Mare hummed happily as she walked into the elevator, a slight smile on her face as she recalled the absolutely stupefied expression on NotFound's face after her explanation.
After escaping the arena, Mare had been well and truly fed up with having knowledge hidden from her, and so spent hours upon hours in a local library, studying all manner of things, from botany, to physics, to programming, professional fighting techniques, medical research, and even the dictionary at one point just to learn a couple of extra words.
From that research she had learned the pressure points on a person that could quickly knock them out, as well as the professional names for many different things in the medical category. That was how she knew what to say when giving the answer to the scenario.
The elevator let out a quiet ding, startling Mare out of her thoughts. She took a deep breath before stepping out into the waiting room of the 37th floor, and proceeded to find an empty seat near the corner of the room, though there were considerably more empty seats here than in the previous waiting room.
Step one of the interview process was a mental assessment. Step two of the interview process was a physical trial, used to assess fighting ability and power sets, if someone was powered of course.
The physical fighting test was first, overseen by Hypno, a hero that dressed in an obnoxious neon green and wore a strange smiling mask, with the ability to control someone through glowing strings from his fingers. He was limited to ten 'minions' at a time, considering he had ten fingers.
The applicants that had made it past the first round stood in line, waiting for their turn.
After a long ten minutes of waiting, Mare finally stepped into the boxing ring, anxiously controlling her breathing, reminding herself that its not the arena, you're not back there, you can back out at any time.
She tapped her thumb against her fingers in the familiar pattern Grayson had shown her, helping her focus on not tapping her ring finger rather than the ring that flickered to an arena if she closed her eyes for too long.
Pointer, middle, pinkie
Pointer, middle, pinkie
Breathe
Mare took a deep breath before bowing to Hypno, signaling to him that she was ready. He bowed back, waited half a second for her to process, and then lunged.
Hypno fought with the same style every time, never waiting for the other person to attack. After observing Hypno's opponents get pummeled into the floor by the exact same moves over and over again, Mare could say she was pretty confident in what to do.
She sidestepped the initial lunge, ducking even before he began the swing above her head, then leaping over the sweep at her feet.
Pointer, middle, pinkie
She continued this dance for a minute or two, focusing on her breathing.
"Attack you worthless girl."
In the arena, a fight with her would have never lasted so long.
"Fight back, don't sit here all day wasting our time."
She would have attacked straight away, not waited for her opponent to tire out.
"Take them down fast enough to be impressive, but not so fast I don't get my show."
Finally she reached a point she hadn't seen any others get past.
"Impossible? You better find a way to make it possible, or your little friend will pay."
It was up to her to figure it out now, all on her own.
"C'mon Goldie. We win or we lose together."
Hypno, clearly not expecting the spar to go on quite so long, and tired from his many other fights throughout the day, had started lagging in his movements.
When he threw a sloppy punch toward her stomach, Mare grabbed his arm, flipping him to the mat, and, jumping over the sweep he threw at her legs, pulled his arms behind his back, keeping him on the ground for 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 seconds, despite his struggles, then letting go.
She stepped back, hesitantly reaching out a hand to help him up.
"Sorry. Are you alright?"
"There's no apologies in the arena Goldie. Apologizing means you regret what you did, and that means you regret living. Never, and I mean never, regret your life. It means the world to me."
"Of course, I'm fine. Are you? How did you even do that?" Hypno stood, shock evident on his face.
"I'm alright don't worry. Does that mean I get to advance to the abilities test?" I deflect the question. Mare despised lying, and while sometimes it is unavoidable, she much prefered to deflect and stay silent than answer without truth.
"Of course. Inferno's waiting in the next room." Hypno glanced at Mare, and as she walked away, she could just make out him mumbling, "Incredible, truly. What did I do differently than with the others?"
YOU ARE READING
Gladiator
FanfictionWhat if Technoblade was a gladiator as a child? What if a younger girl taught him to fight? What if this is the story of the two of them, a pair of fighters stolen from their homes as children, only to be eternally connected by fate? This is complet...
