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…
While Chester sat by himself, he studied the scene again. Even though the metallic and sweat smell wasn’t anywhere near as bad as before, nor did the noises bother him much, boy was he finding the place boring. There was nothing to do, and if someone seemingly done checking their machine, they would start checking all over again. Perhaps he’ll ask if he could enter the main building and watch where the fights are. He considered that to be the case, after seeing a few leave.
Wandering with his eyes, he finally stumbled on the pin-up board. He left the table to look closer at it, finding a piece of paper with names on them. These names seemed to be of schools, as well as what he assumed to be bot names. There weren’t many names in there, Chester noticed. He also noticed how most of them were from colleges or universities.
Someone then appeared behind him and drew with his finger against that same piece of paper.
“There we are…so we are up,” he said, leaving just as quickly.
Chester checked where the man pointed, and indeed confirmed his suspicion. After one more team, Tom and him will go next. It said the name of his school, “Town of Saint Valor Middle School,” written in pen. Funny, the rest appeared to be printed. He also found the word “Shadowbreaker” right next to his school, which he assumed to be their bot’s name.
What does it even mean? he then wondered. Was “Shadowbreaker” even a word?
Chester thought about asking Tom later, only to then imagine the cat’s worried expression once he tells him about what he saw.
Rather than dealing with this, Chester went on to get a sip of water. The heat of the place was making him parched.
He went straight to the wall drinking fountain, which happened to be right beside the door to the bathroom. And as soon as he reached it, the door flung open, and out flew Tom.
“Hey, what-“
The cat dashed away before he could put a word in. Shrugging shoulders, resumed drinking from fountain. The guy is way too jumpy, Chester thought.
“How long are you gonna take?”
Chester looked over his shoulder and saw what appeared to be a large badger-man. His hair was slicked back, a yellow shirt showing his favorite metal back, and he had giant pair of black glasses. All of these things stood out, alongside with him appearing not that much younger than their vice-principal.
“I dunno, you willing to pay for it?” Chester retorted. Unexpectedly, the large man laughed. And he laughed in this very geekish laugh, where he breathed through the nose and kept bouncing the laugh inside his throat.
“That’s really funny,” he said. “You remind me of my little brother. Actually, you here with a brother too?”
Chester glanced to Tom’s direction. The cat was busy jumping from his computer, to battery detector, to his remote, to the bot and then back to his bag.
“I guess…What’s it to you?”
“I’ve never seen someone so young enter the tournament,” the badger stated. He scratched his own ear and leaned on the wall. It was like he was trying to be friendly to him. “You probably never fought with a battle bot, right?”
“Maybe…” Chester replied. He wanted to be careful a bit here while talking.
“Didn’t think so, you seem much cooler than most of us.” He then gave another geekish laugh. “Probably think this whole nerd stuff, is like, the most boring thing in the universe.”
“Not really,” Chester admitted slightly. “Only second most boring.”
“Is school on the first place?”
“Nah, that would be Mayor Lionheart’s lecture.”
The badger narrowed his eyes. “You are from that town down there, right?”
To neither deny or accept it, Chester pursed his lips.
“Of course you are!” the badger geek said, and gave another laugh. “I mean, it makes sense. You don’t seem to hate me, for starters.”
Chester furrowed brows. “Why would I hate you?”
“Cause, well, I’m the ‘Botzilla’.” The badger then took a stance, and reaised his arms, presumably to play up the image. “I am the meanest player in the world. I constantly come back for revenge. I destroy everyone’s bots, even though the point of the game was always to destroy them. It’s not really that surprising. But everyone gets up in arms! No, my bot!” He did a fake scream, before turning it into another laugh. “I think everyone just…doesn’t like me for some reason. I think maybe I’m too big, or too scary. People think badgers are scary, can you believe that?”
“I heard hedgehogs are considered the worst. Like they have needles up their butts.”
The badger then made another laugh, this time louder, and accompanied with clapping. Chester, for one reason or another, couldn’t help but smile.
“Yeah, it’s unfortunate,” the badger said, calming down. “Like, I’m in a lot of pressure here, trust me. I’m the only tester in this whole facility, and I’ve been barred from entering back into the battle bot league until I test every one of these newbies! But no one wants to battle me! And if they do, they assumed the worst, and when they loose, I’m the bad guy! What’s the big idea, right?”
Chester just shrugged. “Everyone likes judging. You can never escape from it. Sadly.”
“Yeah, for sure.” The badger then reached his hand out. “Anyways, you can call me Luc. I know, it’s weird.”
The hedgehog reached as well and shook hands.
“Chester. My ‘bro’ is Tom, and he’s coming up to fight you soon.”
“Well, give him the best of luck,” Luc said. He pulled his hand back, and stared at it for a moment, before putting behind himself. “I bet he is nervous. Like, hands sweating so much, nervous. Wanna wipe them.” He leaned in. “You can tell him in secret, I am too, actually, nervous. If I don’t do y job well, I might lose this job. It’ll be so uncool! Anyways, looking forward to meeting him!”
He then gave a quick wave, and went away.
Then he returned back.
“Actually, I’m here for water.” He made another laugh.
Chester left him there to return to his table. The boy felt somewhat strangely nice about the encounter, something he never felt in another adult. Maybe he could ask the guy to take it easy on Tom, and they could let him win. Luc gets to win, and they get to test Mr. Mouton. A win-win situation.
And then he stumbled upon the bewildered stare of Tom.
“What…were you doing?” he asked slowly.
“I just, talked to someone…” Chester answered defensively. “Is something wrong?”
“Do you not know who…” Tom checked both sides and leaned in, “’Botzilla’ is?”
“You mean that big bag of geek? Seriously, what’s the problem?”
“Chester, I know this guy,” Tom stated with every sense of seriousness in his speech. “He is, without a doubt, the WORST ever battle bot fighter in history! And not because he is clumsy, he is a MONSTER! He is a destroyer of everything good in the world! If battle bot fighting were used to create peace, he’d use it to start a war!”
Chester raised an eyebrow.
