"Eyes up, dragon girl! Today's the day!" Nola's jeering--contrary to his belief--didn't snap Calder out of any deep thinking. She just rolled her eyes at him.
"Just skip straight to calling me slurs, Nola. It makes you look like less of a coward."
And that would be the last time she could enjoy calling him such a thing. While racial and sexual slurs were, of course, banned from use for professional reasons, it had been an occurrence of culture shock to learn that 'coward' was quite possibly the worst slur you could call an active duelist. 'Pussy' was fine, though.
Nola's face contorted into something resentful and nasty, but he otherwise fell silent. He turned away and kept walking, the coliseum rising to fill the arriving parties' view. Calder painted her mental exhaustion to a nearby Parrisol in one perfect expression, and Parrisol reflected it right back.
In reality, there was plenty to be reflecting on. Three long-ass months ago, Calder had been brand new to Aegis, butting heads with the government and testing the waters. Now here she was, four complete tryouts, a moveset decreed to be balanced, and one obstacle remaining between her and her dream.
Nola.
And if last week had been indicative of anything, he wasn't going to be nice about it.
***
May twenty-eighth had started off just like any other day. Calder, after waking up at a jarringly early hour for hopefully the last time, showered and dressed and almost ran out of time for food and dashed out the door like a lunatic, leaving Parrisol to catch up via portal fifteen minutes later. And then tryouts had started, and she'd made it halfway through the group before her name got called.
"NEXT MATCH BEGINS IN FORTY-FIVE SECONDS. APPLICANTS MESH AND MCKAYE, REPORT TO THE COLISEUM FLOOR."
And BAM! It was Nola. The quality of Calder's day had just dropped significantly. She sighed and Parrisol gave her a sympathetic look before saying "go kick his ass" and giving her a little shove in the direction of the ring.
"Put your fists up," Nola called as his opponent stalked towards him. Calder allowed herself a deep breath in and out, and mostly tuned out the PA's restrictions. At this point, it was all maxed-out time limits, for both of them. Fay's brilliant double-the-wait-time plan had gone over smashingly with the evaluators. They'd even thrown in the "five elites at once with a long rest" feature, which Calder knew for a fact she was never going to use. But for now, it was just up to her to get used to the new restraints.
In all seriousness, she didn't expect to strain herself for this fight. She just wanted to practice entrances and exits, hand and verbal commands. It was almost June. She'd have one more exit exam versus Nola next week, and that duel would make the decision as to who would move on and who would get benched for another couple tryouts.
So today's fight against Nola was by chance. And she actually forgot for the first few seconds exactly who she was fighting against.
She remembered when Nola charged up and socked her in the stomach. The blow sent her flying and rocking back onto her neck when she hit the ground, and the adrenaline suddenly flared up with the realization that my neck could've snapped and he's not going easy on me.
She rolled and jumped back to her feet and blocked the next two haymakers with her thigh and forearm, and caught the third with her left hand. Nola tried to land another low shot to her gut, but she caught his wrist and twisted it hard. He grunted and used the weird crossed-arm leverage to throw Calder straight over his head and into the dirt.
The wind was knocked straight out of her. She almost didn't wiggle away from the next series of blows, sweeping through Nola's legs and bringing him down to the ground. Still laying prone beside him, Calder took in the best breath she could and exhaled it as a plume of reddish-orange heat. She and Nola both scrambled to their feet at the same time, and then Nola would be seen breaking though the plume only to get decked by his opponent's fantastic reaction time. He would land back on his ass while Calder let up the heat and jogged backward, turning her head skyward and screaming for a dragon.
Forty-five seconds on the clock.
It was Cloud, raring to go. Nola jumped up and whipped his scarf from around his neck. One or two good shakes later, it was solidified into his scythe, held over his shoulder like a batter at home plate, eyeing the circling dragon with unease.
Then he looked away, seemingly reevaluating his play, and let the scythe revert to being a scarf. Calder eyed him curiously, warily, as he backed away from her. She jumped back into animation, waving her hand in an airborne circle and then ending the signal with a point straight at Nola. Cloud heeded her command, tucked in his wings, and swooped low.
Nola braced himself, arms raised as if to catch...
And Cloud's momentum was destroyed by the giant pastel pink demon that stood where Nola had just been, dark horns protruding from his eyes and curving back over his head. Previously neat fucsia hair was now a spiky, matted, almost bloodred mess. And the hands, now wickedly clawed, were holding Cloud's jaw open as the seven-foot temporary monstrosity heaved the juvenile dragon over his shoulder.
