Drawstone

The organizers brought the top 5 teams onstage, and the losing teams' collective disappointment washed over them. The announcer congratulated Hunter and the other four teams, informing them that the next round would start in 2 and a half hours.

17 disappointed teams left the stadium, while Hunter and the others stayed behind for the next 30 minutes to answer questions from journalists who seemed to appear out of nowhere.

Hunter wanted to find a way out of speaking with them, but there was no avoiding it. Having taken the top spot of the second round, he had a lot of attention centred on him. It felt suffocating. He was worried about saying something wrong.

When everyone had been further away during the testing phase for his force construct, he'd been nervous, but it was manageable. Hunter felt like he was forced to tread a tightrope across a cavern as the journalists pestered him with endless questions. The flasing lights from their cameras were like the tittering of insects. Each click came with the certain knowledge that his image would be broadcast across the world.

Winds buffeted him from all sides. Vertigo took over. He needed to get out of that room.

His only concern was locating a caffeine fix or a quiet spot for a nap.

"Hunter, are you really the son of Gideon Koar?"

Hunter turned away from the journalist and asked the attendant nearest him to help him leave. The camera flashes increased in frequency. The attendant looked confused, flapping her mouth like a fish out of water, but he gave her the most desperate look he could. He must have gained some pity, because she made a call. The assembled journalists protested indignantly. A path opened as two large men, enjoying their task, pushed the crowd apart. With the way cleared, he hurried away from the press room and headed towards the stadium's exit.

The stadium's lobby was full. Most of the losing teams were there or just outside the building, chatting with families. Hunter was surprised and unhappy by the apologies he received from many people for actions over the past couple of days.

They seemed so small to him. Like children in bigger bodies.

He may have been tired. Or maybe his dismissal of their apologies was simply irrational. Either way, he wanted nothing to do with them. Was it bad form to ignore their apologies? Perhaps.

Were he not so exhausted, he could feel furious. Now he felt like nothing but their own mirror image. They had dismissed him for no reason, following the opinions of the crowd. None of them had taken the time to get to know him, to understand the potential he had.

He felt a deep unease about their obliviousness. They were drones, followers of the herd. He wanted nothing to do with them.

Other teams came to shake his hand, congratulating him on his performance so far, and it felt way too similar to being surrounded by a bunch of ambitious journalists.

Some wanted to chat with him about his battery or his Force construct. He told him he was busy and wanted some time to himself before the next round. Most understood his need for time alone; however, some were disappointed, and some were offended—but why should he care about their opinions on how he spent the next few hours? What was it with these people? What gave them the gall to feel they had any claim over his time?

Then he realized.

He saw them comparing themselves, not only to him, but to the surrounding teams. Comparing, giving sideways glances to their friends and others around them, always assessing. Many of them wore high-quality clothing and groomed themselves well. They spoke like they'd had expensive educations — they had that accent, the tilt of the head, the particular words they used. These were a bunch of wealthy brats who were used to having their egos inflated because of who their parents were and how much money they'd been born into. They all had an expanding network of acquaintances whom they can draw upon for favours, business advantages, and career leaps.

He was just another resource for them now. Another pawn on their boards — and it wasn't like they were trying to hide it, either. How do they all tolerate each other? Again, he felt like automatons surrounded him — a small sea of self serving, pretentious machines.

Stepping outside, he saw Jeremy's team chatting amongst themselves. He wondered how they took their elimination and considered leaving them alone. He knew that he'd want to avoid them if their positions were reversed.

Before he could leave and find a cafe, Stephan noticed him and told the team. Nicole beamed and waved him over. They were all smiling as he met them — save Rodney, who seemed to find a sudden interest in the concrete underfoot. Jeremy patted Hunter on the back and offered his congratulations. Nicole seemed to be excited about Hunter's placement.

"I can't believe you did so well! You should have seen David Nettle's face when they announced your results. It was so funny. And when you bowed! He went red!" she said, unable to hold back laughter. Rodney started smiling a bit as well.

"It felt good to see him humbled like that. There's people like him at every competition we've been to," Jeremy said.

"Look at me. My AR is higher than yours. That must mean I am a superior specimen. Behold your king, peasants," Stephan said, doing his best impression of David Nettle, sticking his nose up in the air with his arms crossed.

Hunter laughed with them. He was glad that he wasn't the only one who felt that way. It felt good to let some of the tension bleed away.

"We were gonna grab something to eat. Wanna come?" Nicole asked. Hunter nodded. He felt a lot better than he had the previous day. He checked his watch. There was still over an hour and a half before the next round.