“Wow, that sounds…serious. Where the heck did you hear that from?”
“Hear!? I’ve seen him, Chester!” Tom exclaimed. “He was the worst! He destroys people’s bots!”
“But isn’t the point of this game that you destroy bots?”
Tom looked at him in the eye, looking a bit angry. “First of all, this is not a ‘game,’ Chester. Secondly, you don’t “destroy” the bot that people worked on! Of course, you win by breaking it, but destroying people’s hard work on purpose, just so you could brag about winning is a step too far. Most bots can be repaired after a match, and come back for a loser’s bracket, or even return the next season, who knows. But he doesn’t just break them, he eviscerates like a madbadger!”
Chester stood there, with a demeanor that said unconvinced. “So…you are upset he doesn’t play by the rules.”
Tom made an exasperated sound. “You don’t get it! This guy is the biggest troublemaker in the battle bot fighting history! You can’t trust him!”
“Who made you the boss here, huh?! I can’t just go around and talk to people?”
The two boys stared at one another. Tom was turning red, which barely hid behind his orange fur.
“I’m not gonna lose.”
“Huh?”
“I’m not gonna lose this competition, Chester. It’s my bot, and he might-“
“Dude, seriously, it’s just a game of bots.” Chester looked over his shoulder again, just to see if he could spot Mr. Mouton coming. “I have already have a plan here, and we can-”
“No.”
Chester spun his head fast.
“Excuse me?”
“No, Chester,” Tom said, articulating each point, “this isn’t just a game with bots. Not anymore. Not for me. I need to win this. For my Mom.” He then took his phone out, “You are also not the boss either. I need to do a phone call.”
Chester watched him leave without saying a word back, because he couldn’t. It was somehow impossible, at that moment.
Then Tom returned a second later.
“Can I ask you to watch my bot again?” he asked, his tone quiet. “I’m trying to contact Matthew, but he won’t answer. I’ll be back.”
Chester’s eyes went wide.
“Wait, Tom-“
“Just wait for me!” Tom quickly moved out of the room, his phone already ringing.
Chester sat back on his chair. “Are you kidding me?” were the only things that escaped from him.
…
Lily dusted herself off, making sure her coat looked prim and proper. She then looked at the chair, to see if it got foot marks from her socks. Feeling ready, she cleared throat, raised the piece of paper and began her speech.
“It all started when we came to Mister Gogh’s ‘Peacock Art Shop’,” she said, loudly and clearly. “Me and Bobby,” she pointed to him, sitting on the chair nearby her, “came to his shop to get supplies for our present for Miss Cheshire. Miss Elefantus told us to come here. We met the owner, who was very nice, and showed us everything that he had. It was very pretty. We were going to buy and get everything we needed, until someone showed up out of nowhere. The person who showed up was a very awful looking clown. The clown said, ‘Spare me,’ but very meanly, and threw a dark ball into the owner. The ball turned into a huge black blob, ate him, and transformed into a monster. The evil clown person disappeared, and we ran to get some help. We found Mister Fotia, who happened to be walking by, because he said he needed to help with his friend’s machine and paint it into another color. Like red. He said his dad told him to do that. He asked what’s wrong, so we showed him in. He then said he’ll call you, and you’ll call for help. And that’s what happened. How was it?”
Fotia stood from his chair and clapped. “Bravo, little ones! Excellent presentation, little lady!”
“Thank you,” Lily said. She once again pondered why was he calling her “little lady.”
“You think they will understand? Mister Pierre?” asked Bobby, leaving aside the baking soda container and a tube of paint he played with.
“Why, of course they will! You are quite an orator, little lady, voice blessed by the god of wind and music himself! And you penmanship, little boy, is deft, and I felt every word you written!”
“Really?” Bobby asked, surprised by this. He contently smiled and returned back to playing with baking powder.
“What’s going on!”
Before Fotia could answer, Flora managed to get between him and Lily.
“Young Rose! I meant…’Flora?’” Fotia waited a bit for her to either confirm or deny it. She rolled her eyes.
“Where’s the Torque?”
He nodded, and then paused. “Actually,” he said, “me and the little ones have something to show you.” Motioned to Lily, who was still on top of the chair, who smiled at Flora.
“Can we not have this later?” she asked him. He considered it, so she groaned. “Just show it to me.”
He pointed behind himself. Flora walked in, and couldn’t figure out if she saw an actual scene.
The Torque, the shop owner previously, was sitting on a chair, using several limbs to draw. Several brushes and a painting pallet were in its hands. The drawing it did were wild, and hard to understand.
Flora, with care to maintain her distance, checked on the monster. Or, to be fair, aside from limbs, size and its face, it didn’t look monstrous. It barely acted like a monster for sure.
“Wait, is….is that all?”
“Yes.”
Flora grabbed a broom from nearby, and slowly stuck it in front of monster’s face. As she guessed it, he did not notice her.
“Weird.”
“Quite,” Fotia agreed. Then he grabbed the broom too. “Witness.”
He promptly poked the Torque’s head, to Flora’s contestation. But, it barely reacted to it, until it did, by limply swatting the poking tool away.
“Is young Zamarad with you?”
“Oh yeah, that’s a long story,” she sighed, hands on hips. She seemed already awfully tired. “You know, since we are waiting for the spirits, can I just talk to you? I had a really long day.”
“What about my speech?” Lily asked.
Flora looked at the bat, who was still on the chair.
“I wrote it!” Bobby added.
“Can we do that later, please? I’m waiting for others to come in first. You can tell us then.”
“Okay,” Lily agreed, and climbed down.
While both Flora and Fotia talked, Bobby poked Lily’s hand.
“What a weird day, huh?” he said.
“Yeah.” Lily looked at her paper. “Maybe we could write our birthday speech, how about it? You seem to be good at it.”
“Really? Yeah!” Bobby jumped after some pen and paper that were lying next to him, then got on the floor. Lily sat down next to watch him write, and maybe tell him about spelling like last time.
It was an odd day.
