The warm afternoon sun was shining happily upon an equally beaming Toga. Not only had the Girl Squad managed to take out one of their competitors, but they'd also gotten a freakin' sweet knife out of the deal. Tossing aside the Grow Pole in her excitement, the teenager cradled the blood-caked instrument to her bosom like a small child and squealed with glee. Her far less enthusiastic partner gingerly made her way over to the girl and scooped up her discarded weapon.
"Ugh…" Ellie groaned painfully. "That kind of sucked… I mean, why is it ALWAYS the back?!"
By the point, the older woman's blouse was barely even covering her bosom, but Toga just really couldn't care less about that right now.
"Are you kidding?!" She exclaimed, giving her new blade a few practice swings. "That was amazing! Like, oh my gosh, the guy?! Such a freakin' dreamboat, am I right? And now I got a big knife! Today just couldn't get any better! Ooo! Ooo! Do ya think I should make a mask, to complete the look? I'm gonna make a mask! Bee are bee, Ellie Bellie!"
And with that, the murder loli was happily prancing off to a nearby glade of wood, leaving her bewildered companion behind.
Face to Face
#18 Jak Mar vs #12 Toga & #08 Ellie Vaughan
The pair had been traveling for just a short while when the situation went sour once again. Based on their maps, they were nearing a landmark called ‘Gear Lake’, but before they had even made it to within an eyeshot of that body of water, a gunshot rang out from behind them.
With a dull thud, Ellie crashed to the ground and started to writhe as Toga saw the entry wound on the small of the woman’s back. By just a few inches, the woman’s spine had been spared what would have been a paralyzing blow. Even so, Ellie was screaming and clearly in a bit of discomfort—her blood had already started to dribble out of both the entry and exit wounds.
“What kind of shit?”
Toga turned just in time to see the lithe, elf-earned figure as he hopped down from a rock outcropping and leveled his pistol with the teenage girl’s skull. The antihero smiled as his finger pulled the trigger, and Toga winced at the sound of it, her mind already anticipating the pain before it set in.
When nothing happened, the young girl cracked an eye open. “Am… am I dead? Is that how dying is?” Glancing down, she saw a huffing Ellie Vaughan holding the pole in her bloody, trembling arms.
“Not dead,” the murder loli’s companion grunted as she pointed to the collapsed body of their attacker.
“Did you kill him?” Toga asked with a grin. “Was it bloody? Did you pop his eye out?”
“I barely hit him,” Ellie wheezed as she went limp.
Meanwhile, Jak Mar had risen to his feet. The gun lay a few yards away, but the eco warrior wasn’t concerned with that at the moment. His eyes turned to Toga, and it was then that she noticed something was different.
“You good?” Toga asked. “Weren’t you brown a few seconds ago?”
“I was weak a few seconds ago,” Dark Jak sneered as he narrowed his black eyes with the teenage girl. “I hope you’re ready for me to tear you to pieces.”
“Ooh, is that supposed to be foreplay?” The teenager scowled. “You look kind of old, especially since your skins all gray now.”
“Silence.”
Dark Jak lifted his clawed hands and fired Eco lightning at Toga, who had the wherewithal to get herself out of the way. Machete in hand and dark thoughts in her mind, the teenage girl clenched her teeth and rushed toward her assailant. Seemingly content to cut her open himself, Dark Jak rushed to meet her, and the two crashed awkwardly into the grass. The black-eyed warrior found himself with the upper hand, as his claws raked across Toga’s chest, drawing beads of blood as the young girl screamed and swung the machete. The edge of the blade slashed across Dark Jak’s face, and he recoiled enough to allow Toga to slip out from underneath him.
“I’ll show you how to make someone bleed,” she growled as she swung the machete. Jason’s trademark weapon caught Jak right near the left shoulder, and from there, it carved a deep path of destruction down half of the elf-earned antihero’s arm.
Screaming as he fell back, Dark Jak immediately started to scramble backwards.
“How does it feel to be the one running?” Toga sneered as blood continued to stain the front of her blouse. With an almost hop-like step, she kicked Dark Jak as hard in the ribs as she could, and the warrior went rolling for a few feet. “Party’s just getting started.”
His back still to her, Dark Jak chuckled weakly. “Party’s over,” he added as he rolled over to reveal the gun in his good hand. The first shot went wide, but the second struck Toga in her already gnarled hand, causing the appendage to burst into a cloud of red as she screamed and dropped the machete. Rising to his feet, Dark Jak sneered as he steadied his aim.
Before he could pull the trigger, and irate Ellie sent the power pole crashing into his ribs.
When he landed, Dark Jak found his breaths hard to come by, and with the older woman preoccupied with her younger associate, the eco warrior decided it best to cut his losses and retreat. As he limped away, he glanced down and checked that he still had one final bullet left in the chamber of the pepperbox pistol.
15 Contestants Remain
Jak Mar has used one application of Focus
Ellie V was pressured into using one application of Focus
Toga’s damaged hand is now blasted into a crimson mass (Minor into a Major Injury)
Ellie V has a deep cut down her back (Minor Injury)
Jak Mar’s left hand is lacerated deeply from shoulder to just below the elbow, making it nearly unusable (Major Injury).
Jak Mar fired four times (1 round remaining)
Everyone here is on cooldown for eight hours or until they leave their square. This can be waived through PMs.
Slick with fresh, warm blood, Toga's remaining hand grasped tightly at the ragged stump of her wrist. She screamed as her grip tightened, desperate to stop the blood flow. Despite her own injuries, Ellie moved over to her teenage companion quickly, once assured that their assailant had made good his escape. Tearing free the last remaining shreds of her blouse, the older woman wrapped them around Toga's arm before cinching it tight in a sort of makeshift tourniquet.
With the threat of imminent death averted, for now, Toga fell to her knees and began sobbing uncontrollably. It wasn't supposed to be this way… she was the killer. She was the hunter. But, here she was, one arm down, and smearing crimson blood across her face as she wiped her eyes. Ellie, somehow the more mature one of the two, knelt beside her partner and draped an arm across her shoulder. Her hand gently caressed the blonde's hair, doing her best to sooth the young girl's woes.
After some time, Toga's tears dried up, and her breathing returned to normal. She looked up at Ellie with red-rimmed eyes and growled, "Let's find that bastard and make him pay! I want to watch him bleed! I want to see the hopelessness in his eyes when he sees us standing over his brutalized corpse! I want to make him suffer for what he did to us!"
