by Ramy Vance
The viceroy nodded her consent. “I choose Suzuki and Chip. You may now enter the ring.”
Chip looked up at the rest of the Mundanes and Horsemen, bewildered. “How does she know my name?” Chip asked. “I’ve never seen or heard of this techno-broad in my life. How’d she get my particulars?”
Suzuki shrugged his shoulders as he pulled out his ax and approached the arena. “Don’t worry about it, Chip,” he assured her. “The Horsemen are famous. She’d be a shitty evil lieutenant if she didn’t know your name.”
“I don’t know, Little Fearless Leader. Something don’t seem right.”
Suzuki and Chip stepped into the arena. Ashegoreth and the giant were already waiting for the two MERCs. A plan was brewing in Suzuki’s mind. He knew that it was a long shot but at this point, everything seemed like a longshot.
He looked at Chip, who smiled at him uneasily as the invisible walls of the arena closed down around them.
23
The air around the arena was electric.
The two armies stood at opposite sides of the arena, each glaring at their enemies through the arena or cheering on the appointed champions. From inside the arena, Suzuki marveled at what the viceroy had built in honor of the Dark One. It was almost a Roman coliseum. And nearly everyone watching was a pawn to the Dark One’s foul machinations. There wasn’t much time to wonder about it, though. The red dragon and giant were patiently waiting for the viceroy’s command. The viceroy was perched in her throne above the arena, smiling smugly.
Suzuki also noticed that the monolith beneath her was vibrating strongly.
When Suzuki looked closely at Ashegoreth, he could see that the techno-organic decay had spread farther down her wings. The monolith was definitely responsible for causing the change. The microchips were for control and the monoliths for elevation. If he got out of this alive, those distinctions could be the key to destroying what the Dark One had created.
The viceroy lifted her hands, electronic tendrils and cables stretching from her fingertips, hooking herself into the throne and building behind her. “Let the battle begin!” she shouted.
Ashegoreth took to the air instantly, screaming and spewing fire at the arena below.
Suzuki ran, dodging the jet of fire as it came for him. He recalled his ax and pulled out his plasma pistol, firing three shots at the red dragon. The plasma shots bounced off the red dragon’s chest, obviously causing no harm. Fuck, Suzuki thought.
Chip had rolled to the side, both of her arms converting to a plasma cannon. She fired two shots at Ashegoreth. The plasma blasts were huge and brimming with energy, tearing up the ground as they rocketed toward Ashegoreth. The dragon swooped out of the way, letting the plasma blasts hit the invisible barrier and dissipate.
Across the arena, the giant was barreling toward Chip. She turned just in time to see the giant’s energy club nail her across the chest. She went flying and landed in a heavy heap beside Suzuki, who ran to her side and helped her up. “Come on, Chip, we got this. We just gotta plan it. Avoid Ashegoreth, take down the giant, and then we’ll deal with the dragon. I’ll get the giant’s attention and you flank him. Then we close this down fast, all right?”
Chip nodded as she stood and her arms returned to their normal state. Suzuki tossed down his plasma rifle and ran his hand over his ax, imbuing it with fire. Then he scrolled through his HUD and set his scent to one thousand Englishmen. He watched as the giant’s eyes clouded with an uncontrollable hatred.
The giant sprinted toward Suzuki as Ashegoreth dived at Chip from above. Chip jumped out of the way, rolling across the ground, her arm exploding as it rearticulated itself in a cannon, and she fired a shot that hit Ashegoreth square in the chest. Instead of following up with another attack, Chip took off running around the outskirts of the arena.
The giant was closing in.
Suzuki decided it would be better to bring the fight to the monster. He leapt through the air, his ax raised high above his head. The giant raised his club and Suzuki connected with the black energy shot out of the club. He could feel the energy blowing back toward the giant, but the holy fire was hardly enough to compare. The giant dropped the club, reached out, and snagged Suzuki from the air. He held Suzuki high up, Suzuki’s arms in one hand and his legs in the other.
The giant pulled, trying to tear Suzuki in half. Suzuki screamed in pain as he felt his arms and legs being ripped from their sockets. He tried to wiggle away, but the giant was too strong. Instead, Suzuki focused on his ax, which came instantly to his aid. He focused on the ax impaling the giant’s skull. Suzuki heard the giant scream in pain. His ax had cut through the giant’s hand. Close enough, Suzuki thought as he grabbed his ax and sank it into the giant’s other wrist.
