Deathstalker 01 - Deathstalker

quickly away. It disappeared head and all through the main gates, and the crowd gave it a mocking farewell. They had no time for losers. The head would be kept as a trophy; the rest would be butchered and rendered down to provide protein for the other aliens waiting in their pens.
    Microorganisms in the sand ate up the fallen blood and dispersed it evenly as the handlers raked the sands till they were tidy again. They finished their work and got off the sands as quickly as they could. The crowd tended to throw things, and some of them had a nasty sense of humor. The audience reluctantly settled down, conversations still buzzing here and there, and looked to see what was coming next. It took a lot to satisfy the Golgotha crowds, and they were always greedy for more.
    The recorded trumpets sounded again, a man strode out onto the sands, and the cheer that greeted him eclipsed everything that had gone before. The crowd went
    insane, jumping to their feet to cheer and wave and hug each other in anticipation. There was no announcement; everyone knew who he was. He was the Masked Gladiator, undefeated champion of the Games, the darling of the Golgotha crowds. Everything else had been warmups. He was what they had all come to see.
    No one knew who he really was. He could have been any age, from any background.
    He was tall and lithely muscular, wore a simple anonymous steel mesh tunic and carried a sword that was almost as famous as he was. It was long and slender and entirely unaugmented. It was called Morgana. No one knew why. A featureless black steel helm covered his head completely, and he had never been seen without it. In his three-year career as a gladiator, he had never even come close to being beaten or unmasked. He specialized in winning against impossible odds, and the crowd loved him for it. His identity, and his reasons for concealing it, remained a mystery, though there were any number of rumors. Some said he'd been dishonorably discharged from the Army and sought to regain his honor through combat. Others said he was an Investigator who had somehow lost his nerve and sought to reforge it in the Arena. There were those who spoke of a lost or dead love and said he sought the comfort of forgetfulness or death in battle. And some at least suggested he was a noble, seeking thrills and excitement he couldn't find anywhere else.
    No one said that last one too loudly, of course. If it were true, it would be a major scandal. The aristocracy settled their disputes only through champions or the code duello. Anything less would have been beneath them. The elite were above and beyond the lesser drives and emotions of the lower classes. They were special, untouchable, unattainable. It was vitally important that the gap be maintained.

    But whatever the secret of his face, the crowds loved him, and they conspired with the Arena staff to keep his secret and preserve his identity, even from the Empress' security people. Which was probably unique in the Empire. So far the Empress had declined to press the point, which had given rise to a whole new batch of rumors.
    He fought always with the sword Morgana, disdaining monofilament edges or other energy weapons. He was a superb swordsman, with speed and skill and trained reflexes beyond anything outside the augmented men. There were still those who claimed he had to be a cyborg of some kind, or at the very least a product of the body shops, but the Arena staff said not, and they were best placed to know.
    The Masked Gladiator took up his position in the center of the Arena and waited patiently for his opponent to come to him. The giant holoscreen showed a closeup of his featureless helm and ran columns of statistics from his previous fights on either side of it. The figures were impressive: never beaten in a hundred and thirty-seven combats. Only wounded seriously twice, in his early days. Present odds against his current challenger: one thousand to one, in his favor. The odds kept small fry from wasting his time, but there were always challengers.
    The latest in a long line stepped out of a side gate and strode confidently toward the waiting champion. The crowd gave him a good-natured cheer. They admired courage, and fresh blood was always welcome. His name was Auric Skye, and he wanted to become a bodyguard for the Lord of Clan Chojiro. But since that was one of the top jobs in the bodyguard market, the only way to jump to the top of the queue was by committing some great act