“Down!”
The referee revived Rafiq where he fell, where the grassy hill sloped into the edge of the arena, the ground wet with puddles of mud. La Vague looked down on him from the top of the hill, backlit by the streetlight shining down on the park bench.
Rafiq clenched his shaking fists, seething behind his grit teeth. It wasn’t working. If he lost another round, it would all be for naught — all the planning and preparation.
Vague popped her neck side to side while his eyes scanned the puddles of water all over the arena and in the grass. Carmen helped him map out her abilities earlier in the day, and their observations proved true. As a Zoner, she fired projectiles of water, and from any puddle of water, she could summon clones to grab him or geysers, too, in case he tried jumping in.
“Round two! Ready?”
Rafiq tensed his muscles, preparing to run. Even if he had the downhill disadvantage, his strategy didn’t change.
“Fight!”
He needed to get close.
Rafiq bolted forward, but, hands seized his ankles on his next step. He had run into another puddle, and a transparent, watery clone of Vague grabbed him by the ankles. A second one shot from the ground, punching him in the stomach. He stumbled backwards into another puddle, where a third clone waited to send him to the dirt with another low hit.
Rafiq scrambled in the mud, but the moment he rose, a quick Dripshot sent him rolling back down the hill, inches away from the boundary once again.
He clenched his muddy fists, tongue curling with venom — she had to only be fighting so hard to compensate for her crooked-ass wig. But, Mr. Stone’s words echoed through his mind, louder than the faint ticking of the round’s clock.
You lack awareness for low attacks, and your aggression blinds you.
It’s up to you to grow past his version of your life.
His words lifted the fog from his mind. He was so angry, he hadn’t even realized he was standing in a rare patch of dry grass. Rafiq straightened his stance, taking a deep breath. Blind aggression would get him nowhere. He was so focused on himself, on what was natural, that he forgot to take full advantage of his plan.
Down. Back.
He stepped back and extended his hand, summoning a spare dodgeball in his offhand. As Carmen explained, Vague had a simple flowchart. If he was far away and standing on water, she’d strike with Dripclones and Dripgeysers. But, if he wasn’t on water, she'd spam Dripshots.
Down. Forward.
Sure enough, Vague crouched and thrust her shimmering palms forward, firing another quick ball of water. Holding his spare dodgeball, Rafiq crossed his arms, blocking, advancing a step.
Down, Forward!
On her second shot, he lobbed a new dodgeball of his own. It collided with the Dripshot with a wet slap, neutralizing the projectile before he threw his offhand dodgeball, too.
That was Carmen’s idea, too — with the first dodgeball, he could neutralize her projectiles before quickly throwing a second to apply pressure. Vague swiped upwards, summoning a Dripgeyser shield to block his projectile.
She was busy. Distracted. She couldn’t summon clones to drop him from closing the distance, dashing up the muddy hill. He rolled underneath her desperate final Dripshot before finally reaching the sidewalk at the top of the hill — fair ground.
Vague backpedaled. Rafiq twitched into a high punch. She took the bait, crouching into a sweep. Easily, Rafiq blocked and punished with a lunging knee to her jaw. He followed up with an elbow, finishing the combo with a Spinning Hook Kick.
His heel smashed against her nose, taking a combined quarter of her health. Blood trailed from her nostril as she raised her guard against his blockstring. His final jab left him barely a foot away. She opened her palms. Rafiq lunged backwards, dodging her attempted throw.
He raised his own open palms, as if punishing her missed throw with a throw of his own. As Carmen observed, against throws, Vague would always try to neutralize them. Vague watched his movements. Even a blind man could tell she was waiting to grab his hands to cancel his throw.
A throw was never the plan.
At the last moment, he closed both fists and planted them into her solar plexus. Hitstun left her paralyzed and defenseless as she gasped for air, open for a combo. He followed a few kicks with a dodgeball throw, freezing Vague in hitstun once more, extending his devastating punish.
Desperate after his last kick, Vague let out a shrill scream before backpedaling, crouching, and lunging back towards him. Rafiq gasped, recognizing her inputs a breath later.
Back. Down. Forward.
Vague fired a Dripshot from barely two feet away. He pivoted behind her, grabbing her shoulders before throwing her to the concrete and stomping right on her stomach for the final blow.
“Down!”
Rafiq jumped away from her unconscious body, shouting in excitement, pointing a finger into the sky — where he hoped the Jazz Hands Insurance representatives were watching his victory. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a physical crowd to watch, aside from La Vague’s boyfriend scowling from the sidelines.
