Skipper lay in the dark, nursing his wounds.
After stopping the bleeding with a coagulant and bandaging up the stump, he'd retired to his quarters for some much needed rest and relaxation. Well, he wasn't feeling very restful or especially relaxed, but still. It was the thought that counted.
He glanced down at his new wound, at the arm that was missing from the elbow down. It wasn't quite as bad as his injury back on Caelus Breck, but a missing arm was a missing arm. Once they got to Elysian Fields, he'd have to get another prosthetic bolted on. There was no way he'd be killing the Supreme with just one hand, Freedom or no.
Even though his wound ached, pain sculpting itself into the shape of the missing limb, it was not what consumed his mind. No -- what had been dancing through his head for the last hour or so was the countdown.
Was it time, yet? Was it time, now?
He held his script in his prosthetic hand, screen open to the function he'd need. A single tap of the screen, and everything would begin. But was everything ready? Could they not wait a little longer, maybe, get things ready, make sure they had everything they needed? Perhaps they could leave all this by the wayside for just a while more, have some more adventures out in the bounty of space…
…no.
The time for that had passed. Avaman had his scent now, and he wasn't one to let his quarry go. Skipper had seen that same ferocity in the mirror too many times to mistake it. As much as Skipper needed to kill the Supreme, Avaman needed to kill Skipper. It was what animated them.
Some time ago, Skipper had managed to get his hands on a certain virus. An escapee from the Absurd Weapons Lab of the Supremacy, stolen by a particular pirate and then stolen again by Skipper. It wasn't capable of much -- simply lurking in the background of a communication system, and then broadcasting a message when prompted. As far as weapons went, it was pretty low tier. But it was what Skipper needed.
He'd already introduced the virus to the Supremacy's central communication network a while ago. He'd already recorded the message. All that was needed now… was the go-signal.
They were almost at Elysian Fields. There wouldn't be a better time than this.
A metal finger clicked against a glass screen.
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"This is going to be pretty confusing for most of you. You must be thinking: who's this guy?”
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The doors to Atoy Muzazi's quarters suddenly slid open -- and Morgan Nacht charged in, white in the face. He was breathing heavily: clearly he'd sprinted all the way here. Muzazi immediately leapt up. Morgan was meant to have been guarding Aclima. Had something happened?
Morgan spoke before Muzazi. "Have you… have you seen it? Is your videograph on?"
Muzazi shook his head, confused. "Seen what? What are you talking about?"
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“Can't blame ya. Sorry for interrupting your shows, folks, but I need to make a little announcement here."
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Commissioner Marcela Caesar watched with keen interest as the message played on the holographic screen before her.
On that screen, floating in the air, the image of a man lying on a couch could be seen. It was not a man familiar to her, but those eyes -- oh, they were familiar to her. Those eyes held the killer instinct of a born warrior. Something she prized in her own Special Officers. This was the second playback of the message, and she was listening just as intently as the first time.
Before this interruption, she'd been joining other members of the military for a demonstration of Halcyon Interstellar's new developments in orbital defense. The turrets they'd been showing off had certainly been impressive, but were now utterly forgotten in the wake of this bombshell. The representative who'd been espousing the wonders of the new rapid reload system was just as transfixed by the broadcast as the rest of them.
She glanced across the seating area, to where the Ascendant-General was watching the message with his own staff. Alexandrius Toll had a deep frown on his face as he took the words in, again and again. Nobody had said it out loud, but it was clear what this would bring.
Marcela’s gaze returned to her girls.
Michael Kerberos tore her eyes away from the main screen long enough to grin back at her. Marcela’s personal bodyguard was a Pugnant woman with scruffy white hair that hung over her eyes, in a way that reminded one of a puppy. Her 'uniform', for lack of a better word, consisted of little more than scraps of metal and fabric arranged in such a haphazard way that it provided slightly more protection than a swimsuit. That fanged grin on her face was proof enough, though: she, at least, understood what this meant.
Marcela’s personal aide, Dariah Todd Harlow, seemed much less excited. She swallowed nervously as she watched the message, bright blue eyes flicking between it and Marcela every couple of seconds. The Cogitant girl had a bob of deep black hair, combed compulsively to an inch of its life each morning, with an arresting mole beneath her left eye. She wore a sleek and sleeveless white dress that terminated just above the knee, with black stockings over both her legs and arms. She cleared her throat as the message completed its third replay.
"Ma'am," she said haltingly. "What is this?"
