"Hello again, everyone." The voice of the Man in Red returned. It sounded somewhat strained, lacking the full depth of his usual joviality, but it was unmistakably him. "I see we have all had a relatively uneventful afternoon filled with a minimal amount of violence and death. An amount almost approaching zero, in fact." He audibly 'tsk tsk'ed at this. "How disappointing. And you were doing so well, during my absence! Alas..."
"Do keep in mind the further encroaching and advancement of dead zones on the island:
All remaining spaces in Row J
All remaining spaces in Row I
Space, and time, are both running out! Make sure you find a way to end this soon, or else the island itself might just do it for you."
"Oh, yes, and one last thing... As I'm sure Vater mentioned, I do have something special planned for you all. When the sun rises, I will be unveiling something that....well. Let's just call it a little changing of the rules. Until then!"
NPC Movement Updates
Blaidd rolls along with his new teammates.
Kiryu & Majima gear up and mentally steel themselves for future bullshit.
Bulletins and Updates
Weather -- The stars will almost seem to begin winking out one by one throughout the night, leaving the sky nearly empty by the time the sun begins to rise. When the sun does rise, it...won't actually rise; light will spread as if it has, but it will be a vague, pale illumination and bring no warmth.
Unmaking -- Shit's bad, yo. Real bad. Watch your step.
Rule Change -- There will be a special objective, as well as an alternate win condition, presented at the start of Day 3, along with two fairly major rule changes. Keep your eyes peeled.
FACE-OFF
#003 Trevor O'Skully, #010 Princess Flak & #018 Blaidd the Half-Wolf VS #015 Chaos Agent Rory & #019 Peter Pellbrook VS #X Gogeta Easter Egg: Fusion Manual
It was nearly pitch-black up on the surface of the plateau. There weren't any trees to hide behind, there weren't any cliffs to lurk along, there wasn't even any particular cover of deeper darkness from clouds in the sky. It was just a large, wide-open, mostly flat expanse of grassland, marred only by a rather sizable crater, still smoking slightly from the impact that had created it. Not the normal supply cache like previous affairs, this one was...much larger. Shaped like a large capsule, in fact, with a clear door in it. A door that held a panel on it, the tiny screen of which bore a timer.
A timer counting down.
Already, those who would compete for the prize this time were arriving, flashes of light shining through the blackness of night as they appeared one by one. The rim of the crater was the last barrier, as they all closed in...
~ * ~ * ~* ~
The titanic form of the Franky Shogun loomed large and proud, even in its battered state, as it stomped up to the rim of the crater. Its remaining eye blazed like a searchlight, as it scanned the scene for any sign of opposition, while the comparatively ant-like form of Peter Pellbrook marched up alongside it, holding up the digitized form of the Power Suit in his hand. "You saw those others show up, on the far side, right?" he murmured, as the high-tech armor broke down into particles and formed around his body.
"Yeah, d00d. Three of them." And the penguin next to him looked up, slapping a flipper against his armored leg. "You got this, mang."
"....I really don't," the vampire nurse groaned, before stepping forward and sliding down the smoking side of the crater.
~ * ~ * ~* ~
The unlikely trio marched steadily forward after their arrival, spirits relatively high in spite of the foreboding darkness and total lack of anything approaching cover.
"Look at that; only two guys showed up! And we got three on our side!" Flak's assessment of basic numbers was as accurate as ever, if nothing else. "This is gonna be easy." She cracked her knuckles, baring fangs in a bold grin, as she reached for her assortment of weaponry. "Smash these dorks, and let's grab the prize!"
"Don't assume it's gonna be easy just cause we got the number advantage," Blaidd growled, glancing down to uncertainly check the status of the weapon in his hands. These damn firearms...definitely not his weapon of choice, but it would do in a pinch. "No telling what shape they're in, or what weapons they have."
"Yes. We've been lucky so far this competition, and have plenty of weapons of our own, but..." Shinku trailed off, slowly drawing the silvery blade into his hand, lightly patting the gun on his opposite hip.
"Alright, alright, fine; I get it!" Flak grumbled. "We'll use, like....caution, and strategy, and stuff." She harrumphed, stopping at the edge of the crater. The gears in her head whirred and sparked as she tried to think up a play on the fly. "Alright! Trez, Wolf-dude, you two hang back up here for a minute. I'm gonna go down and start the brawl. Once they're focused on me..." She gestured around the sides of the crater. "...do your sneaky stuff and come in from either side, take 'em by surprise."
Blaidd stood up to his full height, craning his neck to peer around the perimeter. "....right. Sound plan, given the circumstances."
Shinku merely nodded. "We'll keep you covered."
Flak's grin returned. "Alright, then! Let's go!" And without wasting a further moment, she jumped forward, stumbling wildly down the steep and uneven incline in those accursed heels...
~ * ~ * ~* ~
The scene at the bottom of the crater immediately devolved into violence. Flak leaped into the fray with great relish and reckless abandon, utilizing everything at her disposal. Bullets and energy bolts from the Shogun and Peter's power suit ricocheted and pinged almost harmlessly off of her and almost uselessly sizzled against her hide, the durability afforded by the super crown only seeming amplified by whatever dark powers were coursing through the ring taken from the Nazgul.
Explosive bursts of fire, blazing streams of plasma, and all manner of mystical miracles erupted forth from Flak in turn. It was only Peter's vampirism-granted agility, augmented even further by the power suit, that kept him from being outright obliterated under the absurd onslaught. The lumbering form of the Franky Shogun, too, had its impressive durability taxed to its limits, already beginning to show wear and tear as its stalwart hide began to dent and crackle.
"....alright. Showtime, d00d..." Rory whispered as he went into action, waddling down the slope of the crater wall and circling well around the whole mess. He was just gonna crack open that pod, yoink the stuff, and get the fuck outta here. Nice and quick, couldn't be easier.
"Evening, mate."
".....ah, shit, d00d."
With a sharp crack and squawk, Rory was simply kicked. Punted violently, like some kind of football, to crash directly into the hull of the oversized supply cylinder. "...oh. Hey, mang, this thing's got a timer on it...." he slurred, as he slowly slid down to the ground.
"I wouldn't worry about that, now, friend." Blaidd loomed out of the dark, the barrel of the blaster rifle in his hand leveled squarely at the crumpled penguin. "You've got bigger problems."
As the timer on the pod hit zero, it let out an almost comical ding sound, and all at once the door cracked open. A large wave of pressurized air and mist wafted out around the edges of the door, before a sound could be heard within. A faint rustling, as of something moving around.
"Alright..." a strange voice spoke up. It sounded...bizarre, almost layered, as if two people were speaking in unison. Then the door of the pod caved outward with a sharp impact, before a second one took it off entirely, sending it crashing into the side of the crater and only narrowly missing taking Blaidd's arm off. Backlit by dim lighting from inside the pod, a humanoid figure slowly emerged.
"Think we've got enough people here already," the half-wolf growled, and turned his weapon on the newcomer, releasing a hail of blaster fire on them.
"Couldn't agree more!" that odd, two-toned voice spoke up, and the newcomer bolted forward, weaving through the hail of fire in a dizzying display of acrobatics, before seizing the large wolf-man by the throat and hosting him off the ground. "So let's thin the crowd a bit, shall we? HYAAAAAA!" And all at once, the entire crater lit up with a brilliant gold as a massive burst of energy was released from the new arrival's hand, consuming Blaidd's head -- and soon enough, his entire body -- and blowing it away, quite literally, leaving nothing behind.
Whirling about in place, the new arrival only smirked, as a bright white aura roared to life around them. "Lucky for me, I've been told you'll all come back after this; so no need to hold back!" He reached into his belt, producing...a small, purple and white capsule. "The prize you're all after is in here. So, if you want it: come and get it!" And with a cocky laugh, he tucked it back into his belt and hurled himself into the fray!
#018 Blaidd the Half-Wolf -- DEAD
The Blaster Rifle has been destroyed
A new challenger enters the mix!
EVERYONE PAY ATTENTION TO THIS NEXT PART:
Anyone/Everyone involved currently: you may choose to abandon this fight or remain here.
To anyone not involved: you have a second chance now to ping and join the struggle for the prize.
To anyone who stays/joins: you may write a post covering this fight as best you are able to.
Everyone has 6 hours to make their decision(s) regarding this, before I will move on and begin processing the conclusion.
Perched atop a rock at the edge of their encampment, Coda stared out across the rolling hills that littered the landscape around them, gaze slowly sweeping the murky horizon for any sign of movement. Her eyes, glinting in the dim light behind her sunglasses, appeared more subdued than usual. Weariness had dulled their usual luminescence down to a dusky gleam, though it was more an emotional failing than physical.
The night was still, deceptively so. Nanaue sat slumped against the boulder under her, his snores echoing among the trees. Kiryu and Majima were a good distance away, propped against the trunk of a mighty oak tree, their hands still tightly clutched around their weapons even in slumber. They had passed out after a few hours of attempting to lift the group's spirits, having at one point engaged in a dance-off with the aid of their new disco ball.
Only Zayin was still awake, though he seemed to be in a kind of trance. His eyes were closed, dark head bowed and raven hair spilling into his face as he knelt over the ground, hands clasped just under his chin. Straining her ears, Coda could hear him murmuring softly to himself, though the words were so quiet she couldn't make heads or tails of what he was saying.
So Coda, being the only other being among them not in need of true rest, took to standing guard while Zayin did... whatever he was doing. She stood atop her rock perch, motionless, like a sentinel of the night, her light-colored silhouette stark against the star-strewn night sky. Staking out a silent vigil at the edge of the unknown.
She tipped her head back to look up at the stars, which seemed to be slipping out of sight one by one, all that remained being the wide black bowl of the sky. The trees around them were motionless in the windless night, quiet enough to hear a pin drop. It seemed that even the night birds had flown to another roost, their shrill cries absent from the dark woodland.
Not a single blade of grass stirred in the absence of a breeze. All was still and dark, the island seeming almost like some giant artificial diorama, not real at all.
A shudder ran through Coda, raising a ripple of gooseflesh over her skin. She reached up to draw her mask taut beneath her chin, shrugging her shoulders to ward off the sudden chill.
Snap!
From some distance there came the sudden snap of a twig breaking. A dry crack, echoing through the silence of the woodland like a bomb going off.