…
-----------------------------------------
…
While Chester sat by himself, he studied the scene again. Even though the metallic and sweat smell wasn’t anywhere near as bad as before, nor did the noises bother him much, boy was he finding the place boring. There was nothing to do, and if someone seemingly done checking their machine, they would start checking all over again. Perhaps he’ll ask if he could enter the main building and watch where the fights are. He considered that to be the case, after seeing a few leave.
Wandering with his eyes, he finally stumbled on the pin-up board. He left the table to look closer at it, finding a piece of paper with names on them. These names seemed to be of schools, as well as what he assumed to be bot names. There weren’t many names in there, Chester noticed. He also noticed how most of them were from colleges or universities.
Someone then appeared behind him and drew with his finger against that same piece of paper.
“There we are…so we are up,” he said, leaving just as quickly.
Chester checked where the man pointed, and indeed confirmed his suspicion. After one more team, Tom and him will go next. It said the name of his school, “Town of Saint Valor Middle School,” written in pen. Funny, the rest appeared to be printed. He also found the word “Shadowbreaker” right next to his school, which he assumed to be their bot’s name.
What does it even mean? he then wondered. Was “Shadowbreaker” even a word?
Chester thought about asking Tom later, only to then imagine the cat’s worried expression once he tells him about what he saw.
Rather than dealing with this, Chester went on to get a sip of water. The heat of the place was making him parched.
He went straight to the wall drinking fountain, which happened to be right beside the door to the bathroom. And as soon as he reached it, the door flung open, and out flew Tom.
“Hey, what-“
The cat dashed away before he could put a word in. Shrugging shoulders, resumed drinking from fountain. The guy is way too jumpy, Chester thought.
“How long are you gonna take?”
Chester looked over his shoulder and saw what appeared to be a large badger-man. His hair was slicked back, a yellow shirt showing his favorite metal back, and he had giant pair of black glasses. All of these things stood out, alongside with him appearing not that much younger than their vice-principal.
“I dunno, you willing to pay for it?” Chester retorted. Unexpectedly, the large man laughed. And he laughed in this very geekish laugh, where he breathed through the nose and kept bouncing the laugh inside his throat.
“That’s really funny,” he said. “You remind me of my little brother. Actually, you here with a brother too?”
Chester glanced to Tom’s direction. The cat was busy jumping from his computer, to battery detector, to his remote, to the bot and then back to his bag.
“I guess…What’s it to you?”
“I’ve never seen someone so young enter the tournament,” the badger stated. He scratched his own ear and leaned on the wall. It was like he was trying to be friendly to him. “You probably never fought with a battle bot, right?”
“Maybe…” Chester replied. He wanted to be careful a bit here while talking.
“Didn’t think so, you seem much cooler than most of us.” He then gave another geekish laugh. “Probably think this whole nerd stuff, is like, the most boring thing in the universe.”
“Not really,” Chester admitted slightly. “Only second most boring.”
“Is school on the first place?”
“Nah, that would be Mayor Lionheart’s lecture.”
The badger narrowed his eyes. “You are from that town down there, right?”
To neither deny or accept it, Chester pursed his lips.
“Of course you are!” the badger geek said, and gave another laugh. “I mean, it makes sense. You don’t seem to hate me, for starters.”
Chester furrowed brows. “Why would I hate you?”
“Cause, well, I’m the ‘Botzilla’.” The badger then took a stance, and reaised his arms, presumably to play up the image. “I am the meanest player in the world. I constantly come back for revenge. I destroy everyone’s bots, even though the point of the game was always to destroy them. It’s not really that surprising. But everyone gets up in arms! No, my bot!” He did a fake scream, before turning it into another laugh. “I think everyone just…doesn’t like me for some reason. I think maybe I’m too big, or too scary. People think badgers are scary, can you believe that?”
“I heard hedgehogs are considered the worst. Like they have needles up their butts.”
The badger then made another laugh, this time louder, and accompanied with clapping. Chester, for one reason or another, couldn’t help but smile.
“Yeah, it’s unfortunate,” the badger said, calming down. “Like, I’m in a lot of pressure here, trust me. I’m the only tester in this whole facility, and I’ve been barred from entering back into the battle bot league until I test every one of these newbies! But no one wants to battle me! And if they do, they assumed the worst, and when they loose, I’m the bad guy! What’s the big idea, right?”
Chester just shrugged. “Everyone likes judging. You can never escape from it. Sadly.”
“Yeah, for sure.” The badger then reached his hand out. “Anyways, you can call me Luc. I know, it’s weird.”
The hedgehog reached as well and shook hands.
“Chester. My ‘bro’ is Tom, and he’s coming up to fight you soon.”
“Well, give him the best of luck,” Luc said. He pulled his hand back, and stared at it for a moment, before putting behind himself. “I bet he is nervous. Like, hands sweating so much, nervous. Wanna wipe them.” He leaned in. “You can tell him in secret, I am too, actually, nervous. If I don’t do y job well, I might lose this job. It’ll be so uncool! Anyways, looking forward to meeting him!”
He then gave a quick wave, and went away.
Then he returned back.
“Actually, I’m here for water.” He made another laugh.
Chester left him there to return to his table. The boy felt somewhat strangely nice about the encounter, something he never felt in another adult. Maybe he could ask the guy to take it easy on Tom, and they could let him win. Luc gets to win, and they get to test Mr. Mouton. A win-win situation.
And then he stumbled upon the bewildered stare of Tom.
“What…were you doing?” he asked slowly.
“I just, talked to someone…” Chester answered defensively. “Is something wrong?”
“Do you not know who…” Tom checked both sides and leaned in, “’Botzilla’ is?”
“You mean that big bag of geek? Seriously, what’s the problem?”
“Chester, I know this guy,” Tom stated with every sense of seriousness in his speech. “He is, without a doubt, the WORST ever battle bot fighter in history! And not because he is clumsy, he is a MONSTER! He is a destroyer of everything good in the world! If battle bot fighting were used to create peace, he’d use it to start a war!”
Chester raised an eyebrow.
