Match 16
#35 Nimia “The Shelled Tiger” Altamirano
Vs.
#34 Elijah “The Beastmaster” Skalk
Inventory:
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Nimia woke from dreams of blood and fire with a start, jerking up on...a floor? A grimy floor, right, kay, and somewhere way too damn loud...seriously, why was there so much screeching?
She looked around, frowning at just how damn dark it was too. Was she in some freak’s dungeon? Those topless weirdos with the bodypaint and tranq rifles had managed to knock her out, so clearly they took her alive...wait, topless weirdos, bodypaint, beast masks-
“THAT CHEATING FUCKER!” she shouted, adding to the cacophony of animalistic screams and squeals all around her, though she settled a second later, still letting out an aggravated huff at Sawyer’s actions
Sure, it was a death match, no rules, whatever the fuck. It still rankled that the asshole formerly known as the 35th–and formerly living with a head on his shoulders–had actually fucking called ahead and asked the 34th’s crew for help. Like, fuck, what? How was that even fair? You weren’t supposed to work with the guy right above you!
Well, except for when you already had a prior relationship, like the robo siblings, or Grizzly and Toro, or-
“Fuck, alright, no, don’t make assumptions, that fucked you over. Calm it down, take some stock,” she muttered to herself, finally looking down at- “Why the fuck am I naked.”
Yeah, she was naked. The place she was in–a cell? No, more like a cage, there were bars on all sides instead of solid walls–was hot though, so it wasn’t like she was freezing or some shit. Still, alright, apparently the Fangs were thorough in taking everything, those raider fucks. And her arm was gone. Right arm, mechanical arm, slightly less of an issue than if they’d chopped off her remaining one but also decent prosthetics cost a lot, decent doctors cost more, and discrete doctors who could set a gal up with a prosthetic made to murder people cost even more than that! Least she still had her legs, and they seemed fine. If kinda dirty from all the dust around.
And there was a collar around her throat. Far more concerning, especially since it seemed mechanical and not like something she should grab at if she didn’t want her head blowing off. “Goddammit, this better not be a bomb collar…probably is though…”
She couldn’t seem to access her inventory either, which was especially not great. Either the collar was locking it off, or, far more infuriating, the bastards that grabbed her stole her stuff.
Alright, fuck it, what did she know about the Fangs? Fourth biggest raider gang in the West, though the gang itself was officially known as The Maw. It had dealings with the other three, but mostly carved out its own niche in the outlaw world through its use of mutagens, gene mods, and bioweapons. Not the artificial plague kind though, more like the horrifically mutated monstrosity type. Chimeras? She was pretty sure they were called chimeras.
Monson’s files had some other stuff on them, like their main base being what used to be an Old World zoo and how the majority of their members were Thirios. Basically people who gene-modded themselves to be part animal, sorta like the mammalian equivalent to Sinen. Though while the Sinen were largely people mutated by circumstance, Thirios were most often willing individuals looking to alter their bodies for one reason or another.
Most were just people that liked the idea of having cute animals ears and/or tails, but the type that ran with The Maw were more the “rawr, screech, law of the jungle, survival of the fittest, embrace your inner murderer” type. Which, fair, Nimia had embraced her inner murderer long ago, but she also didn’t inject herself with beast drugs to do it.
So, yeah, that was what she could figure out through the pain in her head from being drugged and probably dehydrated. Also hungry.
“...fuck, somebody better show up soon-”
“Would you stop fucking talking?! Fuck, my head…” Oh shit, there was someone in the cage next to her. Social activity!
Nimia moved towards the bars of her cage, still keeping low for the moment, and tried to look into the one next to hers, her eyes slowly adjusting to the dark as she made a mental note to get a night-vision implant at some point. “Hey? Yo? Other lady?”
“Ngh, fuck off! I said not to talk!”
“Yeah, sure, but what’s up? Why’re you in here too?” She glanced around again, looking at the other cages filling up the dark, musty room. There were lots of big ones, full of dark shapes growling, roaring, screeching, and screaming, all without any apparent rhyme or reason, like they were all just agitated and trying to find the best way to let it out.
