Sadly, being that he was a sadist who lived to torment us, Abel refused to say another word about the Shatter Lanes until the next morning when we were just about to leave. He did invite the others, but Sloane and the others had gotten an offer from some of the low F-rankers in the Beast Lord Garden to spend the day with them. Apparently they were planning to take their seniors down to Riot Bay to do some fishing, hoping to make some more money.

I wished them luck, but that left us with Sydney, Megan, Wren, Lestri, and Lament coming with us still, which would be fun. We also had the wolves with us. They weren't fans of water so we hadn't brought them to the bay but the Shatter Lanes weren't water based, and Abel insisted they would have a blast there. We'd had them wait in the rooms before, and I felt kind of bad about cooping them up inside, so it would be nice to let them run a bit.

Sydney was absolutely enthralled by Jin and Rellia as soon as she met them, and spent the entire morning at breakfast sandwiched between the big fur balls, cuddling them mercilessly. Finally though, it was time for us to head out, and Abel decided to finally fill us in on what his comment about bird racing meant as we walked.

"Alright." He said after the twentieth time I asked. "Fine. Racing. It's not a complicated thing. The Shatter Lanes are a huge dirt track in the middle. When you show up you can pay to race on the backs of giant wingless birds called Ralkors. They have scales instead of feathers and their beaks and claws are metal. Scary little fuckers if you piss them off, but they're trained not to attack their riders."

I was beginning to sense a pattern here. "Let me guess. During the race the Ralkors attack anyone who isn't their rider who gets close, and to win you need to battle your way through the pack of them to reach the front?" I should have known Abel wouldn't suggest any activity that didn't have a chance to kill us all, training or not. Still, it definitely sounded like a lot of fun, especially since Callie and I had our F-rank armor to fall back on even if we did get attacked.

Abel gasped in feigned shock, putting a hand to his chest. "What? Me? Put you in danger? Preposterous! Lies and slander! Absolutely...ok yeah. They'll try to kill anyone who gets too close, but you have to kind of nudge them. Riders can team up too, and attacks take away from running, so its not like every single Ralkor will be attacking. Some riders choose to go all out on speed, or set traps, it's fun trying to figure out exactly what people will do. I'm actually going to be taking part in this one. Personal strength is much less of a factor here because the Ralkors are all about the same. Though admittedly my spatial perception might help a tad."

He sounded genuinely excited to take part, and it occurred to me that Abel had mostly been forced to stay out of all the activities we'd been doing. With the exception of the fishing, this had been more of a supervisory thing for him. For someone who obviously loved Doomtown and all the things he was showing us down here it must have been hard to just sit back and watch, but he'd never complained. I felt kind of bad for only noticing that now.

It was easy to forget that while he was a bit older than us, Abel was still a G-ranker too. We'd been treating him more like a mentor than a friend, and during training that was fine, but he wasn't the formal type usually. I was pretty sure he'd prefer we treat him like one of the gang when we weren't mid training session. I felt kind of stupid for not considering that before, but it wasn't really too late. I chuckled lightly. "I guess that means we finally have a chance to take you down huh? Get ready to taste defeat."

"Taste the feet?" He said archly, wrinkling his nose. "Whatever weird stuff you and your girlfriend get upto isn't my business man, just keep me out of it." I heard Megan choke down a snicker even as Callie squeaked in embarrassment. I grimaced. I'd kind of set him up for that one. I would have my revenge eventually though.

Luckily the conversation was cut off by our arrival at the Shatter Lanes, a fact I was alerted to by the growls and yips of Jin, who it seemed did NOT like the smell of Ralkor. "By the way, you mentioned Jin and Rellia would have fun here?" I asked Abel, as we got in line. "Are they able to race with us or something?" That sounded like it might be dangerous, but the puppies did need some exercise, and chasing scaly hate birds would probably be a blast for them.

Abel just laughed. "Sadly not. But the adolescent Ralkors are much less dangerous, and they train them on a smaller track. The wolves should be allowed to race with them, and since they haven't developed the metal claws and beak they should be much safer." He turned to the man behind the counter we'd just arrived at. "Nine for the noon race. Plus two tickets for the training lanes." Then he paused for a second, checking his scan ring. "Actually we'll rent one of the novice pens for the next half hour if there's one open."

The man, a tall lanky fellow with dark skin and hair and bright blue eyes, just grinned at him. "Sure are. Anyone with any sense has already done all the training they need. You're free to use one. Just go around back and receive your Ralkor assignments."

