John stopped firing.

  Despite the ease with which he had taken down most of the remaining avatars, even he couldn’t help but turn towards the radiant flames bursting out of every orifice of Ka Ren.

  I guess he wasn’t immune to flames after all, he thought, jaw slightly ajar as he watched the avatar melt into a puddle of burning oil, gooey flesh and fake bones.

  Joanna looked almost as bad. Half of her face had melted off; blood was running down her chin which was now more skeletal than beautiful. Her teeth were covered with flecks of ash and John could only see them so well because the skin around the left side of her mouth had completely melted away.

  Her eye socket was disintegrating and he was surprised that the eyeball didn’t fall out and bounce around somewhere near her neckline like a bungee. It was a horrifying sight.

  Yet, as the blood dripped down her chest and Ka Ren’s remains pooled at her feet. She stood tall, a steely look in her eyes. Glancing over at John, she mustered the strength to give a little wave before collapsing to the ground.

  This was his moment.

  It wasn’t glorious, nor was it a battle worthy of a painting, but it was smart. There were two cards sitting right there for the taking in the decrepit body of a monster in human skin. There would be no need for him to feel bad about it, it was logical.

  Then why does it feel wrong, he wondered as he took a jarring step in her direction.

  Holy moley folks, the jovial announcer said in his usual whimsy, talk about fireworks. I haven’t seen mutually assured destruction like this since the Arachnidite cold war. Well, now that the most senior manager on the field is out of the competition I guess the rest of the avatars can quit playing statue and get revenge on the sneaky cowboy assassin over there. What, you didn’t think we all saw you taking advantage of the state of play to shoot up the place John Doe? I mean, no judgement here, but you had to know that there would be a reckoning didn’t you?

  As if his words had woken them from a slumber. With the exception of the scarred one who began a slow walk towards Joanna, the remaining avatars encircling John turned towards him with angry glints in their eyes.

  So much for my plan, he thought, raising his pistols and preparing for yet another slaughter.

  ***

  As it turned out, John only needed to kill three more avatars before the game was over. Joanna’s fire had killed most of the original contestants and John had been no slouch when it came to exploiting the remaining avatar’s loyalty to their fanatical corporate system after that.

  As the latest round left the chamber, creating a hole in his attacker’s gullet, he found himself trapped in a beam of purple light which surrounded his entire body as if he was encased in a tube.

  Frozen still, his weapons were forcefully returned to his card. From what he could tell, the rest of the survivors were also captured by the light, including Joanna who looked more like a corpse than a person. The scarred avatar had also survived, his furious and scary gaze never left Joanna.

  He must have really liked that Ka Ren guy.

  Congratulations! You eight will advance to the quarter finals. Of the many players in this arena, only you survived. That’s a victory unto itself. Well done contestants, well done executives, see you in the next round.

  As soon as his congratulatory speech ended, John’s vision went blank and his stomach began to churn violently as it felt like he was standing in the hold of a ship during a storm.

  Eerie silence surrounded him and all he could hear was the beating of his own heart and the blood rushing in his ears as he was transported. The sensation lasted barely a few seconds before he found himself dumped on the floor of a posh-looking bar.

  “Boss!” Truffle’s familiar voice rang out, and before John’s vision could make sense of his surroundings, he felt the little pig nuzzling into his chest.

  Wrapping his arms around him, he pulled him closer, careful not hug him too tight – he was still a teacup pig after all.

  “Where am I?” John asked dazedly.

  “You’re in my VIP box, I’ve been watching the battle from up here with Kesh.”

  “What’s a Kesh?” John replied, his mind still racing, “it sounds like something I smoked in college.”

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  “I, Kesh,” an unfamiliar, rumbling voice said, “well met, John Doe.”

  Opening his eyes with a start, John stared up at a humanoid pig person holding out a three fingered hand to shake.

  It reminded him of the weird news anchor from the recap video the previous night with green skin, tusks and a face that seemed too large to reasonably stay upright on its neck. An orc, it had to be.

  Wearily, he took the pig’s hand… trotter? And it pulled him to his feet as if he weighed no more than a feather.

  At least this one isn’t wearing makeup, he thought as he tried to take in the weirdness of the creature standing before him.

  “Kesh is an orc,” Truffle explained, “and she works for a company called O.R.C and she’s been keeping me company and feeding me whilst I watched your match Boss, I’m glad you won. That Master Roshi guy was a little bitch in the end, did you hear his screams? He started off so promisingly too.”

  “Thanks,” John replied and then, turning to Kesh, “your company is called orc?”

  “Orcish Refuge Company,” she answered, puffing out her chest proudly, “we galaxy’s premier waste disposal professionals.”

  “You’re trash collectors… in space?” He said dumbfounded.

  “Do not mock O.R.C.” She replied firmly but without aggression, “O.R.C keeps galaxy clean, big money in waste management. Developed civilisations create more waste than planet can handle, O.R.C solve this problem.”