“Because of you, dumbass!” Wait, what?
“How’s that?”
There was an angry growl from the other cage. “Because you just had to climb the fucking ranks, you fucking-Do you even know who I am!?”
“...I don’t know if you can tell, but it’s pitch black in here. You could get closer to the bars-” She grabbed one of the hands going for her throat, a smirk creeping up her face as she took in the pale hands reaching desperately towards her as she leaned just out of reach. “See, now was that so hard?”
“Gh-Let go-!”
Nimia grinned as she stood to her full height, pulling the shorter woman up with her. Now the other hand was on one of the bars as the other woman tried to pull back, cursing under her breath as Nimia tried to get a good look at her in the dark. There seemed to be some tattoos on her arm…
“So, let’s try again.” Nimia yanked hard, pulling the woman against the bars of her cage and earning a yelp from her as she banged against the steel. A bit closer and she could make out some details, like the nasty bruise that was already at the woman’s left temple and the fact that her hair seemed to be dyed a shade of green. “What’s up with you, weird white woman that wants to kill me?”
“Ngh-f-fuck off!”
“Literally can’t at the moment, I’m in a cage. Unless you’re offering, half-pint.”
“Half-pint!? I’m fucking five foot seven!”
“And?”
“And fuck you! Let go of my wrist already!”
“Alright.” And she let go, not even bothering to hide her smile as the lady jerked back and went off balance, audibly landing on her ass with a yelp. Course, the lady couldn’t see her smile in the dark, so no worries there.
“Would you stop fucking grinning!?” Or she could. Huh.
“You can see me smiling?”
“Yeah, of course I can. What, you never sprung for better eyes, bitch?”
“Eh, I like mine as they are. They might not be enhanced, but they work fine.” Nimia kept grinning. “So, context clues tell me you really don’t like me! Add in the bruises and the fact that you’re still alive, and I’m gonna guess you were the only one of the Corridors to live through Sawyer’s concert.”
“It’s Corroders, dumbass! And yeah, I lived, no thanks to you!”
“I don’t know why it would be thanks to me, considering I was pretty fine with killing you at that moment.” Nimia crouched, staring where she could see the woman’s yellow eyes glaring back at her. “Now, as for this moment, I’m not sure if I will, so why not try to convince me?”
The woman stared at her, then grumbled. “...fucking psychopath…”
“Nope, I do have empathy, for the most part. I just-” Nimia abruptly shut her eyes as she heard the lights come on all at once, earning an immediate hiss of pain from Greenie who didn’t think to do the same.
Slowly, she opened them, letting her eyes adjust properly to the suddenly brightly lit room she was in, and took in the sights. Greenie was still rubbing her eyes–apparently fancy cyber eyes don’t help with sudden bright lights–but Nimia could get a decent look at her now. So, yeah, green hair, loose at the top of her head and shaved on the sides, caucasian skin tone–oh she had some cute freckles–and the decently toned and muscular figure of a professional mercenary, albeit pretty bruised at the moment. She had a few tattoos, inked in black up her forearms and at her shoulders; mainly knives, barbed wire, and skulls.
Now, as for the room, it was grimy, and the yellow lights illuminating everything didn’t help that impression. There were a whole lot of big monsters in cages around too, all suddenly as quiet as the grave as a dark-skinned woman walked in, her boots echoing in the silence in step with the two other women following her, both lighter-skinned but tanned. And all three were blatantly a part of the fuckers that jumped her back on The Rapture.
Tusk cocked her head as she stopped in front of the 35th’s cage, staring down at the supposed threat to her boss through the orange lenses of her bestial mask. Aside from it, she wore tan pants that hung low at her hips and nothing else, proudly displaying the stone gray tattoos scything up her brown skin and toned chest, forming crags down her shoulders and stalactites over her breasts, matching the mountainous stalagmites at her waist. They met together on her back to form a stylized mammoth’s head, glaring back at the Fangs following her–who dressed similarly, though with shorts instead of pants and body paint instead of tattoos, plus slings for the rifles over their backs–and matching Tusk’s own narrowed brown eyes as she considered the one-armed, naked woman crouching down in her cage.
