Chapter 4: Carrot girl
Its been 3 days since the arena opened, and I wished I had 10 days more. Despite my hard fought battle with Arrowhead the next set of Ravens were a synch. It was probably because at the last Arena competition Arrowhead was the last to battle and only managed to secure the 50th spot. I had already risen my rank to D-4, but the battles left something to be desired, it seemed I was just challenging fresh faced nestlings. I had flashed thru the ranks in a blur, and also watched higher ranked Ravens lose their rank just as fast. The whole arena ladder had to be updated every 30 minutes due to the fact that all the higher ranking ravens tried to get higher and all the ravens not even ranked at all tried to get a piece of the action. One particular Raven I noticed a lot was Xerox. He had been knocked off the 50th spot more time then I could count and now I was witnessing him battling for the E-7 spot. He used a different AC this time, I knew that it was comprised of Martian parts because it seems that the Martian Corporations liked to be flashy, there parts were work of arts. He had a flamethrower, the MIRROR shield, a missile pack on his back and a what appears to be a chaingun. I really don't know why he would bother with a chaingun, I thought he woulda turned quad based after his battle with me. But amazingly he won, I guess the kid does have some skill. "Hey Chris you ready yet?" Jean was with Steve in the garage checking up on my AC, in my last bout a bazooka shell got logged in my right booster part.
"Ready? My next battle isn't for another 4 hours" I replied "So?" she was eyeing my like a hawk "What?" I said, "I'm gonna relax and cool off " I began to stroll down the corridor, not caring where I ended up just somewhere to relax, I still began shaking before every fight, I thought I had gotten over it but I guess now. My stomach began to rumble, huh I thought, I haven't eaten in a while, I walked pass the dinning hall, ignoring the smell of fish tacos that wafted from behind the counters and looked for the closest vending machine, maybe some artificial chicken today. I always wanted to know why people say that everything taste like chicken, personally I wanted to know how a real chicken tasted like being that their extinct and all, and find out for myself. 3 hours and 14 minutes before my battle and I still haven't found a vending machine. Even the fish tacos began to look appetizing, hell I woulda eaten my shoe before ever admitting that, when I bumped into someone. She was rushing past when I "daydreamed" into her path. A bowl of salad and some lamb chops landed on top of me, I shoulda had my mouth open. "Ohhhhh I'm so sorry!" she was panicking on the ground looking for her glasses, I had bumped into an intern of another Raven I guessed, some carrots lost in her orange hair "That ok" I replied and handed over her glasses, after wiping the soup from it with my shirt.it wasn't a good idea since my shirt was soaked as well "oh thanks" she put on her glasses over her black eyes with some cucumber pieces still on the leans, from my shirt no doubt "here let me help you, I daydream a lot and don't watch where I was going" I pulled her up and bent over, gathered up her salad, chops and papers "awww, now my report is ruined" it seemed that the soup didn't mix well with the paper she was carrying "how come you have paper? Isn't it easier to just carry a disk?" this was the first time I actually saw paper "huh? Oh it makes a good impression, I mean paper is hard to come by these days" she was still blushing gathering her plate and pushing her oversized glasses up with her pinkie "makes sense can I do anything to say I'm sorry?" I wanted to make it up to her, paper cost 100 credits a sheet these days, yikes! I thought "oh no that's ok" she was still blushing, "my names Renee by the way" "how come you told me your name?" I asked raising an eyebrow "because I knew you where going to ask it" she took heed and left, shouting "see you around" when she turned into a corner still dripping and leaving behind a trail "Renee.?" I said to myself as I took a bite out of a piece of carrot I still had in my hands
"YOUR LATE YOUR LATE!!!" Jean was hitting me over the back, she was pissed I showed up 3 minutes late. I had finally found a vending machine all the way across the building when the arena attendant announced the beginning of my match "GET IN THERE!!!" she kicked me into my cockpit and shoved my helmet to me, "your AC was already suppose to be up there, if your AC isn't at arena level in 30 seconds your disqualified!!!" Jean was always scary when she got angry, my HUD finally closed over me blocking out her yelling but she switched to her com link to me and started yelling into it, causing my right ear to go temporarily deaf.and least I hoped it was temporary.
