Bread and the Circus

Chapter 10, Part 2

After that, we travelled pretty quietly, or at least as quietly as we could manage, considering neither of us had spent any serious time in the wilderness before.  At first I cringed a little every time either of us cracked dried twigs, blown from one of the little copses we occasionally saw, each a lot like the one we’d made our own.  Probably all of them were meant for newbies like us, beginners just setting out into the Arena, and in need of a safe spot to call our own, and make us build up a sense of security.  Probably a false sense, of course, but I suppose it’s the little lies we tell ourselves that allow us all to keep from being overwhelmed by the realities of our situation, whatever it may be.

In minutes, though, I soon found that Mac was right: the stat suit’s onboard computer was simply crammed with scads of wonderful features!  Immediately after stumbling upon the first of them, I had to exert all my will to keep from blurting it out to Mac, distracting her from her watch.  No, not yet.  I’d learn a bit more first, and then I’d start talking.  That way I could learn one thing, and then be sharing it while I was discovering the next.

That’s exactly what I started to do, too, except, well, maybe I delayed a little longer than necessary.  In my defense, some of the things I learned took a bit to figure out, but soon I was talking, and Mac was asking me questions, since she didn’t dare to check out her own HUD just yet, not while she was the one being lookout, and couldn’t just try out stuff for herself right then.  Among the many wonderful features I guessed the stat suit must contain, here are the ones that I actually discovered:

·         A clock, set for PGR standard time, but with another readout for local time (along with projected times for dawn and dusk), and a third that was counting down, rather than up like a usual clock.  After a moment, I found a label for that final countdown: it was the timer telling us how long we had before our next pickup.  In the center of this third clock-timer, there was also a directional finder, presumably to make sure we went in the direction of the nearest landing zone.  After all, we’d be a lot less fun to watch if our stat suits suddenly ran out of power because we didn’t get a recharge up on the Circus satellite.

·         A score-keeper, which I could watch ticking upward every few minutes or so.  Of course we hadn’t accumulated that many points, a little less than fifty when I first found the feature, but there were more than I’d expected at first.  Probably because of the lizard-things we’d fought the night before, Mac theorized, and I had to admit she was probably right on that count

·         A mapmaking program.  The program had a simple overlay with a bunch of additional features that could be accessed with the touch of a few buttons.  There was enough to the program so that a beginner like myself could use it to keep from getting lost, while an expert cartographer could create a pretty detailed topographic chart, probably with enough detail for use by a military force.  The program even had tools to let drawings adjust automatically for scale, interfacing with a satellite overview to double-check my work (as I discovered while doodling on the map, just sketching out some rough notes so we could find our way back to the copse later), without revealing anything beyond the areas where we’d already travelled.  Clever, that, and a good feature to force us to explore if we wanted to fill in the map fully.  In the old games on Earth, I believe they called this effect the “fog of war,” only letting a player see an overview of where he’d previously explored, while keeping the rest shaded out.

·         A few handy diagnostics programs.  One gave an overview of the wearer of a given stat suit, monitoring all sorts of information that I was sure a trained medic could use to incredible effect.  For me, though, I discovered with immense relief that I was able to adjust what information I could see, simplifying the layout down to its most basic form.  The diagnostics also included the scanner that told us if food and water was safe, though those thankfully were automatically set to only a basic “safe/dangerous” binary.  If I’d wanted, I could have customized the layout to display all sorts of environmental information, but since almost all of it would have just been gibberish to an untrained sort like myself, I didn’t go to any such lengths.

·         The “panic button” the Arena Master had mentioned.  Finding it was actually incredibly easy, since it was at the bottom of the second screen I visited.  The button had a lock symbol over it, but with just a little light fiddling with a finger, I discovered I could toggle the lock on or off at my whim.  Naturally, for now, I left it locked.  After all, there was no sense in risking an accident that could cost me my chance in the Arena before I’d even really gotten started.

·         A trio of big buttons, each a dull red in color, with the words “Raid,” “Lair,” and “Dungeon” on them.

