Arena Mode (25 page)

That would certainly fit the definition of irony: a regular guy enters a death match with superhumans, survives a bunch of crazy life-threatening battles ... and then dies in a traffic accident.

Brynja had a concern of her own: she was currently in a solid physical state, and wasn’t sure if she’d be able to fade out on command if she was in danger. “I feed off of your focus,” she explained. “The more in sync we are, the more of your energy I can use to control my transformation.” It was my intention that originally gave her mass and form, and for better or worse, I was now linked to her.

It made sense, or as much sense as things were generally making up until that point, but I wasn’t sure what the solution was. “I’ve been with you for a while ... doesn’t that count for something?”

She nodded. “I need to know more about the
real
you. Then I can dive deeper into your psyche and use your energy to fade in and out. It’s all about connection, and connection begins with honesty.”

I shifted uncomfortably and folded my arms over my chest. “How honest are we talking about, here?”

She replied with a cynical smile. “Take it easy. I’m not asking for you to tell me your browser history. But I
do
need something personal. The way to open your mind is by revealing a secret, like some deep fear or desire that you hide from the rest of the world.” Brynja explained that, even though she can read surface thoughts, she was unable to dig any deeper without the other person allowing her access.

It was the most vague request I’d ever received. I wanted to help, but wasn’t sure what to say – if I
knew
what my deepest fears and desires were, I wouldn’t be so screwed up in the first place. “Well, I know that I have commitment issues,” I said with an awkward shrug.

She leaned back on the hood of a car and shook her head. “No shit. You’re a
guy
. Plus you have that look about you. It’s pretty obvious.”

“What makes it obvious?” I asked.

“I don’t know, it’s just a quality you have. Girls can always see the commitment-phobes from a mile away. And it just gets worse when you start dating them.”

“If you know a guy is a ‘commitment-phobe’ then why would you date him in the first place?”

“Because when it comes to romance, we’re hopelessly optimistic,” she said with a pronounced sigh, followed by an even more pronounced eye roll. “And for some stupid reason, we think we can actually
fix
you guys. It’s a girl thing that doesn’t make a lot of sense ... I don’t have time to explain it. Just tell me something
really
personal. Something that you’ve never said out loud.”

It actually didn’t take that much digging. I said something that scared me, and that I was embarrassed to admit, even to myself. I felt like I’d be a terrible person if I said it out loud, but revealing it now could save someone’s life. It wasn’t the time to hold back. “I have a tumor in my head, and it’s killing me. I need money for the surgery, and it’s the only reason I’m here, risking my life in this tournament.”

Brynja’s eyebrows raised and she sat up straighter. For someone who was seemingly unfazed by the strange and unusual, I had managed to legitimately shock her.

“But it’s also the thing that makes me smarter than everyone else. It’s like my ‘superpower’, I guess. If I get it removed, the surgery won’t just be saving my life ... it’ll be stripping away my power. Everything that makes me who I am.”

“Damn,” She whispered. For a moment she didn’t know what else to say.

I leaned back on the motorcycle, letting my arms dangle at my sides.

“So that’s why you’re here,” she said quietly, “risking your ass when you don’t have any actual powers. I just figured you for some kind of an adrenaline junkie, like Kenneth – living out the ultimate ‘Live Action Role Playing’ fantasy.”

I was spilling everything, so there was no use in keeping things buried. “Well, there’s a
little
of that. If I’m gonna go out, go out with a bang, right? At least I can die with my name in the history books. It’s not like I’m leaving anything else behind.”

“So you’re sure the tumor is what’s making you smart?”

The truth is that I wasn’t completely certain, but it was the only logical explanation. “That’s what my doctor thinks. It’s been pressing on different parts of my brain for my entire life, giving me advanced math and problem solving skills. If I get it removed, then I’ll become like everyone else. I don’t know if I can handle it.”

“Why not?” she asked, with genuine concern etched into her voice. “It can’t be all that bad. I sure wouldn’t mind being a little more normal.”

“If I had what other people had, like a family, a job, or some grand purpose in life, it might not seem
so
bad.” I ran my fingers through my hair and looked up at the ceiling. “But sometimes I feel like this is it.”

Her smile grew bitter. “So you’re telling me that you’re here, fighting for your life, just because you want to retain your super-sized IQ? There’s
nothing
else worth living for?” She pushed herself off the hood of the car and stepped towards me, placing her palm flat against my chest plate. “What about her?”

“Her?”

She clacked her fingernail into my breastplate, directly over my heart. “The rings you’re wearing around the chain. I saw you tuck them back into your armor before I found you in the alley.”

I didn’t even realize I’d done it; the rings must have fallen loose when I fell from the rooftop.

“You’re scared of commitment,” she continued, “
but
, for some mysterious reason, you’re wearing a necklace with rings on it. Either you’re married, which seems unlikely, or some girl gave you the rings before you came into The Arena. Someone you legitimately care about ... and that scares the shit out of you.”

I didn’t know whether Brynja had gathered all this information from her observations, or was retrieving it from inside my head; either way, she seemed to know exactly what was going on. “Her name is Peyton. We’ve been friends for years, and recently we had this night ... this
amazing
night together, but then I started pulling away. I was just thinking about everything that could go wrong. The fact that her brother is my best friend, and if something happens between us and it goes south ... it’s just too big a risk.”

Brynja hopped up onto the hood of the Ferarri and leaned against the windshield, placing her hands behind her head as if she were sunning herself on a poolside lounge chair. “So, what you’re saying is that your best friend would rather see some idiot hook up with his sister than
you
, a great guy that he obviously trusts?”

