The Ratings War V: Original Sin - Finals (Winner Announced)
- Thread starter Lord Krunk
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Lost In The Void has asked for a 3 day extension and I've allowed it; because this one is being scored I'm giving everyone until the 8th now.
I will offer no extensions beyond the 8th.
I will offer no extensions beyond the 8th.
Dead on the inside I've got nothing to prove-
----------
Colt's handgrip was damp in my palm, no longer the familiar presence, now an exotic, slippery, animal. A quick flick- seeing the reassuring ring of six-brass circles -flick locking the wheel back in place. I always carry regulation twelve slugs, six chambered, a pair of dinky half-moon clips, three each.
Colossal columns, fingers of a marble giant, twisted into a death grip towards the seemingly absent roof. Stretched for miles. Had what looked like one side of a railway track wrapped around their length, some kind of giant-specific jewellery. It did nothing for my sense of foreboding.
Each morning; slide the rounds into place, manually, one-by-one, smoothly occupying the chambers. Fill out each half-moon, drop them in the holster's pouch.
Each night; slip them back out. Pull the spares off the half-moons. Line them back up, twelve proud little soldiers on parade, long golden uniforms, soft red caps.
My record testifies, even as a decorated Vice Squad Detective, I've never squeezed off lead in the line of duty. "If you end up in a situation where your only option is shooting someone down, you ain't doing proper Police work." I'd defend my record to colleagues.
My colleague now, is a sorry excuse for a partner.
"I don't know why they did that. I didn't mind Modern Marvels..." I shot him a glance, he looked as if he was about to say something else. Mouth hung open, jowl mid-flop. Seemed to happen in fractions of a second. Without much care, jaw interlocked back into place. Somehow, I got the feeling it wasn't me shutting his bumping gums, best intimidation look aside. It looked, honestly, like he'd got a case of the lazies mid-way through speaking, and didn't think he needed to use the energy to finish the sentence. Grunt was the only response I conceded. The others, all up on those platforms in the- it didn't bear thinking about, I couldn't make head nor tail of it, cause I know I wasn't seeing right. Even after shooting that dame down, it hadn't ended. I still wasn't seeing right. And I was still being thrown from place to place. I guess, now I was just refusing to accept it had happened. We'd been in this massive building the whole time- the others, who must have just been in some other part of this building, had looked dangerous. That dame had looked dangerous. This one, he looked tame. He looked tame, so his spikes had to be hidden 'neath that belly. He'd survived somehow. If his ordeal had been anything like mine, there'd be spikes, no doubt. Hell, he could fit a whole hedgehog under that gut.
Off-duty. Bit different. Sometimes you needed to put one through a racket's window, remind them they were meant to be turning a profit. Sometimes a slinger needed more motivation to walk his product a few blocks down, a .38 through the kneecap did wonders for a man's motivation to walk. Rarely, a snitch who couldn't be wised up he was a snitch for you, not on you to Internal Affairs, had to catch a hot-one through the lungs, god bless 'em.
In principle, it was the same. Dropping bullets into the weapon so you could shoot them. But the chasm had opened before me. The vast gulf of distance, between strapping up for the days work, and between having to shove three more into the iron because you'd already killed someone with the first three. I teetered on the edge of that gulf now, it haunted me, made me worry I was wrong about what being a good policeman was, about weapon etiquette, about protecting the city, about staying out of trouble, about not jaunting from location to location with a conga-line of fools and a fat sloven beside me. I teetered, and dug my toes in for dear life.
flick-flick. Still there. Good.
"...I was gonna have a snooze when I'd worked up the oomph for it," seamlessly plucking the thread of past conversation out of the air. I turned back again, he raised a hand to stop, leaning himself against a crescent table.
Some kind of oversized atrium housed us. No, it wasn't oversized. All of it was the right size, it just.. there was too much of it. We'd spent more than quarter hour moving through a forest of the giant's finger columns. Now we arrived at a large crescent, the concierge desk of titanic hotel. High above, but still visible, a large plaque, inscribed with foreign symbols on field of twinkling stars, gold trim inscribed on a field of black marble, just for change.
"Thenagain," the words came out tied together, as if it was easier than saying 'em properly. "not so bad here. Not much to do..." he whipped a thin black rectangle from his pocket, with surprising speed, applied his forefinger to it a few times, before sighing. "Still can't get the pizza though." Whatever that meant, he slid down the side of the table with a mild frown, landing squatly on the chequered marble floor. I lowered my iron, glad he hadn't notice me raise it. We'd be told not to fight each other for this bit, but I had no idea if that rectangle was a weapon, or a make-up mirror. It was back in his pocket now, his eyes fixed on the middle distance. I gave him the third degree. Garrish-patterned shirt, untucked, but clean, despite his dishevelled appearance. He didn't actually look tired, despite the girth, more that he was taking a break cause it was the better alternative to walking.
Death raced towards. Casual as you like. Pair of equidistantly spaced impacts, side by side, bullet holes, spitting up polished chunks, creeping along the floor towards us. The only sound the marble splintering.
The chasm split a few inches wider.
Grabbing the fleshy arm of my erstwhile companion, I struggled against his bulk to pull us out of the oncoming death.
"N-ooo.." with the calm, exaggerated slowness of explaining traffic to a rube. "shooting that slow and obvious and they want us to dodge," grabbing me, unsteady on my feet from trying to pull him, falling onto him, and not out of the path of impacts. Very loud impacts. Repeated. Sliver of marble draws a red trickle across my cheek. From the left. Roll back off him. Quiet now. The trail of bullet holes moves towards us, then swerves to where I tried to drag him.
They wanted us to think we were smart and be quick, whoever they were.
Instead we were dumb and slow.
Instead, we were still alive.
And somehow, I might be wrong about everything.
Remembering to breath again, looking up desperately. Knew the from the angle, they were squirting down on us from an elevated position. From any number of the damn columns. "You wouldn't see them either. I think their good at what they do and I think they probably don't like guns neither. They gave us a chance to see if we-" large exhale followed by a yawn. "-were good enough to-" another yawn. I felt one coming on myself now, suppressed it, "-to.. you know. I think I've done enough for us. I'm not used to being the conversationalist in a group, but you look a little bit rattled and a little bit stoic. I'm gonna find a place for a nap,"
He stood up with purpose, and trudged towards the nearest column "You finish them off. It's only fair to share the workload." Placing both feet, parallel, facing forward, on the odd train-track thing on the column, he suddenly began to slide up, up and round and round towards the roof. "You finish them off, but you might want to move first, this time you can dodge," Like some grim percussion performance, the crescent desk burst apart with that eerily silent gunfire, like someone shooting with a muffler on your iron. Like.. damn.
First one in the shoulder spun me round.
Second in the shoulder dropped me to one knee.
Third one in the raised knee.
Fourth one in the elbow and the Colt clattered to the ground.
Distant noises above. Blood flowing out. Couldn't stand up, drop to hands. Drop to the floor, facedown. ".. you weren't too bad you know. Pity. I can't be stuffed to do it my self."
It was a different beast. Some slippery, exotic animal in my hand. I'd never had to reload it to use it before. Like some Congo snake now, I hadn't paid attention. I'd never had to reload to use it in action again. I could talk, use it to threaten, the implication of violence was all you needed. Then I'd have downtime. Whiskey to recover, and it would be reloaded when I start the day next. I never had to rely on it so much. It may as well have bitten me. It didn't need to be this mystery, silent, killer. It may as well be that I was wrong about it all.
Wrong about it all. It hurt more than the bullets. In seconds I'd been torn up. But that was just my body. Really, it had taken less time to shatter me. Bullets rend through flesh, but the truth, that sad fact, had done more damage than an entire firing squad. Pooling around my wounds. I felt out of it, but I wasn't gone yet. Wasn't gone. Just wrong.
About it all.
Shock was setting in when pairs of hands turned me over, searching me up and done. Unwinding the blackjack from the belt loop. My vision wasn't that hazy. These hands were invisible. I accepted it now, with resignation. That crazy dame, those elevators, those other "contestants", the unwavering, unconcerned optimism of my absent companion, it all must have been there. It was me that didn't fit with the picture.
So invisible hands pawed at me. Searched the holster, darted away for second, and darted back with the Colt floating above me. One hand slipped into the holster cautiously, as if checking that was where it went. Another was feeling its way around my shoes, and another reached inside my jacket removing-
The badge. The damn badge. And breath. I felt breath. That, I was sure of. Now the badge faced me, levitating in the air. The stamped out skyline of the city. I was silent. Attentive. I saw the city. And I knew, I had always worked to better it. It was me. It was me that kept it safe.
That, that was a truth.
I thrashed. I kicked. I struggled. Some demented dervish action.
Because fuck it, I was right. I was fucking necessary. And I was too good to be wrong.
My good arm, my left arm, I lifted it to try and grab the source of that breath, but it just passed through the air, until pain shot up my arm, blood trickled down my fingers. A blade, I clasped, felt like I'd gotten a thin, coarse wrist. It was weak, easy to move, until another hand grabbed my own, then another, and another. My bloodied fingers worked desperately, each movement pain, each pain a relief, a distraction from the dull agony of the bullet wounds, trying to prise its grip open, get the knife, but I couldn't. One of the hands let go, moments later it slammed into my side, then again. But now, I could move the one I had easier. Desperation lent me strength. Vindication lent me more. I jerked the wrist directly up, and felt it strike, token resistance, then warmth, I could see, warm, black liquid trickling down my hand, seemingly from thin air above me. I jerked the hand again, and again, slid it, slashed it, till I slipped off the wrist. But the blade clattered to the floor, visible suddenly, a wicked sharpness with holes punched along the handle.
"NO." I grabbed that handle. "I. Wasn't." Thrust it up again. Weigh collapsed against me. We were tangled, our blood intermingled, swirls of red and black. Struggling desperately.
But I had the blade.
But I was right.
Raising it, high, left handed, brought it down towards my own stomach, confident once more. I hit something, 6 inches above my body. Again. Again. Fountains of black blood splashed up. Bright light. Photographers flashbulb. Left me blinded. I didn't stop. Dammit I was right! Blinking, vision returned, I was embracing some horror, some insect thing with a grey jumpsuit. Its mouth chittered sideways, but its eyes were human. I didn't stop.
"I.
Was.
Right."
When the blade slipped out of my damp palm, I brought my closed fist down over and over, but it had long since ceased moving. I dragged myself out from its bulk.
Pain overlapped me in waves. I spat. I struggled to breath. The chasm closed its gaping maw.
I was right.
----------
-Keep me alive and give me something to lose.
----------
Colt's handgrip was damp in my palm, no longer the familiar presence, now an exotic, slippery, animal. A quick flick- seeing the reassuring ring of six-brass circles -flick locking the wheel back in place. I always carry regulation twelve slugs, six chambered, a pair of dinky half-moon clips, three each.
Colossal columns, fingers of a marble giant, twisted into a death grip towards the seemingly absent roof. Stretched for miles. Had what looked like one side of a railway track wrapped around their length, some kind of giant-specific jewellery. It did nothing for my sense of foreboding.
Each morning; slide the rounds into place, manually, one-by-one, smoothly occupying the chambers. Fill out each half-moon, drop them in the holster's pouch.
Each night; slip them back out. Pull the spares off the half-moons. Line them back up, twelve proud little soldiers on parade, long golden uniforms, soft red caps.
My record testifies, even as a decorated Vice Squad Detective, I've never squeezed off lead in the line of duty. "If you end up in a situation where your only option is shooting someone down, you ain't doing proper Police work." I'd defend my record to colleagues.
My colleague now, is a sorry excuse for a partner.
"I don't know why they did that. I didn't mind Modern Marvels..." I shot him a glance, he looked as if he was about to say something else. Mouth hung open, jowl mid-flop. Seemed to happen in fractions of a second. Without much care, jaw interlocked back into place. Somehow, I got the feeling it wasn't me shutting his bumping gums, best intimidation look aside. It looked, honestly, like he'd got a case of the lazies mid-way through speaking, and didn't think he needed to use the energy to finish the sentence. Grunt was the only response I conceded. The others, all up on those platforms in the- it didn't bear thinking about, I couldn't make head nor tail of it, cause I know I wasn't seeing right. Even after shooting that dame down, it hadn't ended. I still wasn't seeing right. And I was still being thrown from place to place. I guess, now I was just refusing to accept it had happened. We'd been in this massive building the whole time- the others, who must have just been in some other part of this building, had looked dangerous. That dame had looked dangerous. This one, he looked tame. He looked tame, so his spikes had to be hidden 'neath that belly. He'd survived somehow. If his ordeal had been anything like mine, there'd be spikes, no doubt. Hell, he could fit a whole hedgehog under that gut.
Off-duty. Bit different. Sometimes you needed to put one through a racket's window, remind them they were meant to be turning a profit. Sometimes a slinger needed more motivation to walk his product a few blocks down, a .38 through the kneecap did wonders for a man's motivation to walk. Rarely, a snitch who couldn't be wised up he was a snitch for you, not on you to Internal Affairs, had to catch a hot-one through the lungs, god bless 'em.
In principle, it was the same. Dropping bullets into the weapon so you could shoot them. But the chasm had opened before me. The vast gulf of distance, between strapping up for the days work, and between having to shove three more into the iron because you'd already killed someone with the first three. I teetered on the edge of that gulf now, it haunted me, made me worry I was wrong about what being a good policeman was, about weapon etiquette, about protecting the city, about staying out of trouble, about not jaunting from location to location with a conga-line of fools and a fat sloven beside me. I teetered, and dug my toes in for dear life.
flick-flick. Still there. Good.
"...I was gonna have a snooze when I'd worked up the oomph for it," seamlessly plucking the thread of past conversation out of the air. I turned back again, he raised a hand to stop, leaning himself against a crescent table.
Some kind of oversized atrium housed us. No, it wasn't oversized. All of it was the right size, it just.. there was too much of it. We'd spent more than quarter hour moving through a forest of the giant's finger columns. Now we arrived at a large crescent, the concierge desk of titanic hotel. High above, but still visible, a large plaque, inscribed with foreign symbols on field of twinkling stars, gold trim inscribed on a field of black marble, just for change.
"Thenagain," the words came out tied together, as if it was easier than saying 'em properly. "not so bad here. Not much to do..." he whipped a thin black rectangle from his pocket, with surprising speed, applied his forefinger to it a few times, before sighing. "Still can't get the pizza though." Whatever that meant, he slid down the side of the table with a mild frown, landing squatly on the chequered marble floor. I lowered my iron, glad he hadn't notice me raise it. We'd be told not to fight each other for this bit, but I had no idea if that rectangle was a weapon, or a make-up mirror. It was back in his pocket now, his eyes fixed on the middle distance. I gave him the third degree. Garrish-patterned shirt, untucked, but clean, despite his dishevelled appearance. He didn't actually look tired, despite the girth, more that he was taking a break cause it was the better alternative to walking.
Death raced towards. Casual as you like. Pair of equidistantly spaced impacts, side by side, bullet holes, spitting up polished chunks, creeping along the floor towards us. The only sound the marble splintering.
The chasm split a few inches wider.
Grabbing the fleshy arm of my erstwhile companion, I struggled against his bulk to pull us out of the oncoming death.
"N-ooo.." with the calm, exaggerated slowness of explaining traffic to a rube. "shooting that slow and obvious and they want us to dodge," grabbing me, unsteady on my feet from trying to pull him, falling onto him, and not out of the path of impacts. Very loud impacts. Repeated. Sliver of marble draws a red trickle across my cheek. From the left. Roll back off him. Quiet now. The trail of bullet holes moves towards us, then swerves to where I tried to drag him.
They wanted us to think we were smart and be quick, whoever they were.
Instead we were dumb and slow.
Instead, we were still alive.
And somehow, I might be wrong about everything.
Remembering to breath again, looking up desperately. Knew the from the angle, they were squirting down on us from an elevated position. From any number of the damn columns. "You wouldn't see them either. I think their good at what they do and I think they probably don't like guns neither. They gave us a chance to see if we-" large exhale followed by a yawn. "-were good enough to-" another yawn. I felt one coming on myself now, suppressed it, "-to.. you know. I think I've done enough for us. I'm not used to being the conversationalist in a group, but you look a little bit rattled and a little bit stoic. I'm gonna find a place for a nap,"
He stood up with purpose, and trudged towards the nearest column "You finish them off. It's only fair to share the workload." Placing both feet, parallel, facing forward, on the odd train-track thing on the column, he suddenly began to slide up, up and round and round towards the roof. "You finish them off, but you might want to move first, this time you can dodge," Like some grim percussion performance, the crescent desk burst apart with that eerily silent gunfire, like someone shooting with a muffler on your iron. Like.. damn.
First one in the shoulder spun me round.
Second in the shoulder dropped me to one knee.
Third one in the raised knee.
Fourth one in the elbow and the Colt clattered to the ground.
Distant noises above. Blood flowing out. Couldn't stand up, drop to hands. Drop to the floor, facedown. ".. you weren't too bad you know. Pity. I can't be stuffed to do it my self."
It was a different beast. Some slippery, exotic animal in my hand. I'd never had to reload it to use it before. Like some Congo snake now, I hadn't paid attention. I'd never had to reload to use it in action again. I could talk, use it to threaten, the implication of violence was all you needed. Then I'd have downtime. Whiskey to recover, and it would be reloaded when I start the day next. I never had to rely on it so much. It may as well have bitten me. It didn't need to be this mystery, silent, killer. It may as well be that I was wrong about it all.
Wrong about it all. It hurt more than the bullets. In seconds I'd been torn up. But that was just my body. Really, it had taken less time to shatter me. Bullets rend through flesh, but the truth, that sad fact, had done more damage than an entire firing squad. Pooling around my wounds. I felt out of it, but I wasn't gone yet. Wasn't gone. Just wrong.
About it all.
Shock was setting in when pairs of hands turned me over, searching me up and done. Unwinding the blackjack from the belt loop. My vision wasn't that hazy. These hands were invisible. I accepted it now, with resignation. That crazy dame, those elevators, those other "contestants", the unwavering, unconcerned optimism of my absent companion, it all must have been there. It was me that didn't fit with the picture.
So invisible hands pawed at me. Searched the holster, darted away for second, and darted back with the Colt floating above me. One hand slipped into the holster cautiously, as if checking that was where it went. Another was feeling its way around my shoes, and another reached inside my jacket removing-
The badge. The damn badge. And breath. I felt breath. That, I was sure of. Now the badge faced me, levitating in the air. The stamped out skyline of the city. I was silent. Attentive. I saw the city. And I knew, I had always worked to better it. It was me. It was me that kept it safe.
That, that was a truth.
I thrashed. I kicked. I struggled. Some demented dervish action.
Because fuck it, I was right. I was fucking necessary. And I was too good to be wrong.
My good arm, my left arm, I lifted it to try and grab the source of that breath, but it just passed through the air, until pain shot up my arm, blood trickled down my fingers. A blade, I clasped, felt like I'd gotten a thin, coarse wrist. It was weak, easy to move, until another hand grabbed my own, then another, and another. My bloodied fingers worked desperately, each movement pain, each pain a relief, a distraction from the dull agony of the bullet wounds, trying to prise its grip open, get the knife, but I couldn't. One of the hands let go, moments later it slammed into my side, then again. But now, I could move the one I had easier. Desperation lent me strength. Vindication lent me more. I jerked the wrist directly up, and felt it strike, token resistance, then warmth, I could see, warm, black liquid trickling down my hand, seemingly from thin air above me. I jerked the hand again, and again, slid it, slashed it, till I slipped off the wrist. But the blade clattered to the floor, visible suddenly, a wicked sharpness with holes punched along the handle.
"NO." I grabbed that handle. "I. Wasn't." Thrust it up again. Weigh collapsed against me. We were tangled, our blood intermingled, swirls of red and black. Struggling desperately.
But I had the blade.
But I was right.
Raising it, high, left handed, brought it down towards my own stomach, confident once more. I hit something, 6 inches above my body. Again. Again. Fountains of black blood splashed up. Bright light. Photographers flashbulb. Left me blinded. I didn't stop. Dammit I was right! Blinking, vision returned, I was embracing some horror, some insect thing with a grey jumpsuit. Its mouth chittered sideways, but its eyes were human. I didn't stop.
"I.
Was.
Right."
When the blade slipped out of my damp palm, I brought my closed fist down over and over, but it had long since ceased moving. I dragged myself out from its bulk.
Pain overlapped me in waves. I spat. I struggled to breath. The chasm closed its gaping maw.
I was right.
----------
-Keep me alive and give me something to lose.