  “I guess that makes sense,” John said slowly with a shrug, “no one wants their planet turning into a landfill, and I guess it sounds recession proof at least.”

  “Exactly!” Kesh agreed with a vigorous nod and a wide smile which looked terrifying, all tusks and sharp teeth inside a mouth big enough to swallow John whole.

  “But I think the more pertinent question,” he continued cautiously, “is what does your company want with Truffle and me?”

  “Not you, just little one,” Kesh corrected, “O.R.C look after own, orclet trapped in game, causes problem for us. Can’t extract him, best can do is help within restraints of system rules.”

  “You mean Tanlan won’t let you take him?” John replied, gently caressing Truffle’s head as he nuzzled further into his chest, “that’s probably because he’s from this planet and he’s not an orclet.”

  “That’s right Kesh,” Truffle added proudly, “I’m a pig!”

  “No, you are orc. Planet of birth is of no consequence. Orc are orc.” Kesh sighed and scratched at her ear before continuing. “Pig is name Earth people give to prehistoric orc, not yet evolved on this planet. Until now. Our kind are spread across galaxy. Those who develop big brain are orc. You talk, you smart, you are orc.”

  “So this is a semantics issue?” John asked, still unsure of what exactly Kesh was getting at.

  “No, orc is orc.”

  “Maybe we should continue this later, I’m exhausted and I have a fight to prepare for. Do you have any food fit for human consumption?”

  ***

  Joanna awoke on a metal slab sometime later. The room she found herself in was dark and cold. She sighed, trying to comprehend the mess she’d just made.

  She didn’t regret killing Ka Ren, though perhaps if she was less enraged at the time she would have realised that sacrificing her face to kill an avatar was a bit of an unfair trade.

  If it had been the real Ka Ren, then she wouldn’t have regretted anything. But she had really liked her face. It was her best defence. Men liked her face; they’d probably let their guards down even in a death game.

  “You’re awake?” The familiar voice of her manager called out across the dark expanse.

  “Yes,” she replied, her throat didn’t feel sore anymore, at least that was a positive.

  “Good, you put on quite the show down there. Not the kind of publicity I was expecting you to gain, but publicity all the same. Your views have skyrocketed. It seems I made the right choice in choosing you.”

  Looking around the dark room, Joanna tried to place where Barnabus’ voice was coming from, but she couldn’t. It seemed to come from everywhere, was he throwing his voice? Talking to her through intercom? And if so, why?

  She wondered why it was so dark, Barnabus was a gentleman, perhaps he’d dimmed the lights to spare her the pain of seeing her burned off face?

  “Keep betting on me and together we’ll ruin them,” she replied, a slight husk leaking into her usually feminine voice, “I’ll do whatever it takes to get my revenge. If you didn’t believe that before then I’m sure you do now, just look at me.”

  “You look lovely to me Miss Joanna, perhaps you should take a look in a mirror.”

  “How, it’s pitch dark in here.”

  She heard a click and suddenly the room was filled with dim, yellow light. It burned her eyes and she blinked a few times before she got used to the sudden change.

  Her bed really was a metal slab, she was right. There were no covers or pillows, just hard, cold metal. Her body was laid on a slight imprint within the metal and there were machines surrounding her.

  The room itself was a small box, all metal, clinical and freezing. Barnabus definitely wasn’t in the room, but that wasn’t the most important thing on Joanna’s mind.

  To the left was a small, circular mirror on a moveable arm. She pulled it towards herself, grimaced and prepared for the worst.

  Yet before her eyes sat the visage of a young woman, unscarred, blonde, just as she had been before the flames had melted her skin.

  She winced at the memory, the pain, the burning, the rage, it all came flooding back in segments like a photo album, each picture conjuring the memories of the excruciating feelings she had experienced, but numbed and distant.

  “The healing beds at the bar can only do so much, same as your contestant regeneration. You wouldn’t have died from that injury, but scars like that don’t heal on their own even in a game like this,” Barnabus crooned. “Fortunately, here at the arena we have access to state-of-the-art medical technology. Naturally I had them dull the memories of the ordeal. It must have been terribly painful and I can’t have the memories of that pain affecting your judgement in battle. I hope you understand.”

  Joanna didn’t reply, she was fascinated by her reflection. If they could heal this then anything short of death was something she could come back from, surely.

  “When’s the next round?” She asked, still infatuated with her own face, it looked identical to the one she had before and as she prodded it she wondered if it was the one she had before, or a reconstruction. Her regeneration would have fixed her, as Barnabus said, but if the scars should have been permanent then had she undergone reconstructive surgery?

  “I had them delay it; your recovery took some time. The previous round was yesterday morning, it’s now close to dawn of the next day. You have a few hours yet until the fighting begins.”