Abius sighed to themselves as the five other Rethans all headed off. What had originally meant to be a one on one training session with the new Rethan gladiator who was learning to be a sub for the main teams had turned into a full on lesson with not just Arkiir, but captain Gathin and the other new back up fighters as well. Gathin had watched on as Abius had shown the four new vok the best way to pin down larger beings, practising on a somewhat drugged Thragger. The Thragger was an old, dopey creature that lived at the arenas and was a pet to the Banikan gladiators, who had caught it years ago, and it enjoyed being used for training, as long as it got lots of head pats and scritches afterwards.
Unfortunately, once the lesson was over, Gathin had led the gladiators away, taking them back to the normal Dessaron Team Training Areas to go over what they’d learned and to do some team training as well. This annoyed Abius because they wanted to speak to Arkiir, the short, bulky, new person. Arkiir hadn’t given Abius any funny looks about Abius not wearing much armour and the like, and they also just… seemed to like Abius.
That was unusual. Most Rethan house fighters were looked down on. Abius had always felt it. Retvik had suffered that to the extreme, due to him being an exile, but Abius, as well as the retired gladiators Sehon and Kallis, they all felt it too, and Fekrim, who used to be the second most popular Rethan gladiator until they… died… didn’t fare any better either. Admittedly, even the 798th Legion gladiators also had problems. Kayess-En only spoke to other Rethans for work, her friends were mostly Skyans or Ksithans, and Vel, the leader of Retha Squad Three, didn’t seem to have any friends at all.
So it was nice to speak to a Rethan who didn’t look down at Abius and, more importantly, seemed to actually, genuinely have some interest in Abius. That was why Abius was frustrated that the planned one on one session had turned into a group session. Made more awkward by having Gathin watching on.
With a grunt, Abius started petting the Thragger, to calm it down, but it didn’t seem too bothered about being handled today. A Banikan quickly arrived to lead the Thragger back to its little house in the Panicked Wardens, and Abius found themselves on their own.
After some thought, Abius wandered off, heading towards the canteen area. They wanted to see what their non-Rethan friends were doing, but they were pretty sure that Kass and Levik were in a match. Abius should have been annoyed that the plans for a new mixed race Dessaron team fell through, but in all honesty, Abius was almost glad they wouldn’t have had to try and live up to Retvik and his team. Kass and Levik seemed to be happier doing duos matches and Timik was busy rebuilding his streak in solo matches.
Speaking of Timik, Timik had spotted Abius and was heading over.
“Hello, mate!” Timik beamed as he grabbed Abius and sat him down in the canteen. “How did your training session with that Rethan you like go.”
“It was a group training session…” Abius grunted.
“Oh, I thought you were doing a one on one thing?”
“No, Kyr Gathin changed it last minute.”
Timik thought for a moment, then got up, grabbed some drinks and sat back down. “And let me guess, you didn’t ask that weird yellow Rethan out.”
“I did not have a chance to speak to them.”
“You like her… him… them though, right? What’s their name?”
“Arkiir.”
Timik thought for a moment. “Do all yellow Rethans get a name like that? Named after the dead guardian god?”
“Unfortunately. Pure yellow-plated Rethans are rarer than white-plated Rethans.”
Timik inspected Abius some more. “You’re a white-plated Rethan.”
“I am a two-tone white-plated Rethan, because I have a secondary colour. I am also higher-caste though and for some reason, white-plating is far, far more common on higher-caste. Insanely rare on yellow-plated Rethans though.”
“Huh… Because you get colours from your parents, right? But ain’t Skyavok like, completely random? Same way Temthans often are?”
“I guess…” Abius grunted.
Timik looked back at Abius. “You’re angry. It’s hard to tell on you armour-guys, but you’re genuinely pissed you didn’t get to say what you wanted to that yellow guy.”
Abius didn’t answer and instead gulped down their drink. Timik realised maybe he should have gotten an extra large cola for Abius because that drink was gone in seconds. Doubly so as Abius immediately got up and went to get another one.
“You’re genuinely pissed.”
“I guess I am…” Abius grunted.
Timik smiled and leaned back. “I get that. You’re gonna have to be blunt though. Go up to the girl and ask her out on a date.”
“I cannot-”
“Yeah you can. You’re THE Rethan house fighter, you’re the Rethan Wrath, you have that… I assume it’s sexy, but you have those extra sharp bits on you, you’re a giant with all the muscles. You can pull. You can land this date. And I’m sure that little Rethan will go “fuck yes” because she’s probably a bit weird like you and wants to get to know you and is shy as well.”
“I should… just go and ask?”
“Yep.”
Abius frowned. “That is scary.”
“You literally wrestle wild animals in the nude. You can ask a, I assume, cute Rethan on a date.”
“I… I guess…”
Timik leaned across the table. “Alright, this is what you do. You work out when the Rethan gladiators are on break, you find a way to ‘accidentally’ bump into this Arkiir gal, and then you talk to her. Then you ask her if she is busy, then you ask her when she is free, then you ask her on a date. Got it?”
“Alright…” Abius gave in. “I shall do that. And I shall ignore the fact that you repeatedly got Arkiir’s gender wrong.”
“Good!” Timik patted Abius on the shoulder. “You got this.”
“If you think so…”
“No, I say so. Go get her, tiger!”