“Wow, that sounds…serious. Where the heck did you hear that from?”
“Hear!? I’ve seen him, Chester!” Tom exclaimed. “He was the worst! He destroys people’s bots!”
“But isn’t the point of this game that you destroy bots?”
Tom looked at him in the eye, looking a bit angry. “First of all, this is not a ‘game,’ Chester. Secondly, you don’t “destroy” the bot that people worked on! Of course, you win by breaking it, but destroying people’s hard work on purpose, just so you could brag about winning is a step too far. Most bots can be repaired after a match, and come back for a loser’s bracket, or even return the next season, who knows. But he doesn’t just break them, he eviscerates like a madbadger!”
Chester stood there, with a demeanor that said unconvinced. “So…you are upset he doesn’t play by the rules.”
Tom made an exasperated sound. “You don’t get it! This guy is the biggest troublemaker in the battle bot fighting history! You can’t trust him!”
“Who made you the boss here, huh?! I can’t just go around and talk to people?”
The two boys stared at one another. Tom was turning red, which barely hid behind his orange fur.
“I’m not gonna lose.”
“Huh?”
“I’m not gonna lose this competition, Chester. It’s my bot, and he might-“
“Dude, seriously, it’s just a game of bots.” Chester looked over his shoulder again, just to see if he could spot Mr. Mouton coming. “I have already have a plan here, and we can-”
“No.”
Chester spun his head fast.
“Excuse me?”
“No, Chester,” Tom said, articulating each point, “this isn’t just a game with bots. Not anymore. Not for me. I need to win this. For my Mom.” He then took his phone out, “You are also not the boss either. I need to do a phone call.”
Chester watched him leave without saying a word back, because he couldn’t. It was somehow impossible, at that moment.
Then Tom returned a second later.
“Can I ask you to watch my bot again?” he asked, his tone quiet. “I’m trying to contact Matthew, but he won’t answer. I’ll be back.”
Chester’s eyes went wide.
“Wait, Tom-“
“Just wait for me!” Tom quickly moved out of the room, his phone already ringing.
Chester sat back on his chair. “Are you kidding me?” were the only things that escaped from him.
…
Lily dusted herself off, making sure her coat looked prim and proper. She then looked at the chair, to see if it got foot marks from her socks. Feeling ready, she cleared throat, raised the piece of paper and began her speech.
“It all started when we came to Mister Gogh’s ‘Peacock Art Shop’,” she said, loudly and clearly. “Me and Bobby,” she pointed to him, sitting on the chair nearby her, “came to his shop to get supplies for our present for Miss Cheshire. Miss Elefantus told us to come here. We met the owner, who was very nice, and showed us everything that he had. It was very pretty. We were going to buy and get everything we needed, until someone showed up out of nowhere. The person who showed up was a very awful looking clown. The clown said, ‘Spare me,’ but very meanly, and threw a dark ball into the owner. The ball turned into a huge black blob, ate him, and transformed into a monster. The evil clown person disappeared, and we ran to get some help. We found Mister Fotia, who happened to be walking by, because he said he needed to help with his friend’s machine and paint it into another color. Like red. He said his dad told him to do that. He asked what’s wrong, so we showed him in. He then said he’ll call you, and you’ll call for help. And that’s what happened. How was it?”
Fotia stood from his chair and clapped. “Bravo, little ones! Excellent presentation, little lady!”
“Thank you,” Lily said. She once again pondered why was he calling her “little lady.”
“You think they will understand? Mister Pierre?” asked Bobby, leaving aside the baking soda container and a tube of paint he played with.
“Why, of course they will! You are quite an orator, little lady, voice blessed by the god of wind and music himself! And you penmanship, little boy, is deft, and I felt every word you written!”
“Really?” Bobby asked, surprised by this. He contently smiled and returned back to playing with baking powder.
“What’s going on!”
Before Fotia could answer, Flora managed to get between him and Lily.
“Young Rose! I meant…’Flora?’” Fotia waited a bit for her to either confirm or deny it. She rolled her eyes.
“Where’s the Torque?”
He nodded, and then paused. “Actually,” he said, “me and the little ones have something to show you.” Motioned to Lily, who was still on top of the chair, who smiled at Flora.
“Can we not have this later?” she asked him. He considered it, so she groaned. “Just show it to me.”
He pointed behind himself. Flora walked in, and couldn’t figure out if she saw an actual scene.
The Torque, the shop owner previously, was sitting on a chair, using several limbs to draw. Several brushes and a painting pallet were in its hands. The drawing it did were wild, and hard to understand.
Flora, with care to maintain her distance, checked on the monster. Or, to be fair, aside from limbs, size and its face, it didn’t look monstrous. It barely acted like a monster for sure.
“Wait, is….is that all?”
“Yes.”
Flora grabbed a broom from nearby, and slowly stuck it in front of monster’s face. As she guessed it, he did not notice her.
“Weird.”
“Quite,” Fotia agreed. Then he grabbed the broom too. “Witness.”
He promptly poked the Torque’s head, to Flora’s contestation. But, it barely reacted to it, until it did, by limply swatting the poking tool away.
“Is young Zamarad with you?”
“Oh yeah, that’s a long story,” she sighed, hands on hips. She seemed already awfully tired. “You know, since we are waiting for the spirits, can I just talk to you? I had a really long day.”
“What about my speech?” Lily asked.
Flora looked at the bat, who was still on the chair.
“I wrote it!” Bobby added.
“Can we do that later, please? I’m waiting for others to come in first. You can tell us then.”
“Okay,” Lily agreed, and climbed down.
While both Flora and Fotia talked, Bobby poked Lily’s hand.
“What a weird day, huh?” he said.
“Yeah.” Lily looked at her paper. “Maybe we could write our birthday speech, how about it? You seem to be good at it.”
“Really? Yeah!” Bobby jumped after some pen and paper that were lying next to him, then got on the floor. Lily sat down next to watch him write, and maybe tell him about spelling like last time.
It was an odd day.
