Chapter 1 - Opportunity

"Ugh, turn that off while I'm eating."

I dropped my boxed salad on the breakroom table and crossed the room to switch off the TV in the corner. Kari groaned in protest.

"Ray, you're the only one that doesn't like the Real Fights," she said, annoyed. "And Zarc is my favorite."

"Dragons are cliché." I mumbled bitterly as I dropped into the chair beside her and stabbed into my salad. "But he's everyone's favorite, apparently."

Kari was our office admin, which by default made her my closest friend because work took up too much time for me to have a separate social life. She was comfortably plump and quite attractive, with sassy rimmed glasses and probably a million pairs of shoes. Today she was taking her lunch break with a strawberry parfait and new stack of fashion magazines, thumbing through the advertisements while she'd been watching the television.

"Of course he's everyone's favorite," she was saying, dropping her chin into her hand and staring wistfully at the blank TV. "He's the best. He's incredible. He's just…he's…"

She trailed off, speechless at merely the thought of him, so I finished her sentence for her: "Decadent."

"Exactly!" she simpered, "He's just mouthwatering, isn't he?" She held out a magazine photo spread to show me: Zarc, gratuitously fashionable on a dark wood staircase, leaning with casual grace against a banister with his jacket thrown carelessly over his shoulder.

"That's not what I meant," I scoffed, rolling my eyes away from the tacky magazine spread.

"It's got his cologne sample on the page, mmm," Kari said with relish, and then pressed her face into the magazine for a second before pushing it on me. "It's called 'Sarkany.' Here, smell it—"

"Ew, no!"

"Danny and I like to watch reruns of his duels together," she said with a saucy wiggle of her shoulders, "sometimes it spices things up."

"Ugh, stop," I said, shoveling salad into my mouth before I lost my appetite. "I just don't want to watch him break a guy's femur while I'm trying to eat."

"It's the monsters that do that," she said, tapping her parfait spoon thoughtfully against her lips. "And it's thrilling, it's the realest kind of entertainment to watch the opponents really risk it all, you know? A real survival game. That's why they call them Real Fights with Real SolidVision. Besides, they all know what they're getting into when they duel. Both parties have to sign all kinds of waivers that say they or their families won't ask for restitution or anything. But if they actually manage to win, it's money and glory beyond belief. Zarc practically is a king, or at least he probably lives like one. And he basically pays our salaries."

"The arena is our client, not him," I said, "They buy the Real SolidVision system and pay for our maintenance."

"Well yeah," Kari reasoned, "But how does the arena make money? Ticket sales. From his popularity, and the other Elites too. Zarc sells out every single one of his duels almost immediately. Danny has tried to get us tickets the last couple of times but we're not fast enough. He's been saving up for the good seats."

"The ones where you get splattered?"

"That's what the plexiglas is there for."

"Gross."

"You used to be a duelist, right?" Kari mused, digging into her parfait cup for the last of the strawberries, "I don't even remember what dueling was like before the Real Fights. Never went to watch one. I don't really understand how the cards and all the rules work. I mean, did people really care about the card game before it got interesting?"

"Of course they did," I grumbled, "It was plenty interesting before. It was just more focused on the actual game and not on smearing your opponent all over the floor."

It was unbearable how much the game had changed. I had loved the lights and the adrenaline of dueling in front of a packed audience, but once Zarc turned the game into the Real Fights, popularizing how much spectacular violence his monsters could inflict on his opponent during his matches, Father had insisted I quit. I'd been working under him as a technician at the Real SolidVision Department of Research and Development for about three years. I still got to duel sometimes—we tested out the equipment every month—but it wasn't the same. My father wasn't the same. He, Professor Akaba Leo, had been praised for his brilliant developments in Entertainment Technology and was practically a household name before Zarc waltzed into the spotlight and ruined everything. Father never meant for dueling to become this gruesome. He hardly ever went out in public anymore, too ashamed at what his work had become, too ashamed by the praise. He still worked on the system—he knew it the best, after all, and it afforded the two of us a comfortable lifestyle, but he was miserable.

"I want things to go back to how they were," I said, "It was all about fun before, putting on a good show…"

"It is a good show," Kari insisted, "Like I said, it's real. There's nothing fake or acted or scripted. That's why it's so exciting. It's just two people putting their lives on the line."

