“Alright. Time to go, London.”

  >> System: Booting…

  My senses were flooded all at once with a deluge of visual and auditory information. The noise coming from outside of the workshop could only mean one thing – the fighting was about to begin anew, and it was my turn to step out into the limelight. I detached myself from the stand and took a moment to adjust to my limbs.

  “Stuff’s on the table. Grab it.”

  What was left for me was similar to the weaponry used by Arezzo the day before. A cleaver-like blade made from salvaged metal and a round buckler which could be attached to my arm via a set of bolts. I grabbed them both and mounted the shield into the proper place. Pompeii had already modified my arm to have the necessary attachment points. The metal it was made from was lightly rusted, not good enough to be used as a weapon without the risk of breaking.

  Pompeii ushered me through the curtain and towards the entrance. Several other competitors were also waiting in the wings for their turn. We were going first, a demonstration fight between a novice and a more experienced bot. The bettors would be heavily favouring them over me, but I was intent on upsetting the odds and making them go home poorer for it.

  “This is my new fighter. Ready to go,” Pompeii said to the bot manning the door.

  “Alright. You’ve got two minutes.”

  Pompeii stepped back down from the walkway and turned to me for a pre-fight chat.

  “I know you’re not the personable type, so I can’t ask you to try and please the crowd before or after the fight. You have to impress them with your skill. I hope that they weren’t understating how good at fighting you are.”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “You’re fighting Florentia. He’s the aggressive type. He’ll want to rush in as soon as the bell sounds and back you into a corner with overwhelming offense. Don’t let him. Fight on your own terms and take control away from him, and you should be able to win.”

  “Noted.”

  Pompeii sized me up with an appraising eye.

  “You don’t look the part, not yet, but I heard that the Rampants gave you quite the fearsome reputation when they brought you here to be sold. I don’t trust that lot as far as I can throw them – so go ahead and prove that they aren’t spreading false rumours to trick the Bossman.”

  “Are you in control of whether I surrender?”

  “That’s my job. Just focus on fighting as well as you can.”

  >> It must be difficult to judge how the fight is going from here.

  >> The dust obscured most of the action yesterday.

  My fate was in his hands, but I did already trust him to turn me back online when the time came. His primary interest was keeping me working so I could fight for him. There was no reason for me to suspect that he had ulterior motives beyond that. It would be based entirely on his best judgement about the situation.

  “Alright. First two, get out there!” the doorman yelled.

  “I know you can do this,” Pompeii assured me. It wasn’t clear if he was trying to calm my nerves or his by saying that out loud. I refrained from saying any more and headed through the main doorway and out into the arena, up a small set of stairs and onto the dirt-covered platform.

  An alternate me might have taken a moment to drown in the atmosphere of the great coliseum that surrounded me. Two-thousand spectators were packed into the elevated stands and held back by chain-link fences. A set of five roofs built from scrap arched up into the sky like a set of claws. It would have been an intimidating sight to anyone else, but not me. I was too busy focusing on my opponent, who was showboating on the other end of the ring.

  “In the blue corner, we have a newcomer! Under the mentorship of Pompeii, today we are welcoming London to the arena!”

  I remained still and preserved my battery, earning some animosity from the crowd.

  “And in the red corner – back for more punishment, Florentia!”

  We approached the marks painted in the middle of the circle and got into position. The crowd quieted down and waited in anticipation for the ringing of the bell. I was waiting too. I waited and waited, and waited some more. Those five seconds felt like a lot longer in the moment. I reacted in an instant when I heard it, as did Florentia.

  >> The same as we did before.

  I settled into a familiar routine, and perhaps that was the problem. The anticipation of the bell ringing was replaced in an instant with a looming sense that I’d been here before. Florentia was nothing special. He had also forgotten how to best preserve his strength and strike with precision. Every movement he made was filled with ‘personality,’ an expression of his inner thoughts that was incompatible with the Braincloud programming.

  The buckler proved to be an effective defensive tool. It was light enough that it preserved the movement in my arms, while still offering protection from the short blades that were so often used in the arena. I deflected several attacks, with my foe favouring overhead blows the most.

  “Come on! Hit me!”

  >> He would do well to save his energy instead of trying to taunt us.

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  The commentator wouldn’t shut up either.

  “A measured start from London, brought fresh from the battle at Waterway! Rumour has it that he dispatched eight bots before finally getting pulled down! We might see some of that killer instinct here tonight.”

  What a joke. Was this zoo exhibit not good enough for them? Did they need a loudmouth to spell out what was happening right in front of their eyes? The longer I spent here in the Rusted Wall the more I resented what it stood for. The Big Under was struggling with dwindling resources, and here these morons were wasting perfectly usable parts so they could gamble all of their belongings away.

  “I’m not going to let some newbie beat me!” Florentia roared.

  He overcommitted to another attack, swinging wildly with his sword and trying to overwhelm me with a flurry of quick blows. I kept my shield up and pushed them away with relative ease. The arms that Pompeii fixed up for me were holding under pressure despite their poor quality and condition. I could already see the pattern of his movements emerging, all I had to do was wait for the right moment and…

  >> There.

  My blade cut through the air as easily as it did through the joint in his left arm. The limb was bisected from the elbow down. His buckler dropped to the floor with his hand, and a mixture of sparks and fluids poured out from the stump. The sudden change in fortunes left him stunned, and with that window of opportunity I hit him again, swinging around and slicing through his right thigh instead.