…
I want a puppy cafe
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
…
While Chester sat by himself, he studied the scene again. Even though the metallic and sweat smell wasn’t anywhere near as bad as before, nor did the noises bother him much, boy was he finding the place boring. There was nothing to do, and if someone seemingly done checking their machine, they would start checking all over again. Perhaps he’ll ask if he could enter the main building and watch where the fights are. He considered that to be the case, after seeing a few leave.
Wandering with his eyes, he finally stumbled on the pin-up board. He left the table to look closer at it, finding a piece of paper with names on them. These names seemed to be of schools, as well as what he assumed to be bot names. There weren’t many names in there, Chester noticed. He also noticed how most of them were from colleges or universities.
Someone then appeared behind him and drew with his finger against that same piece of paper.
“There we are…so we are up,” he said, leaving just as quickly.
Chester checked where the man pointed, and indeed confirmed his suspicion. After one more team, Tom and him will go next. It said the name of his school, “Town of Saint Valor Middle School,” written in pen. Funny, the rest appeared to be printed. He also found the word “Shadowbreaker” right next to his school, which he assumed to be their bot’s name.
What does it even mean? he then wondered. Was “Shadowbreaker” even a word?
Chester thought about asking Tom later, only to then imagine the cat’s worried expression once he tells him about what he saw.
Rather than dealing with this, Chester went on to get a sip of water. The heat of the place was making him parched.
He went straight to the wall drinking fountain, which happened to be right beside the door to the bathroom. And as soon as he reached it, the door flung open, and out flew Tom.
“Hey, what-“
The cat dashed away before he could put a word in. Shrugging shoulders, resumed drinking from fountain. The guy is way too jumpy, Chester thought.
“How long are you gonna take?”
Chester looked over his shoulder and saw what appeared to be a large badger-man. His hair was slicked back, a yellow shirt showing his favorite metal back, and he had giant pair of black glasses. All of these things stood out, alongside with him appearing not that much younger than their vice-principal.
“I dunno, you willing to pay for it?” Chester retorted. Unexpectedly, the large man laughed. And he laughed in this very geekish laugh, where he breathed through the nose and kept bouncing the laugh inside his throat.
“That’s really funny,” he said. “You remind me of my little brother. Actually, you here with a brother too?”
Chester glanced to Tom’s direction. The cat was busy jumping from his computer, to battery detector, to his remote, to the bot and then back to his bag.
“I guess…What’s it to you?”
“I’ve never seen someone so young enter the tournament,” the badger stated. He scratched his own ear and leaned on the wall. It was like he was trying to be friendly to him. “You probably never fought with a battle bot, right?”
“Maybe…” Chester replied. He wanted to be careful a bit here while talking.
“Didn’t think so, you seem much cooler than most of us.” He then gave another geekish laugh. “Probably think this whole nerd stuff, is like, the most boring thing in the universe.”
“Not really,” Chester admitted slightly. “Only second most boring.”
“Is school on the first place?”
“Nah, that would be Mayor Lionheart’s lecture.”
The badger narrowed his eyes. “You are from that town down there, right?”
To neither deny or accept it, Chester pursed his lips.
“Of course you are!” the badger geek said, and gave another laugh. “I mean, it makes sense. You don’t seem to hate me, for starters.”
Chester furrowed brows. “Why would I hate you?”
“Cause, well, I’m the ‘Botzilla’.” The badger then took a stance, and reaised his arms, presumably to play up the image. “I am the meanest player in the world. I constantly come back for revenge. I destroy everyone’s bots, even though the point of the game was always to destroy them. It’s not really that surprising. But everyone gets up in arms! No, my bot!” He did a fake scream, before turning it into another laugh. “I think everyone just…doesn’t like me for some reason. I think maybe I’m too big, or too scary. People think badgers are scary, can you believe that?”
“I heard hedgehogs are considered the worst. Like they have needles up their butts.”
The badger then made another laugh, this time louder, and accompanied with clapping. Chester, for one reason or another, couldn’t help but smile.
“Yeah, it’s unfortunate,” the badger said, calming down. “Like, I’m in a lot of pressure here, trust me. I’m the only tester in this whole facility, and I’ve been barred from entering back into the battle bot league until I test every one of these newbies! But no one wants to battle me! And if they do, they assumed the worst, and when they loose, I’m the bad guy! What’s the big idea, right?”
Chester just shrugged. “Everyone likes judging. You can never escape from it. Sadly.”
“Yeah, for sure.” The badger then reached his hand out. “Anyways, you can call me Luc. I know, it’s weird.”
The hedgehog reached as well and shook hands.
“Chester. My ‘bro’ is Tom, and he’s coming up to fight you soon.”
“Well, give him the best of luck,” Luc said. He pulled his hand back, and stared at it for a moment, before putting behind himself. “I bet he is nervous. Like, hands sweating so much, nervous. Wanna wipe them.” He leaned in. “You can tell him in secret, I am too, actually, nervous. If I don’t do y job well, I might lose this job. It’ll be so uncool! Anyways, looking forward to meeting him!”
He then gave a quick wave, and went away.
Then he returned back.
“Actually, I’m here for water.” He made another laugh.
Chester left him there to return to his table. The boy felt somewhat strangely nice about the encounter, something he never felt in another adult. Maybe he could ask the guy to take it easy on Tom, and they could let him win. Luc gets to win, and they get to test Mr. Mouton. A win-win situation.
And then he stumbled upon the bewildered stare of Tom.
“What…were you doing?” he asked slowly.
“I just, talked to someone…” Chester answered defensively. “Is something wrong?”
“Do you not know who…” Tom checked both sides and leaned in, “’Botzilla’ is?”
“You mean that big bag of geek? Seriously, what’s the problem?”
“Chester, I know this guy,” Tom stated with every sense of seriousness in his speech. “He is, without a doubt, the WORST ever battle bot fighter in history! And not because he is clumsy, he is a MONSTER! He is a destroyer of everything good in the world! If battle bot fighting were used to create peace, he’d use it to start a war!”
Chester raised an eyebrow.
