Guess who actually kept a promise? Anyway, I hope you guys like this chapter, because I had fun with the action.

My first battle doesn't go exactly like I'd wanted it to.

I enter the room feeling really, really nervous. I've fought with CamCo in mock battles for a couple weeks and I've been brought up to the highest level of tactics, but I don't think I'll ever be prepared enough.

Axle's not fighting today. He has the day off, and I honestly think it's because he hasn't been doing very well lately. He's kind of lacking the focus and creativity recently, which is everything that CamCo requires. The thing is, as much as my brother annoys me, I still think it's be nice to have him here about now.

As I walk over to my cot, Emefa high fives me, Elliot flashes a quick smile, and Cady asks, "You ready?"

I shake my head. "Not sure I'll ever be ready for this."

"Hey, you'll do fine," Elliot says.

"Dude, we're putting you up against Ursa Major. He's ridiculously slow," Alec adds. I smile gratefully up at them, but it does nothing to quell the panic I feel.

We start to hook into the connector wires and I'm shaking a little. Just before Emefa clicks in, she mouths, "Good luck." I flip up my hair, insert the wire, and take control of my ship. Takeoff doesn't require a second thought now, although if I'm honest I still love V1.

We clash near Europa. I'm last to arrive, and my target is left open. Sure enough, it's the slowest ship out there. Our overall plan is to engage one-on-one long enough for Emefa, the best evasive Combatant, to slip through the ranks and land.

As I start to approach Ursa Major, he starts firing with lighter guns. I drop quickly under, then fly straight toward him at a steep upward angle, returning fire as I go. At the last second, I pull up sharply, looping over backward. I come up under him, firing a heavy blast into the belly of his ship. Next, I start to spiral downward as he turns and starts following and shooting after me. I'm about to move behind him, but that's when things start going wrong. I don't know which of our fighters gets taken out first, but as they're blasted into oblivion, the Russo-Chinese shop they were fighting comes after me. With two of them on my tail, I don't even have time to shoot. I just try every evasive maneuver I can think of, rolling, twisting, looping. Eventually, though, I'm locked into a corner, unable to move back anymore without running into the crossfire from other fights. I try to fly straight up, but the second fighter is above me. Ursa Major gets one hit in with heavy artillery, one he has no way of missing, and that's it. I don't stand a chance. As my ship takes the fiery blast and floats dead in space, I wake up. Very angrily.

I look around to see who got taken out first. Alec is sitting up, looking about as pissed off as I feel.

"Who took you out?" I ask.

"Medusa," he replies with a grimace. That explains it. Alec is good, one of the best, but he's not Medusa good.

"Ugh, I think she came after me after she took you out."

"So now you know why we always lose," he mutters. "Still, I was up for a while, so you must've done alright."

"Well, I tried, but it was like she knew what I was doing before I did it," I complain.

Another grimace. "Yeah, get used to that. Medusa is freaking scary."

Just then, the other Combatants start waking up one at a time, each with a look of utter defeat. We wait a few minutes, watching Emefa's body, her continued stillness giving us hope. That is, until her eyes fly open and she rolls over and punches her cot.

"I was this close," she growls.

"What happened?" I ask.

Cady answers, "They trapped us all in a circle, and Kalashnikov came through and massacred us all. We got Emefa through, but Medusa took after her and...well, you've fought Medusa now. You know how it is."

I nod, grimly. "So now what?"

"Now we go kill ourselves watching the videos of our failures," Emefa replies through gritted teeth.

"Hey, we're learning from it," Elliot calls.

"Call it what you want, Elliot," she retorts angrily. "It still sucks."

And on that happy note, I head off to my first battle review. And it really does suck.

A/N- V1 is considered "decision speed," where the pilot either has to take off or abort the takeoff. Oh, the things I learn from Alex Rider.

Thanks for reading, please leave a review! Bye for now