Coda immediately straightened her spine, senses sharpened as she looked to the noise's origin. Nothing but blackness peered back. The hillside was desolate, dappled with trees and foliage, obstructing her view. Ahead was a mostly dead blackberry thicket, bristling with prickly thorns and dried-up leaves. It withheld whatever lay beyond from her sight, enshrouding everything in a chaotic mess of twisted brambles.
Her eyes darted back to Zayin, checking to see if he'd heard the noise as well. But he seemed completely dead to the world, head still bowed in his weird meditation-prayer-thing.
Brows knitting together with worry, Coda's gaze swept back to the thicket. Her heart beat quicker inside her chest now, drumming an anxious staccato against her ribs.
What the hell was that?
Crrnch-crnch!
Another strange noise! Coda's eyes narrowed, scanning the dark silhouettes of the trees standing in a row along the sketchy woodline, and then she saw it.
A figure stumbled out from beneath the shadowy tree line, warped and contorted. It was almost human in shape, possibly female, with disturbingly elongated limbs and stringy white hair cloaking its face. Its skin was a pallid grey, and its eyes were wide and vacant, staring outward like the windows of a house with nobody home. The shadows coiled over its shape in a grotesque manner, making the whole of it seem gnarled and putrefied, like some kind of demented Picasso portrait.
The creature, broken in its form, began to heave towards her, a low, grating moan emanating from the jagged depths of its throat. Coda tensed up, fists clenching as she made to leap down and pummel it into dust— when something abruptly occurred to her, giving her pause.
Nanaue had stopped snoring.
"Nanaue, no—" Coda yelped, but it was too late. Like a gigantic grey boulder given legs, Nanaue barreled past her, bum-rushing the weird zombie.
She almost couldn't bear to look, but look Coda did. Nanaue's fist made contact with the scrawny, ugly thing, a meaty smack ringing out as it struck. The creature was sent hurtling through the air at great speed, almost like it had been launched from a cannon— a spray of blood forming a fine mist over the ground as it went flying.
Seconds later, it hit a distant tree trunk with a hefty thwack, the unsettling crack of bones clearly audible. It landed in a heap at the foot of the tree, looking like nothing but a pile of laundry and pale, disjointed limbs.
It twitched for a moment, one long-fingered hand reaching out as if to grasp something from the air, and then it lay still.
In shock, Coda glanced between it and the hulking form of Nanaue, gaping, as a chaotic trampling of footsteps came up behind her. Turning to look, she saw that it was only Zayin, Majima and Kiryu, all tense and bristling with weaponry, clearly anticipating the worst.
Eagle-eyed gaze sweeping over the scene, Zayin's golden eyes flew up to lock with her own. "Coda! What happened?"
"W-well, I..." Coda stammered, unsure of how to respond. Her eyes drifted back to Nanaue, who stood but a short distance away. His massive chest heaved as breath sawed in and out from the gills lining his neck, bristling aggression palpable, his jagged-toothed maw running with strings of spittle. Boy, did he look mad.
Shuddering, Coda turned back to Zayin. "Nanaue took out the trash, I guess. I don't know what that thing was, but it was trying to creep up here."
"Another contestant?" asked Kiryu, staring at the lump of rags and crooked limbs at the base of the tree.
Frowning, Coda shook her head. "No, I know all the contestants, and none of them looked like that."
She paced over to the body, careful on her approach lest it rise again. It didn't, thankfully, and she was able to crouch down next to it with a flounce of her coat, studying the fallen form more closely.
"I don't..." she began, before her face froze, eyes widening to a mask of horror.
The body had been practically shredded in half by Nanaue's blow, but it was recognizable enough as just... a regular person, though twisted by the Unmaking's sinister will into a ghastly specter of one. A wedding ring was even on the corpse's gnarled finger, the precious stone set into it glimmering in the dark and partly smeared with mud.
The four humans in the party stared down at the body in wordless horror, then glanced between one another, clearly unsure of how to process this new information.
"I didn't know there were other people still on this island!" Coda managed to get out at last, her voice strained and crackling at the edges. "Why weren't the survivors cleared out? I mean, l-look what the Unmaking did to this lady! It turned her into a walking corpse!"
Majima hummed in response, turning to glance at their surroundings, his one good eye narrowing at the still, silent trees circling around them in suspicion.
"Do you think there might be more hangin' around?" he asked, not seeming particularly thrilled at the prospect.
"No telling," Zayin answered gravely, hefting the weight of his new axe. "At least, not unless anymore show up."
They all surveyed their surroundings, a sudden aura of dread pervading the air. And somewhere off in the darkness, a nightjar cried out its shrill warning.
The exchange between the Mechasuit, Peter’s power suit, and the titan that was Flak had left him at the highest level of amused.
“Hehehe… hahahaha!” Flak grinned. Earlier, she’d had to deal with a kind of sadness she never really had before. But now, the game had gotten simple. Fight a samurai robot and a nerd in a robot suit! Easy stuff.
-until the giant pillar of light had blasted through the area, and Flak suddenly got a whiff of burning flesh. Not sure how, but it felt like her senses had intensified recently. Everything smelled pretty vivid, looked vivid, ever since she’d put on that ring.
So when the faint, but unmistakeable scent of burning wolf hair entered her nostrils, she was unfortunately all too familiar with it, as she stopped fighting entirely, giving a relatively disturbing sniff to the air as she all but ignored the gaping Peter, looking at the spectacle.
“If you run away, that’s admitting I’m stronger, ya know -”
“Move!” The princess snapped, running straight for the source of the explosion as she simply backhanded the Suited Peter out of the way - the blow glancing but just enough to move it from sight. The shogun behind him attempted to step in the way, but Flak just leapt into the air, heels clacking with a clang as she jumped up and off of the springboard, and kept running.
Tears threatened to enter Flak’s face. He had to just be wounded, right? She was about to see Blaidd, and he’d be fucked up, but he’d be ready to kick ass. She hadn’t known him that long, but damn it he’d been fun and she’d wanted to!
Eventually, two voices mixed by one introduced themselves, a triumphant pose between them.
“Where’s Blaidd?”
“The wolf?” Gogeta asks, before evaluating the new competitor. “Was he a friend of yours?”
“Still is!” Flak replied, brain ticking. “Unless he said something to you or-”
The Princess’s slow brain caught up, as she realized the smell, and looked to Gogeta’s face.
He looked surprised for a second, before flashing a grin.
“-Or if I took care of him. So, what are you going to do about that?”
Flak’s heels dug a pair of holes in the ground, as the soft earth shattered. Chest felt off, arms were shaking, when was the last time she felt this way?
Oh yeah.
“hey, sis, what’s got on your eye? Playing with your artist boyfriend’s markers? Oh, it’s not marker?...Where is he?.”
Flak screamed at the top of her lungs, before charging in. The brain hurt right now, but it wasn’t really necessary. Flak had never needed to think when he could fight!
“Just a straight challenge? I suppose I’ll take that!” Gogeta’s cocky voice came through the battlefield, choosing to stand his ground as Flak came closer.
Flak threw a barrage of blows, Rough punches that came with speed and power, but no technique. The fusion adeptly blocked the majority, choosing to step back and take the attacks.
“Not bad. You’ve got strength and some speed, alright.” Gogeta added, as he deftly knocked each down. “But you’ve barely got any training, don’t you? You aren’t about to hit me with any of those!”
Flak growled in response, flame spilling from her mouth before she took the opportunity to unleash a point-blank flamethrower with a shrill roar of frustration. Gogeta disappeared with surprise a second before potential charcoalation in a blast of speed.
Flak turned around, trying to see where her opponent was with a frustrated growl. She heard him before she saw him, hearing the sound of a slow, focused clap.
“Not a bad surprise. But if you’re taking me on alone, I’m hoping that’s not all you’ve got!” the fusion replied, grinning at the princess, before his smile faltered to a more serious tone. “I came here to fight the strongest this little tournament has to offer. You’d better show me everything!”
He was mocking her. But he was also right. She had a heck of a lot more!
Lightning arced around her hand as the talisman sparked, a bolt filling her palm with the wrath of zeus - wrath she unleashed with a grin, as lightning sparked across her right arm, and arced in a line towards Gogeta.
“The fusion held up his palm and unleashed a ki blast that dispersed the blast, leaving a smoky trail.. “Not exactly enough. Are you really taking this seriously?” Gogeta asked, before raising an eyebrow in surprise.
Flak couldn’t answer, of course, as she was busy filling her lungs, but she figured the sound of her X-buster charging might give him a good enough idea as the dust cleared.
With a scream, Flak unleashed a blast of fire from her maw, and a blast of plasma from her X-buster at the same time. After all, if she couldn’t take him down with one weapon, the solution was simple - use all of ‘em!
Gogeta looked to the blasts, before a smirk washed across his features, giving a ‘hmph’ of approval with a nod. In response, he held up one hand to fire a ki blast of his own, golden light striking the combined blast with a grin. “Let’s see what you’ve got!” The Fusion taunted, as blue and red struck gold, leaving the two energies struggling against eachother.
Flak felt her lungs burning as the Blast started to head back towards her, before another shock of lightning filled her other hand. Gogeta’s proud smirk grew wider as lightning struck the middle of the blast, sending the beam back and towards the Saiyan powerhouse.
Flak’s eyes raised as he saw this, saw the cocky asshole about to be burned up in his own power. Served him right! The beams were sent back into the fusion, who raised an eyebrow, before raising his other hand…
And deflecting the raised beam with a hard slap, the combined shot bouncing away like a rubber ball before hitting the ground behind Gogeta, leaving a house-sized explosion.
“Okay. Not bad. Actually bruised my hand.”
Flak’s eyes widened. That was, like, all he had, thrown at all the same time, but Gogeta wasn’t giving her a chance to breathe.
“But if that’s all, let’s finish this!”
The saiyan warrior closed in to close combat, and Flak was left mostly on the defensive, her boxer’s guard mostly penetrated by blow after blow from Gogeta’s attacks. She hadn’t felt much in terms of pain since the start of the tournament, but this was leaving her head spinning, as she was pressed. Bruises appeared across her body as she was left with her back literally against a wall.