“Wow, that sounds…serious. Where the heck did you hear that from?”
“Hear!? I’ve seen him, Chester!” Tom exclaimed. “He was the worst! He destroys people’s bots!”
“But isn’t the point of this game that you destroy bots?”
Tom looked at him in the eye, looking a bit angry. “First of all, this is not a ‘game,’ Chester. Secondly, you don’t “destroy” the bot that people worked on! Of course, you win by breaking it, but destroying people’s hard work on purpose, just so you could brag about winning is a step too far. Most bots can be repaired after a match, and come back for a loser’s bracket, or even return the next season, who knows. But he doesn’t just break them, he eviscerates like a madbadger!”
Chester stood there, with a demeanor that said unconvinced. “So…you are upset he doesn’t play by the rules.”
Tom made an exasperated sound. “You don’t get it! This guy is the biggest troublemaker in the battle bot fighting history! You can’t trust him!”
“Who made you the boss here, huh?! I can’t just go around and talk to people?”
The two boys stared at one another. Tom was turning red, which barely hid behind his orange fur.
“I’m not gonna lose.”
“Huh?”
“I’m not gonna lose this competition, Chester. It’s my bot, and he might-“
“Dude, seriously, it’s just a game of bots.” Chester looked over his shoulder again, just to see if he could spot Mr. Mouton coming. “I have already have a plan here, and we can-”
“No.”
Chester spun his head fast.
“Excuse me?”
“No, Chester,” Tom said, articulating each point, “this isn’t just a game with bots. Not anymore. Not for me. I need to win this. For my Mom.” He then took his phone out, “You are also not the boss either. I need to do a phone call.”
Chester watched him leave without saying a word back, because he couldn’t. It was somehow impossible, at that moment.
Then Tom returned a second later.
“Can I ask you to watch my bot again?” he asked, his tone quiet. “I’m trying to contact Matthew, but he won’t answer. I’ll be back.”
Chester’s eyes went wide.
“Wait, Tom-“
“Just wait for me!” Tom quickly moved out of the room, his phone already ringing.
Chester sat back on his chair. “Are you kidding me?” were the only things that escaped from him.
…
Lily dusted herself off, making sure her coat looked prim and proper. She then looked at the chair, to see if it got foot marks from her socks. Feeling ready, she cleared throat, raised the piece of paper and began her speech.
“It all started when we came to Mister Gogh’s ‘Peacock Art Shop’,” she said, loudly and clearly. “Me and Bobby,” she pointed to him, sitting on the chair nearby her, “came to his shop to get supplies for our present for Miss Cheshire. Miss Elefantus told us to come here. We met the owner, who was very nice, and showed us everything that he had. It was very pretty. We were going to buy and get everything we needed, until someone showed up out of nowhere. The person who showed up was a very awful looking clown. The clown said, ‘Spare me,’ but very meanly, and threw a dark ball into the owner. The ball turned into a huge black blob, ate him, and transformed into a monster. The evil clown person disappeared, and we ran to get some help. We found Mister Fotia, who happened to be walking by, because he said he needed to help with his friend’s machine and paint it into another color. Like red. He said his dad told him to do that. He asked what’s wrong, so we showed him in. He then said he’ll call you, and you’ll call for help. And that’s what happened. How was it?”
Fotia stood from his chair and clapped. “Bravo, little ones! Excellent presentation, little lady!”
“Thank you,” Lily said. She once again pondered why was he calling her “little lady.”
“You think they will understand? Mister Pierre?” asked Bobby, leaving aside the baking soda container and a tube of paint he played with.
“Why, of course they will! You are quite an orator, little lady, voice blessed by the god of wind and music himself! And you penmanship, little boy, is deft, and I felt every word you written!”
“Really?” Bobby asked, surprised by this. He contently smiled and returned back to playing with baking powder.
“What’s going on!”
Before Fotia could answer, Flora managed to get between him and Lily.
“Young Rose! I meant…’Flora?’” Fotia waited a bit for her to either confirm or deny it. She rolled her eyes.
“Where’s the Torque?”
He nodded, and then paused. “Actually,” he said, “me and the little ones have something to show you.” Motioned to Lily, who was still on top of the chair, who smiled at Flora.
“Can we not have this later?” she asked him. He considered it, so she groaned. “Just show it to me.”
He pointed behind himself. Flora walked in, and couldn’t figure out if she saw an actual scene.
The Torque, the shop owner previously, was sitting on a chair, using several limbs to draw. Several brushes and a painting pallet were in its hands. The drawing it did were wild, and hard to understand.
Flora, with care to maintain her distance, checked on the monster. Or, to be fair, aside from limbs, size and its face, it didn’t look monstrous. It barely acted like a monster for sure.
“Wait, is….is that all?”
“Yes.”
Flora grabbed a broom from nearby, and slowly stuck it in front of monster’s face. As she guessed it, he did not notice her.
“Weird.”
“Quite,” Fotia agreed. Then he grabbed the broom too. “Witness.”
He promptly poked the Torque’s head, to Flora’s contestation. But, it barely reacted to it, until it did, by limply swatting the poking tool away.
“Is young Zamarad with you?”
“Oh yeah, that’s a long story,” she sighed, hands on hips. She seemed already awfully tired. “You know, since we are waiting for the spirits, can I just talk to you? I had a really long day.”
“What about my speech?” Lily asked.
Flora looked at the bat, who was still on the chair.
“I wrote it!” Bobby added.
“Can we do that later, please? I’m waiting for others to come in first. You can tell us then.”
“Okay,” Lily agreed, and climbed down.
While both Flora and Fotia talked, Bobby poked Lily’s hand.
“What a weird day, huh?” he said.
“Yeah.” Lily looked at her paper. “Maybe we could write our birthday speech, how about it? You seem to be good at it.”
“Really? Yeah!” Bobby jumped after some pen and paper that were lying next to him, then got on the floor. Lily sat down next to watch him write, and maybe tell him about spelling like last time.
It was an odd day.
