Chapter 17
“Hold the door!” the unfortunately familiar face calls as he jogs towards the elevator.
I hit the “close door” button. I know they don’t actually work, but I’m hoping this time it will. No deity answers my petty prayers as Jacob’s hand shoots through the doorway to hold it as he steps inside the elevator cab.
“Thanks for that,” Jacob deadpans, slightly out of breath, as he sees my finger on the button.
“Anytime.”
The elevator moves in silence, slower than a snail despite its high-tech appearance.
I’m no longer grateful for my hotel room’s twenty-fifth-floor view.
I stare straight ahead at the door, pressing myself into the corner to take up as little space as possible.
Jacob leans against the opposite wall, relaxed.
He won his fight this evening, of course.
He’s 2-0, and I’m 0-2. Technically he's 4-0 since he's filling in for All Byte, No Bark on top of his normal fight schedule. I can’t help but shift on my feet, drumming my fingers on my cane, listening to the clickclickclick of my rings.
“So, your drive motors.”
I roll my eyes at the brushed stainless steel door. “Are none of your business.”
“You’re on a two-motor system for your wheels, right?” he persists. This is the slowest elevator in the world. I would get out and take the stairs if I were physically able. “Is it a reliability issue or a connection issue?”
I groan. “Why do you care?”
“Joel Jaxon’s run is making a mockery of the people who put time and effort into this sport.” His words are artificially cool. The boiling disgust is just under the surface, bubbling up and cracking the ice. “And he’s overworking you.”
“That doesn’t answer my question,” I say.
He scowls. “You don’t deserve a bot like that.”
The elevator slows to a stop, and I consider getting out and waiting for another. Before I can move, a large man in an ill-fitting suit barrels through the open door.
“I don’t care if that’s what she said, Kevin, I never agreed to that,” the businessman yells into his phone before smashing a button on the panel for five floors up.
The gallon of cologne he’s wearing fumigates the small space, making my eyes water and my throat itch. I gasp for air, but it makes it worse.
Jacob turns to me. “You and your team are smart outside of that smarmy redhead. But I also know Joel’s ineptitude is a powerful force,” he says in a hushed voice. “It’s showing in the bot design. Is it a connection or the motors themselves?”
Jacob, for all his faults, is a great builder.
One of the best. I know that objectively.
I wish it wasn’t true, but he can probably help me.
Especially because he’s already fought against Zeta.
There’s little doubt that the others are asking their builder friends what to do.
If I want to win, maybe I have to sleep with the devil a little bit.
Metaphorically. I will not be sleeping with Jacob.
“I’m not sure,” I whisper back. “They’re some economy brand that none of us have heard of and can’t even find online.”
“Typical,” Jacob mutters. I can barely see him around the businessman. Suddenly, we are worlds apart. “There wasn’t an issue during your practice drives today. Why are you limiting your test drives?”
“Why are you watching?”
He mumbles something under his breath, but I can’t hear it over the human smog cloud yelling about someone named Jessica. All I can make out is “sixteen.”
The elevator slows and stops, and the man and his toxic cloud depart, leaving us alone again in the leftover olfactory haze. I glance at Jacob, whose sharp focus is on me. I’m prey during open season without the shadow of the businessman hiding me.
“My best guess is that something got knocked loose when we were moving the bot, or there was an issue between the transmitter and receiver, and it didn’t get the memo to start,” I admit. “But the bot is too heavy for the motors, regardless.” Unease throbs under my skin.
“Can you lose weight anywhere on the bot without losing too much armor?”
I shrug. “That’s what I’m trying to figure out.
” The elevator nears my floor, and I’m both itching to get out of here and curious to see what he has to say.
This is the most we’ve talked and the least I’ve wanted to throttle him in eight years.
I click my rings together, the motion drawing his attention to my hands.
“New motors?”
“Can’t.”
“Ditch the horizontal blade,” he says after a moment. “It’s not as powerful, and you can remove the connection points on the front of the chassis and redistribute the weight. It won’t take a lot off, though.”
He’s not wrong. Even if we did all that work getting it in fighting shape, it’s probably better to lose it at this stage. “If we thin the metal on the side panels and add high-impact absorbing plastic and resin, we can lose some of the weight that isn’t a balance for the weapon.”
“Joel willing to spend on titanium for the body?”
I shrug. “Probably not but worth a shot. It’d be lighter than the shitty steel he has on there, and the plastic might be able to compensate.
” The elevator slows. “We can move some of that armor weight to the back for more stability with the vertical. And we can add a wedge in front if we’re getting rid of the horizontal blade. ”
“That will definitely help. What’s your gearbox situation?”
“Optimized for speed, not power, but frankly, we’re not getting enough of either. We could rebuild them, though. Prioritize strength to offset the weight.” The door opens, and I push off the wall.
He looks on with triumphant satisfaction. “That’s smart. Maybe it’ll finally be a worthy bot.” He doesn’t follow me but leans forward and presses a button on the panel as I watch from the hall. The “down” light illuminates as the doors slide close and take a smiling Jacob with them.
What just happened?
I’m dazed. Perhaps that businessman’s cologne sucked all the air from the room, and I’m suffering from hypoxia. That would explain why I thought it would be a good idea to give my competition my strategy.