Art shook his head. “Everyone has their own way of preparing,” he said to himself. And then, louder: “As you wish.”
He moved to the ropes near where he had left his overnight bag and nimbly jumped over them onto the lawn. The grass felt cool and damp under his feet. Perhaps slippery, he thought. Something else to take into account.
Away from the torches’ glare Art found himself surrounded by four big men. One carried two large knives, another held a length of pipe, the other two were bare-handed.
“There is no need for fighting among ourselves, we who come from Earth,” Art said as he sized them up. They were big, it was true, and apparently strong, but it seemed to him that they were most likely self-taught in the martial arts. Their stances did not reflect any particular school. “The enemy is Shang Tsung and his warriors of Outworld. We humans are on the same team.”
“Maybe we don’t want you on our team,” the man with the pipe in his hands replied. “We think we’re better off without your kind.”
“That,” Art said, “is regrettable.”
The four began to close in.
In the tunnels underground, Johnny led while Liu and Sonya followed. From floor to ceiling the tunnel was filled with giant spiderwebs. Johnny brushed them aside and continued forward.
“I think it’s safe to assume that no one’s been this way in a while,” Sonya commented.
“I don’t care about that”, Liu said. “Not as much as I worry about meeting the spiders who put these things in place.”
“I think we had some of them for dinner,” Sonya said. “Hey, Johnny, what’s your sense of direction say?”
“We’re still on the right path,” Johnny said. “You know what I said about Kitana’s perfume? I still smell it.”
“The only thing I smell is bullshit,” Sonya said quietly, but Johnny didn’t hear.
They turned another corner and found an opening into a larger chamber. They walked out into the bigger room.
“See?” Johnny said. “I told you I’d find the way out.”
“This is out?” Liu said. His eyes took in the room. Stalactites and stalagmites, flaring torches, a golden throne…
“We’re right back where we started.”
They were alone. The table was still covered by the wreckage of Kano’s meal, but neither Kano, Goro, nor any of the guards was in sight.
“Yeah, I think I did pretty good,” Johnny said. He gestured at the wide stairway. “Out is that direction.”
The trio started toward the stairs, across the deserted open center of the room. With a clatter of armor, two guards appeared from the gloom in front of them. The three humans froze.
“I don’t like this,” Liu said.
“Me neither,” Sonya said.
“Not too bad,” said Johnny. “Two of them, three of us. Piece of cake.”
Two more guards appeared, coming around to the group’s left rear. Another two came up behind them from the right.
“Oh, hell,” Sonya said.
“Okay,” Johnny said. “Still not too bad. There’s only six of them. That’s two apiece for all of us.”
“So you can count,” Sonya said. She looked at the advancing guards. “I sure hope you can fight, too.”
In Goro’s cavern throne room, Liu and Sonya took defensive stances behind Johnny, feet widely spaced, hands curled in loose fists.
The guards circled the group. Sonya and Liu turned with them until the three humans stood in an open triangle, all of them facing outward in different directions. Armor clattered and clacked. Only the guards’ eyes were visible behind their grotesque bone helmets.
Two of the guards split off to confront Liu. One of them took a stance in front of Sonya. The others arranged themselves in front of Johnny.
“Three?” Johnny said. “How come I get three?” He addressed the trio of guards in front of him. “So what’s the matter with those other guys?”
Moving as one, all of the guards attacked, their dragon lances spinning in circles above their heads.
Sonya watched her opponent rush in. She counted slowly, one, two, three. On three she jumped straight up, arms extended. She grabbed the guard’s lance just below the head in both hands as she overheard in a vertical somersault.
The guard kept his grip on the lance even though the girl in front of him had vanished. Then Sonya came down from her somersault, still holding the lance. She had twisted in midair so she was now facing the guard’s back. Using her momentum to carry her, she rolled away, pulling the guard over as she fell on her back.
With both legs she kicked up, taking the guard in the spine as she went down. The armored creature lost its balance and its grip on the lance and fell. Her legs caught it and pushed it away. It flew over her head into the darkness.
