3000 Stars

Lost

"You're back!" the attendant said cheerfully as Taehyung handed over his phone to check in.

"I'm back," Taehyung said. He forced himself to smile at them as he walked down the blue hallway behind them, past the live recordings of the fights in the three-level tournament arena, and into the preparation rooms. The arena required a warm-up time of fifteen minutes before the first fight of the day, so Taehyung stepped into one of the green circles on the floor and watched it light up as the tube slid down around him. His hack prickled on his skin. He rose, into a smaller room with a few dummies and a display along the wall with empty zeroes beside the stats bars.

When the glass tube rose, he formed an energy spear and the display changed, numbers jumping and fluctuating as he swung it around mindlessly and waited for the clock to count down. He formed shields, then spheres, then sighed and covered the floor in energy, wondering if he should try to make anything new. He couldn't let himself get predictable, or he would have trouble making it into the top hundred, not to mention the top ten.

He had to be on top before Yoongi got there.

Yoongi had finally hit 8,545 stars the night before, and he had a few loyal fans who went around posting on other accounts about getting him more. Taehyung ignored them, but the score concerned him. If Yoongi was close to nine thousand points, he didn't have much time. The leap between being at eight thousand and becoming a 10-K was much shorter than it seemed. Once you passed eight thousand stars, your face would appear on a pre-10-K ranking and more people noticed you. Getting the last two thousand stars was never a problem after that.

The alarm went off, and he returned to his circle, descending to the preparation room. He left and walked further down the blue hall, watching as the colors blended into darker and darker shades of blue until they ended in a huge purple dome.

The organization of the tournament was simple. Those in the higher ranks fought on the first floor, those in the mid ranks on the second, and those under rank 1000 on the first. The dome Taehyung stood in was the center of all those floors. The dome itself was divided into three sections by thin, glowing sky blue lines. Each section was filled with glowing blue circles-- spaces for contestants to be transported to their part of the dome.

Taehyung stepped onto a circle close to the outside of the dome and waited patiently as the glass tube descended and a display appeared, telling him his rank and the name and rank of his opponent. He watched other contestants arriving as he rose, passing through the top of the dome and coming out in a hallway that slanted downward, toward a large set of white double doors. Taehyung walked down to them and pushed the doors open.

On the other side was an arena not unlike the one he had dueled with Yoongi in, complete with glowing holographs to mark the boundaries of the fighting areas. But around the outside was a ring of cameras, their lenses reflecting the light from the arena. Taehyung knew many more were embedded in the walls around them to catch as many angles of the fight as possible. His opponent already waited in the arena, stretching and jogging in place.

"Hello," Taehyung called.

"Hello, X!" his opponent called back. "I'm Kade. Is this your first fight today?"

Taehyung nodded, climbing into the arena. Kade grinned, giving him a casual salute. "Mine too," he said. "Let's make it a good one, yeah?"

"Of course," Taehyung said, shaking his hands out. Why was he so jittery? He knew how to fight. Kade was only one rank above him. The fight was almost equal. He just had to beat Kade.

Kade was the first to charge after the countdown, calling up a gust of wind and slamming it into Taehyung moments before he did. Taehyung flailed, digging in his feet and forming a shield, and ended up with his heel inches from the barrier line. He retaliated, shoving the shield out and pushing Kade back, but Kade got out of the way and slammed a hand down on the shield, shattering it.

That was the most irritating thing about wind users. You could never tell what form their attack was talking unless something else was mixed with the wind they used. Taehyung used the moments before his shield shattered to get away from the barrier, forming a spear in his free hand and throwing it at Kade when the shield came down. Kade deflected it. Taehyung formed balls of energy and threw them at Kade, but Kade just used the wind to spin them around and shoot them back at him, driving Taehyung to his knees. One of the hearts over his head blinked out.

Taehyung gritted his teeth. He had to figure something out, or he would lose. He pressed his hands to the floor, but as he got up a gust of wind slammed into him, and he flew over the edge of the arena, tumbling to the ground. The shield he called up to keep himself from breaking bones didn't stop the pain from coming. He sighed, looking up at his last heart, and decided he didn't care. He just wanted to get one of Kade's hearts before he lost.

That was what this fight would have to be. A loss.

But when he got back onto the field, he felt a surge of energy. He couldn't just give up. That was stupid. Who was he pretending to be? He was V, not X, and he wasn't going to let himself lose. He called up enough energy to coat the floor beneath him and rooted it in the arena floor, wincing as the cement cracked. Kade leapt into the air, spinning in a circle, and Taehyung whipped his hands up, bringing them together as spikes grew out of the coating on the floor and surrounded him. A breeze ruffled his hair, but whatever the attack was, it seemed he had avoided it. He pulled the energy in without diffusing it and shot it at Kade in one blast, knocking him out of the air and into the ground. One heart flickered out. Taehyung didn't wait for Kade to get up. He slammed him with another wave of energy, throwing him off the field. While Kade climbed back up, he rooted himself to the ground again and used the energy to brace his legs, hoping to avoid being blown over again. It wasn't a new technique, but he hoped it would work.

"You fight a lot like someone else I knew," Kade said. "Have you been in the arena for a long time?"

Taehyung shook his head.

"Huh," Kade said. "I could have sworn you were. You wouldn't happen to know anyone named V, would you?"

Taehyung's heart stopped. "No," he said. "Why?"
"Nothing, just curious," Kade said, bringing both his hands together. "I've been wanting to fight him for awhile."

Before Taehyung could respond, Kade threw his hands out, and wind slammed into Taehyung, ripping at his roots and tearing him up. He threw out a loop of energy, intending to tie himself to Kade, but he missed and flew out of the arena, throwing out a shield beneath him to stop his fall.

"Thanks for the fight," Kade called to him. "If you ever meet someone who fights like you, tell him I said hi!"

Then he turned and walked out the other end of the arena, leaving Taehyung alone.