Donovan and Eden stare each other down from opposite sides of the room, their respective weapons drawn to attention. Donovan gulps, a cold sweat trailing down his back. The crazy woman was looking at him like a hyena looking at a piece of meat on the savannah. She stretches from her side of the room, limbering up her muscles for the fight to come. Donovan does more of the same, shrugging the jacket off his shoulders. He gently places it down, folding it into a respectful square.

  “Why don’t you go first, pretty boy.” Eden calls, a row of sharp teeth sparkling in the light.

  Donovan adjusts his grip on his Tonfa, willing his hands to stop sweating as he mulls his options over. Going first seemed the worst option at first. The second speaker got to choose how they’d like to react to the information given without worry of betrayal. If the first person decided to be open, the second could either choose to be honest in kind, or they could be intentionally deceitful. It was an open prisoner's dilemma, one entirely hinged on the first’s inherent trust, or distrust, in the second. It didn’t matter either way. Donovan already had a plan.

  “I can create stuff from my Tonfa.” Donovan slowly explains. Eden stares at him, her arms crossing as she waits for further explanation. When none comes, her eyebrows furrow, her smile replaced by a frown.

  “And?” She says, spinning her machete to coax more out of him. “You gonna give me a name? Weakness? Anythin’ else?”

  “Rules said I had to explain the basics,” Donovan says. “Not the entire inner workings of my weapons.”

  Eden stares at him for a long moment, her eyes turning to slits. Donovan can feel another wave of sweat pour down his back. He began to worry that she could see the sweat seeping through the material of his shirt. Those thoughts are proven false as a boisterous laugh escapes her mouth, a jagged noise like sharp glass.

  “HahaHA!” She cackles, her smile returning with full force. “You are funny, pretty boy! Alright, if you wanna hold out on me, I’ll find out soon enough.” Her machete spins in her hands, the light glinting off its wicked edge. “I can store energy in Betsy here.”

  Donovan squints in kind, hoping for more while expecting less. When no more comes, he sighs, steeling his nerves. She seemed to have some good will with him. It wouldn’t hurt to try and coax more.

  “That’s all you’re gonna tell me?” He questions, slotting a coy smile on his face. “And here I thought we were starting to get along here.”

  She laughs again, her legs prepped to pounce at any moment. She was ready to fight at any moment, the only thing between that inevitable moment being the conversation bounding between the two.

  “What comes around goes around, pretty boy.” Eden says, her machete coming to a sudden halt in her grip. “I’ll find out all about you while you find out a thing or two about ME!”

  With that proclamation, she breaks into a dead sprint, her arms splayed behind her, out of his sight. Donovan wastes no time, quickly throwing up his arms defensively. His shoes screech against the concrete, his legs tensing to lock him in place. She seemed the aggressive sort, so he’d just have to block a hit before counter attacking. Her charge was completely open. If he could get her in the knee, she’d be down for at least a while. That’d buy him some time to fill his Tonfa with air.

  The distance is closed within seconds, Eden’s smile growing wider as Donovan doesn’t attack. Donovan mentally prepares himself, running through his plan over and over. Block, kick, retreat. Block, kick, retreat. Block, kick, retreat. Block-.

  Donovan doesn’t see the attack before it slams into him. The only thing that saves him is the sudden screech that tears at his eardrums, a wave of Synth that slammed into his eardrums like a physical weight. His body instinctively shifts itself a step closer to her, an instinct that saves his arm from being completely lopped off.

  Donovan goes screeching to the side, his guard completely broken, a black bruise blossoming across his arm. Pain shoots through his body, a gasp tearing its way from his mouth. That damn near knocked the air from his lungs! He barely has time to recoup before she’s back on him, that same wild glint in her eye with her machete raised above her head. He rolls, the machete slamming down where his leg had once been. It was almost a blur, concrete exploding into the air like confetti. The crazy idiot was trying to cut his limbs off! She continues after him, her machete arm coming up and down with robot-esque efficiency.

  As her machete comes down for a third time, Donovan capitalizes, shooting his foot toward her vulnerable face. It makes contact, sending her sprawling to the floor with a newly broken nose. He regains his own footing with a stumble, wincing as molten pain seeps from his arm. He tests it, barely biting down a cry of pain. It wasn’t broken, but the bone was at least bruised.

  “Nice instincts, pretty boy.” Eden calls, wiping blood from her face. Now that he had some time to think, he could see a similar bruise blooming on the inner part of her forearm, one that was quickly fading– her nose snapping back into place. “I thought that first attack would’ve gotten ya for sure!”

  Donovan grits his teeth, relief slowly flooding through his system. That was one Synth Charge down, leaving him with only two left. He didn’t gain any valuable info, but he did manage to get her to waste one as well. All he knew was that her machete was fast, but he didn’t know how that correlated to energy storage, especially when it was still for most of the damn time. Was that what the damn spinning was for? Could she store movement in it? If so, why would she keep her arms ramrod behind her while running, and why wouldn’t she spin it in her hands at all times? It didn’t make any sense.

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  His thoughts are interrupted as she charges again. Donovan growls. If defense wouldn’t work, he’d have to pivot to offense. Once they get in range, he twists his body, his full weight poured behind a single kick. If she wanted to dodge it, she’d have to give him some breathing room.

  To his surprise, she continues charging forward, her feet shifting just enough to vent most of the damage to her shoulder. His foot connects, the force behind it sending her arm flying back. Her loose fighting stance allowed most of the energy to dissipate, opting to be displaced in the moment rather than taking enough damage to compromise her arm.