With a warm smile, Ellie nodded in agreement and the two rose to their feet with new purpose.
Jak found himself in the cover of afternoon, watching from a distance as he heard shuffling of not one but two women. A teenager who under the cover of her cuteness laid a psychotic nature along with an older woman who looked like she was a bit more mature in her nature.
The teenager seemed to have some sort of sadistic nature within her as Mar watched her excitedly chant something about murdering for fun.
“Who the hell murders for anything other than survival?” Mar bluntly grunted.
The eco warrior’s moral compass had rescued him several times in the last three days, but forfeiting his heroism is what he did most of the time.
“I don’t need moralism, how the hell am I supposed to tell you this, Light?!”
The eco warrior found his body lit up by the all too familiar dark eco lightning.
Funny how this game worked sometime.
Prey becomes the Predator. Predator becomes someone you can’t recognize fully.
That’s when desperate times came for desperate measures.
The taste of Ellie’s and Toga’s blood still lingered in the dark beast’s mouth. Who was he for ripping a little girl’s clean off in revenge for Karl who watched in pleasure for crowds that would forget his name?
He wouldn’t let himself be known as that failure from Dante’s Abyss 18. Fame and fortune did that to a man.
The crowds lusted over him, cheered his name.
And so the legends foretold:
“Jak, get the fuck up!” A ottsel turned long eared man stood placing a hand in spirit on the eco warrior’s shoulder.”
“Are you going to let a little girl who cried wolf ruin you?” A figure stood, trying to help the man up.
He stared into the skies, letting the piercing eyes of Ellie and Toga stare down at him.
“Come on, I think he’s a goner. He won’t touch us again.” Ellie told Toga as she laughed in victory.”
It was a fool’s game. The eco warrior had a habit of “playing dead.”
Ellie and Toga had slightly miscalculated and made a lapse in judgement.
Ellie wasn’t the one Dark wanted. It was Toga. The insufferable little girl who wanted to play “Jason”. Dark held her by the ripped up blouse.
“Now who’s laughing?!”
Her eyes were dinner plate size.
“No, please. It was just a joke.”
“Fuck you.” The Dark King was simply moving his claws along the girl’s neck as blood dripped into his mouth as he smirked.
“Next time? You won’t be so lucky, little girl.”
Jak was almost watching a movie as he gritted his teeth.
This game had both intentionally and unintentionally made him into a monster but he never enjoyed his kills as much as this girl did.
Light stared at Jak, trying to question what Dark was showing both his host and him.
The eco warrior squeezed his fist, pounding it lightly on the ground, shoving a pile full of mud into his usable hand.
Sometimes you become the hero in your own stories, other times you’re the villain in another’s book. But Karl’s game brings out the worst of us.
Face to Face
#23 The Hulk vs #20 Doomguy & #13 Yuuka
The pair found their green adversary after spending the better part of the day resting and trying to regain their bearings after their initial run-in with the monster.
“I’m going to tear it apart,” Doomguy hissed as he clenched the sword. Before Yuuka could propose a sidebar to discuss a strategical approach to assailing the giant, angry monster, her partner was already leaping down the small hill and stomping his way toward the Hulk.
“Hey!” Doomguy screamed as the Hulk turned around. The Hulk looked just about as ugly as the sneering marine who marched toward him. “Come and die.”
With little more than feral instincts to drive a body that was growing beleaguered from days of survival, the Hulk smacked his chest like a territorial gorilla and charged. As he did, he soaked long-range blasts from Yuuka, but the beast shrugged through the blasts even as pieces of his broad chest were literally sheered away.
Doomguy swung the sword and thrust it forward as the Hulk’s massive form fell onto him.
From her position up high, Yuuka could only watch as the Hulk crashed down on top of her partner.
“…Doomy?”
As if he needed that cue, the marine literally tore up and out through the back of the dead behemoth. His body drenched in blood, guts, and viscera, Doomguy merely looked up at the flower girl, brushed some organic 'debris' from his face, and nodded up at her. "See? Easy."
The spandex was unmistakable, but the voice... that wasn't the obnoxious voice he associated with Deadpool. Well, it was still obnoxious, what with that bizarre accent, but it was different, somehow. Like there was another voice layered on top of it. And that hat... where had Frieza seen that hat before?
Then he mentioned the gun, and his eyes snapped open.
Of course.
He glanced up, and though his ears were covered, he could make out two earring-shaped bumps under the mask. So that's what those earrings did. He'd seen them go flying in the explosion when Sutor died, but hadn't thought much of it. Now all the pieces were coming together. It sounded absurd, that two separate people could fuse into one being, but everything about this Dante's Abyss event was fucking absurd. And that did explain why the death toll this morning was six, when he very definitely remembered there only being five corpses.
With a herculean effort, Frieza pulled himself into an upright standing position. A risky move, considering the energy blade to his throat, but he kept his hands raised in surrender so he could face him eye to eye. Well. Eye to eye minus the height difference, anyway.
"You're not Deadpool. Who are you?" he asked.
"I'M TWO GUYS NOW!" Maybe-Deadpool struck a dramatic pose that would make Ginyu blush. So he had fused with someone. "You can call me Artpool. Actually, no, don't call me that. That's lame. Sounds like I'm from a line of 16th century British aristocrats or something. Call me... RED DEAD. Wait, wait, waaaaait a second, I'm the one asking the questions here!" He pointed the energy blade at Frieza's neck more aggressively. "The gun. Where did you get it."
Frieza thought back to where he'd seen that hat before, and then it all fell into place. The Factorial City battle. He'd aimed his dynamite at a pair of people. One of them had been a gun-touting man in this very hat--come to think of it, this very gun. The other had been a robotic creature, who later wielded that gun against Sutor. He didn't know how they'd gotten separated, or how the man in the hat had survived that gunshot wound, but it was easy enough to put two and two together.
"You want to know if I'm the one who killed your comrade, is that it? The icy looking robotic fellow." Frieza asked coolly. "No need to worry. That wasn't my doing. I just happened to be on scene when he died. He died in a suicide attack against the former owner of those earrings, said something about avenging his partner--I can only assume that was you?" Or, half of him? He was a bit unsure of the etiquette of addressing... two guys.
