Strike Arena

Hector stood slightly apart from his team. Their nervous chatter and bursts of laughter grated on his focus. Some Strike teams entered the dome for glory or thrills—but not his. For them, this was survival. A brutal winter loomed, and the winnings from the Strike were their only hope of securing enough rations and power cells to make it through.

Above, the muffled roar of the crowd echoed like a distant storm, punctuated by the hum of drones and the occasional burst of static from malfunctioning speakers. The previous team was already in the bolthole ahead, their neural feeds cut mid-match. His teammates were chattering nervously slightly apart from him.

“Enough,” Hector said sharply.

The noise died instantly. A few teammates looked relieved—someone was finally taking charge.

“Archie,” he continued, “if I have to hear one more joke about that girl you spent a weekend with, I’ll tear off my own ear just to have something to throw at you.”

Archie’s grin vanished. Tilly smirked at him, which only deepened his embarrassment.

“We’ve trained for this. We know stages one and two inside out. If we make it to stage five, I like our odds. But stages three and four? That’s where we need focus. If we clear stage three with six still standing, we’re set for winter. The prize credits will carry us through.”

He wasn’t just talking to them now—he was reminding himself. But the team leaned in, hungry for confidence.

“We’re ready. Don’t rush. Use cover. Slow it down if you have to. And don’t take a shot if it means going down. If you fall, someone has to pick you up—and that’s two people out of the fight.”

“Let’s get ready. Last year we barely scraped through stage one. This year, we’re different. We’re prepared.”

The team dispersed, each heading to their corner of the prep chamber. Gear was checked, exosuits calibrated, neural links synced.

Astor and Marlon, the long-range sharpshooters, inspected their railbows and adjusted their smart-quivers. Archie, a hybrid marksman and rusher, tested the tension on his compact arcbow. He was fast and agile, darting through the field to take enemies down up close. He worked well with Tilly and Hattie—both small, fierce, and impossible to hold back. The girls thrived in close combat, spurring each other on like twin storms. Tilly wielded twin vibroblades, slicing with lightning speed. Hattie sported curved blades she had designed herself.

Leo secured his holsters, each filled with capsules—green for nanobot healing, red for incendiary bursts, blue for shockwave shrapnel. In the dome’s projection field, these would burst on impact, either mending wounds or wreaking havoc. Leo was their lifeline.

Chase mirrored Hector’s role on the opposite flank. Both were broad, powerful men—brutes who could clear the field when the others couldn’t. Then there was Quinn.

Hector watched as Quinn strapped on more armor than anyone else, a curved kinetic shield on his left arm and a monoblade in his right. Three more blades lined his leg. He carried a few capsules, but his bulk left little room. Quinn wasn’t reckless—he was deliberate. He chose the front line not for lack of skill, but because it gave him the best view of the battlefield.

He approached Hector quietly.

“A word?” Quinn asked.

Hector nodded.

“When the tunnel opens we usually turn right,” Quinn said. “however, we don’t know what algorithms they’ve changed this year.”

“I know,” Hector replied. “But if we all bunch up, we’ll get picked off.”

Each year, rounds one and two stayed the same, but the mechanics shifted slightly. Round one’s boss was always the same: a massive, bio-engineered warbeast nicknamed Rhino. Invincible until four power nodes were activated simultaneously—each hidden in a rock at the dome’s corners.

Simple in theory. In practice, waves of drone-spawned ferals poured from the walls and floors, some armed with scavenged tech. Rhino would charge in shortly after the first wave, targeting whoever caught its sensors. If any node was disabled, the beast’s shielding reactivated.

Hector’s plan was precise. Marlon and Astor would take high ground on a rock near the entrance, covering the field. Tilly, Hattie, and Archie would rush to the far end to activate the rear nodes. Quinn would draw Rhino’s attention. Hector and Chase would handle the front nodes, with Leo supporting wherever needed.

The dome was vast—rocky, moss-covered, with boulders three times a man’s size and thick foliage that obscured vision. It was a nightmare to navigate, but they’d trained for this.

“I still think we shouldn’t split too early,” Quinn said. “If someone goes down fast, we’re done.”

“I agree,” Hector said. “We hold the front until Rhino shows. Once you’ve got its attention, the rushers move.”

Quinn nodded, satisfied. “Let’s make it count.”

“Right, listen up, everybody,” Hector called out. “If you’re ready, it’s nearly our time.”

He quickly ran through the opening stages of the plan, reminding each teammate of their roles and the dome’s mechanics. As he spoke, the noise from above began to fade. A synthetic voice echoed through the chamber, announcing the failure of the team ahead of them.

From behind the reinforced doors, Hector heard the returning team—groans of pain, the scrape of armor, and the sharp edge of an argument. He didn’t need to look to know they were in rough shape.

That was one thing he loved about his own team. No matter how bad things got, they never turned on each other. No blame. Just grit.

He finished his briefing with a grin. “Let’s keep those nodes online—and under no circumstances are we going to be the idiots who let the warbeast reset.”

A few chuckles rippled through the group.

Then the doors burst open.

Nine men hobbled in—battered, bruised, one barely conscious and supported between two teammates. Blood stained their armor. One of them muttered as he passed Hector, “Good luck.”