Those last three were especially intriguing to me, so I moved them up to the active HUD, positioning them along the bottom of my vision, while putting a tiny, simplified version of my personal health diagnostic to one upper corner, and a minimap in the other upper corner, all of them placed so that (hopefully) they wouldn’t interfere with my vision more than necessary.  Since everything was transparent, though, so that it didn’t completely block my vision even while I’d been scrolling through all the features, I guessed I’d be all right, at least most of the time.

“Huh,” said Mac suddenly, even as we started on a downhill slope, the gulley where the river ran (and it was indeed starting to become a proper river) starting to show on either side of us, while the grass receded, replaced by rock and gravel.  “Looks like the map’s already got notes on it.  Whoever made this place named everywhere.  Back where we were are the Scratch Plains.  And right here…it’s Ginchis Deep.”

How could I really blame Mac for finally breaking down and trying out one of the stat suit features?  It wasn’t even a really major feature, just the map, so she could have all the little features on her HUD that I did: vital stats, minimap, and those three big buttons.  The problem, of course, was that even that little distraction was still a distraction, and that meant that for several endless minutes, probably less than five, but too long all the same, neither of us were paying attention as the gulley – Ginchis Deep – continued to deepen, and then to widen.

Lucky for us, we also caught a break: we figured out what the buttons were for.  Of course, the way we figured that out was when one of them – the “Lair” button – suddenly lit up in bright red.

Instantly we were both turning our heads, sticks in one hand, stones in the other, then turning our bodies until we were back-to-back, ready for whatever might come at us.  Just a few seconds later, we heard the whistles of the night before, louder now, and a lot more numerous.  They didn’t just skulk around in the underbrush, though, not here on their home turf – not that there was a lot of underbrush anyway in this rocky place.  Soon we saw spears and scaly heads poking up from over and behind the rocks all around us, most of them the small fry we’d faced before, but some of them, mostly in the back, almost as tall as us.

There were a lot of them.

“Well,” I said with a strained chuckle to Mac, “at least now we know what that feature is for.”

“Yeah,” agreed Mac, curling her lip in defiance at the squamous slayers looking down on us from the sides of the gulley.  “It means we’re screwed.”

I was going to say something in reply, but I didn’t get the chance, as I heard a high-pitched screaming sound, like the wail of a teakettle on the boil, and turned my heard just in time to see Mac’s club smack hard into the head of one of the little squamous slayers, knocking it right out of the air from where it had been leaping down on us, flint knives in both hands.  The beastie thudded wetly against a nearby boulder, and I spared it only enough attention to make sure it wasn’t getting back up before I spun to face two more that had been trying to sneak up on me during my period of inattention.  One of my rocks splatted heavily into the face of one of the little brutes, while the other went down to an overhead swing of my club.

Behind me I could feel Mac’s body moving, could hear the grunts of her exertion as she swung again and again, taking the club into both her hands for more power.  There were wails and squeals and more of those awful screams, and a host of even more awful sounds that could only be bones breaking and internal organs rupturing.  I hated those sounds, all of them, and I especially hated the creatures that were forcing us to do this to them if we didn’t want to die.

Of course I didn’t turn to actually look at what Mac was doing: I was far too busy with my own troubles, thank you very much.  They seemed to favor Mac’s side, but I kept my rock hand moving, lobbing stones as fast as I could get them, finding it hard to miss in these close quarters.  The little guys must have been pretty fragile for a throwing arm like mine to take them down, but they were quite small, after all, and despite their scaly bodies, they didn’t look very well-armored.  Obviously they were designed for mass-production, not individual combat performance, perfect for wearing their opponents down with sheer numbers.

And…yes, I was getting tired.  I didn’t know that combat could be so exhausting!  We’d only gotten a taste of it last night, and as the memories of that previous encounter came back to me in the clarity of my adrenaline-soaked grey matter, I realized that we’d slept so well because of how much even that short fight had taken out of us.  But I couldn’t think about that now, or anything, really, not when there were monsters trying to cut me down with their little flint knives, their sharp claws, and their terrible gnashing teeth.  Teeth that went flying everywhere as I mashed one of my rocks right into the side of one especially tenacious squamous slayer’s jaw, one with red scales and those same big, black, blank eyes, sending it spinning all the way around before it dropped to the side of the stream bed.

