The Games Villains Play (17 page)

CHAPTER 1
6

PRACTICE HAD GONE
as well as Donny could have hoped.  They would face the orange team the next day, and Donny was uneasy about the fact that his chances were looking so good.  The orange team had been ranked third before the start of the games, but the way the matchups had gone, along with the early upset of the eighth place red team against the first place blue, the orange team had faced the teams ranked sixth, seventh, and eight, while Donny’s team had faced those ranked fourth and second.  Donny had faced tough teams, while the orange team had only faced those who were not thought to be top teams anyway.  The orange team also had a few major weaknesses.  In their match against the red team, one of the red team’s traps apparently worked harsher than expected, and two of the orange team’s top Hermes had sprained ankles.
 

Despite their advantages, Donny made no assumptions of their weaknesses, and found as many ways of getting by them as he could muster.  He assumed the school would not make the same mistakes it had for the previous game, which meant they would not have a means of getting to the catwalk, nor would the game be set up in such a predictable fashion.  Nevertheless, Donny prepped his team for the po
ssibility of a slow paced game.

The rest of that day passed relatively uneventful.  Hunter was telling everyone he saw that Donny had cheated, and many of the yellow team members were going out of their way to bump him in the halls, but this merely reaffirmed that he had beaten them when it mattered,
and at their own game no less.

The next day came, and Donny soon found himself waiting at the door of the arena for the championship game.  Being unsure what to expect, he had chosen his team to be well rounded, with an array of talents ready to use.  Donny felt the door, and noticed it was no longer cold as it
had been the day before.  He put his ear up to it to see if there could be anything heard, but he heard nothing.  He was unsure if he would be able to hear anything even if there was
noise, but it was worth a try.

With only a minute left to the start of the game, Donny realized he had
not
said a word to his team since arriving.  He turned to look at them, and noticed they were all looking at him.  They were waiti
ng, even now, for instructions.

Donny smiled, and said the only thing he cou
ld think of.  “Let’s win this.”

The mood loosened slightly, and determination could be seen setting in.  Whatever they faced on the other side of
that door, his team was ready.

Click

The door unlocked, and Donny’s team flooded through, with Donny and Duke at the head of the group.  The environment this time was a rainforest, with large trees and vines placed thickly throughout.  Donny was amazed at how thoroughly the school was able to change the scenery within the arena, but he could not stop to marvel now.  Before even reaching the table, he
called out to those behind him.

“Gather up fist sized rocks and strong vines, and anything else that could
be useful from the landscape.”

He reached the table and saw no ropes, no guns,
no
shovels, no anything.  The table itself was even made of rock, and half buried in the ground to prevent itself from being moved. 
Ok, all the supplies will n
eed to come from the landscape.

All that could be found on the rock table were the directions for the game, written on a strip of tree bark.  It was to be a capture situation, where they each had an orb that they needed to defend from the other team.  They could not touch their own
orb,
and the moment that one team
successfully touched the orb of the other team, the game would be over.  With the instructions came a map with the location of their own orb.  Donny was hesitant to believe the map, as they had received a false one during their previous game.  Nevertheless, the location marked was close to their starting door, so it would not harm t
hem to look into the situation.

Donny immediately broke the team up into groups, the first being a scouting party of Hermes to find the location of the orange team’s orb, the second being a group of the more clever members to see what sort of traps they could build to immobilize the enemy, and the third being those who would wait by the orb, or in sight of the orb, and defend their position.  Group one was sent out
immediately,
and groups two and three went with Donny to check the location.

Arriving at the point designated on Donny’s map, he was surprised to find that the map was true.  A short distance down the outer wall to the west from their starting door a small ledge had been connected high up on the outer wall, and sitting on that ledge was their orb.  Donny sent out group two to begin their scouting, and told team three to find positions where they could see what was going on around, and be able to move quickly when the need arose.  Donny stayed with the guards
at first to scout out the area.

The ledge was high up on the wall, too high for anyone here to jump.  A tree was positioned close by, with a large branch stretching out towards the orb.  If someone were to climb out onto that branch they could easily reach out and touch the orb.  Donny knew it would strengthen their defenses considerably if he could get rid of that branch.  Having no cutting materi
als, he had to try brute force.

“Bring me a vine.  Lenny, throw the vine over th
e end of that branch up there.”

The vine proved harder to throw than the ropes had been, but after tying it to a nearby rock, Lenny looped it over the high branch.
 

“Now grab both ends of the vine and pull
until that branch breaks off.”

Lenny pulled, and the vine bent easily at first.  As the bend increased, it began moving less and less.  Lenny pulled with all his might, but even he
could not break the branch.

“All Titans, grab hold of the vine,
help Lenny break that branch.”

All the Titans in the guard group came over and took a piece of the vine.  They all pulled, and the branch bent a little further, but still it would not break.  It was clear to Donny that this tree had been made differently than the rest, and the school had no intention of it being broken.  After a few minutes of straining to break the
branch, Donny called them off.

“Never mind the branch, back to your position
s.”

If he could not break the branch, he would have to stop the orange team from getting to the tree.  At the base there were numerous rocks which could be used as footholds to get up into the trees branches.  He would need to do something to those rocks.