As their host disappeared Fredrick felt the urge to vocalize what he was sure everyone was thinking, "What. The. Fuck? Does he really think that we're going to be able to take on enemies of someone like this? How? "He for the most part was already out of ways to express his disbelief, "I mean some of you might be able to present a challenge, but fuck; I'm just a guy."
He made a motion towards the "War" door and saw a man only slightly older than him and a little girl who looked less than 10 step toward it as well. He was now terrified for his life, it wasn't enough that he was just a guy, he got stuck with two others that weren't even beings that could do it either. It was a truly damning proposition ahead of him. He stepped forward almost out of adrenaline and felt almost a cooling sensation about him. They were on a world; one that he didn't recognize, even from the minimum amount of schooling he had obtained. An immediate smell of sulphur and fire filled his nostrils and he spun to look at his companions. The other guy looked just as confused as he was, but the girl, she had a look that would haunt him; she stared ahead almost as if searching for something, but was lost trying to find it. The hollow look in her eyes terrified him more than the world he found himself on. This was soon to be rectified.
A huge being stood before them; an armoured man that towered over the three as if an impassable mountain stood before them; this armour was the greatest weapon that Fredrick had ever seen in his entire life; it was truly a testament to their opponent. It was War, war in its purest form and it was about to wage its namesake against them.
The being spoke, not a brutish sound that might have been expected to come from a being known as War, but rather a smooth calculating voice; one of not just a warrior, but of a tactician as well; Nathan knew that this fight wouldn't be easy and immediately looked to the others for ideas of what they could do. To his surprise the other man was already gone from sight. What the fuck? Fredrick thought to himself, They guy was just here, what is he some kinda freaky invisible guy?
Fredrick's question was answered as War swept his hand foreword and caught a sneaking Carl in his fist, looking at him, almost studying him before levelling his fist across a horizontal path to Carl's face. Fredrick was frozen as Carl pounded futilely on War's armour; the sounds around him were almost hypnotic, especially since they appeared to be moving in harmony. The pounding of War's armour, the hydraulics of his armour hissing almost silently, the cracking of rock and stone; its own....
"Melody," a quiet voice said behind him and Fredrick spun around to see the girl, Eurania, he remembered, her name was. She looked in control now, not lost, but instead immersed in the sounds around her. Her eyes shimmered, while still barely containing a sort of artificial beauty. Her face changed for only an instant and sparks crackled in War's suit causing him to drop the lucky thief who immediately appeared to vanish yet again, "Fucking coward," Fredrick muttered under his breath until he realized that he would kill to have escaped from this hell. He had to think to get away from this. He was lost though; he hadn't had a fix in hours and his head was filled with a fuzzy train of thoughts, he needed his drugs and he needed it now.
With a blatant disregard for his own life, he opened his tattered pockets to obtain his ragged bag of cocaine. With careful, yet shaking hands he poured the powder out on the rock, trying frantically to straighten a line out with a quarter fished out of the bag. He saw War looking at him, but he didn't care. He heard the mumbled laughter through the haze in his brain; he knew he was weak, he wanted to be able to sneak, to destroy, to even understand something but he didn't have the abilities, the strengths; instead he was just a doped up idiot. He was also a pissed off, doped up asshole who was gonna do some damage before he met whatever maker he was headed towards.
He took the hit and felt the immediate euphoria overtake him; it was an amazing high; he felt rushed but also relaxed, like he had sped up and the world had slowed to a halt. He felt the rocks underneath his feet, smelt the sulphur as it burned his nostrils and listened to the harmonic melody that the surroundings created. He wanted to help create beauty to be part of something this beautiful. He walked slowly to his bat and swung it haphazardly before striking a rock with it, creating a solid clunk.
Bass, the sound and the word emanated through his skull and he felt like it was the right thing. He continued to strike the rock oblivious to all around him, though he could see the fires, the sparks the battle, the War occurring around him. A crisp sound of bullets striking the ground near him, the smell of gunpowder and napalm; all combining into a masterpiece of sound; something that pleased whatever forces consumed him....
Carl was lost in this battle; from the start it had confused him and instead of trying to decipher what was going on he had tried to disappear instead. That hadn't worked and he had found himself forcefully pounding against what appeared to be impenetrable armour. For some reason the suit had malfunctioned and he had found himself searching for the shadows once again. He felt an inherite disappointment with his companions as neither appeared to be doing anything to fight this monstrosity they had been pitted against. If anything they were just making it easy by standing there.
Perhaps they were not afraid of dying, in which Carl deeply envied them; despite not understanding what he thought of death himself. Being taken away from his career was causing him to think of things that normally would be put aside in place of work instead, but here he was; out of the shadows and fighting for his life, while also debating the merits of his own psyche. It was maddening, why couldn't things just be simple.
His thoughts were interrupted by Wars heavy booming voice and the laughter that accompanied it, "I came here expecting a battle; I expected warriors, monsters, anything that Sin could throw at me; what do I get instead? I get a coward; an android girl with what appears to be no function and an addict; Sin is getting sloppy," he continued to chuckle, before finally pausing to speak again, "But this must end, I require my challenge, do so; that I might end your existence like I have destroyed so many before you. War is an all consuming machine that requires feeding and you shall all serve to grease the gears of war."
Carl listened for a response, surely someone would explain their reason for being here; surely he wouldn't have to tell War himself and show himself to the warlord. When no answer was forthcoming it was as if someone had flipped a switch on War's personality and the entity became aggravated, annoyed and angry; he paced back and forth before firing a couple bullets at Fredrick, who in Carl's eyes, had gone mad after his dose of whatever he had snorted. What a time for an addict to need his fix, but it was annoying War to the point where he seemed to have forgotten Carl completely.
"Answer me!" War snapped again, trying to intimidate the addict blowing flame in his face but yet Fredrick never stopped hitting that rock in the same rhythm, the same movement and tone; it truly confused Carl. What was he thinking? Why was this man mocking War in such a way that he still could not be killed? What was the point?
"The world shook with War's rage as he vented upon Fredrick but did not strike, because of who knows what; a sense of honour perhaps that drove him to wait until the challenge was issued. This begged the question though; what happened if the challenge was never issued? Hopefully it meant the end of this battle before it began because he couldn't take this hiding for much longer.
It had been a world of noise when she had entered, but now Eurania instead felt the gentle flow of music around her. It had started with the Melody the solid beginning to their song that was only starting to manifest. She allowed the musical tones to intertwine, feeling them enter and travel through her being as the song played for a world that tried to ignore it.
Only one was beginning to understand it. The redheaded one had tried to create music and was continuing to do so despite this monster's threats. It was called War, but why was it War? Was it called so for the glorious battles it would have? Or the graves that would scatter the worlds as his bloody conquest consumed the lives of millions? Was it truly the name of a being such as he?
Eurania stopped everything she was doing and the music stopped; the tune silenced for a more serious tone, "Who are you?" she whispered, the words barely auditable as they rolled off her tongue.
"I am War," the monster answered puffing itself up to tower even higher over the little girl, "And I shall be the Emperor of the known worlds and control all that I can in my name; War shall become a synopsis for power and all that speak of peace will know that there is no existence of such a word."
Eurania looked War in the eye and it was as if it were only the two of them, "But really, are you War; or are you simply a pawn to the concept of it; only to be discarded when you are considered obsolete. Like a song, much like the one I created around us had to end, soon your concept of War shall be over and another shall replace you, for War cannot exist without its people and you are so alone right now."
War snapped up enraged, "How dare you compare my might to such a paltry existence as music, of art," he raged, "I am control and I am War when a duel has been declared; you and your team are too cowardly to do so; War is honourable and will remain so."
The music had died in Fredrick's ears and War had moved to Eurania. He was scared of War taking the song and angry that it had to stop. He wanted to kill War but his armour was much too powerful; there had to be a weakness though and he took to studying the armour while the being inside it was preoccupied by the talk of he and the android.
Synthesis, was the word whispered in the ear of Carl as he noticed two things about War. The first was that there was literally nothing War was paying attention to except for Eurania, and this left the exploitation for Carl to manipulate. Upon War's armour there lay one weak spot near the neck. One that he would surely take advantage of. He began to walk towards War, taking precautions but he found a trip to the giant quite simple. There was a small gap in the neck of his armour that would have worked well, if he had actually carried a knife on him. He motioned to Fredrick who would, if he were lucky have something on his person to cut the neck of the great War.
Fredrick looked lost but temporary found himself as well as Carl in his spaced out state. He was picked up by the obviously stronger man a and thrown onto the back of War, who thrashed quickly grabbing one of Fredricks legs, attempting to pull him off of his armour. Fredrick wasn't ready to let go though and instead, he drew a bloody furrow in War's neck which caused War's immediate panic. No one had gotten even close to his suit before, heroes, monsters, they had all fallen; what made this combination so special? It was because they cheated; it hadn't been a duel, he was to die as someone who was ambushed and betrayed. The thought echoed through his head as he slowly bled out. He had lost for the first and last time; like his father before him he handed the mantle to his Killer, Fredrick.
Fredrick took the cloak and looked at it, he had the power to wage War now; or to bring peace. He thought of those and the song that had plagued him this entire experience. He realized that the two titles were nothing more than trumped up words to try to explain away the human nature he felt inside himself once again. There was no War, just as there would be no Peace, there was no honour, cowardice nothing like that; it was simply killing for the sake of killing. He found himself freed by this revelation; instead of fearing death, murder, or such acts as those, he instead realized that all that was irrelevant if you knew that it was only killing. "Everything else," he said outloud to the now dying War, "Is just a perspective," he placed the mantel over War's face and walked away, leaving War to slowly bleed out alone on the battlefield.
He made a motion towards the "War" door and saw a man only slightly older than him and a little girl who looked less than 10 step toward it as well. He was now terrified for his life, it wasn't enough that he was just a guy, he got stuck with two others that weren't even beings that could do it either. It was a truly damning proposition ahead of him. He stepped forward almost out of adrenaline and felt almost a cooling sensation about him. They were on a world; one that he didn't recognize, even from the minimum amount of schooling he had obtained. An immediate smell of sulphur and fire filled his nostrils and he spun to look at his companions. The other guy looked just as confused as he was, but the girl, she had a look that would haunt him; she stared ahead almost as if searching for something, but was lost trying to find it. The hollow look in her eyes terrified him more than the world he found himself on. This was soon to be rectified.
A huge being stood before them; an armoured man that towered over the three as if an impassable mountain stood before them; this armour was the greatest weapon that Fredrick had ever seen in his entire life; it was truly a testament to their opponent. It was War, war in its purest form and it was about to wage its namesake against them.
The being spoke, not a brutish sound that might have been expected to come from a being known as War, but rather a smooth calculating voice; one of not just a warrior, but of a tactician as well; Nathan knew that this fight wouldn't be easy and immediately looked to the others for ideas of what they could do. To his surprise the other man was already gone from sight. What the fuck? Fredrick thought to himself, They guy was just here, what is he some kinda freaky invisible guy?
Fredrick's question was answered as War swept his hand foreword and caught a sneaking Carl in his fist, looking at him, almost studying him before levelling his fist across a horizontal path to Carl's face. Fredrick was frozen as Carl pounded futilely on War's armour; the sounds around him were almost hypnotic, especially since they appeared to be moving in harmony. The pounding of War's armour, the hydraulics of his armour hissing almost silently, the cracking of rock and stone; its own....
"Melody," a quiet voice said behind him and Fredrick spun around to see the girl, Eurania, he remembered, her name was. She looked in control now, not lost, but instead immersed in the sounds around her. Her eyes shimmered, while still barely containing a sort of artificial beauty. Her face changed for only an instant and sparks crackled in War's suit causing him to drop the lucky thief who immediately appeared to vanish yet again, "Fucking coward," Fredrick muttered under his breath until he realized that he would kill to have escaped from this hell. He had to think to get away from this. He was lost though; he hadn't had a fix in hours and his head was filled with a fuzzy train of thoughts, he needed his drugs and he needed it now.
With a blatant disregard for his own life, he opened his tattered pockets to obtain his ragged bag of cocaine. With careful, yet shaking hands he poured the powder out on the rock, trying frantically to straighten a line out with a quarter fished out of the bag. He saw War looking at him, but he didn't care. He heard the mumbled laughter through the haze in his brain; he knew he was weak, he wanted to be able to sneak, to destroy, to even understand something but he didn't have the abilities, the strengths; instead he was just a doped up idiot. He was also a pissed off, doped up asshole who was gonna do some damage before he met whatever maker he was headed towards.
He took the hit and felt the immediate euphoria overtake him; it was an amazing high; he felt rushed but also relaxed, like he had sped up and the world had slowed to a halt. He felt the rocks underneath his feet, smelt the sulphur as it burned his nostrils and listened to the harmonic melody that the surroundings created. He wanted to help create beauty to be part of something this beautiful. He walked slowly to his bat and swung it haphazardly before striking a rock with it, creating a solid clunk.
Bass, the sound and the word emanated through his skull and he felt like it was the right thing. He continued to strike the rock oblivious to all around him, though he could see the fires, the sparks the battle, the War occurring around him. A crisp sound of bullets striking the ground near him, the smell of gunpowder and napalm; all combining into a masterpiece of sound; something that pleased whatever forces consumed him....
Carl was lost in this battle; from the start it had confused him and instead of trying to decipher what was going on he had tried to disappear instead. That hadn't worked and he had found himself forcefully pounding against what appeared to be impenetrable armour. For some reason the suit had malfunctioned and he had found himself searching for the shadows once again. He felt an inherite disappointment with his companions as neither appeared to be doing anything to fight this monstrosity they had been pitted against. If anything they were just making it easy by standing there.
Perhaps they were not afraid of dying, in which Carl deeply envied them; despite not understanding what he thought of death himself. Being taken away from his career was causing him to think of things that normally would be put aside in place of work instead, but here he was; out of the shadows and fighting for his life, while also debating the merits of his own psyche. It was maddening, why couldn't things just be simple.
His thoughts were interrupted by Wars heavy booming voice and the laughter that accompanied it, "I came here expecting a battle; I expected warriors, monsters, anything that Sin could throw at me; what do I get instead? I get a coward; an android girl with what appears to be no function and an addict; Sin is getting sloppy," he continued to chuckle, before finally pausing to speak again, "But this must end, I require my challenge, do so; that I might end your existence like I have destroyed so many before you. War is an all consuming machine that requires feeding and you shall all serve to grease the gears of war."
Carl listened for a response, surely someone would explain their reason for being here; surely he wouldn't have to tell War himself and show himself to the warlord. When no answer was forthcoming it was as if someone had flipped a switch on War's personality and the entity became aggravated, annoyed and angry; he paced back and forth before firing a couple bullets at Fredrick, who in Carl's eyes, had gone mad after his dose of whatever he had snorted. What a time for an addict to need his fix, but it was annoying War to the point where he seemed to have forgotten Carl completely.
"Answer me!" War snapped again, trying to intimidate the addict blowing flame in his face but yet Fredrick never stopped hitting that rock in the same rhythm, the same movement and tone; it truly confused Carl. What was he thinking? Why was this man mocking War in such a way that he still could not be killed? What was the point?
"The world shook with War's rage as he vented upon Fredrick but did not strike, because of who knows what; a sense of honour perhaps that drove him to wait until the challenge was issued. This begged the question though; what happened if the challenge was never issued? Hopefully it meant the end of this battle before it began because he couldn't take this hiding for much longer.
It had been a world of noise when she had entered, but now Eurania instead felt the gentle flow of music around her. It had started with the Melody the solid beginning to their song that was only starting to manifest. She allowed the musical tones to intertwine, feeling them enter and travel through her being as the song played for a world that tried to ignore it.
Only one was beginning to understand it. The redheaded one had tried to create music and was continuing to do so despite this monster's threats. It was called War, but why was it War? Was it called so for the glorious battles it would have? Or the graves that would scatter the worlds as his bloody conquest consumed the lives of millions? Was it truly the name of a being such as he?
Eurania stopped everything she was doing and the music stopped; the tune silenced for a more serious tone, "Who are you?" she whispered, the words barely auditable as they rolled off her tongue.
"I am War," the monster answered puffing itself up to tower even higher over the little girl, "And I shall be the Emperor of the known worlds and control all that I can in my name; War shall become a synopsis for power and all that speak of peace will know that there is no existence of such a word."
Eurania looked War in the eye and it was as if it were only the two of them, "But really, are you War; or are you simply a pawn to the concept of it; only to be discarded when you are considered obsolete. Like a song, much like the one I created around us had to end, soon your concept of War shall be over and another shall replace you, for War cannot exist without its people and you are so alone right now."
War snapped up enraged, "How dare you compare my might to such a paltry existence as music, of art," he raged, "I am control and I am War when a duel has been declared; you and your team are too cowardly to do so; War is honourable and will remain so."
The music had died in Fredrick's ears and War had moved to Eurania. He was scared of War taking the song and angry that it had to stop. He wanted to kill War but his armour was much too powerful; there had to be a weakness though and he took to studying the armour while the being inside it was preoccupied by the talk of he and the android.
Synthesis, was the word whispered in the ear of Carl as he noticed two things about War. The first was that there was literally nothing War was paying attention to except for Eurania, and this left the exploitation for Carl to manipulate. Upon War's armour there lay one weak spot near the neck. One that he would surely take advantage of. He began to walk towards War, taking precautions but he found a trip to the giant quite simple. There was a small gap in the neck of his armour that would have worked well, if he had actually carried a knife on him. He motioned to Fredrick who would, if he were lucky have something on his person to cut the neck of the great War.
Fredrick looked lost but temporary found himself as well as Carl in his spaced out state. He was picked up by the obviously stronger man a and thrown onto the back of War, who thrashed quickly grabbing one of Fredricks legs, attempting to pull him off of his armour. Fredrick wasn't ready to let go though and instead, he drew a bloody furrow in War's neck which caused War's immediate panic. No one had gotten even close to his suit before, heroes, monsters, they had all fallen; what made this combination so special? It was because they cheated; it hadn't been a duel, he was to die as someone who was ambushed and betrayed. The thought echoed through his head as he slowly bled out. He had lost for the first and last time; like his father before him he handed the mantle to his Killer, Fredrick.
Fredrick took the cloak and looked at it, he had the power to wage War now; or to bring peace. He thought of those and the song that had plagued him this entire experience. He realized that the two titles were nothing more than trumped up words to try to explain away the human nature he felt inside himself once again. There was no War, just as there would be no Peace, there was no honour, cowardice nothing like that; it was simply killing for the sake of killing. He found himself freed by this revelation; instead of fearing death, murder, or such acts as those, he instead realized that all that was irrelevant if you knew that it was only killing. "Everything else," he said outloud to the now dying War, "Is just a perspective," he placed the mantel over War's face and walked away, leaving War to slowly bleed out alone on the battlefield.
"What? Who's there?"
He stood up, and brushed himself off. A cold breeze flew by, gently patting his cheeks. His nose caught the cold and was struck with a sudden pain. He grabbed it, closing his nostrils and tried to breathe into his hands, though the warmness brought more pain. Never had this happened, and he was struck with surprise.
"Oh, just leaves," he said, writing the earlier disturbance off as merely nature's trick, though he started harbouring thoughts if this even was really nature, in his mind's eye his earlier fight coming to the foreground. He did a quick spin with both his feet firmly on the ground, an inexplicable fear of flying away creeping up.
Facing the thick forest that was behind him a moment ago, another cloud of leaves flew towards him; and he jumped back. He crouched, and stared at the sunset, at the beautiful, orange-yellow sun above. Yet again, he feared it, and fell onto his back, covering his face with his eyes.
"What is wrong with me?!" he yelled out in desperation, pounding the ground, as more leaves glided around. He turned to face the sun again, in hopes this was a passing thing, but noticed the volcano there, the presence of which he mysteriously missed earlier; or at least he thought he missed the presence of it.
"Hey!" he heard someone yell, sounding like the enthusiastic, cheery greeting of a young girl.
He hastily stood up and looked around, finding a little girl walking towards him from the direction of the small cottage that solemnly lay on the hill, naught but a solitary tree between it and him.
She wore odd clothes, at least for what Chance had seen. First thing that popped into his mind was a carnival he went to when he was a child - one of the high-lights of his childhood. As it shifted from his arrival to the attractions he rode after, he felt a bit lightheaded, and fear came flying back, like a tsunami pushing against his whole body.
"What's wrong?" the girl asked, her voice concerned, but remaining visually almost completely unaffected. "What's wrong?"
"Nev-nevermind," he said, breathing once - in and out - heavily. "Where are we?"
"Where are we? I don't know, me and Henry just woke up here."
"And you haven't noticed anything?"
"What do you mean," the girl asked, her doll coming to life and leering at him.
"What is that?" he asked with a voice as calm as what the wind had turned into.
The girl raised an eyebrow, and smiled.