COMBATANT DEFECT IS READY TO BEGIN THE MATCH
I just made it with 3 seconds to spare, I put on my gloves and helmet, not noticing that I put my gloves on the wrong hands I turned on my vid link and got a look at my opponent. "so you finally showed up huh?" it was a female this time, and a butch one at that "yeah yeah yeah hold your horses" I relied, switching on all my weapons, this time I had to go up against a heavy weight tank, from what I hear she's also an AC mechanic at Global. Looks like she's trying to raise her rank in this arena as well.
BOTH ARENA COMBATANTS DEFECT AND FLYING FIX ARE READY TO BEGIN, WE APOLOGIZE FOR THE DELAY, PLEASE ENJOY THE BATTLE
I could hear the crowd again, my heart started to slow down, my hand stopped shaking, I was ready
BEGIN!!!
I switched to my ground torpedoes and let loose 5 sets of them, Flying Fix was expecting me and dropped her decoys, all my missiles where locked on the floating orbs that surrounded her, she overboosted toward me with her slug gun posed to fire, I dogged left and got nipped by the spread blast. I miss judged my landing and landed hard "CR*P!" I was at the right range for her slug gun blast to do optimal damage, she fired 2 rounds and both hit squarely in the chest "ha!" she was enjoying herself, I knew she was a skilled pilot and I shouldn't have underestimated her. I boosted above her as soon as her flamethrower shot its flames, I positioned myself slightly above her and released my blade, it sliced thru the barrel of her slug gun "One down" I told myself, my plan was to get rid of her most devastating weapons, she dropped the damaged one and switched to a new model "if you thought that was bad, this is worst!" she turnboosted toward me and fired it, 5 bazooka shells erupted from the cannon, 2 of witch hit my rocket housing. She had changed one of her slug guns with a spread bazooka back piece and made it look like a regular slug gun "Sly devil" I said "I wasn't expecting that" I switch to my rockets and fired off a round, my rockets missed her by a mile, her bazookas must have damaged the firing system of my rockets because they were firing at weird angles now "You want me to fix that?" she was mocking me now, I changed to my missiles again and pressed the trigger when I got a lock, this time she was caught by surprise, she deployed her decoys but it was too late my missiles where locked on her AC this time. Being a tank she couldn't do anything about it, she was too slow to dodge so she took my missiles head on. Her right arm got the brunt of the attack rendering her arm bazooka useless, it didn't matter I still had the one on her back to deal with. I checked my AP and hers, it was 4738 to 7352, I had to even the odds, and fast. I knew what would help with that, I fired my machine gun and watched her AP drop 1000 after my first burst. "Get ready for the end" I yelled over the com link "Yeah yours!" she let her flamethrower do the talking, I forgot that my AC was in range and watched my heat raise as fast as her AP was going down. She overboosted to my left and switched to her slug bazooka, I couldn't overboost yet, I was waiting for my heat to go down, OUTPUT DOWN blaring on my screen, just 200 more degrees to go. She fired a spread and luckily all of them missed, I turned around and switched to my rockets, I was feeling lucky. I fired 5 rockets into Flying Fix's direction, my fingers crossed, I overboosted toward her. All my rockets hit their mark and she landed her AC directly infront of mine "game over" I whispered and watched as her red toned AC become an orange glow after my blade attack.
"wow Chris that was one hell of a battle" Jean was impressed with me, it seemed the battle cooled her down.but I guess not enough, "but if your late for another Arena battle your gonna get it!" she started to wave her fist around in the air, taking aim at my shoulder and punched me "owww" I pretended, "so when is my next battle?" "lets see its scheduled for 9 o clock, so that leaves you 6 hours to roam around, make sure your not LATE!" "I know, don't worry I'll just take a quick nap" "no napping for you!" her voice started to raise, " you know how groggy you are when you wake up, and a nap is like 9 hours" its true I'm a log in bed "so I guess I'll just wonder around the city then" I thought about paying my brothers Darren and Julius a visit, "see you around Jean, I'll make sure that I'm not late this time" "you had better!"
I wondered past the lounge and saw another battle was taking place on the monitor. An orange hover AC and a black reverse jointed AC where duking it out, I soon lost interest and walked out of the Nest, I rather be the one fighting then watching. I jumped onto my Black motorcycle in the garage and speeded past the guard booth, surrounding it were 10 heavy MTs and a Green heavy weight bipedal AC equipped with a grenade launcher and sniper rifle. I waved to Vent in his AC, he replied with a wave of his rifle, we all took turns guarding the nest, ever since other Ravens Nest "Nerves Concord" got attacked. It was the worst terrorist attack recorded, killing hundreds of Ravens before it was stopped. At the end Nerves Concord was almost disbanded and many of their Ravens left for earth or to the neighboring nest Rapture Point. I hope it doesn't happen here on earth.
