Chapter 73 - The Competition.
"LADIEEES AND GENTLEMEN! YOU ARE IN THE COMPANY OF THE ONE YOU ALL KNOW AND LOVE — KELO ORFI! AND IT IS WITH ENORMOUS HAPPINESS, JOY AND PLEASURE THAT I DECLARE OPEN THE EVENT YOU HAVE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR... THE SPECTACLE... THE BRIGHTEST OF THEM ALL... THE MIDAR COMPETITION!!!" announced Kelo Orfi through the magic loudspeakers from the center of the starting ground, where a vast, long course lay ringed by thousands of clapping and shouting spectators.
Kelo looked like an ordinary Heliosian Conductor, silvery skin, white hair of medium length slicked back, a clean-shaven and trim face, and a stylish turquoise suit as well.
Fireworks burst above everyone, flags streamed and confetti scattered, and down on the ground the whole course joined together and rebuilt for the start as the mechanisms came into motion.
"TODAY... AS ALWAYS, OF COURSE... WE ARE JOINED BY OUR GREATEST BENEFACTORS AND THE PILLARS OF OUR REPUBLIC'S FUTURE! PLEASE WELCOME... THE COUNCIL OF ARCHONS!!!"
In the main boxes every Archon rose from their seat, Aurelius, Varian and even Lucia among them.
They raised their hands in greeting, and the public answered with a single roar.
The whole course ran out in a great ring along the walls of Midar, and every few dozen meters cristocytes hung in the air and threw the image onto tall screens.
At the edge of the course stood operators with massive fixed devices, on the ends of which spun imported crystals from the island of Maris-Vitrum, able to take in visual information and pass it to the cristocytes, which made a camera and a screen out of the pair.
"Mama! Papa! When is it going to start?" a little girl asked, hopping on the spot among the stands.
"One gold on Gray," said one of the senior students.
"Hah, in that case I'll put mine on Kerar," another replied.
This was one of the few days when Midar gave off a level of noise you could hear kilometers out in the desert.
Underneath all of it, muffled in part by the walls, Eveline stood in the preparation wing.
She was adjusting the protective armor with photocytes on her, the same as in the practical sessions.
Artus and Olen checked her straps. Aren stood facing her with his arms crossed over his chest and tried not to let his nerves show.
On Eveline's face the nerves showed without any effort at all.
"All right then, looks like everything's set," Artus said, and stepped back.
"How are you?" Olen asked.
"...Fine..." Eveline answered.
Olen said nothing, only gave a restrained smile and patted her lightly on the shoulder, and then stepped back as well.
Aren came over to her, and she raised her eyes to him.
They were silent for several seconds.
"Remember the plan?" Aren asked.
"Use their hatred against them, and use the surroundings. Don't shed speed and... try not to end up in a duel," she answered.
Aren smiled, and then held out both palms so that Eveline could lay hers against them.
Once they had taken each other's hands, Aren looked into her eyes in silence a moment longer.
"You're going to do this."
"I'm going to do this."
"Tear them apart."
"I'll tear them apart."
"..."
"..."
"You're the best."
"I'm the best."
The smile stayed on Aren's face and on the others' too, and then they turned toward the exit, where a bright light came in at them from the street.
"Well... go on," Artus said on an exhale.
Rexy flew onto her shoulder, and she rubbed his muzzle, and then drew a deep breath in, let it out, and walked forward, and left her friends behind.
The noise of the stands grew louder and the light brighter, until everything went white, and then her eyes adjusted to the daylight and opened the whole scale of it in front of her.
Tens of thousands of people filled the stands, which rose fifty meters and ran off into the distance; down below, where Eveline was, at least seventy competitors had gathered.
Every one of them was mounted on their companion, some winged, some not. Yet one description bound all of them together — massive, dangerous, merciless.
Many of them were clad in armor, Alvazar among them, with Gray seated on his back.
Eveline's breathing shook, but she went on walking forward until she stood between rows of enormous creatures whose riders looked at her with open disgust.
She activated her lightsurf and stepped onto it, and most of the competitors broke into laughter.
Among them she caught sight of Ilau.
He sat on his boar, and his face had visibly thinned and grown colder.
Looking ahead, Eveline could not see his eyes, but she could see that he had changed since their last conversation, which had ended for them in a way that was far from pleasant. And she remembered it.
He turned his head toward her, and her heart clenched when she saw the grim cold with which he looked at her.