"As long as we don't go too far out of the way, sure," Hunter said. They talked as they walked. Hunter got to know the team better. Rodney seemed like he had something he wanted to say, but elected to remain silent.

They chose a restaurant near where Jimmy had taken him a couple of days ago. It was busy. Most families had the day off on Sunday and there were plenty of people out to lunch.

Someone led them to a rounded booth. As they all sat down and started browsing the menu, Rodney took the chance to speak up.

"How'd you do it?" he asked.

Hunter shook his head.

"Could you be more specific?" Hunter asked. He decided to match Rodney's discourtesy with a dose of his own.

"7 stars, both rounds," Rodney said, his eyes unflinching as they bored into Hunters. "The highest score by over 10 points, while solo? I still can't figure it out. How did you do it?"

Hunter studied Rodney's face. He searched for something like an accusation, some sign that he was just like the rest of the pricks he'd been having to deal with. But although Rodney had a certain intensity to him, the dismissal he'd noticed the other day wasn't there anymore. He wasn't apologizing or trying to gain some favour. All Hunter saw on Rodney's face was a sincere desire to solve a problem.

Hunter could relate to that feeling. He imagined being in Rodney's shoes and knew that he would feel the same. He'd want to do whatever it took, to sit however long he needed to in front of however many books, and do however many experiments it took to figure something out.

"I've got to admit, I'm kind of curious too," Jeremy said, "It's awesome that you've been doing so well, but you've got to understand that from our perspective, its hard to believe even for us — and we were there."

Hunter considered his words. They only confirmed what he'd expected when he signed up to take the preliminary test, at least to a degree. But if he was honest, what he'd expected was a bit more intrigue and corporate sabotage. Maybe he'd read too many novels.

He didn't trust the team. However, he had experience deflecting questions, so he'd give them a vague response to satisfy their curiosity. Another point in their benefit is that they weren't nosey journalists, instead they were among the few people who had treated him with respect over the last few days.

"Gideon Koar was my dad," Hunter said, waiting to see how they'd react. It was less unbelievable than his performance in the competition so far. They all had similar reactions to this revelation; a casual nod, a shrug of the shoulders.

"I've always had this handicap — my AR," he said, "but etherium has always been my core passion."

Nicole snickered.

Jeremy gave her a look that seemed like a warning.

"What did I say?" Hunter asked, confused by the reaction.

Jeremy's look intensified. Nicole ignored him.

"You said core passion," she said, snickering again, "like Koar passion."

Hunter was stunned.

His reaction seemed to amuse her even more, and her snicker graduated into a full-on giggling laughter.

"I deeply apologize. She's hopeless, the poor thing," Jeremy said with a sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose. Nicole's merriment was undaunted. She continued to giggle to herself as Jeremy suffered.

Was she like this the previous day, and he had just been too tired to notice?

Hunter continued with his point.

"Anyway, my dad always encouraged me to continue studying constructs. By the time I was 8, I was building my own. A few years later, after he died, I had to support myself — constructs kept my fridge full and a roof over my head. But I had to adapt. I had to learn how to approach the craft differently. I had to learn to do it my way," he said. He wondered if that would be enough to satisfy them.

Rodney shook his head.

"I believe that's only half the story," he said, "I could accept that you took a unique approach to the battery, and that it would be enough to impress the judges — not that I could imagine how your approach differed from ours or anyone else's. But that doesn't explain how you could create such a powerful and efficient Force construct," Rodney said.

The intensity of his demeanour might have held some envy. It might have held some regret, but what Hunter saw was that Rodney's intensity was mostly a result of his excitement.

He knew Hunter knew something. And he wanted to know, too.

He could tell him the truth, at least what he suspected. It wasn't rare for high-AR individuals to develop mutations, mutations that they sometimes passed on to their children. It could be an unnatural increase in strength, speed, endurance, or even a change in skin colour. A famous example was an elderly man who had reached an AR of over 100, and his skin turned a light shade of blue, and he could adjust the temperature of his skin by amounts that would be difficult for human beings to survive prolonged exposure too, and he could do it for days at a time.

Such mutations were rare — even among high-AR individuals. The highest known AR is 120, and as far as Hunter recalls, he had shown no signs of having developed a mutation.

He suspected his father had a similar mutation. He hadn't known what his AR had been by the time he'd died, but if Hunter's suspicion was correct, then he inherited the sensitivity after it manifested in his father.

