When Marvin wasn’t watching the tournament or talking to Caroline and Ben, he was thinking about Caroline’s request.

To be their pilot.

When he debated it with himself, his skeptical half always won out. There was no point in risking his life for these people he had just met. There had to be some other form of repayment.

However, when he was sitting with Caroline and Ben at the dinner table, listening to them bicker about the most inconsequential things, hearing how dedicated they were to solving his murder, he often thought, Maybe piloting won’t be so bad.

The day after Mecha Realm ended, Ben and Bob exchanged a few messages and decided on a time and place to meet: 7PM tomorrow, Sibao Pot, table 4E.

Sibao Pot was a hotpot restaurant in Nagatown. It was usually jam packed and crazy loud, making it a good meeting spot.

Naturally, Marvin, Caroline, and Ben took precautions. During Mecha Realm, Caroline had acquired a robot body for Marvin and had fixed it up as best she could. It was a simple factory bot: blocky limbs, slow responsiveness, and next to no flexibility. But when Marvin took his first step in that thing, he felt like he was flying.

Marvin would wear a cloak and hood and pretend to be Ben’s cyborg friend at the meeting. If Bob said or did anything suspicious, Marvin would fire a smoke grenade hidden in his arm. A little extreme and illegal, but “100% necessary,” according to Caroline.

The three of them took the shuttle into Nagatown, then Ben and Marvin headed to Sibao Pot on foot while Caroline waited at the parking garage.

Even though his steps came one second later than he expected them to, walking through the streets of Nagatown was pure bliss for Marvin. Being able to rotate his head and see layers of society above him, to move his arms and brush the holoads in front of stores, to watch his feet cover patches of luminescent water at a time…

“I’ve always wondered,” Ben began as they made their way down Gina Street. “Why is the water glowing? Is it polluted?”

“My uncle said it’s because they put rocks in the aqueduct,” Marvin replied.

“Rocks don’t glow.”

“These are special rocks.”

“Ooh, special rocks,” Ben said, waving his arms around.

They stopped at an intersection as a stream of hoverbikes passed. No one drove cars in Megacity 14; all transportation was done on bikes, subways, and monorails. Some people also rollerbladed but they were seen as a nuisance.

Across the block, the neon sign of Sibao Pot poked out from the cluttered row of shops. When Marvin and Ben walked inside, it was as if they had put on a pair of tinted glasses. Everything was a shade of red, and the air was cloudy with steam. Compartments in the ceiling opened up and robot arms delivered trays of raw food and sauces to dozens of tables. The opposite wall was made of glass, giving way to a mini aquarium. An avalanche of noise crashed into Marvin’s robotic ears.

There was only one open table, marked with a hologram that displayed two large symbols: 4E.

“You been here before?” Ben asked.

Marvin shook his head. “I’m not from this area. Have you?”

“Once. Didn’t eat anything, though.”

“Why?”

“I don’t like hotpot.”

“So you just watched everyone else eat?”

“Yup.”

Marvin and Ben took their seats at one booth of table 4E. The opposite booth was vacant; they had arrived five minutes early. The table was made of sleek black marble, and in its center sat a fat pot of boiling water.

The holographic 4E shrunk to Marvin’s eye level and split into four menus, two for each side of the table. Ben immediately began tapping on random items.

“What are you doing?” Marvin asked in alarm.

“I’m hungry, man,” Ben replied.

“You said you didn’t like hotpot, like, two seconds ago,” Marvin said.

“Did I now?” Ben kept ordering food.

“Are we gonna pay for this?”

“Nah, Bob invited us.”

“Not to dinner!”

At that moment, a pair of shadows crossed over them. Marvin looked up to see Bob and Sienna Lee standing there.

Ben’s finger hovered above the menu, frozen in shock. Marvin nearly fired the smoke grenade in his right arm. Why was Sparrow’s pilot here?

Just act cool, he told himself. We’re not here to talk to famous pilots.

Bob and Sienna slid into their seats and Sienna gave a small wave to Ben and Marvin. Bob smiled, evidently seeing their reactions.

“I guess I don’t need to introduce my girlfriend.”

“What?!” Ben said.

For a second, Marvin felt his respect for Bob dip. Had the man brought Sienna along just to show off?

No, Marvin realized. She was probably here for the same reason as him: protection. All good mech pilots were well versed in martial arts.