She turned away and tried to steady her already shaking breath, as Kelo the announcer carried his speech on.
"AND SO!... LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!... I HAVE ONE QUESTION FOR YOU!... ARE YOU READY?!"
Every stand broke into a single answer.
"ALLOW ME TO PRESENT MY PARTNER AND MY BROTHER — NORO ORFI! TODAY THE TWO OF US WILL BE COMMENTATING ON EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENS, IN ALL THE FINEST TRADITIONS!"
Noro bowed to the public under the applause, and then fed energy into the crystal of his microphone.
"Today we count a full seventy-seven competitors from the various groups of the first and second years! As always, every student is assigned a number of their own!" Noro said.
"TELL THEM ABOUT THE RULES AND THE SPECIALS, BROTHER!" Kelo said.
"The rules and the format of the competition remain unchanged! Along the whole course the competitors have to pass through a multitude of obstacles and traps, and to keep the other riders from knocking them off! To come out the winner and stand on the podium — a competitor first has to collect 7 points, and then cross the finish line!"
"BUT IT ISN'T ALL THAT SIMPLE!"
"Exactly! The whole course is divided into Seven sectors. Each sector holds its own set number of crystals. On top of that the crystals come in two kinds — ordinary and duel. Ordinary crystals are worth one point. Duel crystals — two."
"OH YES! THE COMPETITORS WILL HAVE TO SET THEIR PRIORITIES WITH GREAT CARE AND ADAPT AS THEY GO!"
"On top of that, the transitions between some of the sectors carry a strict crystal requirement! At the transition from the second sector into the third a competitor must hold at least one crystal! From the fourth into the fifth — at least 3. Too few crystals and the barriers at the transitions will not let you through!"
"IN OTHER WORDS — YOU ARE OUT ON THE SPOT! AAGH IT GIVES ME GOOSEBUMPS! WHAT A SHOW THIS WILL BE!"
"And so! The rules are clear to everyone! And now..."
"WE... BEGIIIIIN!"
A powerful signal roar went out across the whole ground; the stands erupted in an uproar, and the competitors readied themselves for the start.
Aren and the cadets took seats in the lower rows, beside Eveline's father, Deron, and mister Uro.
All five of them sat with sweating palms and quickened hearts, their eyes on Eveline down below, barely visible among the seventy-six other riders.
"Oh Lord... hold her up," Deron said in a whisper, and Aren let out a shaking breath.
Lucia stood in the boxes with her hands behind her back. Aurelius sat at her right hand.
"You won't even sit down?" he asked.
Lucia said nothing and kept her eyes on the competitors, or more precisely, on Eveline.
The countdown began on the screens, and the first numbers came floating over the starting ground. Ten... nine... eight... seven...
Every rider gripped the reins harder, and Eveline leaned forward.
Three... two... one... A sharp signal went off over everyone, and a massive wave of seventy-seven competitors tore forward, threw up a wall of dust and gathered speed.
Every spectator rose from their seat in the same instant as a wave of wind off the impulse of dozens of riders passed over them.
The ground creatures raced under a massive thunder of feet that set the earth shaking, as the fliers curved around one another, broke ahead and cut the air.
The mechanisms and the traps opened fire, and the ground riders set to jumping them or ramming straight through at the cost of their speed. The fliers curved around and dived, and slipped expertly through the narrow spaces between firing traps and physical obstacles.
Eveline raced along with the whole stream, hemmed in on every side by a dense wave of other competitors.
Rexy held on to her shoulder as she watched the first obstacles come up.
She drew a short breath and leaned forward into a burst that accelerated her instantly, while the others were slowing down to get through the obstacles.
Several massive beams with spinning mechanisms of jutting sleepers and plates blocked the way at one moment and opened a small window at the next, and immediately beyond them came the following obstacle, which she had to clear by rising instantly.
Even so, she did not slow down but accelerated harder still, and at one perfectly chosen moment she flew into the window as it opened, and at once arched the lightsurf, took hold of its front end with one hand and went up.
At the top of it she dived down in an elegant turn and straightened her line immediately.
Many crashed into those obstacles, and others curved around them with some loss of speed and obvious mastery.
"WELL WELL, WE HAVE OUR FIRST UNLUCKY ONES WHO HAVE HAD THE GOOD FORTUNE TO RUN INTO THE LOW-GRADE TRAPS!" Kelo said.