Marcela chuckled, reaching forward and brushing a lock of hair out of her aide's face -- enough to stop that stammering and replace it with a blush. Oh, yes, she knew what this was. She was no fossil like Toll -- when she saw a disruption like this, she couldn't help but feel her heart tremble.
"Opportunity," she purred.
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"Well, introductions are in order first of all -- the name's Zachariah Esmeralda.”
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In the great city of Match's March, traffic -- both pedestrian and vehicle -- had come to an utter halt. Every head was looking up at the message that had replaced the constant advertisements on the skyscrapers, and every ear was listening to the words echoing throughout the urban jungle.
Here, the man called Zachariah Esmeralda had a captive audience of millions -- and this was only the tiniest sampling of his listeners.
Roy Oliphant-Dawkins, paused in the middle of Match's March's famous crossing, frowned deeply as he looked up at the screens, at Skipper's face made stories tall. The last time he'd seen that mug had ended in disaster. The hell was he thinking…?
Buzz.
Someone was calling Roy's script. Adjusting the bag he had slung over his shoulder, he pulled the device out of his pocket and put it to his ear.
"Yeah?" he said, going to resume his walk -- only for the voice on the other end stop him in his tracks once again.
After all, it was the same voice as the one coming from the screens.
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“Well, that name probably doesn't mean much to you guys. Some people call me Skipper.”
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In the esteemed private manor of the Ospilerous family, Special Officer Winston Grace grinned widely to himself as he listened to the message being beamed across the Supremacy. He leaned right into his small script like he was playing a video game -- eyes scanning any detail of the dark room, ears listening intently to every word out of Zachariah Esmeralda's mouth.
How exciting! How interesting!
This man's words seemed to suggest that he and the Supreme had a prior history, but his name wasn't one that Winston was familiar with at all. Zachariah Esmeralda...
Was there perhaps a relation to Achilles Esmeralda, the old executioner of the Supremacy? According to historical record, he'd committed suicide before the Supreme, but his reasoning had been left suspiciously opaque. Oh, that made sense. This Zachariah Esmeralda must have been some kind of relative -- perhaps an adopted child, based on the lack of familial resemblance -- who had done something to the Supreme, and Achilles had killed himself to maintain his honour. If it was severe enough to provoke that kind of response, then most likely it had been an assassination attempt -- but Zachariah had survived? That was weird. If he'd survived, wouldn't he have become a Contender? So he'd survived, but in such a way that he was physically unable to continue fighting. On the verge of death from the Supreme's counterattack, then. That explained the timeline discrepancy, too. This man was just a little too young to have been in such a scenario back then, so he'd probably been in some form of stasis for a period. So now he was back and wanting revenge. That made sense.
"Um, Detective?" called out the security officer from the drawing room, the various witnesses and suspects visible through the doorway. "You were telling us the truth of the case?"
Oh. That was right. He was here to investigate the Pseudo-Suicide case. Well, he'd figured that out five minutes after he'd gotten here -- he'd just been stalling things for the free drinks at this point.
"The butler did it," he declared, waving a dismissive hand over his shoulder. "Can someone give me a ride to my ship?"
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“Again, probably drawing a blank. I'm not exactly famous. But let me tell you what I'm all about."
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The beast had been a titan, nearly the size of a village, all scaled skin and massive fangs. It had been terrorizing the people of this planet for years now, devouring their cattle and destroying their lands. Apparently, it was a leftover experiment from the time of the gods -- or, as the people of the galaxy at large called them, the Gene Tyrants. Many warriors had gone up against it, and many warriors had died.
It had taken Lily Aubrisher about two minutes to finish it off. Smoke rose from its charred skin, and stray tendrils of lightning still danced around its empty eye sockets. Its jaw hung open, and the slop that had been its tongue and organs oozed forth freely.
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In its death throes, one of its teeth had come loose and lodged into the ground. Lily now used this as a makeshift seat, carefully rebraiding her brilliant white hair. It seemed to come loose every time she did anything these days, but that was no surprise. When you moved at the speed of lightning, appearance tended to take the backseat.
"Ma'am!" called out Hailel in his bedrock-deep voice, stalking over.
He was a tall and sallow man, long black hair and black cloak giving him the appearance of some kind of evil sorcerer. His features were stern as stone, and the reachers that protruded from either side of his head were gnarled like sinister wood. His red eyes glinted in the sunset of the planet as he approached.
"What's up?" Lily said, finally giving up on the braids. They'd only come undone again once she moved faster than a run, anyway.
"The locals have been talking," he said seriously, holding out one of those devices -- a script. "There's a message going out, all throughout this region of the galaxy. I think you should see it."
