Robot Warriors

First published in 2013 by Curious Fox,
an imprint of Capstone Global Library Limited,
7 Pilgrim Street, London, EC4V 6LB
Registered company number: 6695582

www.curious-fox.com

Text © Hothouse Fiction Ltd 2013

Series created by Hothouse Fiction
www.hothousefiction.com

The author’s moral rights are hereby asserted.

Cover Illustration by Dani Geremia

All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

ISBN 978 1 78202 008 0

1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

A CIP catalogue for this book is available from the British Library.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means (including photocopying or storing it in any medium by electronic means and whether or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this publication) without the written permission of the copyright owner.

ebook created by Hothouse Fiction Ltd

With special thanks to Adrian Bott

Dedicated to the memory of Ray Bradbury, who showed so many of us the way to the stars

Walking into Hyperspace High’s main lecture hall, John Riley thought for a moment that the colossal ship had vanished around him. As he sat down on a nearby HoloStool, the awesome virtual reality effect of the walls and floor showed the starry heavens scrolling past in perfect 3-D. The black depths of space surrounded the students, dotted with occasional planets and stars. It almost felt as if John could reach out and touch them. However much time he spent on this ship, John never failed to be impressed by his school’s technology.

Every single student at Hyperspace High seemed to be in the hall. Students were still crowding in, no two of them alike. They waddled, crawled, fluttered, shuffled, drifted above the ground, or stalked on long, sucker-toed legs.

“Excuse me, human. Can I just squeeze past?”

John looked up at a three-metre blue slug. “Erm... sure,” John said, with a nervous grin. He drew his legs up on to his MorphSeat and gave the creature as much room as he could. The MorphSeat obligingly changed shape, adapting to his body.

The blue slug squidged past, making a noise like a rubber boot being sucked into mud. It settled itself across two empty MorphSeats with a contented sigh. The seats morphed together into a sort of banana-shaped couch, holding the alien comfortably.

“Thanks,” it gurgled.

“No problem,” John said, smiling despite his disappointment. He’d been secretly saving those seats for his best friends, Emmie and Kaal. But they were nowhere to be seen in the crowd.

More students pressed past John, looking for the few remaining seats – first a greenish, pear-like being with a mouthful of jagged teeth, then something like a round lava lamp that trundled past on tank tracks. John couldn’t help staring in amazement at them. They were just so
alien
. No, he corrected himself, not
alien
. Just very different to human beings. Even after the weeks he’d spent at Hyperspace High, he still wasn’t completely used to it. All those years he’d spent growing up on Earth, wondering if there might be extraterrestrial life somewhere out among the stars... and now here he was, with alien life shoving, elbowing and – well –
tentacling
him as it crowded past.

Life at a boarding school in England would have been a lot less interesting. If he hadn’t overslept that fateful morning, jumped onto a suspiciously high-tech coach, and accidentally ended up on Hyperspace High in place of a Martian prince, he’d be there now. Of course, his parents thought he
was
there now, which made talking to them about school a bit awkward.

There must be at least a thousand students here
, John thought. He could count heads – but that wouldn’t be much help, since not all of the students had a head, and some had several. At any rate, there were
far
more students here than there had been at his old school. What’s more, they all seemed excited, as if they were expecting something. Voices babbled away on all sides. John felt left out. Nobody had bothered to tell him why they were all gathered in this lecture at midday. And he was surprised Kaal and Emmie hadn’t come to find him here – they would have told him what was going on. It wasn’t a normal assembly, he was sure of that much.

He tried to listen to what the other students were saying and managed to catch a few words:

“...stomped the Powanator completely flat!”

“Yeah, but then Rippertron pulled its leg off. Not much of a Stomper with only one leg, was it?”

John desperately wanted to ask what they were talking about, but he stopped himself. Plenty of the students already thought he was a “primitive Earthling” who didn’t know anything. The last thing he wanted to do was prove them right. Fortunately, he didn’t have to wait long to find out. With a
wheeze-STOMP, wheeze-STOMP
of mechanical limbs, Master Tronic came hulking onto the stage.

Master Tronic wasn’t just the technology teacher – he himself was a walking, talking technology lesson. He liked to rebuild his body depending on what he was teaching the students. John rubbed his elbow as he remembered the time Master Tronic had taken the form of a kinetic force cannon to teach them about particle collisions. The rapid-fire zero-G tennis ball barrage had got a bit out of hand, and his elbow felt sore just remembering the accident...