  She works with the movement, her smile spreading ear to ear as he machete flies toward his midsection. With only a split second to think, Donovan throws himself back on his anchored leg. The blade glances off him, cutting a shallow gash across his chest. A small trickle of blood leaks from the wound, but not enough to be life threatening. She continued to rush him down, her eyes still locked on his Tonfa. That left her open to the roundhouse kick that slams into her chest.

  He backpedals, his mind spinning to come up with some sort of plan as she reels back, the air snatched from her lungs. Blocking wouldn’t work, so he’d have to pivot. He was confident in his hand to hand, but her ability left a lot more up to the imagination than his. He could also barely react to whatever the hell kind of attacks she was throwing out, so close altercations were a no go. That really left him only one option

  Range them out.

  Donvan turns on his heel, sprinting with all the might that his body would allow. At the same time, his Tonfa began greedily sucking air in from the now unlatched bottoms. Eden chases him, though she’s noticeably slower than him.

  “Get back here!” She yells out, not a lick of rage in her voice. Quite the opposite. She seems almost elated. Donovan grits his teeth, his Tonfa now prepared to spit something out. He wills flame to his mind, feeling heat bloom through the wood of his weapon. If he didn’t stop her, she’d chase him forever. With a single motion, he turns, fire spitting from the bottom of his Tonfa.

  Eden steps back, just barely dodging out of the flames range. Donovan takes the chance to take another step back, more air sucking in to take its place.

  Donovan narrows his eyes as his flames begin to dissipate, air rushing to take its place. Strange. He might be crazy, but had her machete– or arm for that matter– moved an inch? He didn’t have much time to question that before her frozen arm suddenly whips forward, the machete blistering toward him at speeds that would make a professional pitcher envious. Donovan raises his Tonfa, prepared to deflect the thing entirely. That plan goes out the window as it crashes into his block, shattering it instantly. He stumbles backwards, the machete sailing overhead in an arc, most of its energy stolen.

  His forearms shake, his hands barely able to grip onto his weapons. If he hadn’t blocked that, that would’ve damn near killed him! His mind pieces together the scattered puzzle that laid before him. Finally, he felt he knew what her ability was.

  He hadn’t listened much in school, most of them bored him to no end, but one of the classes he had taken a modicum of interest in was physics. He could vaguely recall a lesson scrawled on his old teacher's chalkboard, two dual words plastered on its surface.

  Kinetic energy and Potential energy.

  It was like a rubber band being pulled taut, but not yet released to snap. The energy was there as potential energy, but it hadn’t yet been converted to movement– that being kinetic energy. His working theory was that she did something similar with her machete. She locked it in place, building up its potential energy like a rubber band being pulled infinitely taut.

  “I think I get your deal now.” Eden suddenly pipes up, cutting through his fog of thought. He blinks. What the hell was she talking about? He must’ve worn his shock and confusion on his face based on her cackle. “You gotta have a supply of air to make anything, don’t you? That’s why you didn’t somethin’ at me when I charged. You couldn’t. That’s also why you’ve been runnin’ from me.”

  Donovan tightens his grip on his weapons, his expression remaining neutral. Inside, he felt a twinge of panic. While it wasn’t just air, air was the only thing his Tonfa could really intake here. If he could get something denser, maybe some concrete powder or something, then he could get some more material to work with.

  “You confident about that?” Donovan misleads, trying to sound as cocky as his voice would allow.

  “Damn right, pretty boy.” She responds, an unwavering confidence in her voice. Damn it, there wasn’t any misleading her anymore. Confident types like her latched on to an idea and refused to let go. He’d seen plenty in his time on the road.

  “If you’re sure.” Donovan says, pushing as much nonchalance into his voice as he could muster. “But why’d you tell me if you knew? Seems stupid to give up the element of surprise for no reason.”

  She cackles again, her eyes locking onto his. Even without her weapon, she seemed confident in her abilities. “Maybe I wanted to get you off guard, maybe I’m flying blind and got lucky, maybe I’m trying to impress a cutie in tight pants.” She winks, an involuntary shiver going down his spine. She cackles, her finger tapping against her temple. “Maybe you knocked my brain loose with that kick of yours. Who knows, who cares? I’m just interested in the fight at this point. You know mine by now, don’t you?”

  He stares at her for a moment, his mental assessment of her changing in real time. On the spot, he decides not to nod yes or no. Saying yes or no would both be bad against someone like her. Someone like her would leave no card behind her back if they figured the cat was out of the bag, and that could easily spell disaster. If he nodded no, she’d know he was lying. Unless they were an idiot, nobody would intentionally say they didn’t know. No, staying silent was the best way to get her to keep some cards closer to her chest. Maybe, if he was lucky, she’d lose while trying to play it safe.

  “Guess the cute ones really are stupid.” She jokes, another cackle escaping her lips. “Let me Betsy and I’ll explain the deets for ya.”

  Donovan doesn’t take his eye off her for a moment, a blank expression crossing his face. The “look over there” strategy? Really? That was what they were stooping to? They might not mean it to be like that, but the look on their face said otherwise. He knew he hadn’t done as well as he could’ve, but that was just… Petty. Fine, if they wanted to play like that, he’d play like that.

  “I guess I’ll have to piece it together.” Donovan teases, aiming to enrage her into attacking him. Instead, she smiles wider, breaking into a full charge toward her weapon. Donovan slides himself between them, allowing a rhythm to finally break into his step. If she didn’t have her weapon, then that meant he had the advantage, which meant now was the time to leave nothing off the table.