Red Dead froze. He still held the energy blade to Frieza's neck, but the strength in his grip had lessened. "...Oh." It was hard to tell under the mask, but Frieza could see the outline of gritted teeth. Finally, he lowered his weapon. "That noble sonuvabitch... to hell with it all, I'm gonna kill everything on this damn island."
Frieza cocked his head. A murder spree sounded like a lovely idea right about now. "Is that a wise idea with your current injuries? You can't expect to get far like that." He flashed a dangerous grin. "Not alone, at least."
Red Dead scoffed. "Like you're one to talk! My guy, can you even walk? Or do you want me to give you a piggyback ride?"
Frieza glared up at him. "I can walk just fine, thank you. It'll take a lot more than this to stop me. Not until I have that damn rodent's head."
"Wait, rodent? You mean Mickey? Mickey Mouse? Little guy, high-pitched voice, black fur, really big ears?" He made circles in the air next to his head for emphasis, as if Frieza didn't know what ears were. ...Which might have been a fair assumption, actually.
Frieza blinked. If Red Dead had information on his adversary, that might actually be useful. "You're familiar with him, then."
"Aw, yeah, me and Mickey go way back." The cowboy grinned. "We're, uhhh... hm, you know what, I'm not sure WHAT we are. Half of me is saying we were kinda-sorta good buddies, the other half of me is saying he's the resident stick in the mud who's not down with murder. I mean, why would you sign up for a murder game if you don't wanna kill anyone? Seems pretty stupid, if you ask me. Anyway, he really doesn't belong in a place like this, but... hm. I can't figure out if that means I want to leave him alone or want to kill him for funsies, y'know?" He scratched his head. "Man, this is a weird feeling."
"In that case," said Frieza, "it might interest you to know that this Mickey Mouse was the one who landed the final blow on your former partner. He would have died anyway, mind you, but I suppose the mouse couldn't control his bloodlust."
"WHAT!" Red Dead snapped. "That's it, internal conflict over, all of me wants him dead now. Climb on, there's a rodent infestation on this island and you n' me are the exterminators."
Red Dead squatted awkwardly, back towards Frieza as he looked at him expectantly. When Frieza didn't move, he said, "What? I wasn't kidding about the piggyback ride, you know."
Frieza gave him a flat stare. He remembered now why he had been happy to be rid of Deadpool. "I'll... I'll just walk, thank you."
It didn't matter, though. The thought that revenge may be within his grasp was a welcome second wind, invigorating enough to take his mind off the pain. The pair set off, and Frieza's mind was swimming with thoughts of what he'd do to this Mickey Mouse once they caught him. Maybe he'd even let Red Dead take a turn at him, as a gesture of kindness. But what was the best way he could twist in the knife...?
As he did, a memory from the previous encounter poked at the corner of his awareness. The parasite in the jar. Whatever it was, the sight of it had made Mickey go paler than even the mangled corpses of his allies.
"By the way," Frieza asked his new (...old?) partner conversationally, "there was something Mickey's ally had in possession. It seemed to be some sort of parasite. You wouldn't happen to know anything about what it might have been, would you?"
Hours later, Mickey Mouse and Gilgamesh has almost completely combed the nearby forest with no sign of Lord Freezer anywhere.
Who did this fella think he was, anyway, calling himself ‘Lord’? Mickey Mouse only knew one Lord, and that was Gosh — and he was pretty sure that guy (or lady) didn’t look like a squatting white-and-purple alien dude. Frustratedly, he plopped down on the ground and leaned against a tree, letting a high-pitched sigh escape slowly from his lips.
Justice.
It’d been almost thirty-six hours since his fight with Nemesis, yet symptoms of his concussion persisted. He’d given the Pepsi to Gilgamesh — poured it down his throat — at the expense of healing his own injuries. What was a healing liquid, however refreshing, going to do for a chopped off hand? He exhaled again. He was going to die out here, he just knew it. And if he was destined to die, he wanted to set the King of Heroes up to take down the rest of these bad dudes.
But he was going to get some of them himself first.
Justice…
He shook his head wildly. That word had been repeating itself over and over since they’d encountered Freezer in the forest. He’d heard it ringing in his head so many times over the past few hours he’d almost stopped understanding what it meant.
No; he knew. It meant finding the bad guys in this game and making sure they knew who was in charge, making sure they knew that no matter how much bad stuff they did, he — Mickey freakin’ Mouse — would always be a good guy, and he would always be on their tail. They would never get away from their crimes, because he would be there to smack ‘em around and let ‘em know what’s what.
He reached into the pocket of his shorts and lifted the small bottle of pure starlight out. He didn’t know exactly what the magic did, but simply having it on his person made him feel safer. It made him feel like after he’d shown the rest of these bad dudes the error of their ways, he could go out into the rest of the Crossroads and show them, too.
Justice!!
He started to let out a scream when the clinking of Gilgamesh’s armor reached his ears. He quickly quieted himself and turned to the refreshed monarch, who stared curiously at him. “Is all well here, Mouse?”
Mickey didn’t speak, but nodded. A tiny “mhm” escaped his lips, and he could see Gilgamesh’s quizzical expression. The King of Heroes’ eyes narrowed, but he ignored the mouse’s weirdness and started to do a quick double-check of the surrounding areas. When he turned back around, Mickey’s eyes traveled to his face and he almost fainted at what he saw.
“Gawrsh, looks like that mongrel got away.”
Mickey’s eyes widened as what looked, ostensibly, like Goofy-in-Gilgamesh’s-armor stared down at him. He quickly counted the days they’d been on this island — almost three. Was that enough time to start seeing ghosts of friends long gone?
Goofymesh continued to stare as if he expected a response, but Mickey was paralyzed with fear.
“Yeah,” he managed. “Seems like… he did… Goofy…”
Goofymesh quirked his head. “Goofy? Am I funny to you, Mouse?” he growled in his old friend’s traditional cadence, orange-cap atop a bald head with ears flopping down beside it. Mickey scrambled back toward the tree and shut his eyes tight. When he opened them, Goofymesh was gone, thank goodness, replaced by the regular ol’ tyrant.
Mickey trembled. To Gilgamesh, it must’ve looked as if he was shivering in fear of his threatening tone, but Mickey’s true demon had already begun to reappear, as a beak sprouted from Gilgamesh’s face and feathers started to appear all over his body. He shrank down, his hips turning bulbous and his feet bursting from his boots, now webbed.
