The two Ctarl-Ctarl women stared hard at each other. A mutual hatred had formed between them, based on mutual feelings of disgust for the other. Trisha saw Aisha as a spoiled princess that got away with murder because of her families connections. Aisha saw Trisha as a whiny, disobedient drone that didn’t know her place and needed to be broken in. They had no doubts in their minds that the other Ctarl-Ctarl was rotten to the core.

“Here,” Trisha grunted and tossed something to Aisha. Catching the object out of the air, Aisha looked at what she had been given and frowned. It was a pair of gloves, covered with glowing circuitry and bleeping lights. Aisha rolled the gloves over in her hands, trying to figure out what the hell she was looking at.

“Confused?” Trisha sneered. “You shouldn’t be. While you were exiled… opps, I mean on vacation, our technology has changed a little. We wear these gloves when we’re in the target simulator. They record our motions and create backlashes and resistance to some of our moves. It’s kind of hard to use the first time, but with a little bit of practice, you’ll barely notice your wearing them.” Aisha’s face scrunched up into a scowl. She had no time to practice with the new technology, the match was happening right now. Trisha must of known about this and was planning on using this handicap to give her an advantage.

“Maybe for a worthless slacker it takes practice to get used to, but for me, it won’t even take me a second to get used to the changes,” Aisha said without a hint of doubt in her tone. Jim on the other hand wasn’t feeling the same confidence as Aisha. New technology like this was hard to work with the first time. It was like driving a car without knowing which pedal started or stopped the car. Aisha also had a history of not being particularly good with new machinery. She liked simple tech, the stuff you just have to point and shoot with. These new gloves could give Aisha more of a handicap then she thinks. Jim needed to talk to Aisha, at least warn her about what she was getting into. He made a move to step closer to Aisha to whisper a warning, but his small movement attracted the attention of Paige. The shy girl stepped slowly away from Trisha and rushed towards Jim once Aisha’s back was turned. She grabbed Jim’s arm and dragged him away from Aisha quickly.

“Jim, are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” he mumbled, a tad embarrassed that Paige was worried about him. He liked the girl a lot; with her he could geek out and talk about all the hi-tech mumbo jumbo that Aisha didn’t understand. She was so sweet to him that it often left him a blushing mess. He was used to the teasing and joking around of Aisha, not the giggling schoolgirl routine he got from Paige. There was something real special about her.

“Jim!” She hissed softly, eyes darting from side to side nervously.

“Trisha’s going to win and you’re going to be free from that monster.”
“How can you be so sure?” Jim asked. It concerned him how certain Paige was, as if she was stating a fact to him. She looked at Jim seriously and in a very unPaige fashion, winked at him.

“Trust me, she’ll win.”

Now even more concerned, Jim followed Paige to the observation room, where they’d watch the match through the viewing glass. Both combatants were getting the gloves on. Trisha had hers on in a second, but Aisha was struggling with hers. Tiny micro-connectors were located in the fingers and were irritating Aisha’s skin. She growled at the annoying accessories, planning on sending every pair on board into the incinerator.

“What’s wrong, commander? Can’t get those fat fingers into the glove?” Aisha growled louder. Forget the artificial match, she thought. Let me just rip her fucking head off with my own two hands.

The gloves were on, eventually, and Aisha and Trisha faced the right side of the room. Large glowing blocks were embedded in the floor and from them projections of their targets would come out. Aisha and Trisha got ready for the virtual enemies to appear. The blocks lit up and the room became filled with different opponents. Some were Terrans, while others raged from dozens of different species from around the universe. With lightening fast reflexes, the two Ctarl-Ctarl’s struck out at the holograms. Clawed fingers sliced through virtual flesh, causing the holograms to vanish with a pop. They hopped around the room, sticking everything within arms reach. Aisha was being slowed down slightly by the gloves, but was still getting the lead on Trisha. She chuckled evilly when she felt a large Terran hologram disappear after she slit it’s throat. That was her twenty-fifth kill. She looked over her shoulder and saw Trisha struggling to strike a lengthy Terran hologram. She was fighting her nineteenth opponent. A scoreboard on the ceiling showed their results, displaying also the remaining time.

Things were drawing to a close. Aisha had kept her substantial advantage, while Trisha kept falling behind. Aisha gave her opponent a soft blow, pushing him back but leaving him still in the fight. Aisha knew she was going to win, so she decided to play around a little with her enemy. She jumped up to deliver a spinning kick, but the enemy vanished before she could land her blow. Aisha went crashing onto the floor hard. Her opponent reappeared, right in front of Trisha, who sliced into his stomach with a single blow. Aisha crawled back to her feet, looking up to see Trisha surrounded by holograms. This scene made no sense, the holograms only appeared one at a time, not in a group. Trisha didn’t look worried by the large group of opponents, she touched her right glove and it started crackling with energy. She made a simple motion with her hand and all the holograms were hit, they vanished with a pop. Aisha turned to the scoreboard as time ran out. Aisha had scored thirty-three kills, the worst she’d ever gotten. Trisha on the other hand, had forty-one kills. In the last moment when she was surrounded, she struck over a dozen holograms. Aisha fell to her knees, fully comprehending what this meant.

“Tough luck, Cap. That glitch at the end when your opponent disappeared really threw you in a loop. Not that it mattered in the end. When I activated the supercharge kill in the glove, that was all she wrote. Oops, did I forget to mention that nifty trick. The gloves come with a special mod activated near the end. It only actives if this get hard, like say the program fudges up and sends more then one hologram. It happens occasionally, we haven’t fixed all the bugs yet.” Trisha sighed and leaned down to whisper into Aisha’s ear. “You really had some bad luck near the end of the match. Must have been karma getting you back for being such a bitch.” Trisha chuckled dryly and Aisha remained silent. What had she just done?

“You won!” Paige screamed as she entered the room. She ran up to Trisha and gave her a big hug. Her friend had won, with a little premeditative help from her. In the doorway, Jim stood, staring at Aisha who looked intently back. Aisha’s lip trembled, what had she done!