"Oh, Henry? He's my friend!"
Chance rolled his eyes and half-smiled. He ran his fingers across his chin.
"Really, now? Your friend, a moving doll? What's next, fucking magic and fireballs? Maybe you could even tell me what's the color of it," he said, his smile widening at his own joke. The girl was left speechless, and began to show signs of hesitation at staying in one place. Her doll got - noticeably - angry, but didn't make any efforts to move.
"I'm sorry," Chance said, approaching the girl, and grabbing ahold of her shoulder, squeezing it a little. "Guess we ought to see where the winds take us, eh?"
The girl looked up at him, but only briefly, as the brim of her hat hindered her from seeing his face. She thought once she'd caught glimpse of his face, she'd lifted her head too high.
"It's so quiet here, the winds won't take us anywhere," she said, completely stoically.
Chance couldn't help but smile, shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his pants, and motioning for them to move in the direction he thought best.
"We're not goin' to the desert, not goin' in a volcano either. Not a queer house either."
He remembered his last fight - in an arena, one that wasn't even very big. Though a huge volcano towered over them, he exercised the thought of this all being an arena too, an enclosed space somewhere that they'd have to fight in. The thought he spat out - literally. After he didn't know why, but the thought of fighting her made him feel so sick he spat. Away from her, towards the volcano, noticing now how thirsty he was.
After a long peregrination committed in complete silence, they came upon a river. It was crystal-clear. As crystal-clear as he'd seen water ever be, at least. The current was strong and fast. The river itself was wide, and he saw no hope in them trying to cross it.
"What are we waiting for?" she said, jumping as words came from her lips.
"What do you mean? You want to cross this river, with such a strong current it'd take away even the strongest bloody tree?"
She looked at him smiling, and turned to the river. Her hands started to glow faintly, and a coloured gaseous blob flew into the harsh water of the river.
Nothing happened.
"Well, guess I'm just not go-"
"Wait, wait. What was that?"
"What do you mean?"
"That thing you just did?"
"What do you mean what I did," she asked, almost as if it should've been common sense.
Chance silently sighed, trying to avoid her noticing. At least now his suspicions were confirmed - she had magic powers, still something surprising to him after what he'd been through. He crouched and touched the water - it burned. He pulled out his finger and stuck it in his mouth.
"What's wrong with the water?" the little girl asked, walking towards it.
"Dffun toufch i'," he spewed from between his mouth and finger.
"I wasn't going to, I'm just asking what's wrong with the water."
"It burns. No idea why. Had we a horse, I wonder what would've happened to it had we entered the water."
As soon as he uttered the word 'horse', something cracked down the river. A tree fell down, but turned into a black and grey jumbled, erratically flickering mess before it fell under the cover of other trees.
Both of them stood in silence, only the sound of Amelia's hat brim swaying in the wind present.
The river got more fierce and impetuous, waves getting higher. Out of nowhere came a wave that rose above their heads, turning into the same state the tree had earlier. Chance grabbed Amelia, ignoring her surprised appearance, running as quickly as his feet would take him. At the last moment, a wandering thought entered his mind, and his actions. He took hold of Amelia with one hand, and threw her forward - with great force, but sending her flying relatively low.
With his hands free, he grabbed the thickest branch nearby that he could find, and pulled himself to gain momentum.
After almost tripping, he stopped, noticing the wave had collided with the ground, and the resulting impact had created splatter that couldn't reach them anymore.
"What was that?" he yelled, still intently searching for the girl.
"I've no idea, but I've got a hunch we're supposed to bring down whoever caused it."
"You think?"
"Yeah."
The sun turned into a glowing moon, then into a grotesque-looking slab of rotten meat, from which a huge mouth surfaced, opening wide until it collapsed on itself. Chance's vision went blue, with rows of white text running across. A few jumped out, flying at him, their upside turned at him, as if charging head-first into him. He jumped over the first one, noticing the floating line of small, white dots he left behind.
The closer he ran to them, the more apparent became what they were - mouse cursor icons. He grabbed one, and threw it at the letters, as hard as he could. It flew slower than he thought they would, but upon reaching the cluster of letters, it exploded and left an empty space, though soon invaded by the rest coming on.
He tried to escape, running in the other direction. He was surprised at how agile his legs were, and what a distance they covered with but one mere step. Soon, he was so far away from the letters he thought they were tens of kilometers away, yet he could still see them, and with how visible they were, no horizon seemed to exist in whatever plane he currently resided.
He felt the environment around him closing, though he didn't see it happening. He catched short of breath and his heart pounded faster. In a last, desperate attempt, he clutched the cluster of items, tried to squeeze them together, and threw them at what now seemed like a huge, tentacled, indespicably ugly monster, the smell penetrating his nose, him only now noticing how close it was.
The last thing he saw was a ball of a mix of green and blue - the hue of which flame had - flying towards the abomination. His head hit something hard, higher than the ground that lay under his body.
***
He woke up motionless. He felt hot and he was sweating up a storm. His head was dizzy, and he felt that upon any movement from him, he'd collapse completely, and perhaps even die.
He slowly opened his eyes, but was hit with a whirlwave of bright colours around the red part of the spectrum that stung his eyes more fiercely than the sharpest blade could. He slammed them shut, and let out a loud scream.
"My fault, my fault, my fault," he heard Amelia nervously spout, oftenwhile the sound of something passing through the air at him interrupting her silent chatter.
He opened his eyes again, noticing there was a ring of fire around him. As soon as he stood up, the monstrosity turned to face him, and started charging towards him.
The ground underneath it turned into a barren wasteland, a strip of soil uninhabited by anything living, only black, grey...death and decay, a jumbled mess of errors.
"Don't let it get to you, you seemed to fight against it so well last time, even overpower it, and it helped a lot!"
Amelia shot flames at the monster, as it cried out in a horrific high-pitched screech that penetrated his skull and he felt as if his sanity was being taken apart, block-by-block. He saw the world around him turning into a void; a void filled with endless numbers and symbols running across. Only now did he see Amelia's doll - Henry - run around the horror, noticing how instead it was the doll that shot out fireballs, rather than Amelia herself.
An A appeared right next to Amelia, bending and towering over her like a derelict tower, a stench worse than death lingering over it, a colon appearing next to it, starting to spin. As it started doing rounds quicker and quicker, the A moved - and in the span of a second, it had consumed Amelia.
"Amelia?" Chance yelled out, more curious than terrified.
Then an H appeared next to Henry, much smaller, but as ominous and dangerous in size to it as the A was to Amelia. Next to it, however, a slash appeared. The lower part of it started going back and forth like a pendulum, taking a final, ultimate pull backwards, away from the H, and then flying back, striking at the floating letter, with a powerful clank accompanying it.
Now the both of them were gone, only the monster coming at him, shuffling. A hulking C appeared next to him, falling over as if to roll at him, but it suddenly decreased in size. Its intimidating curves were now merely part of a letter - a corporeal one, but not something Chance took as an enemy anymore.
He grabbed it, and threw it at the entity creeping up to him, already extending its tentacles toward him, ready at any moment to snap and envelop him in them. Almost immediately after the C parted with his hand, he remember: He was inside a ring of fire. He imagined the fire to be magical, much greater than fire he'd encountered before. He imagined how the creature'd be set on fire and wriggle around on the ground, chunks of its hideous flesh peeling off and sloppily hitting the ground with a splashing sound. He even chuckled at it, for a moment forgetting everything around him, though as he looked back up, he couldn't see a single thing - the letter C emanated a white glow, brighter than the brightest of glows, and grew, until it filled the room.
As soon as Chance uttered the word "virus", out of disgust for the creature and its unwarranted attacks on him and Amelia and Henry, who were now gone, and his unrelenting advance that couldn't be stopped, part of its brain still irritated over the irrevocable damage it had dealt his whole conscience with his piercing scream, the monster let out another
shriek, swaying from side to side.
Its mouth opened wider and wider, falling on itself, suffocating the creature, still emitting a horrific shriek.
He fell unconscious, taken by complete light that stole all his thoughts and left him with a sleepless state.
***
When he woke up, he was greeted by the sun, still of an orange hue. He stood up, and looked around - it was the same place he'd woken up before. He kept a keen eye on the forest they'd gone to before, only now noticing some of the jumbled mess present in the forest, even a whole road full of it. It stretched to the horizon, in the least dense part of the forest.
At its beginning, on a natureless land between it and the valley he was in, lay Amelia, with Henry - stomach-up - on her hand.
He walked towards her, shoving his hands into her pockets, even though the soft wind was much warmer this time. He crouched next to Amelia, and watched as the rays of the evening sun shone on her face, though obscured by part of Chance's head. He gently pushed Henry off her hand, and started rocking her.
"Hey," he said, touching his forehead due to what felt like an upcoming headache. "Hey! Wake up."
A barely-audible sound of her opening her mouth and closing it was what came as a reply. She opened her eyes, and stretched out her arms onto the ground next to her.
"There's no grass here," she said.
"Well, there's some there," he said, turning around while crouched, and pointing behind him. "See? Where you found me?"
She tried to stand up, seemingly eager to get to the grass, though her spirits were better than the state of her body. She got up arduously, but when she'd gained a foothold, she grabbed Henry and ran towards the field he came from.
"Aren't you coming?" she asked.
"Yeah, I am," Chance replied, shoving his hands into his pockets once again, slowly starting to walk in her direction.
As she turned around, jumped and laughed, occasionally running her hand through the soft, wet grass, few drops of water dropping, he observed. He felt his vision get a bit blurrier than normal, and he wiped his eyes with his hands.
"What happened," he asked himself, trying to fall think of any explanations, but his mind seemed to be against it.
He looked up at the evening sky, now not even afraid of it at all, and felt his head get dizzier.
He stood up, and brushed himself off. A cold breeze flew by, gently patting his cheeks. His nose caught the cold and was struck with a sudden pain. He grabbed it, closing his nostrils and tried to breathe into his hands, though the warmness brought more pain. Never had this happened, and he was struck with surprise.
"Oh, just leaves," he said, writing the earlier disturbance off as merely nature's trick, though he started harbouring thoughts if this even was really nature, in his mind's eye his earlier fight coming to the foreground. He did a quick spin with both his feet firmly on the ground, an inexplicable fear of flying away creeping up.
Facing the thick forest that was behind him a moment ago, another cloud of leaves flew towards him; and he jumped back. He crouched, and stared at the sunset, at the beautiful, orange-yellow sun above. Yet again, he feared it, and fell onto his back, covering his face with his eyes.
"What is wrong with me?!" he yelled out in desperation, pounding the ground, as more leaves glided around. He turned to face the sun again, in hopes this was a passing thing, but noticed the volcano there, the presence of which he mysteriously missed earlier; or at least he thought he missed the presence of it.
"Hey!" he heard someone yell, sounding like the enthusiastic, cheery greeting of a young girl.
He hastily stood up and looked around, finding a little girl walking towards him from the direction of the small cottage that solemnly lay on the hill, naught but a solitary tree between it and him.
She wore odd clothes, at least for what Chance had seen. First thing that popped into his mind was a carnival he went to when he was a child - one of the high-lights of his childhood. As it shifted from his arrival to the attractions he rode after, he felt a bit lightheaded, and fear came flying back, like a tsunami pushing against his whole body.
"What's wrong?" the girl asked, her voice concerned, but remaining visually almost completely unaffected. "What's wrong?"
"Nev-nevermind," he said, breathing once - in and out - heavily. "Where are we?"
"Where are we? I don't know, me and Henry just woke up here."
"And you haven't noticed anything?"
"What do you mean," the girl asked, her doll coming to life and leering at him.
"What is that?" he asked with a voice as calm as what the wind had turned into.
The girl raised an eyebrow, and smiled.
"Oh, Henry? He's my friend!"
Chance rolled his eyes and half-smiled. He ran his fingers across his chin.
"Really, now? Your friend, a moving doll? What's next, fucking magic and fireballs? Maybe you could even tell me what's the color of it," he said, his smile widening at his own joke. The girl was left speechless, and began to show signs of hesitation at staying in one place. Her doll got - noticeably - angry, but didn't make any efforts to move.
"I'm sorry," Chance said, approaching the girl, and grabbing ahold of her shoulder, squeezing it a little. "Guess we ought to see where the winds take us, eh?"
The girl looked up at him, but only briefly, as the brim of her hat hindered her from seeing his face. She thought once she'd caught glimpse of his face, she'd lifted her head too high.
"It's so quiet here, the winds won't take us anywhere," she said, completely stoically.
Chance couldn't help but smile, shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his pants, and motioning for them to move in the direction he thought best.
"We're not goin' to the desert, not goin' in a volcano either. Not a queer house either."
He remembered his last fight - in an arena, one that wasn't even very big. Though a huge volcano towered over them, he exercised the thought of this all being an arena too, an enclosed space somewhere that they'd have to fight in. The thought he spat out - literally. After he didn't know why, but the thought of fighting her made him feel so sick he spat. Away from her, towards the volcano, noticing now how thirsty he was.
After a long peregrination committed in complete silence, they came upon a river. It was crystal-clear. As crystal-clear as he'd seen water ever be, at least. The current was strong and fast. The river itself was wide, and he saw no hope in them trying to cross it.
"What are we waiting for?" she said, jumping as words came from her lips.
"What do you mean? You want to cross this river, with such a strong current it'd take away even the strongest bloody tree?"
She looked at him smiling, and turned to the river. Her hands started to glow faintly, and a coloured gaseous blob flew into the harsh water of the river.
Nothing happened.
"Well, guess I'm just not go-"
"Wait, wait. What was that?"
"What do you mean?"
"That thing you just did?"
"What do you mean what I did," she asked, almost as if it should've been common sense.
Chance silently sighed, trying to avoid her noticing. At least now his suspicions were confirmed - she had magic powers, still something surprising to him after what he'd been through. He crouched and touched the water - it burned. He pulled out his finger and stuck it in his mouth.
"What's wrong with the water?" the little girl asked, walking towards it.
"Dffun toufch i'," he spewed from between his mouth and finger.
"I wasn't going to, I'm just asking what's wrong with the water."
"It burns. No idea why. Had we a horse, I wonder what would've happened to it had we entered the water."
As soon as he uttered the word 'horse', something cracked down the river. A tree fell down, but turned into a black and grey jumbled, erratically flickering mess before it fell under the cover of other trees.
Both of them stood in silence, only the sound of Amelia's hat brim swaying in the wind present.
The river got more fierce and impetuous, waves getting higher. Out of nowhere came a wave that rose above their heads, turning into the same state the tree had earlier. Chance grabbed Amelia, ignoring her surprised appearance, running as quickly as his feet would take him. At the last moment, a wandering thought entered his mind, and his actions. He took hold of Amelia with one hand, and threw her forward - with great force, but sending her flying relatively low.
With his hands free, he grabbed the thickest branch nearby that he could find, and pulled himself to gain momentum.
After almost tripping, he stopped, noticing the wave had collided with the ground, and the resulting impact had created splatter that couldn't reach them anymore.
"What was that?" he yelled, still intently searching for the girl.
"I've no idea, but I've got a hunch we're supposed to bring down whoever caused it."
"You think?"
"Yeah."
The sun turned into a glowing moon, then into a grotesque-looking slab of rotten meat, from which a huge mouth surfaced, opening wide until it collapsed on itself. Chance's vision went blue, with rows of white text running across. A few jumped out, flying at him, their upside turned at him, as if charging head-first into him. He jumped over the first one, noticing the floating line of small, white dots he left behind.
The closer he ran to them, the more apparent became what they were - mouse cursor icons. He grabbed one, and threw it at the letters, as hard as he could. It flew slower than he thought they would, but upon reaching the cluster of letters, it exploded and left an empty space, though soon invaded by the rest coming on.
He tried to escape, running in the other direction. He was surprised at how agile his legs were, and what a distance they covered with but one mere step. Soon, he was so far away from the letters he thought they were tens of kilometers away, yet he could still see them, and with how visible they were, no horizon seemed to exist in whatever plane he currently resided.
He felt the environment around him closing, though he didn't see it happening. He catched short of breath and his heart pounded faster. In a last, desperate attempt, he clutched the cluster of items, tried to squeeze them together, and threw them at what now seemed like a huge, tentacled, indespicably ugly monster, the smell penetrating his nose, him only now noticing how close it was.
The last thing he saw was a ball of a mix of green and blue - the hue of which flame had - flying towards the abomination. His head hit something hard, higher than the ground that lay under his body.
***
He woke up motionless. He felt hot and he was sweating up a storm. His head was dizzy, and he felt that upon any movement from him, he'd collapse completely, and perhaps even die.
He slowly opened his eyes, but was hit with a whirlwave of bright colours around the red part of the spectrum that stung his eyes more fiercely than the sharpest blade could. He slammed them shut, and let out a loud scream.
"My fault, my fault, my fault," he heard Amelia nervously spout, oftenwhile the sound of something passing through the air at him interrupting her silent chatter.
He opened his eyes again, noticing there was a ring of fire around him. As soon as he stood up, the monstrosity turned to face him, and started charging towards him.
The ground underneath it turned into a barren wasteland, a strip of soil uninhabited by anything living, only black, grey...death and decay, a jumbled mess of errors.
"Don't let it get to you, you seemed to fight against it so well last time, even overpower it, and it helped a lot!"
Amelia shot flames at the monster, as it cried out in a horrific high-pitched screech that penetrated his skull and he felt as if his sanity was being taken apart, block-by-block. He saw the world around him turning into a void; a void filled with endless numbers and symbols running across. Only now did he see Amelia's doll - Henry - run around the horror, noticing how instead it was the doll that shot out fireballs, rather than Amelia herself.
An A appeared right next to Amelia, bending and towering over her like a derelict tower, a stench worse than death lingering over it, a colon appearing next to it, starting to spin. As it started doing rounds quicker and quicker, the A moved - and in the span of a second, it had consumed Amelia.
"Amelia?" Chance yelled out, more curious than terrified.
Then an H appeared next to Henry, much smaller, but as ominous and dangerous in size to it as the A was to Amelia. Next to it, however, a slash appeared. The lower part of it started going back and forth like a pendulum, taking a final, ultimate pull backwards, away from the H, and then flying back, striking at the floating letter, with a powerful clank accompanying it.
Now the both of them were gone, only the monster coming at him, shuffling. A hulking C appeared next to him, falling over as if to roll at him, but it suddenly decreased in size. Its intimidating curves were now merely part of a letter - a corporeal one, but not something Chance took as an enemy anymore.
He grabbed it, and threw it at the entity creeping up to him, already extending its tentacles toward him, ready at any moment to snap and envelop him in them. Almost immediately after the C parted with his hand, he remember: He was inside a ring of fire. He imagined the fire to be magical, much greater than fire he'd encountered before. He imagined how the creature'd be set on fire and wriggle around on the ground, chunks of its hideous flesh peeling off and sloppily hitting the ground with a splashing sound. He even chuckled at it, for a moment forgetting everything around him, though as he looked back up, he couldn't see a single thing - the letter C emanated a white glow, brighter than the brightest of glows, and grew, until it filled the room.
As soon as Chance uttered the word "virus", out of disgust for the creature and its unwarranted attacks on him and Amelia and Henry, who were now gone, and his unrelenting advance that couldn't be stopped, part of its brain still irritated over the irrevocable damage it had dealt his whole conscience with his piercing scream, the monster let out another
shriek, swaying from side to side.
Its mouth opened wider and wider, falling on itself, suffocating the creature, still emitting a horrific shriek.
He fell unconscious, taken by complete light that stole all his thoughts and left him with a sleepless state.
***
When he woke up, he was greeted by the sun, still of an orange hue. He stood up, and looked around - it was the same place he'd woken up before. He kept a keen eye on the forest they'd gone to before, only now noticing some of the jumbled mess present in the forest, even a whole road full of it. It stretched to the horizon, in the least dense part of the forest.
At its beginning, on a natureless land between it and the valley he was in, lay Amelia, with Henry - stomach-up - on her hand.
He walked towards her, shoving his hands into her pockets, even though the soft wind was much warmer this time. He crouched next to Amelia, and watched as the rays of the evening sun shone on her face, though obscured by part of Chance's head. He gently pushed Henry off her hand, and started rocking her.
"Hey," he said, touching his forehead due to what felt like an upcoming headache. "Hey! Wake up."
A barely-audible sound of her opening her mouth and closing it was what came as a reply. She opened her eyes, and stretched out her arms onto the ground next to her.
"There's no grass here," she said.
"Well, there's some there," he said, turning around while crouched, and pointing behind him. "See? Where you found me?"
She tried to stand up, seemingly eager to get to the grass, though her spirits were better than the state of her body. She got up arduously, but when she'd gained a foothold, she grabbed Henry and ran towards the field he came from.
