The Games Heroes Play (12 page)

TWO HOURS INTO the simulation, Jay found himself still unvisited by either team.  He had already boarded and blocked up all the windows and doors, leaving no way of an enemy getting into the base without a few Titans taking time to unblock something.  Jay figured this
would be good, because he would be able to fire at them from the fourth floor windows while they tried to get in.  The base was a total of four floors high, and the top floor was all one room, making it easy for Jay to run around and check all sides.  He had been meticulous to constantly check the windows for a while, but he was beginning to get tired of standing there all alone.  He was also beginning to feel weaker and slower, and that made him nervous. 
If my abilities go out now, there’d be no way I could hold off an attack.
 

Jay continued to check the windows, this time moving at a fast walk.  He paused when he got to the window that faced north. 
If only there weren’t so many other buildings, I might be able to see some of the other bases,
Jay thought to himself.  As he was looking forward out the window, the corner of his eye caught sight of some movement in the fourth story window of the building across the street, and he ducked out of the way just in time as a paintball flew in, narrowly missing his head.

Jay wanted to see who he was up against, so he moved quickly out of sight to a different window.  As soon as he poked his head out, another paintball flew his way from a different window, and once again he was barely missed.  Jay had been so proud of his plan of blocking all the entrances, planning to rain paintballs on anyone who tried to break their way in, but he never thought that he would be the victim of cover fire.  If they had a Titan down there working on the barricade, it
would not
be long before they could get in if they are not resisted.  Jay ran down the stairs to the first floor to check the barricades, and to his relief they were still there.  From what he could hear from the outside, he could tell there was someone trying to clear rubble from the outside, but without much success.  Jay could tell from the changing position that it was a
Hermes out there trying to clear the rubble, not a Titan.  He felt
better,
as he knew it would take a Hermes a long time to get those heavy object
s
cleared enough for someone to get inside.

Jay ran up to the third floor.  He only had boards over those windows, and he could still see through the cracks between the boards.  He could see two Hermes in the upper windows of the building across the way, each aiming into the two north facing windows of Jay’s base.  He looked around as much as he could see, through the cracks in the boards facing each direction, and it appeared that all that were around were the three Hermes. 
Good, no Titans.
  Jay was a little relieved, although he knew he was still not in a great position.

For a while Jay more or less just waited there.  He would avoid the windows, and from time to time he would hold a board up in front of a window in order to draw off some fire.  He figured if he did this long enough they would begin to run low of ammunition, but Jay soon realized they must have plenty with them, as they showed no signs of running low.  Three hours into the game found Jay still trapped inside the base, with those Hermes firing in at him while another tried to find a way into the base.

Jay went down to check on the progress of the Hermes who was clearing the debris, but when he got there he realized the sounds coming from outside the walls were too loud to be the sounds of moving these items out of the way.  It sounded more like they were just throwing things at the pile.  Jay moved to the second story and looked out through the boarded window, and immediately noticed what the Hermes had been doing.  Instead of clearing the pile, they were making it bigger.  Realizing they
could not
clear a path to the lower entrances, they decided to build the pile up and use it to climb to the second story windows.  Jay hadn’t thought of this
possibility before, and he realized they
did not
need a Titan for that – a Hermes could easily knock a board off of a window.

Where is my team? 
Jay wondered.  Then the range of possibilities began playing through his head. 
Maybe they have already been hit.  Maybe I am the only one left.  Maybe the other team is also defeated, except for these three.  Could this be the final battle?

