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The roar of the crowd is deafening, especially to Xavi. The din rings in his felid ear so much louder than the hominid. He clutches his tablet tightly, to ground himself. He will never be used to the crowds.
The announcer booms fuzzily over the PA, “Ladies, Germs, and Viruses of all ages, welcome to the 14th annual Mathamania Stadium! Are you ready to rumble?”
The crowd cheers incoherently as Xavi's opponent sizes him up. She's actually an old friend, and Xavi doesn't know if that's a blessing or a curse for him. Dolores Payne is a woman built in the shape of an industrial fridge and twice as heavy. If this was a hand-to-hand match, Xavi wouldn't stand a chance.
"For our first match, in the right corner, you know her, you love her, you fear her, give it up for PRINCESS PAIN!"
Dolores makes her entrance and waves from the other side of the arena, but not to the crowd - to Xavi.
They go nuts for her anyways. Xavi takes his last step towards the threshold with a deep exhale.
"And in our left corner, we're welcoming a first time participant to Mathamania, the last man standing of the Calculesium, say hello to THE CATSEYE!"
Xavi straightens up his back, opens up his stance, plasters on an uncharacteristic smirk, and so transforms into the Catseye. As it leaps into the arena, cape fluttering, the applause is not quite as thunderous for it as for the opponent - and while Xavi would dwell on the reasons for that, or flinch from the sound - the Catseye does not care.
It's not here to win. It's here to fight.
“Two terrifying gladiators squaring up tonight, folks! Place your bets at the terminals and grab yourselves some popcorn because it’s about to get BLOODY! Both of them seem ready to go, so let the match… BEGIN!”
Payne is as cocky as ever. She motions to the Catseye to attack first. It does not need her permission. Its claws glide over the keyboard of Xavi’s tablet. To start, a basic, but trustworthy spell. Modus ponens, applied to the nature of fire. If oxygen is sufficient, combustion can occur. Since oxygen is sufficient …
Combustion occurs and the opponent ducks under the blast, but it still catches the tips of her pastel pink hair, singeing them briefly before the sparks fizzle out.
She responds with her own arc of flame. The Catseye deflects it with a negation and the crowd roars like a faulty engine as it glances Princess Pain’s armored shoulder. The Catseye, in its predatory nature, still seems more feral than Dolores has ever seen it before. She doesn’t give it a second chance.
The math drowns in the adrenaline and the crowd. Payne is putting up a fight, if only by the skin of her neck. Like second nature she scribbles lines to pages of mathematical proofs most civilians never think about, much less learn, all the while maneuvering around the wild animal wearing her old friend’s skin. Her notebook is growing fuller and fuller.
The Catseye has little concept of time but its impatience swells with each minute the woman across the ring remains on her feet. It barely knows the spells it is casting now, leaving the muscles to do the mind’s work.
Fat beads of sweat begin to crown Princess Pain's forehead. The Catseye is tiring too, though it does not acknowledge it. Matches of this intensity seldom last more than fifteen minutes, and both gladiators are panting like strays in a heatwave. They're too evenly matched.
The announcer's words are too blurry to hear. Dolores can tell her reaction delay is growing longer and longer. Xavi's - The Catseye's - is too. She negates another ponens spell, and sends a duplicate spell careening back with it. Both miss, but just by a hair. The next blow to land will finish this.
They don't even break eye contact. Dominance has to be claimed. Spellcasts are solved for in near sync. The stadium lights are too bright and the background noise is so loud it's tangible. They don't see or hear anything but each other. Hours pass in the millisecond between. The world screeches to a halt, and then both snakes strike from the grass.
The Catseye takes a backseat as both mages' lives flash before their eyes. Later, they'll know it wasn't really a near-death experience.