I sagged against the motorcycle, staring down at my armored boots. “It’s more than that.”

“Mmm.” She nodded, prompting me to continue.

“It’s like, she’s this worldly person who goes to college, and travels, and speaks different languages and volunteers at an animal shelter. And she’s brave.
And
experimental. One time she dated a
girl
...”

Brynja let out a tiny chuckle. “And you’re upset she never let you watch?”

I shook my head. “No, it’s not that at all. She’s just this amazing person who’s
already
done so much, and lived this exciting life. It’s just that I just don’t understand what she would ever ...”

“See in someone like you?” she interrupted. “And you think once you start dating and she gets to know the
real
you, she’ll realize that you’re not good enough for her. Then it’s game over.”

“It’s the logical outcome. I’ve done the math.”

She hopped off the hood of the car and walked back to me, resting her hands on my shoulders. “If you think that people falling for each other has
anything
to do with rational thought, you’ve never really fallen for anyone. I sure as hell didn’t love my last boyfriend … most of the time I downright loathed him.”

I tilted my chin up, forcing a smile across my lips. “Sounds wonderful.”

“It
was
,” she said insistently. “At the beginning. And then we got to know each other, and before long it sucked. But that’s the way it goes: you put your cards on the table, let the chips fall where they may – insert any hackneyed gambling cliché you can think of here. But
that’s
what you gotta do: just go with your gut and trust yourself.”

I exhaled loudly through my nostrils and massaged the back of my neck. “And if it doesn’t work out?”

“Then it doesn’t work out,” she said in a child-like voice, tilting her head to the side as her eyes widened. “And your tender little heart gets smashed into a million tiny pieces.” After a beat, she narrowed her eyes and patted me on the side of the head. “You’ll get over it, cupcake. Now stop making excuses. That shit ain’t flattering.”

“I’m
not
making excuses. Things just ... I don’t see it working. Sometimes people just aren’t right for each other ... right?”

“And yet, you’re wearing a ring – a ring from this girl that you
don’t
want to be with.” She shook her head slowly. “For someone who’s supposed to be a super genius, you’re a
huge
dumb-ass.”

The security gates slid quietly into the ceiling and we raced out of the parking garage.
I rode with Bryjna behind me, her arms wrapped tightly around my waist and her face buried into my back. She was still in solid form, and it made her nervous. I didn’t blame her. Hopefully I’d given her enough of a personal connection to allow her the ability to fade out when it mattered most.

When we reached the top of the ramp, I planted my feet into the sidewalk to keep the motorcycle upright, scanning the streets on either side. They were clear. Vitesse hadn’t arrived yet, but he had to be somewhere in the immediate area. Seeing us on-screen, unarmed, would be too much of a temptation.

Before I was able to pull into the road, a powerful gust of wind blew pebbles and dust along the sidewalk, peppering my face. I wiped my watering eyes with the back of my hand, blinking hard to loosen the debris. When I focused my vision, I came face-to-face with a floating nightmare.

A blue lion – the size of a pit bull – hovered at eye-level, flapping a pair of sinewy dragon wings. A scorpion tail swayed behind him, capped with a wicked barb. It was another manticore. Like a clone of the mythical creature that The Living Eye had manifested before he died, but much smaller, and sporting a flowing, white mane.

It stared at me curiously, cocking its head with a low grumble. I stared back, frozen. I tightened my grip around the handles of the motorcycle until I felt like I might rip them off. “Hey,” I whispered without moving my lips. “There’s a goddamned
manticore.
In front of us.”

“Melvin?” She shouted, popping her head out from around my shoulder. “Is that you?” It floated behind me and grunted its approval at the sight of Brynja, rubbing noses with her in mid-air. She ran her fingers through its mane and greeted him with a warm smile.

“You have a pet manticore?” I shouted, unintentionally loud. “It never occurred to you that this might be some important information?!” I wasn’t thrilled with the idea of being so close to that thing; I wasn’t even a cat person, let alone a ‘cat with wings and a scorpion tail’ person.

She threw her head back and laughed while she continued to scratch behind the manticore’s ear, much to its delight. “It’s not my
pet,
Mox. Kenneth made it for me before we split up and searched for you. Melvin disappeared when he died – just turned to dust and blew away. I never thought I’d see him again.”

I leaned back to give it some additional space. I didn’t want to get near it, even though it appeared friendly. “And his name ... the manticore’s name is actually
Melvin
?”

She shrugged. “Well, that’s what
I
call him, and he doesn’t seem to mind. We didn’t have much of a chance to bond before he disappeared on me.”

The questions spun through my mind. How was one of Kenneth’s manifestations still intact hours after his death, and did
it somehow have a mind of its own? Did this thing exist
in another dimension before arriving here? I didn’t have time to ponder metaphysics. We needed to move.

“Can you control it? Melvin, I mean?”

“I have no idea,” Brynja replied, cupping it’s chin in her hands. “He communicates with me in thoughts, but they’re broken and hard to decipher. It’s like having a conversation with a sleepy toddler – I usually just get one word at a time.”

Melvin dipped his head, and his ears perked up; a tiny growl rumbled from deep inside his chest.

“He can hear something,” she said.

A silhouette emerged from between two buildings a few blocks north, moving unnaturally fast.

It was coming our way.

“I think I know who he heard.” I hit the throttle and lowered my chin, flipping up the kickstand with my heel. “Hold on tight.”