Seeing her end about to come, she figured she wasn’t about to go down on the defensive, as she raised her fist for a wild haymaker. “Hraahhhh!” She roared.
Gogeta gave a smirk, and she kinda thought he’d do the block thing, but she was surprised as his body went stock-still, and he took the haymaker by surprise.
“Flak! Are you still okay?”
Trevor!
The emperor by his side, and the morgul blade in hand with a trail of blood, Gogeta had left himself open for the professional’s attacks. And Just like they’d always done, Flak had been the distraction, so Trevor could do what needed to be done from the sneaky sneaky side o’ things!
Speaking of friends, as Gogeta saw the new fighter and turned to disengage, Flak suddenly remembered something. She had been trained, right before the tournament!
And she just remembered the coolest bit of that training, as she moved on the attack.
“Mega-Ultra-Super…”
Gogeta looked back with a face that said ‘you can’t be serious!’ written across it.
“Dynamite Kick!!”
The resulting collision of heel-to-stomach sent the fusion flying across the landscape.
Nanaue rummaged noisily in his bag with one enormous hand. An ergonomics inspector would’ve dropped their jaw upon catching sight of Nanaue’s angle: he’d twisted himself at the waist, shoulder cocked, and had one meaty mitt thrust into the depths of his Carnivale Rosa distributed bag. But the noise he made! Coda stared in horror while the cacophony of sounds bombarded her. Crinkles, crunches, rustles, pops even! What was he doing in there?
Finally, when she could take it no longer, Coda let out a moan of disdain.
“Nanaue!” and she emphasized the middle angrily so that it sounded like nuh-NAH-way. “What are you doing over there!? You’ll wake the dead!”
She thought uncomfortably about the Unmade woman the shark had pulverized only an hour earlier and frowned.
Nanaue, however, brightened at her voice. He lifted a hand whose big grey fingers clasped a water bottle so tightly that it looked fit to burst at any moment from the pressure.
“Road soda!” he exclaimed, holding it out.
“Nanaue, that’s not what that -”
Majima appeared out of nowhere, looming over Coda’s shoulder.
“Did somebody say road soda?” he demanded, grinning wolfishly. “I heard somebody say-”
“Road soda?” asked Kiryu, appearing over Coda’s other shoulder.
“Road soda!” agreed Nanaue, nodding ferociously.
Coda actually palmed her face with her hand, shaking her head.
“Well, where is it?” Majima asked, and the telling signs of impatience frayed the edges of his voice. “Let’s have it.”
“There isn’t any road soda!” Coda burst out, looking at them all incredulously. “Where, on this island, do you think we would find a road soda!?”
Kiryu’s face was a study in consternation, Majima’s a study in despair. He gaped, searching for words, and gestured at Nanaue frantically.
“But he said…I thought…” he trailed off, mumbling indistinctly and glaring at the King of Sharks.
“If there were people left on the island, maybe the evacuation didn’t catch everything, and they might have left one behind,” explained Kiryu, studying the shark with a dubious expression. “We don’t know for sure that they scoured the island completely of supplies. Maybe Nanaue found a road soda after all.”
Majima brightened, pulling his head out of his hands where he’d hung it in despair mere seconds ago.
“Kiryu-chaaaan!” he cooed, delighted. “You’re telling me there is a road soda!?”
“There is no road soda,” Coda hissed. “Nanaue. Show them.”
Nanaue thrust out his hand, palm up, and the crunched bottle of water lay bent in the center; stress lines etched their way down and around the plastic cylinder, and vague indents on the bottle left an impressionist’s interpretation of the Shark King’s goliath fingers for all to behold. Kiryu’s face drew into a tight downward bow of distaste. Majima looked as if he might weep for the first time on the island.
“What the Hell is that!?” Majima demanded, pointing at the water bottle, his single eye widening and dilating in fury. “That is NOT A DAMN ROAD SODA! THAT’S A BOTTLE OF WATER YOU PIECE OF-”
“Majima-san!” Coda shouted over him. “He doesn’t know! He’s just a-”
“Just a what!? What is he!? Go on! Tell me what he is!”
Coda looked at Nanaue, fumbling for the right thing to say, and found herself wanting. She looked back at Majima in defeat.
“...something.”
Majima, still furious, at least found the strength to look triumphant.
“Exactly. He is something. He’s something else, is what he is, because that is not a fucking road soda!”
She gave him a second to breathe during which time he seethed and blustered. Zayin approached, clearly drawn to the confusion the way a referee is drawn to a massive scuffle in a sports game. As he drew in close to the group he searched Coda’s face, his own expression impassive.
“...what’s a road soda?” he asked, finally.
Nanaue thrust out his bottle of water enthusiastically, while Majima threw up his hands and walked away.
Rory watched through the half-dead lenses of his battered (though still quite stylish) shades as Blaidd was converted from a half-wolf to a sum-total of zero in a flash of golden light, pressing his bandaged penguin body against the steaming metal of the pod and willing with all his might that he be quite literally anywhere except here.
The d00d with the spiky hair and the, let’s face it, absolutely bangin’ vest, hadn’t seemed to notice him – or possibly simply didn’t register him as interesting enough to kill. Instead he’d gone straight for what Rory was pretty sure was a magic porn-star while Peter tried desperately not to get fileted by some Turok-looking steroid-monkey with…
“That noot-noot fucking thief! That’s that phantom-d00d’s sword! I killed that d00d! I mean, mostly. But still -
The beginning of Rory’s offended rant was cut off as the battered Franky Shogun lost its footing amidst an attempt to remain engaged with the powerful princess as she rushed to meet the newcomer and tipped over backwards. A tremendous, reverberating boom shook the earth, raising dust from the crater floor, and very nearly knocking him off his feet.
Then the spiky-hair d00d collided with the (presumable) porn-queen, and the penguin did lose his footing, his already shaken equilibrium rattled by the shockwaves as she unleashed everything she had against the mighty newcomer.
There was a pause. For a moment, Rory thought she might have succeeded – but then the bare-chested warrior with the fucked up voice blurred into view beside her and drove a flying knee into the dainty turtle-shell on her back, eliciting a screech and a deafening crunch – followed immediately by a low rumble as the force of the blow sent the female-presenting fighter’s body skidding and grinding along the rim of the crater, carving a trough as it went, finally coming to rest near the opposite end of the bowl.
“Nice shot,” said the spiky-haired super-warrior, “ considering.”
A wave of invective arose from where the woman had fallen, so incredibly foul that if Rory hadn’t been so terrified he probably would have taken notes – there was a manual to be written on how to swear like that, and fat stacks to be made selling it.
Frantic, Rory dove into the pod from whence the spiky-haired warrior had arisen – and found it shockingly plush. He didn’t, however, have time to appreciate the luxurious space-leather seat. Instead, he poked frantically at his shades, watching desperately through the Franky Shogun’s one good eye as the newcomer whirled on Peter and his elaborately tattooed, unreasonably chiseled antagonist, orbs of golden energy glowing in the palms of his hands.
The vampire and the assassin, already stunned by what had happened to the boobs-d00d, took a moment to react – but although they could run, there was nowhere to hide.
“FRAN-KEN!”
“Huh?” grunted the d00d with spikey hair.
With a grinding whine of metal under strain and a shower of stone and moist earth, the Franky Shogun rolled over, its mighty three-story blade gripped in its one good hand. The great slab of pirate-metal alloy slammed into their superpowered antagonist from above, driving him into the crater floor amidst a geyser of splashing soil.
Peter and his opponent stared. Without looking, the nurse-practitioner raised his power-suit’s arm cannon and shot the other man in the chest, sending him sprawling.
A dainty hand tapped him on the shoulder. Behind him, a feminine voice growled:
“That was a cheap shot, bucko. Now stand still and fight like a man.”
“Well, balls,” said the vampire, and the buxom queen, caked in soil, grasped him by the back of the head and drove him face-first into the crater floor with irresistible force.
“Ahhh, fuck d00d. No no no no no!”
Rory fiddled with his shades, trying desperately to make his beloved robot stand up, to help Peter, to do something, all the while painfully aware that although he’d hidden himself in the one place in this crater that there was to hide, if anyone realised he was in here then he was absolutely dead.
The robot’s spindly legs kicked. Rockets erupted from pods within its shoulders, rippling explosions across the battlefield, bathing everything and everyone in gouts of soil and clouds of billowing smoke. With a whine of servos, Rory tried to raise its blade, to use it as leverage with which to stand – but the Frank-Ken was caught on something.
The ground shook. As the explosions staggered his assailant, Peter managed to roll out from under her descending high-heel just in time to save his skull, firing his weapon wildly in her direction and thinking, absurdly, that she was probably going to have back problems when she was older and she should probably come by Doc’s clinic for a consultation about a preventative chiropractic breast-reduction. If nothing else, he could probably recommend a specialist.
The ground quaked again, harder this time. A blaze of white light rose from the cracks in the earth.
“Heh. You know what? This is a nice sword,” echoed a familiar, sneering, double-layered voice. “I think I’ll borrow it.”
And a blurred human figure in hammer-pants and a truly bitchin’ vest erupted from under the ground, impacting the Franky Shogun center-mass, and carrying the mighty robot bodily into the sky.
Rory, rendered heedless of his own safety by what had just happened, burst from his hiding place within the pod and waddled frantically towards the battle, flippers outstretched as he honked in panicked worry.
Peter rolled on the ground as the soldier-turned-princess leapt towards him. Flak threw an earth-shattering punch, her fist sending rubble flying in every which direction. Franky Shogun, meanwhile, was struggling against the newcomer, its heavy metal limbs aching audibly in the night. There was a horrible smashing sound as steel mangled against flesh - but this new guy didn’t seem to mind.
Peter sprayed an array of plasma at Princess Flak, tumbling backwards. He looked up as he did.
“Uh… You got any idea who that is, Doc?”
Dr. McNinja was currently rapping his fingers against his temple.
“Oh, for… It’s on the tip of my tongue!”
Peter’s suit rang some alarms. It took the vampire moments to back-pedal, narrowly avoiding another flurry of blows from the incensed princess. Peter blasted some more shots before looking up again.
Peter clicked his tongue irritably. “This is a really bad time for you to not remember, Doc!”