"For your entertainment." I said sardonically.

"That's how you know they're the best entertainers," she replied. "Zarc risks his own life every single time too. But he just wants to please his fans." She spread her arms wide and gazed at the dingy breakroom wall with starry eyes as though looking out at a packed stadium, "'Ladies and gentlemen!' It's just so mesmerizing, you know?"

"It's disgusting." I pushed my half-finished salad away. "It's like we've gone backwards in time and the stadium is some kind of colosseum now. People get mauled and maimed by the monsters, and everyone wants to watch it. The most violent and cruel are the ones who win, and they get famous and rich and everything they want. It's horrible."

"Danny and I met through the fan club," Kari said, ignoring my diatribe. "You could say Zarc brought us together. And it's going really well. He works for a luxury chauffeur service and they're hoping to get hired by an Elite. There's a fancy soiree coming up this weekend that the arena owners are hosting at their super-nice hotel downtown, and his promotion to Public Relations means that he got an invite and I get to go as his plus-one. It'll be so amazing. We might get to talk to an Elite about signing a contract, if we're lucky. He's a really great boyfriend."

"I'm happy for you," I said dully. "But if I could go back in time and stop this from happening, I would. It's not fair. My father worked on that system for years and look what it's become."

"Imagine if he got Zarc to sign a contract for their driving service," Kari said dreamily to the ceiling, completely disregarding me again, "Then maybe I'd get to meet him. Maybe. They'd get to drive him back and forth to the arena and to all his photoshoots and appearances and everything. The real high-life. You know," she looked back at me, "Danny said he has a buddy in the transport business who knew a guy who drove Zarc out of the arena once. I guess it was a last-minute substitute thing because the usual driver was sick, and he drove him to this weird office tower in the East District, not too far from here, on the corner of Fifth Street and Pivot Avenue. He thought it might be Zarc's manager's office—who is his manager, anyway?—he's in the fan club, this guy, so naturally he went back later to see what this place was, but he couldn't get further than the lobby. So we never figured out what that drop-off was about, but oh well. He shouldn't have told us at all; the drivers aren't supposed to reveal the places they take their clients."

I was barely listening to her babble, trying to finish my salad even though the slimy lettuce seemed uninviting after hearing so much about Zarc. I really hated him. What he'd done to the game, my father and his work…it was despicable. It was a poor reputation to give our company, to associate that kind of violence with our product, no matter how much the masses loved it and paid to see it.

Fifth and Pivot, huh?

My father was still where he was at his desk before I'd taken my lunch break, squinting over his reading glasses at the analysis screen that read a progress bar that was crawling slowly up to twenty percent.

"Take a lunch break, Professor," I said with a tap on his shoulder. "This isn't good for your eyes. The update won't load any faster with you watching it."

My father turned around, taking his glasses from his face to pass his hand over his eyes, and smiled wearily at me. "Do you have those test rundowns written out?"

"I'll push them to your inbox to review," I dropped into my desk chair and swiped through the documents on my own screen, dull blocks of words that described a clinical analysis of the duels we'd run last week, the energy used by the unit on each given monster, any observable lag or glitch from the disk signal to the main unit. I felt bristly and restive; talking about Zarc always ruined my day just like he'd ruined everything else.

"Father."

He draped his lab coat over his chair, holding the sandwich I'd made him this morning. "Hmm?"

"I don't like doing this."

I fiddled with the pen cup on my desk rather than look him in the eye. I heard him let out a quiet sigh, and then he said, "I know you don't. I know this isn't what you wanted."

"It's…it's not that," I said, still rearranging my pens, "It's…we're just facilitating people like—people like Zarc to do his awful 'performances' with our equipment. I don't like it."

"That's true," he conceded, "But I'm still responsible for the machine. I built it, so I'll keep working on it. I know you're unhappy in this job, but you're very smart and I enjoy having you around. And you're safe."

Safe, yes. And bored. "What if all the violence could stop?"

I looked up at his face to see him smiling again, this time a little sadly. "And how can that happen?"

"What if—" I chose my words carefully, trying not to make it obvious that I already had a plan, "What if someone—I don't know—went and talked to his manager about going back to the old way of dueling? I guess they could make a lot more money if more duelists reentered the League and challenged him without all the brutality."

