Timesurfers (31 page)

“How come you three haven’t done the GTs
before?” Cate asked.

“Only Naitanui demands his recruits complete
them. Mortez makes it optional. We were waiting for a reason. And
you’re it.” Balthazar ripped a length of tape and handed it to
her.

“No pressure.” She copied the boys and
wrapped the tape around her arms and legs. Her nerves stepped up a
level. “Is the future me out there watching?”

“She can’t watch because you’re here. There’s
an aura clash. She’s running a horrendous temperature, and will be
until midnight our time. At midnight the fever will break and
she’ll remember everything that’s gone on with you in this
alternate history. Assuming you’re still alive.”

“What?”

“You die, she’s dead.” Gaspar gave his scalp
a vicious scratch and shuddered. “I can still feel them crawling
around.”

“Grommets proceed to the holding pen.” The
nasal voice was back. They shuffled into the holding pen with
around fifty other grommets, who all kept glancing sideways at the
three boys.

“If I survive, I’m going to find the person
who owns that voice and sew their lips together. It’s like nails
down a blackboard on steroids.” Gaspar dug his elbow into her rib
cage. “Stay behind us and we’ll get you to safe ground. Then you
should just wait until the stadium is secure. Understand?”

Common sense would have her agree, but
unsurprisingly, her pride got in the way. “That’s never going to
happen.”

“Predictable.” Gaspar sighed with
resignation. “Idiotic too.”

She took a deep breath, preparing to argue,
when a putrid smell burned her nostrils. It settled in the back of
her throat and she gagged. She attempted to step away from the
stench, but so many grommets were jammed into the small space that
no matter how hard she pushed, no one moved. “That smells like
dead...something.”

“Grommet probably,” Gaspar said.

A low guttural rumble made the wooden rails
surrounding the holding area shudder. Luminous yellow eyes flecked
with brown peered through the gaps in the enclosure. The lions’
pale eyes floated along the fence as they padded the perimeter
restlessly. When they paused to sneer with frustration through the
fence, hot air, dense with the foul, rotting flesh
odour
, wafted across her face. The
deafening roar that followed made her ears ring.

“That would be those pesky lions.” Cate
chewed on her bottom lip. She had really been hoping that they had
changed the format and the lions wouldn’t be here.

Gaspar nodded. “Yep.”

The girl directly to her left sobbed
hysterically. An acidic smell cut through the stench of stale sweat
and rotting flesh. Cate forced what she hoped was an encouraging
smile onto her face and lowered her gaze. The source of the acidic
smell became evident. The girl had urinated, and it was trickling
along the dirt floor.

Cate peeled the damp hair off her neck.
Rivulets of sweat trickled down her back. The three boys were
meditating. Panic and blind terror invaded her mind, rendering any
attempt to tap into calm fruitless. Regardless, she took a few deep
breaths and was overcome by a coughing fit as all the putrid smells
mingled in her nose.

Mel gave her a thumbs up as he adjusted the
spiky metal ball tied around his waist and shook out his arms and
legs. It was oddly comforting to see him loosening up the same as
he did each day before training. His face was devoid of emotion as
he focused on an imaginary spot directly ahead of him. With his
brutally short hair, he now bore a striking resemblance to
Austin.

“Can you not stare at me like that?” Mel
interrupted her thoughts. “It’s weirding me out.”

An enormous roar erupted in the arena. There
was a bucket load of people out there watching.

“That’s the prematch entertainment finished.
We’re up. Check your weapons.” Balthazar adjusted the curved
broadsword on his hip. The jagged edge of a double-sided dagger
glinted in the sun near his shoulder as he wrapped silver wire
around each of his wrists.

The stone handles of the boning knives
strapped to Cate’s legs were smooth and cold to her touch. She
adjusted the thick, prickly rope slung across her shoulder away
from the soft, leather pouch resting over her heart. Balthazar
grabbed her hand and squeezed. She squeezed back. They stood
silently, hands clasped. The heavy wooden gate groaned, shuddered,
and slid open with a rush. “Is it too late to back out?” she
whispered.

Chapter 24

Game On

B
althazar’s eyes burned with the fierce intensity of a
true warrior. “Pretty much.”

