A shimmering red bubble surrounded The Junkyard King, a foot-tall midget in a diaper. He stood on a tower of smashed cars and space cruisers. Black hair covered his chest. A small flask lay at his feet and he clutched a fat cigar and blew clouds of smoke. In the other hand he held a bright red wand. His head snapped toward the timer two minutes away from zero.

I squeezed the cell’s metal bars, trying to stop my naked body from shaking. I glared at the announcers—two small figures enclosed in protective glass high above the battlefield. I hated them for how lightly they took this.

“Looks like the King is getting impatient,” Paul Dice, one of the announcers, said. His voice boomed through loudspeakers set up around the arena.

“He is ready for the Battle to begin,” the other announcer, a woldrak named Dobarh, said in a deep and guttural voice.