Today, Master Tronic was a robot. His upper body was huge and ape-like, armoured with metal plates and strung with cables, while below his legs ended in two gigantic saucer-shaped feet. He swung his metal skull from left to right, glowering at the students.

John swallowed hard.
Did this mean trouble?

Master Tronic began to speak. With each word, a narrow band of red light throbbed in his skull. His deep electronic voice boomed through the hall. “I am delighted to announce this year’s Robot Warriors’ contest.”

A hush fell over the hall. John glanced around and saw all the students excitedly taking notes, whispering to one another, and fidgeting in giddy excitement. Obviously, they all knew what a Robot Warriors’ contest was and couldn’t wait to get started. John guessed he must be the only student in the whole school who had no idea what it was all about. Even so, he had to admit that it sounded cool.

“The rules of the contest,” rumbled Master Tronic, “are exactly the same as last year − and indeed every year.”

John’s heart sank. He had no idea of the rules and dreaded the thought of asking for help, without his friends nearby to tell him.

“However,” Master Tronic continued, “I shall go over the rules once again for our first years’ benefit. There is NO EXCUSE FOR FORGETTING THEM.”

Suddenly, John felt a lot better.

“Each student is to build his or her own robot, and these robots will go on to compete against each other in a series of trials. The trials change every year, but students will not be told what they are ahead of time. However, I can tell you this.” Master Tronic leaned forward. “Brute strength alone will NOT be enough to win!”

“Says the teacher built like a battle droid,” the slug whispered to John.

“Tomorrow has been chosen as Robot-Building Day. All other lessons have been cancelled. Instead, you will spend tomorrow designing and building your robots!”

Wild cheers broke out in the hall. Master Tronic waved his hands for calm.

John alone wasn’t cheering. He was staring ahead, open-mouthed.
One day?
He had only ONE DAY to design and build a robot?

“As always, the rule is one robot per student. No team entries are allowed, and every student is expected to participate.”

Including me
, John thought. The thought was terrifying and exciting at the same time.

“The first rounds will be held the day after tomorrow,” Master Tronic continued. “Then, the next day, the semi-finals and final will take place, and the winner will be crowned Robot Warrior champion of the year!” He paused. “And although luck is a superstitious concept that has no place in a technology class... good luck!”

The students left the hall in a chattering rush. John wandered through the Centre, still burning with questions about the contest. Everywhere he looked, from the seats by the rippling lake to the starlit balconies under the great dome, students were talking eagerly about robots and nothing else. It was as if the entire school had gone robot mad! John shook his head and kept looking for his friends.

He finally found Kaal and Emmie sitting at a table in Ska’s Caf
é
, in a far corner where the black walls swirled with nebular patterns. Kaal, John’s room-mate from the planet Derril, had crammed his huge, green demon-like body behind the table, as if he was hiding behind it. Beside him, the beautiful Sillaran, Emmie, was waving excitedly. The most human-looking of any of the other pupils on Hyperspace High, Emmie’s faintly golden skin shone and her navy-blue eyes twinkled as she beckoned John over.

John navigated past tables crowded with feathered and diamond-scaled beings, tables where students were already building little model robots out of drinking straws and alien cutlery.

Emmie pushed back her chair and bounded up to him, her gleaming, silver hair trailing like rocket exhaust. “Can you believe it? It’s Robot Warriors time already! What are you going to make? Have you decided yet?”

“I’m... er... still at the design stage,” John blustered.

“Smart move!” croaked Gyrim Florm, a frog-like, midnight-black third year with a white mohawk of hair and a silver kilt who was sat at the next table over. “Check out the competition first, THEN decide!”

“I’m going to build Thunderbolt Three,” said his companion Bosquip, who was mostly tentacles and a single goggling eye. “Loads of armour and an electron ram. Like last year’s robot – only better.”

“Thats what you said last year,” Gyrim pointed out. “When you built Thunderbolt Two, and it exploded.”

“It still lasted longer than Thunderbolt One,” Bosquip said stubbornly.

“Which holds the record for the shortest-lived robot in the history of the contest,” Emmie said brightly.

“What happened?” John had to ask.

Gyrim hesitated. “It aimed, it fired... and it blew a great big hole in the hull.
Whoosh
, it got sucked out into space. Lasted three whole seconds.”

“Three
glorious
seconds!” sighed Bosquip, quivering his tentacles dramatically. Everyone laughed, even John.

A robo-waiter glided over to them, bringing a transparent tray with three tall purple glasses.

