Download: Chapter 0-2 (everything up to current chapter) Chapter 2 (just the current chapter)
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Inside the bag, packed as tightly as it would allow, were various tools and weapons as well as some of the most advanced Sup-Hum devices ever developed but Oken wasn’t interested in these. It was the new additions that he was waiting to try out. He had packed four temporal shield generators; after all, what was the point in sporting the most advanced weapon ever made, if no one would remember its effects afterwards? He had also packed Bethany. That was what he had decided to call his ultimate weapon. It would be his private name for the ‘blade’ knowing full well that publicly announcing his new weapon as Bethany could result in years of ridicule.
Again, Oken began to feel very nervous and hot. He was beginning to realise the full extent of what he was about to do. He was about to use a weapon that was inherently banned globally, in a place that was totally illegal, against a fighter that was as yet unknown. He looked around the room. He knew everyone there. He thought it would trouble him, knowing that he may have to kill one of them soon, but it didn’t. Oken mused further. All the fighters were well aware of their potential fate, he thought. They all entered the Zone knowing full well what they were letting themselves in for. Every fight could be their last. It was how they lived. To his knowledge, none of these people had families of their own.
As Oken sat there in complete silence, half listening to the quiet banter that was going on around him, he tried to recall what Bethany looked like. She was very thin and sleek and made from a brushed metal which made her seem as cold as ice. Close to the grip the blade had a hole cut into it, into which a crystal like object rested majestically. It offered a pale blue glow which was enough to light up a small room to some degree. The grip was made from a synthetic leather to allow Oken comfort in use, but also to protect the workings of the device.
Oken remembered the months he had spent in the library researching temporal mechanics and the like. He had spent so much time there in fact, that he was offered a job in the science department. He enjoyed his job there, helping people to find the information they needed for various projects and school work. The pay was far from adequate, but then Oken had no real need for it now anyway. The money from winning a Zone match was more than enough to pay for Oken’s lifestyle. The job was more of a cover than anything else, allowing Oken to blend in with society and to hide his secret underground connections. Many of the other fighters had jobs too. Skins was a pharmacist, Ruben was a antique clock dealer. Each one of them had a ‘real’ job and used it to hide their secrets.
Outside the room the crowd was growing impatient. There were rarely fights in the spectator stands but today was an exception. A man in a black t-shirt and blue jeans decided that the guy standing next to him was annoying him more than he could possibly bare. He promptly punched the antagonist in the face which resulted in an eruption of cheering and shouting. The victim fought back with a swift uppercut to his opponents chin knocking him to the floor with a crash.
It wasn’t long before Ruben was on the scene. His dumper truck sized fists clenched, ready to do his worst to retain peace inside the Zone. He picked the first man up off the floor and dragged him to a room known as the detention cell. Anyone who caused trouble inside the Zone was locked inside one of these cells for the duration of the evening.
The man struggled and protested but Ruben had seen what had happened and knew that the limp body of this kicking and screaming idiot had been the mastermind behind the first punch. Ruben threw him into the cell and slammed the metal door shut. He opened the shutter that was located near the top of the door and shouted inside to the little man.
“Be nice in future.” Ruben too was an educated man who had been spotted by the Zone’s creator six years ago. Since then Ruben had attended every meeting at the arena which occurred once a week. He was tired of these low life jerks, who seemed to believe that they could do anything and get away with it. He walked over to the man who had been attacked and shook his hand. “Nice punch,” he said. The man nodded towards Ruben who slowly walked away.
Before the matches started, the platform was opened up to the spectators who used it as a dance floor. People from all walks of life visited the Zone and revelled in its atmosphere. Several younger members of the crowd were playing a game of tag, weaving in and out of the pillars which lined the platform. The train tracks were terminated by brick walls at each end and large speaker stacks were situated above these. There were also large television screens lining the back wall opposite the tracks. These showed various music videos and advertisements before fights, but during the matches, these were turned into gigantic action replay panels. The platform was littered with tiny remote controlled cameras, the size of flies, ready and waiting to transmit footage of the fights back to the producer who chose the shots to display.