Sonya completed her roll back to her feet, captured lance in hand. As part of the same motion she leapt in the direction in which her guard had fallen. She used the lance like a vaulting pole to send herself flying feet-first to where the guard was coming to its feet in a defensive stance. It swept her legs with its left arm in a circular block that forced her to drop to the stone floor. She barely missed smashing into the guard’s face with her boots.
“Fast,” Sonya said, “but not fast enough.”
She whipped the end of the lance forward, chest-high, using all the force of her shoulders to punch it toward the guard.
In another part of the main room Liu dropped to the floor, catching himself on his hands as the first attack pressed home. Spinning on his hands, he scissored out his legs, catching the legs of one of the guards who faced him. The guard fell, and its momentum lifted Liu back onto his feet.
Liu sprang into the air, coming down heels first on the back of the fallen guard, his legs snapping straight down in a vertical kick at the moment of impact.
The guard had been trying to lift itself to its hands and knees. The force of Liu’s attack dropped it straight back to the floor, the wind driven from its lungs.
Liu jumped again, straight up, using the body of his fallen opponent for a trampoline as the lance of his second foe passed whistling through the place where his torso had been a fraction of a second earlier. At the top of his leap, Liu fired a snap kick at the second guard’s face and connected.
He kicked again and again, five times in rapid succession, each kick smashing into the guard’s armored faceplate, before he hit the ground again. Without a moment’s hesitation he sprang backward, his body forming a perfect arch. He caught himself on his hands, then continued the leap backward to regain his feet.
The guard’s lance swung down at him as he jumped away. Only sheer nimbleness kept Liu from being cut in two by the swinging steel head of the lance. The guard recovered its balance and took a slow step forward.
As Liu and Sonya fought their opponents, Johnny took a slow step to the side, dropping his center of gravity, being very careful not to cross his feet as he moved. The three guards who faced him were moving, too, forward and to the sides, trying to get him into the center of a triangle. Once he was surrounded, Johnny knew, they would attack.
No reason, he thought, for him to wait on their convenience. He did a fast jump to his right, closing his range to the guard on that side and hooking the creature’s leg out from under it. The guard didn’t lose its balance – that would be too much to hope for with such a simple move – but the maneuver did change the rhythm of the contest and gave the initiative to Johnny.
Now, instead of reacting to the guards, they would have to react to him.
Using the same motion he had used to sweep the first guard’s leg, Johnny spun around and brought up his right left in a flying roundhouse kick to the second guard’s head. Even that guard wasn’t Johnny’s main target. He continued to spin, drawing closer to the third guard. Once he got in range, his left hand whipped out to grasp the creature’s left wrist.
Johnny pulled and twisted himself, using the guard’s mass to alter his momentum, until he was standing behind and
to the guard’s left, the Outworlder’s left arm extended across his body in front of him. Johnny kicked with his right leg, a fast circle to the back of the guard’s knees. At the same time he smashed his right fist in hammer-hand position into the middle of the guard’s chest. The warrior fell backward.
Johnny went down with it, going to one knee, his left thigh parallel to the ground. The guard’s left arm came across Johnny’s thigh, and its own falling weight broke its elbow.
Johnny let go and rolled to the right, snatching up the lance the guard had dropped when it hit the floor. He rolled to his feet, lance before him.
His wounded opponent rolled until it was facedown, then used its good arm to rise. A glittering knife appeared in the guard’s good hand. Johnny’s other two opponents circled wide, getting on opposite sides of him.
Johnny raised the captured lance above his head, holding it in both hands in a blocking position. He felt a blow strike into the wooden center of the haft, a blow which had been meant for his head. But he didn’t dare linger. The other guard was thrusting in at Johnny’s unprotected stomach. He swung his lance down, still holding it with both hands, and only barely managed to knock the blow aside. The barbed steel head of the lance missed his body by a fraction of an inch.