Despite the obvious state of vulnerability she was in though, Nimia Altamirano felt predatory to Tusk. Like the simplest mistake would see a pair of jaws clamped tight around her throat.
So it was with an eager grin that she started to speak, “Nice to see you’re up, Sleeping Beauty. I was almost worried I’d have to get Prince to give you a kiss.”
Altamirano chuckled at that, then stood up. Tusk was a decently tall woman, standing at 5’11”, with about an inch added from her steel-toed boots. At 6’3”, Nimia was taller. “Which one’s that?”
Tusk jerked a thumb at Prince’s cage, indicating the broad, reptilian Beastie on all fours, his head “crowned” with small, spiky horns. His head was wide and squashed, like someone had put it in a press, and his thin limbs bent awkwardly, as though someone hand shoved extra joints into human arms and legs and then decided to twist every bone in between them.
“Hm...Nah, not my type. I wouldn’t mind one from you though, lady who I’m pretty sure was the one that grabbed me. You also strip me, or was that your friends there?”
Tusk nodded. “I was also the one that collared you. Keep that in mind, by the way.”
Nimia’s smile twitched as her eyes narrowed. “Good to know. On the subject, is this thing locking down my inventory?”
“No, though it should cut off the signals you use to activate your legs’ thrusters. I don’t exactly know the science behind it, though I know it has to do with the brain’s electrical signals or something like that. It’s the same type of signal that’s used to activate the digital construction that makes an inventory work.” She smirked beneath her mask. “Which is how we fully emptied yours.”
“Ohhhhh. Oh I see, I getcha, so you fuckers robbed me completely, got it, got it,” Nimia replied, nodding along as she kept up her grin, “So what happened to my shit then?”
“Your money was added directly to our own accounts, while your physical items were distributed evenly among the higher-ranked members of our organization. Some people wanted souvenirs from our newest attraction.”
“Got it, got it.” Nimia kept nodding, then paused. “So? You gonna make me wait any longer, or are we going to get the show going?”
Tusk raised an eyebrow. “You’re awfully enthusiastic for a one-armed woman about to be twisted into a monster.”
“Open the cage and I’ll show you what I can do with one arm.”
And at that, one of the Fangs unslung her rifle and shot Nimia in the chest.
Nimia stared down at the dart in her tit, then looked at the Fang in question. “...Alright, point made.” And she promptly ripped the dart free and threw it full force into the Fang’s throat, sending her to the ground gasping and clutching at punctured hole in her throat as Nimia felt her head swim.
There was a bit of yelling, then hands were on her, and some things happened. Shouting, dragging, water, ropes, elevators dinging, and at some point she blinked awake to find herself being carried over Tusk’s shoulder. Which she did admittedly find kind of impressive, since it wasn’t like Nimia was especially light to carry, though she mostly took the opportunity to give a glance at Tusk’s back tattoo–which was very easy to look at since the masked woman kept her head shaved. “Huh. An elephant?”
“A mammoth, actually. You can see the fur, if you look.”
“Oh yeah, I see it. Shame you have the tail curling to the left instead of going all the way down to your ass though.” Speaking of asses, she felt a cloth covering hers. Right, quick stock of herself showed that The Maw members decided to bind her single arm behind her back. Since she didn’t have a second arm to tie it together with, they went with looping the ropes around her chest first, which did feel kinda uncomfortable around her tits. Also, she was now wearing a loincloth, because apparently modesty mattered now. “Also, why an elephant?”
“Mammoth.”
“Why not a boar, or a walrus?” Nimia continued, ignoring the interruption as she glanced around the hall they were traveling through. The walls were covered in some actually decent and colorful landscapes, images of savannahs teaming with wildlife, all currently in the process of killing something. Predators eating prey, prey goring predators, large animals trampling small ones, the works. “Oh, or a hippo? I think those have tusks.”
“...They do, though they don’t show as prominently. Are you always this unflappable?”
“No, I’ve been flapped a few times. I just don’t feel threatened by you in the slightest.”
“Really now? And why is that?”
“Aside from the fact that you feel about as threatening to me as Greenie back in her cage, you have to keep me alive because your boss wants me.”