Suzuki fell to the ground and scrambled to his feet just as Ashegoreth landed next to him. The dragon shot a ball of fire toward Suzuki, who rolled to the left, throwing his ax at the Dragon’s eye. The ax sank deep in Ashegoreth’s eye and the dragon screamed. Suzuki recalled his ax as Ashegoreth stumbled back, holding her eye. When Ashegoreth slashed at Suzuki, the MERC noticed that the techno-organic decay seemed to be spreading from Ashegoreth’s open wound. Suzuki threw his ax again, but this time the dragon knocked it away. He raised his hand and the ax returned. Suzuki turned and ran as the giant swiped its club at him, barely ducking in time to keep it from taking off his head.
Two plasma blasts ripped past Suzuki and connected with the giant, knocking it off its feet as it roared in pain. Suzuki turned around and saw Chip next to the giant. She fired two more shots that connected with the giant’s back, burning through its skin, and it fell to its knees. Suzuki turned, picked up the giant’s club, and cracked it across its head. He then summoned a fireball in his free hand and launched it into the giant’s face. The giant hit the ground with a heavy thud. Suzuki climbed atop the giant and brought his ax down on the giant’s neck. He raised his ax and brought it down on the giant again, severing the giant’s head from its body. He reached down and picked up the giant’s head, raising it for the crowd to see.
The soldiers and MERCs sent out a deafening cheer.
Suzuki tossed the head to the ground. “I told you we got this,” he told Chip. “Now, watch my back. Don’t do anything unless it looks like Ashegoreth is going to rip me apart, all right?”
Chip shook her head, eyeing Suzuki suspiciously as if she didn’t trust that he had thought his plan through completely. “At this distance, it won’t be much help,” she said. “You’ll be blocking me from getting a good shot.”
“All right. I’ll try not to get ripped apart then.”
Suzuki walked toward Ashegoreth as she pulled herself back onto her feet and he threw his ax to the ground.
Then he removed his helm and tossed that to the ground as well.
He raised his hands as he walked to the dragon that towered over him, smoke curling from her serpentine nostrils as her mouth hung open, the smell of sulfur and death rising from her gullet.
“Ashegoreth, Red Dragon, Bringer of Ash and Death, it is I. Suzuki. The Most Mundane of the Mundanes. It is I who approach you. It is I who found you in a cave, hiding as a child would from the Dark One as your brothers and sisters were lost to his mad cravings for power. It is I, Suzuki the Bane of Giants and Krampus, the Freer of Men, who beseech you! Remember yourself!”
Ashegoreth leaned forward and sent a jet of flames at Suzuki, who ducked and rolled out of the way. His hair and eyebrows were singed and he was covered in soot. He took a deep breath and looked up at Ashegoreth. He was close enough that she could have killed him in one swipe of her claw or swallowed him whole. Yet she had not moved. She only stared at him, some vague recollection perhaps in her eyes. Suzuki hoped that was the gleam that he saw meant as he stood and cleared his throat. “I… uh… I was a child when I heard the tales of dragons, of the fearsome creatures they were, of the proud creatures that they were. Yet here you are! Cowed by a microchip!”
Suzuki hit his inventory a
nd stashed away his chest armor. He approached the dragon in only his tunic. “Have you forgotten your pride? Have you forgotten your strength?” Suzuki reached under his tunic. He pulled out the giant hawk feather that Ashegoreth had given him when she relayed her story of her lost love. “Have you forgotten your love, Ashegoreth the Red? Have you forgotten your anger? Have you forgotten the hatred that burns in your ancient heart for the Dark Lord?”
Ashegoreth screamed in rage. Then she spoke and when she spoke her voice was low and stunted, as if it took all of her being to utter the words. “I… I have forgotten nothing, Suzuki…” she muttered.
“Then why do I see a pathetic worm in the place of a dragon?”
Ashegoreth slammed the ground with her claws and tore into it, gnashing at it with her teeth before leaning back on her hind legs and screaming in pain and agony, sending a torrent of fire that reached up to the top of the arena so that it seemed that the sky itself was on fire.
Sweat poured down Suzuki’s head. It was so hot that he felt like he was going to pass out.