Bob gestured to Sienna and explained, “She was the first person I told my theory to. She is a firm denier, however.”

“Why are you here then?” Ben asked her.

“I like hotpot. And I wanted to see if you guys were real,” Sienna responded. “And you know, if there was sabotage… which I don’t think there was… I’ve gotta watch out for my team, too.”

Marvin wondered how many other teams Bob had told his theory to, and whether spreading the word was a good thing. Bob obviously knew the risks—You wouldn’t kill me in this holy sanctum, would you?

“I see you’ve brought a friend, too,” Bob told Ben.

“Oh yeah, this is Steve,” Ben said. “He’s a cyborg and his voice box is a little broken right now.”

Marvin nodded and clumsily waved hello with the arm that didn’t contain the smoke grenade.

Bob frowned. “I swear you were talking when we got here.”

“Okay, you got me,” Ben said. “He’s just really shy in front of strangers. Especially celebrities.”

Marvin glared at him. I know that, Ben. You don’t have to say it out loud.

Bob chuckled. “Don’t worry Steve, Sienna got all her serial killer tendencies out during Mecha Realm.”

Marvin glared at Ben again. Why the hell did you name me Steve?

“I do not have tendencies,” Sienna muttered, one hand drumming the table and the other scrolling through the holographic menu.

“Why do you kill so many mechs?” Ben asked. This year, she had gotten 42 kills, twice as many as Ninth Gen and ten more than The Everlancer.

“It’s fun!” Sienna replied. “Isn’t that why everyone mech-fights?”

“Serial killer,” Bob said.

“I don’t wanna hear it from you, Robert.”

Just then, a robot arm descended from the ceiling and dumped some red powder into the pot. Not even a second later, it placed a silver tray of raw meat at the edge of the table.

Sienna and Ben lunged for the tray, stopped halfway, then awkwardly tried to let the other take it.

“Guys, wait for the soup base to dissolve,” Bob said. He pressed his fingers together. “Anyways, Ben, Steve, I’ve delayed long enough. You want to know what happened to Saberstar.”

Ben pursed his lips and nodded. Marvin subtly craned his neck forward.

“You guys obviously know Marvin Yao. He’s the youngest person ever to qualify for Mecha Realm, so of course, putting an eighteen-year-old’s brain through that much stress usually doesn’t turn out well. But Team Saberstar never made any statements about Marvin’s health before the Gammagrade fight. I know Marvin is a bit reclusive, but he did an interview a week before Gammagrade and he seemed fine. There’s no evidence that he shorted his brain.” Bob leaned in and lowered his voice. “I think the Manhunters bribed them.

“They haven’t had any success with their mech, and it looks like they’re in financial trouble with all the police they’ve bought. Two weeks before Gammagrade, there were rumors that they were encroaching on Sawblade territory. Look at them now—some people are even saying they’ve annexed the Sawblades. I don’t think it’s much of a stretch to say they wanted to use Gammagrade to make it far in Mecha Realm and win some big money.”

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“Why didn’t they just use Saberstar or the other two mechs that qualified?” Ben asked.

“Saberstar and Cinderbot are independent, and Legionnaire is owned by Ainsel AI,” Bob replied. “Taking over any of them would be illegal, but the Hosaka Roundtable has no jurisdiction over affairs between gangs. Gammagrade was the safest investment.

“And one final piece of evidence: last week-”

There was a loud splash as Sienna dumped the tray of meat into the pot.

Bob stared at her for a second before continuing, “Last week, during Mecha Realm, my engineer said he heard the Manhunters talking about Saberstar. Something about paying their dues. I assume they were talking about the bribes they paid Marvin and his team.”

Bribes. If only it were that simple.

Marvin felt good, though. Based on all that, there was a very high chance the Manhunters were the culprits; they had just taken more drastic measures than Bob thought.

“Yeah yeah, the Manhunters are evil,” Sienna said. She turned to Ben and Marvin. “Has Theo said anything that… you know, proves any of this?”

Marvin’s mechanical joints tensed up. According to Caroline, the last thing Theo and the team had said had confirmed the contrary.

“We haven’t talked to him since he made that statement,” Ben said. “Something seemed off, though.”

“And you guys have no way of contacting him?” Sienna asked, narrowing her eyes skeptically.

“Sisi, he never said they were best friends,” Bob said. He turned to the others. “How well do you know Theo? If you don’t mind me asking.”