"More duelists," he said slowly, "Like you?"

I looked back down at the desk, flicking the cap of a pen open and closed idly. "No. I mean, that doesn't matter…I just want your machine to be represented the way it should be. You…you worked so hard on it and it shouldn't be used for cruelty like this. I can—I can talk to his manager. I used to be in the League so I know how things could work in everyone's favor, if I could just—"

"You'll do nothing of the sort," Father cut in, in the tone he always used when he was done with a discussion. "It's not your job to speak on the company's behalf, and anyone working for Zarc is going to be just as deplorable as he is."

I turned back to my documents, fighting the retorts I wanted to throw, and finally just mumbling, "I just want everything to go back to normal."

He sighed again, and sat down at his desk with his sandwich. "So do I. But if it hadn't been Zarc that caused that accident, it would have been someone else eventually. If that's what the crowd wanted to see, if that's the type of dueling they wanted to support, it could have been anyone that started this Real Fights trend. Even if Zarc did calm his tactics down, the fans would just pick a new favorite and it would all continue. We can't change the minds of the fans, they'll just want what they want."

But what about what I want?

I nodded, but my mind wasn't changed either. Zarc was already a favorite before he started the Real Fights, due to his apparent "handsomeness" and particular theatrical flair made fans swoon even before the violence became a factor. He was the one that was popular and the fans would just lap up anything he did. If he stopped his cruelty, everything could go back to normal, the other Elites would follow his lead. Perhaps it was all the same to my father; he had accepted his dejection over the past three years, but I couldn't. He might be disappointed with how his work had been used, but he hadn't had his dreams crushed like I had, dragged out of the limelight to be buried underground in this dingy basement lab that smelled like hot dust.

I could do it. I could make my case, at least, and convince his manager to hear me out.

I decided to drop by the corner of Fifth Street and Pivot Avenue at eight o'clock the next day, Tuesday, excusing myself from dinner with Father by telling him that Kari wanted me to help her pick out dresses to wear to that fancy soiree thing she'd mentioned. A manager working for someone like Zarc would likely be in his office late into the night. If this was even a manager's office; I only had vague speculations for why Zarc might have visited this building, but it was a start. Fixing my father's reputation had to start somewhere, and this was my only lead.

The taxi dropped me off at Fifth and Pivot, and Kari was right: there was a strangely out-of-place office tower here, with the surrounding blocks occupied mostly by warehouses. The tower was unmarked and dark-paned, plainly rectangular but for the windows of the top several floors which angled outward into a wide curve that swept around the building. The taxi drove off, and I took a deep breath. Come on, Ray. You used to be a star duelist. You can do this!

The lobby door was unlocked, and admitted me into a dimly-lit reception area. The walls were paneled in dark wood and the floor was glossy black marble, but there was no one at the reception desk, and only a dusty artificial ficus tree in the corner. The lobby was a much smaller room than the outside of the building, but there were no halls or doors leading off of it into other rooms and offices; just a black-fronted elevator waiting along the side wall in the far corner of the room. I walked over to it, expecting to see a list of office owner names and businesses and which floors they occupied, but there was none. Just a button to call the elevator, with no indication of to what the use of this building was dedicated.

Perhaps the floor listing was inside the elevator car, then. I pushed the button, and waited. The elevator car must have been waiting at one of the high floors, because it took a full minute to arrive and open the smooth doors into the nondescript, dark-paneled compartment. I stepped in and turned around, but there still was no list of offices—there were no buttons at all, none to direct the car to a certain floor, or even the usual open, close, and emergency call buttons.

I was beginning to feel very uncomfortable. I really shouldn't be here. I didn't even know what this place was, or why Zarc might have come here, and why on earth had I come by myself? I made to step out of the elevator, but the elevator door snapped shut on me, and began moving slowly upward.

I started to panic. I was trapped in a tiny box with no way to control it, and it was taking me up to—who knows where. The only office in the building? Was the elevator automatically programmed for only one destination? I went over my speech in my head. If the doors opened right into his office, I should start talking right away, no hesitations or apologies for my intrusion.

The elevator took me all the way up to what must be the top floor, slid to an even stop, and the doors opened.