“Gogeta!” Doc exclaimed, “His name is Gogeta! And uh…”
Peter tumbled out of the way again. He probably couldn’t keep this up. He knew Flak had the crown, but something else was enhancing her performance. Something cursed - Peter’s undead spirit could sense it.
There was a sharp pain in his leg. Peter spun around, noticing Trevor, who had jammed his weapon against Peter’s knee. Thank Arbiters for the armor - otherwise Peter would probably be out for the count.
“Ugh, I forgot about you,” Peter grunted.
He tumbled again (this armor made tumbling really easy) and charged up a shot. Energy rippled out of Peter’s arm cannon in a wide arc, sending both combatants flying. Flak landed on her feet pretty easily, unfortunately, but it bought Peter enough time to-
“Franky-Shogun! Nooooooooo!”
Peter looked up again at the sound of his new ally’s screams. He hissed at the sight instinctively, fangs protruding under the helmet. Now how was he supposed to catch up with that?
Without much thought, two rockets started roaring on Peter’s shoulder-blades. And in another instant, Peter was spiraling skywards.
“Need new intel now, Doc!”
“It’s two people fused together - uh, uh, both very strong! I’m remembering something about carrots…? Point is, do not fuck with him!”
“Oh,” Peter said, his bloodlust rising and his eyes turning crimson red, “I’m gonna fuck with him.”
Peter grit his teeth as the rockets died out. Okay, not quite capable of flight, but good enough at jumping to launch him high into the air. From here, he could see this Gogeta figure pummeling the living crap out of Rory’s robot.
“I am way in over my head,” Peter mumbled as he carefully aimed a charged shot.
A beam of plasma rocketed across the sky upwards, washing over Gogeta. The spiky-haired man looked down, his barrage on the Franky Shogun interrupted. His expression was… nonplussed.
“Stop that! That’s my penguin friend’s giant mecha!” Peter yelled.
Peter fired another barrage of shots at Gogeta. Gogeta, apparently bored with the mecha, abandoned it entirely and rocketed towards Peter. Peter barely had any time to react before the spiky-haired man tackled him out of the sky, unleashing a storm of punches and kicks. Peter screamed in terror, inciting a cocky smile from Gogeta.
Peter turned into a little armored ball, rolling through Gogeta’s legs. He grasped onto Gogeta’s shoulder from behind, his helmet unpixellating to reveal Peter’s face.
“I vant to suck your blood, motherfucker!”
Peter embedded his teeth into Gogeta’s artery. It felt like biting a chunk of metal, but Peter pressed on with his task. Blood spurted out into Peter’s mouth. This wasn’t human blood - not that human blood would’ve healed this faulty clone body - but blood was blood was blood.
Unfortunately, this left Peter’s face very unprotected as Gogeta spun around and elbowed him in the face.
Peter’s armor barely had enough time to reform the helmet as the vampire crashed in the ground. He coughed as he forced himself back up. He caught Rory’s little beak in Gogeta’s pod. Franky-Shogun crashed soon after right next to Peter, mangled though it was. Peter gave him a little wave.
“Got you your robot back,” the vampire quipped.
Franky-Shogun clicked and whirred as it stood up. It flashed the penguin a thumbs-up, which it raised sky-high.
“Generallu Daijobu!”
Rory chittered, “Thanks, d00d.”
“I’m gonna…” Peter coughed again. “I’m gonna get back in there. Want me to get you anything?”
Rory shrugged, inasmuch as a penguin could shrug. Peter nodded.
“Okay. Please feel free to get in your robot and help out.”
Peter charged another shot as he charged back into the fray.
Trevor distanced himself with a quick leap backward as their opponent was thrown away by Flak's attack. As much as he wanted to relax, however, he sensed a sudden surge of power from their dual-voiced opponent. "Watch out!" he called out as a bright blue beam of energy suddenly came rushing towards princess Flak.
"Not bad!" The glowing warrior exclaimed, his multi-layered voice echoing in their wide battleground. Flak on the other hand, was lucky enough to evade by a hair's breadth.
"Oh yeah! Then how about this!," Flak roared, still enraged with the death of her werewolf companion. The princess general charged straight at their foe like a raging bull, her rampaging feet breaking the terrain in her path.
Trevor kept his eyes trained on their opponent's action, worried at his companion's impulsive attack. Far from the assassin's worry, however, the challenged warrior simply met Flak's attack in a head on fist-to-fist clash. In an instant, the attacks from the two surged into a frenzy of blows, waves of energies dancing in the air, resulting from the two warriors' barbaric collisions.
Trevor decided to back off more, making himself unnoticeable to their opponent. The re-entry of the penguin's ally made it more convenient for the sneaky assassin to discretely observe the battle from a distance. The penguin himself, seemed to be distraught at the destruction of his robot, allowing Trevor to concentrate his attention on the ensuing battle.
He pulled the emperor, taking aim alternately at the penguin's ally and the glowing warrior. The dual-voiced warrior proved to be a greater threat but the other foe appeared to be an easier target from his vantage point. He wondered for a while, joggling a couple of scenarios in his mind. Finally, with a momentary release of his breath, he finally pulled the trigger.
The mind-controlled bullet raced at the scene of battle in a beeline almost close to the ground. As it neared the three battling warriors, Trevor made the bullet circle around and then rise, its trajectory aimed at the Saiyan.
FACE-OFF
#003 Trevor O'Skully & #010 Princess Flak VS #015 Chaos Agent Rory & #019 Peter Pellbrook VS #X Gogeta Easter Egg: Fusion Manual
Locked in battle with Flak and Peter, Gogeta was actually finding himself pressed. Not tremendously so, but still...these two were putting up one hell of a fight! It was more than enough to really get his blood pumping, that was for sure! He whirled about, catching the barrel of Peter's arm cannon and Flak's buster-wielding arm with each of his own forearms, holding them at bay and making their energetic payloads blow huge chunks out of the terrain rather than him. "Heh...not bad, not bad! But this is where we'll have to step it uphk!"
His momentary lapse in focus cost him, as the bullet from Emperor struck him square in the chest. Under normal circumstances, as prepared and ready for battle as he was, it would have done virtually nothing to him at all, but with the rules of this damn competition and the way his focus was split....
Blood ran down his chest, as sweat beaded on the fused warrior's forehead. Just enough to crack his guard, and let his opponents break through, finally dealing him a solid blow. A sharp one-two crash send him flying back, to hit the side of the pod he had crashed down in, and ricochet off of it to plant himself face-first into the ground. Coughing up a mixture of spit and blood, the fused powerhouse was quick to regain his feet, even if his balance looked less than certain now.
"Heh...guess this isn't a complete walk in the park, after all!" If anything, his mood seemed to have only gone soaring, in spite of everything. "Guess that freak in the red suit wasn't kidding when he said you guys would put up one hell of a fight!" And clenching his fists, he thundered back into battle!
"I'll show you a fight!" Flak bellowed, and she was there to meet him, an enraged snarl meeting the fusions cocky grin as they crashed into each other in a storm of pummeling fists and thrashing kicks. It was clear almost immediately that, in spite of the almost overwhelming advantage Flak seemed to hold in sheer brute force and raw strength....Gogeta trumped almost every other category, and exponentially so at that.
"Well...just gonna...." Peter slowly raised his arm cannon, as it built up a blue glow within, energy and power visibly crackling around it.
Shinku struck, the Morgul Blade catching the cannon from below and knocking it upward so the tremendous blast was sent discharging harmlessly into the sky. With a scowl, the vampire hissed and lashed out savagely with a clumsy spinning kick at the assassin, sending them both reeling and toppling over into the dirt.
Then the ground trembled again, as the battered and battle-worn form of the Franky Shogun finally regained its feet, lifting ponderously into a standing posture. Its remaining eye, cracked from the stresses of battle but still present, blazed with light. Its undamaged arm was held forward, as its palm revealed a hidden chamber within, opening like a missile silo. "GENERAL....." And a sound like a vacuum sucking in massive amounts of air sounded, momentarily drawing all attention to the goliath robot.
"Ah, crap...!" Peter fell back, tumbling and rolling into a ball as he quickly orbed his way along into one of the mall small caverns born from dislodged chunks of earth.
".....CANNON!" And all at once, that gathered air was released in one single, massive burst of pure pressure. The force of which was enough to shred Gogeta's arrival pop like tissue paper, and blow a massive gouge into the crater wall, rending it as cleanly and explosively as if an actual sword had sliced through it. Virtually everyone else in the path of the air cannon was lost among the dust and debris, as if they had been torn asunder just like the pod.
Rory warily peeked out from the Shogun's cockpit. "Whew...think I got 'em, d00d...." he wheezed.
"Okay," Peter popped out from under a layer of rubble. "When did you get back in there?!"
"Don't worry about it, mang."
"No, seriously, I am worrying about this one! How in the hell--"
He was cut off by a sudden groaning from among the rubble, as the battered and bloodied form of Princess Flak came staggering back into view. Once-regal dress was ripped and torn in several places, and she was definitely worse for wear with the sheer amount of blood and bruises she was now composed of, but otherwise...seemed entirely and frighteningly still ready and able to fight in spite of taking what was almost assuredly a direct hit from that ridiculous cannon.
"Aw what the fuck, d00d..." Rory wailed. "Can't you give a bird a break around here?!"
Within the haze of smoke and debris, there suddenly came a much more worrying sight. A bright blue glow, lighting up the night as a whining of gathering energy sounded. Bright white flared up behind it, as Gogeta's double-layered voice roared out, "BIG BANG...."
And then...it was suddenly gone, with only a flicker and slight whooshing among the billowing dust clouds.
Before anyone even had time to register what had just happened, the fused warrior reappeared again, directly behind the colossal form of the Franky Shogun. He was bloodied and battered, but his grin had only grown broader and more pronounced, with a bright and vibrant gleam in his eyes.
"Rory, watch out beh--!" Peter started.
"....KAMEHAMEHA!"
A massive, spreading wave of energy was unleashed, engulfing the Iron Pirate even as it turned ponderously about. "Oh, come on, you gotta be fuckin' kidding me d0000000000000000000000000000000......"
The mechanized titan and its pilot were both consumed wholesale by the energy wave, slowly breaking down and disintegrating into nothing as Rory's wail of protest faded into silence. Only ashes and bits of metal were left over when the lightshow faded, drifting down like morbid snow.