“You know I could still-“
“You could, but you won’t. I know your type. Some people will hit you if you tell them they can’t. I’m that type. You aren’t.”
“So I’m not impulsive?”
Nimia shrugged. “Basically.”
Tusk snorted, then set her down in front of a set of double doors. “Most people consider being cautious a positive. Being blunt gets you tranqed. Or ‘shot in the tit’, as you put it.”
“Eh. I hear your point, and I’ll take it into consideration. In fact, I’ll put it into practice now, and kindly ask you to open the door for me or else I’m going to kick it off its hinges.”
That earned another snort, but Tusk did as she asked, letting Nimia stroll into quite the lovely sports lounge, if one was way into taxidermy and trophies. The entire left wall was covered in mounting plaques, holding the heads of various mutated monstrosities–ranging from a four-eyed lion with pitch-black fur to some type of blue yak with twelve crystal horns–and trophies of a slightly less macabre nature, like mounted rifles, swords, robotic arms–That was her arm.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
Right, her arm was mounted on a wall and there was her Darling literally right on the plaque above it. Good to know where they wound up, now how to–
“Here she is. My very own thirty-five.” Nimia paused, turning to look at the boss of The Maw as he stood at the opposite end of the room, in front of three widescreen TVs, arranged together in an upside-down triangle.
Elias Skalk was a big man. That wasn’t unusual for the rankings, though the redheaded Beastmaster, who stood at 6’8”, was a sight to see regardless. The man had a veritable mane of fiery orange hair spilling down his bare back, matched by the thick beard, bound with leather belt, hanging down over his heavily muscled chest and against the red, tiger stripe jacket he was wearing. Which might’ve been real tiger fur, now that she looked at it. It had the right texture, if not the color.
He was also wearing camo pants, set in a forest green, along with snakeskin boots and leather gloves. He skinned the snake in question and flayed the bull the hide came from. He had nothing to do with the production of the pants, but it was good he was wearing them, otherwise his building anticipation would’ve been even more obvious.
“Here I am,” Nimia replied with an easy grin, “Though I’m not yours.”
Elias grinned back, baring sharpened steel teeth. “You are. You’ll realize it soon enough.” He glanced past her, to Tusk. “Tusk, sit. A Bitch will be by with a drink.”
“Of course, boss.” Tusk nodded, then did just that while Nimia let her eyes roam from the big bad boss to the row of large windows taking up the right wall from floor to ceiling. They curved slightly, following the curvature of the stadium that the lounge overlooked, where she could see rows of seats full of cheering spectators and a sand-filled pit at its center, where some kind of gold-furred monster was ripping apart a giant silver spider-crab covered with sharp spikes.
“It’s a beautiful sight,” Elias growled beside her, looping an arm over her shoulders. One shoulder, really, and he was making a point of holding the metallic stump where her arm had been. He didn’t sound angry though, more like his voice was just naturally gravelly. “Two animals, tearing each other apart. There’s nothing more natural than that on the planet.”
“I could think of a few things. Stuff that isn’t two genetically modified bio-gladiators fighting in an arena for the amusement of an audience. Like trees!”
“Trees aren’t natural. Robots plant them to alter the world beyond what it should be.”
A loud, bestial roar punctuated Elias’s inane statement and echoed through the stadium as Prizewinner–its name announced on massive screens across the stadium–threw its shaggy head back, reared up on its hind legs and spread its arms in a challenge to all that would seek to bring down the golden monster, currently dripping with white blood and chunks of shell. Some needle-sharp spikes were still piercing into the beast’s thick fur, but not deep enough to act as anything more than the annoyance that drove Prizewinner to quite literally tear its opponent to pieces.
Long Silver’s gray legs were still twitching nearby, the spiked, crab-like appendages spasming with the last of whatever life remained in them.
As for Prizewinner, that particular collared Beastie was something of a cross between a boar, an ape, and a lion. Its black snout extended outward from under a mane of thick, coarse, gold hair, while its chest was broad and bulked with fat from several successful wins. Its arms were almost like a muscular human’s, and ended with black, five-fingered hands possessing retractable claws, while its legs were more similar to a standard lion’s, though far broader to support the beast’s weight. Oh, and it had a bladed tail. Not quite like a scorpion’s, more like someone had attached the head of a glaive to a prehensile, whip-like tail.
