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With the new recruits and added responsibility, how can a hot-headed young adult itching for battle cope up with stress? Underground fighting competitions. It was one of the things Zone vowed to give-up when he got admitted to academy. But finds himself coming back to this illegal escapade from time to time. He kept it a secret to everyone, besides he only competes rarely, changes his name every time and never plays on the same tournament twice. That's what he thinks, time will tell if someone finds out, or if someone already knew.

As usual, Zone ended it early as possible and was trying to sneak inside the academy through the jungle. With sore arms, legs and a few bruises hidden with his hair covering his face and a hoodie jacket, he tries to avoid the traps he could remember and the alarms not to go off, hoping that binary didn't install something new.

Then he heard a voice. He can't tell if this particular person was alone. "Must be a radio or a cellphone" he muttered, "...wait, cells don't work here..." he stopped and listens again if he could hear a radio feedback or something.

'Heh, sounds like a rant to me...hey is that a kid? Sounds familiar...' he followed the boisterous teen voice. It was getting dark and, "s**t the traps!" Zone remembered there was supposedly a trap somewhere near the place where the voice was coming from. He quickly moved to run but didn't see the branch lying around and fell down.

"--What was that?"

Zone hastily stood up and promptly walked in a stagger towards the kid.
"Where's that kid?" he stopped for a moment when--
"Shi--"



'Ouch, was I knocked out? Did someone beat me?' Zone just lay down to where he is, thinking that he lost the fight, how was he going to explain this mess?

"AAAAGH! WHO'RE YOU?!"

'...forest, traps and a kid screaming at my face' slowly, he regains consciousnesses and remembers what really happened, "yup, I'm back at the academy." He steadied himself to sit and his hoodie fell back, "That's one nasty fall" and felt a lump at the back of his head. A droplet of his blood fell to his sleeve. --HISSS-- An acidic smoke immediately rose and burned a hole to it. "Aw, hell and this one's new."

He noticed that the teen moved away from him, it wasn't pitched black but it was dark and hard to see. So he pushed himself to stood up and went closer to the panicking child. "Hey kid, you okay?"

Zone traced his hand to the wall as he moves closer to the girl. 'I definitely heard that voice somewhere...' Fortunately she looked up and a bit of light illuminated her face. He recognized her right away. "Tsk. It's her" he muttered to himself, quickly turn around, raised his hoodie and pulled it further to hide his face.

'Clowrey Eir...'
Going about their first meeting, Zone looked at the two girls' file she confronted at the opening day and still didn't have enough. To shut him up, Binary ran a background test and didn't saw any red flag. 'Bull' he thought as he pulled his hoodie again and groaned "...not gonna apologize to some brat."

Zone continued to trace the walls looking for something and continued to face the opposite direction.

--"What were you doing out so late?"--

“That’s none of your business.” He crouched and felt the corners next “Handsy?” ‘what is she talking about?’ he didn’t felt anything at that time, he shrugged it off and finally found what he was looking for,

“…next, something to place into that pinhole.”--

“Wait, I kind of heard you were talking to someone, is he still up there?” He looked up the hatch, ‘that’s closed alright,’ “same thing happened to me before, no use trying to climb it. At least he won’t fall in this hole, hopefully not in another trap and he can call for help.”

Glancing at the girl, he remembered what comes after they press that pinhole and wondered if the child could take it. Also the hatch was solid steel, he could break it with his blood but he has to break the walls too to have something to grab on. ‘Free climbing, I wonder if she could do it’ a lot of job for his sore tired body and a lot of explaining to do if he wrecked it and got found out. He sat down, leaned on the wall and rests for a bit. “I’m hungry, yeah what a way to start the week” And remembered it's also his first week as a staff. "Responsibility weighs a ton..." he whispered to himself.

“Ghost? Ah--huh, you must’ve hit your head pretty hard.” Zone stood up and patted the dirt off his jeans and stretched a bit. ‘What a lame excuse, is she hiding something?’ he started to suspect the girl again, not knowing that the spirit is true, and then he remembered Binary’s scowling face when he was inquiring about the two kids many times. “sigh…whatever.”

“Okay, before you get delusional again, let’s bust out of here. And get that head of yours checked.” he said while cracking his knuckles.

Zone didn’t hear a word. He turned around and saw Clowrey with her face buried in her arms. ‘so, brats with a mouth like her also gets tired, maybe it’s best to give her some still looking at her and still in silence '...quiet time…’

He inspected his pockets for something that could fit inside the hole but only found some change, a handkerchief, his price money that he quickly hides again and some keys. This tonight's champ, now trapped in a pit, didn’t even brought any communication device or any weapon with him. ‘Drat.’

". . .my brother would probably laugh at me, seeing me like this."

‘…well she’s…a girl’ Zone moved closer to her thinking that she might be wearing a hairpin. Close enough to inspect her hair, crouching down and forgetting that he is hiding his face. And was now moving his hand to her head.