The control room was outfitted with an impressive array of technology. The owner hadn’t skimped on anything. During the day, he rented out this platform as a recording studio for both music and television. He had recorded several albums here and was known in the underground music culture for his decent rates. The normal crew were lined up in their executive chairs, waiting for the fights to begin. One crew member had begun to mess around with one of the hover cams, following various people through the crowds, until he was brashly told to ‘stop it’ by the producer.
Five ash trays adorned the control desk, innocently sitting there waiting to catch the hot by-product of the owners bad habit. Almost all of the control team smoked. All but one. Darren sat in the corner with a bandanna covering his mouth, coughing occasionally in a display of protest at his disgust of the other crew member’s appalling habit. They all knew he didn’t like it but they couldn’t help a life long addiction. Though it was uncomfortable at times, Darren was getting used to the smell. All the crew members got along fine and Darren didn’t want to cause any ill feelings. It was more for attention than anything else.
The first match was a newbie bout. Two young recruits had been drafted in, much in the same way that Oken had. They were now making their way to the platform, dazed, scared and confused. Bouncers and ring organisers began ushering people off of the platform and up into the spectator stands ready for the first match of the night. Oken was busy talking to the Zone’s manager, asking him if he could place these new high resolution cameras in each corner of the platform. He was of course referring to the temporal shields which he required to be placed at specific points around the arena, in order to cover the entire spectator and platform range. Oken was unsure of what the manager’s reaction would be to him using a temporal weapon in his arena. He decided it would be best to leave it till the end of the show and explain it in full later.
Oken moved to each corner of the large platform, carefully removing the shield generators from his bag, placing them on the floor, and plugging them into the power sockets as he went. He dearly hoped that the sockets would be able to provide enough juice, temporal technology was power hungry, real hungry. His own electricity bill for the last few months had been through the roof. It had been so high in fact, that he had been concerned that an inquisitive G-TEP official may visit his residence to see just where all the power was going.
He finished setting up the last generator and dully tested their operation with the remote control device he had also developed. Their lights turned from red to green and back indicating that they were fully working. Oken opened the control device’s top to check the small illuminated display which lay inside. All of the shields were working within normal parameters. Phase one was complete. Now he just had to wait until it was his turn.
The first fight ended fairly abruptly with one of the contenders giving up after acquiring a bleeding nose. The jeers and the shouting was tremendous and Oken briefly felt sorry for the poor young soul who had had his hopes of becoming a Zone master crushed at the first hurdle. The blood trickled down the poor boy’s face and Oken was sure he could also see tears, mingling with the red stuff as it descended. The drips of blood collected on the floor building a red patch that seemed to know no bounds. One of the bouncers handed him a towel and told him to get into the spectator crowds or get out. The boy rejoined the spectators, hoping to gain another glimpse of the awesome power that he had sought so dearly.
The second fight was a lot more interesting. Both competitors were sporting Sup-Hum devices, which they were really using to full effect. One of the competitors, a Chinese man in his early twenties, had configured a device to double his own body weight, obviously with no hindrance to his performance. His punches and kicks were so powerful that he had been told to steer clear of the pillars, even with their reinforcement. The other competitor, a local guy, had configured his device to lower his local gravity to just under half the normal level. Consequently, he was agile and incredibly nimble, much more so compared to his Chinese opponent.
The two competitors stood facing each other across the platform and Oken was reminded of how he had felt the first time he had experienced the same thing. It had been scary, but anticipation had won him over in the end. The music began and the crowds flared. The two tigers roared at each other. The Chinese fighter was raining blows down on his opponent, who seemed to be taking them with a pinch of salt. The density enhancer had failed, the poor Chinese opponent was fighting with just his usual level of strength. The local boy fought back and both of them exchanged numerous Kung-Fu style blows and punches. The fight was well into two minutes already. A good start thought Oken.
With the music blaring and the crowds shouting, Oken found it hard to concentrate on the two warriors fighting for dignity and their lives below. He was now standing at the front of the spectator box taking in all that lay below him. He knew the landscape well, that much was obvious, but it took more than that to win a fight and from his brief analysis, the Chinese competitor definitely had what it took. Even though he was at a significant disadvantage, he was still very much in command of the fight. He was calling the shots. Oken had noticed that the local boy was struggling to keep up; even with his gravity altering device.
