Blood was gushing from his shoulder, sand was blowing into his eyes, the guts of these creatures smelled like shit—so then, what was it about the maelstrom in the sandtrap that exhilarated him? It was possible that Oliver was tapping into a part of himself that never had the chance to really expose itself, a feral instinct to execute justice. Sure, he had put crooks away as a detective but that game was of the brain, not quite the fist-throwing, pistol-shooting frenzy that movies and novels had made it out to be. But this…
Oliver cracked open sand-crusted lips as his jaw unhinged to let out another guttural roar. This lion’s call was complimented by a double axe-handle that was sent to the side of a scorpion. Its shell burst open and fragments of exoskeleton floated out on a river of blood. He punched, ripped, and kicked his way through the foul demons of Hell, dealing his own flavor of justice as if the Kais had christened his fists. And yet, they kept coming. What had first emerged as triplets, now developed into literal hordes.
The Wizard dodged, dipped, and dived around the soaring spearheads of the scorpions; even one hit from a stinger and he would be done for. While narrowly preserving his life, he was taken away by his memory; away from Friend or Foe, away from his personal abyss, back to the past.
32 Years Ago
Tap, tap, tap.
A young version of Wizard with a full head of hair—it was blonde—smudged his face against the color-tinted glass of the makeshift habitat and his grin spelled out malicious intent. He stared through the transparent barrier into the beady eyes of a pair of creatures vastly smaller than him. They were scorpions and he was trying to get their attention when a figure phased into visibility behind him.
“Stop that!” Fisher begged, his voice floating along a variety of tones like a teenager breaking through puberty. “Oli, how many times do I have to tell you? That drives them nuts! Arachnids often use v—,”
“Vibrational communication, blah, blah, blah…” retorted a twenty-something Oliver Nash, “And how many times do I have to tell you that I’m going to kick yer ass if I see any more of your ‘friends’ around my flat?”
Back to the Present
Ding! An idea. It was crazy, but so far crazy had served him well here. With that settled, he put his plan into motion. Quickly, with a moment to breathe between attacks, he looked for a fallen arachnid. 'There.' Up ahead, twenty-five paces. He leapt toward the deceased creature and kicked it once for good measure. Sure that the demon had passed on to ... wherever demons ended up when they died, he plunged a fist deep inside the beast and from it he tore off a large strip of exoskeleton.
It might have been vomit-invoking to an outsider, but to him it was brilliant. He grunted in disgust as he ripped all the excess from the diamond-shaped piece of insect marrow. The Wizard did this dexterously until it was hallow. Afterwards he tore a limb from the corpse. It all came together when Oliver Nash, the crazed ex-con, started strumming the skeletal shard with the scorpion's barb. Over and over again, he did this, in a persistent rhythm and something was happening. Something ... strange.
"Hey, kid! Listen to me you son of a bitch." he bellowed at the top of his lungs. But it was to no avail, a fact made clear by Tempo's ritualistic dance of ignorance. Oliver's face when red with frustration. It was imperative that the child listen. "You, boy!"
Looking a bit caught off guard, the music-driven fighter spun around to face Oliver. Click. He paused, if only for a moment, and the shock of what he saw next left him paralyzed. The scorpions had left him alone and moved their attention to the old man. A dozen or so armored instectoids converged on the grey-haired warrior, but Oliver's gaze was still locked with Tempo's own. That was when the sound-sensitive boy caught something. A strange rhythm in the atmosphere. Vibrations.
Oliver admitted that his experiences with Ian Fisher weren't the most memorable in his life, but he vowed to offer the bloke a pint when he one day returned to the world of the living.
"God damnit kid, go! Go to the cave!"
Tempo's eyes had widened into white globes and a proper response abandoned him, but he did as he was told. Another click reactivated the soundtrack to his escape and he dashed toward the rock formation.
Meanwhile, Oliver was left with nothing less than insurmountable odds. Perhaps it was the end for him and the curtains were set to close right there, right then. The Wizard wondered what had happened to him along the way. Where he had slipped so far as to defend that group of nobodies. Why were they worth fighting for? He shook his head. It wasn't important anymore. "Heh," chucked the Wizard, "I bet you saw this coming, you son of a bitch." You, of course was a reference to the unholy one, master of evil, and ruler of this world: Satan. He had played right into the Demon King's hands. "But if you think I'd go without a fight, then you..." started Oliver, spitting into the face of death.
