Voltage

John: Hey :D
John: My combat test went pretty well! Apparently we’re not done after that. Let me know when you get out of your written test.

John’s messages were sent but not delivered, so he assumed her phone was off. He put his away just as Abigail was thrown out of her barrier. She had lasted about three or four minutes longer than he had. For an instant, her hair was flames, and orange cracks spread throughout her skin. John blinked, and she was back to normal. A man donned in heavy, shiny red armor exited after her, though his armor slowly faded into nothingness.

“You performed well, though with your unique abilities you could have done much better. I’m putting you in-” John was **** to stop paying attention to their conversation when the fat man was ejected out of the barrier in front of him. John moved out of his way as he backed into a wall. Axel followed.

“You have little to no potential, your moves are sloppy, and you rely on strength alone. You’re not that strong. You don’t make the cut. You have twenty minutes to evacuate the premises. How you were even invited here today is beyond me,” Axel berated the man, who scrambled down the hallway nervously toward the elevator and stairs. Afterwards, he noticed Crossfire, who had just finished talking to Abigail.

“Crossfire? You son of a bitch, I thought you were still at the Outpost in K-66! You’re conducting your tests in the room next to mine and you didn’t even drop in to say hi? You think you know a guy!” John began to walk away with Abigail as Crossfire responded in kind.

“How’d you do?” John asked, to which Abigail responded with slumped shoulders. “I lost! I didn’t even really have the chance to get going! He placed me in mid-Class C, but wouldn’t tell me what it means.”

“I got placed around there too. It’s weird, considering they rank the different divisions like playing cards. Maybe it’s a wider classification for some other test?” John reasoned as they made it to the elevators. “I was told to head to the lobby next, what about you?”

“Same here! He said to go over to the rows of screens,” Abigail replied as they stepped into the elevator and she pressed the lobby button.

“What was the person who tested you like?” John asked, curious if his experience was normal.

“He didn’t talk much before fighting, just explained that whoever lost would be kicked out of the barrier totally fine. He was really, really strong. Stronger than my sister maybe. He was a pyromancer so-” She interrupted herself to squint at him accusingly, “You’re not trying to learn what I can do so that you have an advantage if we fight, are you?”

“Even if I was, you’d probably still kick my ass. You mentioned punching stuff before, and from your outfit I can tell you’re a close range fighter. Aside from a few skills I have, I mostly stick to medium to long range,” John replied, causing Abigail to relax.

Her mostly barren outfit made it clear that she was either a spellcaster or a brawler, and given her attitude, it had to be the latter. The baggy brown pants held to her waist by leather strips looked like they allowed for even better movement than the jeans he had made specifically for that purpose. Her similarly colored, laced up, sleeveless crop-top gave her toned arms better range of movement than the heavier duster he wore. Man, I should think about stuff like that more when I make or buy gear. These jeans allow for good mobility, but someone with similar Agility would probably be able to move their arms faster than me, even though this armor is technically lightweight. Just because it doesn’t lower my Agility doesn’t mean it’s no hindrance at all.

John was snapped out of his thoughts by the ding of the elevator, and Abigail continued her recount of her experience, “It was almost like they chose someone specifically to counter my strengths. He barely felt most of my attacks through his heavy armor, and his blade spaced me pretty handily. He was a pyromancer to boot, which took away a key aspect of my fighting style.” She sounds like a firebender from that old cartoon. Good to know.

The message playing over the speakers in the lobby had changed somewhat, now saying, “Applicants who have passed their combat trial, please insert your card into the slot in the middle of any of the screens. Applicants who have failed, please evacuate the premises immediately, and have a nice day.” Looking over at the previously dormant screens, John saw they read “Awaiting Input…” He walked side-by-side with Abigail to a pair of them, putting his plastic identification card into a slot near the middle of the machine. The giant touch-screen blinked for a few moments, before the words “Please Wait…” appeared on the monitor.

Instead of an immaculate skyscraper, Jenny had arrived at a short, wide, long building that reminded her of an airport. Stepping inside, she took her bass case off her back to don a light red jacket she had borrowed from John. Comforting in both smell and warmth, shielding her from the excessive air-conditioning.

After a process that was nearly identical to John’s, save moving areas of the compound instead of floors, she was placed in a room with roughly a hundred people who had either done similarly poorly in their higher education or hadn’t gotten one at all. It looked like an amphitheater lecture room from a proper college, except with computers hooked up along the long desks at comfortable intervals. Looking around, the others taking the test looked much, much more determined than she did. This led to a startling train of thought.

All of these people are here because they want to be Bounty Hunters. I’m here because… I don’t want to be killed by a necromancer, and John’s excited attitude about it was infectious. I got an invite and I accepted it, but I hadn’t thought about it more than that. This isn’t what I want to do with my life! I don’t hate sparring or fighting with people, but I want to be a rock star! What am I really doing here…

The person in front of her abruptly standing up broke these thoughts, and she spent the rest of the time barely managing to finish her test. She submitted her test and rose, taking her bass case. After looking at the tablet in his hand for a few moments, the man with a wand crest on the chest of his suit at the bottom of the room told her to report to room S12 of the lower west wing for her next test.

If Keith’s right, I’m about to get into a fight. Maybe I should just go home. Maybe this was all a big mistake. Despite her thoughts, her feet carried her toward the west wing of the building as the man had instructed. I should at least see this through. Worse comes to worst, I can just accept whatever place I get here, do the bare minimum to stay in, and focus mostly on my musical career. I’m really getting somewhere at the Inferno, at least I think.

Mere meters from her testing room, she was blindsided by a girl with white hair and dressed in a jean jacket littered with pins and stickers, a fair few of them flags of the United Kingdom.