While Donny pondered ways to get rid of those rocks, some from the second group returned.  One of them car
ried a long, flat, curved rock.

“I found us a shovel!  We can use this to dig a hole,
then
cover it with something loosely for them to fall into wh
en they come for our orb.”

“Great plan, get a Titan to dig up those rocks at the base of that tree.  Dig a hole there and cover it again with those rocks.  They will try to u
se them to get into this tree.”

They set to work with their digging, and Donny continued looking for other ways to get into their tree.  One tree stood nearby, just close enough that a solid jump or swing from a vine could
bring someone from that tree into the one they wished to block.  Donny sent some people to go work on that angle, and to his relief those branc
hes proved far easier to break.

“Orange
spies! 
North along the wall!”

Donny turned just in time to see two Hermes from the orange team run off.
 

“Shall we chase them?”

“No,” Donny responded, “We don’t want them leading us into a trap.  Did the
y see the digging by the tree?”

“Negative,” replied one of the Prometheus who had been near to the spot where the Hermes appeared, “they saw the orb, and their focus did not move further than t
he branch reaching towards it.”

“Good, we’ll keep digging here, but just in case we need a second trap in c
ase they get wise to this one.”

Before Donny could think of a second trap to implement, a few of the scouts from the first group returned.  “Napoleon, we’ve located their orb, it’s along the
wall just west of their door.”

“Is it high up like
ours.
”

The Hermes looked up at the orb in surprise.  “No, theirs is sitting on a lower platform.  Actually it’s quite the
opposite,
it is against the wall in a clearing.  There aren’t any trees arou
nd.”

“Ok, then we
don’t
need to climb trees, but we also can’t use them to attack from above.”  Donny looked around until he caught sight of Duke, who was tying vines together into some sort of net. 
“Duke!
  You take charge of the
defenses,
I’m going to j
oin the offensive.”

Duke nodded, and Donny began to go forward with the Hermes.  They ran out into the forest in the direction of the enemy’s orb, but before long something caught Donny’s eye.  He saw a movement far off through the trees, but when he turned
to look again, he saw nothing.

“Wait up
,”
Donny said quietly to his Hermes guides.  He led them around in the direction of the motion, and when they got a little closer, Donny discovered what it was.  The motion had been a group of Hermes running towards the Jade defenses, with a larger group behind.  Upon seeing the larger group he realized there was a way of getting up to
the orb that he had overlooked.

“They made ladders!  I need to go back and organize the defenses.  Most of their team appears to be on the offensive, meaning their defenses are weak.  Run forward to the other scouts, and form an offensive.  Get to their or
b before they can get to ours!”

The Hermes ran forward into the forest, and Donny ran back as fast as he could.  He would easily beat the large group there, but the Hermes who had pa
ssed
were
likely there already.

When Donny got back into view of the Jade team’s defenses, he saw that the Hermes had already been stopped.  Duke stepped forwa
rd with a smile to greet Donny.

“Well that worked out well!  They fell right into all our traps, we have two Hermes stuck in the hole, two more in
nets, and one tied to a tree.”

Donny was not as happy to hear this news as Duke was to tell it.  “Is that
all
our traps?  Do we have any more ready?”

Duke’s smile faded.  “No, they triggered all the ones we had set up, we’ll get rig
ht to work prepping some more.”

“There isn’t time, the Hermes
were
sent forward specifically to set off our traps and make way for a larger group.  And they’re bringing ladders.”

Immediately Donny’s worries were passed along to Duke.  The two of them spread out, calling commands to be ready for a strong offensive, and to find ways to destroy the coming ladders.  Donny had seen that they made three of them, so he called his three st
rongest Titans over to himself.

“You three, hide a little ways out.  When they pass with the ladders, each
take
one an
d smash it in any way you can.”

Duke had organized groups to set out trip wires between trees.  As they did not have wire, the vines were used instead, which were clearly visible.  This would only slow the enemy down slightly.  After a few trip vines were set, a roar was heard in the nearby woods.  The roar was soon met by the sight of the orange group charging forward.  Out in front were a few Titans guarding a fully intact ladder; it was clear that the Titan sent to destroy it had failed.  Behind the charging group Donny could see his Titan trio, Lenny with ladder shards still clenched in his fists as he wrestled with another Titan, and one of the others were fending off three using the rock shovel that he had apparently brought with him.  The third Titan was pinned down.  Donny looked about for the third ladder, and quickly caught sight of it.  It had been broken in two, most likely from a blow by the rock shovel.  It woul
d be ineffective as two pieces.

“Take out that ladder!”  Donny called, as two jade members swung down from trees, to intercept the ladder.  The Titan guards caught them and threw them away easily, and the ladder continued.  Donny looked around frantically for some way to stop them, but to his distress the ladder reached the wall, and was placed under the orb.
 

“Attack!
 
Everyone after that ladder!”
  Donny hollered.  He felt almost mute compared to the roar around him, but his team heard regardless, and the attack began.  They pushed against the guarding Titans who had made a semicircle around the ladder, while an orange team
Prometheus began to climb.  For a moment Donny feared that all was lost, but then an orange team Titan was lifted off his feet, and pushed back into the ladder.  The force was enough, and the ladder snapped under the weight, with the Prometheus falling down on
the group wrestling below him.