He held onto his consciousness, though.
Ashegoreth reached forward and grabbed Suzuki in her claw. Suzuki could feel his organs threatening to pop as she squeezed him and brought him eyelevel. He tried to draw enough breath to speak as the hawk feather around his neck rested on the dragon’s red scaled hand. “You sent me off to find my love,” Suzuki managed to wheeze out. “I found her. We came back to fight the Dark One. Have you forgotten why we fight? Have you forgotten what is lost?”
Ashegoreth stared at Suzuki. Deep in those black and red eyes, Suzuki could see the dragon that he once knew. A tear rolled out of Ashegoreth’s eye, instantly evaporating. “Let me free you,” Suzuki said.
The dragon stared at Suzuki for what felt like an eternity, enough time for Suzuki to realize that he might have bet far too much on this plan.
Ashegoreth opened her hand so that Suzuki sat in her palm. “Please,” she said through tears. “Release me.”
Suzuki recalled his ax and jumped onto the dragon’s shoulders before she had a chance to change her mind. He raised his ax and brought it down into the dragon’s neck, right into the microchip between her shoulder blades. Hot blood squirted out onto Suzuki’s face, so hot that it nearly burned straight down to the bone, but he did not stop. He kept cutting and cutting until he’d removed all of the microchip and a five by five gash was left on Ashegoreth. He watched as the techno-organic decay around where the microchip had been turned gray and burned away, giving way to Ashegoreth’s natural red scales. “Now, Ashegoreth, Bringer of Death and Ash,” Suzuki shouted. “Now will we burn the Dark One to the ground.”
Ashegoreth reared on her hind legs, causing Suzuki to scramble for something to hold on to, and roared loudly as the invisible barriers broke down. She turned to face the viceroy uttering a low growl.
The viceroy leaned forward. Her face was grim, and she did not look entertained by the recent developments. “My understanding was that this was a fight to the death,” she said. “You did not kill the dragon.”
Suzuki shrugged and smiled. “I think we reached an agreement,” he said.
“Unsatisfactory. Chip, kill the boy and the dragon.”
Chip looked around, confused. She pointed to herself and laughed. “Wait, are you talking to me, your Shiny Holiness?” she asked.
“I never forget a project, even one as old and useless as you. There was a time that we attempted to grow order from organics, before we knew better. Regardless, you will still obey.”
Chip shook her head. “Are you shitting me? Are you saying I’m one of your ruddy fucked experiments?”
“One of my first playthings, a lost toy. That was all you ever were. Whatever you have deluded yourself into thinking you are, you are not. You are a tool, and one I intend to use right now.”
“Pish, well, you can kindly fuck off.”
“You have obviously forgotten your training—and your potential. Even our most flawed experiments yield some kind of beauty. Let me remind you.”
The viceroy leaned back and opened her mouth. Her jaw disconnected like a python’s, dropping nearly to her chest. A loud, high-pitched ringing came from her gaping maw. In the arena, Chip fell to her knees, screaming as she held her head. Her skin started to break apart, showing the technological mutation she was underneath, her head splitting down the middle. Her bizarre steel skeleton twisted and churned into liquid before her face seamed together down the middle. She collapsed into a shivering mess on the ground.
José pushed through the crowd and ran into the arena, screaming, “Chip!” He knelt at her side and helped her to her feet. Chip looked at José for a second. Then she backhanded him, sending him flying through the air. She slapped her hands together and they combined, breaking apart at the palms, the fingers bending back to create a plasma cannon. She fired at Suzuki and Ashegoreth, the sheer power of the blast pushing her back a few feet.
Suzuki ducked, trying to hide from the blast. Ashegoreth, on the other hand, spread her long, leathery wings and took to the air. The plasma blast whizzed past the dragon and the MERC, burning a long scar into the floor.
Ashegoreth flew to the other side of the arena, landing in the front row of the MERCs and soldiers. She breathed fire as Suzuki stood on her shoulders. He threw his armor back on and raised his ax, preparing for battle.
The viceroy leapt from her throne, landing beside Chip. Her legs split into four and she stood a foot taller than Chip, like some technological bastardization of a scorpion. She opened her mouth again, and a ringing screech tore through the air. “Kill them!” she shouted. “Kill all of them!”