Lily extended a hand to receive the script, only to pause. It seemed that it wouldn't be necessary. She knew the script was going to ring a few seconds before it did.
After all, electricity could be so damn loud.
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"Around sixty years back, I tried to take out the Supreme. Didn't do too well since, ya know, he ain't dead. But I got a good hit in. Took his ear right off. Bet that's the biggest injury he's had in a good while.”
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Muzazi swallowed as the message looped again and again and again. He found he was reflexively assuming the position to activate his Radiants, palms pointed towards the floor. Skipper was doubtless an immeasurable distance away, and yet the words he spoke felt so dangerous that he might as well have been in the room, gun in hand.
On the other side of the room, arms crossed, Morgan looked over. "What do we do?"
"I think it would be wise," Muzazi said slowly, his voice dry. "If we went and fetched the Heir."
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“None of those Contenders or whatever are giving him what I did, that's for sure. Which brings me to my point here…”
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Dragan watched the video on his script, pale in his face, even as copies of it played all across the AE's controls. Those words ran throughout the ship, washing over the four of them in the cockpit -- Dragan, Ruth, Bruno and Serena. Those words that, deep down, Dragan knew would doom them.
There was no coordination between them, but they all moved at the same time anyway. Three heads turned over three shoulders to look, shocked, at the closed door that led to Skipper's quarters.
What are you thinking, Skipper? Dragan wondered. What the hell are you thinking?
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“Ready for round two, old-timer?”
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Avaman, in the darkness of the mining station, seized the monitor in front of him. It had taken him hours to make enough repairs to get the power on, and he'd immediately been greeted with the face of the man who'd just escaped him. His own face.
His blood boiled as he heard the final words Zachariah Esmeralda said. Old-timer. Old-timer. He had called God old-timer. Such disrespect. Such disregard. Unforgivable. Unforgivable!
It would take a long time to get a distress signal set up -- but for the time being, Avaman busied himself by screaming in rage at the screen in front of him.
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“I am. I'll be waiting at Elysian Fields.”
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Wu Ming laughed out loud to himself as he watched the video playing on the videograph screen, ignoring the hushed silence of the other viewers. He was at a premier for one of the new October Jones videographs, and had just been about to die of boredom when this interesting little event had taken over the monitor. As loud complaints began to bounce around regarding the interruption of the movie, he kicked his feet up on the next row and watched keenly, ignoring the withering stare of his aide.
“Skipper, huh?” he laughed. “I knew you were an eleven outta ten, man! A twelve!”
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“Bring whoever you want.”
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On her balcony aboard the Shesha, Paradise Charon smiled softly to herself. The Prisoner was never wrong.
With a flick of her wrist, she cast her holographic screen onto the massive space before her -- a balcony aboard the Shesha could of course not look out into the void directly, but the inside was so dark to pretty much be the same. The gargantuan face of Zachariah Esmeralda continued to issue his challenge over and over, that cocky grin on his face, words rewriting the world. She could feel it, already… like a rumbling waiting to make itself known.
Now, then… how could she use this to eviscerate that loathsome Atoy Muzazi?
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“Let's have fun."
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The Hellhound twitched warily as, for the first time in years, the Supreme stood up from his throne.
This man had never occupied much of the Hellhound’s thoughts, despite the hefty pay he received for occupying his current position as a Contender. The Supreme, to him, wasn’t so much different from the throne he sat on. Furniture. Something constant yet irrelevant.
And yet… in that moment… the Hellhound found himself holding his breath with lungs he did not have.
Dust cascaded off the Supreme’s massive, muscled body like a waterfall. His joints cracked with the intensity of gunshots. There was a series of loud clicks as his chapped lips opened into a bright white grin. He had not been dead, but all the same this was a vision of a man returning to life. Colour seemed to return to his skin and light blonde hair, and the long sigh he let out his lips was the first breathing he’d done in a while.
But, still… that grin.
From his position on the floor, all the Hellhound could see of the Supreme was that grin. His eyes and the rest of his face were obscured from view by his wild hair and the oppressive darkness of the throne room. Even so, though, that huge man was surely rapt with attention at the message before him.
As the message ended, though, a new sound overtook the room. A quiet chuckle, that intensified into loud and hearty laughter.
“Ah…” the Supreme sighed -- before he slammed a fist down onto the arm of his throne, utterly shattering it. "Hell yeah!" he bellowed, voice bouncing off the walls. "Yes! I like that! He's calling me out -- that's awesome! Elysian Fields…" his head snapped towards the Hellhound. "Hey, where is that? Is it nearby?"
