The hollowed-out tree that was used as a cart pulled up in front of the hotel. Angelico tumbled out of the cart, unable to remain on his feet any longer. He wanted to crawl up to his hotel room, but people were around, and he would not demean himself in front of them.
Denying his feelings, he walked through the crowded hotel lobby smiling, greeting people, but never stopping to talk. He made it up to his room in a matter of minutes, despite the swarm of fans.
There was a note on Angelico's door. He grabbed it and threw it onto his bed, without reading it. He examined himself in the mirror. He looked exactly as he feared he would. He had just spent the entire night, and part of the morning, as slave labor on the Gahnin Ranch.
This was his penance for aiding in the death of Rapt Gahnin in a gladiator match. Rapt's father, Ari, was a former gladiator himself, but yet he refused to believe that diying was a natural part of the fighting. He considered Angelico a murderer and treated him as such.
He literally cracked the whip at Angelico's back, making him work harder than he thought he could. Ari offered him no food or water, and never gave him a break. Ari assigned him the dirtiest, the most degrading, and the most dangerous jobs on the ranch. Angelico suffered several attacks from the animals. He seemed to have spent most of his time with the animals raised to fight, not the ones raised to eat.
Nights were much longer than the days, and in total, Angelico thought he had worked nearly twenty straight hours. His eyes were heavy with fatigue. His arms and legs were covered with cuts and bites. Everything ached from fighting match-after-match without a day's rest. He was filthy with dust and animal waste. He was hungry and sore and generally maltempered.
He could not decide if he should shower, sleep, eat, or seek medical attention first. After considering, he decided he would take his pain medication before anything else. He had been warned that having those pills in his system was grounds for disqualification in the Dogma gladiator tournament, but at that moment, Angelico hoped he would be exiled for good. He had had enough of the moon. The three pills he took were in effect by the end of his shower. Feeling better, Angelico decided that sleep and medical help could wait; he had to eat.
Having been instructed to avoid the media, Angelico found a roundabout way to reach the cafe. This took him down a street he had not seen before. The street mostly consisted of houses, but amidst this residential area, Angelico found a bookstore. Vivarine, a local woman who seemed to know a lot about Angelico's goings-on, mentioned that she worked there. He had questions for her and stopped by for a visit. To his dismay, the store was closed.
Angelico entered the cafe through the back, sitting at a table closest to the rear entrance, obscured from the sight of most of the patrons. The manager approached. He was big in a muscular kind of way, with shaved blond hair, and an expressionless face. He often greeted Angelico enthusiastically by name, but Angelico stopped before he spoke. "Don't mention my name, I'm trying to be inconspicuous." Of course, with his wings he stood out in any crowd.
Angelico being inconspicuous was like Batman going unnoticed at bar.
"Of course. What will you have?"
Angelico had no menu to choose from. "I don't know, tagni, gaffer, sker, something like that." Those were the animals that caused him the most pain the night before; eating their kind would be his revenge.
"We have a sker patty, sandwiched between jerked phroge skin." Angelico shrugged; food was food.
"That'll be fine. Listen, do you know when the bookstore will be open?"
The manager cackled ominously as if it was his first attempt ever at laughing. "The book store is never open." Angelico nodded without understanding. While he waited for his lunch, he found a book lying on the chair. It was an atlas of the universe, broken down by the system, some systems broken down further. He flipped to the index and looked up at the moon he was on. Someone had handwritten in Dogma, and after it practically every page number in the book. He flipped through the atlas, noticing that they had penciled in where Dogma was on every map, even on those that were impossibly far away. They certainly had local pride. Angelico flipped back to the index and looked up at the planet Morten. It wasn't there. However, Dogma wasn't originally in the index, perhaps it was not a thorough book.
The waitress brought his food. She was a gladiator who went by the name The Vampyress. She dressed as if she were going to a funeral, or maybe even the corpse in the coffin. She wore all black, powdered her face a ghastly white, and dyed her hair black, except for the very top and very bottom, which were left their natural red. She had been the partner of Rapt that night in the arena when he died. She did not make eye contact with Angelico, laid down his food, and tried to leave without a word. Angelico grabbed her wrist and stopped her. "Hey, I'm really sorry about what happened to Rapt the other day."