Nimia took note of all those details, then glanced down at Elias’s belt. There was a revolver handle sticking out of his pants. She knew where her luck had gone.
“You’re interested.” And Elias thought she was staring at his dick. Fairness to him, the man had a decent bulge there. She still wasn’t into fucking people she was going to kill though.
“I’m interested in a few things. Like the voyeurs over here.” She walked out of his grip easily, earning a raised eyebrow and an amused grin as she strolled over the monitors in question. The top left displayed a cherry red ♥ on a blood red background, the top right showed an azure ♠ on a royal blue background, and the last displayed a pink ♦ on a magenta background. Each monitor had a small camera set in the top of its frame.
“And we’re plenty interested in you, sweetheart~” the ♥ crooned.
“Don’t speak for all of us,” the ♦ chastised.
The ♠ said nothing.
“Would these three count as your sponsors, Skalk?” Nimia asked, keeping her eyes on the monitors.
“Cheeky bitch. I can appreciate that. You’re wrong. They’re my partners-”
“No we’re not,” Diamond snapped, audibly irritated.
“Aw, don’t be mean to Elly,” Heart said, still sounding cheery and amused, “He’s trying~”
Spade was still silent, so Nimia continued. “That would make you the number Twenty-Three–” She nodded to the bottom diamond. “–the number Eighteen–” Top left heart. “–and the number Fourteen.” Top right spade. “Giselle Summerton, head of the second largest raider gang in the West, Paradiso. Vivian LoVullo, head of the first largest raider gang in the West, The Grindhouse. And Omari Rhodes, head of the third largest, Tombstone.”
“Ooo, you’ve done your homework~” LoVullo purred, “Though you left out-”
“A slaver, an organ thief and drug baron, and a weapons manufacturer. Spreaders of human misery for the sake of profit and three absolute monsters who somehow found enough people that shared in their fucked up worldviews to have their own private armies ranging from sycophants to zealots. In short, the type of people Elias back there wants to be a part of. Hell, I can even see where he can slot in fine for you sick fucks, considering he enslaves people and mutates them into monsters.
She directed her gaze at the diamond, since she couldn’t exactly point. “I’m sure you’ve got more than a few freaks who’ll be in the market for that type of thing.”
“Don’t act like you know what I’m thinking!” Summerton snapped as LoVullo tittered, “And quit talking shit! You’re a failed ranker, caged and stripped by your better, so shut the fuck up about ‘human misery’ or whatever the fuck crusade you think you’re on!”
“Do you remember Jerome Lynch?”
The screen flickered, as if surprised. “That thug from Miconti? Who the fuck gives a shit about a dead man?”
Nimia’s laughter came out like a harsh bark, sending an eager shiver up Skalk’s spine. “Oh you’d be surprised what people are willing to do for dead men, Giselle! Our whole world’s formed by the words and actions of people long dead, with plenty of folks more than willing to act on the behalf of mummified corpses! But that’s not what I mean here. What I mean is that Lynch rented out his thugs to whoever paid most, in between all the raiding and raping and murdering, and a mother fucking prick by the name of Brocato decided to put some on his payroll! Dumb bastards that postured and threatened and got stupid bastards to join up with them with promises of glory of all fucking things.
“And those fucks came to my house, my family home for generations, shot my brother right in fucking front of me, cut his head off, and burnt down my fucking house down around my ears! Oh, but I can’t forget them gutting my mother either, all cause she just couldn’t help but shoot the murdering fuck leading the bunch straight in his goddamn dome. And, here’s the thing, I killed every last one of them! The whole fucking gang, I killed them, all six fucking hundred, and I’d do it all again!
Her smile was wide and manic as she glared straight at the monitors. “SO THANK YOU FOR BEING SUCH PIECES OF SHIT! Because now I can do exactly that, four more fucking times.
