When Cole opened his door to head to the mess hall for breakfast, he found a smartwatch at his feet. The watch was made of dull gray metal, and the band automatically adjusted to his wrist when he slipped it on. It buzzed and flashed a message. It read:
Titania: After you eat, please come down to practice yard Delta. The sooner, the better. From now on, please wear this watch at all times. See you soon.
Cole ran down to the cafeteria and grabbed a bowl of oatmeal and a cup of coffee. He kept an eye out for Powell, Jones, and Roberts, but they were nowhere to be found. The other trainees sat away from him like he was radioactive. He wondered why a few dances with Titania were really such a big deal. Needing to talk to a friend, Cole thought of Maddy, and he frowned as he picked up his tray and put it on the conveyor belt. In high school, when he was falling behind, he felt his friends drift away. Now that he was doing well, people wouldn't approach.
The practice yards at the base were reinforced concrete domes, each the size of a hockey arena. Six domes sat in a circle atop a mountain that looked as if its top had been cut off. He didn't bother to catch a tram from the central base to the practice yards; he sprinted up the road to warm up.
As he approached the practice yard's security checkpoint, his watch buzzed. The security guard looked up from his terminal, touched two fingers to his forehead in a friendly salute, and said, "Good morning, Trainee Cazagaro. Titania is waiting under the dome."
The dome door opened like a nuclear-bunker entrance: a wedge of metal rolled out, leaving just enough space for him to walk into the practice yard. The dome walls looked six feet thick, lined inside with inches of metal alloy, like a blown-up version of his prison cell in New Jersey. Inside, the space looked like the Pantheon's dome, with squares in the roof concentric with a wide, transparent window at the apex. Several sections of the dome bore scorch marks, and chunks had been taken out. Drones scanned the surface with lasers while others sprayed foaming epoxy and smoothed it out with a trowel. At the center of the clay floor, Titania stood, flipping through a hologram that emanated from her wrist. She wore her official golden chrome supersuit, which made Cole's heart skip a beat.
She looked up and sliced her hand through the hologram, and it faded. A smile danced over her lips before she set her face, looking serious. When he got close, she put her hands behind her back and said, "Good morning, Trainee Cazagaro. I hope you slept well."
He noticed her change in tone. Standing straight, he said, "Yes, ma'am."
Titania walked towards him. "At ease, Cole. This isn't the military."
Cole relaxed and looked at her. "That's a relief. Do you mind telling me what happened to my friends? Why am I here?"
She walked around him. "Their evaluations are over, and they've been given their list of possible assignments that they can pick from. Let's say they'll be handling issues at a local level."
Cole raised his hands. "I'm sure they would have done better if I wasn't there getting in their way. They could have handled those robots."
She continued to pace. "Perhaps, but not as quickly as you, and they may have suffered a fatality. They trained for years, and you were literally dropped into Veltio without a day's instruction. I think you're underselling yourself. Cole, your recent examination means we need to pull you out of the standard evaluation process. That's why you're here. The dome we're under has thousands of sensors recording everything we do, down to the minute detail, every millisecond." This chapter was taken from novelping.com without permission.
Cole looked up at the dome. "So I'll be fighting more robots then? That shouldn't be too much trouble."
Titania smirked. "You won't be fighting androids, Cole. You'll be sparring with me."
He stepped back and looked her up and down. "Are you sure that's really necessary?"
She put a hand on her hip and tilted her head. "Am I not good enough of a challenge for you?"
Cole put up his hands and laughed. "No! It's not like that at all! I'm just not in the habit of throwing hands at a lady, or a friend."
Titania relaxed her stance and shook her head. She put a hand on his shoulder and smiled. "That's really sweet of you, but I assure you, there is no way you can hurt me. If anyone should be concerned about hurting someone, it's me."
Cole took a breath. He remembered that women supes were far more powerful than men, and that Titania was the world's top-ranked supe. If he could put a scratch on her, they'd have bigger problems. "If you're fine with it, then I guess I am too."
She nodded and stepped back. "So tell me, have you had any martial arts or combat training at all?"
