The colosseum floor lurched and broke into sections. Structures rose and fell. Elora’s sniping platform dropped out from beneath her. She took 20 points of falling damage. My whole chest squeezed tight. I couldn’t breathe. Jake was knocked upward onto a rising slab. Fig tumbled from her cover, exposed in a suddenly clear swatch of field.

  A new water hazard cracked open beneath Frag and the centaur, too large for Robot Boy to have a chance to make it to the edge before he fell in. Akilah’s fingers squeezed tighter.

  “Where the hell was his Environmental Alert?” I snapped, chopping my free hand at the screen. “It’s like he saw it, but the others didn’t.”

  Akilah tore her gaze from the screen to look at me, eyes widening. She looked back, her expression smoothing when the truth hit. Her voice was soft but heavy. “They need you to be able to see it.”

  “Me?” The answer kicked me in the head a second later. I’m team leader. I’m like the router for the team. Without me, they were unable to party talk, coordinate, or see each other’s effects and damage. They’ve been hamstrung. My shoulders slumped.

  Elora lay still—then rolled up to stagger to her feet. She stumbled toward the pillar Jake ended up on, darting around it to climb away from enemy fire. Jake’s HP went up. He’d taken a moment to jab himself in the arm, then crawled on his belly to the edge of the platform to look out.

  Fig was exposed. She staggered to her feet and started toward the nearest blind, arms and legs pumping. A plasma bolt seared past her. The drow sprinted at an angle for her, crossbow up. The enemy archer let off a volley of arrows from beside their new sniper’s pillar. Fig veered away, but her momentum put her close to one of the arrows. She was caught in the crossfire of exploding arrows and plasma bolts.

  Jake’s raw, wordless cry stabbed into me. He saw it. Of course he did.

  The little songbird got wrecked in seconds. The demon monk appeared to finish her off with a brutal flurry of fists. When Fig's HP bar reached zero, Elora and Jake unleashed hell on the monk. The demon triggered [Chronostep Evasion] to escape, robes smoking, pulling silver arrows from its flesh. On its screen, everyone else became caught in slow motion, moving at a near still-frame rate that slowly sped up and snapped back into sync with the monk.

  Water churned in the center of the arena as the centaur slashed its massive blade at Frag. The cyborg kicked and dove, rifle in both hands. I hissed in response as the thick, flat blade slashed into one of Frag’s legs, striking the gleaming metal bone. Frag sank like a stone. His HP dropped another ten points.

  Beside me, Akilah let out a strained squeal and bit her lip. On Frag’s camera, bubbles swirled in blue water as he swam deeper. He rolled, aiming up at the big, muscled body above. [Weapon Mutation: Environmental Adaptation]

  Plasma carved through the pool, leaving a sizzling tunnel, a brief glowing tube of heated vapor, before the water slammed back into itself. The centaur warrior roared on impact, glanced down into the water. He thrashed his four equine legs, while his human arms reached for the edge of the pool.

  Fig’s lifeless body was getting to me. It just lay there in a puddle of blood. Lifeless. I reminded myself she’d be back and forced myself to focus on the others.

  Jake and Elora had no cover, only height. The Explosives archer climbed the backside of the opposite platform. I willed them to burn the dark elf and the monk down before they were threatened by the archer’s explosive rounds again. They’d fired a few shots at the centaur, but Jake switched to the monk, yelling at Elora to do the same.

  The black-clad elf crept closer to our platform, right beneath their eyes. My jaw clenched. The monk, time shenanigans on cooldown, sprinted for the platform. Elora clipped him anyway. Jake put a few more holes in his fancy twink robe. Good.

  Frag stayed underwater, aiming for the centaur’s unprotected belly again. Whoom! The vapor tunnel flashed blue and slapped shut again. The centaur jerked and roared, scrambling harder to get out. The tanky brute sat heavy at 70 HP. I growled, “C’mon Triumph Cannon. Proc already!”

  “He has to get in five good hits before it procs. He has twenty seconds left before Perfect Paralax comes off cooldown,” Akilah supplied, watching with the same breathless suspense I was.

  The rifle’s too slow. A faster fire rate would push his abilities to proc more quickly. I slid a glance at Akilah. Maybe that was one of their ‘genius projects.’

  Frag fired off another round and then kicked off the bottom of the pool, leaving streamers of his weird, pale blood behind him. The centaur scrambled onto the lip, still straining to get its bulk out of the water. Frag hauled himself up and out in one smooth motion, twisted, and aimed, but held his finger on the trigger.

  “What is he waiting for!” I yelled, leaning toward the viewscreen.

  Frag squinted one eye closed and braced the rifle against his unwounded shoulder. His finger tickled the trigger. Just as the centaur got its hind legs on the lip and thrashed up out of the water hazard, the monk darted past. [Weapon Mutation: Triumph Cannon]

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  The glowing lines on his skin detached from his arms and neck like wayward veins, threading to lock into the weapon. The muzzle flared, blooming a blue flower of death that rocketed toward the centaur, engulfing it for -30 points. The monk glanced over just in time to see the bolt, which incinerated its robes.

  “Oh, it’s a dude,” Akilah said.

  I didn’t really care either way, but clearly it was male. Without the robes, he looked like an underfed sharkman, all teeth and bony body. He ran for the water, the closest cover. The Triumph Cannon had only shaved 10 points off his life pool, though he’d been in the max damage range. Fucking demons.

  Frag jerked. On his screen, an exploding arrow jutted from his back. He only had 20 HP left. Akilah’s fingernails bit into my hand.