She stared straight into the Diamond monitor, keeping her eyes on her first prize as she heard Summerton seethe. “So get ready, Giselle, because you’re next after I kill this fuck.”
“You won’t kill me,” Elias retorted, twirling the revolver he’d pulled from his belt. It spun easily around his finger, even in his larger hand. “You lost your luck the instant you challenged me. It’s mine now. Thank you for admitting I’ll work perfectly with the other three card holders. I’ll be lenient.”
Nimia chuckled as she turned to face Elias. “Sure. Alright. You want a cute, mewling pet, yeah? Someone to rub up against you on lonely nights?”
“I have that. None of my nights are lonely.” His grin was wide and cocky as she started to walk, his eyes tracking her walk along the wall opposite him. He was still near the windows, she was walking near the trophies. “I want a monster out of you. I know you’ll make a good one. You’ve got fire in you.”
“Heh. Sure. Fire, something like that. Something like that, sure.” Her grin was twitching, more angry than amused at this point.
He glanced at her sword. She would be going for it first, definitely. Maybe she’d try sticking it in her mouth. He’d like to see that. It would make things more fun–
“See you.”
His gaze snapped back at the Spade monitor, his eyes widening for the slightest moment at hearing the cold voice of the Mausoleum, before he had another slight moment where it clicked that Nimia wasn’t actually going for her Darling, she was just getting in position to sprint straight for Elias, jump, and slam both feet straight into his face.
His eyes went far wider and his grin dropped into an open-mouthed gasp of genuine shock as she slammed him straight into and then right through the glass of his lounge. Tusk had about a second to realize she should be moving before her boss went flying straight through the shattered window and Nimia went right with him, her feet right on his face as they flew into the open air.
It took the crowd a few seconds to realize the odd sound that cut through the cheers and roars was breaking glass. When shards of said glass fell into the crowd and pierced through a few spectator’s skulls, it clicked pretty quickly, though even then, the spectators–many of whom weren’t even members of the Maw, but merely sponsors of enough influence and/or wealth to earn themselves a seat amid one of the four largest raider gangs in the West–that weren’t directly in danger had their eyes drawn instead to the two figures flying through the air.
It felt like the world had slowed, but things happened quite quickly. Lucky flew from Skalk’s hand and Nimia caught the revolver’s handle in her teeth and Nimia herself started falling away from Skalk as she kicked off his face. Skalk landed straight in the center of the Pit, actually plowing straight into Prizewinner and knocking the chimera of its feet, while Nimia flipped and landed, just barely, on the capped head of one very unfortunate spectator, before springing off it, jumping from spectator to spectator as she made her way from the stands to the field.
And if she stepped hard enough to snap necks and crack skulls, well the dumb fucks paid raiders to see some blood and gore. Sure, bloodsports were a thing, but they could at least keep away from the bastards kidnapping people to warp them into monsters–wow, there was a weird feeling of hypocrisy in Nimia’s brain, but she wasn’t sure which part it was. She didn’t kidnap people, just kill people...she did participate in a few bloodsports? But those were to kill ranked people–
Am I a bad person? she wondered as she landed in the sandy pit of the arena, before leaning next to the large, cracked half of Long Silver nearby and using the broken bits of its shell to start cutting her ropes. ...ehhh, yeah, probably. Do I care though?
She watched Prizewinner rapidly shrink back from Elias, the large beast whimpering in fear Skalk pushed himself up from the dirt with an enraged snarl and ripped his filthy jacket off, bearing his mutilated chest. While Tusk had chosen to tattoo her whole upper body, Elias had taken the far more extreme choice of having his history and accomplishments stitched across his bulky chest. Scenes of great monsters and brutalized corpses were inked in black into the red leather directly woven into his flesh, an act that left most of his exposed torso and arms looking flayed.
No, I don’t. Not as long as these bastards die too. She nodded to herself, then snapped her remaining arm free of her restraints and let her revolver drop into her freed hand, flipping it up and pointing straight at Skalk as the big man snarled.