I don't know how people could live their lives so.normally, especially my brothers. Both where the same age and still in training academy, aspiring to follow in the footsteps of their big brother but only as inters, which came as a relief, I never wanted to fight them Raven to Raven. They've been surviving on "chump change" for quite some time now, I don't know how they could do it. I left 2000 credits on their account (which would no doubt be spent on video games) and walked around the upper portion of the colony. Since we've been underground so long, many of us refused to live and opted to live underground the rest of their lives. Life above ground they say was "unpredictable".
I loved walking under the light of the sun, not any artificial light that I grew up on, I loved the heat the sun provided, I loved the way it shined, but I had to turn my eyes if I started at it for too long. It was after I got blinded with the sun when I happened to bump into Renee. I wasn't looking (hell I was blinded) and bumped into her again. "huh? Oh I'm sooo sorry!" I replied, even after a year I still didn't learn about not looking into the sun "hey.its you again" she looked at me (at least I thought she was) and tried to remember my name "its Chris" I was still blinking, "you didn't give me a chance to let me tell mine" "Chris huh? So still want to repay me for the paper you wasted" she asked me "uhh, yeah sure, what do you want?" my vision had just returned and I saw her blushing "How about a date?" she giggled "Date?" I was reeling back, "sure, uhh ok" "great!!" she was smiling now, I couldn't hold back mine when I saw hers "how about we meet at 6 o clock in front of the Ravens nest?" so I'm gonna repay her with a date I thought, I better choose an expensive restaurant "sure, 6 o clock tonight it is" she was skipping ahead of me now, "see you there" "yeah see you." she was outta sight before I could finish my sentence, I looked at my watch, it was 4 already which left me 2 hours to get ready. I got to my bike and speed to the nest, I ran to Jeans office promptly making her spit out her soda onto her monitor when I scared her "Jean I need help" this was my first date ever, and I needed help
Its been 3 days since the arena opened, and I wished I had 10 days more. Despite my hard fought battle with Arrowhead the next set of Ravens were a synch. It was probably because at the last Arena competition Arrowhead was the last to battle and only managed to secure the 50th spot. I had already risen my rank to D-4, but the battles left something to be desired, it seemed I was just challenging fresh faced nestlings. I had flashed thru the ranks in a blur, and also watched higher ranked Ravens lose their rank just as fast. The whole arena ladder had to be updated every 30 minutes due to the fact that all the higher ranking ravens tried to get higher and all the ravens not even ranked at all tried to get a piece of the action. One particular Raven I noticed a lot was Xerox. He had been knocked off the 50th spot more time then I could count and now I was witnessing him battling for the E-7 spot. He used a different AC this time, I knew that it was comprised of Martian parts because it seems that the Martian Corporations liked to be flashy, there parts were work of arts. He had a flamethrower, the MIRROR shield, a missile pack on his back and a what appears to be a chaingun. I really don't know why he would bother with a chaingun, I thought he woulda turned quad based after his battle with me. But amazingly he won, I guess the kid does have some skill. "Hey Chris you ready yet?" Jean was with Steve in the garage checking up on my AC, in my last bout a bazooka shell got logged in my right booster part.