She shielded her eyes from the glare of the
sun as the grommets surged forward into the stadium. Thunderous
applause and a vociferous roar rolled around the arena. The stands
were packed with thousands of hazy faces and muted colours.
Something brushed past her head, ripping at her scalp. Her fingers
came away warm and sticky, stained crimson. The grommet to her
right smashed face first into the dirt, an arrow protruding from
his back. She slammed to the ground, flattening herself against the
dirt.

The twang as multiple arrows left their bows
was followed by the wet, dull thunk as they found a target. She
scrambled away from a lifeless body that collapsed across her legs
and searched frantically for the source of the arrows.

Blindfolded Timesurfers lined the stone edge
of arena’s roof. Arrow feathers glinted over the curve of the
archers’ bare shoulders. Black singlets pulled taut across their
chests as they reloaded silver bows and fired with mechanical
precision. An arrow grazed Cate’s arm. She scrambled over a
motionless lion and ducked behind it. Her cheek pressed against its
surprisingly soft and warm belly. Multiple arrows protruded from
its body. Blood seeped around the gaping holes in the grimy tan
coat. It resembled a ghoulish Dalmatian.

Balthazar commando-crawled her way, gesturing
frantically. Timesurfers who lined the other side of the arena
catapulted flaming metal balls into the air. He threw his body
across hers, and a flaming cannonball bounced off him and rolled
onto the dirt.

“You’re fireproof?”

He nodded.

She snatched an arrow from the air heading
directly for Balthazar’s ear. The smoke from the flaming balls made
visibility poor. Cate closed her eyes and listened for the arrows
and flaming balls. All that time training blindfolded with Jonah
now had a purpose. She grabbed Balthazar’s shoulders and rolled
them both to the left. An arrow landed exactly where their heads
had been a second before.

“Thanks.” Balthazar launched them both over
the dead lion. A hail of arrows embedded in the ground where they
had lain. They landed with a thud, followed by a solid crack as her
head smashed into Balthazar’s nose. Warm, wet blood sprayed across
her cheek.

“Not the thank you I was looking for,”
Balthazar groaned.

“Sorry, sorry.” She put her fingers over his
nose, which now had a definite lean to the right. “Be better, be
better, be better.” In less than a second, his nose was perfect
again. There was no hint of the bloody mess from a few minutes
before. The blood was even gone from
her
hands. It was like she’d pushed a rewind button.

She crawled to a grommet with three arrows
protruding from his chest, unaware if he was dead or alive. She
grasped his hand. He thrashed and struggled to his feet. His eyes
glowed violet as he scurried to the other end of the arena. He had
been dead. “You’re welcome,” she muttered. The crunch of bone
shattering and fiery pain that tore through her leg
signalled
one of the flaming balls
had struck her thigh while she had been distracted.

“Hold still.” Balthazar pressed her hand hard
on the charred flesh of her thigh. “Clear your mind and heal
it.”

She howled some very unladylike words at him.
Black spots floated across her eyes and the noise around her
dulled. Chills rippled through her body as ice crept along her
veins. Her head slumped against the earth, now damp and tacky with
blood.

“Don’t be such a girl. It’s barely a flesh
wound,” Balthazar yelled.

“Are you calling me a girl and attempting to
quote Monty Python?”

Balthazar grinned. “Yes indeed.” He touched
his ear and pointed to the sky. “Hear that?”

It was silent. The arrows and fireballs had
stopped.

Balthazar jumped nimbly to his feet for such
a big oaf. “Mend your leg because I have better things to do than
protect your sizable butt all day. Let’s regroup. Preferably well
away from the dead lion that the very-much-alive lions are coming
to eat.”

She braced against the dead lion’s back and
squirmed into a sitting position. The fiery pain in her thigh
spiked each time she twisted. Shards of bone protruded from what
looked like a mangled, raw steak. Shredded sinew and charred flesh
had melted on her jeans. Her stomach heaved, and she leaned away
and vomited.

Balthazar held her hair back from her face.
“Gross. You never were good with blood. Put your hand on your leg
and make it better.”

“B...b...b...better,” she stammered as tears
welled in her eyes.

“There’s no crying at the Grommet Trials,”
Gaspar snapped from over Balthazar’s shoulder. “Warriors don’t cry.
Move away from that dead lion. I’ll do weapon recon.”

