City of the Falling Sky (21 page)

“
Man, I’m telling you, it’s
the ultimate comfort food. Anyway, I asked the lady behind the desk
for my usual, and she said, ‘I think you’ve started a trend.’ I
didn’t know what she was talking about to begin with, but she
slowly pointed to the other side of the counter where there was
this girl sitting by herself, soaking up the bottom of her megamilk
with a big, juicy chip. Can you believe it?”

“
Wow,” said Seckry. “There’s
two of you.”

“
Exactly! Who else in the
world likes chips dipped in milkshake? No one. No one except for
her. It’s like I was looking into the eyes of my
soulmate.”

“
Did you talk to her?”
Seckry asked.

Tenk looked down miserably.

“
He chickened out,” Tippian
said.

“
I didn’t chicken out!” Tenk
said furiously. “I just . . . I thought I’d have time to finish my
chips before going over to her. As I was scoffing them down,
though, the Northern Nightmare gang arrived, all cheering and
shouting and hugging each other, and I lost sight of her. I got up
and looked around but she had gone.”

“
He wouldn’t leave the
stadium afterwards,” Tippian said. “The place was empty and we had
to drag him away. He was convinced she had to be there
somewhere.”

“
I just don’t understand
where she could have gone . . .” Tenk said despairingly.

On the following Monday, they had electronics
once more for first period, and as soon as they entered the
classroom one of the girls squealed in delight.

“
Peanut’s back!” she
shouted, running to the cage. Soon, a group of pupils had gathered
around it.

“
Move away!” Cutson’s voice
sliced through the excitement like a guillotine.

The crowd dispersed sheepishly and Cutson
approached the cage slowly.

Now that Seckry had a clear view he could see
that attached to Peanut’s cage was a magnet of a pineapple.

“
You
stupid
animal,”
Cutson said with disgust.

Peanut turned to look at her whilst chewing
on a leaf and gave her an expression that seemed to say, “What did
I do?”

“
Training time,” said Loca
Thumbsuckle, pacing the Friction common room a week later with a
determined expression. “The Meltdown’s just three weeks away and
we’ve all got to be on top form. Right Tippian?”

Tippian looked angry. “It ain’t my fault
Cookrook gave me extra homework again. He hates me.”

“
I don’t care how much
homework you got, I want to see you training. We’re not losing
again. I’ve had enough of losing to Mobbins and the Northern
Nightmare gang. If I see his smug face holding that trophy again
this year I’m gonna . . .” She clenched her teeth and cracked her
knuckles. “Now we need to talk strategies. The reason we’ve lost
for three years running is that we’ve got no structure. Everyone’s
doing their own thing and trying to compete for attention when what
we need to be doing is giving everyone roles.”

Tenk shook his head. “The reason we lost last
year is ‘cos those blummin overseers stuck us in a cave.”

“
Well if we’d equipped one
of us with a torch beforehand we’d have been fine.”

Lessana sighed and chuckled.

“
Amateurs.”

Loca narrowed her eyes.

“
You’re not better than us
Lessana. Just because you found your way out doesn’t make you a
better player. A truly good player would have helped the rest of us
out.”

“
Why bother?” said Lessana.
“You’d all just have got trapped in the marshes anyway.”

Lessana continued to be a nuisance to
everyone during their following training sessions, and Seckry was
getting particularly annoyed with her smugness after the cheap
trick she had played on him.

They began training three times a week after
school had finished, and before Seckry had even come around to
accepting it, the Mega Meltdown was upon them.

Just three days before the event, during the
midst of a heavy practise session, something strange happened.

They were all running through a section of
the Atoria Valley and reloading their weapons when Loca
stopped.

“
Something’s different,” she
said. “Something’s wrong.”

Everyone came to a halt and looked
around.

“
What’s the matter?” Tenk
gasped. “Come on, we’ve only got two days left of training. Let’s
go, let’s go!”