"One more down," the fused warrior remarked, wiping away a smear of blood from his chin.
His cockiness once again cost him, as a sudden bout of teamwork from Flak and Shinku -- the former bodily hurling the latter like an improvised projectile -- soon saw the fusion tackled out of the air, with a cursed sword driven through his gut, and borne to the ground with a heavy crash, pinning him to the side of the crater.
"You sure are actin' like you're hot shit, buddy," Princess Flak growled as she stomped up to the momentarily downed warrior, positively looming over him. "But even I'm smart enough to know you don't gloat while the fight's still goin' on."
"Heh..." Gogeta smirked, showing bloody teeth. "...hah....hahahaha! Ahahahaha! You guys are unreal!" he bellowed, throwing his head back. "Even though I've been beating you all senseless, you're still not willing to give up! You fought back hard enough to actually hurt me, and really give me a run for my money, here! You've got real spirit!"
"But now...I think it's time we all got serious here, don't you?" All the amusement and bravado died on his face, as his smirk turned to a snarl. His hands clenched into fists, as the aura around him surged higher. Streaks of gold fire shot through the white, as his hair began to sway and flicker with lightning.
In the comms unit of his suit, Peter suddenly heard Doc screech out loud. "Super Saiyan! HE'S GOING SUPER SAIYAN!" The sound of the doctor-ninja slamming his hands on the desk was clearly audible even over the call. "Don't let him do that! Seriously, don't let him do that!"
With a groan, Peter tensed himself up before breaking into a sprint, energy charging in his arm cannon. "Yo, dynamic dumbasses!" he hollered. "Stop him from whatever he's doing!"
"Butt out, metalhead!" Flak roared, before cocking her fist back to start commencing the mother of all pummeling beat downs on Gogeta, while Shinku raised Emperor in his free hand.
And then with a mighty roar, Gogeta's eyes went turquoise, lightning racing up along his body as his hair turned to gold, and his aura exploded around him in a wave of gold flame. The sheer force of it kicked up immense wind, but only served to buy him a fleeting half second before he was on the receiving end of a pummeling again.
A half second he capitalized on.
His legs swept out in a circular kick, taking Flak's own legs right out from under her and making her viciously swung punch overbalance and land squarely on her own partner's knee. The assassin howled out in anguish as he toppled over, the crunch of his elbow hitting the ground matching the sharp crack of Emperor firing off a shot. A shot that struck Peter Pellbrook squarely in the visor as he leaped in to discharge his own addition to the fight, and the ensuing explosion engulfed all three fighters in a burning cloud of plasma.
Gogeta leaped clear, flipping through the air to land in a ready crouch. He grimaced, as blood poured from the wound in his stomach, but otherwise he held fast. "Come on, now; don't tell me you're done already?" he taunted.
The only response he got was a wordless screaming noise, courtesy of Flak, and an absolute hail of projectiles of various kinds. His eyes widening, the fused powerhouse crossed his arms before him and a burst of energy leapt out, forming a barrier dome around him.
A dome that lasted all of five seconds, as the proverbial freight train that was Princess Flak came thundering out of the fire and leaped forward, coming down with an earth-shuddering stomp that splintered the barrier dome like glass. Gogeta recoiled back, his eyes wide and face flushing briefly red as he got an unintentional upskirt view for his trouble. And then the transformed general quite literally landed on his chest, bearing him down to the ground, and shoved the barrel of the X-Buster in his face.
And fired.
The ensuing stream of plasma ripped open a huge gash in the earth, burning and melting the stone and dirt into molten slag and sparkling motes of glass by the time it was done. When it all cleared, though....there was no sign of Gogeta. He had pulled his vanishing trick again, leaving only a few scraps of his admittedly bitchin' vest behind. "Temper, temper," he called out mockingly from above, as the golden blaze of his aura shone down from the edge of the crater. "Gotta admit, you almost had me that time!"
The shadows behind the fused powerhouse slithered and roiled, as Shinku slowly rose up out of them, his face livid. He stepped forward and took the Morgul Blade in both hands, preparing for what he was sure would be a deathblow....only to have it intercepted by a whirling backfist from Gogeta. "Didn't think that'd work twice, did you?" And he spun about in a leaping twist, landing a skull-rattling kick to the back of Shinku's head and sending him sprawling to the ground in an unconscious heap.
"Now, then..." And as his feet touched the ground again, the fusion held out a hand toward Shinku's downed body, bright golden energy flaring up in his palm. "....that makes three."
"NOOOO!" And Flak was suddenly....there. In a whspery, flashing instant, she crossed the distance in only a few rushing steps, and left her fist meet the side of Gogeta's frustratingly perfect jawline with a sudden speed and fierceness that sent the saiyan reeling, staggering and stumbling as blood spattered onto the ground to his side.
Breathing heavily and raggedly, Flak stared venom at Gogeta as she stomped forward, flames flickering in her mouth with every breath and sparks crackling about both of her weapons.
From out of the shadows, Peter Pellbrook came crawling, one hand resting on his arm cannon to support it. The red glare of his eyes shone through the power suit's visor.
"Hey. Metalhead," Flak growled.
"'Sup, turtle-tits?" the nurse hissed.
"....ten seconds. We work together for that long."
"....ten seconds," Peter agreed.
Gogeta regained his feet in time to see the pair of unlikely temporary allies bolt toward him. A chaotic and messy exchange ensued, Flak bringing every last bit of raw power she could muster and Peter bringing speed and unpredictability to the equation. Against either one individually, the fused saiyan could have come out on top ten times out of ten. But already winded and worn down as he was, and against both at once? He was being not only pressured, but steadily forced back. And, eventually, completely overwhelmed, as blows began to not only land, but land cleanly and savagely.
And finally, at long last, he was struck decisively, blown back to crash into the muck at the crater's edge. His aura weakly guttered and sparked, the golden light growing dim as he fought to regain his composure. "Heh...guess you got me..." he managed, before collapsing altogether as his aura flickered out entirely.
As Princess Flak and Peter Pellbrook stood there, heaving ragged breaths, they slowly relaxed from the battle high.
"Looks like...we won, huh...?" Peter gasped, as his armor slowly digitized into its dormant form again. "Now all we gotta do is grab the--" He never got to finish his thought.
Without even looking, Flak swung her arm around and backhanded the vampire nurse directly in his face, with a quite literally face-pulverizing impact, reducing his skull to something more resembling meat jelly than anything else. "Ten seconds is way past up," she growled. "Prize is mine and Trez's." And she stomped over to the fallen fused warrior to dig through his pockets and retrieve their prize, even as Peter's headless remains slowly toppled over.
#015 Chaos Agent Rory -- DEAD
#019 Peter Pellbrook -- DEAD
#X Gogeta -- DEFEATED
Trevor O'Skully used one application of Focus
Princess Flak suffers egregious damage to her wardrobe (Story Injury), as well as some gnarly burning and battering related wounds in several places (Major Injury overall), but the absurd durability afforded by her transformation and cursed items staves off most of the damage
Shinku suffers a fractured left knee (Minor Injury), as well as a cracked skull and minor concussion (Minor Injury); he will also suffer an unpleasant degree of full-body plasma burns and generalized Gogeta-related physical and bludgeoning trauma (Major Injury overall)
The Flavor Army claims the Fusion Manual
The Franky Shogun was destroyed
Armstrong’s shirt was flung free without hesitation in answer to the mad terror’s howl of challenge. He grit his teeth, fists meeting together in front of him before he dropped into a comfortable stance.
“Be exceedingly cautious Miss Abernathy, This beast looks even more deadly than your own! We must-”
Armstrong cut off mid-sentence as the volcanic entity released a roar that seemed to crack the very rock beneath their feet. A crackling beam of red lighting arched forth from its multitude of arms, scorching a path along the earth as it rocketed towards them. Armstrong grabbed Lauren and spun away from it as the torrent of power and rage screamed past them. Instantly, Superman’s corpse took flight, speeding towards the monster faster than a speeding bullet. The assault was intercepted by a multitude of energy blasts, hurled from the many arms of the raging monster, battering the undead son of krypton and halting his charge as he crashed into a smoldering crater short of his target..
“His power is neigh overwhelming! We will have to approach him tactfully if we have any hope of success! Divide its attention, keep it from focusing on any single target!”
As Lauren and Armstrong spread out to flank the monster, the Strongarm Alchemist’s delimiter blinked silent once more. Either the thing was defective, or someone in the Carnivale was interested in a show. Well! If they sought a demonstration, he would not be caught lacking in his performance!
Hefting a chunk of rock the size of his forearm, Armstrong flung the rubble into the air, his gauntleted hand starting to accumulate the tell-tale blue sparks of alchemy. He punched the rock as it dropped in front of him, his alchemy transforming the rock into a lethal spike on impact, sending the missile hurtling back at their foe. It crashed into the side of one of the beast’s spectral arms. Armstrong wasted no time, unleashing a barrage of his own as the growling visage of Asura turned away from the crater to face him. The energy blasts that had pelted the man of steel moments before began picking Armstrong’s alchemical projectiles from the sky with a practiced ease. The thing was not entirely devoid of tactics, even if it seemed possessed by nothing but rage.
Perhaps more importantly, it was able to fire faster than Armstrong. This was a losing tactic, time to try the next one! With a grunt of effort, Armstrong ducked a streaking missile of fiery destruction, twinkling faintly as he struck the ground with both fists. Blue lightning streaked towards the monster as spikes erupted from the rock, tearing apart the earth that lay between Armstrong and Asura as they punched into the monster’s arms.
With a roar, the spectral arms of the destroyer rent the earth, But Armstrong had vanished from view. A shot from the good samaritan plinged off of Asura’s face and he whirled just in time for Superman to strike him in the jaw at full speed. Asura’s jaw wrenched back, but before the man of steel could continue his assault his foot was caught by one of Asura’s spectral arms. The Destroyer flung his corpse about, slamming him into the ground like a child with a doll before hurling the body upwards into the air with a roar.
“Don’t go taking your eye off the threat now!” Armstrong roared as he leapt towards Asura, landing a right cross, then quick-stepping away from the retaliatory swing. Armstrong’s hand stung from the impact, as though he had punched a slab of molten rock. His foe had a multitude of appendages, and Armstrong quite doubted his ability to deflect their swings. That left him but a single recourse. Not getting hit to begin with.
