Chapter 52 Buzzer Beater

When Jake screamed Zack's name with everything he had, the scream itself had two different effects. Well, three really. The other applicants that were around were slightly confused, distracted even, wondering why this guy was screaming for the massive woman from a place called Eden. A chill was sent down her spine, causing her to hesitate for a moment. But for Zack, the person the scream was meant for, he could only smile. 'Finally,' he said under his breath.

As the woman's head turned from the screaming Jake to the smiling Zack, she watched as the spiky-haired boy took off with blinding speed. But not at her. He wasn't trying to fight her anymore; he was running full speed ahead towards Jake's position. As he ran, the act confused the woman. 'What… the…. hell… is he… doing?' she said in her thick accent. 'Why… is he… running?' Her mind started to race until she came to the conclusion that he was running away from her, running from their fight.

'She screamed suddenly as she took a step forward. 'Coward!' she screamed. She was going to follow him. It was shameful, she thought, for any warrior to not see a battle through. She thought he was no warrior, no man, just a cowardly rat.

She broke into a fast sprint, then she stopped suddenly as she noticed something. Or, in fact, she noticed the lack of something. Her eyes shifted to her right arm, the arm where she proudly displayed her red armband so all applicants who saw her would be compelled to attack. It was gone. Just gone, out of nowhere, as if it vanished into thin air.

Then the warrior woman started to feel around her body. 'Did it become loose?' she thought. Or maybe it had fallen. But the more she searched her person, the more frantic she became as she started realizing that the red armband, she displayed wasn't the only one that was missing. No, all of them were now gone, all of the armbands she had hidden secretly within different parts of her armor.

'But how?' she thought, her brain working overtime trying to solve the case, till it landed on the only factor, the spiky-haired boy she had been fighting. The same spiky-haired boy that just ran away full speed. As her brain started to put the pieces together, the woman started to doubt herself. Maybe he wasn't trying to defeat her in combat. Then that means he only wanted her armband. But they fought the whole time. When did he...?

The woman froze suddenly, her mind taking her back to the fight they had. Each time he came in for an attack that did zero damage, when he slid under her, when he attacked her from behind, all things she thought were because he aimed to take her down in combat but just wasn't able to. But reality started to set in. The muscular warrior woman felt a deep pit set in her own stomach. She was so focused on the battle, the pure joy and savagery of battle, that she wasn't aware of anything else that didn't pertain to the battle itself. That included the points she needed to advance.

But still, she wasn't convinced. She couldn't allow herself to expect that she, a warrior from Eden, had been duped. But she would get her answer. As the woman turned back, facing the direction of the fleeing Zack, she caught a glimpse of him looking back at her. And what she saw confirmed everything she didn't want to expect. He gave her the smuggest smile she had ever seen as he ran. And then she knew, in that moment, she was played for a fool.

She roared in pure hate. Zack only chuckled as he reached Jake, reaching out his free arm, scooping the still-tired young man, and throwing him over his shoulder, then running into a crowd of applicants. The entire interaction took only a second. Zack didn't even stop to pick Jake up; he simply did it while running full speed, and it was the correct choice. As the warrior roared violently, she took a massive step, cracking the ground underneath her feet, then she took off running in the direction of that rat. No, she ran after the two thieving rats. She was full of rage and hate on levels she never felt before. She was going to kill them when she caught them.

Still running as fast as he could through the sea of applicants, Zack dug in his pocket and pulled out a red armband, the very armband that the woman from Eden had noticed was gone. He then reached around his back, displaying it to the guy he had tossed around his shoulder. 'Here,' he said. 'The last of your points.'

Jake grabbed it. 'Thanks. Couldn't have done it without you.'

Zack laughed. 'You damn right. So, I'm guessing from how you screamed at me, you snagged all those guys' armbands, right?'

'Yeah, I did.' Jake's hands were full of what seemed like a dozen or so armbands from applicants that tried but, we're easily defeated by the warrior woman, Zack snickered. "Great, stuff them in my pocket."

It was unordinary by the way he was positioned, but Jake managed to put all the armbands into Zack's pockets. The very moment Jake finished doing that, a loud buzzer was heard throughout the entire auditorium. The sound was so loud that it halted all applicants that were locked in desperate battle. The sound rang for what seemed like a good minute, then left without a trace.

Then the voice of the announcer, Moon D, came from over the loudspeaker. "Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, that's it. We're through. This is the end of the exam's second phase."

"What? No!" screamed many applicants.

"Please, wait just five more minutes," came from another.

"Damn it," one applicant said, falling to their knees. "I just needed a few more points. Please, just give us more time. You can't do this. This isn't fair!"

"No!" a male applicant said with tears falling down his face. "Damn, I failed again. Three years in a row."

At the closing of the second phase of the exam, an uproar was happening: screaming, shouting. After each passing second, it seemed that the voices were only growing louder. It sounded as if a riot was about to break out, but it stopped as the loud sound of the buzzer shook the auditorium again with its loud, obnoxious noise. The sound of the buzzer was a hundred times louder than the complaining applicants. It drowned out their voices so much, in fact, that the applicants had no choice but to quiet down.

Once it was believed that everyone had settled down, the buzzer once again vanished, leaving a quiet auditorium.

"Now, as I was saying," came the voice of Moon D, "the second phase is now over and done with. That means the retrieving of, and collecting of, or the giving of any more armbands is now prohibited. Any applicants caught doing so will be disqualified from progressing, even if they met the criteria for points."

As Moon D spoke, the walls that were erected to keep all the applicants in were being brought down. When they did, all the applicants saw an even larger group of assistants surrounding all, dressed the same, each standing shoulder to shoulder.

"My lovely assistants here will be going around tallying up each of your points. To the applicants that pass, remain where you are, but to those that fail, you will be escorted out."

After saying all he had to say, that's when all the assistants started moving forward, going from applicant to applicant, tallying up each of their points.

The results weren't the best as many applicants broke down, hearing they had failed. Many tried to protest, but the complaining and pleading fell on deaf ears, as the assistants were making their rounds.

Only then did Zack decide to relax. He took Jake off his shoulder, laying him on the ground, then he fell face first right next to the kid.

"Man, I'm beat," he shouted.

Jake couldn't help but laugh. "Me too. My body hurts something terrible."

Zack mirrored Jake's laughing. "Yeah, you're telling me. I haven't been this beat in a single day in years."

The two young men laid on the ground laughing with each other, without a single care in the world, both of them knowing they were advancing. As the two laughed, they stopped suddenly as they heard a loud voice screaming.

The voice was booming, it sounded like thunder cracking through the sky. "No! I will not accept this!" the voice said.

Another voice was heard, more faint, but it could be understood that this one was speaking to the other, trying to get them to calm down. "I'm sorry, ma'am, but you don't have any points, so you can't advance forward."

The sound of a punch was heard as a body was sent flying; an assistant had been attacked. The commotion was drawing the attention of everyone. Even while on the ground, both Jake and Zack tried to angle themselves in such a way that they too could see what was happening. It was hard; they were lower than everyone else, and everyone was all pushed together, but eventually, they could make out what or who was making all that noise. And it wasn't hard because she stood taller than everyone around her.

It was the muscular warrior woman, eyes full of rage, teeth gritted. She stood there, protesting, failing the second phase of the exam, and all eyes were now on her.