“Brucko juices are on me,” Emmie said. “Good luck, everyone!”

As the three of them leaned in to slurp at their drinks, John said in a low voice to Emmie and Kaal, “What’s the big deal with this contest, anyway? Everyone’s going barmy over it.”

Emmie’s blue eyes went very wide. “You don’t know?”

“Of course he doesn’t know,” Kaal whispered. “He’s
new.
”

John sucked at his Brucko juice. His mouth flooded with amazing flavour – sweet and zingy at the same time, like plum and cherry syrup with exploding pop rocks in it.

“Suck the bubbles up,” Emmie told him. “They’re chewy.”

John chased bubbles around with his straw while Kaal did his best to explain the contest.

“Winning the Robot Warriors’ contest is basically a shortcut to being king or queen of the school,” he said. “You get major respect from all the students. Everyone wants to be your friend. And there’s a prize.”

“The prize is always
epic,
” said Emmie, through a mouthful of bubbles. “Here, check out Quondass val Haq,” said Kaal. “He won the contest last year. Now look at him.”

Quondass was a scaly bodied student with a round belly and fangs like broom handles that jutted from his lower lip. He reminded John of a troll figure he’d once painted for a war game. As usual, Quondass had his fan club around him, a gang of adoring students who kept his table supplied with drinks and snacks. As John watched, the whole group laughed loudly at the same time.

“His jokes aren’t even funny,” Emmie said, “but they all laugh anyway.”

Aha!
John thought.
That explains why he’s so popular!
Well, it couldn’t have been for his looks...

“So they still think he’s awesome, even a year later?”

“Oh, yeah,” Emmie breathed. “You see, his prize was a private gig by Neutron Decay, the heaviest heavy rock band in the galaxy! All those fans of his are students he put on the guest list!”

“Wow,” John said. “So what’s this year’s prize?”

“Nobody knows,” Kaal said. “But the funny thing is – it’s always something the winner really wants. As if
someone
knew who would win, before the contest even started!”

John and Emmie looked at one another. “Lorem,” they said at the same time. Lorem, Hyperspace High’s headmaster, had an ability to see into the future.

“So what would you want to be the prize if you won, Emmie?” Kaal asked, finishing his Brucko juice with a loud slurp.

“A new model Flitter X5000,” Emmie answered instantly.

“What’s wrong with your old one?” John joked. Emmie had shown him clips of her flying her little personal ship back home on Sillar, weaving in between trees at dangerous speeds.

“Nothing’s
wrong
with it. It just doesn’t have the cool lights on the underneath, or the turbo button, or the underwater cruising mode... So, what would
you
want the prize to be, Kaal?”

“Nothing much,” Kaal said mildly. “Just a trip home at half-term. I know we get to go back at the end of term, but—”

“
But
the poor Derrilian is all homesick,” sneered a familiar arrogant voice. “What’s the matter, Kaal? Missing your mummy?”

Mordant Talliver had crept up behind them. Above his shoulder hovered his constant companion and only friend, the cricket-ball-sized droid, G-Vez.

“Oh, that was a good one, master,” it chirped.

Mordant’s yellow eyes gleamed as the black rubbery tentacles that grew from his ribcage rubbed together in delight. The half-Gargon never missed an opportunity to bully his classmates, and his silver drone was always quick to praise his efforts.

“Why don’t you enter that Serve-U-Droid of yours in the contest?” John asked. “There might be a boot-licking round.”

“We have to design our own robots from scratch. Surely even
you
know that,” Mordant said nastily, as he swung back his large mane of black hair. “I wouldn’t even bother trying, if I were you. Your primitive human brain doesn’t stand a chance!”

G-Vez agreed. “Quite so, master. Perhaps the Earthling will try to make a robot out of sticks and animal skins!”

Mordant gave a low snigger. G-Vez bobbed up and down.

“Get lost, Talliver,” Emmie said.

“Don’t worry, I’m going. I’ve got to get started on my winning design,” Mordant said, and scurried away. One of his tentacles flicked the back of John’s head in a final insulting salute.

“You know, I don’t much care who wins, so long as it isn’t
him
,” Kaal muttered, as soon as Mordant was out of sight.

But John was lost in his own thoughts. He wasn’t just going to enter the Robot Warriors’ contest. Now he wanted to
win
it. No prize could be better than showing the likes of Mordant Talliver that a “primitive Earthling” really did deserve to be a student at Hyperspace High. In fact, John thought it might prove to the whole school that he was just as entitled to be a student here as everyone else. This was his chance.