Scrapmetal (on hold)

Chapter 3

I heard merciless dogs barking orders at each other, herding us like sheep into a jumbled mess of metal that they some how manage to keep from falling apart and still be able to call it a cage. Well almost keep it from falling apart. I looked up with my good eye to see a raggedy looking scrap-piece dressed in dingy iron clad, hissing a cuss word under his breath as a massive chunk of welded chain crumbled to the ground. A very boisterous kid zipped past me in a blur grabbed a long piece of chain right from under another scrap-piece with a massive deformed metal arm and a beer-gut to match. The kid had the happiest look on his face as if this was a joyride,

"Hey kid! what the heck do you think you're doing!?" The beer-gut man bellowed.

"changing the odds!" he yelled, and barreled straight into me and rolled behind me just as the beer gut was a charging bull of anger and slammed his sludge hammer of an arm inches from my chest. I was in no mood. I gave the beer gut man a menacing sneer that what I thought would of been enough to let him know I meant business and he needed to back off, but with a black eye and sweat beading up on my face it probably showed I was sick and meant barf-zone. The man gave a laugh that echoed in the room and in his gut, it gave a whole new meaning to the word alcoholic stench, this man stunk like he was marinated in the stuff and it managed to rot his teeth out which didn't do much for his grimy five o clock shadow. Before I really did mean barf-zone he backed off when the more thin iron clad scrap-piece shouted,

" that chain will crumble anyhow before he gets in the arena, just leave it, less for me to get busted for breaking anyway," the beer-gut deflated a little when the alcoholic grunted in disappointment and hobbled off as all of us initiates shuffled into the contraption that would bring us to our "arena" but I doubt it would look any better than this. I turned around to face the whack-job that stole the chain but he vanished as if he were never there, I did a 360 to scan the cage for him and I caught sight of a blonde head of hay-wire curls that matched this kid's weird taste in fun because one side was shaved off to reveal a tattoo that depicted the words "Ei Pelkoa" in jagged cursive looking writing. Just how old was this kid anyway? And what did he mean by changing the odds? The sickening odor of alcohol was gone but it was replaced by a much more haunting one, cigarette smoke. I looked over to see a viper of a girl smoking away with her pigtails igniting the dark scenery. I noticed the eerie hush of murmurs cascading around the cage as if you spoke that name you would die on the spot. Piston. And then like a surprising burst of lightning I heard the name deadbolt. That's what piston threatened me with. Well this was interesting and to make matters more peculiar, piston heard it too and her complexion twisted into and evil grin like a chilling snake playing with it's food.

" what did I just hear?" she purred, snapping her head in the direction of a small girl with a mousy appearance quivering near the edge of the cage. She cleared her throat and raised her chin as her cowardly shake began to falter.

" Dead, bolt," she said in a scratchy but confident voice. She was braver than me. But not dumber. She dodged a swift talon like snatch of an enraged piston and climbed up the shoddy metallic sphere with amazing speed just out of pistons clutches. That's when I heard the wicked clang of chain on the small concrete platform.

" If you're smart you will never. Lay a finger on my sister...Piston" the curly headed blonde practically spit the last word out with disgust, that's when I had enough. I was basically hiding behind two, maybe 11 year olds, and a black eye. No more. I bolted up to the pigtailed fiend and gave her a piercing look with my good eye. She didn't even flinch.

"what's got you all worked up? Dead bolt," the anger drenching my voice held up like a stone wall when I said,

" I could ask you the same thing, what's got you so on edge?" she froze with an eyebrow raised trying to wonder what I was getting at and I smirked in spite of myself. "something as small as a name? Like, deadbolt for instance," I said my voice gaining a deadly tone that I was impressed I could muster under the circumstances of how close we were. I watched as her eyes calculated up and down my body, probably wondering what to make purple or bleed next. But I didn't calculate my hand must've had a spasm because there was no way what I did next was a part of my rational thought. The smug look on her face that she always got when she took a hefty inhale of her cigarette instantly turned to pure hatred as I plucked the orange tipped toxin out of her mouth, threw it to the ground and stomped it out. All faces surrounding the scene were in awe and I almost joined in, but my glare only grew to bring her rage to a blinding boil. In a whirling blur her fist was on it's way to a place between my eyes but was stopped in it's path when a crystal orb was dropped from it's high perch between mouse-like hands. The shattered pieces were now housing small drops of blood that were rapidly blooming from the mangled looking crevice that was now drowning in a pool of darkened red, raggedly flowing from pistons still clenched fist. I never moved, I stood there and stared at the expression on pistons face. Nothing. It didn't faze her for a second. The bewilderment on my face however was definitely present. When I looked up at my mousy savior a smile spread across my face as easy as butter when I saw her plop down next to her brother and give him a giggle filled high five. Piston took a sassy leave and swished her long pigtails with pride and disappeared into the hushed crowd. Suddenly a wave of inspiration washed over me. I would change the odds. So I picked up the sharpest shard of crystal and leaned against the rickety chains and metal with a sly smile playing on my lips as we were being hauled up by more chains and thick ropes up into an arena that would hold either a nightmare or a dream that was sure to come true.