One Round

The robot’s left leg kept trying to fold backwards.

I braced my shoulder against its thigh housing and tightened the stabiliser clamp another quarter turn.

“Move it again,” I said.

The handler leaned over the open control rig and pushed the test command.

The robot lifted its foot, set it down, and shifted its weight.

The knee held.

The hip didn’t.

A dull knock ran through the frame, followed by a shudder that travelled all the way into the torso.

I pulled my head back before a loose panel clipped my ear.

“That’s not the leg,” the handler said.

“It’s the hip.”

“You said the knee was the problem.”

“I said the knee was the obvious problem.”

The arena shook around us as something heavy hit the floor beyond the repair bay. The crowd roared a second later.

I glanced towards the open doorway.

A screen mounted above the tool lockers showed two machines circling beneath the lights. One was narrow and quick, with blue armour and long arms. The other looked like somebody had built a brick wall, added legs, and taught it how to shove.

The quick one darted in.

The brick wall caught it by the waist and drove it into the barrier.

The crowd loved that.

So did I.

“Can you fix it?” the handler asked.

I looked back at the machine in front of me.

It was called Knucklebone, although there wasn’t anything especially memorable about it. Two arms, two legs, a squat torso, and enough armour to survive a few decent hits. Its paint had once been red. It is mostly gone now.

I reached through the side opening and pressed my thumb against the hip assembly.

It shifted enough to be a problem.

“It needs a new bearing sleeve,” I said. “The housing’s worn, and the joint is moving under load.”

“I don’t have a new sleeve.”

“I know.”

“Can you fix it enough to last a match?”

He was older than me, maybe fifty, although that didn’t mean much. Half the handlers in the lower league were retirees, and the other half looked like they should still be in school.

The arena advertisements loved that.

“No age limits. No weight classes. No strong body required.

Anyone could become a champion.”

They played the message between nearly every match.

Sometimes I still believed it. Not enough to say it aloud. But that was the appeal… the hope, the dream.

“If I lock the joint,” I said, “it’ll lose rotation through the left side.”

“He doesn’t rotate much.”

“It’ll turn badly.”

“He already turns badly.”

“He’ll turn worse.”

The handler rubbed both hands over his face.

“How long will it last?”

“I don’t know.”

“One round?”

“Maybe.”

He lowered his hands.

“One round is enough.”

It usually was, right up until it wasn’t.

I reached for the locking brace.

My arena shift covered standard repairs, which meant replacing damaged cables, resealing coolant lines, and doing whatever else the venue considered cheap enough to have lower-tier teams get back onto the mat. Anything beyond that was private work.

Private work was supposed to mean extra money.

Mostly, it meant promises.

I fitted the brace around the hip assembly and pulled the bolts tight. It wasn’t elegant, but it would stop the joint from slipping sideways. For a while.

“Test it again,” I said.

Knucklebone stepped forward.

The left side dragged slightly, but the hip held.

The handler smiled.

“That’ll do.”

“No hard turns.”

“He won’t need them.”

“No side impacts.”

“He’ll avoid them.”

“And if the brace starts knocking, stop the match.”

His smile thinned.

“You know I can’t do that.”

I did.

He closed the torso panel and wheeled the control rig towards the staging corridor.

Knucklebone followed with a slight limp.

I watched them go.

Then I looked up at the screen.

The blue robot was missing an arm now.

The brick wall had both of its hands locked around the remaining one and was twisting.

A warning light flashed at the edge of the screen.

The blue machine’s handler surrendered before the shoulder tore free.

The crowd booed.

I didn’t.

There was always another match. There wasn’t always another arm.

A recorded voice filled the arena.

“Strength has limits. Age has limits. The human body has limits.”

The screen changed to a child standing beside a polished silver robot.

Then an elderly woman.

Then a man in a powered chair.

“Machines don’t care who you are. Build yours. Enter the ring. Become more.”

The league logo filled the screen.

I’d seen the advertisement so many times I knew exactly when the music would rise.

I still watched it. That was probably the point. A bell sounded from the staging corridor.

Knucklebone’s match.

I wiped my hands on a cloth and moved to the doorway.

The staff viewing area wasn’t much more than a strip of concrete behind the first seating level, but it gave me a clear look at the ring.

Knucklebone entered beneath weak red lights.

Its opponent came out under gold.

That told me almost everything I needed to know.

Better sponsors. Better armour. Better repairs.

The opposing robot was called Saintmaker. It had polished white plating and a chest shaped like a shield. The name was painted across both forearms.

The crowd knew who would win. They chanted as it walked in.

Knucklebone got a few cheers from somewhere near the back. The handlers took their places behind the control barriers.

The bell rang.

Saintmaker moved first.

Knucklebone absorbed the first hit and stayed upright but managed to gain a brace that held Saintmaker for a moment.

I leaned forward.

Saintmaker struck again, lower this time.

Knucklebone stepped back, planted its left foot, and shoved.