  He clawed for it, but it was in the narrow space just out of reach. [Hit: -5 Ticking Threat 2s]

  The arrow exploded, throwing him facefirst into the pool. [Hit: -10 Explosive]

  [Hit: -10 Arc Arrow] Elora’s arrow curved as it tailed the monk into the pool to strike him in the ass. Nice.

  The shadowy drow scaled our platform as Jake and Elora fired at the centaur, who could do nothing but roar at them and run at their base. Their shots shaved another 10 points from its HP. I hissed, as if I could have warned them.

  My throat tightened as the drow crept closer to where Elora knelt, her bow drawn, aiming at the platform across from them. “Wake up, Elora! Dammit!”

  Jake fired down into the water, no longer worried about the centaur. They couldn’t climb for shit, obviously.

  “Turn around,” I muttered. Couldn’t they feel it? Smell it?

  Two short swords slid out from the stalker’s cloak. He smiled as he raised both to stab Elora in the back. My throat clenched.

  “Spartan kick that motherfucker, Jake!”

  As if he somehow heard me, Jake looked around, surprise warping his face. He rolled, aiming his pistol at the attacker, even as Elora scrambled away and pitched forward, off the platform. I shook my head in denial. How could this be happening?

  Elora hit the ground, sustaining another 20 points of damage. Like Frag, she had less than ten left after that fall. The centaur, spotting her, charged. She flashed a hand up as if to ward him off, the green glow giving away a spell. Vines sprang from the stone to wind in the tank’s legs, stopping it. [Tangle] flashed across her screen. The centaur threw its sword at her, and she rolled away, the metal clanging to the ground.

  A lucky shot from Frag sizzled out of the pool and clipped the centaur.

  Jake fired at the drow, who couldn’t blend into shadows on the open platform. There would be no retreat for the rogue. The elf lunged, blades flashing. Jake grinned at it and jumped, wings booming out to catch him. The pistol disappeared, and he grabbed the tranq gun from the two-point harness on his chest. He rotated a chamber near the stock and aimed as he glided, firing off darts. [Toxic Pestilence -2 x 10s] One tagged the centaur in its thick butt. Jake rolled and flapped, shooting at the elf on our platform. Another toxic dart struck it as it stood on the edge.

  Frag fired repeatedly, plasma bolts blasted at the demon in the pool with him and the wavering images he could target. Didn’t that guy need to breathe? Cyborgs.

  An arrow struck Jake in the side. His wings collapsed, and he rocketed for the water hazard, crashing through the surface. A second later, BOOM. A geyser went up as the arrow detonated.

  “No!” I shouted, as if that would stop anything. I didn’t know how much more of this watching bullshit I could take. If Akilah hadn’t been clutching my hand so tightly, I would have gotten up and started pacing again.

  [Weapon Mutation: Redoubled Triumph Cannon] Another hot bloom of blue plasma burst from the pool toward the enemy’s sniper platform. The explosive archer’s eyes widened.

  “Redoubled? Damn.” I whispered.

  She and the tower vanished in the intense light. A second later, the platform’s top was sheared and crumbling. The archer lay on the ground, half-crushed beneath rubble. Her HP was empty.

  “Thank fuck,” Akilah sighed, eyes flickering with the light of the projected viewscreen.

  Beneath the water, three figures struggled. The demon monk swam to Frag and grappled with him for his weapon. Jake tumbled, reorienting himself. He fought to swim, wings causing drag as he scooped at the water. The demon bit Frag’s arm. The cyborg’s grip loosened.

  Jake pulled his tranq gun up, rotated the stock dial, and shot at Frag, but the dart pinged off his skin without enough velocity to pierce. He scrambled forward again, grabbing at the monk.

  Elora crawled away from the centaur for a few yards before stumbling to her feet. She turned, just as the centaur reached his hand towards his sword. Her face twisted as the big cleaver snapped back to his palm, and she darted around the corner of their platform. She looked up to see the dark elf climbing down. Her eyes rolled in exasperation, and it almost made me grin. Almost.

  Everyone was on their last legs except Jake, and he was hardly unscathed. Both Akilah and I were on the edges of our seats. We held each other’s hands like tense parents at their kid’s first big match.

  Jake got an arm around the demon’s thick neck.

  Elora tumbled to her bow.

  Jake took a dart and slammed it into the monk’s neck.

  Elora shot at the drow as he was descending the last few feet. [Clean Kill]

  “Oh shit! She proc’ed a big one!” I cried, grinning at Akilah.

  Akilah whooped, but her eyes were on Frag. He was sagging, sinking in the water. The demon let go of the rifle, twisting to wrestle Jake, but the low HP it had, coupled with the toxicity of Jake’s poison quickly sapped it, and it stilled.

  Jake dove for Frag, a new dart in hand. He grabbed Frag’s vest and thrust the dart in the cyborg’s neck, driving healing serum into the cyborg’s bloodstream. Frag’s eyes opened and focused on Jake. They nodded to each other and swam upwards. Robot Boy grabbed Jake by a horn to help haul him towards the surface. That did make me grin.

  The dark elf fell in a pool of black cloak, a silver arrow quivering under his chin.

  Elora staggered out of sight of the centaur, still bound by her spell. It hacked at the vines, freeing a leg. She ducked around and fired off an arrow. The centaur hacked another leg free. She shot it again. From behind, a plasma bolt hit it in the back of the head.

  When Elora rolled back out of cover and aimed, the centaur sagged in the vines, sword trembling in its hands, raised to hack down again.

  She put an arrow right between his eyes.

  Akilah and I looked at each other, jumped up, and rushed out the door.

  -ARCHIVE-

  Cultivation ? Progression ? Multiple Lead Characters

  by Tequilama