disbelief that greeted him. This was what they got for sticking him in the lightweight ring. Garth gave the crowd the old ‘winding the punch up’ display then clobbered Antonio in the back of the neck.
The d-mesh prevented the bones from breaking, but as he lay there, Antonio wished otherwise before falling unconscious. He’d had his ass thoroughly whipped by a man one-third his size.
Garth did a victory dance unlike any ever seen in the history of The Game. He rode an invisible horse around the ring, smacking its ass while waving his hands in the air like he just didn’t care. He let loose with a torrent of smack talk so profoundly vile that censorship crews would later bleep out almost everything he said, although there were very few curse words. He popped and locked. He did the moonwalk and the jitterbug. He was about to bust out with the Charleston when it dawned on him he was the only person moving.
The entire Arena -other combatants included- stared at him, completely silent and evidently upset.
Naoko walked up to the ring, pushing her way past the medical attendants. She held out a hand to Garth. “Please, come with me if you
want to live.”
Images of a bulky, leather-clad, shotgun toting Hollywood actor turned Presidential candidate forced a choked bark of laughter from Garth. He immediately regretted the spontaneous fit of laughter because, as he climbed out of the ring, the mood of the audience turned darker. God soldiers quietly began filling the Arena in anticipation of a full-scale riot. Garth followed Naoko, skin crawling with the urge to protect himself by ridding himself of every single threat in the massive sports complex, one person at a time, if need be.
All thoughts of mayhem and murder vanished like a flame in high wind when Naoko turned to look at him over her shoulder, a small, delicate smile on her lips. The sight elicited a response he didn’t want to trust -he didn’t know where his feelings for Naoko were coming from- which was worrying; he was already jam-packed with conflicted emotions concerning his true motives for wanting to go into The Box/ship. He didn’t have the time or the wherewithal to find out why he felt like he was in love with a woman he’d seen once. The entire scenario was dangerous. Portsiders were out for his blood and the OverSecretary was going to be fundamentally pissed off when his scapegoat didn’t die. Trying to get a piece with all that going on was suicidal.
If, miracle of miracles, he managed to survive the entire cavalcade of lunacy waiting for him around every corner, Garth knew he had the charming future of running away from an entire civilization once they figured out what he’d done.
There was nothing in his plans that could be considered healthy for a girl like Naoko. It was a bad, bad, bad decision.
Naoko smiled again. His worries puffed away. She was so beautiful.
Ten minutes later and ten miles away, the two of them sat at a table in a small rooftop cafeteria. They were enjoying a light lunch. The moment was surreal in ways that Hunter S. Thompson could only hope to glimpse on the best –or worst- trip of his life. He’d beaten a God soldier –admittedly a low level soldier, but still- to a pulp and nearly had an entire auditorium of fanatics headcases turn on him and now he was sitting in a restaurant having lunch.