As soon as he stretched out his hand to her, Zone received a kick to his face from the girl. “…what, the--” The boy who was carelessly about to pet this stray pup was now laying flat on his back with her shoe on his face. It was already night and the moon was high, giving them a few light. Agitated, he grabbed the shoe, kicks off in the air and bounces off standing. His hood was now taken off, down at the back, his hair out-of-the-way and his face clearly shown beneath the moonlight passing through the hatch.

His blood starts to boil, literally and was now enraged. His nose was bleeding, “RAAGH!” and threw the shoe at the girl’s feet that got some of his blood at its plastic sole, that now starts to burn a hole to it. He was ready to attack and threw a punch to the girl but somehow manages to divert his fist to the wall. The wall cracked, and Zone let out a couple punches more to it. A bit of debris falling, letting out some of his steam, he calmed down, somewhat.

“What the hell WAS WRONG WITH YOU?!” his hands flying side to side facing and shouting at the girl. He brushed up his hair and walked towards the little dot hole on the wall, “I was just looking for some stupid pin to fit through here!” his finger-pointing at it, can the girl even see that from where she’s standing? Oh, but his bleeding nose was noticeable enough, except for Zone.

Zone faced the wall with his outstretched hands, closed his eyes and tries to meditate, breathing in and out slowly to calm himself down. A method Dr. Flo told him to do when he’s about to go berserk again. It was hard to do when a fourteen year old girl was yelling right at him inside an enclosed tight space. “Will you stop--ALREADY!” he banged the wall again for one last time.

“Okay I was wrong for not asking! Dammit.” That’s the time he noticed his bloodied nose, pulled out his handkerchief and wiped the blood off, but at least the blood flow stopped. ‘Yeeesh,’ his hanky starts to disintegrate. He was still mad but starts to cool-off, a little bit. “I already gave that space, and I don’t want to hear that loose cannon of yours. Thought you won’t notice.” he finished cleaning off and yanked his ears next “…but it blasted off instead” he murmured to himself.

He caught a bit of what Clowrey said to Corduroy, and thought she was talking to him. “What, my fault?! For all I know there was a fixed curfew and you were loitering around!” then he noticed that the girl was doing something.

“Wait, what are you--” Clowrey managed to create a solid pointed material out-of-smoke. Zone was about to stop her in inserting it to the pinhole but he was too late. All he could do was breath-in enough air and closed his eyes anticipating the water that will come pouring out.

Rapid torrents of cold water, ‘…water, where’s the water?’ he opened his eyes and astonished to see an underground maze had opened up before them. At least he won’t be troubled thinking if she could swim in violent water current.

‘Oh great, is this Binary’s lair?’ still marveling at the sight. “This…didn’t happen before…” he glanced at the girl “And I’m not a pervert, you’re the one that said who was ‘handsy’ earlier” and Zone stepped out of the pit, questioning on where exactly are they in the academy.

The lights were open and they were out of the darkness. Famished, sore muscles and now a headache. 'Geez, won't she ever shut up?' After bursting from before, Zone was tired to start another shouting session. 'Let her scream as much as she wants...she'll soon get tired.' yeah, Zone was pretty tired too after seeing how big the place was.

He looked around and said, "It's impossible to have an endless maze below the academy, still a big place but...it's smokes and mirrors." Zone turned around to Clowrey, hands akimbo, "Well, Miss Eir, this isn't an ordinary school. Also, the founders are out of the island and seems that one of them doesn't want anyone touching their stuff, it's on autopilot, until he's back." Zone reached for a coin, "You're free to stay and wait for a week if you want." and tossed the coin with all his strength above the walls of the labyrinth from where they were standing. It was to see if it will bump into a hidden wall and know the boundary of the place. But instead a motion detection artillery was activated when it passed over the wall. With pinpoint accuracy, the coin was shot and landed somewhere inside the maze. After that, it was silence again.

Zone doesn't want to go through this maze. Exhausted and getting anxious especially when he's with this boisterous violent little girl. 'A surveillance job? No ones getting paid to do that kind of job--heck no one is getting paid at all!' he clenched his fist looking at the automated gun turrets on top of the walls.

'Again with the pervert issue, what's up with this girl' he can feel another vein popping out. Thinking about this predicament made him chuckled a bit. "Heh--yeah, it's better to die trying!" impatient, mad or simply too tired to think of a better plan.

"It's too quiet, they can't hear us." Zone ran towards the thick cement wall aiming for the closest gun turret. Takes off with his left leg, kicked the wall with his right foot and leaped up the ledge in a matter of seconds, bashing the automated weapon off its post.

It sounded the alarm. "Tsk, Binary sure loves his toys." He ran back to Clowrey, "Someone will come for sure now, we'll just have to survive this dance until then." he smirked.

Automated weapons was activated one by one, walls begins to move and mechanical sounds can be heard everywhere. Like an orchestra tuning before the show.