After my tryout and discovering that Max Brass didn't remember me, I went back to my room. I put my suit on the empty bed, powered it down, and looked at the digital clock. 8:20pm. Surprisingly, I didn't feel much of the effects of jet lag. Or is that because I got eight hours of sleep and a good meal during the flight? I wasn't sure. I tried to think about what to do next. I sent a message to my dad, telling him that I got into the Grand Prix and then I texted Veronica,

Hey girl. Guess what? I got into the ARMS Grand Prix.

A few minutes later, she responded with, They let you in? Nice! Although you do realize how early it is? You know I usually sleep past this hour!

Oh dang it. I forgot that Japan is 13 hours ahead of U.S Eastern Time. For her, it was 9:20 in the morning and she slept until ten. Apologies. I'm still trying to adjust to the new time zone.

It's fine. How bad do you feel the jet lag?

Not very bad. Heck, I'm not sure I feel anything bad at all. Then again, I did get eight hours of sleep plus a decent meal.

Your cardigan rhythm and eating patterns are being thrown out of whack, even if you don't realize it.

You're probably right.

I continued the conversation and told her about my tryout.

A hundred opponents?! she texted back. That's insane!

Ikr?

How many did you beat?

The minimum requirement for immediate qualification was 50. I got 66. They said it's rare for someone to beat 1 vs 100. Only one person has ever done it!

Really? Do you know who that person is?

I think they said his name is Misango, the spirited fighter. I have no idea who he is though.

Misango. Never heard of him. I gotta get going. My second job starts soon! Btw, if you find anything out about this spirit fighter, tell me.

After she sent me that message, I heard and felt my stomach growl. It was 8:45. I decided to go and find some food. I went down the elevator to the lobby and tried to find my way to the food court. Luckily, a sign pointed me in the right direction. I went to the food court and looked at the menu. After looking at it, I also saw the employee behind the counter was snoozing. She had pale skin and red hair that reached to her shoulders. She wore a white shirt with shoulder sleeves and black pants. As far as I could tell, she was the only employee working here. I wanted food, but at the same time, I didn't want to disturb her. She looked so peaceful.

"Maybe I should just skip dinner..." I mumbled to myself.

"Huh? Skip what?" a weary voice said.

The snoozing employee woke up. Not only did her green eyes look weary, she also had big dark circles under them. Her name tag read Suzie. Because of her sleeping habits, I secretly nicknamed her Snoozing Suzie.

"Are you okay?" I asked. "You look..."

"Tired?" She smiled crazily and laughed. "Yes, I get that all time. Ever since I started working the night shift four days ago." She laughed again, this time without much insanity in her voice.

"I'll take a chicken pot pie and a small soda."

"That'll be $5.50."

I handed her the money, got my tray of food and sat at the nearest table. Since it was well past the dinner rush, the food court was a ghost town. I got a cup of Sprite from the soda machine and started eating my meal. For a while, it was deserted. I thought of who this Misango could be. They called him the spirited fighter. What did that mean? Was he dedicated to fighting? Was a witchdoctor or voodoo spiritual priest? Was he a bridge between the spirit world and this world?

I became so lost in my thoughts that I didn't realize someone had joined me at my table. I looked away.

"You look lonely." a feminine voice said.

"I guess you could say that." I responded.

I heard the sound of a metal spoon clinking into a glass dish. "So uh, where are your ARMS?"

"Huh? Oh, my ARMS Mecha Suit's in my room."

"An ARMS suit, eh?"

I turned to her and asked, "Yeah. I got a picture of me in my suit. Wanna see it?"

She smiled. "Sure!"

I did a double take. "Ribbon Girl?!"

The popstar winked. She was dressed in her normal clothing, but there was one major difference in her appearance; She had her hair down and the ribbon she used to keep up her ponytail was now camouflaged in with her right arm. If it weren't for the fact that a few strings were hanging loose from her arm, I never would have seen the ribbon.

"Surprised to see me?" she asked after taking another bite of ice cream.

I gave her my phone so she could see the picture. "Y... Yeah. It.. it's just that... I'm just a normal girl, and you're famous. Why would you even talk to me?"

"Oh, don't be so hard on yourself." She handed my phone back to me. "I gotta say, that suit looks pretty impressive."

"You really think so?"

"Yeah, it looks so complicated."

"The long explanation of how it works would fry your brain."

"Ok, then, can you give me a shorted version?"

I gave her the shortened version of how the suit worked.

"Wow, that sounds like a complex and time-consuming project." Ribbon Girl remarked.

"Yeah, it was." I finished my meal and took another sip of Sprite. "It took several months. Not to mention the two month delay..."

"Two month delay? Were you missing supplies?"

