The Arena (Book 1)

The Brick Wall

As we're running through the streets, we have to watch out for puddles of collected rain in potholes. Sometimes I'll slip and almost fall into one, but I always manage to avoid it luckily. The gunshots from earlier have subsided but the city still has an edgy feel looming over it. Eventually, Tigris will tell me something small about her past. Like her first car, the time she was asked to prom, and so on. I listen but usually don't reply.

Finally, we reach the outside of the city, where a tall brick wall stands. "Follow me, be careful." She says as we run along the edge for a while until we reach a ladder that stretches to the top. Slowly we begin to climb to the top, each ring on the ladder has water droplets on it so we both use our sleeves as protection. When we finally reach the top we take a small break, laying out our weapons to check supplies. "We should be able to go fight some of the other robots now. We just have to make sure we avoid the AI." She says, retrieving her weapons. There's a skyscraper branching off of the wall a few hundred feet away from us.

"Okay, who's left anyway?" I ask.

"You, me, 009, and Witch Doctor. We should go after Witch Doctor first, then 009 since its Liam's robot." She says. I nod and we start heading along the top of the wall.

Suddenly while running behind Tigris, something wraps around my foot and prevents me from moving. I look down and see a machine in the shape of hands grabbing my feet. "Tigris help!" I shout, looking behind me to see Witch Doctor approaching me. She turns around and sees what's happening. She begins to run towards me, with her gun aimed at Witch Doctor. But she won't be able to reach me in time. I pull out my new katana and try to break the trap I'm stuck in. After a few unsuccessful swings, I finally chip away at one side, freeing one of my feet. But before I can free the other one, something flies into my chest, ripping through the gears and wires. I scream in pain, but mostly in fear that something important was broken. Because I can still move I reluctantly assume I'm alright in the grand scale of things.

"004!" Tigris screams as she runs up to help me, seeing my chest. She aims her gun at the trap still holding my other foot and fires. It releases my leg and I can move again. I begin to run towards her, she waits for me to catch up to her, then we both start to run along to wall to a skyscraper ahead.

"Come on! We can make it there!" I yell as she starts to fire shots at Witch Doctor, who's closely pursuing us. I keep running, each step I take I speed up. When I reach the skyscraper I finally stop running, taking a few breaths. But when I look back, Witch Doctor is gone and Tigris is still far behind me. She sees that I'm safe and begins to run towards where I am. When she's a few meters away, she stops dead in her tracks.

"Tigris?" I say, and we make eye contact but something's wrong.

Suddenly a hand wraps around her shoulder, and Witch Doctor appears behind her. I look Tigris dead in the eyes and watch as Witch Doctor pierces its arm through her chest, and tears out her heart. I turn and begin to run up the stairs of the skyscraper, not looking back. I reach into my pocket and pull out the gun Tigris gave me and turn it to overload settings, then I close my eyes tightly as I throw it down to them. A moment later I see a bright flash and hear ringing in my ear as it explodes.

I know Witch Doctor is dead.

And so is Tigris.