Yet, Rafiq couldn’t wipe the grin off of his face. “Sorry about your girlfriend, man. I just got too much riding on her downfall.”
It was the truth — but it wasn’t just about him. He wasn’t gonna let himself act from the selfishness Coach had set him towards. No, he had to win for the sake of all the help and advice from Mr. Stone and Carmen. They got him here. He couldn’t let it all be for nothing.
La Vague brought herself to her feet, wiping the blood away from her nose. “I must admit, you’re the first to have gotten past my zoning.”
“Don’t congratulate me,” Rafiq said. “Thank my friends.”
“No. This isn’t a congratulation,” she snapped, glaring at him with eyes of venom. “And that isn’t my boyfriend.”
“Huh?”
“Final round! Ready?”
Vague grit her teeth, clenching her fists tightly, breaking her dignified fighting stance from before. “He was supposed to be my husband right now. I was supposed to be his wife. But you ruined it!”
“Fight!”
The plan said she was supposed to fire Dripshots if he was standing on dry ground. It said she would always try to keep him at bay.
But, the plan didn’t have an answer for her rushing right at him, riding a wave of water, her scaly leg aimed for a low kick. Rafiq’s heart skipped a beat. He blocked her low attack, but she guarded against his retaliating high punch.
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Hands gripped him by the ankles. Her slide had left a puddle of water behind, and a clone kept him in place. Rafiq didn’t even have time to gasp — her fist welted his face.
“I was supposed to be a wife right now!”
HItstun kept him paralyzed, unable to do anything as she continued her combo and ended it with a Dripshot to his stomach, launching him back into another puddle in the grass. A Dripgeyser shot him upwards. Vague jumped to meet him in the air, knocking him into the concrete.
With half of his health now gone, pain racked through Rafiq’s entire body. Rafiq nearly lost his balance trying to get back up, but he had to weave and block her aggressive attacks, drawing ragged breaths.
“This was gonna be our moment, but you ruined it, child! This is unforgivable!” she screeched.
Rafiq’s arms shook from the pain and the scrapes along his skin. He put her words out of mind, racking his brain for what the plan said about her combo game. Did she prefer high attacks? Lows? Did they talk about if she relied on mixups?
He’d backpedaled into another puddle. A clone grabbed his legs, holding him in place as Vague shuffled back and forth.
Left, Right, Down, Back, Forward, Right.
“You belong at the bottom of the ocean!” she screeched, eyes gleaming blue.
The pool of water below his feet glowed, too, and more clones of her appeared, matching her fury, pulling him down into the puddle itself as it darkened.
Rafiq drew a final breath before they pulled him under. Water surrounded him in every direction as a hazy cobalt blackness. It swirled and bubbled through his ears; the puddle they came from was gone, but he still flailed his arms trying to swim towards the light above.
La Vague had become a torpedo. She sped towards him, her legs transformed into a full fish tail, with long blood-red talons instead of fingers.
“Unforgivable!”
Her claws slashed at his ribs as she flew past, and crimson leaked into the frigid water around him.
“Unforgivable!”
Her shrill voice was everywhere. Rafiq tried to block where he heard her, but she struck him from behind, bashing him over the head, sending him into a tumble. Again and again, she attacked from every direction and slashing at his uniform, pounding at his body. Rafiq desperately held onto his final breath as the void of oxygen grew in his chest — could he survive if he held it long enough?
Vague came for his neck next, clasping her claws around his throat. She squeezed. Bubbles rushed from his lips, and the sharp pain followed it as water rushed into his mouth, into his chest, into his lungs. His muscles themselves were being ripped apart from the inside, and every gasp for desperate air only brought more pain.
“Unforgivable!”
He was still losing. He tried to curb his aggression, tried to fight his anger and be more tactical, fought to be more selfless and not give into the impulse to spout insults. He tried to reject Coach’s teachings, and follow Mr. Stone’s words.
But he was still losing.
Rafiq saw Coach’s raised hand before it cracked across his face. He saw his mouth sputtering with spit as Coach screamed at him. He saw La Vague, eyes full of pure hatred before blackness consumed his vision.
And he fought back. Rafiq kicked off of the door of death and clutched onto his final breath, thrusting at Vague’s throat, kicking her in the chest and stomach. He wouldn’t die here. He couldn’t. He wasn’t this pathetic — he wasn’t her. Underneath that cool exterior, she was all fury and anger, and he was better than that.
He wouldn’t die here.
Rafiq blinked. He laid on the sidewalk, sprawled out on his stomach, gasping desperately for air. His heart pounded in his chest, and before he could even comprehend, La Vague kicked him in the face, sending him rolling several feet away.