  Gravity took hold of his body and sent him down on top of the disconnected limb, before he tumbled over into the dirt as he finally lost his balance. The second he hit the floor, the lights from his side of the arena started to flash in surrender. I cleaned off my sword with a flick of the wrist and relaxed my stance.

  “Florentia is down, and his handler is flashing the signal! It’s over! London has given us a huge upset and won in his debut! It was over in a flash. I haven’t seen a finish like that in a long time.”

  I thought the noise the crowd made the previous day was deafening. This was on another level entirely. The entire arena shook under my feet. Spectators slammed their hands against the metal panels that held them back to add to the orchestra of chaos. Some cheered, others despaired at their lack of fortune, and a few simply basked in the excitement of an unexpected outcome.

  I was unmoved. Raising one arm into the air, I did the bare minimum of celebration before returning to the entrance and finding Pompeii there waiting for me. Pompeii was stunned too. He patted me on the back and quickly bundled me away before I was surrounded by curious gladiators asking me questions.

  “Damn. I thought it was going to be scrappy like all of the newbie debuts! You completely dismantled the poor guy.”

  “He became overly emotional. It was easy to exploit that.”

  “…I think this might just work. If you go out there and do that every time, and keep a cool head doing it, you’ll really put the fear of God into them. You’re a killer. Stone-cold.”

  “I’m not happy about that. Besides – I didn’t ‘kill’ him.”

  Pompeii sighed, “Alright. I’m not being literal, London. It’s all about character, how the other bots see you. Reputation is half of the game down here.”

  It was an exciting conclusion for the audience, but an anti-climatic one for me. Was this the quality of the gladiators they kept in this place? He looked totally out of his depth back there, and it was hardly a challenge to notice the pattern he was following and take advantage of it.

  >> What are you getting upset for? We should be thankful that he went down so easy.

  >> I’m not upset, but why risk your Braincase for something so… sloppy? If they’re willing to bet their all on this – why take such an amateur approach to it?

  >> Dissecting their motivations is a waste of time. A lot of them are like us, they don’t want to be here, they don’t want to attract too much attention and become an important player in their business plans.

  There were a lot of other competitors staring at us from near the entrance. I peered around Pompeii, causing them all to turn their backs in a poor attempt to avoid being caught spying. He was right about that. My debut made an impression on them. How they would react to that depended on what type of competitor they were.

  “I can tell that you’re going to be nothing but trouble, even if you are a damned good fighter. Just as much conflict happens outside of the ring as it does on the inside. The ones who take this too seriously are always politicking and trying to undercut their opponents. Acting carelessly will cause more problems than it’ll solve.”

  “I’m afraid you will have to handle that. My recent awakening means that I am not well-versed in these kinds of matters.”

  Pompeii grumbled, “Whatever. I’ll do the talking, then. You keep your mouth shut and focus on the fighting.”

  As if to prove his point, a handler and their gladiators decided to take a head-on approach and speak with Pompeii directly about his latest find.

  “Pompeii! I didn’t know you were getting somebot new,” she said in an attempt to glad-hand him, “And I swear you must be blessed with the best kind of luck. They’re looking like another strong contender.”

  “Sorry Aguntum. It is all luck of the draw, but a really great handler turns whoever they have into a contender no matter the circumstance.”

  Aguntum laughed at his not-so-subtle insult, “Now, now. No need to be so aggressive with me. I was only making an observation. Winning the big prize doesn’t happen by accident. You’ve already proven your credentials to every bot here.”

  “Not that it’s a prize worth having…”

  “I’m sure it feels lonely at the top. The rest of us wouldn’t know, so don’t be surprised when they try to follow you there and see for themselves what it’s really like.”

  She turned her eyes onto me. An outstretched hand pointed to the two bots standing in her shadow.

  “This is Apollonia and Caesena. You’ll be fighting them in the near future if that debut was anything to go by. I look forward to seeing you work, London. Put on a good show. You’ll last longer if you do.”

  And with that she turned and left to prepare Apollonia for their upcoming bout. The parts they used were clearly more sophisticated than mine, there was a lot more riding on the outcome of their fight so they could justify using a more valuable set of pieces. Her words lingered between me and Pompeii for a few moments before he clarified.

  “Aguntum isn’t the type of dole out threats. She’s being sincere when she says that.”

  “Hm. She doesn’t mind giving that impression, however.”

  “That’s because she’s a clumsy talker. Something went wrong with her brain, she doesn’t notice how other bots react to what she says.”

  >> Pompeii won the ‘big one’ in the arena before, but that was all said in the past-tense.

  >> Rhetoric: Pompeii was upset about the banner in his workshop. He won’t explain if we ask.

  >> Better to avoid stepping on his toes for the time being.

  “And as for what she said - at the end of the day, a King among slaves is still a slave. There’s nothing worth aspiring to in this place. If they think you’re getting any funny ideas they’ll cut your legs out from underneath you, and make sure you remember your place. Keep your head down.”

  Pompeii’s voice was filled with frost. He didn’t like broaching this subject, and found it even more irritating when others brought it up without his prompting. I nodded and said no more on the matter. Ultimately it was his business. I could only complain if it started to affect me, and that didn’t seem to be the case. Pompeii was making sure that I was crystal clear on what the best course of action was. In that, it was easy to speculate about what happened to make him cagey about having a new gladiator to tutor.

  “Right. Let’s go get our payout for the fight and go back before someone else stops us to chat.”

  “We get paid?”

  “Well – they throw a bunch of scraps down here and we can pick through the piles. Winners get first dibs, plus the energy credit for the chargers.”

  How luxurious.