Jay began to worry that the game might be coming down to him once again.  Once again, he
was not
pleased with his odds.  There were less of them this time, but both his mental ability and his strength were all but ineffective at this point.  The only one of his abilities that he could feel holding strong now was his speed, but that made this a face-off between three Hermes and one Hermes.  Jay moved back to the third floor, and tried to think of a plan.  He decided the best he could do at this point was to fire back, and hope he got lucky.  Jay held up the board, and a few more shots hit it.  Then he lifted a gun so the nozzle was facing out the window and quickly began to fire.  He took care to keep as much of his arm hidden as possible, because he knew a hit would be a hit, and his arm is just as vulnerable as any other part of him.  He fired until that gun was out of ammunition,
then
quickly recoiled his arm back out of sight.  Immediately a few shots followed, coming back in through the window.  He knew those shots were not meant to hit him; they were fired to taunt him.  He had fired wildly, and they were letting him know they had just as much ammunition to burn.  Jay got another gun, and once again he lifted it and fired repeated out the window. 

Half way through his firing, the alarm sounded, signaling the end of the game.  Jay looked down at himself to make sure he hadn’t been hit.  Realizing he was still in the game, he looked out the window.  All three of the invading Hermes
were
still there,
unhit
and eligible.  Jay
realized what must have happened just before the voice came on to announce it.  “The game has
ended,
the green team has captured all four bases.  Please make your way back through the door from which you entered.  Thank you for participating in this year’s simulation games!”

Jay was elated. 
They weren’t defeated after all! 
He thought with relief.  Jay ran down to the second story and pried off the boards from one of the windows.  He looked out at the pile of debris, and realized just how close the Hermes
were
getting to being able to enter.  He jumped out onto the pile, and climbed down to the ground.

As he reached the ground he saw a few of his team mates coming around the corner of a building towards him.  There were three of them there, and they were smiling just as widely as Jay was himself.  He ran over to greet them.

They told Jay that they were the three left from guarding the two middle bases, but that there would be more coming back from the far base.  As they waited for the remainder of their teammates, they told Jay of all that had happened to them.  One Titan, after an assault on his base that left him the last one standing from either team there, decided to create scarecrows to post at the windows.  He explained how the base he was guarding was particularly dark, so he built fake people out of pieces of debris and placed them at every window.  “A few Hermes came by and fired at some of them, but after I returned fire from a different window they ran off
,”
h
e explained with pride.

The other two, a Hermes and a Titan, had managed to hold their base by mere force.  They said they simply fired back at anyone who came, and were able to get the orange players before the orange players got them. 

Jay learned that the middle bases were taken quickly, and once acquired a team of four were left in each of them, while the rest went off to join Hammer for the attack on the last base. 

Jay began to explain his scenario, and how the three Hermes were kept at bay.  While he spoke, the
y noticed a group of four
coming their way.  There was Hammer, leading three more of their team members back.  The pride on her face was radiant, and Jay knew she was satisfied with this win. 

Once they were all together, they began walking back, still swapping their war stories.  Hammer mentioned how they had split the forces in three, with one group making a frontal assault while two smaller groups tried to sneak around the back.  She mentioned how the front group was nearly depleted when they received the reinforcements coming from the center bases.  The sneak attack from the back did not flush them out as Hammer had hoped, but it did trap a large group of them inside, and it was then a matter of picking them off whenever one would get too close to a window.

“They made the same mistake we did, they clumped
,”
Hammer said with excitement.  “When we first arrived a group of them were in a circle in front of the base, and all we needed to do was fire at that circle and we were sure to hit someone.  That gave us a quick man advantage.”

Jay was sorry to see that Duke was nowhere to be found.  He was hoping Duke would be able to see the victory from the inside.  The other Prometheus, who was part of the group who survived from the far base, soon began recounting Duke’s story, and it was not a sad one.  “Duke was on fire out there!  He held up a blanket reading at least twice as long as I’d ever seen him do before, and whenever one of them even thought of poking their head out a window for a shot, he
was ready!  He must have taken out at least six of them on his own.  He would have gotten more if he hadn’t become their main target.  One of them had gotten on the roof, and we didn’t realize there was a way onto the roof, so we weren’t looking there.  The player was able to get a few shots off in Duke’s direction before being noticed.  Unfortunately one of the shots landed.  By that point there were only two of them left in there though, so I think Duke knew we were going to win this
one.
”

Jay
could not
help but wonder what would have happened if he had lost his base.  It appeared that those three Hermes were the last members of the orange team left standing at the end of the game, but if they had gotten him and taken the base, they would have had a good vantage point.  Jay was sure his team would have left some guarding the other bases, so only three or four would remain to try and take this one.

