The Pushover

a Whateley Vignette

byBek D Corbin

“Well, that was ugly,” Ayla said as what was left of the two boys was toted off out of the arena.

“I dunno which was worse,” Toni said disgustedly, the damage those two idiots did to each other, or the fact that they didn’t do it very well. I saw better punch-outs back in grade school.”

“So, who’s next on the list?” Lancer asked.

The chime sounded and the picture of a sweet-faced girl wearing a gingham dress with her hair in pigtails appeared, looking for all the world like she’d just stepped out of ‘the Wizard of Oz’.

“Whoops,” Bunny said hesitantly.

“Take care, honey-bunny!” Nikki said, giving her friend and oft-times lover a quick hug. “What’s with the pigtails and the silly dress? I’ve never seen you wear that outfit?”

“Well, I wore that at my interview. I figured that if the MCO thought that I wasn’t a threat, they’d leave me alone.”

“Ah, she’ll be fine!” Toni breezed. “Gadgeteers kick ass in these matches!”

“I, ah, didn’t bring anything today.” Bunny admitted as she stood up. “I wasn’t expecting to be picked so soon. All my stuff is back at the lab. Maybe they’ll let me go get it!” She skipped off.

As soon as Bunny left, Toni moaned, “She’s dooommed!”

“Hey, maybe they’ll give her a real pushover,” Lancer said in a voice full of false hope. Alas, that wasn’t borne out by the next picture, which was of a tall, beefy looking boy of maybe 16.

“Whoops,” Toni said. “He’s in Barricade- that’s T-Bird’s team, along with Rack and Tesla. I hear that they’re near the tops of the ratings in the Sims.”

“Oh Well,” Nikki said in a tight worried voice, “at least Bunny aces her regular classes, so this won’t affect her overall grade- too much…”

Bugs walked onto the urban scene wearing her bunny-eared ski cap and parka. She looked around nervously, and hesitantly approached the spindle. Then she seemed to spot something and she started heading down one of the simulated streets. When she was about a block or so down the street, a wall of a black tarry substance slammed across the street, cutting her off from the spindle. As she rushed to the wall of tar, another wall trapped her between the two buildings. Bunny rushed to one of the storefronts, but an explosive blob of the tarry black material sealed it. Even as she turned, another blob sealed off the door across the street. Bunny rushed to the center of the street and just barely managed to avoid another blob.

A large blocky almost featureless black figure slid down a ramp. He walked up menacingly, a large tar mallet forming in his hands. Bunny stood stiffly, as if rooted to the spot in fear. Her eyes were large and teary. Tarmac loomed over her, raised the hammer and-

“WWWAAAHHHH!!!” Bunny broke out crying.

“What?” Tarmac stopped.

“WWWAAAHHHH!!!” Tears were flowing from her eyes.

“You can’t CRY! This is a combat sim! There’s no crying in combat sims!”

“WWWAAAHHHH!!!” Bunny scrunched up her face and started hopping.

“Don’t… don’t… Tarmac looked around helplessly. He dropped his ‘tar’ armor. “Look, I’m not gonna hurt you, I’m just gonna-”

“WWWAAAHHHH!!!”

“Look, will you just stop CRYING?”

“WWWAAAHHHH!!!”

“Hey, there’s an ice cream parlor a couple of blocks over, I saw it while I was scouting the area. How about I buy you an ice cream cone?”

“Ice cream?” *sniff, sniff*

“Yeah, as big as you want!”

“Triple scoop?” Bunny asked with a small, little-girl voice.

“Yeah.”

“Strawberry, Vanilla, Chocolate?”

“Yeah.”

“With Sprinkles?”

“Yeah, just… don’t start crying again.”

Tarmac dropped the wall, and they left the street together. Tarmac went to find the ice cream parlor. As he turned the corner, Bunny skipped over to the spindle. She stepped into the spindle and started typing in.

Tarmac was just realizing that the ‘ice cream parlor’ was just a mockup, when he heard the gong announcing that it was in operation. He rushed over to the spindle and pounded on the side of it. “Hey! No Fair! I was going for ice cream!”

Bunny poked her head out of the spindle. “Do you MIND? I’m on the PHONE!” Then she popped back in.

A moment later, the last gong sounded and the announcer’s voice said, “Simulation complete. Winner: Bugs.” Tarmac slumped and pounded the side of the spindle.

As the lights went up, two girls, Tesla and a pony-tailed girl were standing, yelling, “Foul! No Fair! She didn’t list CRYING on her list of techniques!”

Leaning back and laughing, Ayla drawled, “She is SO getting an ‘A’ on that one.”

Lancer nodded, saying, “It was glad day for men everywhere, when she decided that she was a lesbian.”

Finis