"Aren't you coming?" she asked.
"Yeah, I am," Chance replied, shoving his hands into his pockets once again, slowly starting to walk in her direction.
As she turned around, jumped and laughed, occasionally running her hand through the soft, wet grass, few drops of water dropping, he observed. He felt his vision get a bit blurrier than normal, and he wiped his eyes with his hands.
"What happened," he asked himself, trying to fall think of any explanations, but his mind seemed to be against it.
He looked up at the evening sky, now not even afraid of it at all, and felt his head get dizzier.
I left it intentionally vague (and because it's me who wrote it, after all, and that's what I do), but since seeing the info for this round, between Amelia and Chance, I exercised thoughts of Pestilence trying to mess with Chance (for various purposes), but how Chance'd come out victorious, and everything that happened here is, to a degree, connected with that. I could've inserted a lengthy "exposition ho!" discussion with Chance and Amelia in the end, but I decided not to.
-Act 1-
-So It Begins-
-So It Begins-
A breeze of hexadecimal digits flittered around in a formation for several seconds before revealing the bits of data they contained. Flesh, fur and cloth were formed from seemingly nothing and, seconds later, Henry, Amelia and Chance had appeared at a crossroads. It was a barely visible dirt path stretching off towards the four main compass points; North, West, East and South.
They looked to the North, seeing as they were faced that way as they appeared. As far as they could both see that way laid endless sand until, Amelia imagined, there was no more sand and the world ended. West was a large volcano protruding from the earth and spewing forth clouds of smoke and ash. The East showed a large forest which, rather strangely, had a cottage?s thatched roof jutting out of it in an oblique fashion. And finally, to the immediate South, lay a forest.
It was not the same as the other forest. It was like no forest Amelia had ever laid eyes on because many of the trees were starting to decay down at a base level, no longer being trees but leaking away as a black ooze of digits. She suspected that their opponent, Pestilence, lay within...
Henry and Chance seemed content to begin already, but Amelia stood still for a little longer than they; too deep in her thoughts to walk. Despite how much she was trying to be brave, those brief seconds on the zeppelin had scarred her. She hadn?t expected that she would have to...
That man... He had thrown himself off, fallen with such speed... Had she killed that man? Or did he return happily to his own world as if he had never met Amelia Rhodes? As if he had woken up and everything was the sublime metal that he valued so much more than himself? She hoped with all her heart that he had. And she hoped that if she lost she would get to go and apologise to him and everyone else who had died in these games.
?Hey, kid, you awake? I?m not going to fight this fucking thing by myself.?
She snapped back to reality as she felt a hand on her shoulder and saw an unfamiliar man looking at her. Henry was stood next to him, concern for his master present.
?Kid, nod your head or something. I?m not going to wait here for-fucking-ever while you get over your clichéd-as-all-hell existential crisis.?
Amelia nodded in reply, not quite sure why she was being told to nod or who this man was. But she saw Henry nodding, albeit worriedly, so she nodded too.
He accepted this, ?Right kid, let?s get this shit over with.?
?Don?t call me ?kid?.? There was no joy in her voice, no childish curiosity. There was only coldness. ?My name is Amelia.?
He gave her a blank look which shifted to her companion. Henry didn?t quite know how to display what he was feeling without communicating through Amelia, but he settled with a nod and a shrug.
Chance seemed to begrudgingly accept this too. He introduced himself too, which may very well of fallen short of making it to the disillusioned child, and then set off toward the dark, decayed forest with his temporary companions in tow. He didn?t care enough to make a fuss over this kid; she could just sulk on her own for all he minded.
---
-Act 2-
-Decay and Despair-
-Act 2-
-Decay and Despair-
They walked for a short time, following a thin trail of black ooze that hung in the recesses along the forest?s floor. Chance was leading the way, Henry was walking beside his master on all fours and Amelia was absently and silently following behind Chance with her eyes on the floor. Before she would have gone on and on to win, but... killing unsettled her. She wasn?t meant to be here to kill people. It took her very nature, her basic understanding of who and what she was, and grinded it to dust before her eyes...
Henry made a leap up to his master?s shoulder and sat down, stroking her cheek with a paw. She didn?t react as she otherwise might have: her thoughts were black as the ooze of the decaying forest around them.
Amelia... You shouldn?t be thinking so. Henry?s voice was in her mind. These sorts of thoughts aren?t right for you.
There was no reply at first. Amelia kept her pace through the dark forest. And then, quietly, Amelia?s fears surfaced. I killed him. He died ?cos of me. Henry, I -
He understood exactly why she hurt. She felt this wasn?t what she?d been told to do and Henry agreed with her. The old man who had recruited them for this had said nothing of death or of killing, only of wealth, You see Chance?
She nodded. Chance was walking ahead of the two, completely unaware of their conversation as he kept a semi-vigilant watch for sudden movements.
He probably regrets being here. He would have killed someone to get here too. And he knows he?ll have to kill other people too. But he knows that if he gives in he would not be able to survive. So he keeps going. And you have to as well Amelia.
Again the witch made no reply, but Henry felt as if she had at least unconsciously understood what he meant, even if he was lying about it. Before he jumped down from her shoulder, he left the witch with some parting words. Think about that, Amelia.
---
-Act 3-
-Pestilence Strikes-
-Act 3-
-Pestilence Strikes-
Further and further they walked, going toward the source of the ooze. The forest was more decayed here and any trees that had survived the decay were by no means unscathed; bite marks and giant wounds grazed each one and numbers were pouring like blood from them. The few leaves left un-compiled hung static in midair. Henry snatched one from the air and threw it upwards, watching as it floated away. ?I believe this means Pestilence is near. Be prepared,? he warned.
Amelia nodded, pulling her staff from her cloak and planting it on the ground. She didn?t charge a spell. Chance felt safe in the knowledge that his knives would adequately defend him from surprise attacks. After all, his knives were fucking reality-bending super knives
Of course, nothing could prepare him for Pestilence.
Sharp cracks struck the air as trees were uprooted from the ground
The Champions felt themselves go weightless A sickening lurch hit them as gravity swung 180 degrees
Amelia felt a hand grasp hers
Chance held on for dear life as they both fell upwardsThe sudden change took them both by surprise, kicking them high into the air before they saw their opponent. Amelia struggled to understand what was happening until she was able to right herself in mid-air, with a swirling haze of light present on each foot.
Chance had been lucky enough to get to Amelia before he fell upwards, and was now dangling from her outstretched hand. With enough magical force Amelia was able to lift him up and keep him airborne too. To cut her work she climbed onto his back so that only he had to be kept stationary.
The world was flipped upside down with the infinite sky stretching out below the two of them, uprooted trees falling down from the newly appointed ceiling. Her hat had fallen from her head (presumably into the endless virtual sky) in the turn. Henry managed to crawl up upon her shoulder, having held on to her cloak.
And, before them both, was the sickening form of Pestilence. Amelia, in her mind, pictured this being as the sort that was what badness was made of. It was a grotesque amalgamation of mouths and eyes and spikes and tentacles that looked as if it were from some infinitely dark plane of existence; a plane that no light had ever hoped to permeate.
Chance attacked first, watching as several of his knives vanished into nothingness before they reached their target. He narrowly avoided a tree that fell from above him, bringing his two teammates with him.
?Amelia! Do something for fuck?s sake!?
The witch shook her head. No killing. She didn?t want to any more. Today it was one, a beast no less, but soon she would be dulled to killing and pain. Where would that leave her?
---
-Act 4-
-Break on Through-
-Act 4-
-Break on Through-
Chance didn?t have time for this shit! Here he was getting attacked by trees and gravity-reversing many-tentacled monstrosities and this kid refuses to help! What the hell was her problem anyway?
It was quickly out of his mind as another attack came. With no way to attack back he was forced to backpedal in the air. He didn?t know how many times he had to dodge.
Henry was taking shots at their attacker, seeing little batches of code float away when hit with the fiery projectiles. This gave him an idea; one that wouldn?t work while Amelia refused to kill. He?d have to see what he could do to remove that as an obstacle.
?You have to use fire.?
?Can?t...? She shook her head again. ?No killing, Henry. Not even this monster.?
?You have to...?
She shook her head more, ?No, not going to. Can?t make me.?
?Look you whiny *****!? Chance had had enough of this girl and her sudden lack of survival instinct. ?I?m fucking trying to save your ass while you whinge and moan, so how about you have your fucking crisis later!??
Amelia wasn?t shocked often. It was an emotion that didn?t play well with her, though neither did her current state, ?B-but...?
?No buts. It?s either that thing or us so just fucking hit it with fire already!?
She stayed still for a moment, not speaking or moving. She was powerful, she was able to summon up anything she wanted; no-one ever talked to her like that! No-one orders Amelia to do things because that just isn?t how things work!
She felt Henry tugging at her hair. ?No time for this Amelia. Make him pay later.?
She nodded, gripping her staff in right hand with her other arm firmly around Chance?s neck. She would teach Chance for ordering her about, but first she had to get through Pestilence. She levelled her staff and a red light pulsated upon the tip.
?Hit him hard.?
She nodded confidently. She thrust her staff toward Pestilence, unleashing a huge flare, and then another and another.
Pestilence was taking the attacks well. It was able to dodge with a fair amount of ease; any that couldn?t be dodged were met with a shield of uprooted foliage. Amelia blasted a last fireball directly at the beast.
The gravity started to change, trees were lined up as a barrier from the projectile, and as they were burned they were flung Champion-wards.
Amelia and Chance broke through the burning shield, toward Pestilence. Fire sprouted upon Amelia?s staff and started to twist and spiral so that the end was almost a deadly concentrated point.
She couldn?t speak for Chance, but the split second before they collided was the worst second she?d ever lived through. If she managed to live for a million years, this would be the moment that cemented itself most vividly within her mind. Everything turned to code before her eyes; everything went from flailing tentacles and snapping jaws to indecipherable binary as seething flames blazed through them.
As the digits dissipated before them to reveal sky and earth again they turned, seeing the beast with the code bleeding from the huge wound it now had along its diameter. Gravity was fluctuating around the beast and had they been following the rules it set in its universe they would have been ripped in two. But they remained still; Amelia kept her staff centred upon the opponent.
?It isn?t going to survive long with that wound. It would only be best to end its suffering now Amelia.?
Amelia nodded, knowing that the win would only count if they killed this beast. The pulsing light on her staff shot out, sparking outwards when it met Pestilence.
An explosive choir of roars shook the virtual landscape as Pestilence was enveloped in molten flame. With a scream of bitter agony from his many mouths, Pestilence?s virtual world began to fall to numerical pieces around Amelia and Chance. Trees disappeared into nothingness, the ash above them was lost among a wave of ones and zeros, gravity became a blur of confusing algorithms and objects faded away in a non-existent breeze.
She felt as if little hooks were embedding themselves in her skin as her form started to flitter into the hexadecimal breeze once more, telling her that Pestilence was gone and that the battle was theirs. Chance too was caught in the breeze, fading away just as she was.
He looked relieved. Relieved to be on his way through to the next round, relieved to be rid of her? She didn?t know, but she was a little relieved too.
Okay, the only people I haven't received either word or an entry from is @Zombie_Fish and @NewClassic - I intend to close the round at 10 p.m. AEST.
Apologies for not having gotten back, I got home at 5 and spent pretty much all of my free time on this before going out at seven. It's currently 9:50 in England and I swear to God I will finish this. From what I've looked up, AEST is 10 hours ahead of England, which gives me until noon tomorrow. I should have it done by the end of tonight (England time), even if it kills me.Lord Krunk said:
Once again, sorry about any hassle, but I'll do my absolute best to get this done ASAP.
Despite what you might think, attempting to run away from anything (especially something that is nothing and yet has the appetite of a particularly large something) without any legs and only one arm is usually considered a bad move in general. Most people would simply accept their fate and allow themselves to be swallowed/eaten/quickly disassembled atom-by-atom; Beuxhart, however, rather did enjoy a challenge.
Not to mention he and the Void were old buds.
A series of thuds were made as the Blade of Shadows appeared in the arena and fell out of the air in several small pieces. "Guess I wasn't able to hit an Inn before starting up again, huh? Coulda used a bed for it's mysterious healing powers." Leaning over, Beuxhart grabbed one of his severed legs and the lower part of his torso (both removed by yours truly) and began to work the jigsaw puzzle that was the remains of his body.
"Nothing, old friend, how has it been?!" yelled the man as he twisted one of his legs back into place (luckily the parts of his body that had been appeared alongside him not too far away). Upon receiving no response (aside from the Void moving ever closer), Beuxhart nodded solemnly and slid his lower torso back into place. "Yeah, same here. Everyone nowadays seems to be a ***** in comparison to those long summer nights we spent together. Not to mention it's hard to tackle a kegger without you, bro."
Again, no response. Whether or not Beuxhart truly expected one (or was possibly hearing his own within his head) wasn't entirely clear- though the Void was barely ten meters away and the distance between the Dark one and Famine was quickly disappearing. Literally. His other leg smashed into place, Beuxhart pushed himself off of the ground, a small frown playing across his lips. "Baby, I didn't leave you. I've simply been on vacation for a while and haven't had the time or means to call. Hell, you don't even have a cell phone, Nothing."
The last severed limb lay several feet away from the man, a bit too close to the Void for his personal comfort. He may have once visited the End of Everything, an act that gave him power beyond his imagination, but that didn't mean he had any sort of real alliance with Nothing. After all, it's rather impossible for one to make any sort of friendship with something that doesn't speak, feel, see, etc, etc. Hell, Beuxhart didn't even remember what had happened there or how he even managed to return from the Abyss.
Not that any of that mattered right about now.
Beuxhart dashed forward, an act that would have been much simpler if he had put his legs on the correct sides. Falling flat on his face, Beuxhart had somehow covered just enough ground to reach his arm; however, Famine also appeared to have covered a lot of ground as well. Staring directly into the Void, Beuxhart muttered what would, most likely, be his final words.
"Ah, shit."
"The Hive, huh... How quaint."
Somehow perceiving his time would best be spent not looking at a large sign with the words "THE HIVE" written on it with big, yellow print (several bumblebees with smiles floated amongst the letters), Mr. Charles Taylor looked around the rather large, open room for a way out. He had long since noted the presence of another in this place, as well as the ever-approaching wall of Nothingness. Neither of these revelations interested him- he simply knew he had to find a way to delve deeper into this "Hive" before the Void devoured him. If his opponent died due to the fact that Famine had devoured him... Well, it wouldn't be much of a chip off of his shoulder.
After about half a minute, Chuck found a rather large door. He was a bit surprised he hadn't seen it sooner (it was stark white against the deep yellow of the rest of the hive, making it rather hard to miss), but he supposed it really didn't matter at the moment. He tapped the steel door experimentally with the toe of his shoe before noting two rather large green lights on either side of the door. A small grin appeared on his features as he drew his blade, elongating the blade until it was just long enough to hit the button opposite to the one the Drifter was standing at. Still smiling, he hit the button closest to him and swung his weapon...
Causing the mechanism to shatter. A loud fizzing noise emitted from the button, followed by the eruption of several sparks and a low pitched whine. It was, quite obviously, broken.
Cursing, the Drifter swung his weapon at the door, which did little else than make a loud dink! as it bounced off of the metal. After a few more enraged slashes, Chuck took a deep, calming breath and readjusted his hat. There would be another door. There was always another door.
With that reassuring realization, the slight grin returned to the Drifter's lips. However, shortly following this realization came another one that was much more disturbing: the Void was rather closer than it had been mere moments ago. Also, his opponent was still alive as well, which made for fun times all around. He could actually see the man now, laying down before the Void and waiting for it to devour him.
"How foolish..." the Drifter muttered, turning on his heel. If the man was dumb enough to allow himself to be taken into Nothing, then he deserved his fate. It wasn't like he would be of any use to Charles...
Spinning around, the Drifter made a mad dash for the fallen cloaked man. If he made it to the next door, a similar locking mechanism would probably hold the damned portal closed. Even one as stupid as this man appeared to be would be able to do something as simple as pressing a button, right? He had to have some cognitive capacity to have made it past his first battle.
Grabbing one of the dark clothed man's legs, Charles tore him away from the Void with surprising ease. Either this man was incredibly light, or Chuck had somehow grown in strength exponentially in the last few minutes, as the man flew through the air and crashed into the dense steel wall.
"Thanks ma--" Beuxhart's heartfelt reply was cut short as several tons of steel connected with his facial structure. Sliding down the wall, Beuxhart snapped his fingers, causing a large portal to open directly next to him. He motioned with to it with his still severed arm (as it's rather hard to speak with your face smashed into a wall) before pulling himself into it.
Once he was on the other side, Beuxhart cut off his legs again and put them on their correct sides before ramming his other arm into place. The Drifter had, apparently, made it in the portal before Beuxhart and was staring at him rather intently.
"You can remove and reattach your limbs? What a useless ability."
Frowning, Beuxhart pushed himself off the ground and knocked on the wall directly behind him. "Yes, it's almost as useless as opening portals through one-foot thick steel barriers and saving your ass. You're welcome, by the way."
The disgusted look on the Drifter's features gave Beuxhart much more satisfaction than it should have. He motioned at another wall several feet away, thus making a second portal appear on it and bowed to his newfound ally. "After you, good sir."
Several mumbled curses tumbled out of the Drifter's mouth, nevertheless he stalked towards the vortex and stepped through it. Beuxhart followed shortly thereafter, noting that the wall he had just passed through had disappeared into nothingness as he entered the next level of the Hive.
"You know, this whole "Escaping the Void" thing is a lot simpler than I first assumed it would be. Granted, I'm kind of cheating- but stupid is as stupid does and you can't outrun the Void without throwing some ponies in the way, as I always say."
A sort of quizzical glare was the only response Beuxhart received from his companion, not that he expected much more. Shrugging, he pointed at the next wall and snapped his fingers again, however, nothing appeared to happen. Frowning, he snapped his fingers again and again, each time receiving no results. He turned to the Drifter and cocked his head to the side, sticking a pinky in his ear. "I think I may have run out of juice. Either that, or it's one o' them 'Anti-portal Fuck You' doors. The good news is that we're totally boned now. Bad news is that the Void has nothing to bone us with."
Beuxhart's statement was, once again, met with limited response. Instead, the Drifter began to sprint down the corridor the two men had found themselves within. Beuxhart casually jogged along behind him, noting that the Void would be tearing through the walls in a few seconds. "You know, it's kind of hard to outrun something when you're surrounded by it."
"Surrounded? It was coming from one direction, imbecile."
"Well, yes... originally. The wall was made of a super-dense steel somethingoranother. The Void breaks down everything in front of it atom-by-atom and, since the steel had so much mass, it took longer to tear down than, say, the air and floor of the room we started in. Because the steel was so massive and because it took so long to tear through, the Void kind of had time to wrap itself around the rest of this place. Or something like that- I may just be spouting off hogwash about now."
By now, the odd duo had reached another doorway, not dissimilar to the one the Drifter had encountered. Beuxhart smashed the button above him as the Drifter did the same, causing the doorway to open. Once inside the portal, several large, shiny buttons that bore labels like "Instant Matter Spray" and "Void Blocking Wall" on them hung on the wall directly next to Beuxhart. Contemplating the buttons for a moment, Beuxhart nodded before hitting as many of them as he physically could in about two seconds and running through the quickly closing door.
"You know, this is getting old pretty fast, mate. I vote we skip ahead to something far more interesting."
"For once, I understood what you had to say, and I most definitely agree."
A large red button with the words "Press for Big Bang" written beneath it lay on a smooth, black table. The glass above it had been smashed and the button pressed inward. Directly in front of the button stood two men who were both smoking rather large cigars, sipping daintily on tea and carrying rather large machine guns.
"Those last couple of rooms were intense, bro. I never knew wolves could grow wings and rocket launchers."
"It was a bit odd, yes. Sort of like something you would come up with as well, I think."
Taking a rather large puff on his cigar, Beuxhart nodded before draining the rest of his glass of tea and mumbling: "Indeed, good sir. Now all that's left is for me to kill you... or the other way around. Eh... was the objective for this mission to die after ten minutes?"
"I believe it was survive for fifteen, you nitwit."
"Ah... My mistake. Well... we've got quite a bit of time left, I think- what with the whole recreation of the Universe keeping ol' Voidy away. What say you and I attempt to decapitate each other with swords?"
"What say you shut up and we both just wait for another six minutes or so and let our Overseer decide who goes on?"