I charged out immediately, saying, "Excuse me but I'd like to talk about—"

I stopped abruptly. What had been a dark room when I had stepped inside was beginning to flicker into light upon sensing my movement, and this certainly wasn't an office. It was a massive expanse of black marble, a huge circular room that was easily large enough to fit my father's and my entire house inside it. But for the short expanse of wall that housed the elevator, the room was lined all around with those huge outward-angling windows I'd seen from outside. They extended at least the height of four floors up, ribbed at intervals with strip lighting so the height of the room stayed evenly lit all the way up to the ceiling.

I was obviously in the wrong place, but I let my curiosity push my better judgement aside. There was hardly anything in the room, despite its massive size; just a great expanse of marble floor reflecting the light fixtures above, except for two chesterfield couches next to the windows on the far side of the room, with a glass coffee table between them. I turned to my right and walked along the dark wood-paneled wall. Close to the elevator was a sideboard set with a generous selection of liquor bottles and glasses, and the wall twisted around behind itself, rolling back into an almost-concealed spiral staircase that led down to a darkened level below. I reached the end of the wall and peered down the staircase, but I couldn't make out what was down there.

But then my eyes were drawn to the windows. This room was up so high that I could practically see the whole city and its thousands of lights—street lights, the moving streams of cars on the highway, the gentle glow of the residential blocks, the brightly-lit shopping centers. I'd never seen the city from so high up before. It was breathtaking. Perhaps this place was some kind of observation deck of the city. I walked along the windows, all the way around the room to the far side with the chesterfield couches, picking out familiar buildings in the distance. There was our lab facility, empty for the day and dark but for the safety lights around the buildings. There was the Aether Arena further away in downtown, its domed roof glowing brightly with the decorative lights that changed colors from moment to moment, where I used to duel.

"It's a nice view, isn't it?"

I spun around so quickly and gasped so deeply in shock that I practically choked and almost fell backward against the window.

There he was.

The man from the posters and billboards, from the magazines at the convenience store, the gratuitous TV replays.

Zarc, the Supreme King, the Champion, leaning casually against the edge of the wall by the staircase.

"I—I—" My stomach was churning so violently that I wanted to vomit. I'd seen this very same man break bones and take magnanimous bows to the delighted roars from the crowd, sickened as my father's life's work became splattered in this man's bloody infamy. A thousand emotions exploded in my belly, from disgust and hatred to unbridled terror. Oh god. Oh god. He was close to the elavator, so if I made a run for it—my legs couldn't even move as it was. I was rooted to the floor in utter horror. That man—that same man. The man that changed everything, the one that turned Duel Monsters into the Real Fights so I'd had to…That same man, standing here in dark casual slacks and a black button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, staring at me, waiting for me to explain myself.

"I—I don't know—" I spluttered, "I don't know—how I got in here—"

Zarc raised an eyebrow. "You rang my doorbell."

I paused, trying to pull myself out of my panic to think clearly. Rang the doorbell…so the button on the lobby floor didn't just automatically call the elevator car. But that meant…

"This isn't…an office?" I tried to push my tone down to an even impression.

His face was totally passive, completely different than the ingratiating, savage smile I'd seen in the Real Fight recaps, but he glanced up at the high ceiling as if to punctuate how absurd my question was.

"This is where I live."

Another flood of horror crashed down on me. This was his home. Unwittingly I had just barged in on the personal living space of the most famously violent person in the city. I stared down at my shoes, trying to think of an innocent excuse that could negotiate my escape.

"What can I do for you, Miss Akaba?"

Somehow the sound of my name—my father's name—fully grounded me, and I planted my feet and stared him right in the face. "I hate you!"

He raised his eyebrows even further, and responded in a flat, sardonic voice, "So you're not from the fan club, then?"

An avalanche of absolute rage crashed down on me, and I couldn't even control my tirade.

"No I am not from your stupid fan club," I erupted, balling my hands into fists and planting my heels into the floor, "My father worked for years on Real SolidVision! He dedicated his whole life day after day pouring his blood, sweat, and tears into that technology to make dueling more exciting and innovative and better than ever until you came along, with your disgusting 'entertainment' and you disgraced the game and my father's work and you ruined—you ruined everything and I—I—I hate you!"

