There’s history between these tow Operators; the last time they met SingularByte contested the result, and still holds that Brendan essentially stole the match - most lately calling Brendan out in a series of guest verses on rap tracks, as SingularByte is also a very skilled MC besides being a skilled Operator.

Still, the expectations for this Bout are low; Brendan was public about being willing take on anybody to deny Trapdoorspyder further victories, and the sense in the air is that neither Operator is going to be trying too hard here, or wanting to risk valuable components in advance of a possible Tournament finish.

In position 4 we have Hard Hat, unchanged since its last bout against Annoy-o-Tron, in which Cool Hand Luke provided a famous assist. Opposite from Hard Hat is Dark Lord - who seems to have varied its loadout at the last minute with a giant mitt, to prevent bypassing manoeuvres, thanks to its modular breakpoint.

And they’re off - but Hard Hat is just sitting there - is this another SingularByte stratagem? In the Operator pit SingularByte is looking expectantly at Brendan, who jams the control forwards, moving Dark Lord over the traps and past the various obstacles to position 8. SingularByte looks disgusted - it’s unclear what he was looking for from the Bad Boy of BlogBot but he didn’t get it - and now h’s dramatically jamming Hard Hat backwards, and yes - out of bounds! SingularByte declines a post-match handshake from Brendan and stalks out of the arena, but Brendan just shrugs and updates his LED Banner, as the judges announce -

Dark Lord wins by TKO!