Hunter figured that although he might not trust them, he did liked these guys, and Rodney seemed like something of a kindred spirit, in a way.

"Any of you got a pen and paper?" he asked the team. Stephen nodded and grabbed his backpack, taking out a pad of paper and a pencil. Hunter took it and started drawing.

"I'm betting you made three key choices when you designed your construct. I assume you prioritized the Force glyph in your AR budget. Did you use two small, spaced Amplify glyphs near the output plate, with at least one Reinforced?"

Nicole nodded and pursed her lips. He'd never taken the time to explain his thoughts about constructs before. Most of his notes were his own personal brand of chicken scratch, and the rest of the logic was in his head, where it was safe.

He spoke slowly as he considered his words.

"I placed my Reinforce glyph on the plate, but it was one of the first glyphs in my network syntax." He paused, seeing if they were following. Jeremy looked confused. Stephan seemed as stoic as usual, but Rodney was nodding enthusiastically.

"Unless I'm mistaken," Hunter said, "David Nettle and Jonathan Berrymoore's teams also used this syntax modification, although with their own adjustments. My guess is that Jonathan's team created a design that was a lot more streamlined than David's. How you place and size your glyphs could make or break your place on the leaderboard. I also bet that Jonathan's team did something similar in how they placed their Reinforce glyph — rather than just having it earlier in the syntax, they might have had it right at the beginning, like mine."

"Are you saying that having Reinforce as part of the initializing syntax makes it act as an amplifier?" Rodney asked.

Hunter nodded. Before he could continue, Rodney snapped his fingers.

"And you're saying that having it on the output plate would have reinforced the Force glyph through proximity. "Honestly, I've never heard of proximal effects outside of theory," Rodney said, his excitement making his words rush out. "But if you say you've proven it..."

He thought before continuing, "But I'm not seeing how that would have much of an effect on either AR efficiency or output. "

"It wouldn't, you're right. But some of the other support glyphs I used would have had a destabilizing effect on the Force glyph. The subtle effect that Reinforce had in proximity to the Force glyph allowed for greater output without the glyph destabilizing or the causing the constructs' efficiency to drop."

"And you're gonna keep those specific support glyphs to yourself, I take it?" Nicole asked with a smirk.

"Wouldn't you?" Hunter asked.

Nicole shrugged and conceded his point.

He could tell he'd given the team a lot of think about. Especially Rodney. He seemed content with the answer so far, but Hunter knew he wouldn't feel satisfied until he got the full breakdown.

Too bad for Rodney.

Hunter was uncertain about the future. If he shared anymore, he might one day discover that his work was being used by one of the companies which had taken his home away from him. Reverse engineering is inevitable; any company releasing a new product couldn't do much about that except for enforcing their patents. Hunter had heard that the patent battles could take years and weren't always worth the money it took to either prosecute or defend.

Another variable for corporations to strategize over. How exhausting.

It wasn't like Hunter had never used his synergistic glyph networks before. Whenever he wanted to impress a client or assumed of his work being observed by another artisan, he would use some of his own research to improve a construct.

But those were exceptional circumstances. Hunter was content to repair things to their original function. There were other ways to improve the quality of a construct without giving away his prized knowledge.

Hunter wanted his work released to the world on his own terms when he was ready. He wanted total control over how his tech was distributed.

Although, he had to admit that the respect he saw in the eyes of the team was something he could get used to.

 ---

The top 5 teams were back in the stadium. They walked out one by one in the order of their ranking from the previous round to a long period of applause from the gathered spectators. As Hunter entered, he was surprised to see that there weren't any workbenches. Instead, there was a large, open-faced room that was full of machines and gadgets of various sizes. The room was elevated, built upon the stage the announcer had used for the previous two rounds.

The teams were told to line up, facing the spectators with their backs towards the open-faced room.

Hunter had a bad feeling about this final round. An attendant pulled him aside just before he entered. He was told he could only use two custom tools this round, not the full set. The third arm was a given, otherwise the disadvantage would be unbridgeable.

He selected his multi-node tool, which simplified attaching multiple batteries. This also significantly reduced battery attachment and detachment time during construct testing.

Those were his two greatest disadvantages during this competition, and those two tools had been his lifeline. The rest of his tools were still important, as they helped with channel carving. He brought stencils for frequently used or technically challenging glyphs. His shaky hands made intricate work difficult, but he could manage it without it in a pinch.

Would it be enough to win him the competition? He had to believe it would be.

He'd done well enough so far, and he wasn't about to doubt how far he could push himself.