With the excitement all around him, he decided not to think any more about it for the moment.  Once they got outside of the arena, the thirteen members of their team who had been eliminated were waiting still covered in paint, and gave a loud cheer upon their arrival. 

They returned to the dining hall without cleaning up first, and spent the whole night together talking and celebrating.

CHAPTER 12

JAY COULD NOT decide if he regretted the all-nighter they had just pulled once classes began the next morning.  He still felt pretty good, and was glad to have been there to celebrate with them, but he had trouble concentrating on his classes as it was, and skipping a night’s sleep after the stress of the game was not helping.  He sat through his classes out of formality,
then
moved on to get lunch with Michael as he always did.
 

Jay wanted to ask for Michael’s opinion as to why his powers had failed him the day before, but there were constantly people around that Jay
did not
want to overhear.  At this point there were only four teams left, and although the other three are all ranked much higher than they were, that only made them all the more feared.  People seemed to know what to expect from the other three teams – a group of talented Hermes, Titans, and Prometheus, who had trained and organized thoroughly.  With the green team, people were unsure what their story was.  They had now won two games, and the victories were different for each.  The first consisted of their first year recruit outmaneuvering the whole team on his own, and the second saw very little of him, with the rest of the green team overpowering the orange team at every turn.  Jay knew their victory was not as swift as the rumors made it out to be, but Hammer never corrected the tales, so Jay decided he
would not
either.
 

After lunch, they got together for yet another practice.  None of them had slept the night before, and it was beginning to show.  Hammer was the only one who looked fully awake, and with her running the practice, they knew it would not be any lighter
than if they were well rested.

“Before we start, I want to congratulate all of you for a fantastic game yesterday,” Hammer began.  “But now that game is over, as are the celebrations.  Now we need to focus on the next game coming up next weekend.  The two teams we have faced thus far were not bad teams, but now we have only the best teams left ahead of us.  Our next game is against one of the big four, and if we win that, we will most likely be up against the red team in the finals.  We cannot ease up now.  I heard the stories from the groups I was not a part of, but I don’t want stories, I want reports.  What worked well,
and what could we improve on?”

The Titan who had held the east base using scarecrows spoke up.  “Tricking them worked well.  I figured I had the weakest post, so I made it look like the strongest, and they stayed away.  If we can’t outmuscle these team
s, maybe we can outthink them.”

“Outthink Brain?  That would be like a slug trying to outrun a Hermes
,”
Duk
e’s Prometheus friend retorted.

Hammer was not happy with this remark.  “With that attitude we might as well just give up.  Brain is not unstoppable.
What else is there to report?”

“If we start taking a lead, we can’t get cocky.”  It was Duke this time.  Duke was the only one who did not change his shirt after their game the day before, and the big blue paint splotch was clearly visible.  He wore it as a show of pride in their accomplishment.  “I was doing well and I felt invincible, so I wasn’t thinking of maintaining a solid cover.  I got cocky and allowed myse
lf to be too much in the open.”

“Good point Duke, and a great lesson.  We need to remember our first game, where we were all but finished, but the game turned around and we won.  These teams consist of the best students at this school, and they could turn a loss into a win just as easily if we let them.”

Jay raised his hand.  He
did not
want to admit to his shortcoming from the game, but he knew he had to, as part of the team.  “I had a personal prob
lem during the game yesterday.”

“Yes, your mind reading was n
ot functioning properly again.”