Hector paused and watched the men hobble out, the Strike Arena operates through a high-fidelity neural projection system that overlays a simulated battlefield onto a physical space. Each combatant’s consciousness is synced into the simulation, allowing them to fight in a virtual environment while their bodies remain in the projection chamber. Damage sustained in the simulation is mirrored in the real world—but at a reduced intensity. A lethal strike in the arena might result in severe injury rather than death, though fatalities do occur, especially in high-risk scenarios. Boss encounters are particularly dangerous; their systems are designed to push the limits of the simulation, and their attacks can bypass standard safety buffers. Before each match, teams are briefed on flagged hazards—unstable tech zones, legacy systems, and boss protocols—where the simulation’s safeguards are weakened or disabled. In the arena, survival isn’t just about skill. It’s about knowing when the simulation stops playing fair. These men looked like they had taken a real battering up above.

Hector didn’t reply. His eyes were already on the chamber beyond—a vast square room lit by nine thick beams of light cascading from the ceiling. A surge of adrenaline hit him. Yes, they needed the credits. But this? This was also the thrill of the fight.

He raised his blade, grinning.

“This is it, team. Clear sights, clean shots!”

The team roared in response, hearts pounding, gear humming. They broke into a run, scattering to their starting positions, fired up and ready to take down a monster built for war.

The nine beams of light flared to life—one for each team member. Hector stepped into his, heart pounding. The others followed, gear primed, exosuits gleaming under the cold white glow of the neural sync array. The chamber around them began to hum—a deep, resonant vibration that rattled their bones.

“Neural sync initializing,” came the system voice, calm and synthetic.

The light intensified. Hector felt the familiar pull—like his mind was being threaded into the simulation, his body digitized and reassembled in real time. The world dissolved into white.

Then—impact.

His boots slammed onto solid ground. The roar of the crowd above was gone, replaced by the eerie silence of the dome. The projection had taken hold.

They were in.

The arena stretched out before them—an expanse of jagged concrete, rusted steel, and shattered glass. Towering slabs of debris and overgrown tech wreckage formed a maze of cover. Shafts of artificial light pierced the haze, flickering through the mist like dying stars. The air smelled of ozone and scorched circuitry.

“Feels different this year,” Tilly muttered, crouching behind a collapsed drone chassis. “Smells worse too.”

“That’s not the arena,” Leo replied, adjusting the capsules strapped across his chest. “That’s Archie’s nerves leaking.”

Archie, already halfway up a broken scaffold, shot Leo a glare. “You’ll be begging for my nerves when I’m saving your hide.”

“Eyes up,” Hector called. “Positions.”

The team scattered with practiced precision. Astor and Marlon scaled a high ridge of twisted rebar and concrete, railbows slung across their backs. Tilly and Hattie darted low and fast, weaving between cover. Chase and Quinn took the front, kinetic shields raised, while Leo lingered near Hector, scanning the terrain with his HUD.

“Hector,” Astor’s voice crackled through the comms. “I’ve got eyes on three power nodes. Fourth’s not where it should be.”

“Say again?”

“Northwest corner. It’s gone. Either buried or moved.”

“Damn it,” Hector muttered. “They’ve changed the layout.”

“We adapt,” Quinn said. “We always do.”

“Copy that,” Hector said. “Everyone stay sharp. We find that node.”

A low rumble vibrated through the ground. The mist stirred. Then came the screech—high, sharp, and synthetic.

“Contact!” Marlon shouted.

From the cracks in the arena walls, ferals poured out—dozens of them. Twisted humanoid drones, half-organic, half-machine, their eyes glowing with corrupted code. Some carried jagged blades, others scavenged rifles. They moved faster than last year.

“Hold the line!” Hector barked.

Tilly and Hattie were already in motion. Tilly spun through the mist, her vibroblades flashing as she sliced through two ferals in a single breath. Hattie followed, leaping from a broken pillar to drive her blade into a drone’s neck before flipping away.

Archie loosed a bolt mid-air, landing beside them with a grin.

“Told you I’d save your hides.”

“Don’t get cocky,” Hattie said, slicing through another attacker.

Leo hurled a red capsule into a cluster of ferals. It shattered with a hiss, erupting in flame. Screams—metallic and human—echoed as the creatures scattered.

“Nice throw,” Chase grunted, slamming his shield into a feral and crushing it against a wall.

“They’re faster this year,” he added.

“Then we hit harder,” Hector replied, driving his blade through a drone’s chest.

The ground trembled again—this time deeper, heavier.

Then came the roar.

It wasn’t just sound. It was force. It shook the arena, rattled bones, and silenced the ferals for a heartbeat.

From the far end of the dome, the warbeast emerged.

Rhino.

But this wasn’t the same beast. He was larger—his frame reinforced with blackened alloy, his horns plated in carbon steel. His chest was covered in adaptive armor, shimmering with reactive nanotech. His eyes glowed red—with rage and targeting data.

“That’s not the same beast,” Quinn said. “They’ve upgraded him.”

“Then we bring him down harder,” Hector growled.

The ferals surged again, emboldened by their champion. Rhino charged, hooves cracking the ground beneath him.

“Leo!” Hector shouted. “We need that fourth node!”

“If it’s buried, we dig with fire,” Leo replied, fumbling for a blue capsule.

“Where?” Archie asked, already moving.

“Northwest quadrant. Look for a break in the rubble—might be a collapsed tunnel.”

“I’m on it,” Archie said. “Tils, with me.”

Tilly nodded and sprinted after him, blades flashing.

The rest of the team held the line. Quinn stepped forward, shield raised, and bellowed a challenge. Rhino turned, snorted, and charged.

“Now!” Hector shouted.

Quinn braced. Rhino slammed into him like a freight train. The impact sent a shockwave through the arena, but Quinn held. Just barely.

“Go!” Hector yelled. “Get those nodes online!”