Everyone knows Rizzo Rawlins is a cheat I said How can we prove he’s cheating in the battle-bot competition The flat piece of vizpaper in Zarkof s large hands sparked to life The paper’s surface glowed softly with the words Rockfall Battle Bot Association Rules and Regulations Zarkof thumbed through the manual He cleared his throat before speaking It states clearly in Section 12 Subsection D that all essential mainframe apparatuses and sub-linear underlying frameworks must be Um run that one by me again I said Certainly Zarkof smiled It states clearly in Section 12 Daztan stepped in to translate What he means is we have to build our battle bots using parts we make ourselves And run the bots using computer code that we write ourselves Ryla added That way participants can’t just buy the best equipment or hire some professional professional computer coder to make their battle bot And that’s what you think Rizzo has done Daztan nodded His bot moves too fast It’s too smart to have been created by a bunch of monsters 6
from elementary school We think he got his battle-bot battle-bot parts and code from a professional bot maker And we want you to prove it It is quite important that the truth be known Zarkof said The winner of our school battle-bot tournament will represent Gravelmuck in the Slick City Battle Bot Cup next week And you think Rizzo will win Tank asked If he does win he won’t deserve it Ryla said We just want things to be fair Daztan said All the other monsters have been working on their battle bots for a long time It’s not right for Rizzo to use his money to get an advantage over us If you can prove he bought his computer parts Principal Weaver will have to remove him from the tournament A chance to prove Rizzo Rawlins is a cheat I looked to my detective partner Tank’s ears stood at attention like a pair of hungry flame hounds She was in we'll take the case
chapter twO code-sniffing two days later Tank’s ears had started to sag Rizzo and his crew weren’t letting anyone near their battle bot The kobold wouldn’t talk to me or Tank Even Rizzo’s goons the Gutro twins were keeping tight-lipped about what made the Rawlins Reaper work When the Gravelmuck battle-bot finals rolled around it was a match between Rizzo’s Reaper and the Troll Patrol Thrasher After chasing that kobold for two days we had nothing Now the whole school had gathered in the schoolyard to see the battle Rizzo’s dad Ratso Rawlins had even rented a special battle-bot arena with seats for the fans 8
I had dusted myself off from the close encounter with Rizzo’s battle bot and was ready to never get in the ring again Tank had other ideas Okay Fizz this time try not to get crushed by the battle bots I wasn’t trying to get crushed Rizzo must be using illegal parts to get his bot to move so fast 9