“Heyyyyy, Mouse,” Gilgaduck blew out of his beak, waddling closer to Mickey. “What’s the big ideaaaa?”
Mickey lifted his only remaining gloved hand to his face and shut his eyes tight.
They were so close to the end.
This, he knew, was a desperate time.
What was it desperate times called for again?
The word repeated again: Justice.
His eyes popped open as Gilgamesh’s human fingers reached out and touched his ear. Flashes of the last time the gilded monarch’s hand had been near one of his big ears exploded into his brain, and he instinctively snapped at the young man with his teeth. Gilgamesh yanked his hand away and shoved the barrel of the freeze ray into Mickey’s head, knocking the tiny creature to the forest floor.
He heaved up and down as he lied there, stewing in the different images flying throughout his brain. He supposed the continued wear and tear and lack of rest had only contributed to the severity of his concussion. He looked up at Gilgamesh.
“I… I’m so sorry.”
Gilgamesh huffed. “Save it. This place is horrendous.”
Yuuka's voice cut through the blood like her partner's sword had cut through Banner's flesh. "Are you gonna finish that?"
"Huh? I'm pretty sure he's already dea-"
Doomguy's stomach turned as he found out Yuuka wasn't really waiting for an answer- she had already sunk her teeth deep into the greenish flesh of the corpse they had just made, tearing chunks out and swallowing them whole one by one.
...He was beginning to seriously reconsider his choice in partner.
-
The air was sticky and thick with bugs, which seemed to somehow hunt the pair of them down even more than any other contestant could have nightmares of. The larger ones, thankfully, she just heard in the distance- but they somehow filled her with even more dread than the tiny ones lining up to suck out all of the nectar-flavored blood she was still covered with. Damn her for her strange anatomy, and damn the island for exploiting it.
Doomy, while certainly bloodier than she after his little spat with hulky-boy, didn't seem to be much more of a target. After just having sweat his ass off in the hot spring, now here he was immediately dirtier than he'd been before. Both of them, she figured, thoroughly missed being clean more than anything else. Sure, it wasn't unusual for either of them to be this incredibly sticky with the scent of iron (and, in Yuuka's case, burnt jasmine) and sweat, but that didn't make it comfortable.
Though crippled by the metal spikes that dotted her form, Yuuka didn't seem to be moving much slower than usual. Karl had been right when he snarked that these things got harder with age. She hadn't bothered pulling any out, well aware of how puncture wounds worked despite her overall lackluster medical knowledge. It was from experience, of course. Both from dealing them and being dealt them.
"Don't think we'll get a minute's rest from now on," the marine observed, marking off the dead zones on his map as he tried not to think about what he'd just witnessed. Maybe some idle conversation would keep his mind off of it. No, his mind needed to be on their situation now. The deathtraps were closing in on them, to be sure- no way they'd be safe where they were come next sunrise.
"And what a shame." Yuuka adjusted the fit of the Proto-Buster on her arm as she spoke, having put it back onto her blood-drenched hands after... Ugh, dear lord... Flynn pushed that image out of his short term memory. "At least last time, they patched us up between the fights. Though I do... question their methods of doing so."
"Oh, you were in the last one too? Guess we're fellow veterans, then." Though his words were ostensibly friendly, even Yuuka could hear a little hesitation in his friendliness after everything he'd just seen her do. She expected that trepidation, and on some level, relished it. That fear was even more delicious to her than the beast-of-a-man's flesh. (She licked her teeth inside her mouth.) "Why'd you sign up, anyway? I have my guesses, but..."
"To do unbelievable amounts of violence to strangers and get paid for it." A still-bloody smile spread its way across Yuuka's face, manic energy filling every part of her expression.
"...Right, I don't think you're alone there." Doomguy let out a nervous laugh, despite himself. That was probably exactly what he was expecting from her, though maybe he wasn't expecting the brutal honesty. "I'm hoping to get my gun back. I keep hearing it fire, so I'm sure someone's still got their dirty little hands on it." He shook his head, half of a snarl growing on his face as his thoughts returned to the kind of damage the little shit was probably doing to his baby.
"Hmm... I suppose that should be our next goal, then." With a nod, Yuuka made eye contact with him, that unnerving bloodthirst in her gaze now burrowing deeper and deeper into the anxieties in the back of his mind. "Our supplies do seem to be getting a little thin. Restocking seems... prudent, before the real fun starts."
For the brief moment where my glee of a kill was left intact, I felt adrenaline pump through my veins as I had been drenched in my glory kill. The green giant had escaped me the first time, my sword had nearly ended it before a witch wielding hellfire. My blade now tasted it’s first kill, a flick of the weapon caused viscera to splatter to the nearby flora. The bounding in my head and heart brought back a nostalgic feeling of demons caved in from shotgun blasts. Even when the ogre's corpse collapsed onto me, it only added to the experience as my hands rip and tore through it’s huge guts. I broke through, bloodied, and left in elation.
Then Yuuka happened.
I see some of you giving me a look. Yes, I’m used to being knee deep in the dead, I’ve fought abominations while sprinting through trees of bone and gore. I’ve seen men’s bodies twisted into the gaunt and tall Revenant in front of mind, there screams the shifted to the horrible yell of the armed skeletons. But I paused on this one. It wasn’t even just the act of cannibalism that turned my stomach, it was how casual she had done it and the gusto she did it.in. It colored a lot of the bonding we had made the last few days in a different color.
Much like back on day one, I was now keeping further than arm’s length from the… I wasn’t sure what to call Yuuka. It had started to come into place; she may not have been human. Perhaps something I should have questioned when I noticed she smelled like fresh cut grass when I was down wind from her. Her reveal made it hard for my mind to lose the grip of paranoia that washed over me. Even as we made talk, all the little things she did that I saw as merely character made alarms scream in my head. As if a sole moment would end with her already bloodied teeth latching for my jugular.
And I suspected, by the joy on her face, that she wanted it that way. So I was frightened, paranoid, and annoyed.
Her willingness to help me regain my lost baby, however, did lessen that mangle of emotions somewhat. My shoulders felt some of their tensions less, and I gave her a genuine smile back. A nervous one, but it’s what I could manage.
“Any plans for afterwards?” I ask back, and her smile gives me another answer. Well, the same answer. “More gratuitous violence?
“Seems a good enough thing to do, after all. You?” She looks to me, and I can’t look her in the face. I assure you, it was still because of the bloodied teeth.