My voice reverberated off the high ceiling and settled into a ringing silence. His face was still passive as he watched me closely, his eyes slightly narrowed as he considered me. I expected him to demand that I leave his home immediately, bellow at me for coming over unannounced and showing him so much disrespect in his own weirdly huge living room or whatever it was; or worse, charge right over to me and throw me straight through the large, angled window right behind me. But he turned his back to me, and said instead, "Have a seat."

Zarc moved to the sideboard and picked up two old fashioned tumblers and a bottle of dark amber liquid, and turned around to see me still standing in the same spot, speechless.

"You're my guest, after all."

I weighed my options. I could still run, but I had the feeling that if I ran he would instinctively chase me, spurred by a savage prey drive like a wild animal, but his hands were full now so if I made a break for the elevator he'd have to drop his belongings to catch me. I could politely refuse—make an excuse for myself, apologize for my mistake, and maybe he'd just let me go with my head down. But—

No. I didn't come here to run away or retreat without dignity, and the idea of apologizing to this man after everything he and his reputation had done to my father was repulsive. I'd come here to negotiate rationally with a businessman. I'd even dressed for it—a professional pencil skirt with a blazer and subdued makeup so that I would be taken seriously, and not addressed like a silly little girl who had wandered into the wrong place. If I had known the person I'd really be meeting with was Zarc himself—well, I wouldn't have come at all. But I was here, and even after my initial outburst it seemed I had a second chance to make my case. I sat down stiffly on one of the chesterfield couches, keeping my knees and ankles pressed firmly together so my posture could not be interpreted as anything other than professional. He crossed over to the couches with the bottle and the pair of tumblers.

Ludicrously and unbidden, I was reminded of an evening about two years ago when Kari, frustrated after her breakup with an ex-boyfriend whose name I could never remember anyway, insisted I needed to "get out more" and dragged me to a sleazy nightclub on the other side of town. On her giggly encouragement, I let a guy buy me a drink, and consequently had to endure an agonizing forty-five minutes as he sat way too close to me with one hand on my knee and the other around the back of my seat, breathing heavily on my shoulder. This guy had talked on and on about his "wildly successful" financial consultation firm and asked me nothing about myself or my own job except whether I "came here often." I'd finally pretended I needed to use the restroom, left Kari there—already suctioned onto a rebound guy anyway—and caught a taxi home.

Zarc set the empty tumblers on the coffee table and poured a small amount of the dark amber liquid into each glass. There was no way I'd accept so much as an ice chip from this man, much less liquor, but if he was going to slip something into the drink to drug me he'd have done it at the sideboard where I couldn't see what he was doing.

He sat down on the opposite couch facing me. I had seen his face on magazine covers and billboards, whether or not I wanted to look at them, but never in person. He was probably my age, with a strong masculine jawline but a youthful, softly curved cheek. He was widely regarded as the most attractive man in the city, but I didn't really see what the fuss was all about.

The ridiculousness of this situation was starting to settle in. Kari would absolutely die if she could have seen me now. From everything I had unwillingly learned in overhearing her phone conversations and her idle crooning over gushy magazine articles, Zarc had mastered the art of being ostentatiously elusive: keeping himself just enough in the spotlight to stay in constant relevance but carefully avoiding tawdry scandals that would get slapped all over the tabloids. He was mysterious and superior to his ignominious peers, maintaining the focus of his fame entirely on his victories in the arena and leaving everything about his personal life up to the imagination of his fans. But not only had I stumbled blindly upon his private home, I'd actually been invited inside.

He picked up his own drink and said, "So, how did you find this place?"

I hesitated. The truth, "my coworker told me her boyfriend's friend's friend in the chauffeur business drove you here once," seemed too stupid to offer. Instead, I said, "I thought your manager kept his office here. I wanted to see if I could make an appointment on behalf of our Research and Development Department, so I could talk about—"

"I see," he said, disregarding my further explanation, "This building is owned by a real estate firm under the same name as my business at the arena," he said, "If you really did some digging you could figure it out, but of course you wouldn't get past the lobby unless I authorized the elevator. I keep the bodyguards at my property in downtown so the crazed fans can try to break in there all they'd like. Occasionally I get a few curious visitors ringing my doorbell here, but they don't have much to go on and I can see who is bothering me from the security camera. But I saw you, Miss Akaba Ray, and I was curious what you might be doing here at this hour. I trust you'll keep this location a secret."