He didn’t die. Fighting back kept him alive long enough to survive her ultimate at only a quarter of health, bleeding like a wet rag. Water dripped from the open slash wound at his side and across his ankle, intensifying the pain.
Tears slipped down his cheeks.
“Do you feel that agony? That pain? You’ve cost me a once in a lifetime opportunity,” La Vague shouted. “This is a fraction of what you’ve done to my heart!”
Despite her words, despite the pain making every movement a chore, his heart rate calmed with an inner peace, cool like the ocean itself.
The answer wasn’t to reject either of their teachings.
“Die like the maggot you are, boy! Dripslide!”
As La Vague rushed towards him, coasting on an entire wave of water, Rafiq chuckled, blood seeping into his smile.
His tactical mind kept him in the game. His instinctual aggression kept him alive.
He didn’t need to only pick one lane.
La Vague jumped off of her wave and flew in for a high kick. Rafiq raised his guard and, from the depths of his heart, shouted through the pain.
“Burst!”
His transparent guard became a solid blue shield, and as La Vague’s foot made contact, the Guardburst launched her into the air. He leaped after her, continuing his combo with two kicks into the ground.
One side of his mind worked to predict her next move, but he listened to the other — to the urge to fight. He lunged straight towards her, dashing out of a puddle of water where a Dripclone missed its grab. Vague defended herself against his blockstring, but a quick dodgeball throw kept her in blockstring long enough for him to sweep her off of her legs.
Down. Up. Kick.
“Kodeup Chagi!”
One to the ribs, one to the head, both an EX special move that decimated her health. Vague stumbled to her feet and screamed, thrusting into a high punch, but Rafiq ducked past and returned a Spinning Hook Kick.
Vague’s stance swayed. She slid away on a wave of water, her health as low as his. Rafiq’s mind switched gears once again — she was retreating to her familiar flowchart to protect herself from losing. He dashed towards her, dodging a Dripgeyser from one puddle, rolling underneath a Dripshot from straight ahead.
She’d positioned herself behind a puddle, putting it between them, and the flowchart predicted her aiming for a Dripgeyser. But, this time, Rafiq jumped right into it. He crossed his arms in front of his face, and the Dripgeyser blasted against his guard, sending him soaring into the air.
Rafiq switched gears again. He took happiness in the moment, in the rushing wind and pounding adrenaline of battle, and raised his fist to the moon, drawing back for a punch. La Vague glared up at him, preparing to block.
But he never planned on attacking on the way down.
Down. Back.
Rafiq landed in front of her and summoned an offhand dodgeball before sweeping her off of her feet, striking back to back before ending his combo by throwing a second dodgeball. She froze in place, open to eat a second combo of attacks.
And he ended the second with another dodgeball throw, chaining a third combo into the mix, ending it all with a final kick to her chin. La Vague flew backwards and rolled down the hill, out of the boundaries, and into the lake.
“K.O.!”
“Céline! No!”
While her fiance sprinted down the hill to follow, the referee raised Rafiq’s hand into the air, bringing a wave of healing with her familiar cold, mechanical touch. “Rex wins!”
A menu blinked into existence in front of him, showing his results. His A Class tag burned away, revealing a new S Class rating and his new rank, just barely below one million. Plus, with a performance like that, there was no way they’d kick him out of the program.
Rafiq beamed, looking up at the moon, hoping his parents were watching. But, below, La Vague dragged herself out of the lake. Though her physical wounds were healed, her boyfriend still helped her up.
“You don’t understand the connections I have, boy,” she snapped. “Never trust the ocean again. Never! My father will make sure your next boat ride will be your last.”
“So? Are you gonna rematch me for your rank back?”
“I—”
“Céline, please!” Her boyfriend cut her off. “You can find someone else to fight tomorrow. This was supposed to be our night.”
He mumbled more in her ears, and the anger in La Vague’s expression faded, though she still looked at Rafiq with fading scorn.
Was that how I used to look at people? For real?
“Fine,” she spat. “Keep your rank, boy. Just avoid the ocean.”
Rafiq smiled, nodding. “Thanks, La Vague. You really showed me somethin’ I’d never learn on my own. Y’all have a good night.”
And with that, he turned and continued down the park sidewalk. It was the truth. She showed him his only path towards greater strength. He couldn’t let his anger blind him, unless he wanted to be as nasty as her. He couldn’t strictly rely on instinct or on his mind, either; he had to balance both.
But, he wouldn’t learn how to do any of that on his own. Rafiq smiled again at the moon, hoping Daniel and Carmen were having the same success.