She shrugged. "People die."
"I know. But I don't want you thinking I'm some killer, it was an intense battle, and he struck me with that orb...I was hallucinating. I thought I was fighting one of his minions." Her eyes connected with his for the first time. They were deep with the memory of a lost friend but reflected an understanding of Angelico's words. She made no response, but she was not trying to pull away, either. This gave Angelico the message he should continue the conversation. "I haven't heard, are Concussion and The Mystical Phenomenon all right?" At the end of the last match, Angelico had accidentally dropped Kelly "Concussion" Coaxes on her head, and Shadowed had attacked Rapt's sister, Mandissa "The Mystical Phenomenon" with his claws.
Now the waitress was staying there of her own accord. He let go of her arm and she did not flee. "Kelly's in the hospital. They think she might have lost her psi-powers. Mandy was released this morning. Her face is pretty messed up." Mandissa was the local beautician; a scarred or deformed face would not be good for business.
"If you see them, tell them I hope they're doing ok." She rolled her eyes, expressing that she would not deliver any such message for him. Angelico glanced down at her nametag, learning her name for the first time. "Existence?"
She too looked at her nametag and rolled her eyes again. "Yeah. Parents..." She shrugged. She paused to see if Angelico would say more, but he was waiting for her to finish her sentence. She took his pause as an end to their conversation and went back to work.
Angelico's meal was free to him, which was good, as he had not received one credit for his fighting since he arrived. He had spent every last credit he had had on television, so he could see how the media tore him apart. Next, he went to a place that was always free to him, the hospital. His favorite acting doctor, Arianna, examined him. Per the norm, she wore her long, brown hair down, the curly ends resting on her chest. She wore a white lab coat now, as if she really were the doctor, maintaining a professional-only attitude. Angelico had subtly been letting her know he was interested in her. Her husband was in a coma, and he saw no reason she needed to remain faithful at such a time.
"What is the problem?" she asked in her even-keeled voice.
"Everything except my wings," said Angelico. They were cybernetic, which was her area of specialty. What he needed was a mystic healer.
"You will want to take these." She opened a drawer and pulled out a bottle of pain medication. She crossed to him carrying the bottle, walking so smoothly that the bottle did not rattle once.
Angelico took the bottle, which rattled the moment he touched it, and looked it over. "I already have these pills. The agents told me I could be disqualified for taking them before a match. Do you have something that would be legal for me to take?"
"No, that is the only medication I have to prescribe. Is there anything else today?"
"Well, there is one thing..."
"Yes?" Arianna's voice went up unnaturally high every time she asked a question. This sent a shiver through Angelico, causing goosebumps. He did not let this shake him.
"It's just that..." The time for subtlety was over. He grabbed her by the head, pulled her in close, and planted a kiss so hard it nearly lacked the emotion he was trying to express. Her lips were cold. She did not react, neither by kissing back nor pulling away. At last, Angelico let her go.
"If you have no further business, you may leave."
"One last thing," this time he really had a question. "Could I get another hospital toga and sandals?" He received a set last time he was there and used it as his starting costume when he entered the gladiator arena. However, the last time he left so abruptly to work at the ranch, he left them behind.
"They are in the bottom drawer in the next room." With just a slight nod of her head, she left the room, letting him find his own clothes.
Angelico took his time looking through the clothes, finding just the right one, pulling off one of the shoulder straps, as it would not cross over his wings, and fitting the sandals to his feet until one pair was perfect. This distracted his mind from the pain that managed to break through the painkillers' barrier. As he crossed through the hospital lobby, he awkwardly saw Arianna again. To his surprise, she was pushing a wheelchair that held her husband, Dr. Surgeon. Angelico approached them. "Out of the coma, doc?"