"What say... Ah, fuck it." Beuxhart drew his weapon and slashed it at the man in a single movement. Had the Drifter not been inhumanly fast, the blow would have removed the man's head from his shoulders and most likely would have killed him as well. Without so much as batting an eyelash, Charles angled his recently acquired gun and pulled the trigger, sending several dozen bullets flying at the Blade of Shadows.
Somehow, every single shot missed.
"Whoa... I didn't know it was possible to miss with that many bullets at that close of range. Good show, ma--"
The sword that the Drifter was holding had somehow found it's way into Beuxhart's throat, thus cutting his congratulations short. Confused, the Voidling tapped the blade with his free hand and mouthed the word "Ouch" at Chuck.
"You were the one who proposed we decapitate each other."
Nodding, Beuxhart stepped forward, pushing the weapon further into his throat. A brief look of dismay crossed the Drifter's features before he twisted the weapon and slashed outward, nearly removing his head. A swift second blow followed this, removing Beuxhart's skull rather effectively. His body took another step forward before falling forward onto the floor at the Drifter's feet.
"That wasn't very nice, mate. I expected more from you... Like... Real, true friendship."
The Drifter raised an eyebrow as Beuxhart's body pushed itself up off of the ground, dusted itself off and resumed sitting next to the man. Picking up the cigar he had been smoking, Beuxhart took a long pull on it (via the stump that remained of his head) before picking up his severed noggin and returning it to it's former place of rest (i.e. his neck).
"You were the one who attacked me, fool."
"I have a name, you know. I simply cannot recall what it was about now. Do I have something in my brain?"
A loud, rather comical sucking noise was made as the Drifter removed a rather large piece of glass from the Voidling's head. Upon pulling the shard out of his skull, Beuxhart nodded and grinned, offering a hand to his companion. "Right, my name is Kliss... I think. Something, something Soulbender."
"You don't sound so sure of yourself," replied the Drifter, neglecting to even note the presence of Beuxhart's hand in his general vicinity. "You may refer to me as 'The Drifter'."
"The Drifter? So... you're a sailor then? A sailor with lots of crap luck who runs out of fuel and then ends up drifting?"
Beuxhart's grin was cut short by being decapitated a second time within the last few minutes.
"Beuxhart. The name's Beuxhart."
Not to mention he and the Void were old buds.
A series of thuds were made as the Blade of Shadows appeared in the arena and fell out of the air in several small pieces. "Guess I wasn't able to hit an Inn before starting up again, huh? Coulda used a bed for it's mysterious healing powers." Leaning over, Beuxhart grabbed one of his severed legs and the lower part of his torso (both removed by yours truly) and began to work the jigsaw puzzle that was the remains of his body.
"Nothing, old friend, how has it been?!" yelled the man as he twisted one of his legs back into place (luckily the parts of his body that had been appeared alongside him not too far away). Upon receiving no response (aside from the Void moving ever closer), Beuxhart nodded solemnly and slid his lower torso back into place. "Yeah, same here. Everyone nowadays seems to be a ***** in comparison to those long summer nights we spent together. Not to mention it's hard to tackle a kegger without you, bro."
Again, no response. Whether or not Beuxhart truly expected one (or was possibly hearing his own within his head) wasn't entirely clear- though the Void was barely ten meters away and the distance between the Dark one and Famine was quickly disappearing. Literally. His other leg smashed into place, Beuxhart pushed himself off of the ground, a small frown playing across his lips. "Baby, I didn't leave you. I've simply been on vacation for a while and haven't had the time or means to call. Hell, you don't even have a cell phone, Nothing."
The last severed limb lay several feet away from the man, a bit too close to the Void for his personal comfort. He may have once visited the End of Everything, an act that gave him power beyond his imagination, but that didn't mean he had any sort of real alliance with Nothing. After all, it's rather impossible for one to make any sort of friendship with something that doesn't speak, feel, see, etc, etc. Hell, Beuxhart didn't even remember what had happened there or how he even managed to return from the Abyss.
Not that any of that mattered right about now.
Beuxhart dashed forward, an act that would have been much simpler if he had put his legs on the correct sides. Falling flat on his face, Beuxhart had somehow covered just enough ground to reach his arm; however, Famine also appeared to have covered a lot of ground as well. Staring directly into the Void, Beuxhart muttered what would, most likely, be his final words.
"Ah, shit."
**********
"The Hive, huh... How quaint."
Somehow perceiving his time would best be spent not looking at a large sign with the words "THE HIVE" written on it with big, yellow print (several bumblebees with smiles floated amongst the letters), Mr. Charles Taylor looked around the rather large, open room for a way out. He had long since noted the presence of another in this place, as well as the ever-approaching wall of Nothingness. Neither of these revelations interested him- he simply knew he had to find a way to delve deeper into this "Hive" before the Void devoured him. If his opponent died due to the fact that Famine had devoured him... Well, it wouldn't be much of a chip off of his shoulder.
After about half a minute, Chuck found a rather large door. He was a bit surprised he hadn't seen it sooner (it was stark white against the deep yellow of the rest of the hive, making it rather hard to miss), but he supposed it really didn't matter at the moment. He tapped the steel door experimentally with the toe of his shoe before noting two rather large green lights on either side of the door. A small grin appeared on his features as he drew his blade, elongating the blade until it was just long enough to hit the button opposite to the one the Drifter was standing at. Still smiling, he hit the button closest to him and swung his weapon...
Causing the mechanism to shatter. A loud fizzing noise emitted from the button, followed by the eruption of several sparks and a low pitched whine. It was, quite obviously, broken.
Cursing, the Drifter swung his weapon at the door, which did little else than make a loud dink! as it bounced off of the metal. After a few more enraged slashes, Chuck took a deep, calming breath and readjusted his hat. There would be another door. There was always another door.
With that reassuring realization, the slight grin returned to the Drifter's lips. However, shortly following this realization came another one that was much more disturbing: the Void was rather closer than it had been mere moments ago. Also, his opponent was still alive as well, which made for fun times all around. He could actually see the man now, laying down before the Void and waiting for it to devour him.
"How foolish..." the Drifter muttered, turning on his heel. If the man was dumb enough to allow himself to be taken into Nothing, then he deserved his fate. It wasn't like he would be of any use to Charles...
Spinning around, the Drifter made a mad dash for the fallen cloaked man. If he made it to the next door, a similar locking mechanism would probably hold the damned portal closed. Even one as stupid as this man appeared to be would be able to do something as simple as pressing a button, right? He had to have some cognitive capacity to have made it past his first battle.
Grabbing one of the dark clothed man's legs, Charles tore him away from the Void with surprising ease. Either this man was incredibly light, or Chuck had somehow grown in strength exponentially in the last few minutes, as the man flew through the air and crashed into the dense steel wall.
**********
"Thanks ma--" Beuxhart's heartfelt reply was cut short as several tons of steel connected with his facial structure. Sliding down the wall, Beuxhart snapped his fingers, causing a large portal to open directly next to him. He motioned with to it with his still severed arm (as it's rather hard to speak with your face smashed into a wall) before pulling himself into it.
Once he was on the other side, Beuxhart cut off his legs again and put them on their correct sides before ramming his other arm into place. The Drifter had, apparently, made it in the portal before Beuxhart and was staring at him rather intently.
"You can remove and reattach your limbs? What a useless ability."
Frowning, Beuxhart pushed himself off the ground and knocked on the wall directly behind him. "Yes, it's almost as useless as opening portals through one-foot thick steel barriers and saving your ass. You're welcome, by the way."
The disgusted look on the Drifter's features gave Beuxhart much more satisfaction than it should have. He motioned at another wall several feet away, thus making a second portal appear on it and bowed to his newfound ally. "After you, good sir."
Several mumbled curses tumbled out of the Drifter's mouth, nevertheless he stalked towards the vortex and stepped through it. Beuxhart followed shortly thereafter, noting that the wall he had just passed through had disappeared into nothingness as he entered the next level of the Hive.
"You know, this whole "Escaping the Void" thing is a lot simpler than I first assumed it would be. Granted, I'm kind of cheating- but stupid is as stupid does and you can't outrun the Void without throwing some ponies in the way, as I always say."
A sort of quizzical glare was the only response Beuxhart received from his companion, not that he expected much more. Shrugging, he pointed at the next wall and snapped his fingers again, however, nothing appeared to happen. Frowning, he snapped his fingers again and again, each time receiving no results. He turned to the Drifter and cocked his head to the side, sticking a pinky in his ear. "I think I may have run out of juice. Either that, or it's one o' them 'Anti-portal Fuck You' doors. The good news is that we're totally boned now. Bad news is that the Void has nothing to bone us with."
Beuxhart's statement was, once again, met with limited response. Instead, the Drifter began to sprint down the corridor the two men had found themselves within. Beuxhart casually jogged along behind him, noting that the Void would be tearing through the walls in a few seconds. "You know, it's kind of hard to outrun something when you're surrounded by it."
"Surrounded? It was coming from one direction, imbecile."
"Well, yes... originally. The wall was made of a super-dense steel somethingoranother. The Void breaks down everything in front of it atom-by-atom and, since the steel had so much mass, it took longer to tear down than, say, the air and floor of the room we started in. Because the steel was so massive and because it took so long to tear through, the Void kind of had time to wrap itself around the rest of this place. Or something like that- I may just be spouting off hogwash about now."
By now, the odd duo had reached another doorway, not dissimilar to the one the Drifter had encountered. Beuxhart smashed the button above him as the Drifter did the same, causing the doorway to open. Once inside the portal, several large, shiny buttons that bore labels like "Instant Matter Spray" and "Void Blocking Wall" on them hung on the wall directly next to Beuxhart. Contemplating the buttons for a moment, Beuxhart nodded before hitting as many of them as he physically could in about two seconds and running through the quickly closing door.
"You know, this is getting old pretty fast, mate. I vote we skip ahead to something far more interesting."
"For once, I understood what you had to say, and I most definitely agree."
**********
A large red button with the words "Press for Big Bang" written beneath it lay on a smooth, black table. The glass above it had been smashed and the button pressed inward. Directly in front of the button stood two men who were both smoking rather large cigars, sipping daintily on tea and carrying rather large machine guns.
"Those last couple of rooms were intense, bro. I never knew wolves could grow wings and rocket launchers."
"It was a bit odd, yes. Sort of like something you would come up with as well, I think."
Taking a rather large puff on his cigar, Beuxhart nodded before draining the rest of his glass of tea and mumbling: "Indeed, good sir. Now all that's left is for me to kill you... or the other way around. Eh... was the objective for this mission to die after ten minutes?"
"I believe it was survive for fifteen, you nitwit."
"Ah... My mistake. Well... we've got quite a bit of time left, I think- what with the whole recreation of the Universe keeping ol' Voidy away. What say you and I attempt to decapitate each other with swords?"
"What say you shut up and we both just wait for another six minutes or so and let our Overseer decide who goes on?"
"What say... Ah, fuck it." Beuxhart drew his weapon and slashed it at the man in a single movement. Had the Drifter not been inhumanly fast, the blow would have removed the man's head from his shoulders and most likely would have killed him as well. Without so much as batting an eyelash, Charles angled his recently acquired gun and pulled the trigger, sending several dozen bullets flying at the Blade of Shadows.
Somehow, every single shot missed.
"Whoa... I didn't know it was possible to miss with that many bullets at that close of range. Good show, ma--"
The sword that the Drifter was holding had somehow found it's way into Beuxhart's throat, thus cutting his congratulations short. Confused, the Voidling tapped the blade with his free hand and mouthed the word "Ouch" at Chuck.
"You were the one who proposed we decapitate each other."
Nodding, Beuxhart stepped forward, pushing the weapon further into his throat. A brief look of dismay crossed the Drifter's features before he twisted the weapon and slashed outward, nearly removing his head. A swift second blow followed this, removing Beuxhart's skull rather effectively. His body took another step forward before falling forward onto the floor at the Drifter's feet.
**********
"That wasn't very nice, mate. I expected more from you... Like... Real, true friendship."
The Drifter raised an eyebrow as Beuxhart's body pushed itself up off of the ground, dusted itself off and resumed sitting next to the man. Picking up the cigar he had been smoking, Beuxhart took a long pull on it (via the stump that remained of his head) before picking up his severed noggin and returning it to it's former place of rest (i.e. his neck).
"You were the one who attacked me, fool."
"I have a name, you know. I simply cannot recall what it was about now. Do I have something in my brain?"
A loud, rather comical sucking noise was made as the Drifter removed a rather large piece of glass from the Voidling's head. Upon pulling the shard out of his skull, Beuxhart nodded and grinned, offering a hand to his companion. "Right, my name is Kliss... I think. Something, something Soulbender."
"You don't sound so sure of yourself," replied the Drifter, neglecting to even note the presence of Beuxhart's hand in his general vicinity. "You may refer to me as 'The Drifter'."
"The Drifter? So... you're a sailor then? A sailor with lots of crap luck who runs out of fuel and then ends up drifting?"
Beuxhart's grin was cut short by being decapitated a second time within the last few minutes.
"Beuxhart. The name's Beuxhart."
And edited... Moof- I feel a rather lot like shit about now.
From atop his great throne War unleashed a barrage of laser-guided rockets-- Eurania imagined that they resembled a flock of graceful seabirds, rising and diving in unison, before she was jerked by the elbow into a dark place.
Her new friends ushered her rapidly down a smooth incline which led beneath the surface of War's domain, frantically fleeing the Horseman's murderous gaze, and managed to get just far enough-- the hot breath of the explosive pyroclasm which obliterated the spot they'd been just moments earlier merely knocked them all forward a heap and then peppered them with bits of debris.
Fredrick lifted himself up with a groan and shook the dirt from his red hair, "Fuck me sideways, that was close."
Carl had done a tumble and landed on his back, and now stared up at the smoldering opening with silent assent.
When they'd all collected themselves, Fredrick turned to Eurania, who was staring dreamily down the dark passage. "D'ya hear it still?"
The android nodded confidently, "Yes, we are near. The vibrations in this tunnel are fast and angry... they flow from a mighty source, something hard and unnatural."
Her two companions glanced at one another, then shrugged. Nothing the robot girl did seemed to make much sense, but their options at this point were limited. Getting close to War, they'd found, was impossible-- the guy was a living fortress made of guns. Both felt that they'd gotten a pretty shitty draw this round and things were pretty hopeless, but Carl had advised that their best bet would be to avoid being blown to all-hell in the open. To that end, they'd discovered these metal tunnels leading beneath War's terraformed battlefield-- Eurania claimed that some kind of music was pouring out of them (kind-of like vents in a mine, they'd metaphorically determined) and had recognized that one in particular was "screaming."
It seemed they'd found it... whatever "it" was.
The trio advanced into the depths, Eurania leading and casting her ghostly bluish glow across the smooth gray walls. Their footsteps thudded dully in the gloom-- frequently, Fredrick would steal a paranoid glance backwards when one of their echoes seemed just a little out-of-place.
***
They reached a door, sitting obstructively in their only path. None were particularly surprised to find it locked solidly with no keyhole-- though as Fredrick tugged futility on the handle a single red dot blinked to life at his eye-level.
"Passcode." Came the electronic-voiced command.
"Uh... what-" Fredrick balked.
"INCORRECT PASSCODE!" The door responded automatically. Another red dot appeared next to the first-- Fredrick could now see that there was only one more left unlit.
Everyone was silent, afraid to make the slightest suggestion of a passcode. Eurania's processors were so overloaded with algorithmic suggestions and the utter improbability of selecting a single unknown harmonic sequence rendered her paralyzed; Carl, too, felt a new wave of hopelessness wash over him, certain that, if some sort of automated security system didn't obliterate them there and then, War would soon smoke them out of their hidey-hole.
Only Fredrick managed to think in less fatalistic terms-- Two guesses, right? Well, might as well use one more before running like hell...
"War never changes." Stated the irishman. Carl winced audibly, but the door did not respond with immediate rejection. A tense moment passed, then there was a hiss sound, like an airlock being released. Fredrick, still grasping the handle, felt it suddenly give and swing inward.
Even Eurania wore a baffled expression. Fredrick turned and grinned sheepishly, "Heh, luck of the Irish, right?"
"Astonishing--" Eurania's emerald eyes were alight, "Your people manipulate the threads of cosmic fate which bind the laws of reality?"
Fredrick nodded simply, "Yes," and beckoned his companions inside.
***
The cavern into which they emerged was tall and round and very, very bright. It was a few minutes before Fredrick and Carl could adjust to the intensity enough to make out any distinct shapes, but when they did, they perceived the silhouette of Eurania standing against what appeared to be a giant, gourd-shaped lightbulb. The thing was screwed into a platform about a meter off the ground, and from this platform ran countless branching channels of energy. The glowing veins ran across the floor in haphazard veins, giving it the appearance of cracked glass.
Within the bulb was the source of this energy-- a humanoid shape so-enveloped in pure white light that none of its features were distinguishable to the human eye. Suspended at the center and bound with heavy, chainlike wires, the creature wailed a low, sad noise, causing the chamber to vibrate with its latent power.
"Mary mother of God..." Fredrick mumbled. Both he and Carl were so transfixed by this sublime creature of light that they did not notice Eurania until it was too late:
She reached out one crystal hand and placed her fingertips on the glass-- her eyes pulsed green and it went to rainbow dust.
Thrmmmmmmm The being of light entreated pitifully, its moan charging the air with a voice which was somehow itself energy. It writhed weakly in the wires which tethered it to the core of The Goliath, its essence being drained and channeled to fuel War's insane battleworld-- a gruesome testament to the prowess of the Universe's most ruthless engineer.
"Such is the nature of war, bending life into a cruel industry of destruction..." Eurania mused. The being of light gazed wearily down at her, and she, whimsically, up. Then, honing the creature's considerable latent vibrations into a sonic blade, she severed its bonds in a single, graceful stroke.
***
The result was spectacular, and immediate. At one moment, they would all later recall, they had been aware of a single moment of the most deafening silence-- then everything went white. "True white," Eurania would confirm, though the significance of that was mostly lost to the humans.
***
A star, for that was the being's rightful form, formed at the core of The Goliath. In its rage the starchild exploded from its tomb beneath the battlefield, its white-hot light searing matter into nonexistance. War screamed in dismay, suddenly fearful of the powerful entity he'd imprisoned to drive his heinous machine, and released a full arsenal at the starchild. Though the life was draining from his ship, War's personal generator still shone bright upon his chestplate-- so long as he could fight, he would never, could never, retreat.
The starchild, however, embodied light, and moved with unmatchable speed. It shot towards War's heart like an arrow, piercing the horseman's torso and erupting from his back like a bloody comet. The starchild streaked through the battleworld's artificial atmosphere and away, carrying its saviors safe within its core.
Her new friends ushered her rapidly down a smooth incline which led beneath the surface of War's domain, frantically fleeing the Horseman's murderous gaze, and managed to get just far enough-- the hot breath of the explosive pyroclasm which obliterated the spot they'd been just moments earlier merely knocked them all forward a heap and then peppered them with bits of debris.
Fredrick lifted himself up with a groan and shook the dirt from his red hair, "Fuck me sideways, that was close."
Carl had done a tumble and landed on his back, and now stared up at the smoldering opening with silent assent.
When they'd all collected themselves, Fredrick turned to Eurania, who was staring dreamily down the dark passage. "D'ya hear it still?"
The android nodded confidently, "Yes, we are near. The vibrations in this tunnel are fast and angry... they flow from a mighty source, something hard and unnatural."
Her two companions glanced at one another, then shrugged. Nothing the robot girl did seemed to make much sense, but their options at this point were limited. Getting close to War, they'd found, was impossible-- the guy was a living fortress made of guns. Both felt that they'd gotten a pretty shitty draw this round and things were pretty hopeless, but Carl had advised that their best bet would be to avoid being blown to all-hell in the open. To that end, they'd discovered these metal tunnels leading beneath War's terraformed battlefield-- Eurania claimed that some kind of music was pouring out of them (kind-of like vents in a mine, they'd metaphorically determined) and had recognized that one in particular was "screaming."
It seemed they'd found it... whatever "it" was.
The trio advanced into the depths, Eurania leading and casting her ghostly bluish glow across the smooth gray walls. Their footsteps thudded dully in the gloom-- frequently, Fredrick would steal a paranoid glance backwards when one of their echoes seemed just a little out-of-place.
***
They reached a door, sitting obstructively in their only path. None were particularly surprised to find it locked solidly with no keyhole-- though as Fredrick tugged futility on the handle a single red dot blinked to life at his eye-level.
"Passcode." Came the electronic-voiced command.
"Uh... what-" Fredrick balked.
"INCORRECT PASSCODE!" The door responded automatically. Another red dot appeared next to the first-- Fredrick could now see that there was only one more left unlit.