“He mentored us at a programming camp,” Ben replied. “That’s it.”

“Did he leave an email or anything?”

Ben shook his head.

For Marvin, that could not be farther from the truth. He could give Bob Theo’s Network ID right now. It was far safer than visiting Theo himself, and, with Bob being the middleman, it could result in all the evidence needed to convict the Manhunters.

But if the Manhunters were watching Theo, he and Bob would both be in danger. If Marvin was responsible for their deaths… he didn’t want to think about it.

Funnily enough, a week ago he would’ve shared Theo’s NID without a second thought. Perhaps Caroline was rubbing off on him.

“So, Robert,” Sienna said. “What you’re saying is, you dragged me here just so we could have hotpot with your new friends.” She maintained her stern look for a moment, then broke into a grin. “This is great!”

Bob sighed and rubbed his forehead.

For some reason, it had not occurred to Marvin that they would actually be eating dinner. He suddenly began to panic. This was going to be incredibly awkward; he had no idea what to say to these strangers, especially the one who held the Mecha Realm kill record, and he could not pretend like he was preoccupied by eating.

A table diagonal to theirs cleared out and its holoplayer burst to life, displaying 5D. Marvin took this chance to ask, “Can I get some fresh air?”

“Steve!” Ben hissed.

Oh right, I have the smoke grenade. As if these guys are gonna try to kill us.

But Marvin remained in his seat, for Ben’s sake.

In time, four bowls of sauce and many more trays of food descended onto the table. Marvin watched as the others savored slices of pork belly and rice cakes and other delectable treats that he remembered the taste of all too well. He felt a grumble in his phantom stomach.

Fortunately, the conversation was quite nice. They talked about mechs and vacation spots in Megacity 14 and shared a few life stories. With Ben at the helm, Marvin never had to talk more than he was comfortable with, but the others also involved him just enough to where he didn’t feel left out. Bob and Sienna were extremely friendly, but sometimes they would just look at each other for no reason as if sharing a telepathic joke. That gave Marvin a bit of an existential crisis.

If I’m a robot forever, I’ll never have anything close to a girlfriend.

But that was just a passing thought. The real crisis presented itself when a new group of people came to sit at table 5D.

Marvin recognized all five of them straight away: Max, Charlie, Tasien, Grover, and Peter. They were his best friends in high school; Peter went to college nearby, so it made sense that he would invite the gang to this place.

He would’ve invited me, too. Marvin tried to hear what they were saying, but the table was too far away. Did they miss him? Or were they angry that he’d seemingly abandoned them for his mech team?

Marvin gradually drifted away from Ben, Bob, and Sienna and began observing his friends in the corner of his periphery. That was the convenient thing about his cameras—his entire field of view was crystal clear.

The world seemed to slow a bit. Every laugh, every turn of a head, every scoff, every playful shove… Marvin saw it all, then he saw it again. Something so familiar yet unreachable.

Marvin knew it was bound to happen at some point, but seeing this fragment of his past was a gut punch all the same. Here he was, sitting mere feet away, completely unrecognizable. Disregarding how unsafe it was, would they even believe him if he told them who he was? Of course he could say something only Marvin would know, but…

Am I even Marvin anymore? Maybe I’m just a clone of his consciousness.

After a bit, his friends began looking in his direction, but not at him. What did he expect when he was sitting with Sparrow’s pilot?

The five of them began whispering excitedly. Eventually, Max and Charlie got up and shuffled over to Marvin’s table.

Marvin instinctively lowered his gaze. It would be so easy to say something, just a quick, “Hi Charlie, hi Max,” to catch them off guard. Then he could explain who he was and make up some lie about why he was a cyborg.

Max and Charlie stopped a few feet away from the table. They gave Marvin an inquisitive glance, but quickly turned their attention to Sienna.

“Excuse me,” Max said. “Are you Sienna Lee?”

Of course she is.

“Of course she is, you idiot,” Charlie said.

Shut up, Charlie.

“Shut up!” Max hissed.

Sienna looked up, her cheeks swollen with food, and nodded once.

Say something! Marvin’s head shouted. They’re right there!

But he couldn’t.

Max cleared his throat. “We were, uh, wondering if we could get a picture with you?”

“Yeah, sure,” Sienna said with a smile. She stuffed two more rice cakes in her mouth, then slid out of the booth. Max and Charlie led her to their table.

