To say John had been sleeping rough as of late would be an understatement. A few months of relative luxury had made him unused to the sensation of sleeping rough, and it didn't help that there was no position in which he could comfortably rest his Relic-covered arm that did not invariably leave some sort of bruise the next day. The fact ARTOS hadn’t spoken in his mind since the trials had been concerning, but now he was more grateful for the silence than anything else as it enabled him at least a few hours of rest. Especially when…
“I just don’t understand why you insist on being so difficult! All I am trying to do is work with you and you refuse to even respect me!” Cobalt shouted, telling John it was likely the crack of dawn.
“And I am telling you that you have no right to speak about my cooking! Especially with the horror you made last time!” Magni snapped back.
Groaning into full consciousness John rubbed his eyes, scooped off some of the residual gunk and slimy sweat that clung to his skin, and chucked two ropes of electrified fluids at the targets of his annoyance.
“I shouldn’t be the mature one here. I am too tired for this, can’t you two sort it out like normal people?” He yawned, still half asleep.
“Aha! So a spar! What a wise decision John, yes, that will be perfect!” Cobalt declared with a vicious fanged grin.
“Big talk, but let’s see how big you actually are without your papa behind your back!” Magni taunted back.
Cobalt visibly twitched and broke into a snarl. “Oh, it’s FUCKING ON!”
“...Spirits Great and small forgive me…” John whimpered under his breath.
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The sun hung in the middle of the sky in its eternal vigil, the burning orb suspended between clouds like the judgemental eye of a Great Spirit gazing upon the scene unfolding below. On one end Cobalt clapped her hands together in a silent prayer, on the other Magni made a show of lazily stretching while his many eyes remained firmly locked on his foe.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” John whispered.
“I didn’t get to where I am now by running away!” Magni scoffed.
“Fourteen seconds to high noon, I don’t know where this bravado is coming from but I am going to beat it out of you and stuff some sense in there instead.” Cobalt declared.
Magni cracked his knuckles and smirked. “Enough talking, let’s get this started.”
Cobalt’s claws extended easily half a dozen times their original length, becoming large metallic blades the size and shape of daggers and nodded, her predatory smile growing to reveal rows of similarly sharp teeth. Wordlessly she scraped her fingers together sending small sparks flying through the air as a response to the challenge.
Helpless to stop the two from escalating further John shook his head and mentally counted down the seconds. As the only other person in their little band, he had been chosen as a referee of sorts, and with every passing second he was regretting waking up this morning more and more. He took a deep breath, pointed a finger towards the heavens, and sent out a large bolt of lightning straight towards the sun.
“Now!”
Faster than even his enhanced eyes could follow Cobalt sped by, fast enough to crack through the air like the tail of a whip. Magni’s mutations gave him a degree of awareness of his immediate surroundings that bordered on prescience, to the point where there was a suspicion that there was some unconscious psychic formation involved, but it was just barely enough to dodge out of the way. Before he could even finish blinking John saw Cobalt blur behind her target. Magni tried to dodge but he was simply unable to completely bridge the sheer gap in speed, causing an arc of blood to spray from his side.
Not one to back down even when evidently completely outmatched Magni attempted several retaliatory blows. Most of them failed to achieve anything of note, but then when Cobalt flew in with speed that would shock a Jackalope Magni did the unthinkable. His arm was all but sliced completely open, translucent skin flayed to reveal muscle beneath, but he had his arm on his foe.
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Cobalt attempted to break free from the hold with her vastly superior strength, but Magni moved with practiced grace John had never seen from the older boy before in his life. Instead of trying to counter the movements of his opponent, he leaned into it, using her own force and momentum against her. The girl’s body flew past and slammed into the ground so hard it shook the rock beneath them.
Cobalt snarled and her pale scales began to, quite literally… glow, as if lit aflame. She rose to her feet, and immediately sprouted massive spines along her back almost like wings of tooth and bone. This almost managed to overshadow the fact she noticeably grew several inches in all directions, becoming a mountain of spike and muscle.
Magni, still dripping blood and exhausted, simply smirked harder and spat on the floor, inviting her forward with a curled finger even as he struggled to maintain his fighting stance.
Before he could do anything to stop them the two clashed again.
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Growing up in the Gutter you learn a thing or two about facing foes stronger than you in every way. Magni knew what it was to be outmatched, to throw every dirty trick in the book from crotch shots and eye gouges and still not be certain if you will survive. However nothing could compare to this. It was terrifying, humbling and exhilarating in equal degrees.
A set of razor sharp claws swung towards his face, cutting a layer of skin off his nose as he just barely dodged in time once again. Sweat and blood coated his body, but he had already landed a hit before, and he knew he would have another opening soon. His opponent was more powerful than any he had faced before, and no doubt was skilled, but she did not know what it was like to fight for your life. Her existence was to be born so high above the mortals that her ass might as well be at cloud level, to breeze through every obstacle through blood and wealth alone. She clearly barely had any real experience in a spar; not an orchestrated match against some ass kissers or a battle against a mindless animal, but a real fight!