Everyone was silent, afraid to make the slightest suggestion of a passcode. Eurania's processors were so overloaded with algorithmic suggestions and the utter improbability of selecting a single unknown harmonic sequence rendered her paralyzed; Carl, too, felt a new wave of hopelessness wash over him, certain that, if some sort of automated security system didn't obliterate them there and then, War would soon smoke them out of their hidey-hole.
Only Fredrick managed to think in less fatalistic terms-- Two guesses, right? Well, might as well use one more before running like hell...
"War never changes." Stated the irishman. Carl winced audibly, but the door did not respond with immediate rejection. A tense moment passed, then there was a hiss sound, like an airlock being released. Fredrick, still grasping the handle, felt it suddenly give and swing inward.
Even Eurania wore a baffled expression. Fredrick turned and grinned sheepishly, "Heh, luck of the Irish, right?"
"Astonishing--" Eurania's emerald eyes were alight, "Your people manipulate the threads of cosmic fate which bind the laws of reality?"
Fredrick nodded simply, "Yes," and beckoned his companions inside.
***
The cavern into which they emerged was tall and round and very, very bright. It was a few minutes before Fredrick and Carl could adjust to the intensity enough to make out any distinct shapes, but when they did, they perceived the silhouette of Eurania standing against what appeared to be a giant, gourd-shaped lightbulb. The thing was screwed into a platform about a meter off the ground, and from this platform ran countless branching channels of energy. The glowing veins ran across the floor in haphazard veins, giving it the appearance of cracked glass.
Within the bulb was the source of this energy-- a humanoid shape so-enveloped in pure white light that none of its features were distinguishable to the human eye. Suspended at the center and bound with heavy, chainlike wires, the creature wailed a low, sad noise, causing the chamber to vibrate with its latent power.
"Mary mother of God..." Fredrick mumbled. Both he and Carl were so transfixed by this sublime creature of light that they did not notice Eurania until it was too late:
She reached out one crystal hand and placed her fingertips on the glass-- her eyes pulsed green and it went to rainbow dust.
Thrmmmmmmm The being of light entreated pitifully, its moan charging the air with a voice which was somehow itself energy. It writhed weakly in the wires which tethered it to the core of The Goliath, its essence being drained and channeled to fuel War's insane battleworld-- a gruesome testament to the prowess of the Universe's most ruthless engineer.
"Such is the nature of war, bending life into a cruel industry of destruction..." Eurania mused. The being of light gazed wearily down at her, and she, whimsically, up. Then, honing the creature's considerable latent vibrations into a sonic blade, she severed its bonds in a single, graceful stroke.
***
The result was spectacular, and immediate. At one moment, they would all later recall, they had been aware of a single moment of the most deafening silence-- then everything went white. "True white," Eurania would confirm, though the significance of that was mostly lost to the humans.
***
A star, for that was the being's rightful form, formed at the core of The Goliath. In its rage the starchild exploded from its tomb beneath the battlefield, its white-hot light searing matter into nonexistance. War screamed in dismay, suddenly fearful of the powerful entity he'd imprisoned to drive his heinous machine, and released a full arsenal at the starchild. Though the life was draining from his ship, War's personal generator still shone bright upon his chestplate-- so long as he could fight, he would never, could never, retreat.
The starchild, however, embodied light, and moved with unmatchable speed. It shot towards War's heart like an arrow, piercing the horseman's torso and erupting from his back like a bloody comet. The starchild streaked through the battleworld's artificial atmosphere and away, carrying its saviors safe within its core.
Woop~
I effing loved your post, bro. Who knew that Irishmen could manipulate the cosmic threads of fate?HSIAMetalKing said:
Damn this makes me mad that I'm at work, missed two entries and can't read them for another 2 hours, I wanna know how mine measures up...
15 minutes
Charles Taylor emerged with his new cohort into a corridor of sorts. There was something slightly futuristic about the way the room looked, with unbelievably clean silver covering the whole floor, walls and ceiling. Before them laid a corner to the right, and as the two of them look over their shoulder, the pillar which originally led them to this world had disappeared to reveal the remainder of the room, stretching onwards before eventually coming to a deadlocked door about 200m down. Apart from themselves, there were no other objects in the room that were visible. It was time to begin.
Charles started to walk towards the corner, when he heard a shout from his teammate. "Wait, don't go down there!" Turning to face this hooded ally, The Drifter waited for some reasoning for not going down that path.
"Why not?"
"Haven't you seen any action films?" The hooded person responded, as a silence filled the air for a second. "No? Oh well, your loss. Anyway, a big-ass door is always meant to represent one thing and one thing only: That something really powerful is behind it that people wouldn't ever want getting out." He explained. "What if that really powerful thing that people wouldn't ever want getting out is this opponent we're meant to defeat? If so, travelling in that direction would simply be a waste of time when we could solve this right now by defeating this enemy right here and now."
They both looked down towards the door. It looked like a large, metal hatch with little if any marks of decay or wear on it. Like everything else, this door was covered entirely in a shiny, stainless metal that didn?t offer any hint of how powerful the door actually was. Whilst Charles was hesitant, his companion casually strolled towards the blocking. With each step getting close to the door, a noise filled the air. It was like there wasn't just a lack of sound, but that there was a sound of such a kind that it would eliminate all other noise around it. As if there was a void of silence.
Upon reaching the hatch, the human traced his gloved finger in a circular pattern around a small spot in the upper half of the metal cylinder which was only a little bit bigger than him. A groan roared from the door throughout the corridor and the figure smiled to himself. Turning to face Charles, he moved towards the middle of the room. ?Well, there is definitely something behind that door. And whatever it is, it?s gonna die." As soon as he had just over 150m between him and the door he turned, pulling a pistol out of his pocket. ?A classic case of killing the big baddie, saving the world and proving myself to be the greatest hero of all-time yet again. Yaay for generic super hero fantasy."
Charles, on the other hand, was more worried. ?You really think that will work won?t you?" He asked rhetorically. ?We don?t even know what we?re up against yet, how are we supposed to assume that using a gun against it will work easily enough?"
This hooded character shrugged, his back turned to The Drifter. ?Meh. Killing thousands has gotten me this far in life. No reason why this one should be any different."
Charles interrupted. ?Despite being a rival of the creator of this universe as we know it?"
The figure had no opportunity to answer this question ?- which was an advantage, as he didn?t have anything close to a retort in the first place -? as the door gave one more violent groan before collapsing in on itself. What appeared from behind it was an ever advancing abyss -- a void of darkness and Nothing. Immediately, bullets were fired from the gun to no effect. The small lead pellets were eaten whole by the darkness with no visible damage whatsoever to the outside of It. Regardless, this didn?t put off the person armed with the gun from trying even harder to kill the progressing Nothing. Reloading the gun, his second round of bullets were finished in about seven seconds. He repeated this technique a third time again to no overall effect, but before he could attempt a fourth go he almost fell over backwards as Charles pulled him away by the back of his hood. The void was already covering the distance of the corridor at great speed.
?What the hell!? Let me go!" The man protested, as the hood fell back to reveal his black hair and golden eyes. Striking with his elbow, he forced Charles to release his grip on the hood, before moving his arm around to reveal a sword where a gun had been. ?Why did you do that?"
?Because unlike you, it seems that I know when to run away." Charles reasoned. ?We?re meant to work together here, yet you risk killing yourself for no god-damned point."
?I disagree entirely." The person responded with, whilst adjusting his hood to hide his hair again. ?I do know when to run away: Never. There is nothing that can?t be defeated via one means or another, and I refuse to stop until I find the means of killing this creature, regardless of what It is." He turned away from Charles to face the still oncoming wall of Nothing. ?Giant statues can be crushed, immortals can be buried underground. This thing will be defeated by me if it?s the last thing I do."
Charles was amused by the naivety this cohort had, as the hooded person ran off towards the darkness. Rolling his eyes, he started to run in the other direction and round the corner. However, it was only a matter of 30 seconds before he and his partner were reunited, as a large black circle manifested itself on the wall and the figure returned through it. Whilst the magic at work here was very interesting to observe, Charles wasn?t in the least surprised to see who emerged from it.
?Well?" He asked with a sense of smugness about himself that he hadn?t experienced for at last a decade or two.
The person caught his breath before speaking. ?...you may have a point.? Charles used this time to look over this ?teammate? of his. There wasn?t much that was notable about this person, as pretty much every inch of their body was covered with black fabric, from the black gloves on his hands to the black hood which obscured the black hair that lied beneath. But what was most notable of this person were his eyes, which were a tint of gold Charles had never seen someone have as irises in all his 9 centuries of living.
The two of them stood together awkwardly for a few seconds, before Charles continued the conversation. ?Well, seeing as we?re meant to be working together, you can call me The Drifter.?
?The Drifter? Wow, your parents must have really hated you to not even give you a proper name!? The man chuckled to himself whilst The Drifter waited for a different response. ?Oh, right. You can call me Beauxhart, The Blade of Shadows, The Wanderer of the Void.? He said, rather egotistically. As they ran off down the corridor, Charles only had one thought on his mind:
No way in Hell am I calling him all of that.
[hr]
12 Minutes
The unlikely duo of Charles and Beauxhart ran. And they ran fast. Charging through the never ending series of bends and corners in this maze of unbelievable size and complexity, they kept on running. With no idea of where they are, whether or not they were gaining distance from the void or not and whether they are at all progressing in this challenge to defeat Nothing, they kept on running through the continuous stream of silver-lined walls for something to stop them. And eventually, something did.
The something in question was a large, silver hatch, much like the one which the Nothing appeared from in the first place. Next to the door was a silver cuboid with a number keypad and a small screen on the front. It didn?t take much thinking to work out what the keypad was meant for, though while Charles was going for the obvious method, before he could bend over and reach the keypad Beauxhart revealed his different intentions.
?Stand aside.? He ordered as he pulled the same pistol as before from his pocket. ?We don?t have time to de-code this door, but brute force will always suffice.? He obnoxiously claimed as he unloaded the magazine at the security lock. This did have an effect on the door -- that was easy to tell from what happened in the next few seconds. Unfortunately, it wasn?t the effect that either of them truly wanted, as yet more locks were heard sliding into place behind the door, and now they didn?t even have a keypad for the code. Beauxhart was embarrased and hunting for an excuse. ?Ah, now. I know this can look quite bad as a repertoire seeing as twice in a row I have now caused even more trouble than before by pulling out this pistol, but...?He started to mumble awkwardly in his attempts to think of an excuse, whilst The Drifter looked over the door.
?Well, you?ve certainly done a lot on it.? Charles exclaimed. ?But now I guess we have no other option but to be eaten alive by whatever?s coming our way. Oh well, at over 900 years I?ve lived a satisfactory life. How about you??
Beauxhart didn?t bother answering the question, but simply repeated himself. ?Stand aside.? Charles sighed in regards to this figure?s view that everything can be solved with more gun, but decided that he still didn?t want to get between Beauxhart and a target, even if the guy swore a blood oath not to resort to destruction. With that in consideration, he slowly moved away from the door. Sweeping his hand across the air, a small orb, no bigger than an inch in diameter and as dark as the void itself, formed between Beauxhart's fingers, almost as if he had pulled it out of his sleeve like a magician would. He looked at Charles in the eyes. ?I suggest that you really get far back now.? And with that, he threw the tiny ball at the door. Absolute volumes of noise rang throughout the chamber as a great explosion came from a surprisingly small object. But, most importantly, the blast had somehow succeeded in creating a hole in the door large enough for themselves to fit through. Beauxhart turned to The-rather-shocked Drifter. ?See? I told you that brute force can solve any problem.?
[hr]
10 Minutes
Eventually, Beauxhart and The Drifter turned a certain left-hand in the path which led them to a long stretch of corridor, similar to the corridor they started in to the point that the two could?ve been confused as being identical, if it weren?t for the lack of Nothing in this area yet. Stepping forward, Beauxhart noticed the piece of floor he was stepping on drop slightly, though before he could remove his foot the chain reaction of trouble had already set itself off. Four doors revealed and opened themselves along the sides of the corridors, each one containing two armed guards behind it. The soldiers were of the most basic human structure of simply a skeleton, each one wearing a chest piece and armed with an average-sized sword and shield, like a Roman army. And now, they had awoken for battle.
However, Beauxhart wasn?t at all mesmerized by their appearance, as he casually strolled over to the first soldier whilst at the same time removing a hilt from his pocket. The skeleton tried to swing at the villain but Beauxhart dodged to the side in a fraction of a second, before pointing his hilt at the soldier?s head. Before the guard could even contemplate attempting another attack on the swordsman, what was a hilt quickly became a spear as the arrow-head manifested itself inside the skull of the soldier. The rest of the skeleton and armour came crashing down in an instant, as Beauxhart turned to brag towards Charles about his achievement.
?Gee, you would?ve thought the creator of this universe could?ve made a slightly more effective group of people to protect something.? He carried on to mock the skull on the end of his spear, as Charles noticed the second of the skeleton patrol creep up behind Beauxhart?s back.
As the soldier drew its sword, The Drifter just had to warn Beauxhart. ?Watch out-? But before he could finish what he was warning Beauxhart had already reached behind his shoulder as the spear in his hand turned to a pistol -- thus losing its decoration of a skull on the end as the head fell to the ground ?- and pulled the trigger, thus shattering the bones of the skeleton.
?Watch out for what?? He humerously exclaimed, before looking over his back at the remainder of bones and metal on the floor. ?Oh, watch out for that! Right, I?ll make sure to take better care of myself next time, dad.?
Three more of these guards had already started advancing towards Charles at this point, though this didn?t worry him in the slightest. Removing the hilt of his samurai sword, he ran towards the first of these troops, and offered it an uppercut, both quick enough that there was no time to react, and powerful enough to shatter the connections between the bone and the neck. While Charles was distracted with attacking the first guard, the second charged towards him with a jabbing motion being aimed with his sword. But this was all in vain, as The Drifter moved aside and placed the hilt of his sword onto the back of the guard?s neck and the neck of the guard was pierced by the blade. The third member of this wave put up the best fight, as it knew about blocking, yet even this was unlived as the blocking left this guard wide open, and Charles took this as time more than ever to hack it to pieces. But as Charles stopped to catch his breath, Beauxhart was wondering about something completely unrelated to the fight he had just witnessed.
?Are you copying me??
The Drifter faced Beauxhart, a sight of bewilderment across his head. ?Just saying, we do have similar weapons.? Getting back to the battle, they faced the last three guards. The remaining guards started to charge towards the two protagonists, but any attempt at harming either Charles or Beauxhart was laid in vain as bullets rang out through the air, oblitterating the skulls and bones of the three soldiers as the magic that held them together faded away and the warriors crumbled to dust under their own armour. Our two heroes would have spent more time on a celebration if they hadn?t forgotten about the void still chasing them. Still hunting them. Still hungry.
Quickly, the two of them moved onwards through this silver, futuristic maze. They hadn't escaped from the Nothing just yet.
[hr]
6 Minutes
Traps. Yet more damn traps. This was the general topic that was running through Charles? mind as he and his companion Beauxhart tried to navigate themselves around yet another set of obstacles in this Incubator. By this point in time the two of them had already experienced traps varying from spears coming out of walls to spikes rising up from the floor, and even a guardsman they encountered along the way revealed a part of the floor which would crush anyone who were unfortunate enough to step on it. Beauxhart did thank the guard afterwards for pointing out the spot, but there wasn?t really much left of him to thank.
Currently, their task was to navigate across a room, but the issue lied with the flooring. Whilst all the silver panels that they stood on looked identical, some of them were much weaker, and would simply give way to the endless void underneath if even very little weight was put on them. This was proving to be a greater problem than originally predicted, as the careful progress required was severely costing them, and Nothing was starting to catch up on them, as hungry as ever before, and as hungry as ever after.
Eventually, the void became audible. The sound of square feet of metal upon square feet of metal being eaten away by the Nothing was filling the chambers, and ?precision movement? moved down a stage on The Drifter?s list of priorities over ?not being killed by the void?. In a desperate attempt to make it across, he recklessly leapt across the room. As predictable he did screw up at a few moments, but there wasn?t anything that could be solved by a combination of quick reactions and speed. As for Beauxhart, his predicament was thankfully solved by yet another portal he concocted out of the dark material which formed in his fingers. Conveniently, this was the point in time where the Nothing revealed itself from round the corner they had once came from, before continuing to devour everything that lied in its path. Once again, it was time for the duo to run as fast as they could.
They kept this pace up for about three minutes before eventually appearing at a split in the path. Like with the traps, this wasn?t the first time they had experienced such a thing, but with the void so close now their decision had to be much more secure. Taking the diversion could potentially be fatal in this instance.
Charles pondered quietly to himself over which of the routes to take. Beauxhart, on the other hand, had different thoughts running through his head, as he swung a strong punch at Charles, knocking The Drifter onto the floor. By the time Charles had regained his standing position on two feet Beauxhart had already moved towards one of the two hallways, with a third ball of black matter forming between his fingers. Determined not to be left behind, Charles reached for his hilt, and extended the blade easily over five feet in order to catch Beauxhart in the back of his neck. However, as the edge of the samurai sword went through the Wanderer of the Void?s neck, Beauxhart turned his entire body around to face The Drifter, revealing a manic grin all along his face as his head fell off and tumbled onto the floor.
?Oh, didn?t I mention that my body was made out of Nothing and am therefore immune to decapitation?? He called sarcastically, ?Strange, I swore I did mention something along those line- Oh, I know what it was! It was me assuming that you had the common sense to work out both how I created that dark matter you?ve seen me use, combined with the fact that people call me the Blade of Shadows, and the Wanderer of the Void. Seriously, what the Hell?s happened to common sense these days? Are all people this stupid or is it...? The head carried on talking in this rather obnoxious manner for a while, during which time the body went back to what it was doing previously and threw the ball of matter towards the ceiling.
Once again, noise rang out as an explosion brought down the ceiling of the maze, completely blocking that path. Running at the pile of rubble, Charles tried to pick away at pieces of debris to little overall effect. All the while, Beauxhart?s body worked on re-attaching the head, whilst the head tried to justify its actions.
?Look, I?m sorry, man, okay? But the fact is, you?re competition. And as much as we?re meant to work together through this, I?m really not letting anything get in my way from winning this tournament. Even if it comes at the cost of a ?teammate?. And with that, Beauxhart?s voice silenced. Charles gave up scraping away at the rubble, it was proving to be of no use and with the combination of all the running, the fighting, the over-use of extending his sword and finally that punch from Beauxhart, he needed to conserve all the energy he could. And thus, once again, he made a decision out of a lack of alternatives and chose the currently free path. He just prayed for God that it wasn?t a diversion.
[hr]
1 Minute
Charles was no longer running at the strides he was able to at the start of the battle, but somehow he was still keeping up a swift pace as he carried on through the corridors. Or it was at least a pace fast enough to keep distance from the void which was as always on his tail, and as long as that pace was kept up he had no preference over how well he was doing.
After about twenty seconds he ran past a path which merged with this one. From what he could assume he guessed that it was the route Beauxhart had taken, though any signs of the golden-eyed stranger were nowhere to be seen.
The Drifter started moving once again, first down to the end of this hallway, then taking a left followed quickly by a right. It was only a few paces after this right turning when his leg touched something. Looking down very carefully, he saw a thin piece of string stretching across the floor from one wall to the other.
A tripwire?!
Immediately, a dart flew out from a hole in the wall and caught his ankle. A combination of pain and the contents of the dart mixing with Charles? blood caused him to collapse on the floor, becoming incapable to move yet still fully able to see, hear and sense everything. Fear built up in him as he became incapable to move freely once again.
10 Seconds
The void became audible, its noises becoming an orchestra of destruction and feeding as it drove relentlessly through the paths of the maze. Desperate for one last stab at hope, Charles attempted to prop himself up on his right arm, but his body refused to even slightly budge.
5 Seconds
Darkness formed in the reflections of the silver walls. Fear completely overwhelmed the trapped being as he shut his eyes and prepared for darkness.
3 Seconds...
2 Seconds...
1 Second...
[hr]
Zero Time.
A bright flash of light filled the room, blinding Charles for a second or two. Slowly, he opened his eyes to see that he was still alive. As if such an experience wasn?t brilliant enough, he was able to prop himself up on one elbow, and position his legs so that he could stand up and walk.
Looking ahead, he saw the void, frozen in place, as if someone had just happened to hit the pause button in a video game. It took him a short while to realise what was actually happening, and whether this was him having defeted Famine or simply some strange afterlife of sorts. Thankfully, turning to his left answered this curiosity perfectly, and it was the result that he desired.
