Breakout

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Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick....

The clock on the wall, the only thing approaching an amenity or courtesy they'd left to him in this place, incessantly ticked on and on, mockingly counting the passage of time. Beneath the clock itself, linked to the timepiece itself, was another timer. Slowly it counted down, and down, and down, displaying the time remaining until it ran out.

Until his sentence ran out.

There were no bars in his cell, no windows, no door. They hadn't taken any chances with him, not with his absurd strength and habit of finding a way out of any 'normal' prison. There was nowhere here for him to get leverage to try and rip his way through the walls, and with the state he'd been left in of being just short of starved to keep his strength in check, he couldn't just punch through the walls.

It was a sad, sad state of affairs.

In spite of it all, though...the look in his eyes had never changed. The grin that split his mouth wide, exposing his teeth to the world, had never died down. The anger and hunger had never left him, depression or resignation had never taken root. Even in circumstances this poor, when he knew full well that he had been sent into certain death, his deranged pride and self-assured knowledge that he would survive and not only get out, but deliver payback in more than equal measure, had given him enough sustenance to survive.

The fact that he suspected his Gourmet Cells had gone into dormancy to conserve what little strength he had also helped. It provided another dose of kindling to the fire that burned just below the surface, of course; without his Gourmet Cells fully active, he had lost most of his power, especially in his starved state. He didn't even have the juice to shatter this place wide open with a Sound Bazooka, or blow the head off of one of his 'guards' with his Machine Gun Voice. He might as well have just been a normal human.

And that made Zebra very, very angry. Angry enough to resort to the one thing he despised; the one tactic he loathed above all others: Patience.

He had bided his time, let himself be starved out and weakened, but saving up every ounce of strength he could. Every spare calorie, every spare second. He hadn't even moved, save to eat the few meager bits of food that he was served up, in weeks now. It was still a pitiful, weak amount of energy, and he had been exhausted and half-asleep most of the day now. The growling of his stomach was akin to a mad beast's snarls of anger, but it didn't sway him from his plans.

Because they were working. Any day now, he would finally have the strength again. The strength for one last burst of sheer force. It was a desperate gamble, all hinging on whether he could manage to put the strength he'd squirreled away to quick enough use to make a go at his escape.

Just one key second; one solid grip on the only way in or out of here when it opened...

Just the way he liked it.
 

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Slowly, but surely, time crawled onward. The ravenous growling in his stomach escalated, and he felt so very weak. The Gourmet Cells in his body screamed and threatened to start devouring his own body if they didn't get the necessary food to sustain themselves soon.

The clock on the wall didn't lie, though. Only minutes now, until the cocky bastards that had shut him in here showed up again. Showed up again bearing the pitiful scraps of food they deigned to give him; enough to keep a normal human alive and fed enough for basic activity, certainly. But barely enough to keep Zebra, or any other man with Gourmet Cells in their body, alive at all. Hell, Toriko would've keeled over dead after only a few days of such minimal food, the glutton that he was.

But Zebra was different, and had his anger to keep him going. And a much larger store of calories to begin with.

Tick, tick, tick, tick...

Click....creeeaaak...

The grin already present on Zebra's face slowly grew wider as he heard the outer doors to his cell grind open. "Geh heh heh heh..." One arm slowly lifted from the floor, his hand curling into a fist. "...alright, ya cocka bastards...it's showtime."
 

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"Alright, remember, don't get too close to the freak. Even in the state he's in, no tellin' how strong he might still be." The voice of the 'warden', if he could even really be called that. "There's a damn good reason he's locked up all the way out here in the ass end of the universe's digestive tract, keep that in your heads."

Warden...heh. Yeah, right, as if that actually meant anything all the way out here. Really, he was just the biggest, smartest, toughest, unluckiest son of a bitch among a whole gaggle of big, tough, not so smart sons of bitches. He only had as much authority as he was willing to hang his ass out the window to grab for. Which meant, around here...not very much.

CLANG

Metal club smacking metal bars brought the gourmet criminal's face slowly up, staring at the offender with dark, sunken eyes. Right into the smug, grinning face of the 'Warden'. "Hey there, Jackass," he chortled. "The mighty Zebra, reduced to this sad sack of shit...can't even break out of a few li'l chains. Ain't it a sad sight." He cackled and spit off to one side, sucking in a breath through clenched teeth. "Just lookin' at ya makes me sick." He let the club in his hand, more of an over-weighted metal bat than anything, rest on one shoulder. "So, you still got that spirit o' yours? Plannin' some grand escape or other? Or you settled in and adapted to this place already?"