"No, I broke my arm."

"Ouch."

"Yeah. Ouch. I guess I better hit the hay." I stopped briefly, before walking away. "Also, by the way, do you mind if I get your autograph later?"

"Sure, no problem! Sleep well!"

I went back to my room and had a strange dream that night. It started with a horrible flashback. I was five years old, and I was returning home from school. I took the path I had always taken by foot. After walking for 10 minutes, I had made it back home. Mom was unconscious, having collapsed onto the floor only mere seconds before my arrival, according to dad. I looked at her.

"Mom? Why are you sleeping on the floor?"

I looked upon my dad's face as he hung up. I knew this was serious. A few moments later, the emergency workers arrived and took her to the hospital. The doctors had done some medical tests and revealed that she was suffering from Bovineitis, a rare and almost always deadly disease from a rare species of cow that was created due to an ARMS experiment in the 2990's that went horribly wrong. (Don't ask. It's a long story.) The rare mutated cows were wiped out or turned back to normal, but scientists are still combating the malicious disease to this day. Luckily, it's nowhere in my home country, or in the United States. At least, as far as I can tell. How she got the disease is not entirely known, but since she had been traveling the world on a three month long business trip prior to her death, she probably caught a strain of virus from an infected person. Which is strange, considering that there's only one way for it to spread; direct contact with an infected person's blood.

Unfortunately for my mother, she had discovered it in the late stages and was dead within a month. The really bad thing about Bovineitis is that if it's not cured within the first two stages, the third and final stage is almost impossible to cure, and many victims don't survive treatment. I remembered the day I arrived back at the house, only to find that mother would never return. January 20th, 3040. It was the worst day of my life. I was six years old, and after being teased by Karai and her friends, I wanted, more than ever, for my mother to comfort me.

I entered my room and dropped my backpack onto the floor in shock. I saw dad crying. He was kneeling, his arm on the couch cushion, sobbing into his right arm. I had never seen him cry before.

I approached him slowly. "Daddy? What's wrong?" He looked at me, turned away and cried some more. "Daddy?"

He nodded his head no slowly. "Marina..." He spoke, trying to prevent himself from sobbing. "Miwa is gone..."

"Mom? No, this, this can't be! Why?! What did she ever do to anyone?! WHY?!"

I broke down crying too. Neither of us knew what to say to each other. Then the image of us sobbing in sorrow vanished, like ripples in a puddle of water. The vision changed to Karai. Karai was a black-haired, pale-skinned girl with green eyes and wore a lot of makeup, even when she was a little girl. She wore black eyeshadow, mascara, eyeliner, a small bit of blush and concealer. No blemishes, no hair except for her eyebrows and her hair on her head. She looked flawless. She wore black pants with a dark grey mini skirt and a dark blue spaghetti strap top along with black slipper flats, a lightning bolt choker and a bracelet of skulls.

"Honestly, Marina, when are you going to learn?" she asked. "You have no extendable ARMS. You can't possibly build a suit with ARMS and even if you could, would it really even work?"

I felt so angry and so sad at the same time. Those words are what she taunted me with numerous times, whether it be in person, or in a letter. (Sadly, she knows where I live.) Then I heard an evil laughter echoing and the sounds of fast footsteps running through a corridor as flashing red lights blinked and an alarm was blaring through the halls. I saw a silhouette of a woman with short hair running in heels. She seemed to be very worried about the situation at hand. She was muttering something under her breath (or were those her internal thoughts?) but it was hard to hear them over the sound of the alarm. She eventually made it into a room with a huge hole in the wall, showing the sky. She saw something escape.

"No!" someone screamed.

I woke up, gasping for air. What was that? I looked at the calendar I put on the wall; June 4th. The first matches were set to begin in three days. I already knew that there would be roughly a hundred or so people entering the tournament. I tried to think of what I'd do in the meantime. I decided to take a walk around the building, maybe even see the beach itself while I was at it. After I went down the elevator, I saw Ribbon Girl and Twintelle headed towards another area with a bunch of tables. I followed them and saw numerous people in line getting a bunch of various breakfast items.

"A breakfast buffet?" I asked softly.

"You didn't know they had that here?" Twintelle asked.

"Oh, give it a rest, Ella." Ribbon Girl said. "She's new here."

"A new fighter, huh?" She looked at my arms and then at my hair.

"I pilot an ARMS Mecha Suit."

The actress mused to herself. "Hmm... I never heard of such a thing before."

I pulled out an image of Ribbon Girl in her victory pose with a ribbon whirlwind surrounding her in midair. "Oh, and by the way, Ribbon Girl, can I get your autograph?"

"Sure thing!"