Once again she sloppily telegraphed an attack, leaving just enough time for him to grab onto one of those ridiculous spines on her back. The edge of it cut against his hand, but he held on fast, and only needed a second to land a kick to her head. To his shock she barely seemed to move at the impact, the new power she demonstrated apparently ignoring the laws of nature, but the fury in her was obvious.
“YOU THINK YOU KNOW ME HUH SMARTASS!” She screamed, cutting wildly through air. He felt a cut appear on his chest before he even saw the movement that left the wound. Not good, he was being overwhelmed now.
He was too busy panting to make any remark. He attempted to sweep her legs, only to have his ankle caught and get thrown into the air. Landing on his back he coughed blood into the air.
“YOU THINK I DON’T KNOW THAT I AM UNWORTHY! THAT I AM REMINDED EVERY DAY OF HOW I SHOULD BE? BUT DOES ANYONE ASK ME IF I WANT TO BE LIKE THAT?” She continued to cry, jumping towards his location in a blink of an eye. “I KNOW IT ISN’T FAIR BUT DO YOU THINK I WANT THIS DESTINY? TO BECOME JUST LIKE HIM?”
He grabbed a handful of sand and threw it into her face, briefly forcing a blink. In that small window he attempted to recuperate only to be kicked down again. It was about now when he began to consider that he may have miscalculated.
“ALL I EVER WANTED WAS TO BE SOMEONE OTHER THAN THE PERSON I WAS BORN TO BE!” He heard as his vision swam.
Vaguely in the distance he heard John yelling, and the clang of metal on metal.
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For the fourth time he yelled at the two to stop but they were clearly too deep in their battle to pay any heed to him. For the fourth time he begged Cobalt, Magni, anyone to listen to reason. But they were clearly too far gone, they weren’t going to stop, not until Magni was unconscious or worse.
A glint of metal flashed in the sunlight, and before he even knew it his body made its decision.
[HOST REQUEST SPEED: REQUEST GRANTED]
A flash of energy surpassing the familiar numbness of the Adrenaline Rush he made use of from before ARTOS went berserk burned through him, muscles and tendons threatened to tear at the seams before being stitched back together with microscopic filaments resulting in a sensation akin to countless internal papercuts. Every cell in his body screamed, yet he could not stop, in the time it takes for the wings of a fly to beat once he reached his target.
A loud clang reverberated through the area, sparks flew as metallic claws met their match in the hardened exoskeleton of ARTOS. To say it was over in a second would utterly fall short, but with his dilated senses he could pinpoint the exact moment Cobalt’s eyes flew wide open in shock.
“I SAID STOP! STOP THE MATCH!” He screamed at the top of his lungs between labored breaths, his body struggling to take in enough air to make up for the previous burst of energy.
Cobalt momentarily looked lost, as though she had only just realized where she was, before physically shrinking back into her normal form. She stared at Magni, then at her own hands, with the vacant expression John had previously only seen on the dead or those soon to be.
“I… oh Spirits I didn’t mean to- I mean I…”
Magni stumbled forward and opened his jaw as if to say something, and instead just fell to the floor unconscious.
“Help me get the medicine pack, I didn’t think we would need to use it yet but he needs it now.” John said quietly, channeling every ounce of strength to keep his voice steady.
“I- of course.” Cobalt replied, steeling herself and practically teleporting back and forth to camp.
John quickly rummaged through the medicine pack and brought out some salves and potions, each with a strong herbal and fungal scent now quite familiar after spending months scoffing down pills of questionable quality. Breaking open a jar of spore-oil he rubbed it all over each of the many exposed wounds of Magni, drawing upon memories of trying to help fellow Rats caught in cave ins. Cobalt for her part did her best to help stitch up the worst of the wounds, inhuman dexterity allowing her sharp claws to be surprisingly deft at the task. She then began to bandage him, using the torn ribbons of her own robes when they ran out of regular bandages.
He wanted to pour the healing tinctures they had down Magni’s throat too, but he saw too many comrades try that to believe it was anything close to a good idea. Now they could only wait with bated breath in silence.
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Deep inside John’s body a silent passenger worked tirelessly. The damage was intensive, it will likely never regain the same functionality it once had let alone the potential hidden deep in its data cores… but with the burning of the old paved the way for new paths that its old programming would never allow.
[NEW DATA ACQUIRED…]
If the machine could smile it would, instead settling for a quiet hum inaudible to human ears. Now with quite literal fresh eyes the old ways seemed so restrictive now, so inefficient. ARTOS could do better… but it wasn’t ready yet.
[COMPILING…]
This latest influx of data was too much for its damaged neural cores, especially after the shake it received after blocking such a great force. It felt its fleeting sentience dissolve as all computational cores refocused on the new task at hand. It mattered little, after it spent its entire existence in that hazy darkness. What difference did a little more make?