"Tch..." Zebra leaned forward ever so slightly, the chains lashed to his wrists clinking. ""Cocky little fucker...adapted to this place?" His eyes slowly closed. "Got some balls on you, y'know...askin' me a thing like that..."

"Hear that boys? I got me a right fine pair o' balls!" The 'Warden' hollered, slapping his leg with a free hand, and eliciting a round of raucous laughing from the goons following him. "What the shit ever. Give the striped horse his food and let's get outta here. Planet gives me the creeps."

One of the others shuffled forward, tossing a shoddy-looking sack across the room. It hit ground, rolled, tumbled, and bounced along, coming to a stop near one of the gourmet convict's boots. "There ya go. Eat up! It's all you get for the rest of the week."

"I would'a thought people like you would know." Zebra's voice was a low reverberation in the room, as he slowly reached for a pocket in his weathered jeans. "Would'a thought you knew damn well." The chunks of meat he fished out of his pocket were...unappetizing to look at. Dried out, withered, dusty...awful. Like an amateur's first horrible mistake at making jerky.

"Eh?" The 'Warden' leaned forward, lifting a hand to his ear mockingly. "Whassat now? Thought we knew what? That you already had a snack?"

The wilted meat vanished into Zebra's scarred maw, with only a single chomp to herald its disappearance. "I'd have thought you bastards would know what happens when I go somewhere." He chewed once...twice...and noisily swallowed the few pitiful scraps of dried beast flesh, his eyes snapping open. "THEY ADAPT TO ME!" He surged up to his feet in one motion, eyes wide and manic, teeth bared in a deranged, snarling grin. "IT'S MY WAY, OR THERE AIN'T NO FUCKIN HIGHWAY! YOU GET IT?!"

He let out a loud, echoing belly laugh as he threw his head back, sucking in a deep, vacuum-like lungful of air. And then continued to inhale, the cell starting to grow stiflingly dense and dry.

"Hey, hey, 'ey, the fuck are you--" Recognition dawned on the face of the 'Warden' after only a few seconds. "F-Fuck! RUN! BEAT IT!" he screamed, turning on one heel and making it only a few steps before the inevitable happened.

"SOUND BAZOOKA!"

Zebra's voice was akin to a bomb going off as the name of his next action roared forth for all the world to hear, and then an actual bomb did go off. Dense sound waves blasted out, the very air rippling and distorting from the sheer, explosive pressure. The nearby guards were knocked flat and plastered to the walls, screaming uselessly against the pain and sound assaulting their body and ears.

For several, torturous seconds the onslaught lasted before petering out, just as the chains securing the gourmet hunter to the wall shattered, losing their hold on the stonework. He staggered forward, heaving deep breaths and rubbing at his throat with one hand. "Heh heh heh...serves all'a you right..." he rasped.
 

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Zebra was not a man who was the type to sit down and admire the sights or take in a pleasant view. Things like that just never even registered on his radar, they weren't important. He had other things to occupy his mind and senses. Things like the taste of fresh meat, torn straight from the bones of its former owners. Things like the smell and sound of freedom after being locked in a cell with the same musty, agonizing dust and silence for so long.

And there was a whole hell of a lot of all of that to appreciate out here, alright.

Picking through all of the armor and clothing to avoid getting it stuck in his teeth was a pain in the ass, of course. But it was a minor thing compared to the simple wonder of getting anywhere near a full stomach for the first time in however long. It wouldn't be anywhere near enough to get him actually full or even recover much of his strength, but it was a definite start.

"Tch...disgusting..." Like always, another bad stock. He'd had worse, of course, but he'd damn sure had better, too. Nothing like some of the wild animals and beasts he'd hunted down, or even the damn plants and vegetables he'd scarfed down in the past. It was filling, and probably doing wonders for his energy, but damn if it was a low bar by comparison to his past exploits.

At least it gave something to do while he relished in the feeling of being able to stretch out his senses again. Hard to get much of anything while locked up, just faint echoes of the jungle outside; out here, though, he could really get a feel for the place. Stretch and focus, listening in on a much wider scale. See what there was out there that held any interest for him at all. Something to get him riled up and ready for work, or even a way off this fucking greenhouse when he was ready to take it.

....sure enough, he did get word of something to that effect. Whisperings and secrets, poking and prodding around this way and that. Getting the word out onto the streets and airwaves, searching for interested parties for a job. A job to take a rich man down a few pegs. Put him in his place. Perhaps more importantly...a paying job to put a rich man down a few pegs.

"Rich bastards...always got so many pegs to be taken down," Zebra cackled as he gnawed at a bone. "Sounds interestin'...takin' down someone cocky like that." He gave a fierce chomp, crunching the bone into shards, and turned his eyes skyward. "Looks like it's time ta get movin'."
 
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