Coming from his side was the source of all the light: It was a cylinder of light appearing out of the ground, before turning to metal. It was almost exactly like the pillar that had brought him and Beauxhart to this world in the first place, the only difference being in the inscription on it. Where the previous column had read ?Famine?, this tube simply read ?Hive?. As he walked through it the column disappeared from the Incubator as mysteriously as it had vanished the first time.
Stepping out of the chamber, he appeared in the same room as he was briefed in. Making sure not to trip over the wires, he looked over to his right to see a certain memorable figure there, wearing a black hood and black gloves with very noticeable, golden eyes. At the sight of him, Charles felt a sudden increase in anger over this traitor, as he reached into his waistcoat pocket and removed the hilt once again.
Screaming with rage, he drew a blade from his hilt and went in to strike down Beauxhart whilst he had the advantage of being the first to draw. Luckily for Beauxhart, though, Original Sin already saw something like this happening and before The Drifter could even get close to the Blade of Shadows, a guard easily one and a half times taller than Charles and twice as broad appeared behind Charles, before picking him up and restraining him in a bear hug.
"Now now, Mr. Taylor. The two of you had the chance to kill each other if you wanted to back when you were in the Incubator. As it is, I?m afraid you will have to be more rational whilst here and conserve you energy and anger for more suitable areas. Now please, Mr. Taylor, stop fighting against me.? Charles screamed and fought against the man, but it was all in vain. Eventually, he started to relax more and the guard agreed to put him down cautiously. Although something was strange. Despite feeling perfectly normal, at occasional points he would see flashing dots. Points where Nothing would take up a tiny space of what he could see, and they especially built up around Beauxhart.
It looked as if it would Charles Taylor take more than a few minutes to clear his memories of the void.
Charles Taylor emerged with his new cohort into a corridor of sorts. There was something slightly futuristic about the way the room looked, with unbelievably clean silver covering the whole floor, walls and ceiling. Before them laid a corner to the right, and as the two of them look over their shoulder, the pillar which originally led them to this world had disappeared to reveal the remainder of the room, stretching onwards before eventually coming to a deadlocked door about 200m down. Apart from themselves, there were no other objects in the room that were visible. It was time to begin.
Charles started to walk towards the corner, when he heard a shout from his teammate. "Wait, don't go down there!" Turning to face this hooded ally, The Drifter waited for some reasoning for not going down that path.
"Why not?"
"Haven't you seen any action films?" The hooded person responded, as a silence filled the air for a second. "No? Oh well, your loss. Anyway, a big-ass door is always meant to represent one thing and one thing only: That something really powerful is behind it that people wouldn't ever want getting out." He explained. "What if that really powerful thing that people wouldn't ever want getting out is this opponent we're meant to defeat? If so, travelling in that direction would simply be a waste of time when we could solve this right now by defeating this enemy right here and now."
They both looked down towards the door. It looked like a large, metal hatch with little if any marks of decay or wear on it. Like everything else, this door was covered entirely in a shiny, stainless metal that didn?t offer any hint of how powerful the door actually was. Whilst Charles was hesitant, his companion casually strolled towards the blocking. With each step getting close to the door, a noise filled the air. It was like there wasn't just a lack of sound, but that there was a sound of such a kind that it would eliminate all other noise around it. As if there was a void of silence.
Upon reaching the hatch, the human traced his gloved finger in a circular pattern around a small spot in the upper half of the metal cylinder which was only a little bit bigger than him. A groan roared from the door throughout the corridor and the figure smiled to himself. Turning to face Charles, he moved towards the middle of the room. ?Well, there is definitely something behind that door. And whatever it is, it?s gonna die." As soon as he had just over 150m between him and the door he turned, pulling a pistol out of his pocket. ?A classic case of killing the big baddie, saving the world and proving myself to be the greatest hero of all-time yet again. Yaay for generic super hero fantasy."
Charles, on the other hand, was more worried. ?You really think that will work won?t you?" He asked rhetorically. ?We don?t even know what we?re up against yet, how are we supposed to assume that using a gun against it will work easily enough?"
This hooded character shrugged, his back turned to The Drifter. ?Meh. Killing thousands has gotten me this far in life. No reason why this one should be any different."
Charles interrupted. ?Despite being a rival of the creator of this universe as we know it?"
The figure had no opportunity to answer this question ?- which was an advantage, as he didn?t have anything close to a retort in the first place -? as the door gave one more violent groan before collapsing in on itself. What appeared from behind it was an ever advancing abyss -- a void of darkness and Nothing. Immediately, bullets were fired from the gun to no effect. The small lead pellets were eaten whole by the darkness with no visible damage whatsoever to the outside of It. Regardless, this didn?t put off the person armed with the gun from trying even harder to kill the progressing Nothing. Reloading the gun, his second round of bullets were finished in about seven seconds. He repeated this technique a third time again to no overall effect, but before he could attempt a fourth go he almost fell over backwards as Charles pulled him away by the back of his hood. The void was already covering the distance of the corridor at great speed.
?What the hell!? Let me go!" The man protested, as the hood fell back to reveal his black hair and golden eyes. Striking with his elbow, he forced Charles to release his grip on the hood, before moving his arm around to reveal a sword where a gun had been. ?Why did you do that?"
?Because unlike you, it seems that I know when to run away." Charles reasoned. ?We?re meant to work together here, yet you risk killing yourself for no god-damned point."
?I disagree entirely." The person responded with, whilst adjusting his hood to hide his hair again. ?I do know when to run away: Never. There is nothing that can?t be defeated via one means or another, and I refuse to stop until I find the means of killing this creature, regardless of what It is." He turned away from Charles to face the still oncoming wall of Nothing. ?Giant statues can be crushed, immortals can be buried underground. This thing will be defeated by me if it?s the last thing I do."
Charles was amused by the naivety this cohort had, as the hooded person ran off towards the darkness. Rolling his eyes, he started to run in the other direction and round the corner. However, it was only a matter of 30 seconds before he and his partner were reunited, as a large black circle manifested itself on the wall and the figure returned through it. Whilst the magic at work here was very interesting to observe, Charles wasn?t in the least surprised to see who emerged from it.
?Well?" He asked with a sense of smugness about himself that he hadn?t experienced for at last a decade or two.
The person caught his breath before speaking. ?...you may have a point.? Charles used this time to look over this ?teammate? of his. There wasn?t much that was notable about this person, as pretty much every inch of their body was covered with black fabric, from the black gloves on his hands to the black hood which obscured the black hair that lied beneath. But what was most notable of this person were his eyes, which were a tint of gold Charles had never seen someone have as irises in all his 9 centuries of living.
The two of them stood together awkwardly for a few seconds, before Charles continued the conversation. ?Well, seeing as we?re meant to be working together, you can call me The Drifter.?
?The Drifter? Wow, your parents must have really hated you to not even give you a proper name!? The man chuckled to himself whilst The Drifter waited for a different response. ?Oh, right. You can call me Beauxhart, The Blade of Shadows, The Wanderer of the Void.? He said, rather egotistically. As they ran off down the corridor, Charles only had one thought on his mind:
No way in Hell am I calling him all of that.
[hr]
12 Minutes
The unlikely duo of Charles and Beauxhart ran. And they ran fast. Charging through the never ending series of bends and corners in this maze of unbelievable size and complexity, they kept on running. With no idea of where they are, whether or not they were gaining distance from the void or not and whether they are at all progressing in this challenge to defeat Nothing, they kept on running through the continuous stream of silver-lined walls for something to stop them. And eventually, something did.
The something in question was a large, silver hatch, much like the one which the Nothing appeared from in the first place. Next to the door was a silver cuboid with a number keypad and a small screen on the front. It didn?t take much thinking to work out what the keypad was meant for, though while Charles was going for the obvious method, before he could bend over and reach the keypad Beauxhart revealed his different intentions.
?Stand aside.? He ordered as he pulled the same pistol as before from his pocket. ?We don?t have time to de-code this door, but brute force will always suffice.? He obnoxiously claimed as he unloaded the magazine at the security lock. This did have an effect on the door -- that was easy to tell from what happened in the next few seconds. Unfortunately, it wasn?t the effect that either of them truly wanted, as yet more locks were heard sliding into place behind the door, and now they didn?t even have a keypad for the code. Beauxhart was embarrased and hunting for an excuse. ?Ah, now. I know this can look quite bad as a repertoire seeing as twice in a row I have now caused even more trouble than before by pulling out this pistol, but...?He started to mumble awkwardly in his attempts to think of an excuse, whilst The Drifter looked over the door.
?Well, you?ve certainly done a lot on it.? Charles exclaimed. ?But now I guess we have no other option but to be eaten alive by whatever?s coming our way. Oh well, at over 900 years I?ve lived a satisfactory life. How about you??
Beauxhart didn?t bother answering the question, but simply repeated himself. ?Stand aside.? Charles sighed in regards to this figure?s view that everything can be solved with more gun, but decided that he still didn?t want to get between Beauxhart and a target, even if the guy swore a blood oath not to resort to destruction. With that in consideration, he slowly moved away from the door. Sweeping his hand across the air, a small orb, no bigger than an inch in diameter and as dark as the void itself, formed between Beauxhart's fingers, almost as if he had pulled it out of his sleeve like a magician would. He looked at Charles in the eyes. ?I suggest that you really get far back now.? And with that, he threw the tiny ball at the door. Absolute volumes of noise rang throughout the chamber as a great explosion came from a surprisingly small object. But, most importantly, the blast had somehow succeeded in creating a hole in the door large enough for themselves to fit through. Beauxhart turned to The-rather-shocked Drifter. ?See? I told you that brute force can solve any problem.?
[hr]
10 Minutes
Eventually, Beauxhart and The Drifter turned a certain left-hand in the path which led them to a long stretch of corridor, similar to the corridor they started in to the point that the two could?ve been confused as being identical, if it weren?t for the lack of Nothing in this area yet. Stepping forward, Beauxhart noticed the piece of floor he was stepping on drop slightly, though before he could remove his foot the chain reaction of trouble had already set itself off. Four doors revealed and opened themselves along the sides of the corridors, each one containing two armed guards behind it. The soldiers were of the most basic human structure of simply a skeleton, each one wearing a chest piece and armed with an average-sized sword and shield, like a Roman army. And now, they had awoken for battle.
However, Beauxhart wasn?t at all mesmerized by their appearance, as he casually strolled over to the first soldier whilst at the same time removing a hilt from his pocket. The skeleton tried to swing at the villain but Beauxhart dodged to the side in a fraction of a second, before pointing his hilt at the soldier?s head. Before the guard could even contemplate attempting another attack on the swordsman, what was a hilt quickly became a spear as the arrow-head manifested itself inside the skull of the soldier. The rest of the skeleton and armour came crashing down in an instant, as Beauxhart turned to brag towards Charles about his achievement.
?Gee, you would?ve thought the creator of this universe could?ve made a slightly more effective group of people to protect something.? He carried on to mock the skull on the end of his spear, as Charles noticed the second of the skeleton patrol creep up behind Beauxhart?s back.
As the soldier drew its sword, The Drifter just had to warn Beauxhart. ?Watch out-? But before he could finish what he was warning Beauxhart had already reached behind his shoulder as the spear in his hand turned to a pistol -- thus losing its decoration of a skull on the end as the head fell to the ground ?- and pulled the trigger, thus shattering the bones of the skeleton.
?Watch out for what?? He humerously exclaimed, before looking over his back at the remainder of bones and metal on the floor. ?Oh, watch out for that! Right, I?ll make sure to take better care of myself next time, dad.?
Three more of these guards had already started advancing towards Charles at this point, though this didn?t worry him in the slightest. Removing the hilt of his samurai sword, he ran towards the first of these troops, and offered it an uppercut, both quick enough that there was no time to react, and powerful enough to shatter the connections between the bone and the neck. While Charles was distracted with attacking the first guard, the second charged towards him with a jabbing motion being aimed with his sword. But this was all in vain, as The Drifter moved aside and placed the hilt of his sword onto the back of the guard?s neck and the neck of the guard was pierced by the blade. The third member of this wave put up the best fight, as it knew about blocking, yet even this was unlived as the blocking left this guard wide open, and Charles took this as time more than ever to hack it to pieces. But as Charles stopped to catch his breath, Beauxhart was wondering about something completely unrelated to the fight he had just witnessed.
?Are you copying me??
The Drifter faced Beauxhart, a sight of bewilderment across his head. ?Just saying, we do have similar weapons.? Getting back to the battle, they faced the last three guards. The remaining guards started to charge towards the two protagonists, but any attempt at harming either Charles or Beauxhart was laid in vain as bullets rang out through the air, oblitterating the skulls and bones of the three soldiers as the magic that held them together faded away and the warriors crumbled to dust under their own armour. Our two heroes would have spent more time on a celebration if they hadn?t forgotten about the void still chasing them. Still hunting them. Still hungry.
Quickly, the two of them moved onwards through this silver, futuristic maze. They hadn't escaped from the Nothing just yet.
[hr]
6 Minutes
Traps. Yet more damn traps. This was the general topic that was running through Charles? mind as he and his companion Beauxhart tried to navigate themselves around yet another set of obstacles in this Incubator. By this point in time the two of them had already experienced traps varying from spears coming out of walls to spikes rising up from the floor, and even a guardsman they encountered along the way revealed a part of the floor which would crush anyone who were unfortunate enough to step on it. Beauxhart did thank the guard afterwards for pointing out the spot, but there wasn?t really much left of him to thank.
Currently, their task was to navigate across a room, but the issue lied with the flooring. Whilst all the silver panels that they stood on looked identical, some of them were much weaker, and would simply give way to the endless void underneath if even very little weight was put on them. This was proving to be a greater problem than originally predicted, as the careful progress required was severely costing them, and Nothing was starting to catch up on them, as hungry as ever before, and as hungry as ever after.
Eventually, the void became audible. The sound of square feet of metal upon square feet of metal being eaten away by the Nothing was filling the chambers, and ?precision movement? moved down a stage on The Drifter?s list of priorities over ?not being killed by the void?. In a desperate attempt to make it across, he recklessly leapt across the room. As predictable he did screw up at a few moments, but there wasn?t anything that could be solved by a combination of quick reactions and speed. As for Beauxhart, his predicament was thankfully solved by yet another portal he concocted out of the dark material which formed in his fingers. Conveniently, this was the point in time where the Nothing revealed itself from round the corner they had once came from, before continuing to devour everything that lied in its path. Once again, it was time for the duo to run as fast as they could.
They kept this pace up for about three minutes before eventually appearing at a split in the path. Like with the traps, this wasn?t the first time they had experienced such a thing, but with the void so close now their decision had to be much more secure. Taking the diversion could potentially be fatal in this instance.
Charles pondered quietly to himself over which of the routes to take. Beauxhart, on the other hand, had different thoughts running through his head, as he swung a strong punch at Charles, knocking The Drifter onto the floor. By the time Charles had regained his standing position on two feet Beauxhart had already moved towards one of the two hallways, with a third ball of black matter forming between his fingers. Determined not to be left behind, Charles reached for his hilt, and extended the blade easily over five feet in order to catch Beauxhart in the back of his neck. However, as the edge of the samurai sword went through the Wanderer of the Void?s neck, Beauxhart turned his entire body around to face The Drifter, revealing a manic grin all along his face as his head fell off and tumbled onto the floor.
?Oh, didn?t I mention that my body was made out of Nothing and am therefore immune to decapitation?? He called sarcastically, ?Strange, I swore I did mention something along those line- Oh, I know what it was! It was me assuming that you had the common sense to work out both how I created that dark matter you?ve seen me use, combined with the fact that people call me the Blade of Shadows, and the Wanderer of the Void. Seriously, what the Hell?s happened to common sense these days? Are all people this stupid or is it...? The head carried on talking in this rather obnoxious manner for a while, during which time the body went back to what it was doing previously and threw the ball of matter towards the ceiling.
Once again, noise rang out as an explosion brought down the ceiling of the maze, completely blocking that path. Running at the pile of rubble, Charles tried to pick away at pieces of debris to little overall effect. All the while, Beauxhart?s body worked on re-attaching the head, whilst the head tried to justify its actions.
?Look, I?m sorry, man, okay? But the fact is, you?re competition. And as much as we?re meant to work together through this, I?m really not letting anything get in my way from winning this tournament. Even if it comes at the cost of a ?teammate?. And with that, Beauxhart?s voice silenced. Charles gave up scraping away at the rubble, it was proving to be of no use and with the combination of all the running, the fighting, the over-use of extending his sword and finally that punch from Beauxhart, he needed to conserve all the energy he could. And thus, once again, he made a decision out of a lack of alternatives and chose the currently free path. He just prayed for God that it wasn?t a diversion.
[hr]
1 Minute
Charles was no longer running at the strides he was able to at the start of the battle, but somehow he was still keeping up a swift pace as he carried on through the corridors. Or it was at least a pace fast enough to keep distance from the void which was as always on his tail, and as long as that pace was kept up he had no preference over how well he was doing.
After about twenty seconds he ran past a path which merged with this one. From what he could assume he guessed that it was the route Beauxhart had taken, though any signs of the golden-eyed stranger were nowhere to be seen.
The Drifter started moving once again, first down to the end of this hallway, then taking a left followed quickly by a right. It was only a few paces after this right turning when his leg touched something. Looking down very carefully, he saw a thin piece of string stretching across the floor from one wall to the other.
A tripwire?!
Immediately, a dart flew out from a hole in the wall and caught his ankle. A combination of pain and the contents of the dart mixing with Charles? blood caused him to collapse on the floor, becoming incapable to move yet still fully able to see, hear and sense everything. Fear built up in him as he became incapable to move freely once again.
10 Seconds
The void became audible, its noises becoming an orchestra of destruction and feeding as it drove relentlessly through the paths of the maze. Desperate for one last stab at hope, Charles attempted to prop himself up on his right arm, but his body refused to even slightly budge.
5 Seconds
Darkness formed in the reflections of the silver walls. Fear completely overwhelmed the trapped being as he shut his eyes and prepared for darkness.
3 Seconds...
2 Seconds...
1 Second...
[hr]
Zero Time.
A bright flash of light filled the room, blinding Charles for a second or two. Slowly, he opened his eyes to see that he was still alive. As if such an experience wasn?t brilliant enough, he was able to prop himself up on one elbow, and position his legs so that he could stand up and walk.
Looking ahead, he saw the void, frozen in place, as if someone had just happened to hit the pause button in a video game. It took him a short while to realise what was actually happening, and whether this was him having defeted Famine or simply some strange afterlife of sorts. Thankfully, turning to his left answered this curiosity perfectly, and it was the result that he desired.
Coming from his side was the source of all the light: It was a cylinder of light appearing out of the ground, before turning to metal. It was almost exactly like the pillar that had brought him and Beauxhart to this world in the first place, the only difference being in the inscription on it. Where the previous column had read ?Famine?, this tube simply read ?Hive?. As he walked through it the column disappeared from the Incubator as mysteriously as it had vanished the first time.
Stepping out of the chamber, he appeared in the same room as he was briefed in. Making sure not to trip over the wires, he looked over to his right to see a certain memorable figure there, wearing a black hood and black gloves with very noticeable, golden eyes. At the sight of him, Charles felt a sudden increase in anger over this traitor, as he reached into his waistcoat pocket and removed the hilt once again.
Screaming with rage, he drew a blade from his hilt and went in to strike down Beauxhart whilst he had the advantage of being the first to draw. Luckily for Beauxhart, though, Original Sin already saw something like this happening and before The Drifter could even get close to the Blade of Shadows, a guard easily one and a half times taller than Charles and twice as broad appeared behind Charles, before picking him up and restraining him in a bear hug.
"Now now, Mr. Taylor. The two of you had the chance to kill each other if you wanted to back when you were in the Incubator. As it is, I?m afraid you will have to be more rational whilst here and conserve you energy and anger for more suitable areas. Now please, Mr. Taylor, stop fighting against me.? Charles screamed and fought against the man, but it was all in vain. Eventually, he started to relax more and the guard agreed to put him down cautiously. Although something was strange. Despite feeling perfectly normal, at occasional points he would see flashing dots. Points where Nothing would take up a tiny space of what he could see, and they especially built up around Beauxhart.
It looked as if it would Charles Taylor take more than a few minutes to clear his memories of the void.
Not too happy with how it turned out, but it will suffice. All apologies for it being about twice as long as everyone else's, I think these guys may have been able to fit about 30 minutes of action into a 15 minute piece somehow.
EDIT: Done some minor editing. Mostly spelling, grammar and vocabulary, nothing causing any serious change to the overall story.
Man, Shanks was giving me issue with his tone. His character's hard to write for.
I was aiming to get done by midnight my time. And what do you know, I was three minutes early. Go me! Sorry for the length, but hopefully the words are worth it.
The last staff meeting Harold had been to was when he was 19. He remembered it clearly.
