Galileo (Battle of the Species) (29 page)

Renn ran out to the middle of the arena with his heart racing. He looked up into the stands, getting more and more nervous by the second. If he made a fool out of himself, the entire school would see it and his self-doubt festered.

“Level one. The planet is Earth,” Ava said.

The top of redwood trees were the first to appear from the white arena floor, rising into the empty space. A forest with moss covered rocks and rolling hills ascended, frozen in time, then a clear blue sky was painted above with white, wispy clouds scattered about. No sign of students or a ship remained. The only thing hinting that he hadn’t been teleported was Ava’s scoreboard floating in the sky. It was quite beautiful, rather peaceful he thought. He had to walk around a few trees before finding Dylan, but there was no sign of either Grus or Jonah in the dense woods.

“Fighters, prepare,” Ava said, resonating from the sky. Renn didn’t know what to expect. Everything was so vivid; it was hard to tell what was real and what wasn’t. He could hear a muted cheer from the crowd, but couldn’t see anyone, just the serene woods surrounding them.

“This place is amazing!” Dylan said. “This is where you live?”

“Not this exact area, but same continent,” Renn replied, feeling a little homesick.

“Are you allowed to actually go to places like this or do they have them blocked off, like on Temin?”

“Blocked off? Wow, no. And you don’t have to go anywhere to find nature. You just have to walk outside.”

“Incredible,” Dylan said. “All right, let’s get focused. It doesn’t matter how tranquil it looks, this is battle. There will always be a species trying to kill us. Got it?”

“Got it,” Renn said, trying to get into fight mode.

“The game will begin in five, four, three, two, one.”

Renn and Dylan felt a breeze and heard leaves rustle all around them. Birds chirped and a placid creek flowed nearby. They looked around, looking for signs of life.

“So, what are we looking for?” Dylan asked.

 “Bears…bobcats…rabid raccoons,” Renn snorted, and then looked up to see a doe staring at them in the distance.

Dylan scrambled into a kung fu fighting stance, ready to attack.

Renn laughed. “Dylan, it’s a deer!  It won’t hurt you,” he said. “They’re completely docile.”

“Are you kidding me? Like these things just walk around freely?”

“Well, yeah,” Renn replied. “Okay, am I losing it or can I really hear the deer thinking?”

“That’s still Ava. It’s an auditory illusion. She knows you’re Mindeerian.”

“Oh.”

Desh and Kia continued watching from the holding tank, looking rather perplexed while they watched. From their point of view, they could see the mountain lion creeping up to the fighters as the fighters’ fascination with the deer continued. 

“Seriously?” Kia asked.

The crowd yelled, some trying to warn them, others heckling them, but all the voices were distorted by the time they reached the fighters.

Dylan looked up towards the faint voices that reached him in jumbled whispers. He scanned the area until he spotted the mountain lion, heading for the deer.

“Renn!” Dylan yelled.

Renn whipped around in time to see the mountain lion dive for the doe. Renn ran after it, grabbing the puma’s tail. The mountain lion’s ears went back and it whirled around, hissing, with its claws swiping at Renn’s face. Renn blocked its paws, and then backed up to get into a fighting stance.

The doe continued running, safe from its predator. Dylan looked up above the trees and saw they had already gained 1,200 points, between Renn saving the doe and blocking the mountain lion’s paws.

Dylan ran up to Renn’s side, further angering the mountain lion. “What do we do?” Dylan asked.

“Unstrap me,” Renn said, not taking his eyes off the animal.

“Are you crazy?” Dylan asked.

“Do it!” Renn said, prompting Dylan to run behind him and take off Renn’s shoulder pads.

Once they were off, Dylan threw it at the puma, but the mountain lion dodged it and hissed. Dylan turned back to Renn who had now taken his shirt off and was wrapping the shirt around his hand.

Renn squared off with the mountain lion, both ready to lunge. Renn had heard stories about hunters surviving attacks this way and thought if it worked for them, it could work for him. He just needed to get control of his nerves, visualize it happening, and then go for it.

Renn and the puma locked eyes. He saw the large cat twitch before it charged. Renn’s legs sprang into action. They met in the middle as the mountain lion’s paws aimed for Renn’s bare chest. Renn shoved the wound-up shirt down the animal’s throat with his fist, blocking its airway.

