Arena Mode by Blake Northcott

was a dizzying wake-up call, and it jarred me back to reality. This wasn’t a game. It wasn’t an adventure, or a quest, or a fictional story where the protagonist would emerge victorious regardless of the insurmountable odds he faced.
    The footage I had just witnessed alarmed me, but it was also a motivational tool. Until the tournament I was going to eat, sleep and breathe Arena Mode.
    All that was left was to secure an invitation.
     

If you sneak up behind a man and stick a giant fork in his ass, you’d better keep on stabbing until he’s dead. You feel me? If you don’t finish the job, pulling that [expletive] will get you killed.
    “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not vindictive. What I did to that little guy ... I actually feel kinda bad. It was nothing personal at all, man. Nothing personal. I’d never even heard of that dude before today, or read his blog about fish or whatever. But he tried to make a name for himself by taking me out, and you guys are saying it’s because he wanted into Arena Mode? That [expletive] doesn’t surprise me, man. Not one bit.
    “Cameron Frost is ready to drop ten billion for first place in this tournament. You hear me? Billion , with a capital ‘B’. Whoever wins this thing isn’t just going to be living large, they’ll be a player . A [expletive] player on a global scale, up there with the top politicians, businessmen ... that kind of power drives people insane. I almost don’t blame the little guy. He was probably out of his [expletive] mind.
    “What you saw tonight, that [expletive] was nothing. By the time Arena Mode rolls around, we’re going to be living in a whole different world.

    - Dwayne Lewis (The Phoenix Times Multicast, June 2041)
     
    “This is where the crime is going to take place,” Gavin announced with complete confidence. “And when you beat the bad guys and save the day, you’ll be New York City’s first real-life superhero.” He jammed a finger into the battered map that was unrolled on the counter, at the north-west end of The Fringe bordering the Dark Zone.
    It was midday at Excelsior, and customers were browsing the store as we plotted our less-than-legal activities. It wasn’t the ideal situation, but the days were running short, and we couldn’ t afford to just strategize during the evenings.
    Peyton volunteered to help us with the plan. She had far more experience with programming than Gavin or myself, and had even hacked a few networks before she moved to The Fringe and started her new life. At one point, Gavin alluded to his sister’s involvement with the ‘family business’ back in The Dark Zone, but left it at that – I didn’t dig for additional details, and he never offered any.
    She swiped her hand across a translucent blue tablet, producing a holographic image of the area. “The location is perfect. Check out the intersection: three high-res security cams, but not a single cerebral dampener. It’s like it was meant to be.”
    “No doubt,” Gavin said with a nod. “If any CDUs are in the area Frost will never believe you’re suped up.”
    Cerebral dampening units became one of the largest expenditures of the US government over the last decade, second only to military defense. When it was discovered that superhumans existed, America spent billions trying to find the cause – the mechanism that gave a seemingly ordinary person extraordinary abilities. While no specific catalyst has yet to be discovered, a trait became evident that was unique to everyone who possessed powers: their brainwaves.
    The human brain constantly emits electrochemical impulses of varying frequencies, often referred to as ‘waves’; beta, alpha, theta and delta. While the first three are emitted during times of stress, relaxation, anger, and every other emotional state, the delta waves occur only during sleep.
    Superhumans, it was discovered through EEG measurements, emit delta waves at all times, cycling several hundred times faster than normal.