With one final blow the Chinese fellow sent his opponent sprawling to the floor. His opponent couldn’t get up; it was time to finish it. With a quick kick to the head it was all over. The crack of the young boy’s neck sent a shudder down Oken’s spine, but it felt somehow ironic. This was the sport he was in, he should be used to it by now.
Oken had not really seen any need to kill the boy, but then it was always the victor’s choice. Oken was glad he had never done that. If he had killed his opponent, it had always been in the thick of the fight, never when it was clear that they had already lost. That wasn’t fighting, that wasn’t honourable, that was just murder.
Two bouncers went into the ring and dragged the body of the boy off for immediate incineration. It was vital bodies were disposed of quickly and effortlessly less the government should find out what really went on there. No one in the spectators stands had any idea what happened to the corpses, the victims of the Zone’s insatiable appetite for destruction, but then no one really cared. Once a fight was over, the loser was generally forgotten. Most spectators just assumed he would be dumped in a park somewhere and it would be dismissed as a drunken brawl by the authorities.
Oken returned to the Chiller. He sat down and poured another glass of wine. He sat back into the chair and put his feet up on the glass table in the centre. It wasn’t a big room by any stretch of the imagination. Adorning the walls were posters of previous death blows and doctor’s certificates detailing various chilling injuries. Hanging from the ceiling was a chandelier style light fixture. Oken watched the pattern the light made on the white painted ceiling as the chandelier swung gently back and forth, moved by the air from the ventilation system.
The door swung open and the Chinese fellow victoriously entered, hands held high in the air by fellow fighters. He picked up a bottle of beer from the table and began to hurriedly drink it down. Oken took little notice of the panting animal and instead turned his attention to one of the weekly newsletters lying on the table. The electronic paper changed to show the face of the Chinese man standing next to him and the story appeared below. ‘Hung hangs local star,’ read the headline. Oken gathered that the young man’s name must be Hung. He was a new fighter, not one that Oken had seen before. To him he just seemed to be another young hopeful who would soon be sipping his mid-morning milk through his nose, just like all of the other young kids who became too proud, too fast.
The door opened again and Ruben poked his head round. Oken had always found it mildly amusing at the amount of light that was reflected by Ruben’s bald head. Today was no exception and he almost felt like shielding his eyes in jest, but he knew from experience though, that Ruben would not take kindly to jokes about his appearance.
“You’re on next Oken my man,” said Ruben as he looked around the room at the quietly chatting fighters. He clicked his fingers and pointed at Oken. “Make it a good one,” he said, “I took the night off for you.”
“I’ll do my best Ruben,” said Oken, though deep down he already knew the fight would be utterly spectacular. Though he had tested some of the weapons abilities, he had no idea what would be the result of killing someone with a temporal weapon. Would there be a shower of sparks, a ray of light, a big explosion? He knew not, but he had heard stories of the consequences in the many temporal mechanics books he had read.
Though temporal weapons were abhorrent creations, banned and restricted the world over, the general public knew that they existed. They didn’t however have any real knowledge of what these devices could actually do. The G-TEP was a terrifying force, definitely not one to be challenged. Yet the thrill of developing something so dangerous, so sought after, had driven Oken from the beginning.
The G-TEP had obviously been temporarily shielded, they could see echoes of temporal events a few days, sometimes even weeks before they would occur. It gave them time to prepare, and if luck was in their favour, to stop the event from taking place. An impact analysis was always carried out, and the G-TEP forces would try to predict what the eventual outcome would be, taking into account whatever evidence they had at the time.
Throughout the development of the temporal weapon, Oken had discovered that not only could he obliterate things from existence with the technology, but that he could also affect the flow of time. He was able to slow time down to a tenth of its normal speed, with his own body remaining unaffected. He had built this technology into Bethany also. To activate it, he just had to squeeze on the grip and linearity would do the rest. The harder he squeezed, the slower time passed. It took tremendous amounts of power to run the temporal devices and though Oken had never run them for more than a few seconds, he knew the power source in the hilt of Bethany wouldn’t hold out for long.
Oken picked up his holdall and grinned at how light it seemed, now that the four shield generators had been removed. He took one last look around the room and walked out shutting the door to the Chiller behind him. Unbeknownst to him, the other fighters in the Chiller were all lining up ready to take up their positions in the spectator stands to watch what was rumoured to be the most important and monumental fight in the Zone’s history. Ruben had to be thanked for that. He could spread a rumour quicker than a rash.