“
Tenk, she’s right,” Tippian
said. “Something’s been changed. The mesh.”

Suddenly, Basher’s big, furry body started
jiggling.

“
Tenk, what are you doing?
This isn’t the time for dancing!” shouted Loca.

Basher began wiggling his large, fluffy
behind in Loca’s face.

“
It’s not me! I’m not
controlling Basher anymore! Something’s seriously
wrong!”

“
It looks like I’m picking
my nose,” said Tippian, whose avatar was thrusting a huge finger
into his metal nostril.

In the sky appeared some bright green
writing.

Having fun, losers? Get ready to be
slaughtered on Saturday. The Northern Nightmare is coming your
way.

There was a flash of light and the writing
disappeared. Tenk and Tippian regained control of their
avatars.

“
Those cheating scum!” Loca
yelled. “How did they manage to hack our game?”

“
When I see Mobbins I swear
I’m gonna pound his face in.”

Basher picked up a rock and threw it at the
sky. “You hear that, Mobbins? I’m gonna smack you in the face!”

“
Guys, I don’t get it . . .
” Tippian said. “How could they have hacked our game? The only way
they could have done it is by knowing our combination key for the
security lock.”

“
Unless . . .” Loca said
suspiciously. “Unless the lock was left open . . .”

“
Who would open the security
lock?” Tippian said. “We’d only do that if one of us wanted to hack
the game ourselves . . .” Tippian trailed off and everyone slowly
turned their heads towards Lessana.

Lessana gulped and looked around
defensively.

“
What? Don’t blame this on
me! I forgot to turn the security lock back on when I pranked
Seckry, so what?”

“
You know what, Lessana?”
said Tenk, coldly. “It’ll be a miracle if I don’t turn my gun on
you in the Friction Meltdown and put a bullet right through that
fat, furry head of yours.”

On the day of the Meltdown, Seckry felt sick.
Even though they had been training five days a week, he still felt
nervous about playing in front of a huge audience. Tenk and the
others had complete confidence in him (aside from Lessana) but
Seckry wasn’t so sure he was going to cope under the pressure. It
was true, he had picked up Friction very quickly, and he loved the
game, but was he really ready to compete in the Meltdown?

At six o’clock that evening, about an hour
after the sun had set, Seckry, Eiya, his mum and his sister all
took a taxi to Skyfall Stadium, which was located in the west
partition, and each of their mouths dropped open when they got
out.

The stadium was a gigantic, open top
structure, lit by hundreds of coloured floodlights, and draped with
all manner of Friction related banners.

There were helium balloons of puffy, cute
avatars floating around everywhere, jugglers and fire eaters, and
the most spectacular array of fireworks Seckry had ever seen.

The air was crisp and cold now as winter was
nearing, but was being warmed by the glowing heat of burger vans
and toffee apple stands. Seckry licked his lips as the rich smells
of frying onions and candyfloss wafted past him.

The place was roaring with the excited bustle
of people, and crowds of all ages were still pouring into the
surrounding plaza.

“
Mum, look, there’s the
Western Warriors captain!” yelled one child.

“
I’m gonna be the best
Friction player in the world when I grow up!” shouted
another.

“
Hotdogs!” screamed a
third.

All players had to be ready to play and
within the gaming area by seven, so that they had time to get
everyone else seated and time to have a prep talk. After Coralle
had bought a few official Friction hats, and Leena had spent enough
time refusing to wear one, they queued up and entered the stadium
itself.

Thousands of seats lined the inner walls and
were all focused on the centre of the stadium, where there was a
large ring of pods. Above the seating were four enormous screens,
one above each corner, which would display footage of the game in
action.

“
Seckry! Eiya!” came a high
pitched call. It was Loca, waving at them from a distance. She made
her way through the crowd, dragging her parents along behind
her.

“
This is my mum and dad,”
she said, panting.

Seckry and Eiya both waved and Loca’s parents
acknowledged them shyly.