Eveline meanwhile could see several fliers ahead of her as they curved around obstacles and collected the crystals that sat among traps, in hard-to-reach zones, and even underwater.
One of the crystals was left behind, since it was extremely hard for massive fliers to get to it, and the leading competitors had worked out that the sensible thing was to pass it by.
For Eveline that was an opportunity.
She did not slacken her pace, drove forward and evaded the next traps, and maneuvered perfectly even at that enormous speed.
Two other competitors appeared on either side of her, and from their expressions she understood at once what was about to happen.
She waited for the right moment and rose immediately, and the two competitors, who had meant to crush her between their fliers from both sides, crashed into each other instead.
Moreover, even though they managed to keep their seats, the instant they raised their heads they were met by a blinding flash from Rexy that took their sight and put them into a metal structure.
"OOH WHAT A MANEUVER! NUMBER 33 IS DOING REMARKABLE THINGS, DESPITE BEING ON A... uh... LIGHTSURF!"
The impact threw wreckage out to the sides and raised a cloud of dust, through which the rest of the competitors tore, deliberately chasing Eveline down.
She recognized her own classmates, who were plainly out for payback.
Rexy, however, had plans of his own for them.
Holding on to her shoulder, he gathered energy around his whole body and put out a bright flash, and the pursuers shielded their eyes with a forearm and could barely make Eveline out.
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It kept her out of reach even when the flying lizards tried to take her with their extending tongues.
Then she flew into the area with the crystal, slipped through a three-level obstacle with a full turn along her own axis, and took the crystal into her hand in the middle of that last maneuver.
The pursuers, for their part, would not go into the difficult zone and flew around it, until Eveline came out of it on a climb and left them at a loss.
"YES! THAT'S IT!" Deron shouted, and swung a fist.
A smile came out on Aren's face. Artus and Olen stuffed their mouths with dried fruit, unable to take their eyes off it.
Once she had cleared the second sector, she set about running down the leading fliers, who had already collected three crystals each.
Gray, Kerar and Gen were among them.
Gray took Alvazar to the left, after a crystal that sat among four-level traps; Kerar on his scarlet griffin carried straight on, and Gen went right and dived underwater with his white saber-toothed panther, through underground tunnels with multi-level traps of the same kind.
Eveline flew on beneath Kerar and curved around the next structures with almost no loss of speed, and Kerar could not see her underneath his griffin.
She caught sight of one of the crystals, which Kerar was going for as well.
He dived, driving straight for the crystal, but Rexy shot out in front of them and blinded them with a flash, so that Kerar pulled the griffin aside immediately, and Eveline flew on through and seized the crystal.
"HA!" she shouted, and Rexy came back to her shoulder.
Kerar went after her with a snarl and tried to run her down.
Eveline glanced over her shoulder at the griffin closing on her.
"He's fast... but I doubt he's this agile!" she said to Rexy, and then went into another burst and flew down along an arc.
She flew deliberately through a difficult branch of the course, where the obstacles were especially hard, particularly for large fliers.
Eveline managed to pass between them without much difficulty, while Kerar struggled to keep from hitting a trap and to hold his speed.
Coming out of the harder zone, Eveline managed to break away from him, and ahead of her she could see the first barrier, which let through competitors holding at least one crystal.
Gray and Gen slipped through, and Eveline flew third and came up on the barrier with two crystals.
Yet she suddenly saw, far below among an especially tight structure of mechanisms, one more hidden crystal.
Even though she could simply have flown on, she chose to go down, into that tight space of mechanisms, where even she had to set her teeth to get past every jutting beam and spinning trap, until at last she came out with a third crystal in her hand.
"THE THIRD! SHE GOT THE THIRD!" Olen shouted, and gripped Artus's shoulder, and Artus and Aren both sat frozen with their mouths open.
Eveline flew through the first barrier without any trouble and crossed into the third sector.
The rest of the competitors were barely behind and fought one another for the remaining crystals. Some knocked others off, and others took crystals in the middle of a maneuver.
Many flew through the barrier, some hit it and took an electric shock in the belief that they held one crystal, when they had not even noticed another competitor lift it neatly off them as they passed. The rest never found a crystal at all and stayed in the opening sectors, out of the running.
The screens showed the leaderboard with positions and points:
Place
#
Name
Points
1
17
Gray
4
2
48
Gen
5
3
33
Eveline
3
4
23
Kerar
3