Saintmaker actually moved.

Not far, but enough to make the crowd react well for Knucklebone. We all loved that underdog.

The handler must have felt the crowd's vibe too, because Knucklebone pressed forward. For a few seconds, it looked good.

The hip stayed straight. The damaged knee held. Saintmaker gave ground twice before bracing against the ring wall.

I smiled before I could stop myself.

Then Knucklebone tried to turn.

The locked hip dragged. Its upper body moved before its left leg did.

Saintmaker caught the hesitation. It drove a shoulder into Knucklebone’s side. The brace knocked once. I heard it from across the arena. Knucklebone staggered.

“Stop,” I muttered.

The handler pushed it forward again. Saintmaker hit the same side. The brace knocked harder. Knucklebone’s left leg bent. The handler tried to pull it back, but Saintmaker was already inside its reach.

It hooked one arm behind Knucklebone’s waist, lifted, and threw.

Knucklebone hit the floor on its damaged hip.

The brace tore free.

The left leg folded beneath the body.

The match ended before the handler surrendered.

Knucklebone couldn’t stand.

The crowd applauded the throw. Saintmaker had won against the plucky underdog, the world felt right.

I went back to the repair bay.

The handler arrived ten minutes later with Knucklebone hanging from a transport frame.

The left hip was gone. Not damaged. Gone.

Saintmaker had torn the joint apart after the fall, probably because the referee waited too long to stop the match.

The handler avoided looking at me.

“I don’t have it,” he said.

I opened Knucklebone’s side panel.

“I know.”

“I thought we’d last longer.”

“So did I.”

That wasn’t completely true, although I had hoped it would be. Hope and expectation were different things. He stood beside me while I examined what remained.

“I can give you the shoulder actuator,” he said.

I looked over at him as he added, “And the right knee assembly.”

“You’ll need both if you rebuild.”

“I’m not rebuilding.”

The words came out flat. He had probably made the decision before the match ended. I looked at Knucklebone’s ruined hip, then at the intact shoulder.

The actuator wasn’t new, but it was useful. The knee assembly was better than anything in my parts cupboard.

“All right,” I said.

His shoulders dropped with relief.

He said, “I’ll authorise the salvage.” a he tapped through the transfer on his wrist screen. Knucklebone was wheeled towards the rear holding area. I followed with my tool case.

The salvage yard behind the arena was louder than the repair bay and smelled worse. Burnt insulation, hot metal, old coolant, and rainwater sat together in shallow drains.

Broken machines waited in rows. Some were wrestling robots. Others had been delivery units, construction frames, loaders, cleaners, or warehouse rigs. Anything the arena didn’t want was sold by weight, stripped for parts, or fed into destruction matches.

I found Knucklebone beside a stack of damaged frames. The transfer marker flashed green against its chest. I opened my case.

Then I saw the machine behind it.

It was a standard wrestling robot, just like the others in the row, but with slightly broader shoulders, thicker arms and reinforced legs. No proper armour, only heavy industrial plating scarred by years of use.

A faded identification strip ran across its chest.

HAU-17

Someone had painted a yellow target over the centre of its body.

I moved closer.

It was a standard wrestling bot with a few added extras. It was an old one. Actually, it was very old.

The chest plating was dented, and one optic was dark. Rust marked the lower joints, but the frame itself looked sound.

“Don’t bother,” a yard worker called from across the aisle. “That one’s booked.”

“For what?”

“Destruction exhibition tomorrow.”

He pointed towards the target.

“Junior league warm-up.”

I looked at the machine again.

“Does it have a core?”

“Supposedly.”

“Powered?”

“Not enough to matter.”

A crane rolled above us carrying half a robot torso. The load swung as the crane changed direction. One of the chains slipped.

The yard worker beneath it didn’t see. I did.

Before I could shout, HAU-17 moved.

Only one arm. Only a few centimetres. Its hand pressed against the hanging torso and stopped it from swinging into the worker’s back.

The worker looked up, swore, and stepped away.

The crane continued.

He didn’t look at HAU-17.

But I did.

A small light flickered beneath its damaged optic. I stepped closer and placed my hand against the access panel near its ribs.

The yard worker said, “Old machines twitch.”

HAU-17 kept looking at me.

On my wrist screen, the salvage system showed three available actions.

PLACE MAINTENANCE HOLD

REQUEST SALVAGE TRADE

TRANSFER TO REPAIR BAY

I stared at them while the arena crowd roared through the walls.

For the first time in my life, entering the ring didn’t feel entirely impossible.

What should Taya do?

1. Place a maintenance hold. Taya marks HAU-17 as unsafe for arena use and requests a full inspection.

2. Offer her new salvage parts in trade. Taya risks giving up Knucklebone’s shoulder actuator and knee assembly to secure legal ownership of HAU-17.

3. Transfer HAU-17 to the repair bay. Taya moves the robot before anyone can stop her, even though she has no authorisation to do it.