Elytra barely had any time to enter into the arena before her opponent was opening fire on her. She slammed down on the accelerator and veered her mech over to her left far harder than she ever had to in the sims. The weight of a real machine made for a slower experience than what they'd been trained on, and was something her opponent wasn't keeping in mind, their continuous fire trailing a considerable distance behind her mech as she advanced on them.
While the purple mech plodded out in a slow, arcing path along the edge of the arena while trying to get a bead on her, Elytra utilized her mech's boosters to zigzag closer.
She opened fire herself, once she had cleared half the arena, aiming for centre mass. Rather than getting out of the way, her opponent activated their shields and came to a complete stop, soaking up the damage and depleting their shields with ill-advised efficiency. They then remembered that they were holding a weapon and opened fire with it once more, but Elytra dodged out of the way again, pressing ever closer.
Her opponent tried to back up, and only managed a few paces before they bumped into the wall of the arena. Elytra took the opportunity to fully close, trading her rifle for a beam sabre, swinging down at the other mech's legs.
As she expected, they activated their shields, which stopped the blow in its tracks, but Elytra didn't stop pressing. Joysticks canted forward, she forced the blade of her sabre against her opponents shields, fighting her controls as the blade tried to skate away.
And soon enough, just as she knew they would, the shields vanished as their energy stores were depleted, and her sabre cleaved cleanly through both her opponents legs.
The announcer's horn rang out as the purple mech toppled over to the ground, unable to continue the match.
Chest heaving, the mech's VI directing her back towards the entrance she'd emerged from, Elytra couldn't stop the relived grin from breaking out across her features. She'd survived her first brush with actual mech combat.
But more than that, she'd won.
After a cursory visit to the facility's medical bay to make sure she wasn't injured during the course of her match, Elytra was dragged off to the feeding area, where she dined alone. Socialization time was skipped over in favour of sending her off to her cell once she was finished eating, which ended up being for the best, as she crashed as soon as she climbed into bed, the stresses of the day dragging her under almost immediately.
The next day was back to normal, and so completely so that she, at one point, worried she'd dreamed up the change of pace that was her first match.
But when she caught Pryseia's eye across the feeding area, the other woman shooting her a fiercely proud look, that worry was obliterated.
Thankfully, training went by quick enough, and after the evening meal, Elytra was once again allowed to participate in socialization time.
"Green victory, final round." Pryseia stated, not even bothering to wait for Elytra to confirm or even sit down before she gripped her shoulder, her fanged teeth bared in a grin, "Your progress is exemplar!"
Elytra couldn't fight off her own grin at the complement, though humbleness had her deflecting her success away. "I think your tutelage had a stronger pull on how the match went than my progress did."
"Factually untrue," Pryseia shot back, "One can listen to teachings all they like, but learning and implementing them is a skill not all possess. And your skills are what carried you to victory. Accept that!"
Not knowing what to say, Elytra just ducked her head.
Eyes closed, Pryseia hummed a laugh to herself. And as the lights dimmed before the recordings of the days matches were played, she ducked down to whisper, "And your victory now brings us another step closer to our escape."
Elytra shot her a look, but Pryseia just gave her a wink before nodding toward the footage now playing before them.
"Come now, let's see how they fared."
The next day was more of the same, though the day after that had Pryseia in a match again. The green victory in the second of three bouts for the day couldn't have been anyone else but her, Elytra reasoned as she watched the recordings by herself that evening. With all the observations Pryseia had been having her doing, Elytra could tell that this pilot was being purposefully average in their matches, not drawing enough attention to be memorable, but not so inept to be disqualified.
"Purposefully so indeed," Pryseia confirmed when Elytra brought it up to her the next day, "My skills are not where I want everyone's attentions to be."
"Because mine are?" Elytra questioned.
Pryseia hummed to herself, eyes closed, before she nodded and said, "I don't know all the details, but the baithaiz of this place have trouble trailing their orbit, and have for quite some time. They believe that the Odazaen they have will save them, but they can't get it to work. Repeated failures have the populace growing more fearful, the masses more likely to lash out at the few who control them. Thus, these tournaments to keep them distracted. They await a champion, and who better to champion them than the one to make the most memorable showing? Like I said before, the one to pilot the Odazaen they have has to be you."
"Can you at least now tell-"
Pryseia hummed sharply, left eye closed as she shot Elytra a sharp look with her right. And underneath the hum, under the noise from the match recording playing ahead of them, Elytra caught the tail end of a mechanical whir, coming from Pryseia's skull.
Pryseia's humming hadn't been quick enough to mask it that time.
Elytra's mind raced as she fixed her gaze back on the match in front of her. Over their time here in socialization, Pryseia would always hum before either divulging or withholding information. Elytra could think of only one reason why. Wracking her thoughts for something innocuous enough to get her message across, she eventually asked while pointing at the green mech on screen, "Do such sensor arrays come standard issue?"
Pryseia grinned at that, humming once more, and now that she was aware of it, Elytra could hear the mechanical sound she was trying to cover up. After a moment, Pryseia turned to her and said, "No, that's an after-market addition."
As she did so, the pupil of her left eye, normally slit like her right one, reconfigured itself into an artificially perfect square shape before reverting back to its slitted appearance.
"Just powerful enough to pick up when we're being observed," Pryseia told her quietly, "Not so powerful enough to be noticed. Or do anything beyond that, sadly."
"Better some warning than no warning." Elytra whispered back, dropping the subject in favour of returning to their commentary on the match.
Pryseia's proud grin returned at that, and she turned her attention back to the fight at hand.