Azure's thighs tighten around the seat of the lightcycle. Its energy vibrates through her, threatening to make her eyes close and shake her control over the steering.
She really should have taken a moment of privacy to stroke herself to overload-- or better, find one of the girls from her battalion to help discharge her-- before starting this match. An overcharge is always distracting. She'll manage, but... oooh.
The opponent is behind her, just barely now, speeding up alongside her bike... the yellow streak of the enemy jetwall forming parallel to the blue of her own, on her left. Close enough now that she can see the flash of blue circuitry inside the yellow shell, a stark contrast.
Lightcycles and armor circuits, both, were blue by default, before the MCP took over and tried to make them all red. Turned out that was easier to do with circuits than cycles. So he kept the plentiful blue bikes for his own red soldiers... including Azure, her name now matching her ride better than the crimson lights on her skin.
Those mostly-failed attempts at red bikes were set aside for the User-Believers who stubbornly clung to their blue circuitry. Some of those cycles really did manage to hold red coloration; others ended up somewhere else on the warm end of the spectrum, yellow or orange, or sometimes shifting unreliably between hues. A fittingly flawed emblem for those naive, pathetic conscripts who still insist on fighting for the Users.
This one, the driver of the yellow cycle gaining on her now, Azure recognizes. Knows her name, even: SYA-30.
A small, thin blue-circuited girl program, her User probably a young intern at Encom. Azure can't even guess at what her function was originally. Doesn't matter now. She's a Cutpaste and always will be.
Which, deep down, makes Azure repress a shudder whenever she thinks of it. How can anyone still hang onto loyalty to the Users, when they know being a Cutpaste is one of the fates it can earn them? The blues really are fools, every one.
This girl has died thirteen times on Azure's jetwall. Well... derezzed. Does it count as dying? At least as bad, anyway. Probably worse. Derezzed into a cut-and-paste buffer, to be reused, again, again, again. A hell of pain and despair, never-ending. Even if SYA-30 manages to win a match someday, she'll just go back to the cell to wait for the next one, and the next and the next, until her next death. And so on.
She isn't going to win this one, though. She's no good; she's never going to be good enough to beat Azure.
They're speeding toward the wall; approaching the last picocycle when they can still choose whether to turn right or left. Azure's reflexes are faster and her eye on her opponent is keener, knowing all the tells that SYA-30 gives off when she's about to move. So Azure will be able to turn first, no matter what, and the pathetic little Cutpaste just isn't gonna be able to react fast enough to save herself.
Two ways this can go now. SYA-30 is coming up on Azure's left, so if Azure turns left she'll get derezzed on Azure's jetwall, and if Azure turns right it'll be the grid wall that smashes her. Another MCP victory, either way.
The arousal from the purr of her engine has Azure feeling energized, ready for the kill... using her jetwall to derezz the enemy feels more to her taste right now. She clenches her thighs hard around the seat, preparing to turn left--
And another wave of stimulation, more intense than she expected, takes her by surprise.
She actually moans aloud, her thigh and groin circuits flaring embarrassingly violet; her lightcycle leans and banks-- oh, no, no--
Shit! The yellow bike's turned now, left, gliding flush against the wall, and Azure was too distracted to anticipate it--
Adrenaline (or whatever code plays its role in a Program's body) takes over from the warmer hormones with a vengeance, and her reflexes reassert themselves fast. She can't turn left without hitting SYA-30's jetwall so she turns right, at the last possible moment, hugging the wall she'd been instants from crashing into... both enemies zooming off now in opposite directions as they recoup from the near-collision.
Once they've built up enough distance they both turn off from the wall, perpendicular, then again, again, reorienting toward each other, ready to attack once more. Their paths are set to converge... Azure's mind races to gauge the time it'll take, and who'll hit whose jetwall if they continue on their current path.
Azure's going to have to be the one who changes her course, her calculations tell her; she'll hit SYA-30's trail first if she doesn't. Damn.
Unless...
