Chapter 78
“What are you doing here?” Joel pulled Athena over to a more private area near Arcade Row until he remembered how useless the gesture was due to the cameras. Those damn cameras!
“Well, I did fight one of the strongest metas in the competition for you. I would have thought that earned me a little alone time,” she said seductively. Then she leaned in and pulled his lips to hers and kissed him. “There must be a… Oh! There we go,” Athena, spotting a more private locale, pulled Joel toward the closest unisex restroom. Luck was on her side tonight. If the restrooms weren’t gender-neutral, she would have had to find some other private room, which could be difficult in public places like bars and clubs. A few onlookers took videos of the interaction and quickly posted them to OnyxSocial.
Athena pushed the bathroom door open and led the clueless boy inside, closed the door, and locked it. Then she pulled a small circular device out of her pocket and clicked it twice. “Great,” she sighed, “now we can finally talk privately. It’s been a real beast trying to get you alone and off-camera. “Ariella kept telling me to wait for you to be alone around the Spire, but you are always surrounded by people. How many friends can one person make in a couple of months? I mean, seriously, you are a popular one, aren’t you.” Joel was shocked. Popular? This was a first. But, before he could think any further on the topic, the woman who had just kissed him out of the blue and pulled him into a public bathroom kept talking. Athena was barely inhaling as she chattered on, “Good thing I ran into that sorta bossy girl Cecilia when we were getting off the shuttles back at The Spire, or I wouldn’t have even known where to find you. You guys all came straight here, didn’t you? I would have at least asked for a change of clothes. Anyway, Ariella needs to keep some distance right now, there are some eyes on her at the moment, and your constant surveillance is becoming a hindrance. So she wants me to look after your training for a bit.”
“You…. You just kissed me,” Joel mumbled.
“Huh, please try to keep up. We only have a few minutes before customers come a-knockin’.” Athena shook Joel lightly to jolt him back to reality. “We’ll be able to use the clicker to dampen the cameras sometimes for late-night sessions, but we are going to need an excuse to cover an All-Star and Challenger hanging so much, so I was thinking we should start a fake showmance.” She paused for Joel’s reaction.
Joel was indeed having a hard time keeping up. So far in the competition, he had just been hanging on for dear life and trying, sometimes unsuccessfully, not to fail. Now, here was one of the hottest new Heralds on the scene offering… he wasn’t actually sure what she was offering. “Showmance?” he asked. “I don’t really know what’s going on right now. Can we take a step back, please?”
“Ugh,” Athena grunted, annoyed at having to walk him through this. “Ariella has assembled a group of people to support her goal of getting you into the vacant seat on The Council. Didn’t you think it was odd that The Show announced Horizon as the first All-Star when she was just a State Level Herald, instead of me, a member of the Allied Herald Force?”
That was odd, now that he thought about it. Horizon was high profile, but Olympian was a rising star. While he pondered that question, Athena continued, “I called in a favor to get named to the competition last minute. Flint was over the moon that someone with my profile agreed to be part of his little stunt, giving it extra credibility. But I don’t care about winning. I will earn a spot on The Council someday, no matter what. My goal is to help you win. When we reveal what you really are, it will signal that times are changing and that doors are going to be opening for more metas in general. But specifically, that it will not be just ‘elites’ who will be able to gain the political and actual power of a seat on the most influential team in the world. To make all this happen, we need to get you to the point where you are able to use your, frankly incredible, abilities subtly enough to be effective in these trials, yet not expose your secret… and possibly a whole lot of other people’s secrets.”
As he took in all that Athena was saying, Joel started to realize that this conspiracy stretched a lot further than he realized. He was selfishly ecstatic that someone as powerful as Athena was in his corner. If he took her at face value, she was willing to sacrifice a ton to help him win the Top Seed competition. “Okay,” he nodded after thinking it all through, “So, explain the showmance thing.”