Oken walked down the stairs to the platform below. He noticed how cold and clinical the place felt. The stairs were constructed from solid concrete and he could see the light from the platform below billowing up the stairwell in a sort of cosmic mist. He continued to walk slowly down, checking his watch at the last step, 8:05pm. With any luck he’d be home before 10:00pm.
The crowds were jumping still and Oken was amazed at how much energy they seemed to possess. Many of them were drug takers, fuelled by an obsession which would eventually kill them. Oken had never taken drugs. He had never seen the point, the effect only lasted a short time, and take the wrong combination and you’d be dead. He drank a little alcohol, but nothing that would affect his performance; just a little to settle the nerves.
His opponent was making his way down the opposite stairwell. Oken knew him. His name was Yaz. Yaz was famed for his technology and his speed. Oken found it fitting that they had been pitted against each other in what was a sincere clash of two titans. He hoped that his time-bending would teach Yaz a brief lesson; Speed wasn’t everything. All of a sudden they were there, standing across from each other. The music thudded a dull beat that Oken found incessantly boring. Thump, thump, thump. He felt as if his head were about to explode.
Oken recovered the remote control from his pocket and activated the four temporal shields. Their lights changed from red to green. All systems go, thought Oken. He opened the black holdall and removed Bethany, still in her scabbard. As he slid her out of her shell, he could hear the metal scraping against the inside of the sheath, setting his teeth on edge as it did so. He was holding the sword out in front of him and he could see Yaz with his staff, performing complex patterns of twists and twirls. Oken pulled the tip of the katana from the scabbard with a delicate finesse. He held her in his hands knowing that soon he would be able to test her in her native environment; the battlefield. The scabbard he was now placing on the floor was of an ancient Japanese design. Oken had designed Bethany specifically to fit inside. He hadn’t made the scabbard. As luck would have it, three days before beginning construction on the blade, he had found the sheath in a charity shop in the commercial district.
He now stood facing his opponent and Oken joined in the ritualistic twisting and twirling of weapons, first left then right, each time getting closer and closer to his own body. He could hear the noise that Bethany made as she whisked through the air. It was as clear as day, even through that incessant thumping. It wasn’t the low whoosh that weapons normally made, but more of a soft screech, largely due to the hum of the generator sitting inside the grip. With each movement Oken became more and more hypnotised by the sound she made.
The crowd started pointing out at Oken. They were knowledgeable and knew that he was not sporting his normal array of specially customised weapons. Oken had something different. One guy tugged at Ruben’s shirt.
“Hey man,” he said, “what’s he got there?” Ruben chuckled to himself and turned to speak to the excited fan.
“Your guess is as good as mine my brother,” he replied. The rest of the crowd was shouting and exchanging their own hypotheses as to what Oken had brought with him. It was this frenzy in particular that Oken loved. Their excitement of the unknown, their electric anticipation. This was what had driven him to creating Bethany.
No one could figure out what Oken was carrying. It was a sword, that much was obvious, but the spectators knew there would be a sting in its tail. Several members of the crowd thought it was some kind of energy weapon, others thought it was super light. None of them even came close to the truth. A few started rhythmically banging their hands against the toughened glass, hoping to start a giant riot to catch Oken’s attention
As the temporal master was performing yet another twirl, he gripped the handle tightly and watched as time slowed to a snails pace. He looked around at the crowds jumping in slow motion. Their clothes caught in viscous ether. He saw Yaz still twirling, the anger on his face, the concentration. He saw a man’s drink being knocked out of his hand and the liquid glistening in the harsh lighting. He looked back across the platform and noticed the water dripping from the ceiling as it had done three years ago when he had first fought in the Zone.
He watched one drop fall from above and followed it with his eyes till it reached the ground. He released his grip on the handle and time quickly returned to normal with a slow whoosh. He hadn’t noticed the music slow down, but now that he listened to it, it seemed unnaturally fast. The crowd went wild.
In the control room, the crew member who had been disciplined earlier for playing around with the cameras was given another lecture about not fiddling with the cameras operating speeds. The poor man protested that he had nothing to do with it, but the producer yelled back all the louder.