"Ready? My next battle isn't for another 4 hours" I replied "So?" she was eyeing my like a hawk "What?" I said, "I'm gonna relax and cool off " I began to stroll down the corridor, not caring where I ended up just somewhere to relax, I still began shaking before every fight, I thought I had gotten over it but I guess now. My stomach began to rumble, huh I thought, I haven't eaten in a while, I walked pass the dinning hall, ignoring the smell of fish tacos that wafted from behind the counters and looked for the closest vending machine, maybe some artificial chicken today. I always wanted to know why people say that everything taste like chicken, personally I wanted to know how a real chicken tasted like being that their extinct and all, and find out for myself. 3 hours and 14 minutes before my battle and I still haven't found a vending machine. Even the fish tacos began to look appetizing, hell I woulda eaten my shoe before ever admitting that, when I bumped into someone. She was rushing past when I "daydreamed" into her path. A bowl of salad and some lamb chops landed on top of me, I shoulda had my mouth open. "Ohhhhh I'm so sorry!" she was panicking on the ground looking for her glasses, I had bumped into an intern of another Raven I guessed, some carrots lost in her orange hair "That ok" I replied and handed over her glasses, after wiping the soup from it with my shirt.it wasn't a good idea since my shirt was soaked as well "oh thanks" she put on her glasses over her black eyes with some cucumber pieces still on the leans, from my shirt no doubt "here let me help you, I daydream a lot and don't watch where I was going" I pulled her up and bent over, gathered up her salad, chops and papers "awww, now my report is ruined" it seemed that the soup didn't mix well with the paper she was carrying "how come you have paper? Isn't it easier to just carry a disk?" this was the first time I actually saw paper "huh? Oh it makes a good impression, I mean paper is hard to come by these days" she was still blushing gathering her plate and pushing her oversized glasses up with her pinkie "makes sense can I do anything to say I'm sorry?" I wanted to make it up to her, paper cost 100 credits a sheet these days, yikes! I thought "oh no that's ok" she was still blushing, "my names Renee by the way" "how come you told me your name?" I asked raising an eyebrow "because I knew you where going to ask it" she took heed and left, shouting "see you around" when she turned into a corner still dripping and leaving behind a trail "Renee.?" I said to myself as I took a bite out of a piece of carrot I still had in my hands
"YOUR LATE YOUR LATE!!!" Jean was hitting me over the back, she was pissed I showed up 3 minutes late. I had finally found a vending machine all the way across the building when the arena attendant announced the beginning of my match "GET IN THERE!!!" she kicked me into my cockpit and shoved my helmet to me, "your AC was already suppose to be up there, if your AC isn't at arena level in 30 seconds your disqualified!!!" Jean was always scary when she got angry, my HUD finally closed over me blocking out her yelling but she switched to her com link to me and started yelling into it, causing my right ear to go temporarily deaf.and least I hoped it was temporary.
COMBATANT DEFECT IS READY TO BEGIN THE MATCH
I just made it with 3 seconds to spare, I put on my gloves and helmet, not noticing that I put my gloves on the wrong hands I turned on my vid link and got a look at my opponent. "so you finally showed up huh?" it was a female this time, and a butch one at that "yeah yeah yeah hold your horses" I relied, switching on all my weapons, this time I had to go up against a heavy weight tank, from what I hear she's also an AC mechanic at Global. Looks like she's trying to raise her rank in this arena as well.
BOTH ARENA COMBATANTS DEFECT AND FLYING FIX ARE READY TO BEGIN, WE APOLOGIZE FOR THE DELAY, PLEASE ENJOY THE BATTLE
I could hear the crowd again, my heart started to slow down, my hand stopped shaking, I was ready
BEGIN!!!
I switched to my ground torpedoes and let loose 5 sets of them, Flying Fix was expecting me and dropped her decoys, all my missiles where locked on the floating orbs that surrounded her, she overboosted toward me with her slug gun posed to fire, I dogged left and got nipped by the spread blast. I miss judged my landing and landed hard "CR*P!" I was at the right range for her slug gun blast to do optimal damage, she fired 2 rounds and both hit squarely in the chest "ha!" she was enjoying herself, I knew she was a skilled pilot and I shouldn't have underestimated her. I boosted above her as soon as her flamethrower shot its flames, I positioned myself slightly above her and released my blade, it sliced thru the barrel of her slug gun "One down" I told myself, my plan was to get rid of her most devastating weapons, she dropped the damaged one and switched to a new model "if you thought that was bad, this is worst!" she turnboosted toward me and fired it, 5 bazooka shells erupted from the cannon, 2 of witch hit my rocket housing. She had changed one of her slug guns with a spread bazooka back piece and made it look like a regular slug gun "Sly devil" I said "I wasn't expecting that" I switch to my rockets and fired off a round, my rockets missed her by a mile, her bazookas must have damaged the firing system of my rockets because they were firing at weird angles now "You want me to fix that?" she was mocking me now, I changed to my missiles again and pressed the trigger when I got a lock, this time she was caught by surprise, she deployed her decoys but it was too late my missiles where locked on her AC this time. Being a tank she couldn't do anything about it, she was too slow to dodge so she took my missiles head on. Her right arm got the brunt of the attack rendering her arm bazooka useless, it didn't matter I still had the one on her back to deal with. I checked my AP and hers, it was 4738 to 7352, I had to even the odds, and fast. I knew what would help with that, I fired my machine gun and watched her AP drop 1000 after my first burst. "Get ready for the end" I yelled over the com link "Yeah yours!" she let her flamethrower do the talking, I forgot that my AC was in range and watched my heat raise as fast as her AP was going down. She overboosted to my left and switched to her slug bazooka, I couldn't overboost yet, I was waiting for my heat to go down, OUTPUT DOWN blaring on my screen, just 200 more degrees to go. She fired a spread and luckily all of them missed, I turned around and switched to my rockets, I was feeling lucky. I fired 5 rockets into Flying Fix's direction, my fingers crossed, I overboosted toward her. All my rockets hit their mark and she landed her AC directly infront of mine "game over" I whispered and watched as her red toned AC become an orange glow after my blade attack.