This was one of those times where multiple heads might've been better. Goddammit. When would she learn which dragon was the right one for the job? She huffed and yelled to her dragon, who was shaking off the shock of the attack.
"CLOUD! Eyes on target at all times! Tail-whip!"
The dragon's orange eyes flared up and he obeyed, smacking Nola hard in the face with the meaty, armored end third of his tail.
"Again!" A second smack was delivered, but this time Nola's claws gripped the tail and yanked, loosening Cloud's grip on the ground he squawked, and Calder came up with another command.
"Bellow! Pushback!" Two moves in one. The first order of business was to drench the target area in Cloud's yellow-hot breath. The second, once Nola continued to hold fast on the tail, was to take flight, almost dragging the demon along. Cloud only hovered as high as he could, beating his wings hard in order to stir up the flames below. One perfectly-controlled wingbeat was all it took to loosen Nola's grip on the tail. A single compressed clump of air.
They shouldn't have expected Nola to just give up after that, and they didn't. But they definitely didn't expect him to leap twenty feet straight into the air and tackle Cloud around the neck. They fell and tumbled, dragon sustaining scratches to the armored part of his back and belly, but all it took was one claw coming a little close to the vulnerable wing for Calder to scream "FIGHT BACK!" at the top of her lungs.
Cloud's jaws clamped hard around Nola's bicep, puncturing the jacket that was already straining against the mass of flesh within it. The dragon, with one great motion aided by his forearms, ripped Nola away and tossed him back towards Calder--with only ten seconds left on Nola's timer. He caught himself, skidded in the dirt, set his sights on Calder, and roared.
Oh, and charged, too.
This time, she was ready for it. Seven seconds. He pounded the ground with such force that the clay beneath the layer of dust cracked and Calder's leap to safety was aided by the blow. Five. She slid between his legs as he tried to grab her, but only succeeded in shearing off a lock of hair with his claws. Three. She jumped and ran up the length of his back as he stood upright again, taking a flying leap from his shoulder and performing a beautiful front flip. One. His fist flew at her, a devastating downward blow that would've caved her skull in, if not for the tiny detail that his time was up and he was already shrinking. The blow hit strong enough to send Calder to her knees, but not too strong for Calder to catch it.
But now there was the issue that she was on her knees--or almost there--and had Nola pushing down on her from above. She wasn't physically strong enough to push back or even sustain her position if she broke away with one arm to send Cloud a signal. So she was down to two options: scream for her dragon or yield to Nola.
Guess which one she chose.
"CLOUD!" her voice was shrill and tore at her throat. Nola flinched. "CLOUD, TAIL!"
She was aware of Cloud's snarl and heavy, angry footfalls as he approached. She was aware of Nola changing his grip on her forearms, but for what?
She realized it too late, when he swung her into the air and let go, effectively throwing her at her dragon. Who was already in the middle of his own attack.
Agony shot up the outside of her right thigh and bloomed to engulf the whole upper leg and hip, and all she could do was cover her head and pray to black out or something.
The universe couldn't even grant her that. She felt the fall hit hard, more on her stomach than her leg, but her head--sheltered by her arms--was fine.
Upon unfolding and looking across the battlefield once more, Nola was passing by, giving her a shove with his foot like she was a sack of flour sitting in his way. She rolled onto her back and cast him the darkest look she could manage.
Back in the other direction, Cloud was crouching all but fifteen feet away, crooning in an utterly terrified voice, arguing with himself over which course of action would result in his lifespan continuing for the longest.
"You can come closer," Calder croaked, her voice hoarse from the earlier screaming.
Her dragon heeded and shuffled closer, albeit with his head bowed. Calder moved to a sitting position and held her arms wide for a hug. Cloud's big spikey head nuzzled her stomach, and snapped up into a grimace when he heard two people behind them.
First aid team.
"Ease up there, hot-head," Calder scolded, accepting the hand that offered to pull her up. She tested her leg, and when it didn't buckle, she gave Cloud the wordless signal to shrink and perch, and turned to follow the team. With a frustratingly heavy limp.
The scoreboard counted this as a victory to Nola.
