The Underdogs

Madness to Magnet

Chapter Two

Madness to Magnet

The lights went out without a sound. Shades of blue -- midnight, navy, subtle hints of aquamarine -- enveloped The Underground as it made its nightly transformation from arcade to fighting ring. A dugout deep in the basement, abandoned during the day, was suddenly lined with people of all sorts. High school drop-outs, disgruntled salarymen, low-level grunts from neighborhood gangs. All waiting for a chance to meet her.

Slipping through sheets of dirty rain, Tak sprinted toward the club. For the second time that day, she was late. But rather than at school, where she could endure yet another lecture from her homeroom teacher, she did not want to cross those at The Underground. It wasn’t that she was scared of them -- Junpei Sato, the night manager, treated her as kindly as if she were his own little sister -- it was just that The Underground had given her a second chance at life, and she did not want to disappoint anyone there.

Had Tak not found The Underground all those years ago, she was certain she would have ended up on the streets, in a gang, or worse. The nightly fights wrung out all of the girl’s extra aggression and it tempered her anger. Whatever else may come during the day, Tak knew she could handle it, so long as she had The Underground to come back to at night.

Grey rain pitter-pattered against the ground, mixing with grime and slithering into the city streets. Tak checked the face of her watch, only to remember that the battery had died days ago. Bursting through the back entrance of the arcade, she hopped down the stairs two at a time until she finally reached the basement.

“You’re late,” remarked Junpei, a thick-set man well into his thirties who always smelled like fast food and cigarettes.

“I know,” Tak spat out, breath ragged from the run. “Sorry.”

A petite woman appeared at Junpei’s side. “Here, Tak, have a drink before we call your first fight,” she said, handing the blue-eyed girl a bottle of water.

“Thanks, Hikki,” Tak said, tearing the cap of the bottle and chugging down half its contents. “Who we got on now?”

Hikki tossed her head over one shoulder, averting her gaze to the ring, where two teens were exchanging blows. “I’m not sure,” she replied. “Lots of newbies came out tonight.”

“Good for me, huh,” Tak said, wiping a trail of icy water from the corner of her lip. “Lots of easy wins.”

“Better be,” Junpei grumbled. “House is betting high on you tonight.”

“’Preciate that, Jun,” Tak said, giving the night manager a friendly slap on the shoulder. “You know I won’t disappoint.”

The boy peered above the heads of the crowd to watch the girl fight. Though short and verging on scrawny, the outline of lean muscles trailed up and down his arms like a subway map. Brown hair, flecked with streaks of copper, flopped over his face and caged his eyes, obscuring his vision. Swiping the wild strands from his face with hands like pale spiders, he watched the end of the fight.

Tak caught her opponent in a swift uppercut, sending him reeling backward. Scrambling on all fours, shirt scrunched from where she had hit him, he tried to right himself before the next blow came. But he was too slow; the blue-eyed fighter was on him in an instant, fist raised, ready to lash out.

The onlooker could not take his eyes off Tak’s. He had never seen someone with eyes that shade of blue before. Electric, almost neon, they were two bright beacons in the darkness.

Someone, somewhere far off where the boy couldn’t see, called the fight. Tak let her prey go, and her former opponent promptly scurried into the darkness. The boy pushed his way to the front of the crowd.