She pulled out a pink pen and signed her name on the photo. The three of us then got breakfast and sat down at a table. As Ribbon Girl and Twintelle spoke, I stayed mostly silent and tried to eat my food at a moderate pace.

"You're not very chatty, are you?" Ribbon Girl asked.

"Well, I never thought of what to say." I answered. "It's just that... you two are super famous. Why would you bother talking to me?"

"Girl, you don't give yourself enough credit." Twintelle said. "It doesn't matter where you come from, the color of your skin, if you're human or not, rich or poor, first or second generation fighter, none of it matters when we enter the ring. We're all equals here."

I smiled. "I suppose you got a point."

"It isn't easy being a rookie. I know; we were all rookies at one point in time." Ribbon Girl commented.

Twintelle looked at me as she sipped on some coffee. "So, you got a name?"

"Fighter alias or real name?"

"Your fighter alias. What's your nom-de-guerre?"

I had no idea what a nom-de-guerre was but I answered with, "Mechanica."

The two superstars smiled. "Mechanica. I like that." Twintelle responded.

"It has a nice ring to it." Ribbon Girl commented.

"Thanks." I turned to the actress. "And what is a nom-de-guerre?"

"It literally translates to 'name of war'. It's an alias taken on for the purposes of combat. For instance, Manfred Albrecht Freiherr von Richthofen, or Richthofen for short, was called the Red Baron when he entered combat. He was a German pilot in World War One."

"Alright. I heard Ribbon Girl call you Ella. What was that about?"

"It's just my nickname. Ever since my ARMS mutation, rarely anyone calls me by my full real name, although some refer to me by my nickname."

"Your full name... It's Isabella Stefani, isn't it?"

Twintelle nodded and smiled warmly. "It feels nice to hear my old name."

"I thought you liked the name Twintelle." I took a bite of scrambled eggs.

"I do, but sometimes..." She looked away sadly. "I feel nostalgic. I feel everyone's forgotten my previous works before I became even more fabulous than I am now."

I looked at her sincerely. "I haven't."

"Glad to see someone still remembers."

Ribbon Girl took a bite of cereal. "Your mutation wasn't even too long ago, was it?"

"Nearly two and a half years ago. January 13th, 3048."

She swallowed her cereal. "Wow. That long?"

"When was yours?" I asked, looking at the singer.

"Close to a year ago. August 12th, 3049."

I noticed Kid Cobra taking his tray of food to a lone booth facing the wall. From this angle, it was impossible to see him. He ate in solitude and silence.

"He looks lonely." I remarked.

Ribbon Girl nodded. "Yeah, that's Kid Cobra for ya."

"One would think that, being the popular internet sensation he is, that he would be a social butterfly." Twintelle commented.

"Does he always do this?" I asked.

"Uh-huh."

I wonder if he's okay. I thought to myself. I told myself I would speak to him later. Since Ribbon Girl recommended that I get sponsors, I decided to try and find some sponsors. Luckily, while I was out exploring the city, I found an advertisement from an automobile company called Tesla. The poster read,

Hey ARMS Fighters!

Need a sponsor but are having difficultly finding one? Well, you're in luck.

ARMS Fighters Wanted

Call or email us

Walk ins are also welcome

I took a picture of the ad and decided to pay them a visit after lunch. I got into my suit, flew around the city and found the building. After waiting for a long time, I went into the room. There were three different men, each of them wearing suits with three different colored ties; a blue bow-tie, a red bow-tie and a black and green neck tie. They looked at me strangely.

"So, who or what are you?" the blue one asked.

"She looks like a robot." the red one remarked.

"I am not a robot." I answered, kinda annoyed by their response. "This is just a high-tech robotic ARMS mecha suit."

The red one blinked. "Well... We've never seen an ARMS Mecha Suit before."

"Have you already tried out for the ARMS Grand Prix?" the black and green tie guy asked.

"I have."

"How many enemies did you defeat?"

"66."

The blue tied guy mused to himself. "Hmm... That's higher than most." He turned to the neck-tie guy. "What do you think, boss?"

"Well... With a score of 66, you have to admit that is impressive. How old are you?"

"Fifteen. Do you think I'm too young?"

"No. Technically Helix is only two years old."

"But he has a structure and default height of a full-grown man." the blue one added.

The three men huddled together. I tried to figure out what they were saying, but the only thing I heard was the red tie guy saying, "This is a bad idea! Mechanica won't be accepted by her audience!"

I pretended not to hear, to not care, but the truth was, I heard and cared about what they said. They assumed I heard nothing, so I tried to hide my sorrow with a neutral look on my face. The three men nodded in unison as they eventually came to an agreement.

"Alright, we'll sponsor you. On one condition. You must first win a match in the ARMS Tournament. You win, we sponsor you. If you lose, well, then it wouldn't matter since you'd be eliminated."