***
"I've only got one shot left at this, Parri!" Calder ranted later that day, after she'd been sent back to the Nemesis Outpost to rest her leg. "It's like he did it on purpose. Maybe not this exact injury, but he needed to ensure I got my ass beat on Wednesday. He needed to injure me. He knows I could take him otherwise." Fuck. Wednesday. She only had five days to get back to full speed, and the doctors were telling her to walk on eggshells until further notice.
"At least the evaluators think your stuff's balanced," Parrisol said. When all it got her was an eye roll, she tried again, from another angle. "If the admins think they saw the same thing as you, he might get suspended. Or kicked out of the program. It's hard to say, though. Kicking someone out takes a vote, and a good number of admins fought during the RHG era."
Calder sighed, the energy draining from her next words. "Which means they've seen worse, and don't care. Fuck."
"I wouldn't say they don't care," Parri countered. "They've just seen worse, and sometimes they think the old rules are still in place. Hyun does a good enough job at keeping his team on track."
Ah, yes. Hyun. The lead administrator and owner of the whole Dojo complex. Calder didn't remember him from back in the day, but she'd read enough RHG-related history documents to know he'd been there. He created the Dojo out of a desire to keep a tradition alive, and to include the next generation in that tradition. That was all she knew. Not nearly enough for an impression. But if she was forced to make one, Hyun would be... an okay guy.
If only she could remember what his fighting style was.
Both girls sort of jumped as they heard a pair of footsteps jogging away from the doorway. Parrisol hurried over, but by the time she got there, nobody was in sight.
They exchanged a look.
Calder sighed and turned away.
***
Thus, the medley of good reasons to hate Nola right about now. Wednesday had chosen to be overcast as Calder marched up the steps to the stands, Parrisol by her side. Six feet ahead, Nola emerged into the sort-of sunlight with his own wingman--an indigo-haired waterbender two steps behind Nola in the registration process known as Ara--at his left. There was cheering when they exited. As this wasn't the normal day for tryouts--those were reserved for Tuesday and Thursday--this fight would be the only one the coliseum would witness today.
Part of Calder found that a little inefficient. Another part of her was stoked. The third part was in a constant state of 'oh god he's set me up to be the only failure of the day' which really wasn't fun. As if it could assuage her worry, her leg was fine... for the most part. It was just the littlest bit sore before she'd gotten the chance to swallow some pain pills, but other than that there was no damage done to the limb apart from some nasty bruising.
Calder hadn't quite believed that at first, but she was walking on it now, wasn't she?
Yeah. She let herself soak in the noise from the crowd, feeling like some kind of high-up celebrity despite the pre-scorched gym clothes and cheap, expendable tennis shoes she wore for the exam. Nola too had dressed down for a change, leaving his jacket and choosing a loose tank top and cargo pants. His hiking boots looked about three sizes too big, but considering the strain his transformation put on his shoes, Calder was hardly surprised. He still had his scythe-shifting scarf around his neck, though, but she supposed he needed that.
She genuinely hoped she could keep him on his toes enough for him to consider using it.
"PLEASE STAND BY FOR FINAL EXAM," The PA requested. The crowd, containing at least a hundred people, most of them close to Calder and Nola, rose up in cheering again. They probably didn't care who won.
"Let's see, June third of the year two thousand and twenty... who's on deck?" A new, non-robotic voice thought out loud over the intercom. "Nola... Mesh. Calder... McKaye. Alright. Mr. Mesh, Ms. McKaye, please report to the coliseum floor."
Nola was over the balcony before the new voice had even finished his sentence. Calder looked back to Parrisol one last time, who winked, and then flashed her own smirk before sprinting and taking a flying leap over the edge.
Cloud swooped past and gave Calder an easy landing in the center of the floor before disappearing again.
"Your leg still bothering you?" Nola called as he walked up.
"Nah," Calder grinned wide, her eyelids low and stance nonchalant. "Just didn't want to sprain my other ankle."
"Weak."
"Ever taken a look in the mirror?"
"Whenever I do, all I see is the next official duelist of Hyun's Dojo."
"Why are you seeing me in the mirror? That's weird, dude. I oughta put a restraining order on your ass."
"You probably could get it easy too, with all that ass kissing you've been doing for Nemesis."
Calder actually burst out laughing. "Only thing I've done over there is make Jade's life harder. She'd refuse the order just to ruin my day!"
Nola leaned in close now, and spoke low. "I'm about to ruin your day unless you let me have this win. Your whole bloodline is nothing but the scum of the earth, and you don't belong here, karryd."