“No plans, but more gratuitous violence.” I answered with a laugh.
The eco warrior stared behind his aching shoulder as he dragged his arm and leg behind him. If he couldn’t carry the weight of the world on his shoulders, he’d at least make sure Toga didn’t get any personal satisfaction from her win. Much of what made Jak drag himself on was pure willpower and plain adrenaline.
Dark Jak could smell the two’s blood coming from a distance, but a fair amount of sobbing brought the beast to his senses. They’d be back after what happened earlier.
An unholy growl came fresh from whatever counted as Hell in the eco warrior’s universe came from the Dark King’s mouth as his host’s body was weakened severely as he spit freshly cut blood from his mouth.
Those putrid cursed ladies had made an utter fool of him..
Pathetic black tears drained from the beast’s eyes as he took a claw and used his one good arm to lick the salt from a tear.
So this is what it is like to cry..”
The many Dante’s Abysses had built up around the rage fueled eco warrior.
The Dark King mustered with all his will “YOU DON'T KNOW PAIN UNTIL YOU FUCKING GET TORTURED IN PRISON FOR TWO YEARS! Years of sorrow means nothing until you" face it head on."
And yet a light shone in the distance. Jak’s irises mixed colors as both sides screamed their bold but furious statement to the world watching. The precursor had come.
“ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!”
“To my fans out there, never give up! You never know when something good can happen.”
Sigmund considered Cho’s question for a long time. Truth be told, the high priest had never actually considered what he would do if the emperor didn't return from death. Victor always seemed so certain that dying was simply an inconvenience that the cultist had come to believe him. Now that he was actually considering the possibility of his debaucherous leader actually dying, he found the question difficult to answer.
One on hand, Victor was technically his boss and one of his few friends in the crossroads. On the other, however, the assassin was a blasphemous, sadistic hedonist who would kill his apprentice to ‘test him’ and the high priest suspected that his own lofty position came solely from the alleged relationship between the emperor and Erik.
“My thoughts on Victor are… complicated.” The cultist sighed. “His death was regrettable, a permanent death would be even more so, particularly because if he doesn't come back, that means you don't either. But if Wolfe dying means that he won't be coming to put us down later, so be it. I don't think it's anything to worry about, anyways, I've seen him come back from fatal wounds before. I don't doubt that he will resurrect.”
Sigmund carefully avoided airing his own grievances with the emperor, deciding they could wait for the moment. Cho seemed grimly satisfied with the high priest’s answer, his worries slightly assuaged, before he turned back to his companion.
“What about you? Is Victor bringing you back too?”
“No, if I fall here my God will bring me back.” The cultist said matter-of-factly.
“Huh, I didn't really think of that. Do you worry that you might… Well, y’know, not come back?” The earthbender asked curiously.
“Huh? Why would I?” Sigmund asked as he frowned and furrowed his brow, genuinely confused. The priest’s faith in Gal’skap was absolute. As far as he was concerned, Cho may as well have asked him if he was worried that the sun wouldn’t rise.
“I- Don't worry about it.” The youth said, realising the folly of his question.
The Babylonians fell silent once more as they made their way across the island. Lost in his own thoughts, Sigmund’s forgotten mission came to mind. His goal of watching as his foes fell to their own demons had taken a back seat to his new objective; keeping Cho alive. The high priest couldn't help but smile a little at the fact that he was probably one of the maddest on the island right now. Go figure.
“Madness…” The voice in his head groaned on cue, echoing the psion’s repressed desire to watch his foe’s minds shatter. He wasn't about to abandon his only steadfast ally to chase his abandoned goal, though. Cho had already had his loyalty betrayed by one of his seniors, perhaps the gravest of Victor’s many crimes, and Sigmund wasn't about to let it happen again.
“Good evenin’, my little rugged survivors! May be take a moment to remember the recently fallen:
#23 Bruce Banner
“Farewell, Brucie. And now, for the danger zones…
C6
C7
D6
F4
F5
G3
G4
G5
H5
“As a heads up, one final prize will be dropped onto square E5. I’m going to call this ‘King of the Falls’. Whoever is on the square when it drops will get the package. Good luuuuck.”
Out-of-Karl Bulletin
Weather – Clear skies at night
At 11 AM tomorrow morning, a package will drop onto square E5. Whoever is there gets the final goodie before the end of the contest. In the meantime, there will be no cooldowns for anyone who engages in a Face to Face on square E5. I call this a 'King of the Hill' special event. If it's worth it, go for it. If it isn't... then don't. Make the call for yourselves.
The dull, thrumming ache in the Earthbenders broken arm produced an ever present grimace across his visage. He drew to a halt as Sigmund continued on a little further. The psion turned to face his younger companion, choosing not to question the stop. Cho moved off to what seemed like a suitably covered spot, nestled into a small outcropping of trees. He slammed a heel into the ground, the earth parting to produce a rock stump onto which the Earthbender sat himself.
“I’m sorry.. I need to take a break.” Cho sighed heavily, “I don’t mean to be a burden or whatever, but I’m starving and my damned arm is killing me.” Sigmund nodded a few times, he’d barely considered the rumble in his stomach, his hallucinations taking up far too much of his attention.
“Sure. I could probably do with some food as well.” The Psion waited a moment as Cho produced another little flat rock for him to perch on. He quickly delved into his duffel back and retrieved one of the MREs, tearing open the packaging and setting upon the rubbery cubes of meat. Cho watched, bewildered, an eyebrow cocked as he chortled quietly.
“What are you doing? You know these things are way better cooked, right?”
“I’m sorry?”
“You’re meant’a cook these things. Otherwise it’s just a chewy mess.”
“What, over a fire or what?”
“Here..” Cho chuckled and removed his own MRE. “Beef Goulash..” He read aloud, a little unsure of what the meal actually entailed. Cho set it down on the ground and with a few wide gestures, produced a hole in the ground. He then stood and thrust his fist upwards. It took a little while, with some precise and calculated movements, but eventually, he produced a small pot elevated on a trio of rocky supports above the hole in the ground. In a stark contrast to his standard movements while earthbending, Cho adopted a more fluid stance and swept his leg out in a wide arc before planting a hand on the ground. As he stood, he drew his hand upwards, not without a vast amount of effort. His hand trembled under the pressure of his action, the hole in the ground eventually brimming with roiling lava. Sigmund nodded in appreciation, Chos lavabending was something he’d seen before, but still impressive.
