Page 240 of The Bonding Games: Part 1

My throat gets tight, and I blink rapidly to try and keep the tears at bay. As if that’s any more subtle than full-on sobbing.

“Shit! Scotty, I made him cry! What did I say?!”

The pure dismay in his voice just begs me to give up and let the floodgates open. Rather than making fun of me, he’s concerned. He cares. After two seconds of knowing me, no less.

“You didn’t say anything, Tiger. I think he’s just overwhelmed.” Scotty looks to me. “Right?”

I nod mutely, still trying to keep the waterworks at bay.

“See?” He slaps a brotherly hand on Tiger’s back as he comes to stand beside him before speaking to me again, “You’re welcome to join us in training for . . . as long as we’re all here.”

That’s a nice way to put our upcoming demise.

Well, with the shade of their Avri clusters they’ll probably make it.

I finally find my voice again. “Y-yes, I . . . yes, please.” Cheeks flushing, I look down at my fitted boots. “I’m . . . My Score isn’t very good, though. It’s . . . 57.” The number is no more than a rasp of breath.

Chancing a nervous peek up through my lashes, I find both brothers watching me without a twitch of their facial expressions. No judgment at all.

A wave of relief hits me, and my shoulders draw back slightly, spine straightening a bit.

Tiger’s grin is huge, two dimples popping up on his face. “Well, let’s get to it, then! You need to practice kicking asses with us since you’re now part of the Kick-Ass Club!”

“We are not calling ourselves that.” Scotty’s groan tugs the corners of my own lips up. We’ve only just met, yet this is the calmest I’ve felt since first school.

If only I’d known them years ago.

5

ALBY

The arrow sails straight past the target and scatters across the hard floor in a hundred tiny lime-coloured pixels.

That was one of the most humiliating moments of my life.

And it’s being aired on live TV.

Pease just bury me in a hole and leave me there to die.

I’m not usually so bad at archery. In fact, it’s what I’m best at. I can even remember the exact shape of the bow, arrow, and quiver since I took such a strong liking to it and studied the bow and arrow even more than the other available weapons, so the Avri from my armoury sticks has given me a perfect imitation of the image in my head despite my nerves.

But my talent with a bow and arrow isn’t greater than the anxiety pressing in on me at the fact I’m being judged and recorded for the world to see. So I’m doing absolutely shit at the one thing I’m supposed to be good at. And even though Tiger and Scotty gave me some great tips to help prepare me, there was hardly enough time to practice those before Evots started being called into this training room for the tests.

With a burning face and clogged throat, I command the Avri back into my armoury sticks and reach over my shoulder to fit the one in my hand back into its home on my right shoulder blade, where it snaps into place with an audible click. A faint overlapping flickering sort of sound meets my left ear as the quiver on my other shoulder blade morphs back into my second baton, the Avri pixels rearranging and shrinking before disappearing inside the armoury stick.

I have my helmet back now, given to me when I first came in here, and I hope the opaque sides of it hide some of the colour in my cheeks, because the taalk visor definitely won’t be any help when it’s clearer than my eyesight.

Then I turn to face the judges.

I’m met with four blank stares that do nothing do boost my confidence.

“57!” the Neutral on the left calls out, letting me and everyone watching this on screens around the globe know my atrocious Score.

I slump down a bit, a puff of air escaping me. I can’t tell if I’m relieved or disappointed, the former because I was half sure my Avri cluster’s shade was about to get even lighter, and the latter because I can never seem to get any higher than the last Score I was given a year ago at EvTS 246. At least it’s better than it was the year before that, but I wish it would budge up just a little—I feel like I’ve made zero progress. But some of my Avri vehicle and other Avri weapon demonstrations must’ve been somewhat decent to have kept my Score the same after that abysmal archery performance, at least.

“Dismissed!”

Head weighed down by shame, I turn and walk pitifully out the door.