1 #2
Sometimes I wish I was stronger so I could actually stand up for myself for once. But I’m not. And as much as I want to jab needles into Troy’s eye sockets, I’m a coward. So what do I do when his elephant feet thump closer?
I absolutely leg it.
Zooming around the corner, I’m in an all-out sprint until I burst into TBG Studies, panting like I’ve just run for an hour instead of the reality of about five seconds.
As always, I don’t waste any time rushing to the back of the room, parking myself in my preferred seat and giving my trembling hands something to do by logging in to the provided tablet on the onyx desk before me while I wait for the lesson to start.
It’s not long until a sea of students clad in black and varying shades of green funnel inside in a babble of chatter, the strips of Avri on their suits reflecting off every gleaming surface of the classroom.
They find their seats just as our instructor claps his hands at the front of the room, demanding everyone’s attention.
“Right! Settle down, settle down, everyone!” He shifts behind his desk, eyes boring into everyone as he waits for silence before continuing.
“Alright, as you all know, Name Generation Day is tomorrow, so we’re going to jump straight into a recap of everything it’s essential to know for competing in The Bonding Games.
Although you should all already know this by now, I’d advise you to pay attention—forgetting just one piece of vital information could cost you your life. ”
My gulp is way too loud in the silence that follows, and it earns me a side-eye from the girl sitting at the desk beside mine.
I feel the tips of my ears redden.
“We’ll start with Avri pads,” Mr Toldem says, bringing up an image on the large screen behind him of the bottom of a fitted boot just like the ones I and every other Evot in the room are wearing, glowing forest green veined throughout the black outsole. “Who can tell me what these are?”
“They’re connected to our identification chips,” Vivian, the girl who’d eyed me, answers, arms crossed lazily over her chest. “The Avri they’re made of is coded to manifest in the form we choose.
By thinking the image clearly in our minds, with a command to eject that image into a real-life vehicle, we can touch and use the energy that shapes before us. ”
Toldem nods. “Good. Give me more details on how that works.”
“The identification chip is connected to our brains and carries the orders to our Avri pads. Since the energy functions off command, it should manifest exactly as we tell it to.”
“And what happens if your command is not strong or clear enough?” he presses.
Another student answers from the right this time. “Then the manifested vehicle could appear unstable, partially made, or even not appear at all. You have to be completely focused for the command to be successful.”
It’s hard to keep in my whimper then, and I wipe sweaty palms on the legs of my Avri suit, trying to calm myself by counting down from ten over and over in my head.
It does absolutely nothing to drown out the panic rising within me.
Toldem gives another dip of his head. “Exactly. A clear command and mental image is essential for your Avri to understand and obey your wishes. You cannot simply ask or suggest, you must command. Is that clear?” Scanning over our nodding heads, mine unsteady, he then asks, “And who can tell me the importance of the run-and-jump method?”
A man from the left side of the room. “Since the pads are on the bottom of our boots, we have to launch ourselves at least three feet into the air to ensure the Avri vehicle has room to form without the ground being an obstacle, so we need a good sprint leading up to the jump.”
A bead of sweat rolls down the side of my face.
“That’s right. Now, on to The Catalogue. Explain what this is.”
Another student. “The official list of Avri vehicles and Avri weapons.”
“And . . . ?”
“And we must have everything in The Catalogue memorised perfectly as we won’t be able to see it during a Bonding Game.”
“Good, good.” Toldem rounds to the front of his desk and leans back on it, crossing one ankle over the other as he roves his gaze over us. I sink low in my chair. “Give me the list of Avri vehicles and describe each one to me . . . hmm, let’s see . . . Alby!”
I let out a squeak as my spine snaps straight.
“U-uh, umm . . . t-there’s Avri cars,” I start in a mess, pausing to clear my throat. “And then there’s the jets, platforms, steps, and tribikes.”
The expectant look he gives me tells me I’m not getting off that easily.
Shit, shit, shit.
“Uh— I, umm . . . th-they’re . . . green . . . ?”
Toldem raises an unimpressed brow. “Are you telling me, or are you asking me?”
The class breaks out into snickers, and my face heats a thousand degrees hotter.
“Telling.” The word is hardly audible.
“Great—then tell me more.”
I clear my throat again, willing myself to speak, but nothing comes out my mouth when I open it.
I can’t think when I’m put on the spot like this, and it’s one of the many reasons I’m not cut out for any of this; I can’t remember the list of Avri vehicles clearly whenever I need to because anxiety takes over and scrambles my brain.
Years of training, and I’m the least talented Evot I’ve ever heard of.
Unless you count the eleven-year-old children having their first lessons in Evot Training School.
If my name is generated tomorrow, I’m royally screwed.
“You can’t even describe one Avri vehicle?”
Ducking my head, I plead with the universe for him to stop pushing me, especially in front of the entire class, whose stares I can feel digging into my skin without a care for my obvious embarrassment.
Toldem scrubs a hand over his face, shaking his head. “You need to know this, Alby. At this point, you’d likely be dead in the first five seconds of Game 1.”
The previous snickering converts to straight-out laughter.
A warning glance which lacks any true reprimand is the only admonishment they get.
“Alright,” Toldem sighs heavily. “Just make sure you pay attention from now on, okay?”
As if I’m not the student here who tries the hardest yet still has the lightest green Avri cluster in EvTS 246.
I nod mutely.
After asking someone else to describe the vehicles, a girl with deep brown skin and voluminous curls who I think is named Willow begins, “The vehicles match the green of the rest of our Avri cluster—which is a darker shade the higher our Score is on the scale from 0 to 100. It’s the same for Exots, but theirs are shades of red.
” She points at a stripe of glowing hunter green running down her arm, the deep colour telling everyone she’s got a fairly high Score.
“So all my Avri vehicles will appear this exact colour, no other.”
“As for the other aspects of the vehicles’ appearances,” she continues, “the Avri cars mimic Techta’s normal racing cars in shape: they have one seat, no roof, and a low-slung body.
They’re also lightweight and small, extremely aerodynamic to allow for high speeds.
” Toldem listens with a proud look on his face that he’s never had with me.
“The Avri tribikes are designed similarly, also based on Techta’s non-Avri versions: they’re ultra-minimalist, have three large wheels in a row, a long body and comfortable seat to allow for the rider to lie almost horizontal, two separate handlebars, and the nose of the bike is shaped like a cone, tapering into a narrow point.
And of course, in front of the last wheel, in the small space between that one and the second one, there’s the foot pegs.
It’s all designed for the least possible air resistance when riding.