Then I suddenly stopped.  This wasn’t because I’d run out of will to keep living – and fighting – though.  No, I stopped because there just weren’t any more creatures to hit.  Just in time, too: I was down to my last two rocks!  Mac was panting heavily behind me, the end of her club sunk down almost to her feet as she stood there, looking around and discovering, as I had, that we were surrounded by bodies and softly-moaning squamous slayers we hadn’t quite managed to kill, and nothing else.

Seconds later, both of us turned at the same time, feeling the same premonition of impending disaster.  Sure enough, the premonition turned out to be true, as behind us, approaching from the direction we’d first taken, was a burly brute of a squamous slayer, as tall as a full-grown human, certainly taller than either of us, and all over muscles, its broad chest covered by a crude cane breastplate bedecked with the bones of various smaller creatures, including some I was pretty sure were taken from the smaller squamous slayers of the type we’d been fighting.  There was a heavy-looking stone battleaxe clutched in both its clawed hands, and it stared at us with those ghastly shark eyes, wide and black and unblinking, as it came ever closer, taking its time, the end of its axe hovering just above the ground, like the blade of a samurai in a duel to the death.

“He’s the leader,” said Mac as we faced our enemy, then flicked her eyes up along the cliffs to either side of the gulley.  “Of this group.  There are more coming, though, and he’s planning to hold us here until they can reinforce him.”

“If he doesn’t kill us himself,” I muttered, casting around with my eyes, taking stock of the lay of the land.  We’d been lucky the attack came while we were on fairly level table rock, but I could see bits of the flint we’d come for lying in cracked splendor along the sides of the stream running through Ginchis Deep; no gemstone had ever been so precious, not after the price in blood we’d already paid for it.  And would soon pay, if I gauged the measure of this monster aright.  Though I was no master of the sword in my fencing classes, I’d had enough experience to know when I was facing an opponent that knew how to fight.

Almost before my eyes came back up to catch his movement, the man-sized slayer was running at us, mouth wide, hissing furiously as spittle dripped from its razor-sharp sawteeth.  It was fast!

Mac was just as fast, the last spurt of adrenaline giving her the speed and power she needed to bring up her club, smashing it with all her might right into the side of the stone axe as it came swinging upward, aimed right for her head and mine, as though to decapitate us both in a single blow.  Her strike came as we both stepped back, making the axe fly even faster on its intended course, the force of the big brute’s swing enough to actually spin the savage slayer all the way around, until he was facing away from us, a vague sort of confusion registering on his mostly expressionless face; I guess it was just his stance that gave me that impression.

Neither of us waited until the big beast had a chance to recover, as I snatched up two of the little flint knives, fallen at our feet from the beasties we’d already slain, one in each hand, and jammed them with all my might into the backs of the savage slayer’s legs.  I got lucky, probably hitting something like the creature’s hamstring-analogue, and it fell to its “knees” (as such things could be measured with its digitigrade legs), bellowing in rage and pain.

The creature’s cry was cut off suddenly as Mac grabbed its stone axe, wrenching it roughly from the creature’s slackened grip, and then brought it down with a sickening crunch.

A moment later, the savage slayer slumped forward, and we stood there, blinking, for several moments more.

“I think I broke the axe,” said Mac as we heard the first of those menacing whistles closing fast from the rocky terrain to either side of the stream, before giving the jutting haft of the weapon a nudge with her foot.  “Mmm, yeah, it’s broke.  Guess we’re stuck with these clubs for a little longer.”  Then her face hardened, and she stepped forward, reaching down to our fallen foe.  “But I’m taking this.”

With a short jerk, she peeled the cane breastplate off of the savage slayer, then let the flexible, vertical-slatted piece of armor rattle as it fell over her torso.  Then I took a second look at the “cane” armor, and felt my face paling.

“Um, Mac?” I queried tremulously.  “That’s…not cane.”

