5 #3
I find my cheeks aching from the smile that’s been glued to my face the entire time as he enthusiastically recounts his and his brother’s entire history . . . and their great-grandparents’.
“. . . I mean, can you believe my great-grandfather would do such a thing?! On their honeymoon, too!” He looks at me with humungous eyes, and those blues are a tad intimidating when glued to me with such intensity, but it’s impossible to feel unsafe with Tiger.
“If I ever got married, I would never squish a bee into her skin! I’d catch that little supervillain in a net before I allowed any bug juice to get on such a perfect surface! ”
Scotty’s own eyes roll up to the ceiling.
My grin widens.
“Wow . . . I love her already.” Tiger’s gaze glazes over as a dreamy look comes over his face, distracted from his storytelling at the thought of his imaginary wife.
Biting back a laugh, I turn my head back his brother’s way to see what he thinks of this.
Only to find him already looking at me with an intense expression on his face.
My grin falters for a second, but the stare doesn’t feel malicious, more just studying, scrutinising. And when Scotty looks back at his brother as we keep moving through the halls, I understand:
Tiger is a rare, genuine person who expresses himself freely—and often loudly and wildly—and I know many people can be judgmental of that.
I have first-hand experience of how poorly people can treat those who stand out from the majority.
So, even though my personality is the extreme opposite of Tiger’s, I understand.
And I don’t fault his brother for looking out for him, but I’ll do my best to prove to him that I’m someone who can be trusted, someone who simply wants to be friends with them for however long that can last when there’s violence all around us.
Approaching the Training Centre, the double doors open with a soft swoosh, granting us entrance.
Evots’ time slot for usage of the rooms is 1 a.m.–12 p.m., while the Exots living in the Headquarters who are all but ghosts with the visual absence of them have available usage from 1 p.m. to 12 a.m., so I’m sure many of the Evots in here have been training for hours already.
I don’t know if any of them have been here from the start, though, because I can’t imagine who’d be insane enough to wake up at that time of day.
And with the Exots, I wouldn’t even know they’d been in this room if it weren’t for us being told about those timed allocations for everything, reminding me of the fact that they’re going through the exact same thing as us right now.
The slots are to make sure the two classifications don’t cross paths before Game 1, both to prevent fights breaking out between us and to keep our opponents a mystery.
Evots only get to see which Exots will be competing ten minutes before we enter the arena for the first time so that we can have some time to decide who we’d like to bond with, but Exot’s go in completely blind.
Not that they’ll care who they’re killing when they’re trying to brutally murder the lot of us.
I’m just following Tiger and Scotty to the private room they were in yesterday, three steps into the Training Centre, when a commotion breaks out to our left.
“SHE’S MINE!”
The animalistic roar is accompanied by the sound of flesh meeting flesh with a loud smack!, and I whip my head around just in time to see a large muscled man launch a smaller one onto one of the mats by the climbing ropes. His painful landing echoes throughout the now-silent room.
The bigger guy pounces on his prey like a lion going in for the kill.
“FUCKING MINE!”
Another punch that has blood spraying.
“YOU GOT THAT?!”
My eyes bug out of my head as red fluid keeps splatting across the mat beneath them, and I flit my alarmed gaze frantically around the room, trying to spot any guards, someone who will stop this.
But there’s no one there. And no one comes.
Ice solidifies in my bones as the realisation hits me:
They’d let us kill each other in here. We don’t have to be in a Bonding Game to do it.
The raging man—whose Player number I note is 4 from the Avri running down both his thick arms—finally stills, panting like a bull as he looks down at the mess he’s made of the other man.
Then he spits on him, hops up to his feet with a grace that belies his body mass, and swaggers away like nothing happened.
It’s a while before any noise returns after that, everyone frozen in place.
“Oh, wow. That was . . . possessive,” Tiger’s voice breaks the silence. “Who d’you think he was talking about? One of the Evots here?”
Scotty shrugs. “Who fucking knows. Let’s just stay away from him. I don’t fancy being turned into mush anytime soon.”
“Good idea. Did you see the shade of his suit? That shit was fucking dark. Like, high 80s dark.”
“Yes—which is why we won’t go near him. I’m confident in both our skills, but I also know the difference between a high 80 and a low 80.”
“Hmmm . . . good point.”
Tiger then moves his attention to me, raising his arm in a flash and flipping my visor down. I jump as the transparent protection snaps down over my face while he cheers, “Training time, Powerpuff Girls!”