“Well ain’t this a sight!” a familiar voice suddenly echoed through the arena, and Nimia glanced up at the screens surrounding the stadium. The monitors were normally used to show different angles of gruesome fights now displayed a single image: a man made of shadows, smiling wide with pearly-white teeth as his red eyes stared down at the arena. “Two topless murderers about to duke it out in the dust! Classic shit right here, classic shit, the kind deservin’ of a prime time slot!”
Nero paused for a second, then glanced off-screen. “Is prime time still a thing?”
“In a sense, yes,” came Bianca's voice, though she wasn't showing up on the monitors.
“Bitchin’.” He turned his gaze back to the arena, still smiling as Nimia and Elias stared up at the Ranking’s MC. “Oh now what’s this? Y’all are waitin’ for me to finish? Damn, that’s a nice feelin’! So, in that case, hiya Skalky! Sorry for cuttin’ in on your own announcer gig, but I can’t help myself! It’s just what I do!”
“...If you want to announce, then call the match,” Skalk snarled, glaring straight at Nimia as she flicked open Lucky’s cylinder, checking how many shots she had. Fully loaded, so that was nice for her and less nice for him. “I need to put a bitch in her place.”
“Damn, testy. But fuck it, I’ll take it! It’s taken a while to get to it, but here we are! The Thirty-Fifth versus the Thirty-Fourth, Nimia Altamirano against Elias Skalk! Y’all can see both of them in all their glory right here, though Skalk really oughta be droppin’ his pants to make things fair. Since he ain’t though, thing’re about t’get real messy round here, and I, for one, am lookin’ forward to it.
Nero clapped his hands together, his voice echoing through the whole stadium: “FIGHT!”
And Nimia shot a hole straight through the center of Skalk’s forehead. His head snapped backwards, blood spraying from the whole, before he forced his head back into place, snarling furiously as the wound sealed shut through rapidly regenerating flesh as Nimia winced at the abrupt sting in her neck. Which was probably because of the collar she had in her neck which, right, this dude had control over, and it was now pumping her body full of mutagens.
“There! Now you’ll turn out much bet-GH!” Skalk jerked back, clutching his wrecked eye socket as his right arm bulged, his own modifications reacting to the trauma–Then the butt of the revolver smashed into his chin, swung like a club as Nimia adjusted her grip and broke his fucking jaw–
Her grip adjusted again, flipping from the barrel to the handle with her finger on the trigger as she took a third shot up through his jaw and out the top of Skalk’s head–An enlarged fist slammed into her side and she grit her teeth and she went flipping back, rolling to her feet to see Skalk rapidly healing and snarling in pure rage as his left arm twisted into a massive, curved blade of solid bone. She ducked a swing and her fourth shot went straight through his other eye, earning a scream of pain and frustration before his upper face erupted with rapidly formed yellow eyes, pressing out and glaring at her through leaking, red tissues.
Nimia hummed, nodding to that, then fired her fifth and sixth shots into his knees, earning another scream as she sprinted away from Skalk, trying to ignore what felt like her veins pulsing in her neck. She put Lucky back in her mouth, gripping it by the handle with her teeth, and tore a thin spike from Long Silver, before rolling out of the way on instinct as Skalk dove for her, his enraged snarling cutting out with gurgled choking as he slammed straight into the wreckage of the shell and got a good dozen spikes through his chest and throat.
There was plenty of blood, leaking fast as Skalk snarled, his eyes wide and frenzied but still intelligent as he tried to twist off the jagged husk, when Nimia shoved the spike straight into his temple. It didn’t quite go all the way through, since all the regenerating, crimson flesh, nerves, and sinew were working hard already to fix the damage she caused, but one more adjustment of grip and Nimia swung Lucky hard to hammer the spike straight through one side of his head to the other, piercing right through his frontal lobe.