“Oh! Have you never watched ‘Overwatcher’ or ‘Island Champion’? A showmance is like a relationship started on a reality competition show that is both romantic and tactical. Often, it's more tactical than romantic, and in our case, it will be fake romantic and completely tactical. Got it? No funny business. We will keep our PDA innocent and completely P with absolutely no D!”
Joel thought he understood. “I think I get it. I’ll just let you take the lead on that one. But what will the training look like? I mean, how do you think you will be able to help me win this? I’m middle of the pack at best.”
Athena grinned, “Glad you’re finally getting it. We need to get you to a point where you can use other aspects of your Moon powers without getting caught. The first thing we will practice is something you were able to do to a small degree in The Culling: subtle gravity manipulation. We can also spar a little and practice your sleep stuff, but basically, we are gonna turn you into a stealth sniper. Everyone thinks you are a Sleep Precept, so when they start feeling sluggish during a fight or have a slight problem catching their breath when you fuck with the atmosphere around their heads, they won’t see it coming.
A knock sounded on the door just as Joel realized the value in such training. He felt lucky that someone as established as Athena had volunteered to help him.
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“Almost done!” Athena shouted. She then looked Joel dead in the eyes, “Okay, playboy, untuck that shirt and rumple that hair. I don’t want my reputation ruined by you looking bored or nonplussed when we exit.”
Joel made a confused face. His mind had just been thoroughly blown by the information he had just taken in.
Athena glanced at his facial expression, “There we go! I knew you were up to the task.” She pulled the drone dropper out of her pocket and clicked it twice. In minutes, the cameras in the area would be back in action. Ariella’s tech contact, who had created the device, had tweaked this particular one for the night, allowing the radius to be greatly reduced so that the cameras outside the bathroom would operate normally. It also had a shorter knock-out duration. No one needed to know what took place in that restroom that night, especially The Show or his producers. It was imperative that the rest of the footage would be usable. As far as anyone would know, two young hot metas used the opportunity to blow off some steam after a long month of battling, nothing more, nothing less.
When Athena and Joel finally emerged from the public powder room, looking disheveled and relaxed, they noticed a disturbance taking place on the dance floor. A small group of men had encircled Bailey, June, and Ashley, loudly exchanging words.
“Shit,” Athena swore. “I can’t leave you noobs alone for more than a minute without hell breaking loose. What is it with you guys?”
“Can’t tame us wild stallions. We were meant to roam free.” Joel didn’t know where it came from, but his quip made the sportswoman laugh.
“Easy there, champ,” Athena’s banter was interrupted when the voices of the aggressive-looking group of men circling Joel’s friends rose to the point of being heard clearly across the club.
“Don’t you know who she is?” one of the loud voices shouted. “She’s Summerset’s daughter. I’ve seen her in family photos on the news.”
“Of course,” his friend added. “Summerset’s daughter trying to accuse more men of harassment.”
Joel followed Athena as she moved swiftly through the forming crowd. She deftly maneuvered through, shifting when couples closed gaps and softly pushing people's shoulders to angle them in such a way that she and Joel could slide past easily. It was mere seconds before they stood behind one of the encroaching men, and Joel noticed that Jax had approached the confrontation to his left with Bobby, Connor, and Ralph in tow.
“Please,” Bailey pleaded with the obviously inebriated men, “This is causing a scene. Let’s just go our own ways and enjoy the rest of the night.” Joel hoped her words would end the whole ordeal. But that was a pipe dream.
“I thought you liked being the center of attention,” the loudest and tallest of the men spat at Bailey. Joel felt rage building within him. Bailey had protected him in so many ways since the day they met. When his anxiety threatened to overtake him in The Culling, it was her kindness that had soothed his nerves. After every challenge, instead of reveling in her strong performances, she would hang out with Joel to make sure he wasn’t allowing his own failure to overwhelm him. So watching this asshole berate her as she was trying simply to avoid a nasty confrontation made Joel feel uncharacteristically violent. Which was the whole point. This guy wanted a fight. And one of the strong women involved was about to give it to him.