The man spoke quickly, "You took my doughnut!"
Harold didn't have anything to say to that. Did it matter? It was a staff meeting, not a bakery. "If you say so."
The hand came down hard on his shoulder. Macho, but harmless. It was a manicured hand. "I do say so. Why'd you take my doughnut?"
"It's food, not gold. Relax."
'Roger,' what it said on the man's name tag, reached his arm back to throw a punch. "What? You think you're better than me, mister contractor?"
"Not really," Harold said, shrugging. "I just wanted a doughnut."
"I'll give you something else to chew on," Roger barked, throwing his fist forward in all of his bureaucratic fury. Harold yawned, sidestepping the blow, and wrenching the man at the wrist. It made a tiny popping sound as the punch flew wide, dropping Roger onto his pampered corporate ass. He barked promises of private detectives and lawsuits. Harold left the conference room, and never looked back.
This room didn't seem too much different from that room from so long ago. Big business rarely managed to encourage the creativity it demanded of its employees. The finishes were a lot cleaner, the metals that much more shiny, the decor even going so far as to become futuristic, but the layout was still standard business. Glass walls, wooden conference desks, rolling chairs, and the oppressive feeling of entrapment.
This always reminded Harold of an old joke, but he never really felt the need to capitalize on it. The area of too quiet, anyway. It had the feel of government, with a little too much space to be a Fortune 500 company. Lots of redundant space, redundant files, redundant (and ineffectual) security. Definitely government. Also very empty. Harold tried not to dwell on it, too much. The conference room was as good a place as any for something like this. Lots of desk space, good air conditioning, and quiet solitude that very often went hand-in-hand with careless indulgence. "What a wonderful thing." Harold thought aloud, resting his ankles on the polished wood of the conference desk. Which looked comical in the big rubber boots he had pulled from the maintenance closet.
After all, it was hard work to drag the watercoolers from offices up and down the hall. Not to mention half of the potted plants in this particular wing of the office. Bags of ice, drinks, water, aloe, soap, and anything else salvaged from rest rooms and break rooms. He also left the sinks running in the bathrooms. Oh, and a bag of chips, which Harold crunched loudly.
Of course, that didn't exactly mesh with his newfound partner, also wearing the bright yellow footwear.. "What's to be done here?"
"Um... There was a man who told me what would be happening. It's a duel with... someone. Some horsemen."
"Was a dame not long ago. Never seems right to be working here when there wasn't done. There's some good to be had from finishing jobs."
"Better to be had to leave clean-up to the professionals." Professional, said the shadow in his mind, is the way to be. Polite. Professional. Efficient. "Besides, our job is to defeat the horseman."
"Hearsay says the dame's a tough broad. You don't seem to chew nickels and spit nails, how you 'spect to clean her clocks?"
He had briefly looked over the file on the target. Although more of her seemed science fiction than even theoretical possibility, the concept of a sentient robot overlording the world from a deistic position was enough to make Harold consider the ramifications of calling things "probable" or "improbable" in this world. "Our best chance is to hold the fort, act natural, and wait for the horseman, or, horsewoman, to come to us."
"Not the worst idea, except if those papers say she's nigh-invisible to the sight."
"Completely invisible," Harold amended, affecting a passive disposition. His nerves were standing on edge, which was enough to set off his paranoia. He didn't act like anything was the matter through, crunching down on another chip. Without turning more than at a slow pace, he eyed the door. It was closing noiselessly on the hinges. No one had opened it. Simple enough reasoning from there.
The detective, face sunken, eyes darting left and right, sensed the change in the atmosphere. He wasn't trying to appear like he was looking around, but too many years working for the police made his instincts faster than his cognitive mind. Subtle reconnaissance was easier to do in urban areas, through populations. In an empty administration wing of a tiny, well-light conference room, rubbernecking was blatantly apparent.
However, dropping from the roof didn't exactly lend itself to silence. The motion, though well-practiced, was betrayed by the twin barks of pistols. Harold didn't know enough to identify the guns, but he did know enough to put the plants and water tanks between the corners and at the wings of the tables. They didn't stop the bullets, but they clouded the line of sight from the walls, ceilings, and sniper positions. The leaves ruffled as bullets shredded through them, spewing bits and worse everywhere. Shanks found himself off-balance, being pulled on by Harold, who was rolling his chair out into the hall. The motion tipped the pair of them off-balance, shoving the door open and spilling them both outside. Harold rolled to his feet, years of Aikido training him to roll effortlessly. Shanks landed in less of a dignified position. Although he recovered quickly, coming to a recovered bounce and scrambling to his feet. "Well, I hope you have a better plan than that."
"Depends on whether or not I left enough soap on the table." Harold answered, and turned to the north. "The bathrooms are still a few hundred yards from here. If we get moving now, we'll probably make it."
The man glared at him, "Probably?"
"Probably." They began running, shoes making cartoonish slapping sounds on the tile.
More bullets. Nasty rounds that ate into the marble tile, spitting rocks with every deafening roar of gunfire. Silencers only make guns sound like a distant firework. Certainly a far cry from the pht Hollywood would have you believe. However, AP rounds had a habit of burying themselves into the marble, instead of ricocheting around the hallway. "Sloppy of her," Harold gasped, tugging Shanks into the side of the hallway covered in water. "Get down."
To his credit, the man responded gamely, throwing himself to the ground. The soap and water mixture worked perfectly, and after Harold followed suit, they slid relatively quietly down the hall. The water was bitingly cold, but Harold gritted his teeth through it. The shadow spoke to him, 'It's unprofessional to complain. Inefficient.'
Shanks seemed to understand what the plan was at this point. He ducked into the bathroom, without being asked, and reached an arm out to catch Harold. They both went in, and immediately climbed on the counters, out of the water. Outside, silence reigned supreme. The gunfire had died completely. She was going to try another stealth attack.
However, it was nearly impossible to mask the splashing of a large body through the ankle-deep water, and harder still to stealth past the crushed ice in the hall. The cracking warned the pair of them that she was getting close. Shanks seemed to be ready to fight to the death, as he was clutching the hairspray and lighter he was given. Harold had other plans.
"Mother, I have a proposition."
The crunching stopped, and the door swung open. Aside from the haunting ripples expanding from nothing, and the drunken drift of water, the hallway was empty. The voice, quiet and soothing, spoke from behind Harold. He had to fight hard not to jump. "I'm listening."
Harold smiled, and reached up to start fiddling with the light fixture. "I have a business proposition for you. Seeing as you're a mercenary, I'm fairly certain you'd be open for a bit of business negotiation. How much is this contract paying out?"
The voice laughed, "Does it matter? The glory is half the payment, and working with the Hive, and against it, is glory enough for a hundred generations. Any credit beyond that has value that even your gold does not."
"Ah, but then there's also the cost of business. Whereas the Hive would be willing to pay you for this one mission, a single paycheck in a long line of endless, spiraling missions, I offer you steady work at- Ow!" He shook his hand, frowning at the singed skin, and continued fiddling with the light socket. "Sorry, at competitive pay. Better yet, the first few jobs will be simply to take time off. See your kids. Paid vacation, essentially. Trust me, I understand the value of time off, and it will be done as your job. No worries, no regrets. Just you, your family, and your money. No more hits, no more stealth, no more worry that your kids will grow up without their Mother."
Although he couldn't see her, what with the stealth suit and him fiddling with the light's wiring, he imagined a pensive expression accompanied the next words. "Interesting proposition human, were it not for the fact that I've heard this before. What do you propose that will make this one different, or yet, better?"
"Two key differences here. I propose, that as a someone of influence, I could not only provide further support for your family while you're away doing jobs, but also handle the dry logistics of your work. No more contracting, or effort. Simply giving you a job pitch, and all you need to do is a simple yes or no."
"At what cost?"
"None. Simply a free service I could do for you."
The stealth deactivated, and a black form hovered into view. She smiled, a deadly, humorless smile. "You reek of pleading, human. A desire to prolong your life. You offer me nothing I couldn't already take, and don't already have. You waste your breath, your time, your oxygen, and you do it fruitlessly. You're going to die, human, and your deal is wasted on the ears of your better. Do you have anything to say?"
"Sure. Isopropyl Alcohol, the cleaning solvent found in many offices like these, has a flash point of 53 degrees Fahrenheit, whose corrosive properties increase as the chemical rises in temperature." Harold took this moment to pelt Mother in the face with a punctured can of Raid. Although very little of the chemical hit her directly, the oily nature of the spray was visibly apparent on the surface of the water. "Which, when combined with other conducting flammables, yields nasty results when introduced to either fire or electricity."
In punctuating that sentence, Shanks let loose with a gout of flame. Heat immediately caused Mother to shrink back, and draw her knives. Which Harold immediately looped with the live wire from the light socket above him.
The resulting show not only caught Mother on fire, but it also paralyzed her from the torso up. Her fingers convulsed, once or twice, but she immediately sank into the water. Which would've been more deadly had the entire building's fuse blown. The circuit immediately kicked into failsafe mode, and the entire building shut down into darkness. Shanks immediately kicked the lighter back to life. The room, and Mother herself, was eery in the quiet light of a single dancing flame. "Well," Harold said, stepping into the electrified water. The current wouldn't completely go away for a few minutes yet. That's what the rubber shoes were for. And to keep Mother paralyzed. That's why he had also plugged batteries into the light switch. "That's enough of that. You ready to go?"
Shanks stepped gingerly into the water, as if the rubber would do nothing. However, they could stand unharmed in the water. "Better than sticking around."
"I hear you. Think anything's good on TV tonight?"
"Doesn't make a bit of difference to me."
"It does for me. I'm tired. That was too much work for one day."
"Well, sleep easy. She had it coming."
"Yeah, she did. Hey, you want to go get some doughnuts?"
The man spoke quickly, "You took my doughnut!"
Harold didn't have anything to say to that. Did it matter? It was a staff meeting, not a bakery. "If you say so."
The hand came down hard on his shoulder. Macho, but harmless. It was a manicured hand. "I do say so. Why'd you take my doughnut?"
"It's food, not gold. Relax."
'Roger,' what it said on the man's name tag, reached his arm back to throw a punch. "What? You think you're better than me, mister contractor?"
"Not really," Harold said, shrugging. "I just wanted a doughnut."
"I'll give you something else to chew on," Roger barked, throwing his fist forward in all of his bureaucratic fury. Harold yawned, sidestepping the blow, and wrenching the man at the wrist. It made a tiny popping sound as the punch flew wide, dropping Roger onto his pampered corporate ass. He barked promises of private detectives and lawsuits. Harold left the conference room, and never looked back.
This room didn't seem too much different from that room from so long ago. Big business rarely managed to encourage the creativity it demanded of its employees. The finishes were a lot cleaner, the metals that much more shiny, the decor even going so far as to become futuristic, but the layout was still standard business. Glass walls, wooden conference desks, rolling chairs, and the oppressive feeling of entrapment.
This always reminded Harold of an old joke, but he never really felt the need to capitalize on it. The area of too quiet, anyway. It had the feel of government, with a little too much space to be a Fortune 500 company. Lots of redundant space, redundant files, redundant (and ineffectual) security. Definitely government. Also very empty. Harold tried not to dwell on it, too much. The conference room was as good a place as any for something like this. Lots of desk space, good air conditioning, and quiet solitude that very often went hand-in-hand with careless indulgence. "What a wonderful thing." Harold thought aloud, resting his ankles on the polished wood of the conference desk. Which looked comical in the big rubber boots he had pulled from the maintenance closet.
After all, it was hard work to drag the watercoolers from offices up and down the hall. Not to mention half of the potted plants in this particular wing of the office. Bags of ice, drinks, water, aloe, soap, and anything else salvaged from rest rooms and break rooms. He also left the sinks running in the bathrooms. Oh, and a bag of chips, which Harold crunched loudly.
Of course, that didn't exactly mesh with his newfound partner, also wearing the bright yellow footwear.. "What's to be done here?"
"Um... There was a man who told me what would be happening. It's a duel with... someone. Some horsemen."
"Was a dame not long ago. Never seems right to be working here when there wasn't done. There's some good to be had from finishing jobs."
"Better to be had to leave clean-up to the professionals." Professional, said the shadow in his mind, is the way to be. Polite. Professional. Efficient. "Besides, our job is to defeat the horseman."
"Hearsay says the dame's a tough broad. You don't seem to chew nickels and spit nails, how you 'spect to clean her clocks?"
He had briefly looked over the file on the target. Although more of her seemed science fiction than even theoretical possibility, the concept of a sentient robot overlording the world from a deistic position was enough to make Harold consider the ramifications of calling things "probable" or "improbable" in this world. "Our best chance is to hold the fort, act natural, and wait for the horseman, or, horsewoman, to come to us."
"Not the worst idea, except if those papers say she's nigh-invisible to the sight."
"Completely invisible," Harold amended, affecting a passive disposition. His nerves were standing on edge, which was enough to set off his paranoia. He didn't act like anything was the matter through, crunching down on another chip. Without turning more than at a slow pace, he eyed the door. It was closing noiselessly on the hinges. No one had opened it. Simple enough reasoning from there.
The detective, face sunken, eyes darting left and right, sensed the change in the atmosphere. He wasn't trying to appear like he was looking around, but too many years working for the police made his instincts faster than his cognitive mind. Subtle reconnaissance was easier to do in urban areas, through populations. In an empty administration wing of a tiny, well-light conference room, rubbernecking was blatantly apparent.
However, dropping from the roof didn't exactly lend itself to silence. The motion, though well-practiced, was betrayed by the twin barks of pistols. Harold didn't know enough to identify the guns, but he did know enough to put the plants and water tanks between the corners and at the wings of the tables. They didn't stop the bullets, but they clouded the line of sight from the walls, ceilings, and sniper positions. The leaves ruffled as bullets shredded through them, spewing bits and worse everywhere. Shanks found himself off-balance, being pulled on by Harold, who was rolling his chair out into the hall. The motion tipped the pair of them off-balance, shoving the door open and spilling them both outside. Harold rolled to his feet, years of Aikido training him to roll effortlessly. Shanks landed in less of a dignified position. Although he recovered quickly, coming to a recovered bounce and scrambling to his feet. "Well, I hope you have a better plan than that."
"Depends on whether or not I left enough soap on the table." Harold answered, and turned to the north. "The bathrooms are still a few hundred yards from here. If we get moving now, we'll probably make it."
The man glared at him, "Probably?"
"Probably." They began running, shoes making cartoonish slapping sounds on the tile.
More bullets. Nasty rounds that ate into the marble tile, spitting rocks with every deafening roar of gunfire. Silencers only make guns sound like a distant firework. Certainly a far cry from the pht Hollywood would have you believe. However, AP rounds had a habit of burying themselves into the marble, instead of ricocheting around the hallway. "Sloppy of her," Harold gasped, tugging Shanks into the side of the hallway covered in water. "Get down."
To his credit, the man responded gamely, throwing himself to the ground. The soap and water mixture worked perfectly, and after Harold followed suit, they slid relatively quietly down the hall. The water was bitingly cold, but Harold gritted his teeth through it. The shadow spoke to him, 'It's unprofessional to complain. Inefficient.'
Shanks seemed to understand what the plan was at this point. He ducked into the bathroom, without being asked, and reached an arm out to catch Harold. They both went in, and immediately climbed on the counters, out of the water. Outside, silence reigned supreme. The gunfire had died completely. She was going to try another stealth attack.
However, it was nearly impossible to mask the splashing of a large body through the ankle-deep water, and harder still to stealth past the crushed ice in the hall. The cracking warned the pair of them that she was getting close. Shanks seemed to be ready to fight to the death, as he was clutching the hairspray and lighter he was given. Harold had other plans.
"Mother, I have a proposition."
The crunching stopped, and the door swung open. Aside from the haunting ripples expanding from nothing, and the drunken drift of water, the hallway was empty. The voice, quiet and soothing, spoke from behind Harold. He had to fight hard not to jump. "I'm listening."
Harold smiled, and reached up to start fiddling with the light fixture. "I have a business proposition for you. Seeing as you're a mercenary, I'm fairly certain you'd be open for a bit of business negotiation. How much is this contract paying out?"
The voice laughed, "Does it matter? The glory is half the payment, and working with the Hive, and against it, is glory enough for a hundred generations. Any credit beyond that has value that even your gold does not."
"Ah, but then there's also the cost of business. Whereas the Hive would be willing to pay you for this one mission, a single paycheck in a long line of endless, spiraling missions, I offer you steady work at- Ow!" He shook his hand, frowning at the singed skin, and continued fiddling with the light socket. "Sorry, at competitive pay. Better yet, the first few jobs will be simply to take time off. See your kids. Paid vacation, essentially. Trust me, I understand the value of time off, and it will be done as your job. No worries, no regrets. Just you, your family, and your money. No more hits, no more stealth, no more worry that your kids will grow up without their Mother."
Although he couldn't see her, what with the stealth suit and him fiddling with the light's wiring, he imagined a pensive expression accompanied the next words. "Interesting proposition human, were it not for the fact that I've heard this before. What do you propose that will make this one different, or yet, better?"
"Two key differences here. I propose, that as a someone of influence, I could not only provide further support for your family while you're away doing jobs, but also handle the dry logistics of your work. No more contracting, or effort. Simply giving you a job pitch, and all you need to do is a simple yes or no."
"At what cost?"
"None. Simply a free service I could do for you."
The stealth deactivated, and a black form hovered into view. She smiled, a deadly, humorless smile. "You reek of pleading, human. A desire to prolong your life. You offer me nothing I couldn't already take, and don't already have. You waste your breath, your time, your oxygen, and you do it fruitlessly. You're going to die, human, and your deal is wasted on the ears of your better. Do you have anything to say?"
"Sure. Isopropyl Alcohol, the cleaning solvent found in many offices like these, has a flash point of 53 degrees Fahrenheit, whose corrosive properties increase as the chemical rises in temperature." Harold took this moment to pelt Mother in the face with a punctured can of Raid. Although very little of the chemical hit her directly, the oily nature of the spray was visibly apparent on the surface of the water. "Which, when combined with other conducting flammables, yields nasty results when introduced to either fire or electricity."
In punctuating that sentence, Shanks let loose with a gout of flame. Heat immediately caused Mother to shrink back, and draw her knives. Which Harold immediately looped with the live wire from the light socket above him.
The resulting show not only caught Mother on fire, but it also paralyzed her from the torso up. Her fingers convulsed, once or twice, but she immediately sank into the water. Which would've been more deadly had the entire building's fuse blown. The circuit immediately kicked into failsafe mode, and the entire building shut down into darkness. Shanks immediately kicked the lighter back to life. The room, and Mother herself, was eery in the quiet light of a single dancing flame. "Well," Harold said, stepping into the electrified water. The current wouldn't completely go away for a few minutes yet. That's what the rubber shoes were for. And to keep Mother paralyzed. That's why he had also plugged batteries into the light switch. "That's enough of that. You ready to go?"
Shanks stepped gingerly into the water, as if the rubber would do nothing. However, they could stand unharmed in the water. "Better than sticking around."
"I hear you. Think anything's good on TV tonight?"
"Doesn't make a bit of difference to me."
"It does for me. I'm tired. That was too much work for one day."
"Well, sleep easy. She had it coming."
"Yeah, she did. Hey, you want to go get some doughnuts?"
I was aiming to get done by midnight my time. And what do you know, I was three minutes early. Go me! Sorry for the length, but hopefully the words are worth it.
Not the longest, and not a wall, really. <_<sky14kemea said:Woo! These look fun to read
*gets knocked unconscious by NewClassic's wall o' text*. x_x
=P
EDIT: So, I guess it's 10PM AEST now, right? Though the number of entries is kind of...worryingly small.
And at least I got my edit in four minutes before the end, after losing a chunk of my text three, fucking, times.
All I'm waiting for now is pigeon_of_doom now. He sent me a PM earlier this morning so he's definitely still in it, so I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt and give him a few more hours to get his stuff in. First thing tomorrow, however, I will send a message closing the round for everyone.
If you want to get your final edits and proofreadings in, please do so in the time I've given you.
@Soothsayer: I did instruct you to keep everyone alive for Round 3 - this round's intention was to whittle 9 down to 8. I'll allow it for judging, but regardless of position I'll declare your entry non-canon for future rounds.
That is, unless you wish to change it in the next few hours. But it's entirely up to you.
If you want to get your final edits and proofreadings in, please do so in the time I've given you.
@Soothsayer: I did instruct you to keep everyone alive for Round 3 - this round's intention was to whittle 9 down to 8. I'll allow it for judging, but regardless of position I'll declare your entry non-canon for future rounds.
That is, unless you wish to change it in the next few hours. But it's entirely up to you.