His tone was not one of making a request. Before I could assure him I would out of fear for my own safety, or even to reassert my purpose here, I realized this was the second time he'd addressed me by name. "You…know me?"

"You were in the Pro League until about three years ago," he said casually, "Your father's notoriety made you stand out, but you held your own just as well. Pretty good win rate. About the same as some of the current Elites were at the time, anyway."

I didn't know what to say. It had been quite a while since anyone even acknowledged I had been in the Pro League, much less knew my general win ratio off the top of their head after I had been irrelevant for so long.

"It's a pity you retired."

My anger suddenly flared up again. Yes, it was a pity that Zarc's ever-so-remarkable talent for popular brutality had led to my father dragging me out of the Pro League out of fear that I'd be mortally injured. What a pity, that Zarc had changed dueling for the worse and turned it all into a blood sport with his pompous, gratuitous, crowd-pleasing cruelty.

I tried to keep my voice even. "My father and I decided I should use my skills to help develop the Real SolidVision technology, so now I work there as a technician."

He blinked at me over his glass, and said quietly, "That must be frustrating, backing behind the scenes after being in the spotlight."

My hands balled into fists on my lap. How dare he try to relate to me. Of course it was frustrating. Of course I wished I could duel again, under the lights and the transfixed gaze of the audience, kicking off the ground and flying through the air with my monsters…but not if it meant risking my ability to walk, or worse. I wasn't the only one. There were tons of duelists that had backed out of the Pro League out of fear for their physical well-being, and now we had come to my main point: that Zarc and the duelists that followed in his footsteps would have plenty more opponents if this violence were to stop.

"That's what I—" I began, but he cut me off again.

"How does it work?"

I blinked. "What?"

"The Real SolidVision system. How does it work?"

I frowned in confusion at him. The Real SolidVision technology was general knowledge, especially for duelists who staked their careers in it. As the most accomplished duelist in the League, he should certainly already know how it works.

"Um," I said, "It—your duel disk sends a signal to the main unit whenever you play a card, and it projects the monsters onto the Field."

"No, no, I know that part," he waved his hand to sweep away my superficial explanation, "But how do the monsters become solid like that? Where does that mass come from?"

So, he wanted the technical explanation. Even Kari couldn't be bothered with the science behind the machine despite working in our office. But here was Zarc, the unequalled Champion of the League, asking me specific questions about my knowledge.

"The arena floor is made of fiberglass," I answered, "So it's porous, at a microscopic level. The main RSV unit is huge, and runs the entire length of the floor. It transforms energy into synthetic particles that can form together to make shapes with stable mass according to our three-dimensional models. It's sort of like an instant 3-D printer, except the model's stability is flexible. The particles can dissolve on command, and reform into a new shape. The energy sustains the shapes of the monsters according to the commands of the game."

"So the system converts energy into mass," he concluded succinctly.

"Electricity into temporary synthetic mass, yes."

"But the monsters have body heat," he said, "How is that possible if they're made of synthetic particles?"

"It's just an emission from the energy that sustains them," I replied, "But the models are built to imitate a lifelike creature, with saliva and hair and skin and a breathing cycle, but it's all synthetic. They're not flesh and bone; it's impossible to build and sustain organic substance with a machine."

"And that all comes out of the main unit in the floor?"

"Yes."

He nodded again slowly, staring into his drink. Maybe I was imagining it, but he looked slightly irritated by my answer. "And your father invented this?"