"wow Chris that was one hell of a battle" Jean was impressed with me, it seemed the battle cooled her down.but I guess not enough, "but if your late for another Arena battle your gonna get it!" she started to wave her fist around in the air, taking aim at my shoulder and punched me "owww" I pretended, "so when is my next battle?" "lets see its scheduled for 9 o clock, so that leaves you 6 hours to roam around, make sure your not LATE!" "I know, don't worry I'll just take a quick nap" "no napping for you!" her voice started to raise, " you know how groggy you are when you wake up, and a nap is like 9 hours" its true I'm a log in bed "so I guess I'll just wonder around the city then" I thought about paying my brothers Darren and Julius a visit, "see you around Jean, I'll make sure that I'm not late this time" "you had better!"
I wondered past the lounge and saw another battle was taking place on the monitor. An orange hover AC and a black reverse jointed AC where duking it out, I soon lost interest and walked out of the Nest, I rather be the one fighting then watching. I jumped onto my Black motorcycle in the garage and speeded past the guard booth, surrounding it were 10 heavy MTs and a Green heavy weight bipedal AC equipped with a grenade launcher and sniper rifle. I waved to Vent in his AC, he replied with a wave of his rifle, we all took turns guarding the nest, ever since other Ravens Nest "Nerves Concord" got attacked. It was the worst terrorist attack recorded, killing hundreds of Ravens before it was stopped. At the end Nerves Concord was almost disbanded and many of their Ravens left for earth or to the neighboring nest Rapture Point. I hope it doesn't happen here on earth.
I don't know how people could live their lives so.normally, especially my brothers. Both where the same age and still in training academy, aspiring to follow in the footsteps of their big brother but only as inters, which came as a relief, I never wanted to fight them Raven to Raven. They've been surviving on "chump change" for quite some time now, I don't know how they could do it. I left 2000 credits on their account (which would no doubt be spent on video games) and walked around the upper portion of the colony. Since we've been underground so long, many of us refused to live and opted to live underground the rest of their lives. Life above ground they say was "unpredictable".
I loved walking under the light of the sun, not any artificial light that I grew up on, I loved the heat the sun provided, I loved the way it shined, but I had to turn my eyes if I started at it for too long. It was after I got blinded with the sun when I happened to bump into Renee. I wasn't looking (hell I was blinded) and bumped into her again. "huh? Oh I'm sooo sorry!" I replied, even after a year I still didn't learn about not looking into the sun "hey.its you again" she looked at me (at least I thought she was) and tried to remember my name "its Chris" I was still blinking, "you didn't give me a chance to let me tell mine" "Chris huh? So still want to repay me for the paper you wasted" she asked me "uhh, yeah sure, what do you want?" my vision had just returned and I saw her blushing "How about a date?" she giggled "Date?" I was reeling back, "sure, uhh ok" "great!!" she was smiling now, I couldn't hold back mine when I saw hers "how about we meet at 6 o clock in front of the Ravens nest?" so I'm gonna repay her with a date I thought, I better choose an expensive restaurant "sure, 6 o clock tonight it is" she was skipping ahead of me now, "see you there" "yeah see you." she was outta sight before I could finish my sentence, I looked at my watch, it was 4 already which left me 2 hours to get ready. I got to my bike and speed to the nest, I ran to Jeans office promptly making her spit out her soda onto her monitor when I scared her "Jean I need help" this was my first date ever, and I needed help