by Aaron Slade
I looked off the edge of the building. A few vehicles arrived below. Car brakes squealed and voices pierced the silence of the night as people congregated around the lot’s boundaries. I felt sorry for the people that had to drive all the way here. Teleporting with Adam was much simpler.
The healers were the ones that usually had to drive here, including anyone else that didn’t have a speedy EHT for traveling. The fighting depended on the healers’ involvement. They came for the entertainment like everyone else, but also to heal the fighters after a brawl. People never got badly hurt, but it was still dangerous. Rumors of people dying spread from adults that didn’t want their children here, but most people knew the healers did their job well.
I heard voices behind me when Seth came skipping to the edge of the building. “There are lights,” Seth exclaimed. I heard Adam’s footsteps approach in the darkness. After Seth greeted me, he faced the obstacle of seeing over the building’s ledge that was inches taller than him. He hopped a few times, pulling himself up with his arms, but finally stood in one of the chairs Adam brought. The city and the quickly growing crowd of our peers ensnared his fascination.
Off the edge of the roof, I noticed several more people present in the empty lot below. They had to be speedsters and teleporters because none of them had cars. They loaded trash and wood in tin barrels and then set fire to the barrel for light. A larger wave of vehicles drove toward the city on the snake-like road. The caravan of headlights looked like a train in the night. The cars came to a halt around the lot, and I noticed a familiar blue car.
Randy Alcott stood out of his car, parking on top of the rubble. Randy’s friends surrounded him and cheered him on for the fight as if he were their champion.
“Nothing to do now but wait for it to start,” Adam said. “There’s supposed to be a lot of kids from Reno here tonight.”
Reno was the town everyone in Fallon loved to hate. The only two survival cities in the Nevada Territory were bound to be rivals, especially after the Weekly Telepath declared Fallon the most beautiful town in the Territory.
“You’d think they would come more often,” Seth said.
“It doesn’t matter,” Adam said. “They never do well.”
“My mom would die if she saw this,” Seth said.
“What did you tell your mom?” I asked. She was strict and knew how to ruin a good time.
“I told her we were going to the movies.” Seth tilted his head off the edge of the building with his feet anchored in a chair.
“How did you fool a mind-reader?” I asked. Seth knew how impossible it was to hide things from a mind-reader.
“It works differently for her than it does for your uncle,” Seth said. “I don’t understand it myself, but she can’t read thoughts– she just knows when someone lies to her. So after we left the house, Adam and I went to the theater, and then we came here from there, so technically we weren’t lying.”
I applauded their loophole discovery. “That’s creative.”
Adam gestured to himself with both his thumbs. “My idea!”
“Tonight, I severed the umbilical cord my mom’s been preserving the last seventeen years,” Seth squeaked with his youthful voice. He propped himself on the ledge, his legs half dangling above the chair. It was hard not to treat Seth like the child he looked like, but Adam and I both knew he detested being treated like a toddler– the way his mom treated him.
“What if your mom finds out later that you came here?” I asked.
“It will be worth it,” Seth assured me. “I’d rather live for one night and be grounded for a month than never live at all. Breaking the law is fun!” Seth shuddered.
I remembered that what we were doing was technically against Military Law. We weren’t supposed to leave Fallon after dark. The rule wasn’t regularly enforced, and it was easy to break when your best friend was a teleporter. Vegas was hours away from Fallon, but Adam made the trip in seconds.
At times, the fighting was epic. Adam never participated in the fights, but there were several students from school that did. My main motivation for coming was to see Randy Alcott lose his match, but so far, Randy was undefeated. Going up against Randy always tempted Adam to join, but it wasn’t in his nature to hurt anyone. He just liked the entertainment purpose of it.
“What are they doing now?” Seth asked.
“The fighters are drawing their numbers,” I said.