"The technology existed before, but he's the one who implemented it into dueling," I replied, "The projections' durability was weaker back then and the projection unit was much smaller, so it was just used for decorative purposes in homes—change your garlands for the season, et cetera—but he saw its potential to make the game more exciting. He stayed late in his office night after night and he and his team built all of the solid models for the existing monster cards and ported in the attack commands and everything from the existing SolidVision version, adding in the tangible element so everything would feel real. It took a long time because of how many times his budget got stalled—the company didn't think it was a priority, and kept insisting he set Duel Monsters aside for other implementations instead. So he went to all sorts of high-society sponsorship parties to get outside funding. He took me along once, when I was a teenager, so I could tell everyone about how much I loved playing Duel Monsters and how excited I was about his project in order to help get him sponsors. I got all dressed up, and Father let me taste his champagne, and I—I felt so grown-up and important. And finally when the project got enough sponsors, he went all over the world to collect data, testing various sources of energy and observing their effects on the projections. He would take me to the lab and show me the monsters he'd finished. So I promised myself I'd work really hard to get into the Pro League so I could make his amazing work shine and put on a great show for everyone and I'd—"

I stopped talking abruptly. Zarc was smiling slightly at my nostalgia. I'd let myself reminisce and forget where I was, and whom I was talking to, allayed by the soft curve of his cheek and his gentle, unthreatening voice. Somehow I'd even relaxed out of my stiff knees-together position and actually crossed my legs like I was comfortable. What are you doing!? You didn't come here for a sentimental chat!
I steeled myself, sitting up straight again and pressing my knees and ankles back together. "Because of what you did," I kept my eyes fixed on the empty seat of the couch beside him rather than at his face, "My father is too ashamed of all that work to go out anymore. The Real Fights have made him miserable, they've ruined his reputation. He's a good man."

It was a weak, mushy argument. I'd had a strong argument before, but I couldn't even remember it anymore; it had all fallen through the cracks in my disorientation at finding myself sitting with this man. What business did I have begging for the credit of my father from Zarc, who profited grossly from his own merciless talents at the expense of my poor father's happiness? He was a superstar. One old engineer's depression was no concern of his among the roars of approval from his fans and admirers. I was stupid. This whole plan was stupid.

Zarc finished off his drink and set the glass on the coffee table with a thoughtful tap. "The thing about reputation," he said, "Is that it's all about what everyone else thinks. Your father's work allows the duelists to entertain the crowd the way the crowd wants, doesn't it? Everyone is pleased and excited by it. Doesn't that mean his reputation is good?"

I couldn't answer. Yes…even after the Real Fights began, my father was congratulated for his excellent innovation. Everyone was pleased, everyone was thrilled at how Real SolidVision had brought about a new evolution of dueling. My father's misery was his own, not due to any shame dealt to him, but it was undue all the same.

Zarc stood up suddenly, as though his thoughts impulsed him to move, and wandered around behind the couch he'd been sitting in.

"There's no such thing as 'good,' anyway," he went on, dragging his hand casually along the back of his couch with his eyes on the window, "There's no medal for achieving moral superiority. There's just what everyone wants from you, and whether you have the guts to fulfill it. 'Good' is just the label everyone else determines, isn't it?" He stood at the window, and I watched him as he looked down at the glittering city that lay below him, "The people want what they want, and if you give it to them, they'll reward you and then ask for more. If they approve of you, you are 'good.'"

I stood up suddenly, my hands balled into fists, and he turned around to look at me with vague surprise, as though he'd almost forgotten I was there in the few seconds that he'd looked away from me.

"You may have instigated the Real Fights and everyone else thinks you're so great but you'll never be good." Sharp anger was running through me again. I wanted to punch him in his stupid tacky face. "My father wanted to create something wonderful for everyone to enjoy, he dedicated his life and all of his skills to make something new. You just—you took an accident and turned it into a horrifying trend—you make me sick, the way you get off on all the attention you get from torturing your opponents in the arena—you don't deserve any of this! How dare you compare yourself to my father! How dare you—how—I hate you and your fan club and your nasty monsters and—and—!"

The look on his face had turned ugly. I turned on my heel and marched toward the elevator, across the vast, empty marble floor. I slammed my hand down on the call button and the doors slid open immediately to admit me. I stepped inside and turned around.

"You're revolting," I said, "I'd once thought since you had the same gift I do you'd be—but no, you're not special. You're just a cruel, cocky gasbag and you—"

"Gift?"

He was walking toward me. The elevator car had no buttons and I couldn't make the doors close before he reached me. I hadn't meant to mention it. It wasn't something I liked to think about, but it was undeniable from even the few of his duels I had had the stomach to watch.

The elevator doors started to close, but he got there first. He put one hand on the edge of the door to force it back open, and closed his other around my wrist.

"What gift? What do you know?"