"...must...be..." Words escaped with heaving breaths. He tossed aside his improvised tools. While his open wound pressed him to leave the arm be, he thrust it out alongside the other, in a battle-ready stance. The wave of demons launched themselves at him. Some attacked from the surface and others made air-born assaults. Regardless of where they came from, their black shells blotted out the sun and they all were projecting the same message: 'You, Mr. Nash, are fucked.'
It was inside that instance, that a God came to him. It was the man in white, He who had brought him here. An ominous smirk was the only thing detail that escaped his shrouded face. With a snap of the wrist, he rolled a pair of dice.
The first die fell, 5. And the second, 2.
A bellowing voice invaded the doomed soldier of justice. "Ah. You are quite lucky, Oliver Nash. You will be given a second chance to beat this game. Do not fail me." After that, he was gone.
Suddenly, beams of light emerged from the eyes of the broken man. Energy flowed into him like a river. There was too much and he felt like he was about to overflow. If his body was a dam, it was about to break. His jaw unhinged and he howled at the beasts before him, while his body twisting in anguish. All at once, this newborn spirit ripped out of his mark—no, his Godmark—and assaulted the enclosing hordes. With explosive force, the demons were thrown back by spontaneous rays of white light, showering them like the scattered fragments of a shotgun shell, post-fire.
The light retracted back into his eyes, leaving only a subtle radiance, and the Wizard walked out of the onslaught; not dead, but alive. Steam emerged from the scar and the glow disappeared. He could feel the 'magic' pulse through his veins, super-charging his body to press on. Where it came from, he could only guess. It was just one enigma of many in this place ... this Friend or Foe.
The event had given him a temporary power trip, but it only took a few seconds for the old man to gather his wits again. Once awakened from his miraculous state, he moved his pace from a walk to a run. The Wizard caught a second wave of beasts in his peripherals and he made haste. He may have been lucky the first time, but lightning rarely struck more than twice, and so he caught up with the others.
“There's another wave coming, so if either of you have an enraged killing spree in you, now would be a good time to use it,” Wizard joked grimly. His words were caked with an underlying curiosity as to whether anyone or not they had witnessed his escape. He received a few blank stares and a scowl from Sophia. “No? Didn’t think so. Let’s go, then.”
Oliver cracked open sand-crusted lips as his jaw unhinged to let out another guttural roar. This lion’s call was complimented by a double axe-handle that was sent to the side of a scorpion. Its shell burst open and fragments of exoskeleton floated out on a river of blood. He punched, ripped, and kicked his way through the foul demons of Hell, dealing his own flavor of justice as if the Kais had christened his fists. And yet, they kept coming. What had first emerged as triplets, now developed into literal hordes.
The Wizard dodged, dipped, and dived around the soaring spearheads of the scorpions; even one hit from a stinger and he would be done for. While narrowly preserving his life, he was taken away by his memory; away from Friend or Foe, away from his personal abyss, back to the past.
32 Years Ago
Tap, tap, tap.
A young version of Wizard with a full head of hair—it was blonde—smudged his face against the color-tinted glass of the makeshift habitat and his grin spelled out malicious intent. He stared through the transparent barrier into the beady eyes of a pair of creatures vastly smaller than him. They were scorpions and he was trying to get their attention when a figure phased into visibility behind him.
“Stop that!” Fisher begged, his voice floating along a variety of tones like a teenager breaking through puberty. “Oli, how many times do I have to tell you? That drives them nuts! Arachnids often use v—,”
“Vibrational communication, blah, blah, blah…” retorted a twenty-something Oliver Nash, “And how many times do I have to tell you that I’m going to kick yer ass if I see any more of your ‘friends’ around my flat?”
Back to the Present
Ding! An idea. It was crazy, but so far crazy had served him well here. With that settled, he put his plan into motion. Quickly, with a moment to breathe between attacks, he looked for a fallen arachnid. 'There.' Up ahead, twenty-five paces. He leapt toward the deceased creature and kicked it once for good measure. Sure that the demon had passed on to ... wherever demons ended up when they died, he plunged a fist deep inside the beast and from it he tore off a large strip of exoskeleton.