The other teams seemed confident. Jonathan Berrymoore and his team stood proudly as they faced the audience. David Nettle's team appeared more subdued, but no less confident. None of the assembled teams appeared to hold any doubts regarding the outcome of this round. They all knew that they had what it took to win.

The first and second round were important — but they were only a means to make it here. The final placement will be determined by combining scores from all three rounds, with the final round contributing the most points.

Hunter knew that much, but wasn't sure how the judges broke down each round's score. But he'd find out in a few hours.

"Welcome, everybody, to the final round of the 10th annual Global Youth Artisan Competition. Our top 5 teams have distinguished themselves as some of the most exceptional artisans of their generation. We have high hopes for you all, and are looking forward to seeing how you'll meet the challenge that's been prepared for you. Behind you is a room full of constructs in various states of repair and disrepair. You can salvage some, but not others. To finish this challenge, you must repair the wireless network hub at the back of the room. You must decide which constructs to recycle and which are necessary to support the hub's core functions."

It was then that Hunter despaired.

During this round, his disadvantages would be the most pronounced. The last two rounds had worked for him because it tested a team's knowledge about the craft. This was a round designed to push a team to its limit, and Hunter didn't have a team to lean on.

"You will have 2 hours to complete the round. The team's time to completion and their creative use of the provided tools and resources will decide their score. You will also have your work appraised by our panel of esteemed judges. Teams, are you ready?"

Hunter nodded. He didn't feel ready, but did that matter at this point? He wasn't looking forward to sticking around for a 10 hours, though. Especially if this round was going to be as taxing as he imagined it would be.

"Hunter Koar, you scored the highest during the previous round, so you may opt to either go first or second. What do you prefer?" the announcer asked.

Hunter didn't take too long to think about it. He needed information and a game plan. Observing other teams might not guarantee his success, but it will help him be more efficient.

"I'll wait," he said.

"Excellent. Jonathan Berrymoore, Tilda Burner, and Philip Golbrune, you're up! Good luck, contestants!"

The team entered the room and discussed their strategy as the round began and the three-hour countdown started.

Hunter had eaten a small meal and had drank a large coffee. He also brought one with him — after getting approval from the competition staff. The logic was that if he spilled coffee over his work, that was on him, and so it was his own risk to take.

He sipped his coffee as he watched the team get to work. They spread throughout the room, taking an inventory of what was there. Hunter recognized some constructs over the 30 yards that separated him and the room. There wasn't any actual logic or theme that he could distinguish. He'd seen similar constructs at Mrs. Margarets, he'd seen some of them in artisan workshops that he'd visited, he'd even seen some at fast-food establishments.

He had some ideas about how this round was meant to be approached. It seemed almost like a puzzle. Jonathan's team was figuring it out as well.

"You can't win this round, you know that, right?"

Hunter almost cringed when he heard David's voice. Every time David had talked to him over the last couple of days, he approached from behind with the same hostile, whining tone.

"Do you have a problem with approaching people like a normal person?" Hunter asked.

"I have a problem with arrogant, self-entitled brats," David said. Hunter decided not to retort. It wasn't worth the effort. If David had the self awareness necessary to appreciate Hunter's most obvious response, then Hunter's response wouldn't be necessary.

David would ignore any mention of his hypocrisy. And Hunter didn't care either way. David had intimidated him when they'd first met. But Hunter wasn't afraid anymore. He'd proven that he deserved to be here.

"Although," David said, filling the silence when Hunter didn't take the bait, "you have proven that you have a right to be arrogant. Two top scores, it's impressive. And all alone, too."

Hunter almost couldn't believe what he was hearing. He looked at David and studied him.

"Are you feeling alright?" Hunter asked.

David snorted.

"I'm just saying, it doesn't matter how you feel, what you think your odds are. You can't win this round. I'm sure you've already realized it."

Hunter shrugged.

"I'll guess we'll just have to wait and see."

David had said all he'd wanted to and walked back to his team. But before he got too far, he paused and looked back.

"You know, I used to admire Gideon Koar. Hearing what he did to those innocent people, it taught me something," he said, staring off into the distance, "such a shame. Should we be worried about you as well, Hunter?"

Hunter had done an outstanding job of staying calm in front of this jerk all weekend. He'd kept himself focused, refusing to let him get inside his head.

But this time, the words had struck home. A fire rose in Hunter's chest, and reached his throat, and fury animated his tongue as he whispered.

"I guess we'll just have to wait and see."