Alarms blared throughout the compound, waking any poor louse whose slumber had yet to melt away.
Victor had been awake for hours. He found no solace, no respite in the bare-bones barracks the producers of this event had shuffled him into after his registration, but he’d yet to crack the code of casual social interactions. When faced with the choice between staying in or engaging in what would, undoubtedly, be frivolous ice-breaking with the other contestants, he’d chosen to spend the majority of the time between entering the ‘pre-show facility’ and now enjoying the solitude even if there wasn’t much else in his chambers to enjoy.
So when he’d been teleported into the compound, he’d been wide awake — and even if he hadn’t, finding himself with a chain wrapped around his wrist and being dragged forcefully through a very large hangar bay would’ve served as a brutal alarm clock.
He smashed into the floor as the beast he was chained to stampeded through the hangar, bucking and rebelling against any attempts to control it by the purple-shirted Syntech workers scrambling about. A few charged with electricity-tipped spears, trying their best to force the monster into submission and succeeding only at getting it to, momentarily, stop charging. It stared down at the various humans and aliens synced up in a semi-circle around it, licking its lips and preparing for its next meal.
The split-second of stillness was all Fries needed, though, to get back on his feet. He took the chain in his hands and yanked, as forcefully as he could. The beast wasn’t… bothered, per se, being many tons more massive than Victor could ever dream of being, even with the most generous growth spurt. It turned its attention, then, to the cryogenically-enhanced doctor, growling and snarling as he, once again, attempted to yank it.
“Heel, beast,” he panted, already exhausted after just two pulls. The towering beast looked at him with interest, the bloodlust it had aimed at the Syntech employees fading ever so slightly. Fries took a step back, still holding tightly to the chain, and looked up at it, his glowing red goggles fixated on the monster’s own glowing, terrible, dead eyes.
Behind the beast, one of the Syntech employees stepped forward, stabbing at it again with one of the electric spears.
“No, you idiot, stop — ” Fries tried to shout, but the employee’s aim proved true, piercing and shocking the mighty monster on the back of its right thigh. It jumped at the touch of the thing, not injured necessarily but supremely annoyed, and swiped a huge claw at the employee, slicing into his chest and knocking him twenty feet back into a dormant mech. The others watched their comrade soar back, crashing, dead, into the heap of metal, and understandably increased their distance, allowing Fries the opportunity to step in again.
“Beast,” he muttered, “heel.”
The monster turned, swiping toward Fries, who barely dodged beneath his striking claw. It growled something at him, almost as if it was trying to speak to him.
Victor cursed under his breath — he’d known the parameters of this game when he signed up, but he supposed they’d find something like the mech for him to pilot, not a fucking demonic-looking monster he’d have to somehow convince to behave.
A claw raised again, and that was when he saw it. As its cloak was lifted, Victor spotted something glowing golden stuck into the creature’s belt. Leaping closer to try and snag it felt like a suicidal move, but at this point, it was either that or become the monster’s next victim. He dashed forward, collecting the chain as he inched closer to the beast, sliding beneath another claw swipe and leaping up onto its leg. He gained as much purchase as he could grasping bits of the creature’s dark brown fur in his gloves, clambering up its leg until he could get a hand on the bottom of the glowing scroll tucked in its belt.
He pulled, sliding it out of the monster’s belt and kicking off, falling — with document in hand — to the ground and slamming into the floor. He rolled as best he could out of the fall, shaking the document until it unrolled.
It spilled before him, seemingly endless and glowing gold, names etched in deep black ink across it. Next to each of the names was a brief couple of words, so few that Fries couldn’t possibly decipher what they were supposed to mean: ‘Joey Brown, bullied his sister’; ‘Kasey Fleckman, stole another girl’s doll’; ‘Leo Woods, vehicular manslaughter’. His eyes drifted past the mess of names and crimes and down to the bottom, where there was a title — ‘Signatory’ — and a mostly blank line. He could see etchings of red ink where a name had been, an ‘s’ and a ‘n’ and a ‘chol’, very faded, but it looked, for all intents, like the line was blank.
And then there was the quill.
He didn’t think, just grabbed the red quill that had been tucked in the scroll and started writing. V-I-C-T-O-R-space-F-R-I-E-S.
The list glowed gold, increased in intensity until the light almost blinded Victor and the other Syntech employees in the hangar. Then, just like that — it disappeared. It shriveled in a great golden blast, and Victor shielded his eyes with his arm, scrambling back.
He stopped as he felt the creature’s nose against his back. It was wet and cold, and when the doctor finally managed to stand up and turn around, he could see that it sat at the end of a gigantic, goat-like head. The head sat before him, the creature kneeling and bowing to him. It had heeled.
My will bends to the will of the Signatory, a voice boomed in Fries’ head, gravelly and growling, clearly that of the monster in front of him.
Fries lifted his head triumphantly, a smirk growing on his face. “And that’s me?”
The creature lifted its head. Yes, it said, you are the master, and the Krampus is your tool.
Fries’ grip on the chain tightened as it began to surge with a ferocious, demonic energy. He felt the Krampus’ life force flowing into him, urging him forward. He leapt up, grasping onto one of the monster’s horns and swinging onto its neck. He placed one leg on one side of the beast’s jaw and one leg on the other, grabbing another horn for support.
“Then let’s see what you’re made of, beast,” he snarled, and the Krampus let out a huge, ferocious roar of approval. The pair turned, Syntech employees scattering at their feet, and surged forward. The Krampus’ goat feet trampled the few small mechs between it and the front of the hangar, leaving a mess in its wake as it gathered its strength, bent at the knees, and leapt forward, soaring with some speed into the daylight of the island.
The sun glimmered off the many metallic creatures scattered about the island, principally the impossibly-large golden mech at the head of the battle. Fries spied their god-king commander just as he and Krampus touched down several hundred yards away.
Syntech soldiers screamed as tentacles crawled out of every crack and crevice in the island’s surface. Fries spotted the source a mere hundred feet away, set up in the nearby town-square: a huge, kraken-shaped blob of shadow that had punctured the ground with its limbs, sending them burrowing toward target after target. “Let’s kill the head,” he commanded his Bond, “and take back this block.”
As you wish, Krampus obliged, snapping its long chain forward and wrapping it around the shadow kraken’s head. The wintery monster pulled, hard, tightening the chain until the opposing unmade beast’s head burst and its tentacles relaxed, releasing nearby soldiers.
“Good,” Victor nodded, holding tightly to Krampus’ horns. A small section of the beast’s demonic chain wrapped around its neck and Fries’ waist, further securing him, as they prepared to continue their rampage.
“Let’s put more of these bastards on ice, Krampus.”
As you wish.