“You play with those damn cameras one more time sonny, and I’ll stick ‘em down ya throat,”
The crew member decided that arguing back just didn’t seem like a good idea. He’d been a hard working technician for going on five years now and it didn’t seem worth blowing all that on a little argument. He needed the money to send his daughter to college.
The time was fast approaching for the beginning of the battle. The music had thinned to a bass line and Oken sensed that in a minute or so, the manager would yell ‘go’ and they’d be off. It was always the manager’s prerogative to begin the fights. Sometimes he passed on the opportunity. Tonight he was there in spades.
Oken decided to try one more little experiment. He gripped the handle tightly and once again felt time begin to slow. He walked slowly over to the water that was still dripping and sliced a single drop in half. He watched as the drop split into two globules, and then he performed another slice, managing to cut both the droplets in half again. At this speed, it could be accomplished by anyone. Despite this, Oken felt proud of his achievement. He returned to his starting position and released his grip. The crowd roared. Oken had become immortal, at least in their eyes. This was something the likes of which they had never seen before in their lives.
Yaz, disappointed at losing the crowds attention, twirled his staff even faster in a desperate attempt to win back their admiration, but he could do nothing to turn their attention away from the grey haired figure standing not twenty metres from him. Oken turned to face the crowds and held up his sword with both hands high above his head. The crowd cheered all the louder. The man standing next to Ruben went mental and was shouting “You the man Oken, You the man” at the top of his voice.
Yaz stopped twirling and shouted across at Oken,
“Fancy trick Oken, but aren’t you a little old to be playing these games.” Yaz chuckled to himself. He spotted an empty beer bottle standing in front of him to the left. He gingerly put the end of his staff into the neck of the bottle and with one fluid motion flung it towards Oken’s head. Had Oken not seen it coming, he would have been knocked out for sure. Yaz was very fast, very strong and his reflexes were nothing to be sniffed at.
Oken watched the bottle coming towards him and gripped on the handle of Bethany. The all too familiar whoosh rang in his ears, like the striking of a gong, and once again time slowed. The bottle was still in mid air, slowly making its way towards him in a graceful dance of silent mime. Oken swung his sword just when the time was right and sliced the bottle clean from neck to base, right down the middle. As he released the grip he twisted the blade slightly and saw the two halves fly past him and shatter as they hit the wall behind. Oken looked down at the sword which was now stock still in front of him and the child inside him screamed, ‘This is a cool toy.’
In the control room the producer was shouting. “Did you get that? Tell me you got that.” The shot was replayed on the big screens and for once Oken allowed himself a quick glance. It had been captured in slow motion and it looked even more spectacular on screen than Oken could have imagined. His body moved with a majestic stillness whilst the whole universe ran at an even lower speed. He could see the gaze of his fans watching him in the screens. He could feel the vigour, even though it had been silenced.
Yaz now looked more than a little worried. It was obvious to him that Oken could win this fight easily if he wanted. Yaz had never seen or heard of a weapon that could do what Oken was doing right now. To the crowds, it seemed as if Oken would suddenly slip into some kind of hyperactive spasm, the results of which would not be fully realised until he slowed down once again.
Oken’s heart was beating fast, very very fast and he wondered whether it was excitement or fear that drove his heart to pound at these speeds. He wanted to experiment more, but knew that the time had come to start the fight. Yaz’s heart was beating fast too. He knew that this would probably be the end of his career and his life. Yaz had foolishly requested this fight against Oken. He now regretted it. His hands were sweating and as he performed one of his many twirls and twists, the staff left his sweaty palms.
As it fell to the floor, it bounced from end to end, making a racket that would have echoed for an eternity had it not been for the volume of the music which was still playing, drowning out the noise and softening Yaz’s humility. Oken could hear the instruments building up and up. He looked down at his shoes and closed his eyes. It was getting there. His time was coming. He took a deep breath, looked up and opened his eyes. In the milliseconds that it took for his eyes to focus, he saw the manager open his mouth and scream one word down the microphone.
Already Oken knew what the word was going to be, but the loudspeakers didn’t. The signal travelled along the copper wires at an almost infinite speed, through the mixing console, through the amplifier and onto the loudspeakers’ cones. It pushed the cone in and out in, bursting the air as it did so, screaming the word every single person on the platform wanted to hear, every single person but one.
“GO!”
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