Armstrong’s hand’s slipped up to a close-guard, tight against the sides of his face. He swept past a spectral punch, then dipped under another wild swing. His foe was powerful, but unrefined.
“Time for a demonstration of the Martial techniques that have been passed down the Armstrong family line!”
A third swing skimmed past Armstrong, scorching him with its heat, but failing to stop him as he ducked inside the beast's reach.
“For generations!”
A one-two punch to the monster’s trunk, and Armstrong kept up the momentum, heedless of the burning pain that each impact was sending down his arms. Asura was skidding backwards, but he was taking the punches with considerable aplomb. Armstrong needed to extract from this brawl before he-
WHAM!
A spectral arm caught Armstrong’s left shoulder, Throwing his guard off. Two more brought a hammer fist down upon his head, crushing the massive man into the earth. For the first time, The monster Asura opened its mouth to do anything but scream. He uttered a short, hateful laugh.
“Flee. Or die screaming.” he snarled.
Armstrong forced himself up to his feet, and away from Asura’s next punch. He barely spared a glance to the blackened scars that covered the ends of his arms from punching the molten beast. They had gone numb long ago.
“I shall not flee!” He roared, side-stepping another wild haymaker. From the corner of his eye he spotted a glimmer of movement over Asura’s shoulder. His timing would have to be perfect, just a moment longer…
“If I am to fall, I shall stand to face you to the last!”
Armstrong pivoted all the weight he could muster into a single uppercut, sliding it up into Azura’s molten jaw at the exact same moment that the undead form of superman struck the back of his head flying full speed.
Both punches impacted the monster’s head simultaneously, and his neck twisted horrifically as it attempted to absorb the conflicting forces. Moments after it had spoken its first words to them, Asura uttered his first scream of pain.
Princess Flak was pretty quick to scoop the Cube from the Headless vampire’s body. “Friggin’...”
She’d definitely seen the dude before, always interfering in their fights, triyng to scoop their loot. He was a good enemy, but he’d also kept her distracted, which made Blaidd’s death her fault. Which meant she couldn’t give less of a Rat’s ass what happened to him.
Well, that wasn’t true. His existence was a great fixture for her to get mad at, and the longer she was mad at the bloodsucker, the easier she could avoid the loss of Team Flavoraidd’s third man.
But, of course, there was still the matter of the second man, and not a second after grabbing the loot did she rush over. “Trev! Trev!”
The Cloak and Dagger of the Flavor army gave a groan, as he pulled himself up to his feet. “Flak…? Did we get ‘em, buddy.”
“Y… yeah! He’s all sploded, Vamps been defanged… get it, cause… vampire fangs…” Flak chuckled, before looking over his bud. He’d gotten really banged up in that last fight. Not just a little banged up like previous battles, this one really hurt him.
It caused Flak to pause, and Trevor looked up. “How ya doin’, general? Head hurt.”
“Well… yeah, little nicked, but nothing big. We got ‘em. Penguin’s dead too. Lost the robot. But more important… we got loot! Took the nerdpire’s suit and…”
Flak looked over the manual.
“Fused chin manual.”
“Fusion manual, Flak.” Trevor stated. “It… lets two people become one. It’s one of those things in DA, though I think they do earrings.”
“What’s DA?”
“Dante’s abyss. It’s a similar competition to this most years, with a bunch of competitors sent ot the island-”
“Discount Deathgame. Got it.” Flak replied.
“So, if we use it… we’d become one being. It’d increase our power, but…” And Trevor gave a shrug. “We’d be pretty dang close.”
Princess Flak’s immediate response was to stick out her tongue, with Trevor looking up with a surprise. “Is it due to your afilliations with WYVERN?” he asks. “Did notice you talking with Lilith…” The Assassin’s lip curled with distaste.
“Huh…? Nah. No. Listen, Trev!” Flak replied, looking him in the eyes with a serious expression. “Lilith’s like, a scary acid-woman co-worker. But you’re my friend. So as far as this whole damn thing’s concerned I’m here for you first. Work still gets the coin afterwards anyways. Since we probably die in this thing…”
The princess crossed her arms with a humph. “It’s just kinda… lot to share, ya know? I grew up in a house with like, a million siblings. Didn’t even get my own room. NowI wouldn’t even be getting my own head!”
“Flak… you’ve already done a lot for me, so if you don’t want to, I understand man. We’re the flavor army either way.” Trevor will note. “But it’d definitely help us get farther.”
Flak gave a sigh, looking over the injuries Trevor had. He’d lost two of the three friends he’d made so far. He didn’t see mr. Satan off. He only had Blaidd’s smell to remember him by. “
So when was he gonna blink and miss when Trevor wasn’t around, either? Flak certainly didn’t want to be here all by himself, either way…
But there was a way to make sure. A way to make sure Trevor didn’t disappear while Flak still had something to say about it.
“I want to do it. I want to do it now, before something happens.” Flak finally said with a grunt, looking to Trevor with a nod. “...Really lucky the manual’s more pitchers than words.”
Shinku gave a knowing smile to that.
It didn’t take longer than ten minutes, as Flak’s military mind switched on for the technique, and they were ready.
Heat washed over Lauren, nearly flash-frying her in her own sweat. She dove behind a scorched boulder and clung desperately to its relatively cool backside. Where the Nazgul had brought death and malignancy, this demigod instead brought a wrath so purified that it threatened to combust the very air. Sweat dripped from her brow, immediately steaming off as it made contact with the chapped dirt. Her lungs filled with burning hot air as if she was standing downwind from an out of control bonfire. She tugged at the buttons of her jacket, stripping it to reveal a sweat-soaked blouse beneath.
“Fuck…” She muttered.
How Armstrong was managing to go toe-to-toe with that force of nature was beyond her ken. Even thinking about the demigod made her brain boil. She clutched the blitzball tight to her chest. Even if she wasn’t being baked alive she knew her chances of survival were slim. She was certain one solid strike from Asura would be enough to splatter bits of her from one end of the island to the other. Her profession relied on preparation and foresight. Ghosts and ghouls often followed very specific rules that could be exploited. But what was there to exploit in a creature who carbonized everything in a ten mile radius? What possible preparations could she have made?
“Enough of this!” Asura’s voice echoed like thunder. She chanced a peek from her cover just in time to see the demigod clasp his hands together and raise them high. Armstrong crossed his arms and braced against the incoming hammer blow. Perhaps against a normal foe this defense would have been sufficient, but a mortal’s strength was nothing before divinity. Armstrong’s guard shattered like a ceramic plate struck by a sledgehammer. He sputtered, stumbling drunkenly. Before he could recover a second blow caught him in the gut, blasting him several meters up and backward.
“Armstrong!” Lauren shouted. She looked towards the sky and shouted, “Boy Scout! Keep him off us!”
Without waiting for a response, she dove over the boulder and ran towards her fallen comrade. In moments her body started to overheat. She struggled to breath and her gait had become a stumbling lope of heat-stricken momentum. Asura screamed and the entire island screamed with him. The ground rumbled. The air roared. The plants and animals caught fire and burned. Lauren tumbled, falling in front of the downed alchemist. Had superman shirked her control or was he simply too far away to reach them in time?
“Come on,” She said, tugging at Armstrong’s limp arm, “Get up Big Guy.”
He grunted in response. A rapidly swelling knot on top of his head told her everything she needed to know. She swore under her breath and shouted again for Superman. The zombified superhero was nowhere to be found. Asura, however, crossed the battlefield in great bounding strides.
Lauren reached for the Good Samaritan, unholstering it from Armstrong’s waist and bringing it to bear against wrath incarnate. Asura did not bother with such trivialities as evasion and instead charged straight towards the barrel of her gun. She used her wrist to steady the handcannon. Her exposed skin sizzled from contact with the overheated metal. It was her turn to protect Armstrong and pain was nothing if not endurable.
The gun barked. A single slug of supersonic ammunition crashed into Asura’s skull. Sparks and slivers of obsidian sheared away from the impact. The wound exposed raw flesh for but a moment before it sizzled and seared glossy black. She fired again. And again. And again. Some bone in her wrist popped painfully from the weapon’s recoil and yet she fired again. It was no use. Like an ant trying to stop a charging rhinoceros. She fell back onto her haunches. The string holding her bonecharm together ignited and turned to ash. Her shades cracked against the heat. She brought an already lit cigarette up to her chapped lips. Asura roared.
Then he was gone. A sonic boom shattered what remained of Lauren’s shades and a blue-red blur rushed by, erasing the charging Asura. Another boom echoed across the landscape as a nearby cliff-face exploded.
Everything fell silent for a moment before Asura’s screams threatened to split the sky. Superman appeared, rocketing free from the rubble and dragging the demigod across the ground. Lava from melted stone bubbled and frothed up in their wake, drawing a trench of magma. All the while Asura screamed, throwing haymaker after haymaker into Superman’s decaying body.
“I WILL KILL YOU!” Asura roared. He grabbed the Man of Steel and slammed him into the ground. They both skidded to a stop, each of them wrestling to end up on top. Blow after blow was traded with each one forcing a spout of magma to erupt out of the ground. It all happened so fast that Lauren could only make out vague blurs of red and black as they struck one another.
“I have bathed in the blood of countless men,” Superman’s voice cut through the violence. Lauren shivered. She had never heard him speak so clearly since his death. Superman flew backwards and fired a twin beam of red-hot energy into Asura’s torso. The demigod stumbled, pushed back by the constant force. He raised a hand to block the beam and slowly marched forward. Superman continued, “Do you loathe me? Do you hate me with every fiber of your being, little demigod? You shallow fool. Blood! Darkness! I shall drown this world in both! I am the sword of despair and I will kill you a thousand times--”
“YOU TALK TOO MUCH!”
Asura dipped beneath the heat rays, his fist scraping against the ground. The divine fist struck Superman’s jaw with enough force to make Lauren’s ears bleed. A shockwave blew outwards as Superman was ejected into the stratosphere. Such a strike was not without cost, however. Asura’s wrath petered out. The heat seemed less oppressive as the demigod fell to a knee. His chest heaved with exertion. Lauren moved to turn towards Armstrong. If she could drag him away before that beast recovered then perhaps they could…
“This battle is far from over!” Armstrong shouted, climbing to his feet. He punched his fists together and strode forward. Blood covered his face, but beneath all of the dirt and bruising the man was still sparkling.