It had been ages since the Supreme had last spoken, but there was no sign of it in his voice. It was titanically deep, yes, but also strangely jovial -- more like a person you would meet down at the bar than a head of state.
With the way he jumped out of his throne and the obvious excitement in his posture, he seemed more like a big kid than anything else.
The Hellhound ran a quick search through his connection to the network. "Elysian Fields," he said, artificial voice smooth and calming, with but a tinge of beastliness. "The site of one of the last battles of the Thousand Revolutions. Abandoned since then. Given distances, it would take around five days to muster significant forces there."
"Really? Five days? Argh!" he clutched his head. "Okay, I'll tell you what -- you let everyone know. Grab the, uh, the Special Officers, and the other Contenders, and let them know to meet us there. We'll make it a whole thing." He snapped his fingers. "It's gonna be great. Yeah?" Seemingly satisfied, he began bounding off out of the room.
The Hellhound nodded. "Sure. What will you do?"
The Supreme skidded to a halt, running a hand through his coarse beard as he turned his head. For the first time in a long while, there was light in his eyes. He grinned.
"Me?" he asked. "Ol' Zachariah was nice enough to send me a whole damn invitation. I'm getting myself presentable."
It was the slightest thing. Perhaps not even intentional. Perhaps just the result of the excitement of the situation. But it happened all the same.
The tiniest spark of golden Aether ran down the Supreme's cheek, and the sheer light of it was enough to blast away the shadows.
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Deep in the darkness of the Shesha, the Prisoner smiled.
“And so it begins.”
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"Let's have fun… let's have fun… let's have fun… let's have fun…"
As the technicians of the Supremacy's communication network finally regained control, the end of the message began to loop. Zachariah's face pixelated and warped, until it became little more than the suggestion of human features. Finally, his voice deteriorated to an incoherent screech -- before cutting out entirely.
Then it went back to the Farball game. Looked like the Pol Bankers were winning.
"You can turn it off there, Johan," croaked the older man, chin resting on his hand. "I think the message was seen and understood."
His hair was white from age and his face and body a mass of battle scars, but something about the way he sat still radiated strength. One eye had been lost long ago, the socket left empty and open to the world, but the other -- glinting gold -- watched keenly enough for a hundred. His fingers drummed against the arm of his chair. Some of the digits were old and some were young, a sign of reckless Panacea usage.
His name was Klaus El, and he was something of a terrorist.
The man named Johan Blackbird was much the same. His Umbrant eyes were dull and dark, sunk into a killer's abyss, even as he held up the videograph remote and turned off the screen. Just like Klaus, he had scars -- once, a long time ago, his lips had been stitched shut, and they still held the marks. He'd lost one arm, and the prosthetic he'd gotten to replace it was strange; rather than a hand at the end, there was only the barrel of an ancient-looking rifle.
"How do we proceed?" he asked, his voice as dull as the rest of him.
Klaus waved his hand at the black screen. "Naturally, of course," he replied, with a voice that sounded like he swallowed gravel professionally. "Skipper's given us the most clear 'go' we could hope for. Inform the men. Free Eagle is coming home."
Johan saluted and stalked out of the room, pumping the rifle on his arm as he went. What a useless gesture. It betrayed his eagerness. What would he be shooting in the next few minutes, after all?
Still… Klaus could sympathize. He stood up from his seat and made his way over to the balcony, using a cane to maintain his balance. His legs were fine, but he'd taken a blow to the head a few years prior that had left him with a permanent sense of dizziness. An endless war took its toll.
He held onto the railing with one hand, taking in a deep breath of fresh cold air. Refreshing.
Elysian Fields was mostly grasslands, interspersed with huge forests and mountains. He could see one of them on the horizon, the towering Mt. Splendor surrounded by dense trees. The sun hung over it, casting the landscape in a melancholy orange light.
His eye flicked down, away from the natural world, and instead to what they had built.
The news hadn't yet spread. His soldiers were still running drills, officers barking orders and automatics carrying supplies to and fro. This base was made mostly from prefabricated buildings, embedded into the old Gene Tyrant ruins like parasites. A great and decrepit pyramid with metal maggots writhing through it.
This was the Regiment RED, the army formed to slay a god. The army Klaus had devoted his life to. The army Klaus would surely see die over the next few days.
Just a few more sins, and all this would end.
It's finally time, isn't it, Skipper? he thought, looking out over his legions. Finally time to kill the Supremacy.