“
Have you seen Kimmy?” Loca
asked, searching around her.

“
Not yet,” Seckry said.
“This place is packed!”

“
I hope he’s not being sick
in the bathroom like last time,” Loca said worriedly. “I thought he
wasn’t even gonna make it into his pod.”

At that moment Mr Binko wandered past them
with a huge hotdog in his hands, overflowing with onions and
mustard.

“
The Mega Meltdown
Meatwurst!” he shouted at them. “This is what Friction’s all about,
eh?” He took a huge chomp and disappeared into the crowd
happily.

Seckry was about to yell after him to ask him
if Tenk was here, but before he had a chance, Tenk stumbled through
a group of giggly girls and put his hand on Seckry’s shoulder,
panting. He was followed by his mum, who was chewing on an
oversized, twirly marshmallow.

“
Hey guys,” Tenk said
breathlessly. “Just been doing a bit of strength and conditioning
before the game over in the locker rooms. You nearly
ready?”

“
Ready as ever,” Seckry
said, with growing nervousness.

“
Look! There’s Mobbins!”
Tenk suddenly said with venom. He pointed to a tall, shirtless,
muscular boy doing press-ups close to the pods. A circle of people
had formed around him and girls were whistling at his
torso.

Mrs Binko gave him a wolf whistle too.

“
Mum!” Tenk shouted. “What
are you doing? He’s, like, our sworn enemy!”

“
He’s really cute!” she said
defensively.

Tenk’s face screwed up into an uncomfortable
grimace.

“
He looks like a machine,”
Seckry said, wondering how he’d ever be able to compete against
someone like that.

“
Yeah, the guy’s a freak.
All he does is train. I’ve heard rumours that he actually goes up
this mountain called Big Boar three months before a Friction match
and trains in the high altitude so that his lungs are almost
indestructible.”

“
That’s crazy!” said Seckry.
“What about his school? Don’t they class that as
truancy?”

“
Are you kidding? I bet they
fund him to go up there. Friction’s big money, man. Mobbins is
their school’s hero.”

Mobbins jumped to his feet and started
flexing his biceps for the crowd, who squealed in delight.

“
I’d love it if someone took
him out in the first minute,” Tenk said viciously. “I swear to
Gedin I’ll do it one day.”

“
Tenk!” Loca exclaimed. “We
gotta stick to the plan, remember? Don’t be getting any bright
ideas about hunting him down.”

In between signing autographs, Mobbins turned
to Tenk and made a slow, slitting motion across his neck with his
finger, and Seckry had to grab Tenk before he ran down to punch
him.

The stadium seemed to be getting fuller and
fuller, and the heat of the crowd and the lighting was making
Seckry feel slightly faint.

“
Greetings,” said Tippian,
squeezing through the masses and readjusting his skew-whiff
glasses. “What’s wrong with Kimmy?”

“
Kimmy?” Loca said quickly.
“Where is he?”

“
Just saw him running to the
bathroom.”

“
Oh no,” Loca said,
distressed. “Right. I’m going after him.”

“
But that’s the men’s
toilets!” said Tippian.

“
You think that’s gonna stop
her?” said Tenk, as Loca stormed away.

She returned about five minutes later shaking
her head in disbelief.

“
His dad’s ignored him,
that’s what it is,” said Loca, shaking her head with fury. “After
all the effort Kimmy’s put in, he blummin’ ignores him!”

“
Is he okay?” Seckry
asked.

“
He’s come around. He’s just
splashing his face.”

With only twenty minutes to spare, Seckry had
become so nervous he couldn’t stop going to the bathroom himself.
When he returned for the third time, Kolda Kod wheeled himself out
of one of the cubicles and began washing his hands in the sink, a
stern expression on his face.

Seckry was in the presence of a true Friction
master, a legend of the game, but all Seckry could think of was
that he had ignored his own son. Before Seckry knew it, his mouth
was talking without his consciousness even having decided to do
so.