The mountain lion backed up in an attempt to breathe.

Renn frantically grabbed its fur, trying to keep it from getting away.

Dylan caught on and got behind the puma, pushing it closer to Renn. It clawed at Renn’s chest and back, over and over. Renn cried out in pain when the animal slashed his flesh.

“Ava…” Dylan said, ready to eliminate the pain.

“No!” Renn yelled, as the mountain lion became still. He backed up and they looked up at the scoreboard. Ten seconds to go before the level was up and the pain would end. “I can handle ten more seconds.”

Dylan used the uniform to press down on Renn’s wound, receiving more points for the good form. “Hang on, man. Almost over.”

“Four, three, two, one.”

On “one,” the pain vanished and the wounds disappeared once the simulation image had lowered into the arena floor. The crowd cheered, stomping their feet and paws while they shouted in excitement.

Renn picked up his shirt, which was scrunched up in a ball on the ground next to his shoulder pads. He put them back on, grateful that the scratches had disappeared.

Their score was 2,250 to Grus and Jonah’s 850, and Renn would later find out that another mountain lion had attacked Jonah. Grus had walked over to it, grabbed it by the back of the neck like a cat, and turned it around so he could see what to make of it. The lion had swiped at Grus, scratching his face. Grus jerked back, insulted by the assault, and threw the lion over the trees, injuring it, but not killing it, causing them to receive fewer points than Renn and Dylan for the bad form.

The fighters didn’t get much time to catch their breath before Ava announced, “The planet is Mindeere.”

The crowd booed on account of Renn getting two planets in a row he would be familiar with, since the entire point of BOTS was to survive species and worlds that the fighters
weren’t
familiar with. Ava, however, found it just as important to survive the dangers on one’s own planet as another, assigning planets based on their species. To the computer, BOTS was never a game.

“Fighters, prepare,” Ava said.

Renn looked across a beige desert covered with sand that ended abruptly at the feet of high, craggy mountains. Hot springs were scattered about like steaming blue puddles, while white, leafless trees ornamented the flat plain, resting under a cloudy blue sky. Renn had no idea where the enemy would come from and put off telling Dylan.

“Fighters, choose your weapons,” Ava announced.

Renn decided to stay with his electricity blasts as his only form of self-defense, seeing as it was the weapon he had the most experience with. He wasn’t willing to take the risk of shooting himself or Dylan because he wasn’t fully trained with guns.

“B-6 hand cannon,” Dylan said. He looked at Renn. “This is all you again! We got this!” he said, jumping at their luck.

“Uh…Dylan,” Renn replied.

“Yeah?” Dylan said, hamming it up for the crowd by posing with the large hand cannon and making the crowd laugh.

“I've never been to Mindeere,” Renn said, embarrassed.

Dylan stopped jumping around. “Yeah, but you know all about it, right? Like, you know what species come from Mindeere…right?”

“Um…I know Mindeerians come from Mindeere…” Renn said, trying to make light of the situation.

“Are you kidding me?” Dylan said, getting into battle stance. 

Grus and Jonah both requested various hand cannons plus one accessory: a bag of lightning rods.

Renn and Dylan both looked at each other, worried about making it past level two.

Grus and Jonah ran around, sticking the lightning rods into the ground until they had created a circle around them.

Ava, however, wasn’t willing to wait. “The game will begin in five, four, three, two, one.”

Steam came up from the blue water, rising in stacks towards the sky. A cool wind stung the fighters’ cheeks, while they looked around for movement. In the distance, Renn could see a creature resembling deranged sheep running towards him, occasionally blending in with the beige sand.

The fighters looked up to the board to see that the animals were a species called “Egars.”

“Are they good or bad? They look pretty intense,” Dylan asked.

“I don't know,” Renn replied, while more came in their direction.

They looked over at Grus and Jonah, who were aiming towards them, waiting to see if Renn would fire.

“Well, do I shoot it or protect it?” Dylan asked.

“I don't know!” Renn replied. “I was raised on Earth.”