“No, it was more than that.  After a while holding the base, all my abilities disappeared.  I could barely run, I felt weak, and I could see nothing at all around me mentally.  I had no idea those Hermes were there u
ntil they began to fire at me.”

The whole group looked at him in partial disbelief.  It was Hammer who finally broke the silence.  “All of them?  Gone c
ompletely?  Are they
back
now?”

“Yes, definitely,” Jay as
sured them, “I feel great now.”

“Good, we need you in top condition if we are going to stand a chance next weekend.  We’ll have to experiment this week to figure out a way to keep your abilities around.  My first assumption is that we’ll need to keep you active.  From what I’ve seen so far, you appear to be in best shape when you are actively using your abilities – maybe we just need to keep you on the offensi
ve line in the next two games.”

Jay could see the rest of the team smiling and nodding at this idea.  They seemed to like the idea of sending Jay against their opponents.  What Hammer said made sense as well; Jay knew that he was at his best when he was pit up against powerful opponents.  Somehow he felt like this was not the answer.  He
did not
always lose his abilities when he
was not
active, in fact he had never lost his abilities since arriving at the school, with the exception of during the games.  He also
did not
always have his abilities while he was active; during the game the previous day, he was still moving around and keeping pace with the game, but his abilities vanished.  Still,
being unable to come up with a better explanation, Jay decided this was probably the best place to start. 

THROUGHOUT THE NEXT week the team practiced rigorously, and Hammer made sure to test Jay’s abilities as they had never been tested before.  She
did not
just keep the tests to practice times either, sometimes she would come up to him in the halls and place a heavy object on him from behind, or say “think fast” and throw objects at him to see if he could catch them in time, or pop up and ask him to quickly tell her what she’s thinking.  She always tried to sneak up on him at these times, but his reading ability was always on track in the halls, so he was always able to see her coming.  By the end of the week, they still had not figured out what caused Jay to lose his abilities, but they did learn one thing.  They learned that he was all around more effective with his abilities when he practiced with a larger group.  The more people he practiced with, the more weight he could lift, faster he could run, and from time to time the picture
s in his head even got clearer.

When the day came for their next game, Hammer had a new plan of action set up.  They were to arrive fifteen minutes before game time outside their designated entrance.  After their pep-talk, Jay was to take off and run laps through the halls of the school, then make his way back when it is one minute to game time.  Jay did as they planned, and for the first time he felt fully functional when they wa
lked through the door to begin.

The arena was dark.  The only light they could see came a short distance in front, where a flashlight on a stand shone down on their supplies.  After a look at their supplies they realized the lights being off was no accident, it was part of the game.  The supplies consisted of ten pairs of night vision goggles, three shovels, a large metal detector, and a picture of a metallic orb.  The object of the game was simple, find the orb and protect it.  According to the directions, once one team finds the orb, they must press a button on it corresponding to their team.  A dim light will go on in the arena corresponding to the team which holds the orb – green if the green team finds the orb, or grey if the grey team does.  A light will also shine down from the roof on the orb that can be visible from any part of the arena, and the light will follow the orb as it is moved about the arena.  If a team can keep control of the orb for
twenty minutes, that team wins.

Team A did not take off right at the beginning this time, but instead waited for Hammer to signal them.  Once the directions were read, Hammer decided she was ready to begin.  “Teams A and F, grab a pair of goggles each and
go scout out the competition.”

Jay was surprised to hear that team F would be going with team A on the scouting trip, but even more surprised when he realized that
he
was team F.  “Me?”

Hammer did not want to waste more time on this.  “Yes, go with them, you are in good shape right now and I don’t want to waste that by
having you stand around.  Go!”

They all grabbed a pair of goggles, and just before they took off Hammer added, “and see if you can get
us some more of these goggles!”

Jay put on his goggles and took off with team A.  He could see now that the arena was set up like a warehouse, with boxes stacked upon boxes all over the place.  Instead of a floor, however, they all sat on plain dirt, similar to that which was used in their first match in the
forest.  They ran along, a little slower than normal but still at a quick pace, with each of the two pairs of scouts on
either side, and
Jay running in the middle.
 