She almost yells out in triumph: that glowing shape on the grid right ahead of her, that changes everything! Yes! She savors the small bump as she rides over it, absorbing its power into her engine, along with an exhilarating rush of speed as the Grid Voice calls out "Turbo boost!" Hell yes. The speed calculations are in her favor now-- she's accelerating so fast that she barely realizes when she's crossing SYA-30's path, let alone SYA-30 realizing it in time. Oh yes.
The crash on her jetwall is so hard she feels it in her bike. One more death for that miserable Cutpaste... and it hits Azure like another burst of pleasurable vibration, making her tingle in violet delight.
The fight isn't over yet, though. In the far corner she can hear the "Turbo boost!" announcement again, as one of the two remaining combatants hits a power-up. She sees the cycle pick up its burst of speed-- it's an orange cycle, another blue-circuited Believer, gearing up to attack the remaining MCP warrior.
Azure squints at the confrontation as she makes her way toward it, ready to battle her enemy if her teammate loses. Seems likely. The teammate is KiTRY, a newbie who never took well to the MCP's training (Azure suspects she doesn't have much loyalty to MCP in the first place, joined his side mostly just out of fear). KiTRY is going to get herself derezzed sooner or later; Azure's given up hope for anything better. Maybe this'll be the time. Too bad, but Azure won't be shocked. She's seen enough deaths to be used to it.
It happens fast, at least.
Like SYA-30, KiTRY isn't prepared for the turbo-boost's sudden speed, and she doesn't adjust her course quickly enough. She and her bike explode in a shower of sparks against the orange jetwall, and now it's just Azure and that final opponent...
... and something jumps inside her, as she recognizes the face behind the windshield of that orange bike.
"Bev!"
...She gasps, realizing too late that she's on intercom, and the enemy cyclist can both see and hear her. Pulling up close alongside her on the right, the driver turns fractionally toward her, head leaning down low with an impish smile.
"Azure!" The voice comes sweet and taunting over the bike-to-bike connection.
It is Bev.
This time, it's memories that nearly throw off Azure's steering.
Memories she's been trying to push down, maybe even trying to forget, in the time she's been fighting for the MCP.
Because her success here, her survival, depends on it. On not thinking about the life she had before... the life of a User.
Barely even a User. Not a programmer yet, really, just an Encom intern who got a bit too sassy one day, when the synthesized Voice of the MCP for some reason decided to start talking out loud to her at her desk.
Lots of things she was unaware of, back then. She hadn't thought of MCP as a true intelligence... wasn't it just some algorithm that mimicked language without understanding it? And she'd known the laser "disintegrated" things, but she never thought much about where they ended up.
Or imagined that the MCP had that much control over where the thing was pointing.
A lot has changed since then.
A lot.
----
(Azure flashback to when she knew Bev and Thea before)
(and when she fought Thea in one of her early Disc games)
(flashbacks to sex scenes from around that time, with Azure's fellow Red conscripts)
(and then cut back to this Lightcycle battle; the campy energy takes over; Bev and Azure playfully tease each other as they race)
(then they somehow both survive; details to be determined)
(Azure returns to her barracks very aroused, seeking a partner to get her off)
----
The flush of purple across her lower circuits might have shamed her for a moment when it was impairing her control of the lightcycle... but walking back to her barracks victorious, she owns the color with pride.
Here, among her fellow-warriors, loyal women of the MCP's battalion, she can meet every curious stare with challenging eyes that say, Yes, I'm on my way to find someone for an interface... what about it? Are you volunteering?
Most of them lower their gaze at that... they admire her, fear her enough to keep her at a respectful distance, even if their fantasies sometimes veer toward thoughts of her touch on downtime.
But as she reaches the more private chambers, she gets more interested looks... and, eventually, she picks one.
(lesbian sex scene with fellow MCP warrior)
(gets called to next match in the Ring Game)
(Beats her first opponent, but the second one derezzes her)
(Wakes up re-rezzed as a User-believer)