Day 129

[from CC BattleGrid]

"Hey Corey, you got your CC System installed? Come on, let's battle! I wanna see if you're as good as your sister! You have a BattleGrid Chip stack, right?"

Corey sighed. "You're the fifth person who's asked today," he said. "Can I at least finish my lunch first?" Corey was currently sat in the cafeteria, a half-eaten sandwich in his hand. This was his first day back at school after getting his CC System installed, and it had naturally caused quite a stir among his classmates.

The kid currently challenging him was Brendan, a boy in his class, and it seemed he wasn't going to take no for an answer. "Come on, Corey!" he said. "It'll only take a couple of minutes! You know how short BattleGrid games are!"

"They're not always short," said Corey. "Not if you have the right Chips."

"And do you have the right Chips?" asked Brendan.

"Not yet," conceded Corey, "but-"

"Then let's battle!" insisted Brendan.

"Yeah, come on, Corey!" said a girl from the next table. "We wanna see you battle!"

"Yeah, battle!" called out another student.

Students all over the cafeteria started chiming in, expressing their wish to see Corey battle.  At this point, Corey realized that it just couldn't be helped: they weren't going to leave him alone until he gave them what they wanted and started a battle. "Okay, fine," he said. "But just one battle. Anyone else will have to wait until I've finished my lunch."

"That's fine with me!" said Brendan, who was already fishing his stack out of his pocket. "I'm gonna be the first person in school to play Alexa's younger brother! I bet I can beat him!"

"We'll see," said Corey, putting down his sandwich.

As Corey was getting off his seat, however, a teacher quickly made their way over. "No BattleGrid games inside the building!" she insisted. "If you want to play BattleGrid, you'll have to go outside!"

"Fair enough," said Brendan. "Come on, Corey, let's take this outside!"

Corey nodded, his hand slipping inside his pocket and gently clutching his Chip stack. The pair made their way out of the cafeteria and outside into the grounds, and most of the cafeteria's inhabitants followed them out. Even a couple of the teachers couldn't help but go outside to watch; after all, this was the younger brother of one of the country's greatest BattleGrid players. It was sure to be a spectacle.

Once they were safely out in the playground, with the expectant crowd gathered around them, the pair took out their Chip stacks, shuffled them, and placed the first six Chips into the slots on their arms. Their holovisors whirred into life, projecting a heads-up display directly into their vision. The game had begun.

Corey glanced at the six Chips he had installed and nodded, satisfied. "Tell you what," he said. "I'll let you go first, Brendan."

Brendan smiled, showing his confidence. "You sure about that?" he asked.

Corey nodded. "I'm sure," he said. "You're the challenger, you should go first."

Brendan's smile grew into a grin. "Too bad, Corey," he said. "You just let me win. "First, I'll activate Gradual Repair and Blaze Shield, not that I'll need them." Through Corey's holovisor, a green aura seemed to envelop Brendan, followed by a fiery shield. Gradual Repair, like Blaze Shield, was a Passive Chip that would gradually restore 750 CP every turn. Looks like he has every reason to be confident, thought Corey. But then again…

"And now," said Brendan, "I activate Ultima Overclock!"

The assembled crowd gasped. This was the strongest and rarest attack in the entire game, capable of dealing 6,000 CP of damage, but at the cost of burning out all the user's installed Chips. This mattered not to Brendan; he thought that with this early blow, victory was almost assured. But there was something he wasn't counting on.

Corey almost chuckled as the intense white beam shot towards him. This was too perfect. "I activate Perfect Reflection!" he said, an instant before the beam struck an invisible barrier inches in front of him and came to a halt.

If the crowd had been shocked by Brendan's move, then this one bowled them for six. Perfect Reflection was a Dormant Chip that doubled the power of any attacking move and then reflected it back at its user. Those who could quickly do the math in their heads realized that the reflected Ultima Overclock would now deal 12,000 CP of damage to Brendan. His Blaze Shield and Gradual Repair would be useless. In only a single move, he had lost the match.

"What?!" exclaimed Brendan, as the reflected beam shot back at him twofold. "There's no way a beginner like you could have a Chip like that!"

"You forget who my sister is," said Corey.

Indeed, before Corey had left for school that morning, Alexa had given him one of her own professional decks. "I'm sure a lot of people at your school will want to battle you today, given my own reputation," she had said. "So, what the heck. I'll let you borrow my own deck for today, so you can take 'em all to the cleaners. You can thank me when you get home~"

Brendan stood stock-still in utter shock as the massive beam of light engulfed him, draining his Chip Points to nothing. The battle was over before it had even begun, and the crowd were left speechless. After a moment or two, however, a great cheer erupted as those gathered in the playground began to celebrate Corey's victory. "That was incredible!" "You beat him in one move!" "That's Alexa's brother, all right!" "Way to go, Corey!"

"I should go back and finish my lunch now," said Corey. Ejecting his Chips and pocketing them again, he headed off back to the cafeteria with the joyful crowd in tow, leaving a stunned Brendan standing alone in the middle of the playground, the "YOU LOSE" message still flashing endlessly on his holovisor.