Arianna answered for him. "Yes, he just woke up this morning. However, he is suffering from paralysis. I thought a walk would do him good." Her voice was friendlier now. The kiss had warmed her up to him, or at least did no harm. Angelico noticed that she looked different. She no longer wore the lab coat. Her hair was back in a ponytail. For the first time that Angelico had seen her, she wore glasses. Her violet eyes were not distorted by the lenses.
With her husband awake, what had seemed to be a golden opportunity was ended. He had nothing more to say but a quick farewell that hid his embarrassment. "Good to see you're doing better, doc, I hope you'll be fighting again soon." With these words, Angelico started the seemingly long trek across town to his hotel room.
He plopped down onto his bed, ready for the sleep his body was screaming for. He glanced over and saw the note he had torn from the door previously. It was a note from the Dogmorian Agents, requesting he meet with them immediately. "Let them wait," he said. He had just started to enter a world of dreams when rapid knocking at the door woke him. He sludged out of bed and opened the door just enough to see who was there. It was the fourhanded, zero-armed messenger of the agents. "Wha?" The "t" at the end of his one-word question was too difficult for him to speak in his heavy state.
"The last message I posted must have been lost. The agents want to meet with you right away."
"Tell them I'll see them just before the match."
"They need to see you right away."
Angelico had never wanted anything less than to go see the agents now. However, they owned his contract, and he felt compelled to oblige their request. "Fine," said Angelico. He immediately headed towards the agents' office, without a glance towards the messenger.
The two agents greeted him. Agent Smeedle, who did all the talking for the two, was like an un-evolved human. Agent Lalox was an alien, blue of skin, and hairless. They gestured for Angelico to sit. "About time you came," started Agent Smeedle, his attitude uncharacteristically hostile.
"I don't just sit around and wait for your beckon call," retorted Angelico. "I have things to do...like sleep."
"Quiet. First off, we received complaints from Ari Gahnin that your work on the ranch was unsatisfactory." Angelico started to protest, but he did not have the energy. "He may work you a little hard, but remember, this isn't a favor you're doing him, this is punishment."
Angelico wanted to ask why Shadowed, the one who had struck Rapt with the fatal attack, was not being punished. However, something inside his head told him to keep quiet. "Work harder tonight. Secondly, you look terrible. You have a public image to uphold. If you don't look like a flawless angel, you'll lose the fervor of the people, stop drawing a crowd, and Dogma will be a scarcely populated moon again." Angelico wanted to point out that they were giving him contradictory orders, but he couldn't.
"Lastly, tonight we have two fights arranged for you. We've found that the crowds do not like watching one fight, then returning eight parts later for a second." Angelico had never mastered the Dogmorian time system. He wondered if "parts" were like hours, but now was not the time to ask. "Even though that is how fights have been fought since the settlement of Dogma, we are changing our method. Tonight at sundown, we will have the first of three matches. This will be a special match entitled 'Air and Water.' It will not be held in this stadium, but in a special arena constructed specifically for this match. You will meet at the mayor's office just before sunset for your instructions." Angelico wondered where the mayor's office was. His question was answered without being asked. "It's at the edge of town, down the road past the hospital." There was nothing within sight of the hospital down that road; it was going to be quite a walk.
"Immediately following, you will return here for a marathon match. Twelve guests from outside the moon will line up to fight you and Shadowed, three at a time. Following, there will be a cart waiting to take you to the Gahnin Ranch. You had best get ready."
They stood, Angelico stood in response. They shook their good-byes, a violent shake that Angelico hated, though times like this when he was on painkillers, it was bearable. The feeling that he should remain quietly broke, and he asked one last question. "I had this drink before, Nixgaven, helps you stay awake through the night. Can I take that before a match, or is it a prohibited controlling substance?"
"It's prohibited," growled Agent Smeedle. Angelico left the office with a feeling that he would not survive the night. That sun was halfway through its descent. He had to cover his wounds, fix his hair, and travel across town. There was no time in the schedule to sleep. However, he was willing to suffer if that was what it took to be noticed by The Ophidians.
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