“Armstrong!” Lauren hissed, “What are you doing?”
“This has been the most invigorating battle I’ve had since coming to this wretched place,” He explained, but did not slow his gait, “Asura! You are quite a formidable foe! I would rather die than back down from a chance to face you in combat!”
“Approaching me?” Asura chuckled. He inhaled deeply, seemingly re-stoking the furnace that was his body, and stood. He swaggered towards the alchemist and shouted, “I’ll beat you to a bloody pulp for your arrogance!”
I WILL KILL ALL OF YOU
#003 Alex Louis Armstrong, #012 Laurentius Abernathy
Asura's body moved like it was utterly lacking in bones, his charred hide flowing and undulating almost like liquid as he charged forward. Alternately scrabbling on all fours and sprinting on two legs, he leaped forward in a reckless charge at Armstrong, his maw spread wide and bellowing out a wordless roar of challenge.
Armstrong himself let out a wordless shout in response, surging forward to meet the incoming demigod. Asura landed with a blistering swipe of his clawed hands, leaving a trail of embers and rippling waves of heat in the air, which the strongarm alchemist deftly ducked and weaved under. His gauntleted fists then sparked as he threw out blow after blow, punching and pummeling with a controlled fury, steadily advancing forward. Asura's body recoiled and convulsed, each mighty fist landing with a sound like crackling glass and crumbling stone. Flakes of the charred black crust of Asura's body flakes and splintered off, exposing the raw flesh and molten orange of pure, burning wrath beneath.
Armstrong's hands trembled an shook, skin moving long past burned to outright charred, the flesh beneath beginning to audibly sizzle. Were it not for the searing temperatures, his fists would no doubt be slick with his own bloody; but in such heat, the blood boiled and steamed away near instantly, leaving only a dark black sheen over his shaking hands and forearms.
As one colossal fist impacted the wrathful demigod in his midsection, folding him around it in a way that would have been comical in any other circumstances, Asura reacted with a sudden swiftness, and his hands took hold of the state alchemist's arm. His claws dug in, tearing through skin like paper and immediately producing the telltale sound and smell of sizzling, cooking meat, as he wrenched himself around, delivering a devastating headbutt to his much larger foe's face. Both of them went toppling over, for very different reasons.
Asura was quick to roll back to his feet, momentarily crouched on all fours, as he heaved ragged, rasping breaths, the air before him almost looking ready to combust. And then his head slowly lifted, his unblinking stare fixating on the other one here. The one controlling that mangled, undead puppet. A low, rumbling noise like a ravaged, pained and starving animal emitted from his throat. He took one step forward, rising up to his full height and looking ready to break into a mad pounce, before he was blindsided by a literal cannon of stone, a projectile the size of a small car catching him broadside.
For a moment, time seemed to slow down as Asura's scorched and burnt body compressed, squishing and contorting to nearly meld with the side of the great boulder, burying half of his face into it, even as the entire thing began to slowly but steadily turn yellow, then orange, then bright cherry red.
Then time resumed, and the boulder rolled over, crushing the demigod beneath its hulk and continuing to roll and tumble along even as it burst into molten fragments and left Asura rolling and flopping along, flakes and shards of his charred, blackened hide breaking off, spattering the landscape with more of his thick, burning orange blood.
A sound of groaning, straining metal sounded as he planted one foot firmly, heaving himself up. The pained rasping of his breath grew yet more labored, straining and gasping, each breath sounding as labored and difficult as ten had just minutes ago.
A dull twinkle shone in the sky above, like one of the many stars.
"You think you're....strong....?" Asura lifted a hand to wipe his mouth, as the exposed molten orange of his skin and blood slowly began to blacken and char all over again, an unsettling sound somewhere between the snapping of especially brittle bones and the crackling of rapidly-forming ice. "...you don't know...what strong is..." His breathing grew stronger and more rapid, as his wrath began to rekindle, visible flames flickering from the vents in his back and from between his maw. "I won't just show you....I'll show everyone...I'll show everything...." He roared to the heavens again, the earth trembling and fires catching as a fresh wave of heat and desiccation exploded out from him. "I'LL KILL THEM ALL! KILL EVERYTHING!"
The twinkling star in the sky shone again, much closer...and then there was a loud, roaring BOOM, as a red and blue blur shot by, hitting Asura and driving him into a hole, deep in the earth. Like a dolphin skimming and leaping out of the water, they burst forth some dozen yards further on, locked in another titanic clash.
They tumbled and crashed with each other again, rolling and punching and kicking as they crashed along the heat-scorched terrain. Over the edge of a cliff, down into the shadow of a ravine. Unearthly roars echoed from within, flashes of searing red light and bursts of molten-orange mantra, the dull reverberating boom of every solid blow they landed on each other.
Then the earth ruptured and split open, as Asura was launched flying out of it, tumbling and spinning through the air. His body twisted and contorted unnaturally, as he flailed about to try and right himself for a landing.
And it was then that something clicked for Lauren, as she lifted a shaking hand to uselessly wipe at her face. "Armstrong..." she managed to croak out, her mouth as dry as a desert. "....it's...it's his own power. He's killing himself."
Armstrong slowly lumbered up to stand beside her, looking incredibly woozy and uneven on his feet. "What...what do you mean?"
"His anger. It's...consuming him, in a very literal fashion." She shuddered at the implication as more things clicked into place in her head. "His body can't keep up with his own power output. He's doing just as much damage to himself by just trying to attack us as we're doing to him. If we can just keep the pressure on him, then..."
Armstrong's concussed mind took several precious moments to make the connection. "Then he will burn out before we do," he finally rumbled.
"Exactly. So all we need to do is...." she trailed off, looking grim.
"....so be it, then." Armstrong set his jaw, and took a more solid stance.
"Next time he burns himself out...we lay into him with everything we've got."
Their chance came only seconds later, when Superman rode the demigod express to face-melt junction, as the being of wrath incarnate quite literally came crashing down in a fiery comet, using the fallen hero to cushion his landing, clawed hands wrapped around the zombified kryptonian's face.
They hit the ground with a tremendous explosion, both of them thrown in opposite directions. Superman tumbling end over end to land sprawled on his side, while Asura went skittering and scrabbling along in unsteady leaping bounds and strides, desperately fighting to remain upright....but faltering at the end, dropping to his hands and knees. And with a sharp whoosh the furnace in him went out momentarily, the bright molten orange and red inferno dying down a a mere yellow glow as he rasped and panted, his shaking body heaving and struggling for every breath.
"Now!" Lauren shouted, as she raised the Good Samaritan in her shaking hands, and let loose. Shot after shot after shot, reloading to keep firing as fast as her trembling, scorched fingers and shattered wrist would allow.
Armstrong stormed forward, his gauntleted fists smashing together as he laid down a circular path around their wrathful foe, slamming blow after blow into the ground and sending up jagged spike after pummeling fist after crushing wall to endlessly batter and crush Asura.
Each strike staggered and winded the weakening demigod, soo enough beginning to produce gouts of lava-like orange blood to spatter the landscape.
....then Superman loomed behind him, his eyes a bright red and standing out starkly against his silhouette in the blackness of night. "You're...mine...!" he roared, and suddenly the blade of Soul Edge, grafted to his arm, burst through the wrathful demigod's chest in a fountain of molten energy, obsidian shards and dark orange blood.
The impact let out a sharp whoosh over the field of battle, and all at once, the charred black coating over Asura's body...burst apart, with all the swiftness of a candle being blown out. His real body hung there, impaled, as Superman slowly lifted it above his head, twisting and wrenching his arm to and fro. Asura gurgled and sputtered, as his eyes rolled back in his head and with a final, earsplitting CRACK he went still, hoisted directly in the air above the fallen paragon.
Lauren sank to her knees as the oppressive heat and inferno was abruptly ended, the stark change in temperature nearly knocking her out then and there. She could only stare at the sight before her, as dark orange blood dripped down the blade of Soul Edge, toward its central eye...and its yellow, reptilian pupil stared directly back at her, the bright molten-orange glow of Asura's wrath flickering dimly along the corrupted blade's edges.
Armstrong used one application of Focus
Armstrong suffers grievous burn-related trauma to his hands and forearms from prolonged close combat with Asura (Major Injury altogether), as well as repeated bashing and general contusions to his head, face and forearms (Major Injury altogether)
Lauren suffers from major, debilitating heat stroke that will impair her for some time but shouldn't prove lethal (Minor Injury), as well as severe damage to both wrists and forearms from repeated use of the Good Samaritan (Major Injury)
Zuperman has been heavily damaged and battered, but...he's a soul-edge corrupted zombie. Kind of hard to do much to that, y'know?
Soul Edge has been further powered up.
Zayin stared absent-mindlessly at the rocket launcher, currently in the possession of Kiryu, a habit that he had picked up since Mr Satan’s tragic passing.
“Hey hey hey, Kiryu-chan, he’s doing it again!” Majima cried out, startling Zayin as he dropped face-first out of a tree, landing with a heavy ‘thud!’. Scrambling to his feet, apparently unphased by the fall, the Mad Dog put his hands on his hips like a stern father as he looked down at the angel. “You gave us that sweet-ass launcher fair and square, no take-backs!”
“Huh? Oh, no, I know.” The living weapon said desperately, raising his arms appealingly in an attempt to talk the Yakuza down.
“It’s fine, Majima-san.” Kiryu sighed before turning to Zayin, giving him a slightly less stoic, slightly more concerned look. “I’m curious though, why have you been staring?”
The angel was silent for a few minutes before running a sheepish hand through his hair.
“I don’t know…” he sighed. “I know it’s pretty ridiculous, but I keep kind of hoping that it’ll turn into an angel.”
Not only the yakuza, but even Nanaue stopped dead in their tracks at the absolutely insane thing that just came out of their companion’s mouth. Coda, however, briefly wore a knowing look on her face before quickly suppressing it.
“Hate to break it to ya, kid, but Mr Satan’s already an angel.” Majima said, slapping Zayin on the shoulder and gazing wistfully off into the sky, a single tear trailing down his cheek.