“Dump some water in the pot. When it’s boiled you can heat it up.”
The statement’s unease hung suspended in the crisp evening air. There was a silent creeping which lurked behind every shadow, emanating a lingering chill in the night's darkness. A set of eyes lay resting on his shoulders, avidly watching with the vicious thirst of a kill-deprived predator. The nervous man’s eye twitched and darted to the woman. She was no threat. Yet, his racing mind perpetuated the thought of her cupping a ball of fire in her palm and Gildarts was convinced he could hear the distant crackle of her flame.
Gildarts was coming in and out of madness. More specifically, he was coming down from his high. Threads of thought unraveled into nothingness, new twine would weave into old, braiding the rebirth of insanity. He felt like a meteorite finally rupturing through the atmosphere and bracing for a- he looked down, his iron fist was balled up.
He hadn’t done that. Right?
His manic eyes dashed back to the woman, expecting to see her aggressive stance initiating his battle instinct. She was eerily dormant. Her gaze had even remained in the same stuck shadow, veering just past him.
Hyper with unyielding anticipation, Gildarts felt his vision shake and blur while his body struggled to maintain its center. The mage took a breath, attempting to clear the away debris of paranoia and come to his senses. But his senses were the problem. A high-pitched ringing offset his fragile, three-pronged balance and the inlay of darkness made his blurred vision even more of a setback. His reality was shifting. Following this, the ground began to slant to one side. Was this part of the game?
“Which game? The one in your head or the one out here?” Deadpony chirped from his shoulder.
Gildarts, who had been using his large staff as more of a crutch since the hulk had smashed his prosthetic leg, felt the intense force of gravity slam into his body. There, compressed into the ground and squeezed by his own madness he gripped at the traces of dirt around him. Crippled was the man in every sense of the word.
“You’re going too far.” A ghoulish voice echoed.
The fallen mage felt his balance return but with it came mounted with intangible boulders stacked upon his back. He’d pushed upward with all his might and found himself unable to lift his mere body even an inch from the earth beneath him. The pinned wizard continued to snarl and squirm against the rich mulchy grime.
Kayleigh couldn’t help but watch painfully from a distance. Her eyes were wide with shock and surprise and she even found herself harboring a hint of pity. Perhaps she had made an error, letting this unknown stranger too close. As he floundered on the ground she felt her lips float into a frown. He was clearly out of his mind. She leveled with the idea of having to put him out of his misery, discerning that it would at the very least be best to protect him from himself.
Gildarts had shaken himself off from the ground’s dirty oppression and was pacing in circles, muttering to himself incoherently. Pronounced fists would form and his expression would sneer into the menace of anger before refusing its carnivorous plummet and diffusing the impulse with an aggressive shake of his head.
The pressures within him were bubbling and overflowing. Kayleigh had yet to move, she had not wanted to set off the mage in turmoil. But Gildarts was edging closer, limping back and forth much like his inner debate with himself. Each warrior was equally craving to get rid of the unnerving threat before them. One mutilated of body and the other severely on the edge of an imploding mind.
Kayleigh couldn’t just watch Gildarts be tortured and swiftly stood up. It triggered the distant man into a hurdling launch toward her weakened stance. His movements were calibrated, his silver hand wrapped around her flaming balled fist. He’d caught her. Kayleigh found herself stunned he’d registered her movement outside of his mind filled to the brim with disarray.
The man offered her an imprisoned gaze, “Don’t hit me. More than a few worlds are imploding within me right now. I don’t know if I'll be able hold back.”
He released her wrist and they held a long dueling gaze. A gaze that sucked her in. Kayleigh was subdued by an inkling of sympathy for the man. Her own fatigue had extended her patience for him. Just moments ago… Her hand unconsciously traced the memories within the wrapped bandages above her abdomen. She winced harder than she’d expected. Causing her body to plunge forward, her chin drilled into his.
Calamity ensued. Gildarts felt the slapping bite of flame on his lips, initiating his next blaze of violence. His arms moved without him and rallied for attack; a blurred gleam of silver snatched her throat with immeasurable strength. The other he’d managed to pull back just inches before it plunged into her weakened gut. Gildarts fought the gratifying temptation to rip out her throat, he felt a flicker of Natsu in the stranger. He clung to that thought, baying his ferocious intensity but the monster of anger gripped tightly onto the strings of his mind.
The steely clutch around her throat gently peeled away, finger by finger. Their hearts pounded, the inferno warrior was grappled by the choke of death. His amber eyes narrowed and his fingers instead fell on the collar and used it to pull her close enough to feel the pour of menace from his seething breath.
Mickey Mouse and Gilgamesh had not slept for almost three days. They sat apart from one another, across an open campfire, staring into the dancing flames. The tension from Mickey’s ‘outburst’ earlier had created a weird dynamic between the two, though to be completely honest -- what was their regular dynamic?
Mickey watched idly as Gilgamesh’s eyes flickered opened and closed. The gilded monarch perpetually tried to hide any sort of weakness, but the mouse saw through the façade. “You should sleep,” he waved an arm at Gilgamesh.
“That alien mongrel could return any moment,” his unlikely ally growled. “We must be alert.”
“Yeah, well, you ain’t, bud,” Mickey sassed.
Gilgamesh let out a long, pained groan before sliding off the rock he was sitting on. His golden armor clanked lightly against the grassy ground. He jerked himself down to the ground, almost as if forcing himself to rest. Mickey couldn’t help but giggle -- did Gilgamesh refuse to sleep even when he wasn’t on a murder island? Surely not; he knew a little bit about what a king’s life entailed.
Mickey, too, slid off his rock-chair and also started to prep himself for bed. “I’m scared too, pal,” he muttered, “but we gotta rest up, especially if we’re going to that ‘King of the Hill’ thing Karl was yackin’ about.”
Gilgamesh furrowed his brow. “Are we going?” he asked. “Am I escorting a handless, concussed rodent to that undoubtedly bloody spectacle?”
“I mean,” Mickey shrugged as he slowly laid himself down to sleep, “we gotta show ‘em who the real kings on this island are, don’t we?”
For what might’ve been the first time Mickey had ever heard, Gilgamesh laughed.
“Those mongrels will bow to us,” the gilded monarch nodded with a hearty grin.