“I’ll go and investigate possible alliances
and collaborations.” Balthazar jogged toward the group of grommets
at the far end of the area.

The pain vanished from her leg and the
mangled mess disappeared. Her clothes were no longer torn and the
blood was gone. Battered grommets lay scattered around the arena.
Those dead were silent and glassy eyed. The pain and fear of their
last moments would remain frozen on their faces forever. Pleas for
help punctuated the tortured moans of those close to death. Shrieks
of agony hung like a thick fog in the air.

Two lions lay dead. Sinew and skin rained
down as the three other lions ripped and tore the arms and a leg
from the girl who had stood next to her in the holding pen. The
lions flopped on the blood-soaked ground; the wet, squelching
sounds of teeth chewing flesh mixed with the snapping and crunching
of bones turned her stomach. There were fourteen grommets left,
including her.

“The ‘don’t die’ plan is working a treat so
far.” Mel placed his arm, now freckled with blood, on her shoulder
and winced. His shirt was soaked crimson from a huge gouge down his
side.

“I’ll try and mend your injury.” Her voice
sounded robotic and flat.

Mel winced as he lifted his arm. “It’s
self-inflicted. I fell on the flail. That’s one sharp, pointy ball.
It’s excellent for smacking lions with though.” A wide grin spread
across his face.

Mel might be enjoying this bloodshed a little
too much. Her fingers squelched against his bloodied shirt as she
touched the spongy gash. Before she closed her eyes or even thought
about it healing, the skin had mended and his black T-shirt was
clean again.

He shuddered. “That freaks me out every time.
Your ability to turn back time and delete a little pocket of
history is awesome.”

“I can turn back time?”

Mel nodded.

That was why the blood always
disappeared.

Gaspar zigzagged across the arena, his arms
loaded with weapons collected from the dead grommets. The lions’
incandescent yellow eyes followed him as they continued to chew
lazily, their muzzles and teeth coated crimson with sticky
blood.

Balthazar was back from speaking to the
grommets huddled at the far end of the arena. “I can’t get the
other grommets on board. You’d think the fact Mortez is my mother
would make them scared enough to do what I ask, but apparently
not.”

“We stand a better chance if we work
together. Surely they see that?” There was desperation in Cate’s
voice. Her calf muscles had started to cramp, and her arms felt
heavy.

“We’re the enemy,” Mel interjected. “They
would throw us to those lions in an instant.”

“They don’t even know
me
,” Cate snapped. “I could be a very nice
person!”

“You’re guilty by association,” Mel said.

“Back in,” Balthazar called as Gaspar reached
them. Putting their backs together gave them 360-degree visibility.
“Mel, don’t take your eyes off those lions.”

Mel rolled his eyes. “They’re not doing
anything. I’m not convinced they actually add any danger.”

“Oh please.” Cate elbowed Mel hard in the
ribs. “The addition of lions to anything exponentially increases
the danger. It’s irrefutable.”

Gaspar started divvying up the weapons.
“Everyone gets a spear. There’s another knife and some throwing
razor disks for you, Cate. Ouch!” He sucked his fingers. “They’re
sharp. Watch them.”

She bit the inside of her cheek and
deliberated how to take the disks from him without losing a finger.
“What the...?” Gaspar’s hand was heading straight for her
breasts.

A metal ping was followed by three more as
the disks attached to the silver strips of duct tape from the
weapons room wrapped around her left arm. It was magnetic. “Oh,
that’s what you were doing.” She stood sheepishly while Gaspar
finished distributing weapons.

“Okay. There are four of us and three lions.”
Balthazar’s eyes remained glued to the lions.

Silence followed.

“And...” Cate prompted.

“I was giving a sit rep,” Balthazar said. “We
need an entire army to help with what’s headed this way.”

She jumped as the three boys whooped.

“You two collect the bodies, and I’ll finish
off the injured,” Balthazar commanded.

There were about ten grommets clinging to
life scattered around the arena. “No, don’t kill them. I can heal
them.”

“There are two things wrong with that idea.
With that many little pockets of time out of sync, everything might
implode. You can only take so many bricks from a wall before it
crumbles. The bigger problem is if you heal them, that’s even more
people who want us dead to contend with.” Balthazar twirled the
double-edged sword in his hand. “I’ll make it as quick and painless
as possible for them.”