Twenty cars surrounded the empty lot. Each one shined its lights into the empty space like stadium lights. Randy Alcott reached in his car and turned up the radio. Music blasted and echoed throughout the empty city. The deep thud of the bass vibrated the old buildings like a booming thunder. A girl spray-painted a white circle around the perimeter of the arena. The fighters weren’t confined to the circle, but it’s where they would begin their fight.
Jacklyn Oleman took her position in the middle of the white circle. Lance Porter emerged from the crowd as her opponent. Both of them were from Fallon. The crowd reached over a hundred people, each one screaming and cheering for their fighter. Even a few adults who had never let go of adolescence came to watch the fights. I saw some people my age that I didn’t recognize. They had to be from Reno. We looked around at other buildings. People climbed them for good seats. Other teleporters found roofs of their own. The people without roof access sat on their cars.
“Super strength versus super dumb,” Adam said.
Lance and Adam didn’t like each other because they liked the same girl in our sophomore year. I thought the grudge was juvenile, but I wasn’t going to lecture Adam on his social life.
“What’s Lance’s extra-human trait?” Seth asked.
“Ignorance,” Adam said casually.
I chuckled. “He’s technically a speedster,” I responded. He has reflexes that allow him to react quickly, but he can’t run like my mom or anything like that. Most speedsters are a class three, but he’s a class four. Jacklyn is a two.”
“Why doesn’t Adam like him?” Seth asked.
“A girl,” I answered.
Adam rolled his eyes. “It’s not about a girl. I have plenty of reasons for not liking him. Remember that time he tripped you in the hallway. You chipped a tooth.”
I remembered all too well, but out of all the abusive stunts against me, Lance Porter wasn’t a major offender.
A car horn blasted though the empty lot and signaled the first fight to begin.
Lance ran towards Jacklyn’s stocky body, gracefully flipping over her before she made contact with a bludgeoning punch. His body moved, twisted, and skipped with a swift finesse, dashing back and forth constantly. Jacklyn was quick, but Lance was quicker. Jacklyn swung behind her with brute force, but was too late to make contact with Lance, who pivoted around her like a dancer, keeping himself positioned just out of Jacklyn’s reach.
“Future permit, all she has to do is land one punch for this to be over,” Adam said with a hopeful tone. He watched the fight intently, leaning over the edge of the roof.
Lance seemed to know that he couldn’t afford to let Jacklyn make contact. He kept getting close to her but evading her attacks at the last second. He used her own weight and force of her punches against her. She lost her balance after over-extending a missing jab at Lance.
I realized he was trying to make her tired. Sweat dripped from Jacklyn’s dirty-blond hair. She panted heavily, trying to catch her breath. Her shoulders moved up and down as she inhaled and exhaled, doing her best to stay aware of Lance. She ran towards a building and picked up a chunk of cement that was twice as big as her body. She broke it in two then threw the large pieces in Lance’s direction.
Lance did some impressive gymnastics to avoid the first stone, rolling his body horizontally in midair. The second piece missed as well, but broke into chunks that went flying in all directions when it landed. One piece of debris hit Lance in the chest and sent him to the ground. The sand absorbed his impact, but it knocked the breath out of him.
&nbs
p; Jacklyn ran towards where Lance was lying on the ground. She made an epic jump, preparing to squash him.
I didn’t know if I could look. It was going to be painful for Lance if she made contact.
She landed, and a cloud of dust and sand filled the lot. The crowd of spectators coughed in the sand-filled air. People cheered and chanted Jacklyn’s name, but no one could see if she had hit Lance. The cheering faded and all that could be heard was the music from Randy’s car.
I could barely see. Had she made contact?
The dust cleared. Lance wasn’t in the crater where Jacklyn’s fist rested. Jacklyn continued to pant heavily. I wondered where Lance was or if she had clobbered him to smithereens. Everyone’s eyes searched the empty area for a trace of Lance.
Lance finally sprung up from behind Jacklyn and tried to grab her, but Jacklyn was quicker than he was this time; she landed a kick right in his gut that sent him dragging across the sandy ground for twenty yards. Bones crackled and snapped as his body dragged across the arena.