“Yeah,” Mickey giggled, “those darn mongrels.”
Gilgamesh chuckled and broke eye contact with the mouse. The little creature’s tiny body heaved one big time as he started to try and relax his body. Anything near proper relaxation was next to impossible on this fucking island, but, Gilgamesh supposed, it was worth a shot.
“Nighty night, Gilly,” Mickey whispered.
“Good night, Mickey,” Gilgamesh responded.
Yet, as the time to claim their abyssal throne edged closer and closer, neither the Mouse King nor the King of Heroes could sleep. Mickey glanced over his shoulder and watched as Gilgamesh struggled to keep his eyes up. His head bounced up and down, the dark bags underneath his eyelids highlighted by the flickering light of the fire.
Mickey pushed himself up so that he was half off the ground. “Having trouble sleeping, pal?” he tenderly asked.
Gilgamesh winced and jolted his head away. The sight of Mickey pushing himself up with the stub where his hand used to be (ow) was unpleasant. Mickey’s face betrayed the stinging pain shooting up through his tiny arms, only serving as yet another painful reminder that the Mouse forced the frothy Pepsi down his throat. Gilgamesh scrunched up his face in anger; the mouse was clearly so much more in need.
Why had he done it? Why had he bestowed the refreshing, healing elixir on his greatest rival when he himself was literally at risk of losing life and limb? Why did he insist on putting Gilgamesh first, despite the horrors the King of Heroes had inflicted upon him?
All at once, it was as if a lightbulb went off inside Gilgamesh’s head.
So -- that was how to be a really good person. A really, really good person.
“I shall be taking the first watch,” Gilgamesh sighed, looking off into the darkness of the forest. “Your King shall protect you,” the Golden King decreed, before resting his chin in his hands.
“My king, pal?” Mickey teased, with a playful smile, before resting his head back into his forearms.
“Be grateful and go to sleep, rat,” Gilgamesh teased. Instead of the usual venom that coated his insults, this one was laced with a little more care. “Go on. I did command for you to sleep,” Gil crossed his arms and leaned against the back of the tree, trying to remain vigilant. Mickey smirked, and started to shut his eyes.
Sleep flirted with him, but never stayed long. Mickey knew that the ‘Nightmares of the Abyss’ would plague him for the next few weeks. They had already begun to seep into his reality. The Mouse tossed and turned in his dirt bed, stirring up a cloud of dust.
As the moon drifted above their heads, Mickey huffed. He clambered to his knees and crawled over to where his partner sat against the tree, curling up next to the King of Heroes and placing his rotund head in the young man’s lap. He felt Gil tense up a bit at first, but after a moment, the monarch relaxed. He was genuinely surprised when he felt the King’s hand gently brush against the top of his head. Mickey let his muscles relax and he closed his eyes, a wide grin flooding his face from cheek to cheek.
“I am often comforted by the tunes of my old life, I suppose you would be comforted by the tunes of yours,” the King of Heroes monologued. He let out an awkward cough, “Now how did this tune of yours go? When you wish upon a star...”
Mickey opened up one eye and watched as Gilgamesh fumbled to find the tune. Under his breath, he started to hum along, and gradually, his ally -- no, partner -- no, friend found his pitch. Eventually, Mickey couldn’t help but sing along as well.
“If your heart is in your dream
No request is too extreme
When you wish upon a star
As dreamers do
Fate is kind.”
They never slept. They spent their night together singing old songs from their past worlds. The combination of elegant Babylonian melodies and cheerful Disney tunes harmonized in the cold air. While this presented a break from the bloodshed, they both knew that this might be their last night together.
Well, that hadn’t been on the list of things he’d expected Ol’ Freezer to ask about. He’d assumed by the… delicate state the guy was in, that maybe he’d already had an encounter with the all-corrupting parasite and whatever unfortunate host it had trapped in its clutches. Now that would be a satisfying battle for Karl’s cameras… tough break, kids.
As it was, Red Dead racked his brain for an answer, sorting through a tangle of thoughts and feelings and, alright, a few innuendos about Frieza’s missing tail. It was tough, being two guys mashed together, but he thought he was managing it pretty darn well.
Turns out, forming coherent sentences was a challenge when one side of your brain’s all sad cowboy and the other an insane mercenary. Who would’ve thought!
“A parasite…” the newly dubbed Red Dead mused aloud, rubbing at his chin. He marveled at the weird feeling of all the… scruff and general beardedness growing around the scarred tissue of his face, hmmm-ing thoughtfully. “Oh, right, yeah. That thingy. I reckon I know a thing or two about that.”
When it did not seem like anything more was forthcoming from the cowboy merc’s no doubt boundless fount of knowledge, Frieza leveled an impatient look at him. “And that is…?”
Scuffing one boot in the dirt as he walked, the cowboy hat-wearing gestalt huffed. His (muscled, burly like a fuckin’ grizzly bear) shoulders rolled back, his frustration plainly visible. “It’s, er… not somethin’ I can really explain, partner. Interdimensional bullshit, totes confidential. All I can tell you is, that icky little tapeworm’s bad news. It’s called the Malefactor. Cool name, right? Real fitting. Anyway, it makes folks do things they normally wouldn’t. Hurt people they might not have hurt otherwise...”
Suddenly, Red Dead let loose with a chuckle, masked face turning to Frieza. His eyebrows waggled. “Oh, riiiiiight. You’re like, the most evil feller ever, huh? Guess that wouldn’t be too much of a downside for you, then, though it does make me wonder… how d’you feel about eatin’ people?”
Frieza grimaced, a curl of disgust on his lips. “I do have some standards, you know.”
That wasn’t exactly the kind of response Red Dead had anticipated. He’d felt there might be more… horrified gasping, nauseated shuddering, just a genuinely perturbed reaction. Instead, it seemed that Freezer was more in the camp of… ‘well, that’s gross, but not necessarily a dealbreaker.’ Like he felt more scandalized by the possibility of cannibalism than repelled.
Interestin’, the gestalt noted, watching the alien beside him closely. But also, yuck.
“Aaaaanyway,” Red Dead continued, finally turning to look someplace other than his traveling companion. His eyes focused somewhere above the trees they’d been wandering through, studying the steadily darkening sky overhead, the twinkling of stars cast across it. “It’s getting awful dark, and I ain’t gonna pick your sorry ass up if you trip over a tree root or something, broken leg or no, sooo…”
He turned to Frieza, arms held out. “C’mon.”