Suzuki looked at the Mundanes and the Horsemen. “The ringtones are coming from the viceroy. We take her out, we take out the army, so stick to the plan?” he asked.
Beth nodded as she drew her sword. “Quick change. The viceroy is mine.”
“What about Chip?”
José stepped forward, his sword raised. “I’ll take care of Chip.”
Stew drew his ax from his back. “All right, let’s show them how the Mundanes fucking party!” Stew charged at the Dark One’s army.
Sandy reached out, trying to stop Stew. “Wait, Stew!” she shouted. “Oh, fuck it!” She took off after him, raising her staff and calling black clouds as Diana ran behind her, whipping bolts of crackling energy at the Dark One’s forces, who had already started firing, bolts of plasma whizzing past them. The Dark One’s forces advanced, the two dragons taking to the air, breathing gouts of fire.
Ashegoreth took to the air as well, Suzuki still standing on her shoulders. She went straight for the other dragons, attacking the larger black one first, their claws tangling as their jaws lunged for each other’s throats. Suzuki climbed to the top of Ashegoreth’s head and slid down her snout, trying to keep his balance. The black dragon glared and tried to snap at him, but Ashegoreth slashed the dragon across the face. Suzuki took aim and threw his ax, blinding one of the dragon’s eyes before recalling his ax. As he raised it again, the black dragon swiped at him, knocking him off Ashegoreth. Suzuki fell through the air, the ground quickly rushing toward him. He closed his eyes, ready to feel his bones shatter on the floor. Then he felt himself steady. Ashegoreth had swooped underneath him. He got back to his feet as a bolt of lightning ripped through the air, connecting with the larger dragon as the smaller turned in the air and sent a fireball at Ashegoreth.
Below the battling dragons, the soldiers connected with the Dark One’s forces. It was pure chaos. The air was hot with plasma, and the ground was already growing slick with blood. Stew was in the midst of it all, his ax swinging wildly as he took down orc after orc. His blood was hot, and he could not tell whose blood covered his body. A giant pushed through the crowd of orcs and swung its hammer, connecting with Stew, sending him flying through the air. Stew froze mid-air, then descended, with his feet softly touching the ground. He turned and saw Sandy, holding her wand in his direction. “Thanks, babe,�
�� Stew shouted.
Sandy turned, whipped her wand into her staff, knocked back a row of Dark Forces with a fiery concussive blast, and gave Stew a thumbs-up with her other hand. Then a plasma bolt ripped through the air and hit her in the back. Her bones scattered in the miasma of ashes and Sandy was gone.
Stew’s eyes went wide with horror and his scream could be heard through the entire battlefield. Those near him from both sides backed away, terrified by such pure, distilled rage. Stew clutched his chest, his eyes glowing red and his muscles heaving and growing. His body swelled to nearly twice its size as he grew an extra foot, now nearly the height of a giant. He foamed at the mouth as he grabbed an orc next to him in the steadily growing circle around him. The orc screamed as Stew ripped it in half, dropping the body and squashing the head. “Sandy!” Stew screamed again as he picked up his ax and tackled a giant. His ax hit the giant in the head, splitting it straight down the middle. “Sandy!” he bellowed again.
A blast of lightning struck beside Stew, flinging orcs and goblins into the air. When the smoke cleared, Sandy was standing next to Stew. “Yeah, babe?”
Stew grabbed Sandy, her body dwarfed by his hulking Berserker form. “I thought you were dead!” he said through his tears.
“No, dude. I was just reforming. It’s easier than dumping all my mana into defense stuff. Also, you look really hot when you’re this big. Glad you figured out how to go all Bruce Banner.”
Stew laughed, his voice booming. He dropped Sandy, picked up the club of the giant he had just slain, and smashed a goblin into jelly. “Leeroy Jenkins!” he shouted.
The Dark One’s forces tried to back away from the deadly onslaught Stew had become as Sandy menaced them with elemental magic. That was the ground side of the battle. Above, Suzuki and Ashegoreth still fought the two dragons, with lightning bolts from Diana and occasionally Sandy narrowly missing both the smaller, faster dragons. José was leading the troops against the Dark One’s forces, but they were still outnumbered and outgunned. Even with José’s passive buff flowing through each of his soldiers, the battle was still being lost. For each one of the Dark Forces that was cut down, two or three soldiers died. Beth saw this as she cut her way to the viceroy.