“Huh,” she said, giving it a tap with the butt of her club.  “Bone.  Might even be lizard-thing bone.  Probably turned his trophies from the ones he had to kill on his way to the top into something that would let him climb even higher in their pecking order.”

“These things,” I suddenly burst out, my eyes widening.  “They can think.  I mean, they use tools, and they have strategy, and a social order, and…”

“And they’re trying to kill us, Neph,” Mac reminded me, giving me a patient look that silenced my rising fears instantly.  “They’ve got some brainpower, yeah, but only so they’ll be more dangerous enemies.  The whole reason they were made – not born, made, grown in some laboratory somewhere, probably in that moon-sized satellite they call the Circus – is to kill people like you, and like me.  All the brainpower they’ve got is geared toward figuring out better ways to do that job.  Even if they’re sapient, and I don’t think they are, unless we wanna die, we’ll have to kill them before they kill us.”  She focused her eyes on mine, making sure she’d kept my complete attention through all her words.  “You gonna be okay, Neph?”

“Yeah,” I said after a moment’s hesitation, taking a few deep breaths, closing my eyes to let them out, cleansing myself with the action.  “Yes, I’ll be all right.  It just…hit me all of a sudden, you know?”

“Yeah,” Mac replied, giving me a gentle pat on the shoulder and then, impulsively, hugging me.  Not really knowing what else to do, I hugged her back.  This only lasted maybe three seconds, tops, before we turned our attention to much more important matters.  Namely, staying alive.  “They’re coming fast,” Mac said, and we could both see the squamous slayers scuttling through the rocks, ducking from one boulder to the next as they came out from every little nook and cranny, eager for Human blood.  Our blood.

“Lucky for us they don’t seem to use ranged weapons,” I added with a wry smirk.  “They could have dropped rocks down on us while we were fighting their fellows in close quarters, and we couldn’t have done much to dodge.”

“Lucky us,” agreed Mac, before she turned her face deeper down the gulley.  “We can’t just stay here: it’s too wide, and they’ll just surround us again.  We need to get to somewhere more narrow, where they can only come from one direction.”  She pointed down the gulley, and I nodded, seeing how to cliffs on either side rose up, casting those deeper areas into dimness, and then into blackness.  “Our best bet’s that way.”

“Let’s move,” I affirmed, letting her know I was with her all the way.

Our fate decided, we took off at a dogtrot down the gulley – and it was down, at an angle that wasn’t extreme, but we could both feel.  Considering the mountains we’d seen on the other side of this rocky area, it must go uphill at some point, probably around wherever this stream ended, sinking into the dirt and rocks to form an underground complex, unless I was really way off in how the designers of the Arena thought.  That was just a stray guess, of course, the thoughts of someone too unskilled to even call himself an amateur geologist.  But at least the thought was enough to keep me from focusing on the pattering, flapping, clicking sounds of many scaled, clawed feet that echoed down the gulley behind us.  Or on those haunting whistles that just got more eerie as the light started to dim once we were truly into Ginchis Deep, full and committed, the cliffs overhead pressing close together, making a natural roof with only the barest sliver of light where the sun showed through.

Luck was once again on our side, as the path did indeed get more narrow, essentially turning into a tunnel of sorts, the scant gap above us the only thing keeping it from being a true cave.  Actually, it was because there was a sudden rush of water as we finally bottomed out on Ginchis Deep, hitting the long stretch at the lowest point, where the stream suddenly turned into a full-fledged river for as far as we could see in the dim light, making a very effective barrier on our right side.  Good timing, too, because that was when the squamous horde finally caught up with us.

There was just enough room on the stretch of rocky terrain between the high cliff wall on one side and the raging river on the other for us to stand abreast as we turned as one, swinging our clubs as we spun to face the onrushing enemy.  My target ducked, but I grabbed its spear when it jabbed at me, dropping my club to my feet as I did so, yanking the long pole out of its hands with enough force to send it screaming into the river, where it vanished almost immediately in the treacherous current.  Instantly I took a step back, flanking Mac, and started to use the flint-tipped wooden pole to jab around her, keeping the squamous slayers at bay.

