The air in the prep room still seemed heavy with Miles's unease.
He had won the first match without even breaking a sweat, a fact that seemed to annoy him more than it pleased him.
"Well, that was anticlimactic," he thought, his internal monologue a low, sarcastic grumble. "I was promised a grand stage, a fight for the ages."
"Instead, I got three guys whose primary combat skill was tripping over their own feet."
"I've had more challenging fights with a stuck vending machine."
Clara was looking at a data tablet, her brow furrowed in concentration. "Don't get cocky," she said, not looking up. "That was just the warm-up."
Leo, their lanky, tech-savvy third member, was leaning back in his chair, spinning a small, high-tech screwdriver on his finger. "She's right, you know," he said, a lazy grin on his face. "The preliminary rounds are just to weed out the cannon fodder."