…
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
…
While Chester sat by himself, he studied the scene again. Even though the metallic and sweat smell wasn’t anywhere near as bad as before, nor did the noises bother him much, boy was he finding the place boring. There was nothing to do, and if someone seemingly done checking their machine, they would start checking all over again. Perhaps he’ll ask if he could enter the main building and watch where the fights are. He considered that to be the case, after seeing a few leave.
Wandering with his eyes, he finally stumbled on the pin-up board. He left the table to look closer at it, finding a piece of paper with names on them. These names seemed to be of schools, as well as what he assumed to be bot names. There weren’t many names in there, Chester noticed. He also noticed how most of them were from colleges or universities.
Someone then appeared behind him and drew with his finger against that same piece of paper.
“There we are…so we are up,” he said, leaving just as quickly.
Chester checked where the man pointed, and indeed confirmed his suspicion. After one more team, Tom and him will go next. It said the name of his school, “Town of Saint Valor Middle School,” written in pen. Funny, the rest appeared to be printed. He also found the word “Shadowbreaker” right next to his school, which he assumed to be their bot’s name.
What does it even mean? he then wondered. Was “Shadowbreaker” even a word?
Chester thought about asking Tom later, only to then imagine the cat’s worried expression once he tells him about what he saw.
Rather than dealing with this, Chester went on to get a sip of water. The heat of the place was making him parched.
He went straight to the wall drinking fountain, which happened to be right beside the door to the bathroom. And as soon as he reached it, the door flung open, and out flew Tom.
“Hey, what-“
The cat dashed away before he could put a word in. Shrugging shoulders, resumed drinking from fountain. The guy is way too jumpy, Chester thought.
“How long are you gonna take?”
Chester looked over his shoulder and saw what appeared to be a large badger-man. His hair was slicked back, a yellow shirt showing his favorite metal back, and he had giant pair of black glasses. All of these things stood out, alongside with him appearing not that much younger than their vice-principal.
“I dunno, you willing to pay for it?” Chester retorted. Unexpectedly, the large man laughed. And he laughed in this very geekish laugh, where he breathed through the nose and kept bouncing the laugh inside his throat.
“That’s really funny,” he said. “You remind me of my little brother. Actually, you here with a brother too?”
Chester glanced to Tom’s direction. The cat was busy jumping from his computer, to battery detector, to his remote, to the bot and then back to his bag.
“I guess…What’s it to you?”
“I’ve never seen someone so young enter the tournament,” the badger stated. He scratched his own ear and leaned on the wall. It was like he was trying to be friendly to him. “You probably never fought with a battle bot, right?”
“Maybe…” Chester replied. He wanted to be careful a bit here while talking.
“Didn’t think so, you seem much cooler than most of us.” He then gave another geekish laugh. “Probably think this whole nerd stuff, is like, the most boring thing in the universe.”
“Not really,” Chester admitted slightly. “Only second most boring.”
“Is school on the first place?”
“Nah, that would be Mayor Lionheart’s lecture.”
The badger narrowed his eyes. “You are from that town down there, right?”
To neither deny or accept it, Chester pursed his lips.
“Of course you are!” the badger geek said, and gave another laugh. “I mean, it makes sense. You don’t seem to hate me, for starters.”
Chester furrowed brows. “Why would I hate you?”
“Cause, well, I’m the ‘Botzilla’.” The badger then took a stance, and reaised his arms, presumably to play up the image. “I am the meanest player in the world. I constantly come back for revenge. I destroy everyone’s bots, even though the point of the game was always to destroy them. It’s not really that surprising. But everyone gets up in arms! No, my bot!” He did a fake scream, before turning it into another laugh. “I think everyone just…doesn’t like me for some reason. I think maybe I’m too big, or too scary. People think badgers are scary, can you believe that?”
“I heard hedgehogs are considered the worst. Like they have needles up their butts.”
The badger then made another laugh, this time louder, and accompanied with clapping. Chester, for one reason or another, couldn’t help but smile.
“Yeah, it’s unfortunate,” the badger said, calming down. “Like, I’m in a lot of pressure here, trust me. I’m the only tester in this whole facility, and I’ve been barred from entering back into the battle bot league until I test every one of these newbies! But no one wants to battle me! And if they do, they assumed the worst, and when they loose, I’m the bad guy! What’s the big idea, right?”
Chester just shrugged. “Everyone likes judging. You can never escape from it. Sadly.”
“Yeah, for sure.” The badger then reached his hand out. “Anyways, you can call me Luc. I know, it’s weird.”
The hedgehog reached as well and shook hands.
“Chester. My ‘bro’ is Tom, and he’s coming up to fight you soon.”
“Well, give him the best of luck,” Luc said. He pulled his hand back, and stared at it for a moment, before putting behind himself. “I bet he is nervous. Like, hands sweating so much, nervous. Wanna wipe them.” He leaned in. “You can tell him in secret, I am too, actually, nervous. If I don’t do y job well, I might lose this job. It’ll be so uncool! Anyways, looking forward to meeting him!”
He then gave a quick wave, and went away.
Then he returned back.
“Actually, I’m here for water.” He made another laugh.
Chester left him there to return to his table. The boy felt somewhat strangely nice about the encounter, something he never felt in another adult. Maybe he could ask the guy to take it easy on Tom, and they could let him win. Luc gets to win, and they get to test Mr. Mouton. A win-win situation.
And then he stumbled upon the bewildered stare of Tom.
“What…were you doing?” he asked slowly.
“I just, talked to someone…” Chester answered defensively. “Is something wrong?”
“Do you not know who…” Tom checked both sides and leaned in, “’Botzilla’ is?”
“You mean that big bag of geek? Seriously, what’s the problem?”
“Chester, I know this guy,” Tom stated with every sense of seriousness in his speech. “He is, without a doubt, the WORST ever battle bot fighter in history! And not because he is clumsy, he is a MONSTER! He is a destroyer of everything good in the world! If battle bot fighting were used to create peace, he’d use it to start a war!”
Chester raised an eyebrow.
“Wow, that sounds…serious. Where the heck did you hear that from?”