“Hey!” June roared. “Step the fuck back!”
“Yeah? Or what?” The towering aggressor challenged as he stepped forward to crowd Bailey even more.
If Joel had been more experienced with his powers or accustomed to volatile situations at clubs, he might have used his sleep powers to neutralize everyone right then and there. But he hadn’t, so he didn’t. Looking back later that night, he would wonder if he had been asleep at the switch or if he just hadn’t expected everything to escalate so quickly. He suspected that, over time, each of the women would thank him for not taking away her own agency in the matter. Yet, he still ended up feeling like he should have acted because it would have meant avoiding the public spectacle that ensued.
June stepped forward and took a swing at the lumbering antagonist. Her fist connected with his chin, and he dropped to the ground. Joel smiled. Then; Bedlam! Joel saw a few of his friends jump into action as Jax moved in front of a punch meant for June, a retaliation for the knockout uppercut she had just landed on their leader; Bailey elbowed one of the assholes standing behind her; Ashley pushed one of the dudes away from her and toward the bar at the edge of the dance floor; Connor and Ralph both jumped into the action, tag-teaming one of the bigger individuals before he could clobber Ashely; and someone bear-hugged June which forced her to kick wildly at her attacker's shins. For his part, Joel backed away from the brawl and tried to contact someone from The Show’s production team.
Of everyone, Athena was the most effective. She never threw a punch. Instead, she ducked a punch that was meant for her, which instead connected with some fuckwad who was about to grab her from behind. She then dodged an oncoming projectile, an empty beer bottle thrown from the outskirts of the fight, which hit her initial attacker on his forehead, dropping him to the ground. Another man charged at her like a bull, so she shifted her weight to the left, sticking out her leg, forcing him to stumble and get clotheslined by a high-top table. A pool cue swung in her direction, so she limboed under it, allowing it to continue its inevitable swing smack into the man who had tried to bear-hug her moments earlier. The force of the wooden staff knocked him out, and the impact rattled the weapon, causing its wielder to drop it. Athena didn’t even look like she was fighting, just dancing through the melee. Joel marveled at the grace of her movement.
But his attention was abruptly interrupted when a giant man-tortoise parachuted in from a ceiling light fixture, “Bombs awaaaay!’ Samurai Tortoise shouted with glee as he cannonballed right into the middle of the bar brawl, kicked out a roundhouse to give him as much space as he could maneuver, and started punching away. This was weird, but not for the obvious reasons. As far as Joel knew, Ken needed to speak his magical shifting phrase to transform, which would then cause a very noticeable, loud, bright spectacle. But not tonight. Tonight, the Tortoise seemed to have burst through without the typical extravaganza that usually signaled his arrival. Joel would have to reflect on this anomaly later on. At that moment, he had to find someone who could extricate The Challengers from the bar without anyone else getting hurt. But before he could extricate himself from the scrum, he heard a familiar voice come over Arkade’s sound system.
“Ahem!” Bobby cleared his throat and forced some feedback through the speakers. “Everyone calm the fuck down!” Everyone listened for a moment to make sure it wasn’t the cops or Heralds and then, realizing they were safe from arrest or destruction for the time being, snapped back to the scuffle. Chaos took hold. Punches were thrown. Faces were smashed. And then Bobby began singing. “Goodnight, sweetheart, well it’s time to go. Goodnight, sweetheart, well it’s time to go...” His voice was pure and sweet.
Without warning, Joel felt compelled to calm down and walk toward the door of the bar. No longer did he feel the need to protect his friends or find a producer. He just needed to go.
“...I hate to leave you, but I really must say…”
The words of the lullaby spun throughout the club, weaving in and out through bodies on the dance floor. Everyone in the bar dropped what they were holding and, like zombies, did what the song commanded and exited the club peacefully.
“...Goodnight, sweetheart, goodnight.”
The eventful night, and month, had concluded.