Scooping up my dropped club, wielding them both, one in each hand, Mac motioned to me, and I barely heard her yelling “Come on!” over the dull roar of the river.  Once more we started off, using that trail-burning, long-distance pace we’d both learned, worlds apart, back when we’d just done running for casual health and recreation.  Now it was to save our lives, before the momentarily-cowed creatures were reinforced by some more of their bigger brethren, giving them the courage to risk death once more (or at least motivation, if not real courage; after all, what difference did it make if they died to us or to their leaders?).

Every few minutes, a squad of the little slayers would catch up to us, driven by their leaders in the rear, and every time they came, we’d beat them down, then just keep on running, pausing only long enough to snatch up a spear here, a long knife (their equivalent of a sword) there.  By the time we could see daylight again before us, hope finally rising in both our chests at the heartening view, we’d collected two additional spears each (which made three for me, and two for Mac), while Mac had two knives and I had one, all of them securely holstered in the little loops and attachment points that seemed to appear on our stat suits at need, which only seemed to need us to want them there to make them show up.  For Mac, that meant that both long knives were slid into loops on one hip, while the spears rested in an X-shape on her back, while my knife rested on one thigh, and I had both of my waiting spears facing in the same direction on my own back.

With the increase in light levels, we could suddenly see why the ground under us was so easy for walking: it was paved.  Actual construction, rather than just a quirk of the Arena’s artificial nature, with big flagstones set evenly against each other.  Almost without thinking about it, we glanced to the side, and saw a square-shaped stone portal, leading straight into the living rock of the gulleyside.  Instantly we traded a knowing glance, and an even more knowing shared smirk: a more obvious dungeon couldn’t have been pointed out any better than if it had neon lights and a bullhorn.  As an incidental aside, I saw that the “Lair” light had turned off somewhere during our flight; as long as we could keep up our pace for just a little longer, we had a real chance of making it out of this alive!

Of course, that was when our luck ran out.

“Crap,” said Mac, coming up short just as we’d passed the portal to the dungeon, her voice barely audible at normal levels now that we were past the most turbulent part of the river.  There was no need for her to explain her reaction, since I could see its reason barreling down the narrow pass right at us: a lean, lupine shape with the slavering sideways jaws and massive compound eyes of a dragonfly!

Without thinking, I thrust my spear forward, the incredible speed of the creature slamming it down onto the wooden pole almost to the halfway point, and me right onto my posterior, before either of us could even consider the possibility of getting out of the way.  Mac stepped in and clubbed it over the head as it started to thrash, then put a foot on the now-still fly-wolf, holding it in place so I could yank out my spear, then get unsteadily back to my feet.

“I…I don’t know if I can do much more of this,” I told Mac, turning forward and back, and seeing death coming on both hands.  More of the fly-wolves were scrambling down from an overhanging cliff, their weird feet letting them cling to sheer walls just like a true insect, and we both knew that once they got their legs properly under them, and had a little time for orientation, that they’d be rushing us en masse.  Meanwhile, behind us, the squamous horde paused for a short while, considering the new situation, but, again, we could both tell it was only going to take them a little while before they realized the benefits of catching us in a pincer attack.  “I’m running on adrenaline and endorphins, and I think my body’s almost drained dry of both.”

“Same here,” said Mac, her jaw set, her expression grim.  “So, death out here, or death in there?”

She motioned with one of her blood-splashed clubs toward the dungeon entrance.

“Heh,” I got out humorlessly.  “He rides on Charybdis seeking to escape Scylla.”  Then I heaved a long, slow sigh, setting my shoulders.  “At least I’ll bet we’ll earn more points if we die in a dungeon.”

“If we’ve gotta go, we might as well earn more for our families,” agreed Mac.

As one, we turned, and stepped through the stone portal.  Instantly we saw the “Dungeon” light flash to life.  Just as instantly, we felt our hearts sink within us as we turned in the darkness of the constructed tunnel, and readied ourselves for one last stand.