Cole shrugged. "My uncle owned a boxing gym in Lawrence. I worked there in high school, and he trained me. He wanted me to continue and get serious, but my mom shut it down. She told me to get a trade and not wreck my brain."
Titania stepped back a few paces and spread her feet shoulder-width apart. "Good, that should be enough to start the job. Now I want you to punch me as hard as you can."
Taking a guarded stance with his fists by his cheeks, he approached and crouched before landing a body blow to her stomach. The impact sent a shockwave through Cole's ears. He jumped back. Her armor was dented but already springing back to its original shape.
"Don't bullshit me, Cole. Don't tell me that punch knocked Tephra out."
"What are you, a fucking light breeze? Hit me like you mean it!" she yelled, her choral voice ringing in his head.
Cole frowned, stepped left, and launched a hook to her ribs, holding nothing back. At the last moment, he felt his arm change, tingling with energy, like when he hit Tephra. His fist connected with her ribs and the armor caved in. Titania skidded ten feet across the packed green clay floor and dropped into a three-point stance.
Getting up, she said, "That's what I'm talking about. Now let's spar." She raised her left hand, put her right hand behind her back, and bent her knees. "Defend yourself at all times. Let's see how good your uncle was at coaching."
Cole moved lightly, bouncing and bobbing. With one arm behind her back, there were so many open paths to attack; the only problem was her insane reach. He stepped forward, keeping his guard up. Titania brought her fingers and thumb together, then unleashed a series of strikes at his head. Cole dodged the first two, but the third landed against his forearm. He flew back and slammed into the dome wall, then fell to the ground as chips of concrete rained down on his back and head.
Cole took a second to check for blood before sprinting back at Titania. She attacked again, her pointed hand a deadly weapon. The strikes were timed, and Cole slipped by four before he threw an uppercut. His fist hit her palm, which had jumped to right under her chin, the impact making a loud thwap. A gleam flashed in her eyes before she drove down, crushing Cole into the ground and cracking the green clay. He was quick enough to see her stomping her foot down, aiming for his head, and rolled away into a crouch. He came back at her using combinations his uncle had taught him, saying the numbers to himself as he punched. "One, one, three... five, two, four..." Each punch landed on the front or back of Titania's smooth hand, blocking him every time.
Titania's lips pulled back in a smile as she defended, stepping back to give herself time to parry and block. The air cracked with each blow, and Cole's punches now moved her hand a centimeter instead of remaining rock steady. Excitement made butterflies flutter in his stomach. Was he getting the upper hand? She was almost up against the wall. He cocked his arm back for a right overhand when she disappeared. Her shin connected with his ankles, and he felt his legs get knocked out from under him. Titania was over him and attacked with her beak strike against his neck. Cole shot his hands up, palms out, and took the hit; his palms flared with pain but didn't break. It was the first time Cole felt pain since Aphelia hit him. Titania pushed down harder, smiling as her topaz eyes glowed. Pushing upwards as hard as he could, his arms wavered, shaking as she overpowered him. He struggled to move his legs, but Titania pinned him, straddling him. Just as his arms were about to give out, she pulled back and stood up.
Leaning down, she offered her hand. "Cole, that was amazing! I can't believe how much potential you have."
Cole panted for a few moments before he stretched out a shaky hand. She pulled him up, wrapped her arms around him, and squeezed him with a strength that would have broken a rhino's back.
She held him by the shoulders and then wagged a finger in his face. "Now you can see the need for a little leg work. We'll get you started on an MMA program. Takedowns, kicks, you need to learn all of that. It's going to take months of training." She brought him in again for another hug. "Great, just great."
Cole smiled and hugged back. "Am I going to be stuck in Veltio all that time?"
Titania stepped back, then walked to the exit, her arm around his shoulders. She wiped her forehead, raised an eyebrow at the sweat on the back of her hand, and stared at it. A few steps later, she blinked and said, "No, I think you can get to work far sooner than that. You'll start working and train as you go along. But first, let's have a chat with Agent Withcote."