"Fair enough. Thank for your time good gentlemen."

"Oh dang, we forgot to introduce ourselves. I'm the head of Tesla Company, Mr. Eisenhower and these are my right-hand men, Mr. Williams and Mr. Johnson." He mentioned to the red and blue ones.

"Pleasure to meet you." Mr. Johnson said.

"Thanks again."

I then left the building. Oi vey, this is not going to be easy. I thought. I had no idea who I was up against. Would my first opponent be a rookie, like Misango? Or someone more experienced, like Spring Man? I didn't know, nor did I have any way of knowing. All matches, and the stages where the matches were to occur, were chosen randomly. I also needed practice, but how was I supposed to train? I did some training with some robot look-a-likes of some fighters. It was very difficult, if not impossible to tell apart a robot from a real fighter. Fortunately, it helped me get some experience. Unfortunately, I was still scared.

A few hours passed, and I decided to head to the Snake Park in New York. The original was in his home of Toyko, Japan, but there was a replica here, as with many other replicated places. Unfortunately, the Snake Park was pretty far from Buster Beach Resort. Fortunately, I was able to hitch a ride in a taxi with some of Kid Cobra's mega fangirls. I could tell they were fans since they wore little snake hats on their heads along with all purple clothing. As we pulled up and exited the taxi, one of the girls started a conservation with me.

"So, have you ever seen him live?" one of them asked me as we walked.

"No, this'll be a new experience for me." I answered.

The second one smiled. "If you thought he looked impressive on screen, just wait til you see him in person."

We walked for about three blocks until we reached the outer edge of the park. We then walked ourselves to a fantastic viewing point; a raised platform with metal bars surrounding it, adjacent to half-pipe a skateboarding ramp. Down below, I saw other fans eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Snakeboard Champion. I looked to the arena and saw the snakeboards, which were these large circular platforms kinda like spinning tops. The girls set up some chairs.

"Wow, you guys got the best seats in the house!" I exclaimed.

"I know, right?" the third one asked.

"Help yourself to a drink if you like." the second one said to me while motioning to a blue cooler in her hands.

I took a bottle of water from the cooler they brought. "So, I hope you don't mind me asking this, but, why are you being so nice to me?"

"Just because we feel like doing something good." the first one answered. "Also, one of our friends got sick and couldn't come. Why do you ask?"

"It's just... You have no idea who I am and vice-versa. Why would show kindness to a stranger like me?"

"That may be true, but it is good to do sheer acts of benevolence." She looked at my eyes. "Something tells me that not many people were nice to you in your childhood."

I laughed darkly. "I still get bullied via a huge stack of hate mail."

The second one stared at me blankly. "Hate mail?"

"My worst enemies know where I live. They send me letters telling me I'm worthless and that I'll never succeed in any of my efforts."

"Wow. That's cruel."

"At this point, I don't even read them. I stopped reading them close to three months ago. I just have them sorted out, and all the hate mail gets burned."

The girls chuckled and then they clapped. "Way to go, girl! Don't let anyone bring you down!" the third one exclaimed.

The first one put her hand on my shoulder. "Well, since we don't know each other, let's fix that. I'm Sarah, Abby, and that's Caitlin." the first one said, introducing themselves to me.

"Marina." I looked around. "So, where are the ramps?"

"They're not set up yet. Since this stage doubles as snakeboarding grounds and a combat arena, they have to remove the ramps and other parts to avoid having fighters run into them. Also, it allows Kid Cobra to use the snakeboards to his advantage. Eventually, the entire grounds will materialize."

We sat down in our seats. A few minutes later, a vent ramp materialized from nowhere, along with a half-pipe. A few rails also formed.

Man, who knew the Snake Park was so complex? I thought.

Pretty soon, the man of the hour appeared before our eyes. Kid Cobra had scaly, snake-like purple arms, a cobra helmet/hood, a blue and grey shirt and purple baggy pants. He also wore white and black sneakers and black socks. As he entered the arena, I stood up and looked into his eyes to see if they hid any sorrow, only to see that they were heterochromatic (or multi-colored). His left eye was purple and his right eye was green. I had never noticed this before, despite him being a live streamer since he was thirteen. (Although I technically first saw him on the screen several months ago while I was recovering from my broken arm.)

Now, six years later, he was an ARMS Fighter by day, live streamer by night. Kid Cobra had been involved in the ARMS Grand Prix since the summer of 3049, was associated with the Naja Crew, a fast, powerful and clever fighter and yet mysterious and secretive all at the same time. As I saw him in person for the first time, I asked myself, Who is he? Why is he so secretive? And how does he truly feel under that mask?