Sonya, not twenty feet away, felt the handle of her lance tingle in her hands with the impact of its head on the side of her guard. But the armored creature didn’t seem to notice the blow. It stepped forward, hands moving as it sought an opening in her defenses. She whipped up the butt of the lance, hoping to take the guard in the groin, but it twisted so that the weapon struck it on its armored side. The guard stepped forward again, seeking to grapple with her.
Sonya braced for the attack.
Not far away, Liu Kang eyed the guard in front of him. He paused for a moment to judge the range, then rolled forward, lance in hand. His guard swung its weapon down at him, but the lance head struck the floor and not his rapidly moving body. Sparks flew as the steel hit the stone pavement.
Liu stopped himself by slapping the floor with both hands. He jumped up, his open hand angled upward to catch the guard under the edge of its helmet. The guard moved its head aside, but Liu swung his arm and struck a blow which spun the Outworld fighter halfway around.
Johnny Cage, meanwhile, was too busy to pay attention to what Liu was doing. The actor watched the progress of his three opponents warily. One of them was wounded, but they were all still dangerous. He tucked up his captured lance beneath his arm, and thrust it backward with all the strength in his arms and shoulders. The weapon took the guard behind him in the center of its solar plexus. The creature stopped, confused.
Johnny whipped the weapon forward, then up and over his shoulder, catching it with his left hand before bringing it whistling forward again. The lance’s speed and momentum increased as he stepped forward.
On her side of the room, Sonya choked up her grip on the lance she held, holding it close to one end. Then with a wild yell she jumped up and over the guard who faced her, landing on her feet behind him. She passed the lance in front of the guard’s throat, then grasped the free end of the weapon in her left hand, with her arms crossed behind the guard’s head. Then she put her knee in the small of the guard’s back, and pulled.
The guard arched backward under the force of Sonya’s attack. The center of her lance forced itself up under the guard’s helmet, tight against the creature’s throat. The guard tried in vain to break the hold. Sonya evaded its grabs and kicks and held the lance in place until its struggles slowed.
At last the creature hung limp in her grasp. She let it fall to the floor, then turned to see what was going on with her two companions.
Liu Kang, meanwhile, had seized the discarded lance of his first opponent. He held it out with both hands in front of him parallel to the ground. The metal shone at both ends, blade and spike, with the center of the lance made of polished wood. Liu sprang upward, his right knee rising as he smashed down with the lance, and the wooden shaft broke across his thigh. Then he tossed the broken pieces upward, allowing them to spin, and caught them again, one in each hand, holding each by the wood close to the splintered end.
He had a weapon in each hand now, and he spun them in fast figure eights before him, the air whistling with the speed of the movements. Grinning, he fixed his eyes on the eyes of the guard, and took a springing step forward.
Johnny Cage tossed his head to throw the sweat from his eyes. He feinted at the nearest guard, then drove the center of his lance into the forehead armor of the next. Johnny spun again, looking for his third opponent, when he saw that one fall backward seemingly on its own. A lance had smashed across the backs of both of its knees. As it fell, the lance smashed down again, taking it in the head. The guard hit the floor hard, and lay still.
There stood Liu, a part of the lance in each hand, grinning.
Johnny spun again, and saw another guard, who until that moment had been fighting him, now lying on its back on the floor. Sonya stood beside it, leaning on her spear.
“Leave one for me,” Johnny said.
He hooked the head of his lance on the shoulder of the wounded guard. He dragged the creature out of position, then suddenly reversed the direction of his swing. The heavy head of Johnny’s lance struck the guard beneath the point of its jaw, where the helmet joined the body armor. The guard flew backward, crumpled, and lay still.
Johnny straightened up and looked about him. The torches in the cavern were still burning, but now only the three humans remained standing.
“Just like I like ’em,” Sonya said, surveying the damage. Six guards lay unmoving among the stalagmites. “Dumb and ugly.”
“Piece of cake,” Johnny agreed.