Frieza stopped mid-hobble. He looked at Red Dead’s extended arms like they belonged to the most despicable cockroach he’d ever laid eyes on, red gaze slowly sliding up to meet the gestalt’s expectant look. “What.”
“I’m gonna carry you.”
“No,” said Frieza, voice heavily laced with disdain. “I don’t think you are.”
“Awww, c’mon Freezy. We’d move so much faster! I promise I won’t drop you,” Red Dead sing-songed. He waggled his arms a bit, as if that would make the prospect any more enticing.
“No.”
“Well, okay, I might drop you. But not on purpose! I mean, look at these arms. They’re like goddamn pythons, feller. Do you really think they’d be anything other than supremely capable of carrying your tiny body around? Look, I’ll letcha hitch a ride on my back instead, if that’ll make you feel better—”
Karl Jak’s smooth-as-shea-butter voice rang out just then, interrupting whatever brilliant nonsense Red Dead had been about to say. Only one piece of information leapt out to the gestalt, immediately arresting his attention.
Sigmund wolfed down the beef goulash, brushing away his embarrassment at the fact that he hadn't thought to cook the meals first. They were labelled meals ready-to-eat, after all, but that was irrelevant now. Though it was far from fine dining, the food was good enough for the cultist to eat without gagging every few bites. His hasty consumption didn't come from a taste for the dish, but rather from a fear of being caught while his hands were full.
“Less than half of the contestants left.” Cho observed, eating his goulash at a less intense pace. Sigmund glanced up from his food, eyes widening a little. The pair had come quite far in the past few days, but it felt like they had been on the island for weeks. To think that they were only half way…
“Gods… That's good to hear, but I have the strangest feelings things aren't going to get any easier in the coming days.” The cultist said, finishing off his food. He fidgeted idly while he waited for the bender to finish his own meal, wondering what the best thing to do from here would be.
“Vrell…” The voice in his head called, cutting through the silence. The voice was no longer a whispered hiss, it was beginning to sound as if someone were right behind the psion, raspily voicing their displeasure at any given moment. “Death… Approaches…”
‘For me?’ The high priest wondered rhetorically.
“No…” It replied, surprising Sigmund with its ability to respond, though it cemented his belief that it was all in his head. “The boy… you cannot protect him…”
The cultist didn't visibly react to the threat, but he felt himself break into a light sweat. He knew it was just a hallucination, but the creeping dread in his heart was very real. The psion was committed to keeping Cho safe, but thus far he had done a rather mediocre job at it. He briefly wondered if the voice wasn't completely wrong before shaking the pessimistic thoughts out of his head. If he accepted that he was going to fail, then he definitely wasn't going to be able to protect his companion.
“We should get going when you're done eating.” Sigmund sighed wearily. It felt as if the pair had hardly stopped and after a moment of thought the high priest realised that their breaks were just as sparse as they felt. He couldn't stop for long, though. Stopping meant being discovered, stopping meant death. If it meant that they were going to live, Sigmund would never stop.
(Evening)
A little water helped calm myself once we reached the site for Karl’s big battle of the bands early. Our approach had been slow, since neither one of us were thrilled to make it up the mountain again with the battle wounds we have collected. The nasty gash across my stomach was a consistent thorn, as each stretch of an arm would stab pain into me. The pain on my arm was a nice distraction by comparison. Yuuka’s own damage was limiting, but her mood never faltered. I had guessed she liked pain, but I was a little too afraid of finding out the answer to ask her that question directly.
The sword slapped across my back as made it higher up, the cave where the waterfall originated in sight. The hair on the back of my neck bristled, as I figured someone was already inside. A hollow echo of footsteps basically blasted out from the mouth, just barely audible over the crashing of water to the earth far below.
“Anything there?” Yuuka said from behind me, the closeness of her voice sent a shiver down her spine. “I would have hated to come all this way for no one to show up.”
“Trust me, there’s people coming to this party.” I replied, I tried to keep a calm demeanor as I slipped my weapon from its resting place. I wished I had even some duct tape to mask the shine of the sun off it, but thankfully the other combatants seem more absorbed in their own problems. Even i’m confused how I, a massive marine in day glow green armor with a fuck off sword, have managed to jump so many people.
Well, I’m pretty sure having to step lightly in the halls of hell gave me a sixth sense on ambushes.
But Yuuka had other ideas, as she waltzed up the cliff face and peered inside the Cave. There was a part of me that wanted to reach out and pull her down in a flurry of quiet swears, but she was no mindless greenhorn. I’d almost have cared about the safety of the other fighters after earlier.
Almost.
“Seems no one is at home, Doomy. Guess we’ll have to set this party ourselves.”
“Good,” I said with a smile, giving a small fist pump, “we can ambush them when they get up here, and give them a good thrashing.”
“Ambush? Doomy, if we don’t give them a chance to think they can win, it’ll be too short.” She says, seemingly day dreaming about how she’d do it. I couldn’t tell if she was being honorable or sadistic.
“How about you greet them at the door and I’ll ambush them?” I compromised. She simply nodded and found a place to root. “You ready?”
“Oh, trust me, I’ll be a most gracious host to our guests~.”
---
I looked down at the burned ground over where Yuuka laid, the smell of burnt flesh assaulting me. I knelled down, resting a hand on her. I was so caught up in the fight against the mouse, I had forgotten to assist her once the little rodent flew off. Despite what had happened, a feeling of solemn regret over took me heart. We had been through a lot together, and was silent as I repesct the dead. Maybe someone could have come up and behind me at that moment, but they would learn the true fury of a marine.
I slowly removed the plasma weapon from her hand, arming myself with it, and turned it on the ground. I fired, sending ground upward. again and again I attacked, sending dirt and rock flying though the air. Until finally I had a proper grave. I lifted her body up, and from the blood drop dropped from her wounds flowers begun to spring. The scorched land around her began to heal before my eyes, black turned to green once again. I moved over to the grave, as vines and grass began to grow over my arms and chest where it could, and I placed her down to rest.
I knew she could very well live again, in these strange lands, but respect must be given to a fallen soldier.
I buried her, and from it plants rapidly grew. Tall sunflowers greeted me, waving in the wind as they searched for the sun.
"I don't know what you were, Yuuka Kazami. But I'll give them hell for you."