“Blimey! Scotch where yer goin' unless yew wan' ter get in'er a scrap! Dey let anyone have a go, I swear it!” A loud cockney accent filled the space between them, the girl looking even angrier and extremely embarrassed as she ran off.

“O-kay then,” Jenny said, watching the punk cockney storm off. I didn’t see any patches branded on her like most of the official people have… why would a Brit be applying for a position near Springfield? The door to the room she was going to be tested in slid open for her, though she didn’t see much of it before being pulled into a trap barrier.

“Good Morning, Vietnam!” A female voice shouting and a lighting bolt greeted Jenny as she appeared in the trap barrier. She barely slipped past the lightning and pulled her bass out of its case in one fluid movement.

“Alright! Here’s the deal - while you’re in this barrier, you have an enchantment on ya that’ll prevent you from really getting hurt. You can still be hurt, but when ya leave, those injuries go away. Get hurt too much, and you’re kicked out. I’m Deadwire! Original, I know. What’s your pseudonym, kid?” a pale woman with spiked, electric blue hair explained and questioned. Taking a moment to look at her and absorb all that information, Jenny noticed that she was unarmed and wore nothing save for black boots and a black unitard with a white lightning bolt in the middle. If John were there, he would’ve remarked on her similarity to a comic book character of the same name.

The room was much longer than it was wide or tall, with a few pillars of stone raised from the ground. It had few furnishings, a few pointless torches on the walls and a screen embedded into the wall behind the woman. When Deadwire snapped to get her attention, Jenny noticed sparks fly off her fingers. “The Charming Bassist,” Jenny replied, slowly moving toward cover and preparing to launch an offensive.

“That’s a little full of yourself, isn’t it?” Deadwire asked, eyes carefully following her opponent. “Well, I guess ya know the deal, let’s get on with it then, shall we?” Two bolts of lightning arced past Jenny on either side, though they were considerably slower than the real thing. She ducked under one, behind one of the earthen pillars.

How does that work? Lightning is lightning, it should- She didn’t have long to think about this, as a large ball of lightning collided with the pillar she was hiding behind. She dodged to the side as the rubble would’ve fallen onto her. Alright, gotta focus. Lightning… that metal band I played with in the Inferno had a good song for this. With that in mind, Jenny put her earbuds in and pressed play - playing along with the song.

“I’ll bring you the head of the demon/ I’m peeling the skin from his face!\” Jenny began, knocking her assailant into the wall behind her. Deadwire reacted by breathing deeply and surrounding herself with an aura of crackling blue lightning.

“The life that you lead is inhuman/ Its cause and effects a disgrace!” Jenny sang as her inhuman enemy formed a circle of electricity in front of her, the sound bouncing off it harmlessly. Alright, different tactic. She’s basically a human spell right now, so… Jenny switched from her destructive riffs to nullifying waves as Deadwire sprinted toward her.

“Walking through fire, fate’s in my hands/ Waiting for lightning to strike!” Jenny backpedaled as she sang, a grin appearing on Deadwire’s face as she closed the gap regardless. Her aura faded with Jenny’s oppressive nullification, but her eyes told a different story. She was already charging something big to overcome this disadvantage.

“Man on a wire, bearing the brand/ Waiting for lightning to strike!” As if waiting for Jenny to say “strike”, Deadwire released a wave of electricity less than a meter away from Jenny, who had no hope of dodging or nullifying it completely. The lightning knocked her off her feet and numbed her fingers. Shit shit shit. I can’t play like this.

The smirk on Deadwire’s face told Jenny that had been her plan all along. Somehow, her earbuds had survived the blast, and the music continued to play. Twisted dreams that are formed from illusion/ The collusion of fear and torment!

I can’t fight her like this. I didn’t want to try this so early, but… Jenny looked back at her aggressor and used Charm, *“Stop. Now. You’re going to wait until I’ve regained feeling in my hands to try anything. Discharge the rest of your energy.*\” Jenny felt a surge of joy as Deadwire stopped approaching, noticing that her eyes glazed over.

It turned to dread when she saw where the rest of her energy was going to be discharged. “With pleasure!” Deadwire replied, drawing energy from the screen across the room and sending electricity toward Jenny in a stream. Jenny, out of mana and options, tried vainly to dodge out of the way, but this lightning was not as slow as the attacks Deadwire had been using before.

Jenny’s last thoughts before the lightning hit were: Seriously! How does some lightning move faster than other lightning? A wash of pain and white overtook her nerves and vision respectively as amperes slammed into and through her.

Her vision abruptly went black, spots dancing through it as she heard Deadwire say, “Ah crap. I might’ve overdone it.” In a final act of defiance, Jenny used what meager mana she had to set off her pick as she threw it at Deadwire; they were both knocked out as a result.

Jenny’s vision returned immediately, and she blinked a few times to get used to the sudden return of her senses. She felt totally fine, as if she hadn’t just experienced what it was like to be struck by lightning spread over roughly ten seconds.

“Well, that was unexpected. You did technically beat me, but if this were real, you would’ve killed yourself. Gotta deduct points for that. I’m also not that great at testing people yet - they tell me I’m not careful enough, though I was specifically requested to test you and a few other people. All in all, high class C, I’d say. That’s pretty great! You should be proud!” Deadwire rambled, before looking pensive for a moment. “Oh right! Go see a secretary now! They’ll tell you what your next test is, I have to go enter your results. Was nice to meet ya. Maybe I’ll see you around.” With that, Deadwire turned around and entered the trap barrier again. Jenny was still dizzy with everything that had happened in the past three seconds.