“…huh? But angels don’t…” The living weapon murmured, looking around at the group baffled. “Does… does it work differently here?”
“Yeah, it does.” Coda said gently, coming over to lay a hand on the same shoulder that the Mad Dog’s hand was currently on, putting hers awkwardly on top of his.
“Wait, you know what he’s talking about?” The Yakuza said incredulously as he turned to her. “I didn’t know you were his shrink.”
“Shrink?” Zayin said, his tone slightly distressed as he gingerly touched the top of his head. “I’m not that tall, I don’t think I can afford one of those.”
“Majima-san, stop teasing, he’s not crazy.” Coda sighed. “Tell them where angels come from in your world, Zayin.”
“Well… I thought it was common knowledge, but alright.” The living weapon agreed. “Where I’m from, if a legendary hero dies nobly, like Mr Satan, their weapon can be blessed by the Heroic Expanse and take on a life of its own. That’s how angels are born.”
There was a quiet silence over the group as they processed this piece of information before it was broken by Kiryu, his face taking on an even more serious expression than normal.
“That’s rad!” He exclaimed. “What weapon are you?”
“Those twin swords I wielded when we fought that witch for the… ‘disco ball’, was it?” He explained. Kiryu nodded while Nanaue looked on blankly, staring at his own sword as the cogs in his brain attempted to both turn clockwise. Majima, though, furrowed his brow.
“Wait, you’re one guy made from two-”
“WE DON’T TALK ABOUT IT!” Zayin shouted with uncharacteristic intensity. Another silence fell over the group as they all stared at the angel who currently wore a slightly terrified expression.
“Ahem.” Coda cleared her throat, attempting to change the subject. “It’s a shame that didn’t happen, angel of the rocket launcher would be pretty useful for taking out zombies.”
“Bah! We don’t need ‘em.” Majima scoffed, hands on his hips. “You know, Kiryu and I once fought off a zombie apocalypse.”
“What?” The Carnivale Employee choked incredulously while the living weapon found that it was his turn to look at the Mad Dog as if he had lost his mind.
“Not this again.” Kiryu groaned, facepalming as his fellow Yakuza let out a boisterous laugh.
“Gahahaha! That’s right! Those Omi alliance bastards tried to take over Kamurocho with zombies to get revenge on Kiryu-chan, but they were no match for us!” He cackled, looking off dreamily as if reliving his glory days. “We killed their boss and held ‘em off until the JSDF could get there. I even thought I got bit, but the old bastard had dentures in!”
Coda and Zayin looked at one another, unable to comprehend what they were hearing. The angel mouthed ‘what?’ to her silently, to which the Carnival Employee shrugged, bewildered.
“None of this was in his file.” She hissed quietly, glancing over and jumping a little as she realised that Kiryu had added himself to their little huddle.
“He does this sometimes, I think he hit his head while watching a zombie movie or something.” He murmured, though their subtlety was probably unnecessary. At the moment, Majima was loudly and animatedly describing his battle with a mutated zombie at a batting cage to a short-circuited Nanaue. “Just go along with it, alright?”
The two gave uncertain nods to their companion before rejoining the other two, giving the Mad Dog approving grins.
“Why didn’t you say so sooner, Majima-san?!” Coda asked. “We’re in safe hands with you, right Zayin?”
“I- Y-Yes, of course!” He replied desperately, still more than a little incredulous that Majima had implied that he was crazy.
“It appears we have found the safehouse reported. The outer systems are online.” Chorus intoned, standing next to his crass companion.
“Yeah, but the question is whether someone’s in there we’ll need to… drag out.” Lilith replied with a sinister smile, one that belied her eyes quickly moving between every camera, every wall. While she was fine taking pain, she was no fool - nor was she about to let herself be easy prey to some idiot’s land-mine. Lord Ridley expected her to perform at her best.
It took a moment of searching, before Chorus spoke up. “We believe we may have our answer. The gate is locked, but powered. Either the systems malfunctioned, or someone has taken residence.
All at once, at his statement, cameras across the outside turned on, and a speaker came online. “Pretty smart robot. Hey Lilith, is this one with you?” a feminine, quiet voice came across the speakers.
“Uhhh… I don’t know you, bitch, what’s it to you?” Lilith asked, peeking curiously into a nearby camera. ““Chara, is that you? Should've told me ya wanted to go for round two!”
“Man, like, terrible time to bring her up, really. But I’m an ally. Mostly. Why don’t I open the gate and let my new comrades in? Hail WYVERN, or all that…. Ridley needs to give us something to call out for a war cry. How’m I to command troops without one?”
Lilith steps back a couple feet, the situation actually absurd enough to cause her a moment of hesitation as her brain tried to connect the dots. Heedless of this, the gate opened up with a mechanical whirr.
“Risk assessment: Inconclusive. Query: should we enter the bunker?” the Chorus’s mechanical voice intoned, looking over to Lilith.
“Dude, I’m way too curious to avoid having a nice… meeting with whoever this is~” Lilith added with a grin. “Not about to avoid a nice invitation into this girl’s hole.”
“Heh. Sex pun.” Came over the speakers.
It took a minute or two of navigating the bunker and its different sections before Lilith sniffed the trail. She was nothing if not a good hunter, and she was pretty capable of figuring out the signs of habitation. In this case, bits of chicken.
The two turned to a sight neither of them recognized - or were particularly understanding of.
The woman sitting in a rolling office chair was most noticeable from the striking set of horns above her head, framing her long, black hair. Her tanned skin had tattoos hidden across it, but most of them were more or less covered by the ripped dress, as she stood with a buzzing tapping of her foot and her hands clasped together.
“So, stupid question, since, like, robot and acid woman, but either of you eat?” the woman asked, turning to both of them, and now they could see the full set of equipment she had. A Blade was clasped in one hand, even as she sat at the table, and a gun sat in her holster. A beautiful talisman brimming with an unearthly glimmer sat around her neck, and a cube sat very still in her other hand.
In front of her, neatly unwrapped, was a disturbing sight. Twin slabs of chicken encasing cheese that had long since dried into an orange mush around cold bacon.
“See, haven’t really been interested since putting on this ring - only kept track after I started existing, but it was happening before that. And this is kind of a lot of food to waste. So, Double Down?”
LIlith looked her up and down, like she was trying to figure out the punchline to a joke she didn’t quite get, while the Chorus looked up.
“Identification, please.” the machine asked.
“My name?” She asked, processing it with a blink. “Well, I am the one-woman army. The Princess of Flavor. Or just, Flavor for short. Don’t worry if you didn’t know it before, I’m only around an hour old? Word doesn’t travel that fast.” She babbled with a lopsided grin.
“An hour? wait…” Lilith added with a groan. “I know you… both of you. Flak? And… the assassin.”
“Ya-huh. Nice to meet ya. We went ahead and did the fusion thing, put our heads together, ensured our friendship’s going to be all death game, baby!” She added with a grin, hugging onto herself as she did so. “And I gotta say? Can’t imagine a better set-up. Trevor gave me brain cells, Flak gave me attitude, we collaborated on the rest! And now… Ta-da!” She yelled, standing up with both of her arms flailing into the air… before bringing them back down to hide the amount of skin shown by the ruined dress.
“Gotta go ahead and get this sewn up a little ‘fore I leave this base thing. Think they have supplies for that.’
“You really don’t have to.” Lilith teased, looking the woman up and down, as she placed a hand on her hip.
The Chorus cut the conversation off with a high-pitched screech that caused both the othes to refocus their attention, Flavor hopping a foot in the air by surprise and nearly impaling a horn into the ceiling.
“You are a combined organic? How did you achieve this form?” Chorus asked, after gaining the conversation’s attention.
“Oh, we had to like, do a thing. Don’t think it’s normal. Though I don’t think it’s unheard of? My trev side’s telling me it’s happened a few times here. This one was dancing!” she added.
Lilith looked up. “Right. And it just… turned you into a girl, too?”
“Oh no, that was the magical crown we swiped. And the wraithy part’s the ring we swiped. And the power suit we gots now…” The woman motioned to the cube, crushing it, as the protective power armor once worn by Peter washed over her. “...This thing is from the same fight we earned fusion from. If Ridley likes watching a good beatdown, I’d say we earned a pretty big raise!” the fused warrior taunted, her voice somewhat distorted by the visor.
“Wow, you’ve been busy, huh. Well, then it’s time to come help your boss out, deliver a few WYVERN family murder-orgys and win this-”
“Ah-ah-ah.” the Loudmouthed assassin added with a smile, looking between the two. ‘Fusion, remember? Not just Flak. Which means I remember last DA, and, uhh, lemme tell ya…” She replied to lilith. “You didn’t make a good impression to half of us there.”
The girl stood up straight, Morgul blade at the ready. “So deal ain’t so simple, toots!”
Lilith sighed, yet a smile came across her face. “Oh, you’re getting feisty! so are you looking to go?” She asked, enthusiasm creeping into her voice as Chorus got into a fighting crouch.
“...Well, not right now. Could’ve just attacked you then, and not offered you the power of the double down.”
“This double down has magical powers?” Chorus questioned.
“Don’t get caught up in the details right now.” Lilith noted. “Okay, then, spit it out, girl. I kinda liked how Flak was at least direct.”
“We make it to the finals. Me, you, and Robot Kazoo. Then We have a little duel once I’ve done what I have to for Ridley. And I stab you until I feel better.” The fusion cheerfully stated.
“Wow, you do know how to sell me on a good time. Deal!” Lilith replies, though Chorus put up a hand.
“Do you have anything extra to offer other than your assistance?” Chorus asked.
The fusion tapped on her helmet a couple times with the Morgul blade in her off-hand, making a metallic clink. “Well… I won’t kill you right now. Which, I think Ridley’s okay with if you’re being mean and uncommoditive. Uncommoditive? Uncooperative. Thanks, new brain cells!”
Flavor gave a grin through her visor as she continued, “Which I could do pretty easily, don’t get me wrong. But the other thing is that I got here with some of the best loot. And I literally can’t wear it all.”
The one-woman Army gave a nod to the camera feed showing a storage room - one with a makeshift armory and a hell of a lot of equipment.
“Now, if I don’t have to remove some arms, why don’t we go get you some?” Flavor asked with a smug grin. “Heh. that was wordplay!”