Calder cracked a dangerous smile. "That's more like it, pussy."
"If you two are done, we're ready to start the assessment," Non-Robot PA Voice said. Nola backed up ten paces and fell still, face frozen in a snarl.
"Okay. My evaluators have provided me with your full reports, and it says here that Calder is allowed to 'call dragons to her aid, but with increasing time intervals before the next dragon can be summoned, beginning at forty-five seconds and doubling with each new addition.' Nola is allowed to 'shift into a powerful demonic form for no more than thirty-five seconds per duel.' Got that? It shouldn't have changed since Thursday."
Calder raised a thumbs-up towards the commentator's box and Nola nodded stiffly.
"Good. Applicants, take your places. The duel will start on my word."
There was a tense, silent pause where Calder and Nola shifted on their feet. Not exactly forming fighting stances, as if they both expected the other to charge first.
"FIGHT!"
Nola immediately turned pink and gained eighteen inches and a couple hundred pounds. He roared up at the sky and lurched forward, sprinting dead straight at Calder. The draconic, egged on by the uproarious cheering of the crowd, bounced back and forth on her toes until the last minute, at which she dove to the right and just barely dodged Nola's attempt at grabbing her. He skidded to a stop in the dirt, kicking up clouds of dust. He sneezed and then turned on Calder again, comically huge fangs bared in a malicious grin. Calder grinned right back and sent a huge plume of fire in his direction, just as the monster started another charge. With his eyeline cut off even more, Calder dodged again, though not as far away. She grabbed the back of Nola's shirt and used it to climb on his back, solidifying her new hiding space with an iron grip on his horn. She laughed and the crowd went wild as Nola tried and failed to shake her. Reaching back meant she found new footing, rolling meant she jumped off and then on again.
Nola roared, a sound of complete rage exiting his windpipe. At the same moment, Calder cupped her mouth with her free hand and yelled for backup.
"You remember Cloud, right?" she teased the uncontrolled mass of muscle below her. "TAIL-WHIP!"
The portal opened up right in front of Nola, and he took the tail straight to the face. Calder stepped off of Nola's head and twisted mid-air so that her feet touched down softly on Cloud's upper neck and she slid down to his back. She pumped a fist into the air as the two fanged beasts reached a fistlock, with Cloud's long neck allowing him to tower over Nola, snarling.
And then time ran out. Nola had to begin shrinking. A moment of panic rocked the demon's world for a moment as he obeyed his restriction, and Calder had the decency to pat the side of Cloud's neck and ask him to back off--after sweeping Nola's legs, of course.
Done and done. Nola was once again a normal-sized human being lying on his side in the dust, and Cloud was rearing back, wings beating and lifting him into a backflip. Calder dismounted with her own leap of faith, twisted, and flattened the just-back-on-his-feet Nola with a devastating y-axis roundhouse kick. Behind her, a blue cotton ball portal opened up in the ground and the dragon who called it disappeared into the maw.
Nola jumped to his feet again, this time pulling the scarf from around his neck and whipping it into the shape of his scythe. He swung at Calder, only for her to lean back Matrix-style and dodge the attack. She leaned just a little too far to dodge the second one and wound up stumbling back, and in that moment of vulnerability Nola grabbed the neck of her shirt and smacked her in the face with the blunt handle of his scythe.
Calder stumbled further when he let go, practically shoving her back. She regained her footing, stood up to her tallest five foot two possible, and launched forward fast enough to put Nola in a fistlock. Her hands curled around his, and he didn't show any signs of letting go of the scythe, so they stood there for a good few seconds, pushing the weapon back and forth towards each other until Nola had an epiphany and swung Calder in a sharp counter-clockwise arc.
She lost her grip and tumbled, but caught herself, stood, and charged again. She slide-canceled to nearly dodge that scythe again and immediately rocketed to her feet to elbow Nola in the back of the neck. He stumbled forward, flailing his arms wide enough for Calder to kick his hand, hook the scythe with her toe and launch it across the arena. It cost her a blow to the face, but keeping Nola away from his blade would better her chances for victory.
They traded blows back and forth for what felt like a while, occasionally broken up by plumes of bright orange flame erupting from Calder's mouth. Both fighters were constantly moving, blocking each blow with terrifying accuracy, footwork precise and smooth.
And then Nola suddenly had his scythe again, and Calder could only curse herself for being stupid enough to let him walk them both over to where it had landed. She was back to ducking and dodging the shiny crescent of metal.