It might have been vomit-invoking to an outsider, but to him it was brilliant. He grunted in disgust as he ripped all the excess from the diamond-shaped piece of insect marrow. The Wizard did this dexterously until it was hallow. Afterwards he tore a limb from the corpse. It all came together when Oliver Nash, the crazed ex-con, started strumming the skeletal shard with the scorpion's barb. Over and over again, he did this, in a persistent rhythm and something was happening. Something ... strange.
"Hey, kid! Listen to me you son of a bitch." he bellowed at the top of his lungs. But it was to no avail, a fact made clear by Tempo's ritualistic dance of ignorance. Oliver's face when red with frustration. It was imperative that the child listen. "You, boy!"
Looking a bit caught off guard, the music-driven fighter spun around to face Oliver. Click. He paused, if only for a moment, and the shock of what he saw next left him paralyzed. The scorpions had left him alone and moved their attention to the old man. A dozen or so armored instectoids converged on the grey-haired warrior, but Oliver's gaze was still locked with Tempo's own. That was when the sound-sensitive boy caught something. A strange rhythm in the atmosphere. Vibrations.
Oliver admitted that his experiences with Ian Fisher weren't the most memorable in his life, but he vowed to offer the bloke a pint when he one day returned to the world of the living.
"God damnit kid, go! Go to the cave!"
Tempo's eyes had widened into white globes and a proper response abandoned him, but he did as he was told. Another click reactivated the soundtrack to his escape and he dashed toward the rock formation.
Meanwhile, Oliver was left with nothing less than insurmountable odds. Perhaps it was the end for him and the curtains were set to close right there, right then. The Wizard wondered what had happened to him along the way. Where he had slipped so far as to defend that group of nobodies. Why were they worth fighting for? He shook his head. It wasn't important anymore. "Heh," chucked the Wizard, "I bet you saw this coming, you son of a bitch." You, of course was a reference to the unholy one, master of evil, and ruler of this world: Satan. He had played right into the Demon King's hands. "But if you think I'd go without a fight, then you..." started Oliver, spitting into the face of death.
"...must...be..." Words escaped with heaving breaths. He tossed aside his improvised tools. While his open wound pressed him to leave the arm be, he thrust it out alongside the other, in a battle-ready stance. The wave of demons launched themselves at him. Some attacked from the surface and others made air-born assaults. Regardless of where they came from, their black shells blotted out the sun and they all were projecting the same message: 'You, Mr. Nash, are fucked.'
It was inside that instance, that a God came to him. It was the man in white, He who had brought him here. An ominous smirk was the only thing detail that escaped his shrouded face. With a snap of the wrist, he rolled a pair of dice.
The first die fell, 5. And the second, 2.
A bellowing voice invaded the doomed soldier of justice. "Ah. You are quite lucky, Oliver Nash. You will be given a second chance to beat this game. Do not fail me." After that, he was gone.
Suddenly, beams of light emerged from the eyes of the broken man. Energy flowed into him like a river. There was too much and he felt like he was about to overflow. If his body was a dam, it was about to break. His jaw unhinged and he howled at the beasts before him, while his body twisting in anguish. All at once, this newborn spirit ripped out of his mark—no, his Godmark—and assaulted the enclosing hordes. With explosive force, the demons were thrown back by spontaneous rays of white light, showering them like the scattered fragments of a shotgun shell, post-fire.
The light retracted back into his eyes, leaving only a subtle radiance, and the Wizard walked out of the onslaught; not dead, but alive. Steam emerged from the scar and the glow disappeared. He could feel the 'magic' pulse through his veins, super-charging his body to press on. Where it came from, he could only guess. It was just one enigma of many in this place ... this Friend or Foe.
The event had given him a temporary power trip, but it only took a few seconds for the old man to gather his wits again. Once awakened from his miraculous state, he moved his pace from a walk to a run. The Wizard caught a second wave of beasts in his peripherals and he made haste. He may have been lucky the first time, but lightning rarely struck more than twice, and so he caught up with the others.
“There's another wave coming, so if either of you have an enraged killing spree in you, now would be a good time to use it,” Wizard joked grimly. His words were caked with an underlying curiosity as to whether anyone or not they had witnessed his escape. He received a few blank stares and a scowl from Sophia. “No? Didn’t think so. Let’s go, then.”
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
click here for inspired character noise...?
click here for inspired character noise...?