“Marvin, you okay?” Ben asked.

Marvin turned to him. “Yeah, why?”

“I dunno, just checking.”

That was a strangely gratifying answer.

Nothing else about the past few minutes had been gratifying, though. Marvin had all but made his decision to be anonymous. The line between his old and new life had been drawn.

Millions of thoughts swirled in his Core, but one eclipsed all the others: I need to get out of this robot.

He considered how far he had come already with the help of Ben and Caroline. Caroline in particular—she had done all the planning and had taken so many precautions. But despite all that, Marvin still hadn’t figured her out. What exactly made her care so much?

He decided that he would confront her tonight.

When dinner was finished and Marvin, Ben, Bob, and Sienna got up to leave, Marvin approached Bob.

“I actually know Theo’s NID.”

Ben gave him a shocked look but said nothing.

Bob blinked. “You’re not joking?”

Marvin recited the sequence of numbers and letters. Bob hastily took out his tablet and jotted them down.

“Please don’t tell him about us,” Marvin said.

Bob nodded and offered him and Ben a smile. “It’s good that you guys are being careful. But I hope Sienna and I have proven ourselves trustworthy.”

“One hundred-percent,” Ben said. “By the way, who’s paying for this?” He gestured to the table.

“Who do you think?” Bob said. He jabbed his thumb at Sienna. “She won ten million dollars last week.”

Sienna’s face went red. “It was only two million! Our team split it!”

“Sorry, only two million,” Bob said.

Ben laughed. “I appreciate it, Ms. Lee. If Theo says anything, let us know.”

“Of course,” Bob said.

With that, the two duos parted ways.

-----

That night, Ben took the shuttle and left to sleep at his friend Renee’s apartment. He’d stay there for a week, then he would bring her over. Renee was their programmer, and she had been with her family the past week watching Mecha Realm.

“Why didn’t you and Ben stay with her last week?” Marvin asked Caroline. He was leaning against a nearby worktable as Caroline assembled a mech chassis.

“Not enough rooms,” Caroline replied. “And someone needs to make sure this workshop doesn’t get robbed.”

Marvin watched as Caroline screwed part of a shoulder bone onto the mech’s upper-body. The metal parts fit together perfectly. Engineers usually bought pre-built chassis, but Caroline seemed to know what she was doing. She had explained that she was trying to replicate Saberstar’s nimble frame, which allowed for maximum maneuverability and responsiveness. However, she added a few bits of plating here and there to make it more durable; after all, Marvin’s life was now on the line.

After attaching the other shoulder bone, Caroline removed her face shield and turned to Marvin.

“You know you can shut yourself off now, right?” she said with a smile.

Marvin knew. In fact, having a designated sleep button was one of the only benefits about being a robot.

“I just… want to talk about something,” he replied. “I can wait till you’re done.”

Caroline put her face shield on the table. “It’s alright, we can talk now.”

Marvin nodded and took a deep, imaginary breath. This didn’t catch him off guard, as he’d been planning the conversation for hours. The words were ridiculously scripted, but they were firmer than anything Marvin had ever said.

“I really appreciate everything you’ve done. But what exactly do you want?”

Caroline sighed as if she had been expecting this question. “I want you to pilot for us. Even if we get your body back and find your old teammates, I want you to pilot for us this year and take us to Mecha Realm. Just this one year. We’ll do everything possible to protect you when you’re fighting.” Caroline gave a thin smile. “I know I’ve been blatantly guilt-tripping you, so you have no obligation to say yes.”

“What do you want at Mecha Realm?” Marvin asked.

“Ben and Renee need money,” Caroline explained. “They came from a pretty rough place, and they’re in a lot of debt.”

Marvin wondered what that could entail, but he’d have time to ask Ben later. At the moment, he wanted to know about Caroline.

“What about you?” he asked.

Caroline seemed to shrink away, as if she were ashamed of her answer. Her eyes flickered down and she began tapping her index finger and thumb together.

Then she stopped and steadied her hands.

“I want to win,” she said. “I want the world to see us on that podium.”

Such a simple motivation, and yet Caroline said it with so much conviction that Marvin almost believed it.

“Are you still gonna help me if I say no?” Marvin asked.

Caroline pursed her lips. “I don’t know. I think so. You’ve become our friend.”

I think so. That was how Marvin knew she was telling the truth.

“I’ll do it,” he said.