We turned to do just that, but Callie called us to a stop as her scan ring buzzed. "One second. I think that's Mordaunt. She decided to meet us here." Sure enough within a minute or two, Mordaunt made her way over, the hulking form of Rahm lumbering behind her silently. Well, that wasn't fair. Rahm didn't lumber. He was a pretty graceful guy. But the whole dead person thing combined with his total silence creeped me out.

After stopping to pick up her own tickets she came around to meet us so we could walk over to get our assigned Ralkors together. As we walked, I had to ask Abel. "So...Ralkors. Is there a lot of variation? Because being assigned a bird makes it seem like some of them might be...recalcitrant." Which was a polite way to say crazy rage beasts that tried to rip apart their owners.

He just shrugged. "There are good birds and bad birds. Some of them don't like riders much, but we'll see what we end up with. They don't give the best ones to the early attendees or anything, that would just make it a matter of who showed up first. It's random."

Mordaunt looked incredibly interested. "This sounds like a blast. I'm glad you invited me. No hard feelings if I maim some of you." Her teasing grin made it clear she wasn't planning to actually maim us...or that she was? I didn't have enough of a read on her to be sure.

It didn't really matter. With our armor Callie and I would be fine, and anyone else who got hurt had the Vitality not to bleed out before I could fix them with heal bursts. When we came to the spot at the edge of a fenced off area, a bored looking woman with blonde hair in a ponytail yawned at us. "Welcome to the Shatter Lanes." She droned. "Please be aware than any mutilation or untimely deaths caused by Ralkors during the course of your visit is not our responsibility. A stipulation you will agree to before being given your Ralkor."

Since this was Doomtown, that seemed to be pretty much par for the course. We all agreed, and the woman nodded, leading us through the fence to where a series of massive bipedal birds waited. The scales of a Ralkor were much more delicate than expected, the dense coating of small plates retaining flexibility and durability regardless of thickness by virtue of overlap.

The beaks and talons, as mentioned, were metal, and gleamed imposingly in the low light. Abel nodded in satisfaction as he took them all in. "Just as scary as I remember. The Ralkor is actually a pretty cool animal. They feed them scrap metal as youngsters, letting the metal build up in their bones. When they get old enough to go through puberty the metal is vented into their beak and claws, creating the effect you see here."

There were about a dozen Ralkor left and eleven of us, so I knew I would be getting one of these. Jin and Rellia just growled at them menacingly as they tried to back away. Sydney knelt down next to them, pulling them against her an cooing softly. I rolled my eyes at them. Big babies. What kind of wolf is afraid of a giant chicken? Still, I reached down to scratch Jin behind the ears. Even if he was a scaredy wolf he was still a good boy. Besides, those metal beaks actually did look kind of scary, so I couldn't blame him too much.

The woman from the entrance had followed us in, and gestured to the Ralkors scattered around the pens. "Alright, now each of you take out your tickets and tear them." I'd been handed a ticket when I showed up, but hadn't paid it any mind. Still, it was her show. I took the ticket out and tore it, and the scraps of paper burst into green flame. The flames floated as a ball in the air before zipping over to be snapped up by a green scaled Ralkor.

When the woman made a shooing gesture I shrugged and walked over to the Ralkor. Its eyes were glowing green like the fire when I arrived, and as that faded I felt a small link form between us. Nothing as permanent or strong as my link with Callie, but similar. Some kind of empathy maybe? I turned to Abel, cocking my head, and he grinned at me. "Beast bonds." He said with amusement. "Only temporary, but they're good for learning to interact with bonded partners. Bonding Skills can be pretty similar sometimes."

I burst out laughing. "You lying ass, you said you didn't have any special training in mind. This whole thing was one big game to get us here." He'd been planning this from the start, or at least as soon as he confirmed we'd gotten the Paired Dueling Skill. He just winked at me and I rolled my eyes. Then I narrowed them suspiciously. "Wait, this doesn't give you an advantage in the race does it?"

He just chuckled. "Not much. I'll adapt faster because of experience, but the beast bond isn't a Skill I actually have. It's just as temporary for me. The training pen should give you plenty of time to get adapted before the race, so we'll be on even footing when I absolutely demolish you all with no real effort." He said that last part with casual confidence that made me want to punch him a little, but I just rolled my eyes again.

Once we all got our Ralkors we headed for the training pen he'd reserved to get used to our bonds and learn to control our temporary mounts. It didn't take long to pick it up, like he'd said, so we were ready to go by the time the race started. As we all lined up at the starting line, I realized that though we were the last twelve, there were about fifty people here. This was going to be much more chaotic than expected. I couldn't wait.