The crowd winced at the damage.
Two healers were already at Lance’s side. It looked like he might have dislocated his shoulder, and I wouldn’t have been surprised if there had been some internal bleeding after that kick. The healers placed their hands on Lance’s chest. A white, healing light glowed around their hands. It took the healers a full minute to get Lance on his feet again. He finally stood up appearing unharmed, except for the rips in his shirt. He waved to the crowd, but kicked the sand for his loss.
Adam had a smug look on his face when Jacklyn was declared the winner. She joined her friends, who all seemed to take glory in a victory over a guy. Not many girls fought, but no one could deny Jacklyn kicked ass.
Neither of the next two matches lasted much longer than a minute. The fights weren’t well-balanced. A class four EHT versus a class two usually ended brutally and quickly. The healers were on standby every second. The class two kid from Reno wound up unconscious on the ground after being electrocuted by Bowman Sanders.
A girl called for the next fighters to enter the ring. One person entered as everyone waited for the second fighter to emerge. Seth strained to see harder when the fighter didn’t immediately surface.
Adam pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket, and I saw the number four written on it.
“You can’t be serious,” I said. “When did you get that?”
“When you weren’t looking,” Adam said, staring at the number.
“No way,” Seth said, noticing Adam’s card. “Are you fighting?”
Marcus Pain, who controlled rock and sand, entertained the crowd from the ring. He had a rare ability, called geokinesis, and he usually did well in the fights. The crowd loved him. I didn’t know how well Adam could defend himself against Marcus.
The girl called out again for the final fighter.
“Come on, Adam, don’t do this,” I said. “You don’t have anything to prove.”
“I need to learn to fight sometime,” Adam said. He refused to even look at me.
Before I could get another word in, Adam vanished, and he reappeared in the arena.
“GO, ADAM!” Seth yelled.
I shrugged off my concern and cheered as well. Seth and I hollered and yelled Adam’s name. Even though I was supporting Adam, I couldn’t help but think something was up with him. He never fought in the fights, so why now?
A new song started to play with a moving rock drive, and Adam bounced arrogantly in rhythm to the music as if loosening himself up. Adam and Marcus stared each other down until the car horn began the fight.
Adam didn’t stay put for long. He teleported all around his opponent, and Marcus struggled to keep up. Adam kept circling around him like numbers on a clock. Marcus had to readjust his stance to keep up with Adam.
Adam hid himself for a few seconds, then eventually made a sneak attack only to get a mouth full of sand. Marcus was more experienced than Adam and was ready for the surprise attack.
Adam collapsed on the ground, spitting sand and wiping it out of his eyes. He disappeared from sight. He didn’t stay in one place long. He moved so fast sometimes it was like he was in two places at once. Adam wound up close enough to Marcus for some hand-to-hand. Adam landed a few jabs on Marcus, but he had to keep moving to avoid Marcus’s gusts of sand and rock. He reappeared every few seconds, and occasionally managed to knock Marcus off balance.
Adam fought with an anger I didn’t recognize. He punched Marcus in the gut, teleported behind him, and swiped Marcus’s legs from underneath him.
“Yeah!” Seth yelled. “Get’em, Adam!”
Marcus was determined not to lose. With one flinging motion of his hands, the area exploded in a sand and dust cloud, knocking Adam out of the arena.
Marcus pulled the debris above his head into a sphere of sand and dirt. The ball grew as big as three of Adam, but Adam appeared behind Marcus and pushed him on the ground where the ball collapsed and buried them both.
When the healers were done digging the two battlers out, Adam’s body was gone. Marcus’s body was partially buried and unconscious. Finally, Adam appeared on top of the pile unharmed. He stood proud and cocky with his hands on his hips as if winning a game of king of the hill. He was declared the winner.
Adam reappeared next to us while the crowd still cheered for his success.