Jay picked up on the trap long before they got to it.  His mind reading was still holding, so he was able to see the thoughts of the four who were waiting for them.
 

“Stop, there’s a trap up ahead
,”
Jay told his team.  He could see that there were two Hermes and two Titans.  They were clearly set up to capture the scouting party, as none of them were making a great deal of effort to block their thoughts, clearly expecting to find just Hermes coming their way.  Jay tried to figure out how to locate them, but all he could see was that they were hiding on top of a pile of boxes, and that the Titans were holding a crate between the two of them that they would trap their captives in.  Jay could not see where they were, but he could tell that their trap would hold
a Hermes well… but not a Titan.

“I’ll go defuse the trap.  I’ll give an all clear when it’s good for you to follow
,”
Jay instructed the four other scouts.  He continued forward at a run, allowing the grey team the opportunity they would be looking for.  Jay knew the trap was coming, but it still surprised him just how fast they were upon him.  He allowed himself to be caught, even though he could easily have fought off the two Hermes who held him.  As they were about to push him into the crate, Jay planted his feet and thrust his arms forward, throwing the Hermes who held him in instead.  He quickly threw the crate door shut, just in time for the two Titans to grab him.  Jay realized he
was not
quite strong enough to just plant his feet and dispel them as he did with the Hermes, so he dropped his feet out from under him, falling onto his back.  As the Titans moved to pin him, he quickly swung his feet in front and underneath them, and kicked out, sending the Tit
ans flying.

“It’s Decathlon!  T
hey sent Decathlon after us!” o
ne of the Titans yelled to the other.  They got up, but instead of running after Jay, they began to run in the other direction.
 

Jay quickly dashed back to where the rest of the scouts were following.  “All clear, we have two Hermes trapped in a crate up ahead, and two Titans running for their lives.  I’m going to catch the Titans before they get back to the rest of grey team and give away our position.”  Before any of the others could respond, Jay dashed off
again, back towards the Titans.

They weren’t difficult to catch up to.  Jay’s adrenaline was pumping, and his speed and strength were at peak condition.  He caught up to them right as they reached a corner of boxes.  “Looks like I have you cornered
,”
Jay said, enjoying his position of power.  He began moving towards them, try
ing to decide how to trap them.

With his focus on his own thoughts, he
did not
notice all the others which were suddenly within range.  They attacked him from behind, grabbing his arms and pulling them behind his back to tie him up.  The one holding his left arm was not strong and he quickly got it loose, but it was soon caught again, this time by a Titan.  His night vision goggles were yanked from his head and he was plunged into darkness.  Jay struggled to keep himself moving, keep himself from being captured.  As he tossed one away, another would grab him from a different direction.  Jay struggled to see, but no matter how hard he strained his eyes, there was no relief from the dark.  With his eyes ineffective, all he had to go by were his mental images.  He could see the thoughts of his attackers, but they were jumbled, and it was difficult to watch and block the advan
ces of more than one at a time.

Then something new happened.  As Jay focused on the pictures, they began to move.  The pictures had moved before, shifting around the collage, changing size and shape as he focused on
different things.  He knew they could move, but this time was different.  As he tried to focus on the subject of the pictures, namely himself, instead of on the pictures individually, they seemed to shift to form a total image of
himself
.  What he was seeing now was a mix from the sights being seen by all of his attackers at once.  Just as they saw him at different angles, Jay found that he now had a 360 degree view of himself as well, and he could shift his view point at his will.  He continued to struggle as he moved his focus from himself to the environment around himself, and sure enough the pictures remained in a tapestry of visions, allowing him to see anything that those around him could see.  The eyes of his attackers did not glow, but it was as if a light were shining from each of them, making all in their line of sight visible in the
light of Jay’s mind.