Until something grazed her upper left arm and a stinging pain bloomed in that exact spot.
She didn't even get a chance to look at the injury before Nola's fist connected in the same place, and then his head connected with hers. Calder stumbled back the next four steps in a daze, then wound up on her butt in the dirt of the arena floor.
As blood dribbled down her arm, Nola raised his arms into the air and the crowd--what little that was there--went wild.
***
While a medic was gluing the slice closed, Nola jeered. He was surrounded by his new followers, twirling his scythe around in his hand and recounting the battle from his own perspective. Everybody had filed into the building, and most of them were hanging around in the entrance hall.
In the medbay, Calder had Parrisol hovering over one shoulder, and the medic prodding the injured flesh of her other arm. Parrisol had been sympathetic. Calder hadn't said anything, just pressed her lips into a firm line and tried to smile once or twice.
"You're good to go," the medic said. Calder's arm was sufficiently closed and bandaged. It had just been a flesh wound. "There should be an admin waiting for you in the entrance hall."
Calder turned to Parrisol, eyes wide. Parri just shrugged. With a final thanks, Calder stood from her seat and followed her chaperone out of the basement.
***
The sun still hadn't graced Aegis Town with its presence at this hour in the afternoon. It was still cloudy and muggy and Calder's nose told her that rain was on the schedule for later. She brushed a stray lock of hair from where it was stuck to her forehead and sighed.
So she'd been pushed back a couple weeks. Maybe three. Maybe they'd let her in next month. Fine by her, so long as she got in.
She wasn't leaving.
The outskirts of Nola's crowd saw her coming, and started applauding good-naturedly. Then the other, more enthusiastic members of the crowd added their own noise, and Calder held up her hands.
"No, no-" she sighed as Nola pushed through the crowd to stand face-to-face with her. "No. This one. This is your new duelist. He played well." She stuck a hand out. Nola looked at it with a mix of confusion and condescension.
Calder swallowed around the awkward lump in her throat. "Thanks for pushing me to the limit," she said, staring at his face.
He snorted, rolled his eyes, and turned back to the crowd.
Calder blinked, and her hand slowly fell back to her hip. Her glare hardened and she bit back on a number of nasty insults.
"Well, if that doesn't get him kicked out..." Parrisol marveled.
"Sportsmanship a big thing around here?"
Parri nodded. Calder huffed and crossed her arms.
"Well, if nobody saw him, it doesn't help my case."
"Somebody saw it."
Calder looked to her companion, confusion written plain on her face. Parri tipped her head to the side, and Calder's gaze followed until it found the little black glassy semi-sphere sticking out from the ceiling. She nodded once, eyebrows hidden completely under her bangs.
"Cameras. Gotcha."
"They're all over the dorm campus too. Hyun's team doesn't mess around."
"They shouldn't if they're harboring this selection of powerful-ass fighters. Or if they're even thinking about housing political fugitives."
"Was that a jab at you, or me?"
Calder blinked and looked Parrisol in the eye. "Me. What do you mean- actually, it's not my business." She waved away the comment. "I don't wanna know what you did."
"Jack squat, compared to you."
Calder rolled her eyes. "That medic said there'd be an admin here, but all I see are people celebrating an asshole."
"That's because you're looking in the wrong direction," a gruff voice said from behind. Both girls jumped and Calder let loose a string of muttered expletives before she turned around fully. Standing before her was a man of roughly six feet, with black hair, broad shoulders, and steely green eyes. He showed the slightest bit of amusement at the expense of the girls' heart rates.
"I have instructions for both Nola Mesh and Calder McKaye." He held up two pristine white envelopes and waited for Nola to push through the crowd, as smug as ever.
"These are not to be opened until later this afternoon, when you are alone." The tall guy said, handing over the envelopes. Calder stared at her name, typed in block letters on one side, then flipped it over to look at the Dojo sticker that sealed the document away.
"How will you know if I open it as soon as your back's turned?" Nola piped up.
"Security footage."
Nola's face fell considerably. It took everything Calder had to not start laughing.
"Have a good afternoon," the guy said, turning and giving everyone a great look at the sleek black and green sword strapped to his back as he retreated down the hall.
Nola fell back to his group of worshippers with a grumble. They accepted him back with a swell of excited chatter.
Despite the scene and the likely contents of her own letter, Calder smiled softly.