Skalk choked, blood and saliva spilling down his stretching, elongated chin as his whole body jerked and twitched, before his organic blade peeled apart, twisting into two bladed limbs, and his expanded fist bulged and twisted and became a massive, solid trunk akin to a battering ram and his legs twisted around to start working properly, tearing through themselves as his bones jutted out, forming legs that might’ve been digitigrade but looked almost insectile and acid spilled from the gaping tears in his expanding stomach and–
35 -> 34
Skalk jerked back, roaring and gasping and choking as its head ripped itself open like a fleshy flower bud in full bloom, pulling the spike out as Nimia blinked, trying to figure out what the hell just happened and why she just–
“Rule Number Three, chica,” Nero spoke up, chuckling as Skalk’s body continued tearing itself apart to form something not quite whole, “Or, more specifically, somethin’ I like to call rule three point five, or three A, or the brain-fuck rule! It has a lotta names, and the basics here is that any sapient being is allowed into the Rankings, as long as they don’t violate Rule Two. Naturally, thinkin’ about it, that’s gotta exclude beings that ain’t sapient, don’t it?”
“...Huh. So...because I destroyed his brain-”
“Oh you outright fucked it, Nimmy. If this fucker was any kind of natural, he would’a died with the first shot, but ah well. As it is though, you did enough to fuck his cheating until it broke his whole body. Pretty damn fast too, so grats on that, specially with the lack of an arm.”
Nimia nodded to that, watching the snarling monster start twitching towards her, the eyes it formed on its upper tendrils completely empty of all the hate they once held. They were vacant; life was in there, but thought wasn’t.
She lifted Lucky and fired at the center of its mass, deciding to trust her “luck” on killing the poor beast. Her last bullet went straight through, missing every single organ, then ricocheted off Long Silver’s shell and pierced right through the mutant’s heart, popping it in a spray of gore. Three seconds later, and what was once Elias Skalk began to slump and slough into a pile of greasy red flesh, soaking into the sand of the arena without ceremony.
“You coulda left him.” There was no judgment in Nero’s statement, just curiosity.
“I could’ve. I don’t think that would feel right though. He was a piece of shit, but I don’t know if I want to leave him like that...or maybe I should’ve? Maybe a mutant monster would’ve had it better than a human monster…” She sighed, shrugging. “I’m not great with philosophy. I just kill people.”
“So do some philosophers. Either way, grats on the win, and good luck on gettin’ outta there. You’re gonna need it.”
“Yeah, I…” Nimia paused, then looked up at the completely silent stands. And all the people staring down at her. The people who invested in Skalk’s business, who sold weapons and drugs to his people, who bought monsters from him, who got off to watching mutants kill each other...and who she just fucked over by killing the source of all their business and entertainment.
And that wasn’t getting into all the Fangs in the stands, who were outright loyal to the sadistic fuck. She could even vaguely make out Tusk staring down at her from the broken windows of the lounge, though the raider turned away after a few seconds.
She pursed her lips, glanced down at Lucky and flicked open the cylinder. Every bullet was spent, because she used every shot. Right. Yeah. Hm.
“Oh, also, while I’m here, a happy heya to the bitches three! Hope y’all enjoyed the show, try not to piss yourself or pop a blood vessel before Nim can get to you, quit schlickin’ it to gore you fucked up surgery fetishist, and lighten the fuck up you genocidal nut.” Nero chuckled, before saluting to the viewers. “Alright, that’s all from me! Just one more thing before I sign out, and that’s to Nimmy herself!”
Nimia paused mid thought, her eyes already glancing towards Prizewinner as the curious chimera wandered over and started sniffing at the meaty corpse now present in the pit. “Ah, what? What’s up?”
“Not much, just wanted to say ‘say hi to the twins!’ So, yeah, say hi to the twins.”
“...Twins?”
Nimia paused, then glanced towards the sound of a massive explosion taking place right outside the stadium, which finally got the spectators to outright panic and start trying to get out as the Fangs whipped their heads around, trying to figure out if they should be avenging their boss or figuring out why the hell they were being attacked out of nowhere.
“...Ah. Twins. Huh.”
“Yeah, enjoy that! Oh, and the new arm, enjoy that too.”
“Huh? Wait, what?” Nimia looked up at Nero, but the screens all cut out at once, leaving only the increasingly loud sounds of screams and explosions. She blinked, then glanced at her right shoulder, which was sort of throbbing for some reason, under the metal plating. Which, right, she did just get injected with mutagens, and it felt like they entered through the right side of her neck, but she did just get healed up, so it should be all good–
And that’s when the pain hit.