Liu was going from one fallen guard to the next, nudging each one with his foot. Now he turned to stare at Sonya and Johnny in disbelief. “A piece of cake you say?”
Johnny shrugged. “Well, it was easy for me.” Liu still looked dubious, and in a sudden explosion of frustration, Johnny continued, “What is it with you, man? We’re standing, they’re not! What more do you want?”
As if in answer, someone nearby began to clap in slow, steady applause. Johnny turned toward the source of the sound.
Rayden sat on the stone stairway leading up out of Goro’s throne room. “Very impressive,” the God of Lightning said. “Congratulations.”
He stopped clapping and pointed back into the shadows of the cavern. Johnny followed the gesture. The darkness was alive with moving reflections of torchlight – and with more guards, dozens of them, all bearing lances and encased in organic armor.
“Now tell me,” Rayden asked, “what do the three of you intend to do about them?”
The human companions exchanged glances of resignation and turned to face the oncoming guards.
Then Rayden got up from his place on the steps. Calmly, he walked over to stand between the humans and the host of guards. He held up a warning finger.
“Remember,” he said. “To attack, other than in a recorded and entered Mortal Kombat, is forbidden to all creatures of Outworld.”
Still glowering at the humans, the guards stepped back.
“This is the way out,” Rayden said. And slowly he led the three humans away from the massed ranks of Outworld warriors, out of the caverns and up toward the open night.
Out on the torchlit fighting field, Art Lean faced the last of his four opponents, the man still held the knives up in a defensive cross, but he was otherwise nearly immobile. He was kneeling on the grass, and seemed hurt. Not as badly hurt as the other three, perhaps; they lay unconscious where they had fallen.
“I’m really sorry that I can’t stay and help you and your friends,” Art said. “But you have to understand, I’m tired after my long journey to get here, and I need to get some sleep.”
“Come on, you son of a bitch, I ain’t afraid of you,” the knife-wielder snarled. “This fight ain’t over yet!”
“You’re mistaken,” Art s
aid.
His left foot snapped forward, between the raised knives, taking the man just below the ribs. The fellow was knocked backward and away with his arms flung wide. The two knives flew off into the dark.
Art bowed to his fallen opponent, then turned to collect his shoes and socks and his overnight back. That done, he looked around the field again.
“I wonder where the sleeping places are?” he asked aloud. “I wasn’t kidding about needing to get some rest.”
The entrance to the great tunnel was bathed in starlight as Liu, Johnny, and Sonya emerged, led by Rayden. They stopped as soon as they entered the garden outside the gate to the underground throne room of the Prince of Shokan.
“Now you have seen what you’ll be facing in the tournament,” Rayden said, looking closely at the three.
“You mean Goro?” Johnny asked.
“And Shang Tsung,” Rayden replied. “And the guards.”
“Will Shang Tsung fight in the tournament?” Liu wanted to know.
“If he chooses,” Rayden replied. The pale starlight made the garden seem a ghostly silver, with deep shadows forming inky pools between the shrubberies. Rayden himself appeared as a spectral form in the dimness. “As a former champion he has that right. And he’s far more dangerous than Goro. His demon power comes from the souls of vanquished warriors. To fight Shang Tsung is to face not one, but a legion of adversaries.” The God of Lightning turned to look directly at Liu. “Remember that.”
“Then how can we win?” Sonya asked. Her shoulders were stiff with tension.
“Goro can be killed,” Rayden replied, turning directly to face the Special Forces officer. “Shang Tsung’s power can be destroyed by mortal men and women. You can overcome any adversary, no matter how bizarre their powers may seem. There is always a way. Only one thing can defeat you: your own fear.”
“Who says we’re afraid?” Johnny challenged.
“Who says you are not? You must first face your fears if you are to conquer them,” Rayden said. “You, Johnny, are afraid people will think you’re a fake. So you’ll rush into any fight to prove you’re not. You’ll fight bravely enough, but foolishly, carelessly, without thinking. And you’ll be beaten.”
Mortal Kombat: The Movie Page 10