D. MacHale - The Quillan Games

“This is one of the entry points to the underground that the revivers opened up,” she explained.

I felt like I was entering an ancient tomb that had been unsealed by archeologists. Beyond the hole were more corridors that eventually led us through a steel door and into one of the underground malls. Waiting there for us was another electric-powered cart. Or maybe it was a tarz-powered cart. With Nevva at the wheel we drove another several minutes through the deserted malls until we found ourselves back at the department store that was the base of the revivers.

“So what do we do now?” I asked.

“We prepare you” was Nevva’s answer.

It seemed like she had been planning this for a long time. There was no question she’d thought the whole thing through. That was Nevva. Her mind was like a computer, calculating every possibility and planning for every contingency. I guess you had to be organized like that in order to juggle three different lives.

The first phase of her plan was to prepare me for the Grand X. That meant a lot of things. For one, the revivers trained me. They worked me over pretty good, too. It wasn’t like the grueling training at Mooraj that Loor put me through, but it was tough. We worked on strength with weights, and agility. We did tons of cardio to build up my breathing and stamina. I ran for miles through the deserted malls beneath the city of Rune. I also did sprints. Many, many sprints. I was already in pretty good shape, but after the time I spent in the underground, I had to admit, I was rocking.

Nevva wasn’t there very much. She had to deal with her job as assistant to the trustees. Every few days she’d come to the underground with news about what was happening with them. The hunt for me was still on. They wanted me for the Grand X. Or maybe I should say. Saint Dane wanted me for the Grand X. He wouldn’t let them give up on me. I think he must have known all along that I would compete. I hated that he was right.

Tylee Magna reported back to me on how the word had gone out to revivers all over Quillan about the upcoming event. I was being talked about as a champion of the people. The buzz was building. Only time would tell if it would get big enough to have the effect the revivers wanted. It was a weird feeling to know that I was being promoted like this. Up until this point, everything I had done as a Traveler was pretty anonymous. That was about to change. Here on Quillan my face would be known to every person on the territory. You’d think I’d be intimidated by the whole thing. I wasn’t. I don’t know why. Maybe it was because I was so confident.

My training with the revivers had a lot to do with that. Nevva had gathered a boatload of information about Challenger Green. She studied the replays of his matches and put together a report on his strengths and weaknesses. His biggest strength by far was his attitude. He was ruthless. I won’t go so far as to say he enjoyed killing off his opponents, but he definitely didn’t mind it. He was smart, too. He adapted to situations quickly. I saw that in the replay of the Tato match where he smashed open the dome, then held on to the opening as he threw the platform off balance, killing Remudi. That was a snap decision and a smart one. I couldn’t count on him making mistakes. He was also strong. He was bigger than me, and I was sure if it came down to a show of pure strength, I’d be in trouble.

But the guy had weaknesses. He wasn’t agile. He could easily be thrown off balance. And he was slow. Running both distance and sprints. There’s a big difference between being fast in the forty-yard dash and being fast in a two-yard dash. From what I’d seen, I was better than Green in both. It made me feel confident that even if things went sour and I got in trouble, I could get away from him. As an added bonus, Nevva told me that the vision in Challenger Green’s left eye was weak as the result of a childhood accident. That was a great thing to know.

But what gave me the most confidence was the fact that I was a trained fighter. Me. Bobby Pendragon. Hard to believe, isn’t it? I never even got in a dumb wrestling match back at home, let alone a fistfight. But that was a lifetime ago. I had recently been hardened by the tough physical regime that Loor and Alder put me through, and by fighting for my life more times than I like to think about. Challenger Green had no such training. The fighting skills I had would help me in so many phases of the Grand X, there was no way Challenger Green could compete with me. I was sure of that.

Nevva walked me through many of the possible events. There were hundreds to choose from-far too many for her to cover all of them, but I got a pretty good overview. The Grand X wasn’t just one game, or battle, or race. It was a series of five contests. Nobody knew what the actual games would be until the day of the event. They were chosen by Veego and LaBerge. Nevva explained that sometimes the Grand X was a huge spectacle, with each event a team sport that pitted several challengers against one another. But usually there were two challengers who battled to Win each event, because the loser would be given a handicap! for the next stage, or the winner an advantage.

Here was the kicker; the Grand X ended if either of the challengers was killed, or injured so badly that he or she couldn’t go on. Nevva told me that many Grand X’s never got past the first event. That was a grim thought. I had no doubt that Challenger Green would not only try to beat me, but once he realized how good I was, he’d try to hurt or kill me. So the Grand X was not only about winning, it was about staying in one piece.

“So how do you win?” I asked Nevva.

“The champion is the challenger who wins the most events. Which means the Grand X might only last for three events if one challenger wins them all.”

“So it’s possible to lose the Grand X and still survive?” I asked.

Nevva hesitated.

“Tell me the truth,” I said.

“Yes, of course it’s possible, but only if you lose the Grand X within the first four events.” “Why’s that?” I asked.

“Because if it goes to the fifth event, the tiebreaker, it’s usually a game where, to win, you must kill your opponent.”

Oh. That gave new meaning to the phrase “sudden death overtime.”

I won’t go into the details of the possible events, because I’ll describe the actual events to you when I write about the competition, but I will say this much: After spending roughly three weeks training in the catacombs of Rune, I was ready. Mentally and physically. As we got closer to the Grand X, I felt that my biggest problem would be overconfidence.

There is something else I need to mention. An odd thing happened during my time with the room that wasn’t much better than a cell. But it was comfortable, so I didn’t complain. One night while I was sleeping, I had a visitor. At first I thought it was a dream, but then I recognized her as the old woman I had met on my trip to see Mr. Pop. The one who showed me the children’s portrait gallery for inspiration. Remember her? She knelt down by my bed and woke me up by stroking my hair. You’d think I would have jumped in surprise, but I didn’t. There was nothing frightening about her. Just the opposite. She had this calm air that made me feel as relaxed as if I were still sleeping.

“You are a very brave young boy,” she said softly. “We are all very proud of you.”

“Thank you,” I whispered.

“You said you were looking for inspiration?” she said, and held up a dark necklace made of stone beads. It wasn’t fancy, the only unique thing about it was a single gold bead that was slightly larger than the rest. I’d say it was about the size of a large pea. “This once belonged to someone who sacrificed everything for what he believed in. I wish you would wear it. For luck.”