“Hear!? I’ve seen him, Chester!” Tom exclaimed. “He was the worst! He destroys people’s bots!”
“But isn’t the point of this game that you destroy bots?”
Tom looked at him in the eye, looking a bit angry. “First of all, this is not a ‘game,’ Chester. Secondly, you don’t “destroy” the bot that people worked on! Of course, you win by breaking it, but destroying people’s hard work on purpose, just so you could brag about winning is a step too far. Most bots can be repaired after a match, and come back for a loser’s bracket, or even return the next season, who knows. But he doesn’t just break them, he eviscerates like a madbadger!”
Chester stood there, with a demeanor that said unconvinced. “So…you are upset he doesn’t play by the rules.”
Tom made an exasperated sound. “You don’t get it! This guy is the biggest troublemaker in the battle bot fighting history! You can’t trust him!”
“Who made you the boss here, huh?! I can’t just go around and talk to people?”
The two boys stared at one another. Tom was turning red, which barely hid behind his orange fur.
“I’m not gonna lose.”
“Huh?”
“I’m not gonna lose this competition, Chester. It’s my bot, and he might-“
“Dude, seriously, it’s just a game of bots.” Chester looked over his shoulder again, just to see if he could spot Mr. Mouton coming. “I have already have a plan here, and we can-”
“No.”
Chester spun his head fast.
“Excuse me?”
“No, Chester,” Tom said, articulating each point, “this isn’t just a game with bots. Not anymore. Not for me. I need to win this. For my Mom.” He then took his phone out, “You are also not the boss either. I need to do a phone call.”
Chester watched him leave without saying a word back, because he couldn’t. It was somehow impossible, at that moment.
Then Tom returned a second later.
“Can I ask you to watch my bot again?” he asked, his tone quiet. “I’m trying to contact Matthew, but he won’t answer. I’ll be back.”
Chester’s eyes went wide.
“Wait, Tom-“
“Just wait for me!” Tom quickly moved out of the room, his phone already ringing.
Chester sat back on his chair. “Are you kidding me?” were the only things that escaped from him.
…
Lily dusted herself off, making sure her coat looked prim and proper. She then looked at the chair, to see if it got foot marks from her socks. Feeling ready, she cleared throat, raised the piece of paper and began her speech.
“It all started when we came to Mister Gogh’s ‘Peacock Art Shop’,” she said, loudly and clearly. “Me and Bobby,” she pointed to him, sitting on the chair nearby her, “came to his shop to get supplies for our present for Miss Cheshire. Miss Elefantus told us to come here. We met the owner, who was very nice, and showed us everything that he had. It was very pretty. We were going to buy and get everything we needed, until someone showed up out of nowhere. The person who showed up was a very awful looking clown. The clown said, ‘Spare me,’ but very meanly, and threw a dark ball into the owner. The ball turned into a huge black blob, ate him, and transformed into a monster. The evil clown person disappeared, and we ran to get some help. We found Mister Fotia, who happened to be walking by, because he said he needed to help with his friend’s machine and paint it into another color. Like red. He said his dad told him to do that. He asked what’s wrong, so we showed him in. He then said he’ll call you, and you’ll call for help. And that’s what happened. How was it?”
Fotia stood from his chair and clapped. “Bravo, little ones! Excellent presentation, little lady!”
“Thank you,” Lily said. She once again pondered why was he calling her “little lady.”
“You think they will understand? Mister Pierre?” asked Bobby, leaving aside the baking soda container and a tube of paint he played with.
“Why, of course they will! You are quite an orator, little lady, voice blessed by the god of wind and music himself! And you penmanship, little boy, is deft, and I felt every word you written!”
“Really?” Bobby asked, surprised by this. He contently smiled and returned back to playing with baking powder.
“What’s going on!”
Before Fotia could answer, Flora managed to get between him and Lily.
“Young Rose! I meant…’Flora?’” Fotia waited a bit for her to either confirm or deny it. She rolled her eyes.
“Where’s the Torque?”
He nodded, and then paused. “Actually,” he said, “me and the little ones have something to show you.” Motioned to Lily, who was still on top of the chair, who smiled at Flora.
“Can we not have this later?” she asked him. He considered it, so she groaned. “Just show it to me.”
He pointed behind himself. Flora walked in, and couldn’t figure out if she saw an actual scene.
The Torque, the shop owner previously, was sitting on a chair, using several limbs to draw. Several brushes and a painting pallet were in its hands. The drawing it did were wild, and hard to understand.
Flora, with care to maintain her distance, checked on the monster. Or, to be fair, aside from limbs, size and its face, it didn’t look monstrous. It barely acted like a monster for sure.
“Wait, is….is that all?”
“Yes.”
Flora grabbed a broom from nearby, and slowly stuck it in front of monster’s face. As she guessed it, he did not notice her.
“Weird.”
“Quite,” Fotia agreed. Then he grabbed the broom too. “Witness.”
He promptly poked the Torque’s head, to Flora’s contestation. But, it barely reacted to it, until it did, by limply swatting the poking tool away.
“Is young Zamarad with you?”
“Oh yeah, that’s a long story,” she sighed, hands on hips. She seemed already awfully tired. “You know, since we are waiting for the spirits, can I just talk to you? I had a really long day.”
“What about my speech?” Lily asked.
Flora looked at the bat, who was still on the chair.
“I wrote it!” Bobby added.
“Can we do that later, please? I’m waiting for others to come in first. You can tell us then.”
“Okay,” Lily agreed, and climbed down.
While both Flora and Fotia talked, Bobby poked Lily’s hand.
“What a weird day, huh?” he said.
“Yeah.” Lily looked at her paper. “Maybe we could write our birthday speech, how about it? You seem to be good at it.”
“Really? Yeah!” Bobby jumped after some pen and paper that were lying next to him, then got on the floor. Lily sat down next to watch him write, and maybe tell him about spelling like last time.
It was an odd day.
…
Category Story / All
Species Unspecified / Any
Gender Any
Size 120 x 120px
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