“That was so awesome,” Seth said. “You were on fire!”
“I have to admit, Adam, I’m a little jealous,” I said. I longed to do the things Adam could do.
Adam acted more humble about his victory than I would have thought. I expected Adam to show a bit of ego. Something was definitely up. Usually, Adam told me everything. I just had to wait for him to tell me in his own time– or, maybe, I was just reading into things too much.
The next fight started, and we watched, but we continued to talk about Adam knocking the fire out of Marcus.
Some of the matches were disappointing. Not everyone had great control of their abilities. The Reno people never did well. The next two matches weren’t nearly as interesting as the others, but both produced victors from Fallon over Reno fighters. Seth seemed to be enjoying himself. I attempted to make small talk with him and Adam during the less interesting matches, but they stayed focused on the fights, leaving me bored.
I wondered what Evee would think about this. Did she do things similar to this in San Diego? It was getting harder for me not to tell Adam about Evee. When something occupied my mind the way Evee did, Adam usually knew about it. He had been on a few dates and I knew I could use his expertise. I reminded myself that she might not even be attending Fallon High School, and that if I revealed my secret, he might think I was some crazed, love-struck stalker.
I’ll wait, I thought. All I wanted to do was talk about Evee, but I didn’t have a reason to talk about her. I probably never would have an excuse for her to be on the periphery of my thoughts, but thinking about her was somehow satisfying.
The last fight was about to start. Everyone was waiting for this one. It was Randy Alcott against Allen Young. They stepped into the ring.
The two boys held eye contact as if to psyche-out their opponent. They were both from Fallon, both class ones and friends with each other, but tonight they were adversaries fighting to prove who was more powerful. I knew firsthand the destruction each was capable of. They had both tortured me over the years. I'd seen them fight before with Randy as the victor. Allen had unparalleled telekinetic abilities. I found myself rooting for him– the lesser of two evils.
“This will be good,” I said.
Seth and Adam agreed and straightened up so that their full attention was on the fighters. The crowd went silent waiting.
The fighters took their positions. Randy rotated his head in a cocky fashion as Allen just stared Randy down. He looked determined not to lose to Randy again. A girl honked her car horn, signaling them to begin.
Allen held his hands out by his sides and closed his eyes. About a dozen boulders
the size of car wheels flew towards him and started orbiting around him in a perfect circle.
Letting out an animalistic roar, Randy sent flames two-stories-tall flying at Allen.
Allen blocked four pillars of flames with the rocks and sent one hurling towards Randy.
Randy countered the rock with a fireball of his own. The hurling projectiles made contact in the middle of the two fighters, making an explosion that sent the crowd into an uproar.
Both fighters had to be admired. The way they positioned and used their bodies to fight was graceful. I couldn’t help but think it almost looked like a dance. I envied both abilities, unsure of which I would prefer if things were different for me. Telekinesis had always been a favorite of mine.
Randy tried to engulf Allen in flames, but Allen wrapped himself in a telekinetic cocoon. When Randy’s flames died down, Allen appeared unharmed. He picked Randy up with his mind and sent him flying. Randy hit the ground a few yards away from where he had been standing. Allen stood over Randy in seconds. He concentrated, and Allen lifted Randy off the ground with his mind. It looked as if Randy fell into the air.
The way Allen used his ability gave me chills– not to mention that Randy was seconds away from losing.
“What’s that?” Seth said, pointing into the dark distance.
I looked in the direction that he was pointing and saw a line of cars driving towards the town. I wondered if it was more people coming to watch, but the night was almost over.
The people on the ground noticed the vehicles approaching the city. Allen noticed, too, but he kept Randy suspended above his head, waiting to be declared the victor.
Big Military jeeps and vans pulled up and soldiers in uniforms immediately assembled in the area. Most soldiers carried guns or some form of weapon because not every EHT had lethal implications, but the unarmed soldiers would be the most dangerous. The class ones, I thought. Class ones were the most powerful people among us.
