The Battle Begins by Devon Hughes

here, but they cannot take that.”
    â€œThey already did!” Castor whined. “I don’t have anyof that anymore. I’ll never see my pack again.” He’d been trying to put his old life out of his mind, and the thought of his pack mates, of Runt and Bill Bull and even Alpha, made his eyes glisten and his heart ache.
    Pookie was less sentimental.
    â€œPerhaps you will.” The Chihuahua-spider cocked his head matter-of-factly. “Or perhaps not. But perhaps you must find your new pack in here.” He gestured one of his many legs around the empty Pit.
    â€œNew pack?” Castor was indignant. The thought of replacing his family was more than he could bear. “A pack is something you’re born into, not something you join.”
    Pookie didn’t argue with Castor. He just stood there patiently, smiling his little smile, swaying on his legs, and waited. It was maddening.
    â€œBesides, I don’t think the animals in here really trust me yet, anyway,” Castor added with a groan.
    â€œShow them, then. Show them you deserve their trust. Show them who you are, deep down inside.” Pookie reached out a long, hairy leg to tap the white patch in the middle of Castor’s chest. “Show them how your spirit soars.”
    Pookie flexed his eight legs and sprang high into the air over Castor’s head.
    Castor was about to say that it was too late, that his spirit had already been broken, when he remembered something: Moss had said that he and Laringo were the only veterans. Castor knew there were unchanged animals in other levels of the prison, but he hadn’t heard about any other mutants.
    â€œHey,” Castor called behind him. “Where did you come from, anyway?”
    When Pookie didn’t answer him, Castor turned around to see where the many-legged mutant had landed. He wasn’t on the track or on top of the treadmill. And in the rafters, there wasn’t a trace of web.
    Pookie had disappeared as quickly as he’d come.

PART TWO
    UNDERDOGS

    â€œAll New Season of Unnatural Mutants!”
    â€œFan Fatigue: Low Sales Show Scratch
    Skepticism on Opening Day”
    â€œCan Newbies Challenge Reigning Champ?”

18
    C ASTOR HADN’T LET HIMSELF IMAGINE HIS FIRST FIGHT. He didn’t even know how to fly yet, let alone fight! He’d refused to think about monsters or Domes or Laringo or the strange quiver in Moss’s voice when he’d talked about the matches.
    Instead, Castor had focused on getting through each minute of each long day. He’d focused on training hard and sleeping deep. He’d focused on the repetitive exercises in the Pit, the careful chewing of the gruel, andthe grinding sound of the tunnel doors in his cell that marked the passing of time between them: Slop, Pit, Slop, Pit, door two, door three, hour after hour, day after day.
    And it had all become so routine that when Castor heard the rumbling of cement one night, his ears didn’t even twitch. It didn’t even occur to him that he’d just eaten an hour ago or that it was too late in the day for training.
    Not until he turned around.
    At the back of his cell, for the first time, the door on the far left—door number one—was wide-open. It was the door Moss had warned them about: the door to the Dome.
    Castor was afraid all over—in his heart and his gut, in his muscles, and deep in his bones. He felt the fear, cold as ice, pumping through his veins. But at the NuFormz facility, obedience came before fear. When a door opened, you walked through it. So Castor made himself move toward the ominous black hole in the wall before the guards did.
    When he stepped, trembling, out of the other side, Castor was surprised to enter a tiny room instead of a huge arena, and to recognize the familiar faces of his handlers instead of an anonymous crowd. He wasn’t ever happy to see his handlers, but today the sight of Slim and Horace filled