I tried fruitlessly to wrench my wrist out of his hand. "Nothing—! I don't know anything—! Let me go!"

"Tell me!"

I was scared. With the grip he had on my wrist he could drag me out of the elevator and fling me across the room. I'd seen him do it in the TV recaps to much larger men. He could slam me into the wall. He could break my arm in his hand. I'd seen him do it. "Please," I whispered. If I spoke any louder I would start sobbing in panic. No one knew I was here. I hadn't told anyone where I was going. "Please let me go."

He looked at my face with some mixture of annoyance and compunction, and then relaxed the hand holding my wrist. I backed all the way against the back wall of the elevator with my arms around my chest, as though that would prevent him from grabbing me again. He kept his hand on the elevator door; I was still trapped.

"What did you mean, I have the same gift that you do?" he said with feigned politeness that hardly concealed his impatience.

He wasn't going to let me leave until I explained my statement. I could lie—but no lie would work on him now if he suspected the truth already. If he knew what gift I meant.

"The monsters," I said quietly, still with my arms wrapped protectively around me, "You can hear them, can't you? I can—I can understand their feelings. Their bodies may not be real but their spirits feel alive to me. I've always kept it a secret because I never met anyone else who could, but…you can communicate with them. They speak to you."

His knuckles were white as he gripped the edge of the elevator door. "How can you tell?"

I weighed my options again, and still in my panic decided to tell the truth."I thought I was just imagining it for the longest time—but the way you move with them in the arena, it's obvious to me. We were in different strings in the Dueling League even back then so we never met in person but—even when I'd watch you, I could see that you were listening to them and learning from them and I felt like they…knew you."

He didn't reply, but simply stared at me in astonishment as though he'd never seen anything like me before in his life.

"May I leave now?" I stared at the floor of the elevator.
He blinked, and seemed to realize that his hand on the elevator door was preventing me from leaving. He slowly slid his hand away and took a step back as the doors finally closed, and the elevator moved smoothly downward.

I didn't tell Kari that I'd visited the address she'd mentioned. I told her nothing of my conversation with Zarc, or his huge, empty tower home overlooking the city. That I had berated him for my father's shame, or confessed to sharing a strange, unexplainable secret with him while he trapped me in his elevator. It was like it never happened, and Kari continued to sigh at her admin desk over each of Zarc's new press cuttings and tacky photoshoots, sometimes on the phone with her boyfriend from the fan club, while I pretended not to hear her and focused on my test duel result graphs.

On Thursday she was distracted, because the fancy sponsorship party she was supposed to go to with her boyfriend was on Saturday and she still hadn't decided which of the four pairs of shoes she'd bought would go best with her dress, even after I'd given her my advice three times.

"Here's your mail, Ray," she said, dropping a stack onto my desk and then immediately shoving another fashion magazine into my face and poking one of the photos with her index finger. "What do you think of this updo? Would my hair be too curly for that?"

"Updos always look better with curly hair," I said firmly, with no idea what I was talking about. I was tired of her constant fussing and glad it would all be over on Monday after the party. "You should put a fancy clip in it."

"Funny you should mention that, I got a couple different ones, I wanted to know if…" and she dragged me immediately into another debate over her hair clips, whether the rhinestone one or the one shaped like a flower would be better. I insisted on the flower, since the rhinestones would distract from the new earrings her boyfriend had given her—"Can you believe he bought me diamonds!?"—on their last big date. She seemed satisfied with my reasoning, and finally went back to her desk and left me alone.

I was happy to see that the newest issue of my home and office organization magazine had arrived, along with some usual ads for department store sales and restaurants, and also a thick, square envelope with no return address.

The envelope was made of embossed paper, and my full name and the office address were printed in fine gilt ink. It seemed very luxurious; I wondered if it was a cleverly-disguised sample ad from the expensive cosmetic shop in the mall; I'd bought one lip gloss there to appease Kari on an outing last year and somehow ended up on their inescapable mailing list. I'd never even worn that lip gloss.

A black folded card came out of the envelope, with my name printed in gold again on the inside:

Miss Akaba Ray,

You are cordially invited to

the AETHER ARENA SPONSORSHIP GALA

at the Stardust Hotel

—and dated for this Saturday night.