In the stands, students yelled, “Shoot it!”, “Protect it!” The yelling grew louder and louder, until the fighters could hear it. One of the Egars was almost on them, running straight for Renn. He had to make a decision. A voice then spoke in his head,
It's going to kill you, shoot it
!

Renn fired a single blast, killing the creature. He could hear booing coming from the crowd and looked up to see 200 points deducted. He turned to where the holding tank would be and glared, knowing very well who had spoken.

Kia looked over at Desh, who was grinning at the deducted points.

“Did you tell him to shoot it?” Kia asked, confused.

“They shouldn't be playing if they don't even know what a Mindeerian Egar is,” Desh replied.

Grus and Jonah lowered their guns and scanned for other species after watching Ava deduct the points. The remaining Egars ran up to Grus and Jonah, hid behind them, and looked towards Renn, like frightened puppies. Jonah patted one, resulting in 200 points for identifying the species as friendly, then looked over at Renn and smirked.

Blue illuminated stingrays with long spindly legs crawled out of the hot springs, heading towards the fighters from every direction.
 
The creatures fired electricity blasts towards them, causing the players to dodge the assault. When the stingrays fired on Jonah and Grus, the fighters were protected by the electricity rods, and the sand took the full impact.

Renn and Dylan fired, killing as many as they could until Dylan was hit with a bolt of electricity, frying his bionic braces and sending electrical waves up his body.

Grus roared, motioning them towards the protected circle, to the annoyance of Jonah and the fear of the Egars.

Renn put up a wall of energy, deflecting the blasts while Dylan tried to recover from the electrocution. He helped Dylan up and the two made their way towards the circle. The lightning rods canceled out Renn’s only weapon, and he took Dylan’s gun, letting him rest when he refused to eliminate the pain till the end of the level.

“The players have advanced to level three,” Ava announced. The crowd cheered, but only to show good form despite the Mindeerian who didn’t know Mindeere.

After the seventy second break, Ava announced the planet as Marlna, and mossy hills ascended above the white floor with white stone caves visible at every turn. The fighters looked down and saw they were standing on ink-black swamp water, which they would easily sink into once Ava started the level. Trees rose through the swamp, with moss draping over each branch, shutting out most of the light.

“Fighters, prepare.”

Renn and Dylan ran around, trying to find solid ground before Ava started the game.

“Choose your weapons,” Ava commanded.

Dylan chose a laser gun, while Renn stayed with Mindeerian fire, and the fighters separated, standing at the edge of separate caves.

“Can’t we ask for extra gear?” Renn asked Dylan.

“Yeah, what do you need?” Dylan replied.

“I don’t know. It just seems like we should stock up if we don’t lose anything by it.”

Dylan shook his head. “Rookie mistake. Extra gear will slow us down. Everything needs to be necessary or it will just get in our way.”

“The game will begin in five, four, three, two, one.”

On “one,” Grus sank three feet into the swamp, being the only one who hadn’t headed for solid land.

Jonah stood on one of the mossy hills, but jumped into the swamp when the moss began to crawl up his body.

Grus, kept looking around the swamp water, while serpents brushed against his legs. He fired into the water around him, causing one serpent to float to the top, dead. It looked like a ten foot black eel, with a jaw that could open up large enough to take a good bite out of Grus’ thick leg. Grus ran for a cave as all the fighters heard the trees rustling in the distance.

“What the hell are those?” Renn asked, looking up towards the figures flying towards them. They had webbed tentacles, green skin, and four protruding black eyes that stood straight up.

Dylan looked up at the board. “Risshions,” he replied.

“Never heard of them.”

“Yeah, me neither.”

Renn and Dylan took aim, waiting for an indication as to whether or not they were hostile, but Jonah wasn’t willing to wait, and fired.

Dylan and Renn looked up to see Ava add points, prompting them to fire along, while the Risshions came in a swarm.

Renn tried to stay focused, for the first time displaying good aim. He finally felt like he was getting the hang of it
,
not noticing that an Odra was creeping up behind him from deep within the cave.

Odras walked erect like humans, with alabaster skin, skin flaps for hair and two eyes dominating two thirds of their face. Each compound eye contained a facet that was repeated 800 times. Below the eyes was the mouth, which was filled with hundreds of worm-like leeches, wiggling about, in place of teeth.